Eldritch Abomination/Tabletop Games: Difference between revisions

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** Several kinds of demons in the game invite comparisons to Lovecraftian beasties as well, especially the various Obyrith subspecies: they've existed [[Time Abyss|since before the dawn of time]], often have incomprehensible biologies, and just glancing at one is enough to induce new phobias or temporary insanity. One of the oldest horrifies ''reality itself'' and can ''kill'' [[Brown Note|if you get a glance]] at [[You Cannot Grasp the True Form|its true form]].

** The [[Epic Level Handbook]] for 3rd edition brought us the Abominations; malformed offspring of deities which desired to destroy all reality. Among the most horrific of them are the Atropal, which are the undead remains of stillborn godlings, as well as the Dream Larvae, who transform into something so scary that it can kill you with fear instantly the first time you look at it.

** Another subterranean race culled from Lovecraft are the kuo-toa, amphibian humanoids consciously modeled on the Deep Ones.

** The First Edition was no stranger to Eldritch Abominations as well. Aside from the Nightmare creatures (like the Diaboli and the Malphera), whose physiology was utterly alien and horrific to humanity, there were also the creatures from the Vortex, a place beyond all dimensions and planes of existence who could cause inexplicable phenomenons with their mere presence. Even the [[Physical God|Immortals]] are afraid of such things.

* The [[Forgotten Realms]] has three Elder Evils. Ityak-Ortheel the Elf-Eater was created when the blood of the orc god Gruumsh and the elven god Corellon Larethian merged. Its appearance is Lovecraftian-inspired (a massive body supported by three legs, tentacles everywhere) It lives in between the planes and is occasionally released by mad cultists (mostly of Malar) to, well, eat elves. And anything else in its way, of course, but it takes pleasure in destroying elven towns and cities and slowly devours them over hundreds of years. The second is Kezef the Chaos Hound, who appears as a massive, skinless hunting dog, its coat covered in maggots. It hunts for the Faithful, those who worship a god, and kills them, and then the maggots swarm over the body before returning to Kezef. The soul of the person slain is utterly destroyed, and not even the gods can bring them back. It also [[Does This Remind You of Anything?|bit the hand off Tyr when the gods were trying to chain Kezef down]]. The third is Dendar the Night Serpent, a serpent several hundred feet long that came into being when the first creatures had a nightmare. It feeds on (and causes) nightmares of every sentient being in the world. As far as Eldritch Abominations go, Dendar serves a somewhat useful purpose: if she wasn't around, people would remember every nightmare they've had in exact, excruciating detail, never wanting to sleep again, for fear of adding to their terror.

* The [[Psychic Powers|psionic]] Slarecians of the third-party (by a [[White Wolf]] subsidiary, unsurprisingly) ''[[Scarred Lands]]'' setting. They're revealed to originally have been beings of pure thought, who were trapped in the world as it was forming, and now they want out. They've decided the only way to do that is to completely destroy the world. The guide book detailing them goes into details of their various experiments during their time on the world Scarn, which, befitting their origins, are pretty damn weird.

** To a lesser extent, the Titans, the original rulers of Scarn. While they usually appear humanoid, and can easily interact with mortals without driving them insane, they're also powerful to the point of not having statistics, they usually see mortals as irrelevant, and their mindsets are incomprehensible.

** Sixth, well, apart from Gugs, plenty other Mythos creatures found their way to the setting, such as the [[Blob Monster|Shoggoths]], [[Clock Roaches|Hounds of Tindalos]] and [[Humanoid Abomination|Denizens of Leng]]; in fact, [[Eldritch Location|Leng]] is [[Another Dimension]] that has infrequent bleedovers with Golarion, [[Reality Is Out to Lunch|with obvious results]].

* Naturally, Chaosium's ''[[The Call of Cthulhu]]'' game is just ''full'' of them. One of the basic stats of PCs, along with the normal STR, DEX, CON, WIS, INT and such, is SAN. That's ''[[Sanity Meter|Sanity]]''. It's arguably the most important single stat unless you ''want'' to keep rolling up new characters.

** There's also a board game based on Call of Cthulhu by [[Fantasy Flight]] called ''[[Arkham Horror]]'' which has tokens for hit points, knowledge of other worlds, and (you guessed it) sanity. Every turn, there's a high chance of a gate opening to another universe, and as more gates open, more monsters come flooding through ... and as the game progresses, the Doom Count slowly rises. If it gets high enough, the Old One (Cthulhu or one of his cousins) appears and the players have to battle it. (Each [[Eldritch Abomination]] has special powers -- Azathoth's power is "if summoned, the game is over. [[Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies|Azathoth destroys the world.]]")

*** And now there's spinoff game ''Mansions of Madness'', which is contained in a compact [[Haunted House]] format.

* In the world of ''[[Earthdawn]]'', the cyclical ebb and flow of magic periodically allows Horrors to slip from their own dimension into the world and devour anything that moves. If you're lucky, they will devour your body before they start on the good stuff. Luckily for the world, [[The Magic Goes Away|magic energies are on the decline]], so the survivors the last cataclysm the Horrors caused have just to outlast their ability to keep existing in our world for a generation or two before they're all gone.

** ''[[Shadowrun]]'' is more or less on the opposite end of the scale from ''[[Earthdawn]],'' with ''Shadowrun'' a world where [[The Magic Comes Back|magic is on the increase]] and the Horrors not terribly far behind. While there's at least one group working to speed the process, there's also [[Our Presidents Are Different|others]] working to delay things, with the hope that this new-fangled technology thing can prevent [[The End of the World as We Know It]].

* And then there's the ''[[New World of Darkness]]'', published as Lovecraft's works are getting more influential...

** Abyssal entities from ''[[Mage: The Awakening]]'' come from what could best be described as an "anti-universe," a world that lives by rules wholly antithetical to those of Earth. Truly, however, the most horrifying thing about Abyssal entities is that the idea that beings of the Abyss always take such predictable -- horrifying and maddening, but predictable -- forms as "monstrous, unclean abomination" is actually a comfortable lie that Mages tell themselves to hide from the fact that the Abyss is, in fact, [[You Cannot Grasp the True Form|in no way as banal and quantifiable as that]].

*** There's also the Nemesis Continuum. It's the [[Mad Scientist|scientific]] [[Cosmic Horror]] to the Prince's [[Mad Artist|perversion of the humanities]]. It's an altered set of the laws of physics. Bits of the material world it contaminates are [[Reality Is Out to Lunch|twisted]]; what if anything green was suddenly boiling hot, and the speed of light was slower than the speed of sound? [[It Got Worse|It gets worse.]] The Nemesis Continuum is summoned by intelligent scientists "accidentally" (the book says that most proofs are found through indirect interference by [[Eldritch Abomination|acamoth]]) finding a proof for it, which then becomes true. And they become obsessed with finding more proofs. The best part? The Nemesis Continuum is apparently [[Hyperspace Is a Scary Place|the physical laws of the Abyss itself]], so to fight it on its own level, ''you probably need to infect yourself with them''. By the way, [[The Virus|it's also easier for a scientist to explain and thus prove a proof once he understands it...]]

** The [[Sourcebook]] ''Summoners'' includes some other examples, such as the chthonians of the Underworld (known as the "neverborn" since they exist in the realm of the dead, but cannot be reliably said to have ever been alive) and certain Supernal beings. Said Supernal beings include the [[God in Human Form|Ochema]], avatars of the [[Big Bad|Exarchs]] in ''Seers Of The Throne''. [[Humanoid Abomination|Sure, they look]] [[Pride|(and act)]] [[Humanoid Abomination|like people]], [[Starfish Aliens|but look at them with Mage Sight]]... Unlike many examples, this is actually because they're ''less'' corrupted than everything else: [[Crapsack World|The Fallen World]] simply [[Divide by Zero|can't handle]] [[Heaven|Supernal]] beings like them... Although they stay significantly longer than and don't cause unintentional damage like Abyssal creatures, since they're ''supposed'' to be a part of the natural order of reality.

** The [[Fair Folk|True Fae]] of ''[[Changeling: The Lost]]'' deserve a mention. Now, they're more recognizable than their stablemates above, capable of great [[Pride]], vanity and twisted creativity, but they are ultimately alien, incredibly powerful and terrifying beings with [[Evil Cannot Comprehend Good|no concept of empathy, kindness or selflessness]], capable of rending souls and striking pacts with aspects of reality itself, and within their [[Reality Is Out to Lunch|home dimension]] they are capable of [[Reality Warper|just about anything]], and can twist their kidnapped human subjects to meet their needs. That they happen to have inspired [[Fairy Tales]] perhaps only makes them ''more'' frightening. And do you wanna know how they're born? {{spoiler|[[And Then John Was a Zombie|No. No, you don't.]]}}

** The sourcebook ''Second Sight'' has a pretty good chapter on building your own abomination, a [[Misanthrope Supreme]] or [[Fallen Hero]] to serve as their high priest, and a cult to worship them. The creation example is a being of dissonant sound. (Although one suggested weakness for this being -- music of unity -- seemed uncannily reminiscent of ''[[Ghostbusters]] 2''.)

** There are several vast armies of insane, unreal things "out" there positively ''itching'' to roll up reality like a carpet and devour the souls of the living. And these things are the setting's [[The Fair Folk|elves]]. Since this is ''Exalted'', it's the player characters' job to [[Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?|punch every last one of them in the face with the power of their undiluted, shiny awesomeness.]]

*** Most of the Primordials that didn't get killed are now the Yozi, [[Demon Lords and Archdevils|demon princes]] who have had their very beings and souls turned inside out and who live in [[Genius Loci|the broken body of their leader]]. They wish to turn Creation into Hell as part of a rather demented plan to escape their prison by expanding it.

*** The Neverborn are ''dead'' Primordials that you have to meet face to architecture. Killing them broke the universe and shat the entire Underworld into being.

*** Autochthon, a living non-Yozi Primordial, is a giant hollow machine-deity approximately the size of a planet, mostly made of steampunk (and he's a good guy. Sort of.)

*** The three kinds of Primordial Exalted -- Alchemicals, Infernals and Abyssals -- are gradually evolving into something closer to their patrons. Alchemicals gradually turn into cities, but the others have only existed about three years and as such have had nowhere near enough time to turn into... whatever it is they end up becoming.

*** Did we also mention that once the Exaltation shard becomes redundant, it is released to be implanted in another Infernal...?

* In ''[[The Whispering Vault]]'', the player characters are all minor Eldritch Abominations who act as a "police force" that apprehends and retrieves other abominations who have illicitly made their way to Earth. {{spoiler|Reality is also literally [[All Just a Dream]] cooked up by those abominations who haven't gone rogue.}}

** The Enslavers, who at first take on almost comprehensible forms of cyclopean octopi and swim in the warp currents. Seem kind of cute until you realize that even the hiveminded Tyranids and other creatures of the warp like Daemons have trouble with them.

** While the Tyranids may seem more like a [[Horde of Alien Locusts]], the utterly alien nature of said [[Hive Mind]] and the metaphysical effects of a Hive Fleet's presence (the Shadow in the Warp, which screws with communication, sensors and navigation and causes insanity in psychically sensitive beings) is rather telling. And at one point it was hinted that they were running from [[Always a Bigger Fish|something even worse]].

** Of course, there was the original [http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=2093 Cosmic Horror] if you go WAAAAAY back to the ''Legends'' expansion. The art says it all.

** The "Horror" creature type was actually used as a grab-bag for a blend of vat-grown monsters, demons, experiments [[Gone Horribly Wrong]] ([[Gone Horribly Right|or worse]]), and other creatures that shouldn't have been for various reasons. That said, many are indeed unbelievably horrific things that will burn your sanity.

* The Lords of Cthul from ''[[Monsterpocalypse]]'' are the Cthulhu-esque, Godzilla-sized avatars of powerful extradimensional monsters... who get [[Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?|bodyslammed]] regularly.

* The Unspeakable One from the Freedom City ''[[Mutants and Masterminds]]'' setting. (It also provides Golden Age stats for an eldritch entity, although that barely qualifies - it may ''look'' like Cthulhu, but it doesn't drive you mad simply from looking at it.)

** ''GURPS'' has a few more from diffetent settings and splatbooks: ''GURPS: Cabal'', with its cosmology based on the qabbalah's Sephirot has the creatures of Qlipoth and its Ur-Lords, ''Creatures of the Night'' has the godlike Betweeners, the force called "[[Dark Is Evil|the darksome]]" which is responsible for the creation of the literal organ-farmer [[Split Personality|Darklings]], and many of the non-undead creatures described, a few licenced settings (like ''Cthulhupunk'' and ''[[War Against the Chtorr]]'') have their own native abominations, and ''Infinite Worlds'', the meta-setting that ties [[The Multiverse]] together, not only makes ''all'' the previous settings inter-accessible, but also has at least one world (Taft-7) where humanity never evolved in the first place because of Great Old One (or similar) influence 50 million years back- and although they're long gone, they left enough "Fun Stuff" behind (and the risk of attracting their attention is great enough) for the agencies overseeing interdimensional travel to quarantine the world from any travel there whatever the reason.

* Spoofed in ''[[Pokethulhu]]''. Yes, there are hideous, evil non-Euclidean critters. But you can tame them and use them as [[Mons]] (and they still drive you to insanity).

* ''[[Cthulhu Tech]]''. An RPG set about 80 years in the future after the Mi-go (or rather, [[Spell My Name with an "S"|Migou]]) have attacked earth and the Great Old Ones are stirring. It combines [[H.P. Lovecraft]] with [[Neon Genesis Evangelion]] of all things (what with the gigantic biological weapons called Engels that pilots mentally sync to and ride in their spines).

** It also throws ''[[Guyver]]'' into the mix, with [[Cosmic Horror]] [[Expy|Expys]] of Guyvers and Zoanoids (you can actually play the former).

* ''[[Betrayal at House on the Hill]]'' has, as one of its 'haunt' scenarios, 'The Stars are Right'. Just guess what survivors are trying to stop, and what the traitor is trying to do.

* [[Precursors|The Ancients]] in ''[[Traveller]]''. {{spoiler|Especially Grandfather, who uplifted the rest, and exterminated them by himself after [[You Have Outlived Your Usefulness|they outlived their usefulness]].}}

* ''[[Nobilis]]'' has three main types. First, the True Gods- some of the earliest gods to come into being, to be found below the world in an enormous mass of tentacles and weirdness, [[Interplay of Sex and Violence|simultaneously fighting and mating with each other]]. Next, the Excrucians, beings of not-being from outside reality who aim to destroy the universe, and finally the Actuals, the precursors to the True Gods- the movement like life, before it learned to live. The Actuals are vital to the existence of reality- but if one is summoned into the world, it will consume ''everything'' in a futile attempt to attain self-awareness if it isn't stopped. The True Gods, on the other hand, could quite possibly be the guys who empower the PCs.

* The ''[[Star Wars]]'' RPG has the DarkStryder, a self-aware supercomputer created by a [[Precursor]]-type race that has created several species of its own and looks like [http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20080922130707/starwars/images/6/6b/DarkStryder.jpg THIS], and the Mnggal-Mnggal, a sentient fluid adept at [[Grand Theft Me|possessing bodies]] so horrible that even the Celestials (a [[Precursor]] race even more mysterious than the DarkStryder's creators, and believed to be nearly omnipotent) didn't want anything to do with it and sealed it away. [[Word of God]] from the creator of the latter abomination says it's supposed to be the same type of being as fellow ''[[Star Wars]]'' abomination [[The Crystal Star|Waru]].

** Then there is the [http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/tormanshee.htm Tormanshee], a creature that creates that can be best described as a neural network of [[Mind Rape]]. [[Oh Crap|And every mind it adds to the the network increases its horrible mind rape radius]]. Oddly enough, it is also a [[Non-Malicious Monster]], which just serves to make it even more disturbing.

** And finally, there is [http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/mothneaser.htm Mothneaser], an enormous pillar of flesh with such perfect control over its blood that it can create massive [[Shapeshifter Weapon|Shapeshifter Weapons]], enormous Blood [[Golem|Golems]], and even use victims as [[People Puppets]]. And also, [[From a Single Cell|even a single blood cell of it's can multiply inside other creatures]] and consume them from the inside-out.

*** And don't forget the "honorary" Destroyer, [http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/necromon.htm the Necromon]. Originally just [[The Symbiote]], a unique mutation caused it to grow in size and intellect until is became a [[Physical God]] with control over its smaller brethren-all of which serve as [[Amplifier Artifact|Amplifier Artifacts]] which also were the basis for an ''entire genus'' of monsters. It's [[Lawful Good|friendly]], but it says something that the ''attempted'' replication of it is a capital crime in Mortasheen, on the basis of [[Gone Horribly Wrong|what happens]]. Keep in mind the same people who banned this ''created'' the Destroyers, so something that scares [[Nightmare Fetishist|them]] must be ''really'' bad.