Gargoyle

This information is intended for use with the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game.


At a Glance

An earthy monstrous humanoid.


Appearance

Size

The gargoyle is described in the Monster Manual. Basically it’s a living statue. The point of this section is to outline how big it is and how much it weighs.

The gargoyle is a monstrous humanoid, not a construct, so it’s not carved, and it’s not totally accurate to think of it as proportional to a human male. However, it does have two arms, two legs, and a head (plus wings and a tail) and I’m going to look at it as a human male with 25% extra body mass which accounts for the extra appendages.

It’s convenient to equate gargoyle height and HD, so that’s what I’m going to do. At 4 HD, a gargoyle is 4 ft tall and Medium size. At 8 HD, it’s 8 ft tall and Large size.

I see gargoyles being made of granite. Granite has a density/weight of 2691 kg per cubic meter, so a certain amount of granite is roughly 2.7 times the weight of an identical quantity of human flesh and bone.

The process for finding a reasonable weight for a gargoyle is pretty straightforward. Start with the weight of a healthy human male of the appropriate height… 180 lbs at 6 ft tall, for example. Add 25% for the wings, tail, and horns: 225 lbs. Finally, multiply by 2.7 because it’s all made of granite: a 6-foot gargoyle should weight about 600 lbs.

Here’s a more complete table.

Ht (ft) Wt (lbs)
4 265
5 415
6 600
7 825
8 1075
9 1350
10 1675
11 2000
12 2400
13 2800
14 3250
15 3750
16 4250
What You See
Art Review

Visually, there’s plenty of inspiration on Google, but I’m thinking here more specifically about humanoid gargoyles. Here’s one example from deviantArt, and this one is also good.


Climitat


Variations

Gargoyles are related to kapoacinth.


Notable Individuals

In Faerûn
Elsewhere

Sources

Primary Sources
Passing Mention

Disclaimer

Wizards of the Coast, Dungeons & Dragons, D&D, Forgotten Realms, and their logos are trademarks of Wizards of the Coast LLC in the United States and other countries. This blog is not affiliated with, endorsed, sponsored, or specifically approved by Wizards of the Coast LLC.

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