I'm going to take a new look at the monsters appearing for Blackmoor in the DA modules. How many of them have you used in your Blackmoor campaigns or even other D&D campaigns? What are your experiences? Which creatures feel the most Blackmoor to you? :)

-Havard

A complete(?) list of monsters from the DA modules can be found in .

Starting in random order, I would like to talk about Garls.

Garl
Garls first appeared in the TSR UK module, CM6 Where Chaos Reigns (1985). They also appeared in AC9 Creature Catalogue (1986) and in the revised DMR1 Creature Catalog (1993). Curiously, they did not appear in the AD&D Mystara Monstrous Compendium which updated many other creatures from the BECMI series to the AD&D 2nd Edition rules.

For Blackmoor, Garls made their first and only appearance in DA3 City of the Gods. Garls are basically Giant Neanderthals standing up to 10' tall with massive strength.

The DA modules were in my opinion a great achievement that fully took Dave Arneson's Blackmoor into a campaign setting for the D&D framework. Dave Ritchie deserves credit for accomplishing this, working with the manuscripts provided to him by Arneson. We may never know exactly where Arneson's vision ended and Ritchie's began. There is no reason to think that Garls existed in Arneson's campaign. However, to me they feel very Arnesonian. I think of them as something out of a Frazetta painting. We know that the original Blackmoor contained many prehistoric and gigantic creatures.

Garls are said to be found in the mountains and remote areas of Blackmoor. In my campaign, they are remnants of the , along with other Cave Man type humanoids, surviving from a forgotten age. During the Burrower Wars, many such humanoids were corrupted by creatures similar to the Egg of Coot and became servants of Chaos. While Garls are not inherently evil, some still show signs of that corruption lingering, centuries later.

I made use of the Garls in my sourcebook, .

Has anyone else used Garls in your campaigns?

-Havard

Great idea for a series Havard. You should cross-post this to your 'blog.

Next up...

Quarg
I am not aware of any other appearance of the Quarg outside of DA3 City of Blackmoor. I had previously assumed it was a reskin of the Ice Wolf. The Ice Wolf first appeared in AC9 Creature Catalogue (1986) and in the revised DMR1 Creature Catalog (1993) as well as in the Hollow World Boxed Set (1990). The Ice Wolf was probably based on AD&D's Winter Wolf, even though most BECMI designers were told not to look too closely at AD&D material. However, on closer inspection, the Quarg has been beefed up to 6 HD, while the Ice Wolf ranges from 3+1 HD to 5+1. Quargs have a frost breath attack, but are vulnerable to fire based attacks. While Ice Wolves have white fur and blue eyes, Quargs have icy blue tinged white fur and pale pink eyes.

Interestingly, none of the encounter tables in DA3 feature Quargs, but I do like that they seem to be unique for Blackmoor. Quargs are another creature I incorporated into I made my sourcebook, . Here I connected them to Brute Men (Cave Men) who sometimes train them as guard animals or mounts.

I am surprised that they never appeared in the D20 Blackmoor line. It is a shame that they never did a monster book for Blackmoor as those types of books seemed to sell really well back in the 2000s. If Dave Arneson had been with us longer, perhaps they would have gotten around to it.

-Havard