Dungeon Master Forum

https://archmdmag.com/boy-11-finds-1000 ... moth-bone/

So what if any are the runes in dm based on? Never really thought about it till now.

Ahh I wondered what article you were talking about in the Discord. As per my reply there, as far as I'm aware the DM spell runes are just symbols based on whatever the rune represents, like Dain resembling an arm holding up a staff casting a spell, Ku is a sword, Ven looks like the hourglass shape you see on the back of a Black Widow spider, etc.

I was wondering if people knew it from pre existing runes. Much like the use of pre existing monsters like mummy but also brand new ones never seen before.

Which monsters in DM are new? As far as I'm aware, a lot of them are based on DnD monsters...

The runes were mostly created by Andy Jaros, graphics guy on DM. He adapted a magic system he'd created for his own D&D games. My understanding is that some runes were based on existing ideas from other cultures, while some were his own invention. The original manual gives details on what they symbolise.

As for creatures, several are original to DM: Trolin (Troll+Goblin), Oitu, Giggler , Rock Pile and Black Flame, while several are based on D&D creatures, eg, Screamer, Ruster, Wizard Eye, Magenta Worm. Other DM creatures were clearly influenced by mythical creatures made famous earlier, such as mummies and skeletons.

Fun facts: Oitus only have 2 legs, and a Giggler's head is also its body!

I wonder where the "official" names for all the monsters come from...are they in the manual? I never read that as a kid, I just use the names they're given in the hint book. So for the examples above - Blue Troll, Giant Spider (even though they're clearly not that spider-like), Thief, Rock Monster, Fire Elemental. In a way, I suppose Rock Monsters are Earth Elementals...Water Elementals are obviously Water Elementals...and DM doesn't really have an "Air Elemental" but those see-through, very-difficult-to-spot, floaty (they ignore pits), flat-on-the-ground monsters in CSB maybe cover it .

As for Giant Spiders/Oitus having two legs...I would say they have two feet, but four legs .

Lots of unofficial hint books arrived for DM before they learned of the official FTL creature names, so they made up their own names.

The official DM hintbook from FTL doesn't even really mention any creatures (http://dmweb.free.fr/?q=node/401), but the names can be confirmed from the disassembled code of the original game. There's a second edition of The Adventurer's Handbook which does use the official FTL names, not only for creatures, but also the levels. That's because the second edition had input from FTL and was sort of sanctioned as a "semi official" hint book (http://dmweb.free.fr/?q=node/403). I can see on the Encylopedia that you supplied the images for the first edition

For the record, rock monsters are officially "rock piles" and the earth elementals are "stone golems". In DM, those orange bastard twisty tentacle things that phase in and out are Materializers, while the flat white thing in CSB that you mentioned is a Rive. In CSB it's much clearer, due to the built in Hint Oracle which gives all the creature names, plus in the Amiga version there's a magic scroll which gives the creature name of the monster standing in front of the party.

I guess you're right about the Oitu 4 legs/2 feet thing. Either way, it's a crazy design and in reality I'm not sure it would be able to walk without falling over!

Just realised how far I digressed from the runes thing... sorry!

Yeah, that second link you've given is indeed my (well, my dad's) copy of the hint book, complete with blue highlighter over all the levels from when my dad was trying to visit every square in the game .

The creatures I was describing as technically being "Earth Elementals" are the Rock Monsters/Rock Piles. The Stone Golems are called Stone Giants in my version of the hint book - I wouldn't call them elementals because they're too humanoid. The spellcasting-evil-bastard-phase-in-and-out things from Level Twelve are known to me as Spell Vines.

And yeah, agreed on the Giant "Spiders" probably not being able to stand up realistically. Reminds me a little of when I was a kid, my dad putting on the War of the Worlds (Jeff Wayne music thingy) on the record player and me going through the pictures in the album and him saying that the tripods wouldn't work in real life, because they'd fall over if they tried to walk .

Well, we're getting even further from runes now. Hrmm...well, I think anything about their intended symbolism is in the manual, pretty much. But some of them are fairly obvious anyway, like Ra being a star/sun when it's the rune of Light/"Good".

Gambit37 wrote: ↑Sat Nov 17, 2018 1:35 pmAs for creatures, several are original to DM: Trolin (Troll+Goblin), Oitu, Giggler , Rock Pile and Black Flame, while several are based on D&D creatures, eg, Screamer, Ruster, Wizard Eye, Magenta Worm. Other DM creatures were clearly influenced by mythical creatures made famous earlier, such as mummies and skeletons.

Fun facts: Oitus only have 2 legs, and a Giggler's head is also its body!

I played AD&D 2nd edition around the same time as DM, and the only AD&D monster I recognized was the Wizard Eye looking like a Beholder, although the Ruster and Oitu did seem like they were inspired by some of the chimera monsters in the MM.
What was the Screamer, Ruster, and Magenta Worm (the legs throw me off, a giant carnivorous worm on the other hand IS in AD&D) based on?

I always thought the Black Flames were supposed to be fire elementals similar to the water elementals we encounter.