I love bestiaries. I think they are cool. Little bios of the monsters you fight in game.
I’ve had this idea for years, like since around ashes was released. I imaged this guy whos father was a respected member of the Gildam Arcanum. The boy wasn’t as skilled as his farther, only ever managing to cast Panetti’s replicating missile and only a weak version at that. The boy was still very smart, he aced every exam on the history of the arcane. Memorized all the important figures and there achievements. Even spent hours debating and conversing theories and ethics. “If the gods aren’t real then how are all these occultist and shamans casting non aether based magic?” That would always get the old prunes blood boiling. He was fine with his lack of ability. He cared more about the learning then casting spells. With the help of his father and the vast understanding of the arcane he became a member of the Gildam Arcanum.
Wondering how he could make his mark in a world were all the great arcanist were powerful spell casters, he set his sights on his strength. Academia. After reading an old legend about the beast Beronath and how all rift spawns decide from its blood he had a thought. But that can’t be. Rift spawns very to much in there design, from insectoid rift spawns to raptors, the traditional rift hound to the briarthorns which are just living bushes in his eyes. How can a brairthorn be a decedent of this ancient beast if shaman summon them and they get there power from gods he knows nothing about. Is there a connection? Some believe there is power in blood. Some legends say humans were born from the blood of a god. Maybe Benronth’s blood mutated the land and creatures around it. What if its all connected blood, gods, magic, the arcane. what if he could fined an underlining theory to explain it all. It would be such a major discovery he would be just as iconic as Iskandra, Trozan, Maiven, Olexra, and even Pannetti who is credited for taking a preexisting spell and expanding upon it. “Why can’t I do the same?” He thinks. But he’ll need proof and lots of it. It could takes years maybe decades to get the proof he needs but that’s the price of immortality. So he packed up and set out for Burrwitch to study the brairthorns and other rift spawns.
After a year or so of arriving the grim dawn happened, putting a pause to his research. Now he spends his time traveling with random adventurers. Documenting the creature they encounter. Noting there strengths and weaknesses hoping that one day he can finish his research. But who knows maybe the evidence he needs is closer then he thinks.
I’ve tried multiple ways to get this idea to work but they all seem to fall flat. I’m still not 100% happy with this approach but its the best I can do at the moment.
I use multiple techniques to achieve this. Some traditional and more excepted were as others new and more controversial.
Lets start with the more controversial one first.
I open up the world editor and place the monster I want to use into the world and record it with OBS studios. I Use the world editor instead of the model viewer because some creature like Barrog is just the basic model reskinned. I open that footage in my video editor, find the frame i want and save that one image as a PNG file. I open the PNG file in paint net and crop the picture.
I then use an AI stable diffusion program to generate a video. Only the first 1 or 2 frames are good everything after that is way off base. I know some people don’t like this but i can’t draw and I don’t have the money to pay someone to draw an image I’d be happy with.
I also used an AI generated image of paper for the back drop. Thats it after this no more AI.
I used blender to make all the writing. Using a font called a time for murder that I found on the internet. This part took the longest because I had to experiment with how I wanted to structure all the writing on the paper. I have 33 different render files just so i could have the freedom to place everything were it needs to be and scale it down and rotate it. I’m still not fully happy with it but finished is better then perfect in this case.
I used blender grease pencil to make the dots. I free handed them to give them a more realistic look.
Now here is my favorite part and I’ve been playing around with this a lot trying to make something cool with it. If you go into the model viewer you can change the background to a dark blue or green and you now have a green screen and can chrome key it out which is how i made the tree background on the parchment.
I’ve been playing around with this to try and make some cool stuff. It does have some limitation but I’ll see if i can’t find ways around that.
So that’s a lot hope you like it. Once I start learning how to use Photoshop hopefully I can make it better. I’ve already started working on Kyzogg. There is a lot of monsters in this game and i want to try and make them look unique. Any tips on how to make the writing look better would be appreciated. It just seems off to me. thanks enjoy.
- looks cool af