Critically Misused: Grimlocks (and Derro)
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- Опубліковано 5 вер 2024
- Welcome to Critically Misused, where we discuss potentially misused aspects of Dungeons and Dragons fifth edition. This episode, we will be covering Grimlocks and Derro as recommended by ABiggs. You’ve waited long enough, friend.
This video wasn’t sponsored by anyone, I just really like Legends and Lattes. It’s the perfect intersection of my interests: D&D downtime mixed with wholesome queer romance. I’m not even done with it yet, but I can already recommend it to queer players and the broader D&D sphere alike.
Edit: I just finished the book and it's so sweet!!
YES YES YES IT HAPPENED!!! It IS a glorious day for ABiggs!
Thank you sir! This was a great video =)
Glad you enjoyed it!
I have always planned on using grimlocks like neo-cavemen, basing their lifestyle and culture off of the public perception of Neanderthals similar to how I've planned on using quaggoths as more-or-less psychic cave sasquatch. as for derro, well, I really haven't thought of them much but I have been thinking of adding a city of them and mind flayers as a location in my current campaign but I still don't know how to do them correctly.
The Grimlocks are completely Blind. I'm not sure why they don't blunder around in the sun more often because bright light doesnt make them weak. They are perfect underground guards, Especially where someone is trying to guard against invisible raiders. I always think Morlock/mole people from the Time Traveller but again with super sensitive hearing and smell but no weakness for bright light. Then Generally I see them as a tough thick skinned AC5 ( so chain mail skin ) in old school D&D and 2HD so Gnoll size when it came to hit points. Nastier than Hobgoblins weaker than Bug Bears.
The Cave Man Neanderthal in Old D&D was a 1 to 2 HD creature and AC 8 as opposed to a naked human AC10 but I think because they wore Skins as armour. The Natural AC5 and heightened senses make these guys tougher though they don't really have a missile use capacity or shamanistic magic.
I like the Derro as nasty, nasty villains. They are in as a side quest in one of the early UK modules When a Star Falls UK4. Not really fleshed out but they are used , which is a little helpful.
I made derro into the psychos from Borderlands only with harpoons inside of axes.
@@beastwarsFTW I don't know a ton about borderlands but anything with harpoons is instantly great.
I don’t have much to say about this video, but I really liked it. Great job once again!
I liked Grimlocks. Saw them as Soloman Gundy so Frankensteinian night creatures of great strength and incredibly durable.
Incapable of Combat?
The Grimlocks I played had heightened senses allowing them to act as perfectly sighted beings within 20'. So perfect meleers. Remind me a little of the Blind warrior from the Slavers series. They can be partially blinded by loud noise ( audible glamour). Their hearing is quite sensitive so things like shatter or thunderclap would do extra damage. I guess also a little like morlocks here Though birght light doesnt effect them because they are blind.
At times I think I had them emitting a high frequency peep that only elves or dogs can hear to help echo locate and paint their surroundings.
Their sense of smell is also great, like a blood hound so they are great trackers and a strong scent can confuse them
They consort with Medusa and Mind Flayers and for my game purposes the Copru. The medusa's like them as vicious servants who wont get turned to stone if they look the wrong way. They are hated by the Githyanki.
They use tools, have mates, eat food as a group and reproduce. While simple and animalistic they are a social animal and I would say more so than wolves for instance. They have a human braincase though a lot of it is soaked up by big olfactory and auditory centers.
Grimlocks definitely remind me of Morlocks and dont use armour. Leader is 3HD and AC 4 and a champion is 4HD and AC 3.
They form perfectly functioning and surviving societies, so though mad it doesn't prevent them from raiding humanoids , killing , returning to the community and communally eating the victms. This is a fairly high level of societal sophistication. I can see your view of them as victims , but dangerous and nasty ones.
You hardly cover the Derro at all here who in my D&D are very intelligent to genius. They are highly sophisticated with weapons, armour and magic and evil, beings who are involved in organized slavery. They always struck me as an evil gnomish breed though the Monster manual seems to have them more like a dwarf or small perfectly proportioned human.
I just used Grimlocks in a series of encounters on a farm in my game! :D I homebrwed some shawmen who could cast Fog Could and my party HATED it. Kind of ran them as a feral tribe like the creatures in the descent to an extent. Long separated from their masters, they were serving a young black dragon. If sight isn't an issue, Grimlocks are pushovers. But if they're paired with something that can obscure sight or a dark cave with a lot of curves and no longer lines of sight, it can be a scary combo.
So many monsters in D&D are TPKs on their home turf and pushovers everywhere else. Good on you for making the encounter interesting
Yoooo thank you I am running OoTA and this is gonna help me run my games. thank you
I fuckin love the Grimlock
Some nice ones to cover could be pixies or if the happy (if a little bittersweet) out of universe story of oblexes
Nolan Whale used his make a wish to give us one of the most inspired new creatures to 5e. Absolute legend
Dero are super underrated.
Fantastic
Critically Misused: Unicorns.
Covered them briefly in my Celestials video, I think
@@thegayerest OH right yeah you did
But covered them briefly does not do unicorns justice imo I love unicorns
@@lyebatenkaitosofgluttony2452 Fair enough. I'll add it to the list
I love Unicorns. My Paladin got dismantled by a Unicorn in Beyond the Crystal Cave UK 1. I still haven't forgiven them or the DM. Though when I purchased the module decades later I don't see what else he could have done or what else my character could have done. Sigh . Good Times.
Never really was a fan of the Grimlock as Mind Flayer Thralls, I always kind of thought of them like the Falmer in The Elder Scrolls, with the Dwemer in this instance being the Drow, and Dueragar.
I kind of think the Mind Flayers should be more intelligent than this. They have psychic needs that the brains they eat need to fill, and I kind of assume low Int brains don't taste as good, not useless, but there's a reason no sane person tries to live off MREs.
The way I run it is slightly different because I do more with mind flayers than just adjust their servants, but they have a full City of humans, that they run, they're the city's, glorious protectors, keeping back the waters of the ocean that threaten to submerge the whole city, it's not so unreasonable that they ask for something in return.
They also have a couple of Aboleth as thralls, and are an almost fully aquatic species (for the most part, its a very long story) so they use the Aboleths to convert the human thralls into something that can go with them to fight the Merfolk. They keep the war going to continue to justify totalitarian control, and to keep the humans aggression targeted outward.
Good video but i hear your keyboard clicks at the end of each take (Probably you hitting stop record on your software) And you stumble a few times when you speak your lines. Retakes and audio editing are needed. Again good video with just a few critiques :)
Yeah, still working on the setup. I've only been doing this for about a month
hiii
Well hello there Traxigor. I'm a big fan of your work /j
@@thegayerest i googled traxigor, i have never quite been so delighted by any other piece D&D lore
He's truly something special
@@thegayerest yknow what
im traxigors wife
:P
@@ottertvmtg6229 Good for you
Troglodyte Folks! Grim and ravenous Cave-Hunters!! Kinda Short, they deserves a More folklore deep developtment 💙💀🦴🧌💎🪨🚇⛰️👹🧗
The funny thing about your comment is that Troglodytes are another species all together. Their name fits Grimlocks better in my opinion
@@thegayerest Agreed, also troglodytes would also be defined, rather those who live in the cave levels, stone halls and other levels of sedimentary bedrock.
next vid maybe fey dragons or redcaps
"I would like to cover something nice for a change"
"Redcaps"
Fr though, I appreciate the suggestion. I don't know if you meant Fairy Dragons or Moonstone, but I could do either
@@thegayerest fairy dragons are more wholesome and underrated but moonstone are more cool