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At a Glance
Absurd Adversary
Even within the context of a fantasy world which breaks many of the “rules” that govern our own, this monster is irrational and/or fundamentally stupid, earning it a spot in my Absurd Adversaries list.
- “…a human-sized flightless birdlike creature…” — Flightless birds are ridiculous to begin with, so if you’re going to turn one into a monster (instead of an easily ignored animal) then you better have a great concept. I don’t know if there was a great concept in the designer’s head, but this monster fails to deliver.
- …far more intelligent than they look.” — Well that shouldn’t be hard, since an abrian looks like a flightless bird. Unfortunately its intelligence score is still 7, which places it right between an ogre and an orc. I get that that’s smart enough for some creatures to be dangerous, but in combination with the next couple of bullet points here it prevents the abrian from being taken seriously.
- “…engage in trade with nomads and traveling merchants.” — What, exactly, do they trade? They’re not smart enough to engage in crafts, as noted above. After all, I don’t see ogres and orcs being big on craftsmanship, and that’s the ballpark the abrian is playing in. The next point also demonstrates that the abrian is physically incapable of both craftsmanship and the exchange of trade goods.
- “…a pair of scaly, atrophied humanoid arms…” — ’nuff said.
Well, this all comes together to paint a pretty picture. A pretty stupid picture, that is. A flock of comparatively dumb, mostly defenseless, totally flightless birds, who want to acquire stuff (barding?) and maybe magic items from passersby in exchange for feathers, eggs, and dung.
Since they’re kinda stupid, they probably get cheated a lot, which helps explain their evil alignment. They can’t carry much of anything (shriveled clawlike hands and reduced carrying capacity) and they’re not really equipped to don armor or use weapons.
They have to depend on their trading partners to do all the lifting and carrying, so presumably a group of abrians surrounds each merchant and threatens to shriek if the merchant tries to cheat them. The merchant would have to deliver his payment to the abrian’s treasury and stack it himself, and then carry away his feathers and eggs by himself, escorted the whole way by this watchful pack of mean birdbrains.
The stench alone would be enough to keep most merchants away. What would make you that desperate to acquire abrian feathers?
The abrian’s only ranged attack is its shriek, which has a 20 foot range and a wimpy DC 12 Fort save. A single quasit could wipe out an entire “communal flock” of 40 abrians in an afternoon. It would be a waste of the quasit’s time, but hey… any diversion is a good diversion when you want to escape your superiors’ notice for a while.
I dunno, I guess the abrian could be useful for humor, but it would inevitably be centered around how absurd this creature is. Which makes it a nice fit for this category.
Sources
- Fiend Folio page 12
- WotC Monster Index
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