Saturday, November 22, 2025

DM's Guide to Immortals: Nightmare Creatures

The Multiverse spans at least five dimensions (more are theorized to exist).  Humans occupy the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd dimensions, while creatures from the "Dimension of Nightmares" occupy the 3rd, 4th, and 5th dimensions, perceiving dimensions from a perspective exactly opposite to the human viewpoint.

Mortal "Normals" occasionally catch glimspes of the Dimension of Nightmares, and view Nightmare creatures as horrible, malevolent beings, while Nightmare creatures view mortal Normals with much the same horror.

Nightmare creatures find Chaos to be the natural disorder of all things, and believe Law to be unnatural and often with evil motivation, although different viewpoints of behavior and motivation occur in much the same proportions as in humans.

When a wish or other powerful magic is used to force a Nightmare creature into the dimensional space of Normals, the victim must make a successful saving throw vs. Spell or go insane, and vice versa.  However, any creature who voluntarily travels in this way (from either dimensional viewpoint) simply fails to enter the other dimension if the saving throw is failed, and suffers no ill effects.


Prince Ghilkyn


Diaboli

Diaboli are a humanoid race of Nightmare creatures, of sizes equal to the range found in humans.  Diaboli have well-muscled arms and legs, and their skin is bright red, shiny, and hairless.  Their feet have split hooves like a pig's, and their hands have only three fingers each but are otherwise entirely human.  The pupils of their eyes are vertical slits, similar to certain reptiles.  The nose is usually longer and lumpier than a human's.  A long, forked tongue, another reptilian feature, is equipped with the various senses of smell, sound, and heat detection.  Two small horns protrude from the top of the head, but these are merely vestigial remains from early evolution, and are nearly useless.  Each diabolus has a tail just slightly longer than its legs.

Adventurous adult diaboli advance through the same character classes as those available to humans, and gain exactly the same abilities thereby.


Claw the Unconquered #4 (Nov-Dec, 1975)


When I was first reading through the Immortals Set rules, back in 1986, the diaboli immediately brought to mind a character from the 1970s DC comic book series "Claw the Unconquered", a horned adventurer from another plane of existence, "Ghilkyn, Prince of the Thousand Hills".

An article by Mike McArtor updating diaboli for 3.5e was published in Dragon #327 (January, 2005).


Malfera

Malfera* have large, elephant-like faces with a short trunk.  Their heads are topped by large horns.  Large fangs protrude from either side of the trunk.  Their chests are a mass of slimy, short tentacles.  Long, muscular arms end in large, jagged pincers.  Their feet are webbed and clawed.  They are colored night-black but has red veins and eyes.  They are native to the Prime Plane.

*introduced in X5 "The Temple of Death" (1983)


Brain Collector

Brain collectors*, or "Neh-Thalggu" in their own language, are truly hideous, with bloated, yellow-orange, oily, amorphous bodies from which sprout dozens of short writhing tentacles.  They move about on six crab-like legs.  Four large, yellow, bulging eyes and a tooth-filled maw are set in its bulbous head.  They are native to the Ethereal Plane.

*introduced in X2 "Castle Amber" (1982)

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