Reviewing D&D 5E Monsters - Planescape - Morte's Planar Parade, Part 1

 

One of the most popular settings in 2nd Edition AD&D was 'Planescape', which codified a lot of the 'multiverse' world-building that exists amongst D&D's many different planes. Whereas Spelljammer brought up the idea of the different D&D settings as being different planets, Planescape goes a bit further by also connecting all the different parallel dimensions. All the Upper and Lower planes, all the Elemental planes, all the planes of law and chaos and everything that D&D's cosmology is. A lot of what is presented in the core sets of subsequent editions would draw a lot from Planescape. 

The idea of Planescape is a hub-world within the various cosmologies of the D&D world, where celestials, fiends, gods, plucky adventurers and basically anyone could arrive onto the plane-city of Sigil, the City of Doors, which itself allows access to technically all the other planes. The result is a rather funky setting that can be pulled in gothic or noir directions, and also allowed for a whole lot of cosmological world-building and, important for our monster review series, the creation of a lot of monsters that are tied to certain planes. Not that you want to do a lot of combat in Planescape, mind you -- it's just as likely that you are able to talk your way out of confrontations as you are to combat them. Also, the original Planescape had amazing art by Tony DiTerlizzi. I know this blog has a heavy 5E skew, but I am a huge fan of the classics as well. 

If all of this sounds a bit vague, I did purposefully keep it a bit vague because there's just so much to talk about Planescape, and it's something I don't feel the most comfortable talking about until I actually sit down and properly read the accompanying setting sourcebooks. But of course, the most important part of the Planescape box set is the bestiary, Morte's Planar Parade! Morte is the floating skull you see on the cover of the book, a chatty (if slightly crazy) guide that accompanies you on your journey through the City of Sigil. 

Also to note is that Morte's Planar Parade starts off with a whole list of 'planetouched' creature variations to emphasize the sheer enormity of the multiverse. Meaning you could have rules for a Copper Dragon touched by Acheron, or a Aurumvorax touched by Celestia, or Leucrotta that has been transformed by Mechanus... it's a nice bit of customization for campaigns that are set in those locations, but other than going through every customization entry I don't think I really care to talk about them. There's also a couple of specific named NPCs, and an extra appendix for a lot of the humanoid factions and... and again, I really don't have much to say about them, especially since they are so specific to the setting. So this review is really just going to comprise primarily of the main part of the bestiary. 
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Archon - Hound Archon

• Medium Celestial; Lawful Good; CR 4

We'll start off with a group of Celestials, the Archons. Introduced in the original 2E Planescape, and having a rather prominent position in the 3rd Edition Monster Manual, the Archons were essentially 'weaker' celestials that had a different flavour of essentially being angels compared to the much more powerful trio of capital-letter Angels. They represent the plane of lawful good, Mount Celestia, which is a bit of a more specific charge than the generally-just-'good' Angels. Yes, that alignment chart and the planes associated with them are quite important for Planescape. 4E randomly assigned the term 'Archon' to Elementals wearing armour (which 5E adapted as 'Myrmidon'), while 5E for the longest time refused to introduce any new Upper Plane beings other than the three boring Angels in the Monster Manual. 

In 5E, Archons tend to be portrayed as defenders of Mount Celestia, and are particularly eager to fight against fiends. I guess the idea is for them to feel more like a 'celestial army' than the Angels do. When not dealing with fiends, Archons are great at communicating, and apparently all Archons know all languages in the multiverse. Their designs are also a lot more variable compared to the three Angels, who are all variations of 'dude with wings'. Other Celestials are allowed to be a bit weirder, because a lot of these were still written back in the days where the 'be not afraid' weirder angels from biblical mythology hasn't became mainstream quite yet. 

That said, the Hound Archon is... a bit underwhelming. He is just a dog-man with glowing eyes and a glowing sword... but ultimately his body is just furry like, well, any dog standing on two legs. I much prefer his 3E incarnation, where the body is given an unnaturally bright shade of red that gives him a bit of an otherworldly quality. This adds quite a bit of confusion since we'll soon see another group of 'furry angel' celestials in the Guardinals bellow. 

I've been really waiting for the other celestials to be updated for 5th Edition, particularly since it's quite reductive to just have 'just' angels as the representatives of the Upper Planes... but I really do feel like they could've stood and did some reinvention for the Archons and Guardinals, specifically because there's a lot more 'animal people' as regular folk running around in 5th Edition. The animal-people Archons and the Guardinals are already a bit hard to tell apart as they were originally conceived, but having the Hound Archon just be a dog-man is a bit boring. 3E's bright shade of red, which resembles Planetar and Solar Angels, would've been something. 

The Hound Archons act as foot soldiers of Mount Celestia, being as loyal and defensive as the hounds they emulate. Most of the Archons have typical 'holy warrior' abilities like some cleric spells, a holy-infused sword, teleportation, and they have a common 'aura' effect to boost allies -- which fits with the idea that they are much more organized than the independent angels. Interestingly, Hound Archons are also able to shapeshift into dogs and wolves, allowing them to silently protect mortals that have presumably found favour with whatever lawful god they serve. 

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Archon - Lantern Archon

• Small Celestial; Lawful Good; CR 2

Love these little guys! Lantern Archons are just little balls of nondescript light hiding in the background of Archon groupshots in older editions, but the 5E redesign has given them a bit more substance. It's still an orb of light, but there's fragments of what appear to be a shattered metal mask, and three angel wings sprouting out of it. It's a neat enough design, although I feel that the mask probably is a bit too 'humanizing' for an entity whose whole point is to look rather inhuman.

Lantern Archons are the lowest ranked of the Archons, and serve an interesting role. They are little guides, lighting the path of newly-arrived souls to Mt. Celestia and allowing souls that ascend to that plane to traverse it with reverence and respect. They have the same aura, teleport and cleric spells that the Hound Archon has, plus a couple of radiant strikes to zap enemies. Ultimately, though, most of their abilities revolve around guiding and casting out light, which makes quite a bit of sense for an Archon meant to guide souls to the afterlife. 

Again, I do really like the fact that 5E has finally sat down to adapt the Archons. With so many options for demons, devils, yugoloths and non-affiliated fiends, it is quite sad that the only upper-realm celestials are basically just three variants of angels and maybe the Empyrean if you squint, and all of them are just... just dudes. Having a wider variety is definitely welcome. The Archons being all about Law does make them have a fair bit more personality and plot hooks compared to the Guardinals that we'll discuss below, and as various other Law-aligned creatures like Modrons and Maruts have been, it's a fair bit easier to conjure up conflict between them and your PCs.

By dint of actually looking special and unique, the Lantern Archon is probably my favourite out of the updated Archons. 

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Archon - Warden Archon

• Large Celestial; Lawful Good; CR 8

The strongest of the three Archons introduced in this bestiary is the Warden Archon, who are bear-people. Again, not sure if I like the design of either the Warden Archon's 5E or 3E looks, where it's just... a bear in armour, with glowing eyes. I mean, they sure are fancy armour, but I really hope that those floating scrolls behind the Warden Archon follow it around whenever it manifests into the Material Plane. A 'big bear dude' doesn't really quite strike that same sense of otherworldly majesty that a servitor of the Upper Planes should. I like the little detail that when they speak, some glimmering radiance punctuates their voices; but that's not quite enough, I feel. 

Warden Archons are specifically wardens of portals and pathways leading to the godly realms. They are magically tied to these portals, always know when it's used, and move very swiftly to intercept whoever breaches the portal. Warden Archons, as you imagine, are a bit more combative, with a wider selection of spells and melee attacks, and even his Archon aura is meant to debilitate the enemy. 

Again... it does feel a bit of a downer that out of the three Archons that are updated to 5th Edition, two of them are just depicted as regular animal people. Not even animal-people with like, glowing eyes or wings. It would've been gauche, but it would've marked them as not just a Lupin or Werebear in some fancy armour. It is a bit of a shame that they didn't adapt something like 3E's Trumpet Archon or something, which would've at least made the Archon trio as a group a bit more distinct than the Guardinals. 

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Baernaloth

• Large Fiend (Yugoloth); Neutral Evil; CR 17

Oh, an interesting one! Yugoloths have mostly been ignored by D&D's design team after the first couple of bestiaries, getting some token entries here and there but always losing out to Demons and Devils in terms of variety and quantity. So it definitely is a pleasant surprise to see this being represented in 5th Edition! Again, tracing its origin to the original Planescape, the Baernaloth are some of the most powerful Yugoloths, mathcing the Arcanaloths in combat prowess and eclipsing even the Ultroloths in rank. 

Baernaloths live in the Gray Wastes of Hades, and their design is... it's neat enough, though honestly not something we haven't seen out of a fiend. The Baernaloth has a head of a skeletal goat crossed over with a crocodile, with a fancy beard. And he's got some goat feet, it appears, and... oh, it's a large size, can't forget that. But ultimately, it is quite interesting that they picked a visual design that could be reduced to 'creepy giant satyr'. I honestly feel like if they had kept the original 2E design's "straight-up-a-goat-skull", it would've worked a lot better than the weird crocodilian head it has now. 

Which is a bit of a shame, because in theory, Baernaloths should be very creepy. Their nature is up to debate, and only the Baernaloths know the answer. One thing about Yugoloths in 5E is their association with the 'Books of Keeping', which keep the true names of all Yugoloths... but the Baernaloths are not there. Whether they somehow manage to remove themselves from the tomes, if they were the first (or the creators) of yugoloths, or if they had been there all along even before the creation of names itself, no one can say. All that we know is that they are mysterious, reclusive and very powerful, hiding in their extraplanar lairs and doing their own mysterious magical research. 

If there is a theme for the Baernaloths, is that if they are roused to combat, they want to spread despair and discord among its foes. Their 'Miasma of Discord' breath attack causes allies to fight each other in madness, and even striking the Baernaloth will sometimes cause your old wounds to reopen. And that's before the Baernaloth bites you, and you realize their very bite causes literal emotional damage. They live to cause pain and suffering, and sometimes Baernaloths will even heal their enemy just for the express purpose of having them suffer. 

I do really like the expansion of the Yugoloths, particularly giving us a stronger, more powerful member... but just having it 'merely' do psychic attacks and causing anguish doesn't feel to be particularly special. I really did feel like there could be a lot more given to us about Baernaloth lore and how it relates to the Yugoloth faction/species. 

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Bariaur Wanderer

• Medium Celestial; Chaotic Good; CR 3

The Bariaurs hail from the plane of Ysgard, a Norse-inspired celestial plane placed in-between the chaotic good and chaotic neutral worlds. I find it bizarre, however, that a centaur-inspired people hails from there. Centaurs come primarily from Greco-Roman mythology! The Bariaurs are essentially just goat-centaurs, being a bit smaller and having goat horns on their head. The Bariaurs really love exploring, and often serve as guides in other realms connected to Sigil. They have an innate 'portal sense', allowing them to locate where portals are and even instinctively know the destination of these portals. While I appreciate that this is an important aspect of the Planescape setting, it also feels a bit anticlimactic that the Bariaurs aren't just a bit weirder. 

Being celestials, the Bariaurs are particularly susceptible to absorbing and adapting to the vast and varied terrains of the different Outer Planes, often taking on aspects of those planes. These little extraplanar mutations are also detailed in the prologue in this bestiary. There are a lot of tables describing the influence of each and every plane may have on creatures that wander into them. It's all well and good, but I really did wish that it was actually explored more either in the art or the mechanics. 

I like the idea that some species are just very convenient for a DM to use as an exposition or a plot-progression tool, but I also feel like the Bariaurs are a bit too simple and don't offer much beyond that. 

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Cranium Rat Squaker

• Tiny Aberration; Unaligned; CR 0 (regular)
• Medium Swarm of Tiny Aberrations; Neutral; CR 5 (Swarm)

This is a bit unexpected! Cranium Rats were previously printed in 5th Edition in Volo's Guide to Monsters, as a tie-in to the Mind Flayer focus in that book. The Cranium Rat Squeakers in Sigil have no more connection to the Mind Flayers, and they just exist as independent mice with visible brains. Love the artwork of that cute little mouse curled up in what seems to be Sigil's equivalent of a musical sheet. 

The artwork and vibe of the Swarm of Cranium Rat Squeakers, however, is particularly excellent. Volo's Guide to Monsters simply alludes to the fact that when Cranium Rats gather together, they get progressively more intelligent and are a psychic hivemind. Well, Morte's Planar Parade gives us an excellent visual representation of this, showing a swarm of mice essentially holding on to a cloak, some gloves and a hat and puppeteering it like a body. Look at the 'head' of the false body! It's filled with the glowing eyes of the individual Cranium Rats! 

I am a huge fan of this, by the way. A lot of these sourcebooks like to add newer variants of older monsters, like a new kobold or a new goblin or the 16th cloud giant variant or whatever, but I really like it when they go to the weird one-offs introduced in books like Volo's or Mordenkainen's and give them a nice twist. 

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Dabus

• Medium Celestial; Lawful Neutral; CR 2

Okay, these are interesting. The Dabus, I think, bring to my mind immediately some alien from Star Wars with how they look. It's a pretty simple design -- a floating thin man in elaborate robes, two pairs of horns, and wispy hair. Not the most exciting design, and it's not like D&D is in shortage of humanoid species. But the Dabus hold a rather important role in the hub-world of Sigil: they serve the Lady of Pain as the caretakers and maintainers of this nexus of the multiverse. I feel like that's always a very cool aspect of these 'hub worlds'! Mass Effect did a sci-fi version of this with the enigmatic Keepers that maintain the hub-world space station. 

The Dabus are celestials that move around and whenever they pass, being a janitorial team and a security force all in one. I love that while their primary function is to seal cracks in broken roads and restore shattered buildings and blocks; if they find individuals that are disturbing the peace, they will use these city-manipulating abilities to combat them. I love that particular twist, where their attacks are specifically highlighted to be telekinetically thrown bricks and giant hand spells created from cobblestone. 

One last thing that adds a nice hint of charm to the Dabus -- as shown in that 3E artwork -- is that they communicate with what's essentially wingdings.  And this is quite literal, too. They create illusory images in front of themselves to communicate, something that no one other than the Dabus can fully comprehend.

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Darkweaver

• Medium Aberration; Chaotic Evil; CR 10

It's a giant extradimensional spider monster! The Darkweaver has gone from a creepy spindly spider in 2E to an amorphous spider-octopus in 3E; but the 5th Edition take goes back to the arthropod roots. The 5E Darkweaver, I think, is best described as a 'stretched out' fleshy spider, almost resembling a whip-scorpion or an equivalent creature from afar. But take a bit of a closer look and you realize that those fleshy-coloured things are strange, stretched-out flesh-matter that extend from the normal 'head' all the way down to the first joints in their legs. In addition, the rest of the Darkweaver's body is mutated enough from what a spider looks like in the real world. 

In 5E, Darkweavers are noted to be ancient predators in the Shadowfell, the plane of shadows, but has inhabited various dungeons and dark locales across the multiverse. Darkweavers behave like regular giant man-eating spiders, as you do, ambushing prey with their webbing made of shadow. In their lairs, they can teleport through shadow, extinguish flames and instill sensations of fear. Pretty standard shadow-monster stuff. 

That's neat in and of itself, but the main creepiness comes after that. See, Darkweavers are fully intelligent. They are fascinated by sensations and how creatures that are not shadow-born spiders experience reality. Thus, the Darkweavers will draw out the experience of eating and treat every meal as a culinary delight. This little detail does really elevate these connoisseurs beyond just being 'Giant Spider, but shadow'. I honestly think it even makes a fair bit of sense for a creature in the Planescape setting, since there are so many different variations of humanoids that can fall prey to the Darkweaver!

This obsession spirals into how you can interact with the Darkweaver as well. Previous incarnations had a simple 'they try to lure you in with voices' deal, but in 5E, captured adventurers could share tales of their own great meals, and if it's something that the Darkweaver can't possibly fathom or understand, it might end up convincing the Darkweaver to let a fellow epicurean go and return with these rare meals. 

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Demodand - Farastu

• Medium Fiend; Neutral Evil; CR 11

We've got another interesting sub-group of creatures, this time being the Demodands, or Gehreleths. They are fiends that are separate from the three major ones, and are instead associated with the plane of Carceri. Carceri, or sometimes Tartarus, plays off the 'prison plane' flavour of hell that sometimes crops up in media, and a lot of dark, elder evils are imprisoned there. The Demodands are both the oldest prisoners and the wardens of Carceri. The idea of Carceri has always fascinated me, but I don't think I've ever properly read up on the Demodands before doing this review. 

As per 5E lore, Demodands were cast into Carceri aeons ago for a transgression that most have forgotten, and have appointed themselves the jailers of the plane. The Demodands themselves are bound to the plane, just as all other fiends and celestials, but due to their technical status of prisoners, their reformation is noted to be particularly painful. All the Demodands have the ability to summon more Demodands as needed, and they also have an ability called 'boundless movement', allowing them to move through the difficult terrain of Carceri. 

The weakest of the Demodands are called the Farastu, also known as Tarry Demodands. They have a generic beastly-humanoid look, with poorly-defined spikes that jut out from their back. Their body ooze a thick, sticky tar that causes anything to stick to it. The 5E artwork shows the Farastu with lots of random armour pieces stuck to his body, although some are in the process of falling off. Farastus are arrogant, cruel, and delight in tormenting weaker beings. In addition to being jailers, they also double as minions that can temporarily leave Carceri as hunting groups to bring back escaped prisoners. 

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Demodand - Kelubar

• Medium Fiend; Neutral Evil; CR 13

One rank up is the Kelubar, or Slimy Demodand, which is a fat, toadish brute with comically undersized bat wings, and a rather cool-looking monstrous maw. Despite their brutish look, Kelubars are actually the bureaucrats of Carceri, preferring to do battle with words and are concerned more about keeping Carceri running. They serve as intermediaries between Farastus and Shators, and revels in the subservience of others. 

As their moniker implies, Kelubars revolve around acid and poison. Their skin and their spit are both acidic, and they can even create clouds of acidic fog. 

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Demodand - Shator

• Medium Fiend; Neutral Evil; CR 16

And finally, at the top of the Demodand heirarchy is the Shator, or Shaggy Demodand. They honestly don't look too different from the Kelubars, except they are larger, have bigger wings, and a wider smile. 5th Edition gives the Shator some additional hair and nasty-looking boils, but the older editions really didn't have much to differentiate the Kelubars and Shators. 

Shators revel in their role as the wardens of Carceri, not out of some sense of justice -- but out of the desire to be in control and force the other prisoners to suffer like they did. Shators keep meticulous records of both prisoners and subordinates. They have several interesting abilities, like Jailer (allowing it to cast 'Imprisonment' immediately), various paralysis-themed actions, and most interestingly, the Liquefaction Ritual. This allows Shators to liquefy all Kelubars and Farastus near it and turn them into liquid enough to fill a flask, paralyzing them. It falls under the 'jailer' theme of the Demodands, and while this could be a form of punishment, it also feels like something that the Shators can do just to bring a small portable pocket army with him. 

Interestingly, the Planar Parade notes that on the rare occasions that Shators manifest on the Material Plane, they will manipulate mortal leaders and philosophers, using them as mouthpieces to tempt souls towards Carceri. Again, I find the theme of Carceri to be particularly interesting. I don't think that a 'hell-prison' should be classified as Neutral Evil (surely it should be Lawful?) but while I feel there is room for expansion -- I always feel there is room for expansion for everything in 5th Edition that's not giants or dragons -- I feel like the Demodands do really bring up a lot of potential stories and plot hooks to a prison plane where the wardens are not at all interested in justice, just punishment. 

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Eater of Knowledge

• Large Aberration; Neutral Evil; CR 6

Okay, this is an interesting one. The Eater of knowledge is just a giant hulking brute made up of flesh. The 5E redesign actually keeps all of the features from its original 2E artwork, like the massive tube running down his chin to his back, and even the googly eyes... they're just a bit more hidden among the pulsating brains pockmarking its head.

Eaters of Knowledge are created by the Mind Flayers' 'god-brain' Ilsensine, and they wander around... devouring brains and collecting knowledge. Okay, that's not the most exciting thing out there in D&D, but what do you expect from a Mind Flayer creation? Especially with that name? The idea is that the Eater of Knowledge is a much more physical combatant compared to the psionic Mind Flayers. However, there is a cute twist to this -- the Eater of Knowledge consumes brains, and the more brains it consumes, it gains access to more and more powerful spells.

Design-wise I find it all right as a rather typical 'body horror' monster, but I do like the implications of having the spells and abilities of a monster be tied to a resource system.  

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Githzerai

• Medium Aberration (Gith); Any Alignment; CR 9 (Futurist), CR 3 (Traveler), CR 7 (Uniter)

We've got a handful of Githyanki variations in Spelljammer, I believe, and D&D has always been a bit more diligent at printing Githyanki variants due to their more aggressive nature. From left to right, we've got the Futurist, who has ascended psionic powers to be able to slightly see into the future; the Traveler who travels across dimensions; and the Uniter who are members of the Sha'sal Khou -- a faction that tries to reunite the Githyanki and Githzerai. The sure are all nice, more versatile stat-blocks, but to be honest I just can't get myself particularly excited to discuss psionic humanoids after already doing it a couple of times. 

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Guardinal - Avoral Guardinal

• Medium Celestial; Neutral Good; CR 9

We've got another group of 'angel-esque' Celestials, and this time it's the Guardinals! The Guardinals are associated with the Neutral Good plane of Elysium; and... and this was why I had hoped for the Trumpet Archon to be included in 5E. That would make the Guardinals' position as 'animal-men celestials' a lot more distinct. Guardinals embody the beauty, calm and righteousness of Elysium, and also kind of do double-duty as ambassadors of the Beastlands. Again, perhaps the primary setting guide would have a bit more of a distinction between the different Upper Planes, but the creatures themselves don't do the best job at communicating the differences between Lawful Good, Neutral Good and Chaotic Good as much as their fiend counterparts do. Neutral Good, as is communicated by the Guardinals, is essentially doing good to protect the beauty of the natural world, and not out of a desire to maintain the rules. 

In their original 2E appearances, Guardinals are a bit less extreme in their 'animalness', being described as having 'noticeable animal traits' but ultimately leaning more towards the humanoid side. Since 3E, though, they've been depicted as fully animal-men, something that is a bit of a novelty at the time. As I mentioned above with the Archons, though, 'regular' animal-people are way more common in 5th Edition so it is actually a bit of a shame that they didn't try to make the Guardinals more divine, or weird, or something. 

But that's all right, since we do get to talk about the designs. Strongest among the Guardinals in 5E is the Avoral, which is a bird person. The Avoral has the body design that I would associate more with harpies in my head -- arms and wings fused together as a single upper limb. The rest of the 5E Avoral seem to be naked, which is a bit odd since the other Guardinals in other editions are all essentially furries with clothes. 

Avorals are noted to leave the plane of Elysium a bit more often than the other Guardinals due to their wanderlust, but are otherwise pretty simple bird-men celestials. A distinctive design if nothing else, but there's also... not much to them beyond being a 'bird-person'. That really isn't the most exciting thing in D&D, which already has Aarakocras, Kenkus, Harpies and Nagpas. 

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Guardinal - Equinal Guardinal

• Large Celestial; Neutral Good; CR 6

Our second Guardinal is the Equinal, who is a horse-man. There's just something that's a bit fun with Equinals because popular culture and fantasy media tends to really like centaurs and minotaurs... and the Equinal has the body layout of a minotaur, but the associated animal of a centaur. It's neat. I'm not sure if I like the traditional 3E Equinal where the horse-man is portrayed in a near-naked gladiator-like look, or if the somewhat more goofier 'cartoon animal wearing somewhat-modern human clothes' look of the 5E works better at communicating the Equinal as an intelligent being. 

I do think that the tattoos -- especially if they were glowing -- would have communicated the fact that these animal people are celestials a lot better. Honestly, anything would've worked here to indicate that this dude in fancy clothes is actually a celestial instead of just an upside-down centaur. I do really like the little visual detail that the horse's tail-hair is braided. That's cute.

Equinals are noted to be very physically powerful, and they often boast their might in contests of strength and challenges. They are physically powerful with the ability to unleash a shout that stops enemies in their tracks. Not... not the most exciting stat block, is it? That's a bit of a problem that I have with the Guardinals even feeling like they're actual celestials and not extras from an old-school animal-people cartoon. 

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Guardinal - Musteval Guardinal

• Small Celestial; Neutral Good; CR 2

And our last Guardinal is the adorable Musteval, based on mice and other small rodens. I love the little getup that the 5E Musteval has, compared to the skeevier-looking 3E Musteval. I do think that the Musteval might be the only 5E Guardinal whose artwork looks the most like a celestial, and that's because he's clearly dual-wielding daggers made up of light. They are the sneakiest of the three Guardinals, enhancing their natural stealth with illusion magic. 

Again, I get that they wanted to keep true to the 'animal-people' aesthetics, but I also felt like it leaves the Guardinals kind of lacking much in terms of visual or flavour after you get over the 'animal people angels, cool!' vibe. I also felt like the Animal Lords being introduced in the 2024/5.5E Monster Manual also makes the Guardinals feel a lot less special. Admittedly, a good chunk of this is because of the retcons in 4E and 5E that changed Eladrin from the Chaotic Good representatives of these Good-aligned Plane-specific Celestials to feel a lot less moored... but that is the function of these books to flesh these guys out a lot more, no? 

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One Piece 1167 Review: Doppelganger

One Piece, Chapter 1167: Ida's Sons

A bit late to this review -- real life's been quite tight in terms of giving me time to write, but I think I would've waited for the official translations to come out because this chapter features quite a bit of terminologies being tossed around. 

We start off 5 years after God Valley, with a bunch of people reacting about enormous figures bursting out of the ocean and sinking pirate ships. This news spread far and wide, and the mysterious being was briefly compared to the Florian Triangle... which is a nice nod to the fact that ships do go missing in the Florian Triangle even before Gekko Moria started kidnapping pirates and shadows. I would absolutely love for the Florian Triangle to return and be relevant in the mainline continuity!

This mysterious figure is actually Harald, moving with the aid of fog and one-shotting ships with single swings of his sword. He had sworn an 'oath of atonement', and assisted the Marines' effort to uphold order. I do like the little mention that people outside of the Grand Line have never actually ever seen a Giant, which fits with how so much of the world's weirdness happens in the Grand Line, bringing back the epic feeling of the giants when we first met Brogy and Dorry in pre-timeskip era. 

We get a brief description of the era after God Valley. Great pirates would grow in power until they became the 'faces of the era'. Shiki being counted among the number of the future Yonko (Whitebeard, Kaido, Big Mom) isn't surprising, but Wang Zhi gets a cameo there too. It's also at this point that the crew of the Pirate King, Gol D. Roger (or 'Gold Roger', as the narrator calls him) has succeeded in circumnavigating the world. We get a nice showing of the first scene of the manga, too, with the subsequent execution of Roger. 

We learn that at this point, with the era of piracy exploding post-Roger's-execution, with the recruitment of giants into the Marines. That's a nice tie-in to the Elbaph storyline for sure. But more importantly is a scene in Mary Geoise, Harald is facing the Gorosei... and on his left arm is the same tattoo that we observe Shanks having at one point. This is the 'Shallows Covenant', and Warcury names him a 'Devoted Blade', the same title that Gunko had during God Valley. Turns out that the Devoted Blades of God are like, the lowest ranks, the squires, if you will, to the Knights of God.

Unlike One Piece's habit of name-dropping something and never explaining it, we actually do get an explanation this time around. Saturn tells us that there are three levels of covenants, going from the Shallows Covenant to the Depths Covenant and the Abyssal Covenant -- named, unmistakably, after the depths of the ocean. Very thematic to the sea theme of One Piece, but also quite ominous with the whole 'abyss' thing! 

The Gorosei are talking ominously about 'god', talking about how only those with the Abyssal Covenant can enter into a contract with the 'true god'. Only thirteen have done that. No clue if this is just the number of the Knights of God, if that number can be increased or are capped at 13, or if the Gorosei are counted in that number. Very cool!

Harald, of course... is not the smartest fellow, ignoring all of this ominous devil-worship talk. Or rather, he is a bit hyper-focused on one thing and one thing only, which is when Elbaph be allowed to join the World Government. It is a bit sad, honestly, to see just how easily the Gorosei is stringing this man along. We get a brief cameo from Garling, Shamrock and Summers, who aren't particularly happy about Harald being around but lets him go around to the lower world until they call him. 

We cut away some years later to Ryugu Kingdom, or Fishman Island, where Harald and Neptune are having a kingly old time drinking in the palace. They talk about typical kingly stuff, including the betrothal of royal children. Neptune notes that there is a prophecy (Madam Shyarly, of course) that he would have a daughter in four years. Neptune even knows that Shirahoshi is going to be born with some atypical powers. Harald brushes it off, making the same joke that Roger did in the Oden flashback about Neptune's "shaggy daughter". 

It's a cute little call-back, of course, if only for the fact that 'shaggy', or 'mosa' in the original Japanese, is the name of Loki's mysterious ally that he has been in contact with. And while the logistics of Loki meeting Shirahoshi (or Neptune, if we're being fair) is a bit odd and needs some explaining, we do know that 'shaggy/mosa' is a lot meeker than Loki...  but also worryingly is in a place that seems to be under attack. I like this tie-in to the present day, even if Shirahoshi being Loki's ally and friend is a bit... odd. I'm all for it, though. 

We also get Saul arriving at Elbaph, and being welcomed by Harald. Harald recruits Saul to open a school for the young giants there. Pretty nice little scene.

And 15 years ago... we get the escape of Fisher Tiger, running away and facing off against a Knight of God. Very clearly a highly silhouetted Shamrock/Shanks. Tiger attacks the Knight of God, grabbing a bandage off of his face... but the Knight of God instead tells him quickly where the armory and keys are before leaving. This lets Fisher Tiger cause some explosions and break free all the slaves, and we get to see the cameos of the three Boa sisters and Koala, escaping alongside Fisher Tiger. 

The aftermath of this has the Knights of God assemble (where were you when Mary Geoise burned, punks) with Summers noting that there is a manhunt for whoever the 'rat' that helped the rebels were. And... and Garling introduces Shanks to Harald, saying that Shanks is Shamrocks's twin, separated after birth, and will soon take the Depths Covenant... but currently is a mere 'Devoted Blade' like Harald. 

Harald briefly wonders if he has met Shanks before, but Shanks -- whose eyes are bandaged up, presumably from an unseen encounter with Blackbeard that gave him his eye scars -- starts acting his heart and soul out, going through the whole Celestial Dragon routine.  'You peon! How dare you speak to me as if we are equals! Filthy Lower Realm creature! I have the blood of Figarland in my veins!' All that stuff. He does not break character at all in front of the other God Knights, but it is important to note that this is still the Shanks that grew up with Roger, and by the timeline, he already has a crew at this point.

So yeah, Shanks is acting his heart out being an evil man, totally so evil and such a high-and-mighty noble and he wasted the 24 years of his life being surrounded by filthy lower-realm mongrels and all that jazz. I like this. 

And finally, we have the last scene of the chapter, where Ida is sick. Of course, she is a mother in a flashback. Ida refuses to burden Harald with searching for a doctor, and keeps telling Mato (who is the current proprietor of the bar) to run the bar for her. Loki shows up, all tsundere-like, yelling at the 'hag' to eat some fresh beef that he hunted for her so she can reopen the bar and totally not because he cares for the 'outsider hag', b-b-b-baka. Meanwhile, Hajrudin and his new crew is going out to search for a doctor for Ida, and one of the other giants tells Ida that 'her boys' are taking good care of her. 

Which, of course, is a nice little subplot happening in the background of Ida always being nice to Loki despite everything. And Loki, of course, ends up liking Ida. But as Loki goes to Brewers' Village, the village where his birth mother Estrid comes from, he is confronted with these 'elders' that have been constantly stopping Harald from marrying Ida all the while. The village elders of Brewers Village start talking about how they don't want the 'outsider' to become queen, and that they want to protect their fortune and status... and an old man reveals that they have poisoned Ida with an incurable poison.  

As Mato and the unnamed local doctor frets over Ida, she makes a claim that she considers Loki her son, just like Hajrudin. Meanwhile, we smash-cut to the Brewers Village... which is on fire. Deservedly. Loki is holding a hammer, choking out the ringleader, and he is yelling about how his real mother threw him off of a cliff into the underworld, and Ida is the only woman that he considers a mother, yelling into the night. A really powerful scene, which is really punctuated by the fact that poor Ida's likely going to die regardless. But with how much of a little shit Loki has been... it's really powerful.

A lot of major world-building revelations in this chapter, and I don't want to take away from that. But it is also a very strong final scene here with Loki, I feel, and I'm happy to be coming back to building up Loki as a character.

Random Notes:

• A young Big News Morgans (Small News Morgans?) makes a brief cameo interviewing people who were reacting and yelling about Harald. Impel Down also makes a cameo appearance. 
• When the random pirates were all panicking and reacting over Harald's assaults, I thought we were going to learn that the epic explosion/destruction of God Valley actually did unleash something. Turns out it's not. 
• Harald is essentially acting as a prototype version of the Shichibukai. I don't think we've got any canon timeline of when the Shichibukai were first established/founded, but some quasi-canon anime OVA specials did establish it as happening 30 years pre-the-present-day, while Harald was doing this 33 years ago. 
• Big Mom's shot in this chapter is a nice segue between her younger self and the massive, monstrous mouth of her present-day self. 
• Notably, the giants that were recruited into the Marines were noted to be taken from other regions, and not all (if any) come from Elbaph. 
• Of course as Harald is meeting the Gorosei,  we get random Celestial Dragons yelling outside wanting to get Harald as a slave. 
• Shangara seems to be a nod to Shandora, all the way in the Skypiea arc? I can't even begin to start the speculation on how this is probably some tie-in to the ancient sky people being descended from the moon, and, and, the Lunarians, and the Enel cover story, and, and, and-
• Harald likes Neptune, but I find it nicely and subtly heartwarming that his instant response to the arranged marriage is "barahahaha, forget it!". While the focus of the scene ends up distracting most readers with the 'mosa/shaggy' nickname and conspiracy stuff, I find it adorable that Harald, despite his strained relationship with Loki, doesn't want to put Loki through the same hell he went through with his own arranged marriage. 
• Queen Otohime has a cameo in this, having just given birth to a young Prince Manboshi. Got to love these little timeline-relevant cameos. 
• There have been people discussing how Fisher Tiger's epic feat of climbing the Red Line on his own to free the slaves was 'erased', but there was a scene at the end of Fisher Tiger's life where he tells us that everything was a fabrication, that he was a slave that was lucky enough to escape, and that it was more important that he's a symbol. It's an interesting showcase of One Piece's continued theme of 'history remembers events differently', but this one shows that the truth actually paints a likable protagonist in a 'worse' or less heroic light than the epic stories instead of the other way around.
• I do think that the chapter is smart to remove any ambiguity that Shanks is still good all along by showcasing him helping Fisher Tiger's escape with the bandage marking his identity; preventing any more 'is Shanks secretly evil zomg' questioning. The plot twist is Shamrock, not evil Shanks. 

Let's Play Pokemon Legends Z-A, Part 15: ¡Mucha Lucha!

Last among our Rogue Mega Evolutions is a Mega Hawlucha, which I face with Lida. As I climb up the rooftop of the buildings, a woman is actually looking for the missing Hawlucha -- it's not exactly her Pokemon, but it's a wild hawlucha that has developed a bit of a bond with her and she's been feeding it all this time. Again, with this second batch, the game wants to really emphasize that the Rogue Mega Evos are going a bit out of control and members of the public are starting to wise up to it. 

Hawlucha's Mega form is... it's perfect, actually. It's basically everything you would want from an epic Hawlucha evolutionary form, just more luchador stuff, more muscles, and a lot more bling. Unlike some of the other Megas that try to change too much of the design, I feel like Mega Hawlucha keeps the core of what made the original design so memorable. This feels something like Mega Pinsir, Mega Charizard Y or Mega Absol -- some of my favourite Megas that just changes a couple of details that are obvious enough to be a significant change, but doesn't go over-the-top, you know? 

The fight against Mega Hawlucha itself isn't... the most exciting, I am afraid to say, especially when compared to Mega Banette and Mega Beedrill -- which were very hectic for me. Mega Hawlucha is just a 'regular' Mega Raid, and its little gimmick is just jumping up to the sky, disappearing for once... before FLYING PRESS THE HELL DOWN ON YOU, WHO'S THERE JUMPING UP IN THE SKY????

That's cute, although admittedly there wasn't a whole ton beyond that. Having both my regular Megas -- the Fairy-type Meganium and the Psychic-type Slowbro -- being super-effective against Mega Hawlucha and both of them being super defensive probably was what made this feel like an easy sequence as well, though. 

I return to the Hotel Z and get into a discussion with team MZ. All of them agree that it's important to get to the root cause of the Rogue Mega Evolutions, but since we have absolutely no information, we're kind of shit out of luck. It's time for another Z-A Royale promotion, though, and this time we're up against Ivor, the big over-the-top martial arts guy we met quite early in the game. I... I genuinely forgot he existed. 

Anyway, I take a bit of a break from the main story and go around completing all the side-quests available to me. First up is the contact lenses lady, who has a bit of a twist on the fetch quests... she doesn't just want to see the Mega Evolution, she wants to fight with them! Which is a bit of a problem because my Camerupt is very much freshly evolved, but it does lead to a cute moment where I have to not kill her party to gather up the Mega Energy, while also keeping my Camerupt alive. She next asks for Mega Sableye, which probably makes the most sense for getting inspiration for contact lenses... Sableye's eyes are gemstones! As Arden notes... Sableye's Mega EYEvolution is inspirational. Eh? Eh?

One of the sidequests involves a sailor in one of the canals, who is faced with a quintet of Binacles around his boat. The sailor asks me to help him get rid of the Binacles, leading to a fight with five of them. This brings back memories of the horde battles from Pokemon XY, where five Pokemon would jump you at once! 

...I one shot all five with Slowbro unleashing Surf, which I felt was appropriate for these aquatic parasites. It was hella satisfying to see, though. 

Turns out these Binacles aren't there to break the boat or anything! They're sentient beings, and they just want to ride on the boat! The ending has all five sitting on the boat with the sailor being excited about it. This one was very, very cute. 

Another side-quest involves a gardener whose garden is being menaced by Weedles. He begs me to help him get rid of a giant Alpha Weedle, which looks glorious with its glowing eyes. I end up giving him the Alpha Weedle at the end of the fight, however, because he ended up becoming sad and realizing that he bonded with the Alpha Weedle that appreciates his berries? And that he can feed the Alpha Weedle sustainably, and the Alpha Weedle will keep out the other Weedles? But you said at the beginning of the quest that the Alpha Weedle was leading the other Weedles? Hmm, sir? Well, whatever. He's got a big worm, and he's happy. 

A fun little quest involves a lady with a Meditite who can't keep focus in meditation, and asks me to go look for the 'Legendary Yoga Master'. Which takes the form of a riddle. More of quests like these, please, Legends team, and not just 'I want to fight you with status moves hurr durr'. The riddle here involves the position of a clock, and the location closest to the sky. It's fun enough deciphering it -- the clock face position obviously refers to Lumiose City's design as a whole, so 12 on the clock must mean it's on the straight line up from Prism Tower to the northern end of the city... but 'closest to the sky' had me running around the different nearby rooftops looking for her until I realized that I had to go for a building within the Wild Zone. 

The Legendary Yoga Master and her Medicham is located in Wild Zone 2, the one with the 'shiny hunt' building if you know it. She takes a look at the quest-giver, and admonishes her for not properly understanding a Meditite's diet. Meditites aren't supposed to eat until they are full, the nature of their bodies means that they must subsist on minimal nutrition. I like this; this happens a lot in real life where a lot of irresponsible pet owners project what humans would like and do and end up causing their pets to have supremely unhealthy diets and lifestyles. 

A short sidequest includes encountering a courier who boasts about his love of Flying-type Pokemon, showing off Pidgey, Pidgeotto and Pidgeot and the move Fly. Like Dig, Fly in this move is a lot more fun because the Pokemon actually disappears from the battlefield for a brief period, before flying down. The dude's delivery company actually has a Talonflame mascot instead of anyone from the Pidgey line, which gave me a bit of a chuckle. 

There is a rather cute sequence where a Goomy appears to give me a quest! ...which isn't anywhere that funny, because all it leads to is an angry policewoman who asks me questions about the Goomy, thinking that I'm the irresponsible owner that is leaving the Goomy oozing up public property. After a battle, turns out that the owner is a little kid that comes and runs off. That is profiling, lady police, I have half a mind to report you to the police chief!

Another sidequest involves Mirte, a woman who sets up a Substitute Doll and asks me to help demonstrate the move Slash to her specifically, just so that her Scyther can learn Slash. I mean, it's just a minor inconvenience in a game that lets you swap moves at any time, so Malamar just slashes the tiny little substitute doll. Turns out that Mirte wants to open a salon for Furfrou, and this is how you get the option to change the hair for your Furfrou. A bit... odd, honestly, but okay. I honestly find the Furfrou gimmick to be quite forgettable. They really should've done a bit more to differentiate the different forms, although I suppose that's the whole point; it's just cosmetic. 

And one of the last side quests I did was a funny one, where I find a gigantic ball of spiderweb with someone inside yelling for help. Did Spider-Man visit France or something? The guy inside yells that I need to hit him with a strong move, and refuses to let me attack if I use regular moves. Turns out that he wants base power, so I have Meganium charge up and unleash the mother of all Solar Beams, breaking him free. 

Turns out that the guy was webbed up by his own three Spinaraks, who were angry at him for destroying their webs. Mighty strong webbing your Spinarak can make, but it's also worrying that you don't discipline your partner Pokemon, sir. This particular side-quest is quite cute; the guy runs away as the three Spinarak hop after him trying to punish him for wanting to sell the Spinaraks' thread for profit. 

In a nice little continuity nod, Vivace, the lady who asked me to show her the five different Flabebe variants, has actually caught all five Flabebes and evolved all five of them into Floettes. She challenges me with all five Floettes at once, leading to a five-on-one battle... that I trivialize with my Scolipede Poison Jabbing every one of them out. Vicace finds poisoned fairies inspirational enough to still upgrade the salon services, giving a fresh set of pastel colours among her offerings. Okay! That... that kind of makes sense, actually.   

In Wild Area 12, as I wander around trying to catch those damn elusive Delibirds, I run across a block of ice with a Numel frozen inside. Oh no! Poor Numel! Its trainer Gelli bemoans the event, because apparently they were just walking around when they got caught out in the crossfire of Ice-type Pokemon fighting each other. Apparently her Numel got hit by '10 Ice Beams'. I end up shooting a fire move to melt the Numel's ice. Poor Numel! It isn't really bothered, though, and is actually snacking on some berries when I free it. 

And finally, I explore Wild Area 13, which is a tiny wild area sequestered to the North-Western part of the city. I love the way this was done! The forest has been infested with giant bugs, and we see that huge chunks of trees have been cut down by Pinsirs and Scythers. Heracrosses are there, too. Meanwhile, on the other end are little swarms of Phantumps and a giant Alpha Trevenant. I like the story being told here, as the Bug-type Pokemon have come to make this area their own, and the Trevenant seem to be guarding its side of the forest. 

Phantump normally evolves by trading, but I like that just like in XY, Trevenants are still able to be caught in the wild. Now, I would really have preferred a full 'haunted forest' (or 'haunted park', I suppose) area, but this was a nice alternate solution, I feel. Always had a soft spot for Trevenant, if I didn't already run around with a Meganium and Aegislash in my party, I would totally run Trevenant. 

Anyway, next up we'll figure out what nonsense the Fists of Justice are up to, I guess!

Random Notes:

• Random NPC: "If the Pokemon really wanted to, they could destroy Lumiose in no time."
• Some of the sidequests described here are technically unlocked at varying points as I progress through the Ivor/Gwynn storyline, but I was essentially working on both parts of the article at the same time to separate the story-heavy parts from the sidequests.
• Two more lackluster quests are 'tutorial' battles, of which we've had a couple of at this point. I fight a lady with Clefairy and Lopunny that teaches me about Pokemon friendliness; a lady that teaches me about HP-draining moves; and a pair of joggers that teach me about buffing and debuffing moves. I get that it's a tutorial for newer players, but surely there are better ways to do this? Or at least ways to make the quests a lot more interesting? You could still teach me about Pokemon friendliness while spotlighting a specific Pokemon, you know? 
  
• Another sidequest that unlocks a holovator up the side of a building just involves me giving a worker a drink. It's... I guess one might be generous and say it's a reference to the Saffron City guards? It's such a boring sequence that I'd rather have a repeat of the 'thundershock a holovator' again. Maybe actually, y'know, feature a Pokemon or something in the quest?
• This sidequest did lead to a rooftop sequence that led to a Larvitar randomly chilling in the center of the building complex. It really is something that bothers me a fair bit with the fully urban setting, because... this really doesn't make sense, right? 
• I did a bunch of evolutions as I was running around, most importantly with my Alpha Pokemon -- like Talonflame. My favourite is to get an Alpha Mega Gyarados that looks properly impressive with the additional size boost. 
• I have never, ever realized that Mega Sableye's model actually has a black empty slot where the giant gemstone exploded out from. That is a cool little detail! With Legends Z-A giving you more opportunities to run around with your Pokemon, I feel that these details with the Mega-Evolved models jumps out a bit more to me. 
• I also love how Mega Sableye runs around with his big gemstone, which of course is not something you'll ever see the model do in the original Gen VI-VII games.  
• Wow, the Mega Evolutions are really under-represented in the TCG, huh? Mega Pinsir didn't have art until the mobile game TCG Pocket, Mega Sableye's only card is shared with Tyranitar, and Mega Medicham doesn't have a card at all. And yet they had space to design the ugly, gaudy 'break' cards? 
• More random easter eggs from passers-by include references to Diantha's movies, which remain popular as ever... and the revelation that Tierno is going on a tour in Unova! You go, boy! Another less-pleasant easter egg is a sweets saleswoman who reminisces about Mr. Bonding. No! No Mr. Bonding!