Free Monsters for Tunnels and Trolls

November 3, 2009 3 comments

Monster management in Tunnels and Trolls 7.5 is incredibly simple. Monster Rating (MR) is both how much damage the monster can take, and how many Adventure Point you get for killing it (or outsmarting it, if you’re clever and have a generous gamemaster). Half the MR is the creature’s Combat Add. Divide MR by 10 and add 1, and that’s how many Combat Dice it rolls. Easy.

This simplicity also makes it possible to round up a ton of free monsters for your game. Yes, free! How? Convert them from That Other Game! Let me how you how.

First, get a copy of the free System Reference Document (SRD). You don’t even need the whole thing, just the monster bits. You can also use the Other System Reference Document if you prefer. Each monster is going to have a bit fat block of statistics, as well as some description of what they can do. We’re going to ignore most of that.

Second, find the monster’s Hit Points. Every monster has an average, pre-rolled hit point total. Using my favorite monster from that game, the Bugbear, as an example, the SRD says it has 27 hit points. Ican have more, it n have less, but on average a bugbear has 27. Use thats the Monster Rating. Every thing else follows suit. A bugbear has MR 27, and rolls 3d6+14 for Combat Dice.

Third, figure out Special Abilities. You can use a similar special ability from a T&T monster, or use a T&T spell that sounds close, but I advocate winging it. When in doubt, use Spite Damage as your fudge factor. For example, a Rust Monster doesn’t do any damage to characters, only metal weapons and armor. When rolling in combat, add up al the 6′s the rust monster rolls and apply that Spite Damage to the metal weapon that struck it (or tried to) or the armor of the nearest character. If a monster has a special ability dependant upon a grapple, use Spite damage to indicate that it grappled, then apply the special effect.

Of course, this not an apples-to-apples conversion. My story, and I’m sticking to it, is that the monsters will get discombobulated crossing the mystical veil from Dungeonworld to Trollworld, and their power levels will be affected as well. It’s not meant to be an exercise in mathematics. What it will do is allow you to use monster books from that other game to stock your tunnels with and give your players new and interesting things to kill.