Everyones Favorite Abominations!

SUBMISSIONS OPEN. RPG ideas that somehow relate to beholders. The occasional Unspoken Tip of D&D. If you want specific D&D advice, don't hesitate to ask me.

[prideknights]

European Citizens' Initiative

Give your support !

EVERYONE(!) I’m blazing this post because at this pace we might barely hit 1,000,000 signatures—or just fall short. PLEASE reblog this post, no matter where you are from, so we can reach as many EU citizens as possible and end this horrible practice!

[definitelybeholderrpgideas]

I'm sorry, was no one gonna tell me that Universal made a life-size Beholder animatronic?

The fact that I will probably never see it in person pains me severely

[prokopetz]

What do you mean that Forgotten Realms is a romantic fantasy setting masquerading as high fantasy?

(With reference to this post there.)

Exactly what it says on the tin – the Forgotten Realms is clearly principally inspired by romantic fantasy, not high fantasy.

In this context, when I say "romantic fantasy", I'm referring to a specific, relatively short-lived genre of fantasy literature that was wildly popular in the 1980s and 1990s, but abruptly fell almost entirely off the map after about 1998, due to a variety of economic and cultural factors which are way too complicated to go into in a Tumblr post. This is distinct from the more contemporary usage of "romance novels with fantasy settings", though there's definitely a lot of overlap.

If you're looking for a romantic fantasy reading list, Mercedes Lackey's Valdemar series – especially the early stuff – is probably the easiest to get your hands on these days; it's practically the only example that still has any real name recognition in 2025, for all that Lackey was a latecomer to the genre. Other names worth checking out include Margaret Ball, Carole Nelson Douglas, Tanya Huff, Holly Lisle, Jennifer Roberson, and Elizabeth Ann Scarborough, off the top of my head, though not all of them worked exclusively within the genre.

(Elizabeth Moon is an interesting edge case, in that her stuff is principally military science fiction, but very much adheres to the forms of romantic fantasy. Her Deed of Paksenarrion trilogy, one of her few pure fantasy works, is a fun snapshot of an era because it was written explicitly in response to what Moon perceived as the shortcomings of the fantasy worldbuilding on display in then-contemporary Dungeons & Dragons settings, and hit the shelves at just about exactly the same time as the earliest Forgotten Realms material.)

[transcyer]

Question, what exactly is the difference? Google just wants to show me Romantasy.

[prokopetz]

Well, the trick is that genres are creative conversations, not checklists of tropes, so the real answer to that question is "it's the type of fantasy that was being written by this specific group of popular fantasy authors, most of whom personally knew and frequently collaborated with each other, during this specific period of time".

That said, there are a few recurring features that can be identified. Not all of these will be present in every example of the genre, of course, and whether they add up to a distinct strand of fantasy or a subgenre of high fantasy or what-have-you is a debate I'd prefer to leave to those who have more time on their hands, but to hit some high points:

Romantic fantasy typically features a strong focus on political worldbuilding – not in the lists-of-kings sense, but in terms of the nitty-gritty details of hierarchies and power relations. What explicit hierarchies are in play? What unspoken hierarchies are in play, and how do they undermine the explicit hierarchies? Who's really in charge, and how does that differ from who's officially in charge? Often there's an emphasis on interrogating gendered divisions within the political sphere. What kinds of political power are typically wielded by men? What kinds of political power are typically wielded by women? How do these spheres interact?

As an extension of the preceding point, romantic fantasy often features lengthy sequences of the protagonist and their allies engaging in complex political discussion and manoeuvres, with the same sort of narrative weight and focus that scenes of battle are given in more conventional fantasy. This isn't to say that romantic fantasy doesn't also feature scenes of battle – it usually does – but they tend to be addressed in a just-the-high-points fashion, rather than the meticulous, blow-by-blow fashion of the politicking leading up to them. (Folks who aren't fans of the genre often report finding this difference in focus dreadfully dull!)

There's often a secret or semi-secret do-gooder organisation – a sort of conspiracy of heroes – which the protagonist either joins early on, or is already part of when the story begins. (This is most common in ongoing serials, and may be absent in stand-alone works.) Valdemar's Herald-Mages and the Forgotten Realms' Harpers are two examples of the type. Contra the expectations of grittier fantasy, the righteousness of this organisation usually is not questioned; stories may concern rooting out corruption or error in individual branches, and members may temporarily fall from grace, but overall they're on the side of the angels.

While specific applications of magic may be secret knowledge, magic in general is something anyone can do. This may be carried to the point of every (adult) person in the setting sporting a unique magical talent, or of people being sortable by their affinities for particular spheres of magic. The protagonist discovering, exploring, and/or mastering their magical affinity is often central to their arc. The lack of such an affinity will usually be framed as a kind of disability, with all the awkwardness and unfortunateness you'd expect of 1980s popular media.

Magical companions aren't necessarily common in the setting overall, but they're common for protagonists, to the extent that being bonded with such a companion is often positioned as a diegetic marker of heroism. Snarky talking cats and wise telepathic horses are both popular choices, though there have been many variations on the basic idea – I recall one example where the protagonist wears a sapient enchanted bracelet which later turns out to be a dragon who's transformed himself into an inanimate object for initially mysterious reasons.

The settings tended to be explicitly egalitarian and gay-friendly, with sexist and homophobic attitudes functioning as cultural markers of the obligatory Evil Empire Over There. This is kind of a nothing distinction in 2025, but in the 1980s it was noteworthy. It wasn't without its problems, of course; homosexuality was usually treated as a kind of gender variance, with gay men being framed as in some sense "womanly" in their fundamental essence, and lesbians as in some sense "manly". Oddly, this idea of homosexuality-as-gender-variance almost never extended to any sort of trans representation. Having a special made-up word for gay people – always printed in italics – was so common in the genre that it became the subject of frequent parody.

[siderealdei]

[taxes-and-laundry]

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Voting ended onFeb 21, 2025

[taxes-and-laundry]

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Voting ended onFeb 21, 2025

[tadfools]

Op disabled rbs but they’re right and more people need to read this a few times over

[thydungeongal]

Running D&D in 2024 is like, the player community collectively convinced each other that dungeon crawls, resource management and attrition are bad, so now everyone runs games where characters can expect to get into one or two fights a day and characters are never stretched for resources, and most Reddit threads about D&D are GMs asking for help challenging their groups because of said ignoring of the resource management aspect and getting told that a good GM could make it work so obviously they must be a bad GM.

[vixensdungeon]

I should start making DM advice videos.

The title: "How to keep your party challenged and engaged"

The thumbnail: "Do this one weird trick!"

The content: "Grind them into paste in your meatgrinder."

[thydungeongal]

"This forgotten method could save your D&D campaign" and the thumbnail has a guy thinking ponderously and the words "Dungeons & Dragons" are on the screen with the word "Dungeons" circled

[vixensdungeon]

With an arrow pointing to it.

[vixensdungeon]

"This forgotten method could save your D&D campaign"

[animeandcatholicism]

Have you considered not playing DnD?

[uncle-mojave]

Are you gonna Satanic Panic this post?

[beakedwhalesyo]

I'll be optimistic and assume they just mean there are more and better game systems out there than D&D.

[gearboxpraexology]

Also worse systems that these Critical Roll people don't have to cut half the rules out of to enjoy their gay little Story Time sessions.

[thydungeongal]

Hey can any of you people read

[alyanas-little-hideout]

You're on tumblr, you know the answer to that question

[daragaus]

The real answer is to change the goals of fights from being to end the enemy forces toward different goals while using noncombat encounters to use up resources.

If people don’t wanna slog through dungeons, add other situations where their abilities and resources can be used. Encourage more utility spells and feat picking, make fights into zone control or getting through a door, etc.

Or just do some smaller fights

[thydungeongal]

All of that stuff can be done in a dungeon.

[anim-ttrpgs]

All of this does happen in dungeons

[probablyevilrpgideas]

I've considered this, since, like, 99.999999% of all "I'm having this problem" questions can be answered wiith "TALK TO YOUR FUCKING PLAYERS/GM LIKE AN ADULT PERSON."

[eldritchbauble]

If you knew who he was would you tell on him?

Yes

No

Voting ended onDec 13, 2024

[writing-prompt-s]

What are some chronic illnesses that can only occur in a fantasy setting?

[beleester]

Partial transformation - mummy rot is slowly turning you to sand, a near miss from a medusa left you with partially stoned body parts, etc.

Hypnotic suggestions from being mind controlled persist after the controller’s death, causing the victim to occasionally take actions to support the cause of a mind flayer cult that no longer exists.

Repeated demonic possession has left the patient with permanent gaps in their soul’s defenses, causing them to immediately get re-possessed if they go outside a consecrated area.

Post-resurrection trauma as the revived soul remembers an unpleasant afterlife.

Magical healing can get very weird if something is stuck in the wound. It’ll get you back on your feet, but you can get outcomes like “there’s a chunk of wood fused into your chest because the magic couldn’t figure out how to get the arrow out of your chest and just healed it in place,” and this can cause mobility issues or infection vectors down the line.

[ihasafandom]

SHealth tied to something else - the health of a tree, the amount of frost on the ground, the inverse of another person’s, the political power of whoever cursed you

Curse of bad luck - makes any small illness or injury potentially fatal if not treated with anti-curse in addition to anti-infection procedures

Magical reliance on a magical or nonmagical substance - can have any number of side effects

Repeatedly being drunk by vampires can cause an increase in blood production and therefore high blood pressure and related ailments. Can be treated by blood letting.

There’s a lot of hybridization happening in a lot of fantasy settings, and that’s just asking for a lot of people with weird half-dragon genetic disorders. Works out fine for some people, not so much for others.

Parasitized by (insert creature here). If you don’t take the correct precautions to keep it dormant it will continue to spread and eventually hatch out/transform you.

Repeated contact with the undead has left you open to their influence - leading to hearing or seeing things that other mortals can’t, which can distort or distract from more mundane concerns.

Alternately to being more vulnerable to intrusion, one’s soul can form a scar that makes helpful magic more difficult to take in.

Sleep disorders that make one fall into an impenetrable sleep at a specific trigger, or to do so for years at a time.

Out of phase with 4D space, one’s body not connected to itself or anchored in place/time in the usual way. There could be a consistent two hour gap between the things you hear and what has happened, you might clip into the floor as if it was in a different place for you, or you might slide through the material plane in cross section.

Intermittent intangibility.

Split into two people, each with only half your traits.

Stuck in a mirror.

[ihasafandom]

Sensitivity to ambient magic - like the thing where peoples’ joints ache before a storm but for being near ley lines or people with a lot of magic built up or other magic reservoirs. - The potential for magic, but where the magic has not yet begun.

[knives-in-the-dishwater]

Heal spell dependency: years of repeated serious injuries being healed by magic causes the body to stop healing naturally. seen often in professional fighters and those with a long career in hazardous occupations.

the forgotten dread: memory modification magic has caused the subject’s conscious mind to forget some past trauma, but their subconscious still remembers, causing them emotions that they cannot explain or justify ranging from mild discomfort to blind panic when presented with triggers related to the aforementioned trauma. often encountered in cases where the subject has paid an unscrupulous mage to make them forget their past as an ill-advised alternative to therapy.

Psychically Transmitted Memories: the subject’s mind has been linked to another person’s and, although the bond has since been severed, they have retained memories or thought patterns from the other person that are difficult to distinguish from their own.

Negative Life Syndrome (previously “False Life Syndrome”): seen most often in cases when the subject is exposed to dark magic while in the womb, Negative Life Syndrome leaves the subject’s life energies tainted by undeath without making them truly undead. common symptoms include intolerance of radiant magic, aversion to sunlight, and the inability to set foot on hallowed ground; rare symptoms include healing from negative energies, sudden necrosis, and the desire to eat flesh or drink blood of living beings.

lycanthropy

Early Life Possessions: the subject was possessed by a spirit or demon during early childhood or infancy, and the possessing presence was in control of them when they learned important milestones, such as how to walk or speak. The subject is now dependant upon the possessing presence to help them perform these tasks or, in cases where the presence has since been exorcised, performs the relevant tasks at a level appropriate for an infant or small child.

[kiragecko]

Body requires nutrients not found in human food, and you must eat rocks, or gems, or some other alternative. You may or may not have the ability to actually digest these without magical assistance

Awareness of too many dimensions makes it difficult to interact with just this one - either to keep track of conversations, or walk to specific locations without ending up on another planet instead

Telekinetic psychosis - delusions tend to physically affect those around you (but HIGH chance for ableism in this one!)

you have flare-ups where your skin tends to slough off and be replaced by some other substance

After sharing life energy with a dying loved one, you’re now both trying to survive off one person’s supply. Like chronic fatigue, but if your loved one gets too big of a bruise you won’t have the energy to get up until it heals

living in reverse

stuck at a certain age

supersenses lead to constant overstimulation

you’re a changeling, and if you don’t have someone who loves you close by, you’ll turn back into sticks and mud

[definitelybeholderrpgideas]

Being healed via nature-based magic too many times has led to your body sprouting plants. In severe cases this can lead to you becoming more plant than person. This is not fatal, but your health will become tied to the health of the plants.

Partial possession, where you periodically lose control of one or more appendages for a length of time.

You're a shape-shifter, and your body grows weaker the longer you stay in any given form.

Your body was constructed by artificial means (forged, sculpted, crafted, etc) and requires special methods to be repaired.

After being part of a hive mind for some time, being alone in your own mind is terrifying, even if you aren't physically alone. You must maintain verbal or psychic communication to stay comfortable.

Soul bursting. You are in a vessel that was not designed to hold a soul, or at least not the type of soul that you are (for example, a powerful celestial body-swapped with a human, or a human body-swapped with some sort of fey insect), and as a result your vessel is being slowly cooked from the inside with radiant damage.

[technofeudalism]

god forbid 5000 year old girls do anything

[flamei7]

[postpoeticparadox]

holy shit bronze age pro sheep bone gamer girl

[probablybadrpgideas]

Not sure if it's actually unusual or if I just don't get out enough, but my only die larger in size than a d20 isn't a normal d100, but specifically a d120.

­

[definitelybeholderrpgideas]

I have one of these! The fun thing is you can use them as any dice in the standard 7-set by dividing by the right number and doing a bit of rounding.

[anneemay]

Sign the Petition

Let Readers Read: An Open Letter to the Publishers in Hachette v. Internet Archive:

Please sign this petition. Almost all of the 500k books that they removed are actually no longer in print and inaccessible to many.

The publishers did not care about those books in the first place but they did this anyway because they have vendetta against open access.

[el-shab-hussein]

As a rule of thumb, don't reblog donation posts or people asking for donations unless they've been vetted and reblogged by Palestinian bloggers. We usually go to lengths to verify this shit because we know scammers have been faking to get people to send them money, using the urgency of our genocide as bait.

It's disgusting this is what we're dealing with, but people are losing money because of some truly evil people out there.

Accounts don't just randomly spring up on tumblr without gofundmes while asking for someone to help them create a campaign. Fuck out of here with that shit.

[el-shab-hussein]

I'm also gonna stop listing the reasons why I recognize something is a scam. It's becoming more and more clear there is 1 person behind this STRING of scams and they're leaving less trails behind but it still reeks of them and their MO.

DO NOT TRUST ANY GOFUNDME OR REQUEST FOR CROWDFUNDING THAT PALESTINIAN BLOGGERS HAVEN'T VERIFIED.

At this point I'm fine receiving a bunch of inbox messages asking me to vet x y z so y'all can avoid this shit. But please have some critical thinking!

People are exploiting our situation.

[el-shab-hussein]

Reblog this post.

Whether you wanna read the whole thing or not idc.

REBLOG IT.

The person this was about deleted the 4th or 5th scam account they made and are definitely gonna make a new one soon. I don't want anybody falling for this anymore.

[pfaugh]

OP's masterlist of vetted requests

every little bit helps.

[probablyunneccesaryrpgideas]

Guy who believes so strongly that magic isn’t real, that he has a constant anti-magic field around him

[jiuta-blog-blog]

hey guys please give what you can https://ko-fi.com/emilygwen

[taliagaza]

Help me save my little angel. She doesn't deserve the fear and terror she's living through. Please, help me provide safety for her. Please, help us survive. Death is approaching us every day. 💔

Please help me for her sake. 🙏 She's suffering from malnutrition. She was so beautiful before the war, but the war robbed her of her childhood. 💔

Donate to Support Alaa and Her Children's Journey To Safety, organized by Ameer Elhussini

Update 5/15/2024, Thank you all for all the donations so far. Below … Ameer Elhussini needs your support for Support Alaa and Her Children's

[tikkunolamresistance]

BOOSTING! PLEASE LIKE, SHARE, REBLOG! DONATE IF YOU CAN.

[probablybadrpgideas]

Weird Dices for Weird Dice Wednesday from a weird board game where you play as a zombie. The green cubes are the simplest, the red ones are the most dangerous. The more brains you eat, the more points you score.

­

[definitelybeholderrpgideas]

Oh I have that game, it's fun. There's a christmas-themed expansion with weird rules.