Fantastical Mounts: Ride into Legend with New Creatures for 5E
No terrain too difficult
A dragonborn warrior, you are proud of your heritage. When your family came to Ulthe-Gana from the Dragon Realm, you were eager to explore the new lands and represent your kind among the people native to the world. As an adventurer, you call Gryphongaffe home, and with your stalwart companions fought against the tide of evil. You stopped the barrow witch’s rise to necromantic might, slew the froghemoth spawned by a cult of Muckwuggle and even aided in the defense of your new home alongside heroes of renown like Relion.
When you learned of the threat to your people’s own settlement upon Ulthe-Gana from a savage tribe of fiendish gnolls, you returned there in haste to aid in the battle to come. On the front lines against the bloodthirsty army, you stood toe to toe with your clutchmates when the howling hordes descended. Bloodlust in their wild eyes, the gnolls pressed relentlessly, moving closer to the frontier settlement. Your numbers dwindled, but you knew your duty and held fast.
When the dranther cavalry emerged from the portal to the Dragon Realm, the tide turned. Led by paladins astride elite dranther, squads of soldiers mounted on the draconic steeds pour onto the battlefield. Pouncing into the midst of the horde, a chance for survival springs anew. Inspired by the arrival of such noble forces, you surge forth back into the fray alongside your people’s esteemed warriors. One of the gnoll commanders brutally strikes you down, and you are prepared to meet your ancestors knowing you stood your ground to the last. But as the foul fiend raises a bloody flail to finish you off, a liege lord astride an elite dranther leaps over the surrounding combatants, its huge claws felling your would-be killer in a single strike. Rising to your feet to fight on, you make a vow to yourself that, should you survive this day, you will join the legion and earn such a mighty mount for yourself.
Sign of nobility
A dragonborn warrior, you are proud of your heritage. When your family came to Ulthe-Gana from the Dragon Realm, you were eager to explore the new lands and represent your kind among the people native to the world. As an adventurer, you call Gryphongaffe home, and with your stalwart companions fought against the tide of evil. You stopped the barrow witch’s rise to necromantic might, slew the froghemoth spawned by a cult of Muckwuggle and even aided in the defense of your new home alongside heroes of renown like Relion.
When you learned of the threat to your people’s own settlement upon Ulthe-Gana from a savage tribe of fiendish gnolls, you returned there in haste to aid in the battle to come. On the front lines against the bloodthirsty army, you stood toe to toe with your clutchmates when the howling hordes descended. Bloodlust in their wild eyes, the gnolls pressed relentlessly, moving closer to the frontier settlement. Your numbers dwindled, but you knew your duty and held fast.
When the dranther cavalry emerged from the portal to the Dragon Realm, the tide turned. Led by paladins astride elite dranther, squads of soldiers mounted on the draconic steeds pour onto the battlefield. Pouncing into the midst of the horde, a chance for survival springs anew. Inspired by the arrival of such noble forces, you surge forth back into the fray alongside your people’s esteemed warriors. One of the gnoll commanders brutally strikes you down, and you are prepared to meet your ancestors knowing you stood your ground to the last. But as the foul fiend raises a bloody flail to finish you off, a liege lord astride an elite dranther leaps over the surrounding combatants, its huge claws felling your would-be killer in a single strike. Rising to your feet to fight on, you make a vow to yourself that, should you survive this day, you will join the legion and earn such a mighty mount for yourself.
Wild and woolly
The scout you hired to guide your trek southward warned of the dangers you’d face from weather and terrain, but you never expected this. What danger could temperature, travel and some snow pose that blood cultists hadn’t already?
Plenty, as it turns out. The packhorses fell one by one. The first was claimed by the strong-flowing waters of an icy river as your party barely made the crossing. The next was put down after a misstep on the rough mountain path made the poor beast lame. Goblin raiders managed to take out two more before you and your companions could overcome the nasty creatures.
On your last legs, you stumble forward. Biting winds and driving snow make every step feel like a mile, and your stomach grumbles from pangs of hunger. Much of the provisions for the trek were lost along the way, and the ranger in your group has had a difficult time scavenging for food in this unfamiliar environment.
Disheartened, your party stops for the day, taking refuge in the shelter of a copse of pine trees. Huddled together, you shiver and draw closer to the sputtering fire, shutting your eyes to get a few fitful hours of sleep before continuing the journey through the desolate lands.
You awake to a blast of warm, moist air in your face and open your eyes to see a huge, woolly head filling your vision. Alarmed, you spring to your feet, reaching for your sword. An enormous beast eyes you curiously. The six-legged creature rears back in fright at your sudden movement, crying out with a loud honking sound as it stomps backwards ready to defend itself.
Elsewhere in your small camp, another of the creatures chews its way through your party’s remaining foodstores, as the scout you hired pats the beast’s woolly head, encouraging it to continue. The scout notices your dismay and motions for you to calm down.
“Shhh, don’t scare them,” she says. “These gantuans are peaceful creatures – as long as they’re well-fed. If we share our food, they can help us and make the trek through the mountains go much easier.”
Gantuans, huh? You’ve never heard of them before. But judging by their size, a single one of these creatures could easily carry you and all your companions. Sure, it’s another mouth to feed, but the scout assures you the effort is well worth it for the convenience one of these fantastical mounts can provide.
Discover all these and more
In Chimes of Discordia: Fantastical Mounts, you’ll find abidzers, dranthers, gantuans and more ready to add to your 5E games. These brand new creatures are designed as options for character mounts, with information on how to find and train these creatures, the trade goods they can provide, and several alternate varieties of them.
Whether your quests carry your into lightless depths, frozen tundras or beneath the waves, each of these fantastical mounts is designed to make travel a unique experience. Finding and training them can be an adventure all its own, so what are you waiting for? Head over to the Nerdarchy store and mount up!
Design diary
There’s an old saying “the first step is always the hardest.” Starting a new journey of any sort can be a challenge to simply begin. The time before setting off on a new course can be filled with anxiety, dread, overthinking and self-doubt.
In the case of Chimes of Discordia: Fantastical Mounts, a new digital product created here at Nerdarchy, we experienced none of these stumbling blocks. All of us involved in bringing this collection of original 5E creatures to the gaming community dove right into the work with one goal in mind – do our best to create something special.
When Nerdarchist Dave looped me in on the project under the vision of Nerdarchist Ted and Nate the Nerdarch, I jumped at the opportunity to help. They peeled back the curtain on their creation process and the material from their imagination workshop and I fired up the ol’ InDesign to get down to business.
After getting involved, from soup to nuts it took about one week for Chimes of Discordia: Fantastical Mounts to hit the Nerdarchy store. The ideas and concepts floated around for a while prior, but once we hunkered down and got serious, things came together pretty quickly.
Every step of the way was (and continues to be!) a learning experience. In my regular job as a layout designer and copyeditor for newspapers, I’m provided most of the assets needed to get the job done. Copy, photos, graphics and page elements from nameplate to masthead follow a set style and are provided in advance. Sure, there’s a personal touch like rewriting headlines and designing pages to look appealing and engage readers, but creating this book was a whole other level.
Aside from the piece of commissioned artwork, everything was done from scratch. The custom font on the cover, page toppers, the parchment background down to gradient rules on the stat blocks and page numbering was created during design to complete the trade dress.
It is not the slickest product on the market. But it is a complete product and I’m proud of the work we did. Whether it’s my writing, design work or anything else I produce, criticisms are always welcome. It reminds me I’m doing something. I would not be here writing these notes if I hadn’t put myself out there to take on the Nerditor role and manage the content for Nerdarchy, or step up to put this product together.
Just like the adventurers we create and play in our games, I learn through experience and get better at whatever I focus on. Right now I might be a 1st level product layout designer. But proficiency can only grow (unless i draw the Fool from a deck of many things…).
Bringing Chimes of Discordia: Fantastical Mounts to fruition was an amazing experience. Working closely together, the team poured over the content time and time again looking for ways to improve and enhance it, both mechanically and visually. At the same time we stayed aware of “analysis paralysis” with an eye towards completing a store-ready product by our self-imposed deadline.
And we did it! Looking back at all the draft versions (and there’s a lot) the book evolved enormously in only a tenday. Like any creators, we continue to look critically at our work and we’ll use that as fuel to move forward into additional projects. The tabletop roleplaying game space is an exciting place to be and adding our voices and vision to the ever-growing content is exhilarating.
While we’re already at work on several other projects to share, we are also taking time to refine what we already created too.
For Chimes of Discordia: Fantastical Mounts this means a brand-new cover. On this new version you’ll see the wonderful illustration of the abizder creature pop off the page ready to inhabit your 5E game world.
Nerdarchy would like to give a huge thank you to everyone who’s already picked up a copy of Chimes of Discordia: Fantastical Mounts. If you’ve used any of the content in the book, head over to the product page and leave a review, or let us know in the comments below what you liked or didn’t like about it. What other sorts of projects would you like to see from Nerdarchy?
We’d love to hear what you have to say about the exciting new directions we’re taking and, as always, stay nerdy!
Chimes of Discordia: Fantastical Mounts in the Nerdarchy store
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