Ah, the Underdark, one of my all time favorite campaign settings and the primary setting of my homebrew game. I love watching your videos as a source of inspiration. My goal is to always give the players a sense of "we're not in Kansas anymore". Lost? Just ask the local fungi for directions. Thirsty? If you bite of this worms head, you can access its water reservoir glands. Indigestion from eating an alien worm? Go back to the mushrooms that you just asked for directions and eat one of them. Don't worry, it will stop screaming after about twenty minutes. Thanks AJ, keep being awesome!
There's one set of hook horrors that come to mind in a published D&D campaign: In the _Out of the Abyss_ campaign, you can potentially encounter a pair of hook horrors being attacked by a pack of gnolls. It turns out that they're defending their nest from the barbaric hyena-people. If you go to their nest, you can find their eggs, assuming the gnolls don't find them first. Taking one of the eggs will, with a 10% chance each hour, result in a baby hook horror hatching and imprinting on the first creature it sees. It'll be helpless in combat until it's one month old, but will be fully grown in 6 months, at which point you'll have a CR 3, 18 Strength, ogre-sized monstrosity with 120 foot darkvision that's dual-wielding greatswords and can climb on cave walls. And considering the travel times in that campaign, it's not terribly unlikely it'll at least survive that initial one-month period of helplessness.
Whenever I hear hook horror I always think of the tragic story of Clacker the polymorphed Pech in R.A. Salvatores' Exile tapping on stone, lamenting that it didn't talk back anymore. I got misty reading that book.
I remember the first time I fought a group of these bugs. Almost TPK at mid level. We had a very cruel DM who made the Underdark an uninviting place. And deeper you went, the more predatory everything was.
I love hook horrors simply because they are symbolic of the Underdark. Something about the vast unknown of the Underdark brings me joy unlike any other as a dm
I love hook horrors they are one of my favorite underdark creatures. I used them somewhat early in my campaign as a sort of carrion creature that followed around a band of orcs assaulting a group of drow.
Excellent lore, mixed with real world behaviors and ecology of beetles and the like. My group thinks sneaking into the complex through the maze of subterranean tunnels will be the easy way in…. Muah ha ha ha!!!
I always pictured this thing as having a beak, along the lines of an octopus or squid. Hidden in that sheath, then pushing out to clip off a head here and there.
They made a Hook Horror toy with LJN's wonderful AD&D action figure line from the early 80's. I had most of those figures, including a Hook Horror. I had forgotten about that until I saw this video.
My husband read the drizzt series when he was in high school and has gotten me into it now but I listen to the audio books. I really like the series and have always wondered about the many creatures that call the underdark home especially after they met Clacker, poor guy, I feel bad for him. Anyways thanks for the video.😊
My mind went right to Clacker too. At least his Hook Horror horrible life ended, too bad it wasn't by a magical cure but his passing. I was rooting for a magical cure.
One possibility for the gold/silver thing would be to have it as their type of gizzard stones. With what they eat from the environment, it's possible that normal stones wouldn't work well for it, and gold/silver resists certain effects while possibly being sturdy enough to still grind fungal matter...
It's about as intelligent as a lizard man or ettercap. I have little doubt that the rare horror could learn another language as long as they could make the noises. It would actually make sense for them to learn similar clicking and chirping languages spoken by nearby creatures.
I think it was one of the Baldur's Gate PC games that had these. It was a really nasty fight because they drop down anywhere and bum rush your squishiest characters; anyone wearing a robe. I had to dump all of my clutch magic on them to keep everyone alive during that encounter.
AJ Pickett one last thing, I remember back in 3e there was something in the abyss called the queen of chaos. What was that suppose to be? Was it Pale Night?
No, the Queen of Chaos (original name wiped from history by her) is another of the original Obyrith demons that survived the transition into the D&D multiverse relatively intact (Pale Night is another of them that did, along with Obox-Ob, Pazuzu, Dagon and others)
Good point! We were just talking about the precious metals in dragon hoards on Discord yesterday, and I thought about the antibacterial properties (or did I say anti-fungal?)
I have a question: do the games 'baldour's gate dark alliance' and 'champions return to arms' take place in the dnd universe or whatever. Because it seems like they use alot of the same shit and you mentioned wizards of the coast.
I like the original design of hooked horrors in the I think fiend folio. My question is are they changed from human to monster by just a curse or a God or out worldly deity. If so I was wondering could they be player characters, maybe a mutant rising from the under dark into the light. Maybe made into a slave or a mongral man that looks like one or a pit fighter
As cool as these are I'm not sure that a social creature with groups of any size makes a whole lot of sense for a large ambush predator in barren region. Pursuit predators and those who hunt in wide open spaces like the open ocean where cornering your prey is necessary generally get more out of true pack and where there are few resources general few and far between a large predator like this generally needs an extremely large hunting space. D&D doesn't really need realism so I'm not complaining these are just a few thoughts.
A savannah is a fairly resource rich environment, especially when its wet and everyone in town and some the dry season lions will generally spread out more to hunt, working in twos and threes.
Loving these series, man! But I have to disagree on the comment you made regarding their being unlike insects in their reproduction and growth. In fact they sound like they have a nymph stage(like the adult but smaller, no sexual organs) but not larva. The shedding seems like it could be instar stages. Think of grasshoppers, and youd have the right idea
Not really important, but you said the eggs look like rocks, so do you think they might collect rocks. They sort of look like penguins, so I kind of connected it.
Oooh, wouldn't it be cool if a Lich or some other powerful undead was somehow covered in zygons as a defense/offense. I just like the idea of the deliberate use of deadly fungus or fungus and magic. Wasn't there a beholder covered in fungus?
Functionally insane and brilliant. And given how they are are said to spend every spare minute in paranoid fantasies which they then act on I can definitely see a beholder going this route for self defense.
I would say it isn't that hook horrors can't learn undercommon but rather have little to no incentive to do so. Why would they care to talk to you, meat? Truly they have no reason to learn the language of their food. But I agree it would still be a pidgin if they did. I can't imagine they develop many complex ideas in their short, brutal lives and it would no doubt mean they would have trouble learning more than simple phrases in another tongue.
You are free to pronounce it however you like, but the vast majority of people, as well as authors and official commentators and storytellers, pronounce it the same way I do.
@@AJPickett Imagine arguing with the authors, creators and a sage who obviously has done serious research. As my grandma used to say shaking her head, "some peoples children"
Hook horrors knowing undercommon sounds like something Volo might write in one of his guides.
Ah, the Underdark, one of my all time favorite campaign settings and the primary setting of my homebrew game. I love watching your videos as a source of inspiration. My goal is to always give the players a sense of "we're not in Kansas anymore". Lost? Just ask the local fungi for directions. Thirsty? If you bite of this worms head, you can access its water reservoir glands. Indigestion from eating an alien worm? Go back to the mushrooms that you just asked for directions and eat one of them. Don't worry, it will stop screaming after about twenty minutes.
Thanks AJ, keep being awesome!
There's one set of hook horrors that come to mind in a published D&D campaign:
In the _Out of the Abyss_ campaign, you can potentially encounter a pair of hook horrors being attacked by a pack of gnolls. It turns out that they're defending their nest from the barbaric hyena-people. If you go to their nest, you can find their eggs, assuming the gnolls don't find them first.
Taking one of the eggs will, with a 10% chance each hour, result in a baby hook horror hatching and imprinting on the first creature it sees. It'll be helpless in combat until it's one month old, but will be fully grown in 6 months, at which point you'll have a CR 3, 18 Strength, ogre-sized monstrosity with 120 foot darkvision that's dual-wielding greatswords and can climb on cave walls. And considering the travel times in that campaign, it's not terribly unlikely it'll at least survive that initial one-month period of helplessness.
Whenever I hear hook horror I always think of the tragic story of Clacker the polymorphed Pech in R.A. Salvatores' Exile tapping on stone, lamenting that it didn't talk back anymore. I got misty reading that book.
Same here. It's a permanent association.
I remember the first time I fought a group of these bugs. Almost TPK at mid level. We had a very cruel DM who made the Underdark an uninviting place. And deeper you went, the more predatory everything was.
I like how 60% of the pictures are a dwarf smashing a horror into a stalactite with a hammer lol
"Nobody tosses a Dwarf!!" -Gimli ;)
Cuz that’s what dwarves do. They smash 50 shades of shit out of things with big ass hammers.
I love hook horrors simply because they are symbolic of the Underdark. Something about the vast unknown of the Underdark brings me joy unlike any other as a dm
I like how most of the pictures depict hook horrors getting wrecked by hero’s
Hearing about the parasites makes me want to play a druid vet of the under dark.
I love hook horrors they are one of my favorite underdark creatures. I used them somewhat early in my campaign as a sort of carrion creature that followed around a band of orcs assaulting a group of drow.
I have watched this multiple times. Thanks AJ.
And this is why you stay out of the Underdark.
Watching baby cockatiel videos and TH-cam suggests this next.
Makes perfect sense, if you know cockatiel's well.
Perhaps it was confused with cocktarice lol. (I know I'm 2 years late but I'm bored.)
5:38 😊
Really enjoying the Underdark theme of the last few videos, I really hope you continue with them. Also, First.
Thanks! I might gather the Underdark stuff into a playlist of its own.
That would be wonderful. Thank you if you do, and if not, still thank you for all the excellent videos.
Hey do you think you could do a revised Umber Hulk video? maybe?
Excellent lore, mixed with real world behaviors and ecology of beetles and the like. My group thinks sneaking into the complex through the maze of subterranean tunnels will be the easy way in…. Muah ha ha ha!!!
That thing looks almost like Gigan(very small Gigan) An alien cyborg Kaiju, and enemy of Godzilla. Long live the King^^
I always pictured this thing as having a beak, along the lines of an octopus or squid.
Hidden in that sheath, then pushing out to clip off a head here and there.
They made a Hook Horror toy with LJN's wonderful AD&D action figure line from the early 80's. I had most of those figures, including a Hook Horror. I had forgotten about that until I saw this video.
awesome. just fought a mess of hook horrors tonight in our campaign!
I've always loved the idea to have a lizardfolk hunter with a hook horror as a hunting pet
My husband read the drizzt series when he was in high school and has gotten me into it now but I listen to the audio books. I really like the series and have always wondered about the many creatures that call the underdark home especially after they met Clacker, poor guy, I feel bad for him. Anyways thanks for the video.😊
My mind went right to Clacker too. At least his Hook Horror horrible life ended, too bad it wasn't by a magical cure but his passing. I was rooting for a magical cure.
Poor clacker :/ may Ao have mercy on his poor pick soul
Love them brother! Keep them coming
I had forgotten about White Dwarf. I had a DM use these monsters but modified so that infravision did not see them.
Aww this makes me think of clacker
Poor little Pech
One possibility for the gold/silver thing would be to have it as their type of gizzard stones. With what they eat from the environment, it's possible that normal stones wouldn't work well for it, and gold/silver resists certain effects while possibly being sturdy enough to still grind fungal matter...
I like making them into cave-dwelling volcano snails with squid-like vulture beaks
Ahhhh!!! is the best response to encountering a hook horror.or a simple jab with a weapon
It's about as intelligent as a lizard man or ettercap. I have little doubt that the rare horror could learn another language as long as they could make the noises. It would actually make sense for them to learn similar clicking and chirping languages spoken by nearby creatures.
CLACKER!
Clacker... died a hero's death and finally gained his original form when he passed. RIP Clacker.
What about the talking hook horror from the Drizzt series? He talked. He was polymorphed, but still.
Yes!...That was so tragic. I think he was a deep gnome originally.
Why are you posting so early? Now I'm going to have to stay up longer (10/10 excited for this video though).
Early to bed and early to rise, makes a DM healthy, wealthy and wise.
I didn't think the time difference between us was that big haha! Wise words though AJ!
I imagine their language may sound like what the Judas sounded like from the movie Mimic
That intro music is legit AJ
I love the denizens of the Underdark!!!!
Lovely monster compendium of Dark Crystal's ecology.
Garthim! Yes yes :)
Hmmmm....a pet Hook Horror you say?
@ 6:14 yes! zygom not to be confused with the ZygoNs from Dr Who :P
I don't know, I think it might be neat to have a Hooked Horror Pet.
I can't find any Dire Corby videos of yours. Locrius Planetoid did a pretty good video about them. Have you seen his videos?
Yes, I have seen them.
It's a greater daemon of Tzeentch!
I think it was one of the Baldur's Gate PC games that had these. It was a really nasty fight because they drop down anywhere and bum rush your squishiest characters; anyone wearing a robe. I had to dump all of my clutch magic on them to keep everyone alive during that encounter.
Ice Wind Dale 2.
Icewind Dale II you get overwhelmed by these in the Underdark
Whitewolf!? I had no idea!
I had the toy of this critter when I was a kid - and it was just the coolest looking monster! :)
Hey man love your lore videos. Could you do some on Primus?
Edit: forgot my question mark😱
Mechanus is my favorite outer plane.
AJ Pickett one last thing, I remember back in 3e there was something in the abyss called the queen of chaos. What was that suppose to be? Was it Pale Night?
No, the Queen of Chaos (original name wiped from history by her) is another of the original Obyrith demons that survived the transition into the D&D multiverse relatively intact (Pale Night is another of them that did, along with Obox-Ob, Pazuzu, Dagon and others)
AJ Pickett oh okay thanks for clearing that up. So she's like the Raven Queen just a big lore tease
AJ Pickett was there ever any stats on her or it's just a big ol mystery?
Silver is antibacterial. So they may be trying to self medicate when they eat it.
Good point! We were just talking about the precious metals in dragon hoards on Discord yesterday, and I thought about the antibacterial properties (or did I say anti-fungal?)
Can a hook horror learn to repeat words it's heard continuously, Like a parrot? Maybe Drow would train them to do this in order to setup an ambush.
Drow have had ten thousand years to breed custom monsters for their environment, so, sure.
Invertebrates? Didn’t see that coming. Thought they were some arcane accident.
Eagle-preying mantises eh?
good video
They're suck cool monsters. I love having them scaling cavern walls towards the party while making those creepy clicking sounds.
I have a question: do the games 'baldour's gate dark alliance' and 'champions return to arms' take place in the dnd universe or whatever. Because it seems like they use alot of the same shit and you mentioned wizards of the coast.
Yes. Baldur's gate is firmly faerun
I knew someone would answer this before I did :)
I like the original design of hooked horrors in the I think fiend folio. My question is are they changed from human to monster by just a curse or a God or out worldly deity. If so I was wondering could they be player characters, maybe a mutant rising from the under dark into the light. Maybe made into a slave or a mongral man that looks like one or a pit fighter
Human to monster? I think they are just alien creatures.
As cool as these are I'm not sure that a social creature with groups of any size makes a whole lot of sense for a large ambush predator in barren region. Pursuit predators and those who hunt in wide open spaces like the open ocean where cornering your prey is necessary generally get more out of true pack and where there are few resources general few and far between a large predator like this generally needs an extremely large hunting space. D&D doesn't really need realism so I'm not complaining these are just a few thoughts.
Underdark Lions.
A savannah is a fairly resource rich environment, especially when its wet and everyone in town and some the dry season lions will generally spread out more to hunt, working in twos and threes.
Can you do a video on Quicklings?
Yes :)
Nice.Thank you.They are one of my favorite fey.
Gigan
You said you can't eat them. Is it because of all the nasty stuff in their stomachs like poisonous/parasitic mushrooms?
Lily Fauns probably both
You just need to boil ‘me long enough then drain the water and boil them again and you’ll be fine.
Baby Gigan
Loving these series, man! But I have to disagree on the comment you made regarding their being unlike insects in their reproduction and growth. In fact they sound like they have a nymph stage(like the adult but smaller, no sexual organs) but not larva. The shedding seems like it could be instar stages. Think of grasshoppers, and youd have the right idea
Not really important, but you said the eggs look like rocks, so do you think they might collect rocks. They sort of look like penguins, so I kind of connected it.
Great ,got to roleplay a den of 33 berserk hook horrors that's nest have been destroyed by a bullet .Players are f* if can't deal with it
You should really turn this stuff into a podcast
I have had a good result from testing out more pod-cast styled content, and I have a service I am looking at using, so, yes, I am working on it. :)
Damn. Nasty.
Oooh, wouldn't it be cool if a Lich or some other powerful undead was somehow covered in zygons as a defense/offense. I just like the idea of the deliberate use of deadly fungus or fungus and magic. Wasn't there a beholder covered in fungus?
Probably. Beholder more than likely thought that the fungus looked cool and decided to make a coat of it. They are insane
Functionally insane and brilliant. And given how they are are said to spend every spare minute in paranoid fantasies which they then act on I can definitely see a beholder going this route for self defense.
@@jacobfreeman5444 Great way to put it. Thanks for adding to the idea. I'm pretty sure there is some precedent for beholders and fungus somewhere.
Hamopavor phobises
hmm so Hookhorrors eat drows. well i guess they are not that bad then. Now i there was a monster that only ate gnomes i be super happy
Make one
Well, they are not exclusive about their appetites, but Trolls most certainly love to eat Gnomes and Halflings.
Kinda like Silverbacks
I would say it isn't that hook horrors can't learn undercommon but rather have little to no incentive to do so. Why would they care to talk to you, meat? Truly they have no reason to learn the language of their food. But I agree it would still be a pidgin if they did. I can't imagine they develop many complex ideas in their short, brutal lives and it would no doubt mean they would have trouble learning more than simple phrases in another tongue.
good point
Bah, what you call "inedible", someone from kara-tur calls a "delicacy"!!! x.X;
Could they learn Morse code?
Gnomish tap cipher? Sure.
They made old toys of this it was black
Day 1 view!
its pronounced drow, as in a murder of crow. not a heard of cow.
You are free to pronounce it however you like, but the vast majority of people, as well as authors and official commentators and storytellers, pronounce it the same way I do.
It's definitely supposed to be drow like cow
I have never heard anyone pronounce it as rhyming with crow. That would be weird.
@@AJPickett Imagine arguing with the authors, creators and a sage who obviously has done serious research. As my grandma used to say shaking her head, "some peoples children"