Three-Pack of New Free Stuff

Been a minute but I've got some new material for y'all. Affiliate links ahoy although I'm not sure I even know how to link them correctly.

First is Abomination Appendix Volume I which converts several D&D 3e and Pathfinder to OSR stats. I wanted to make a more elaborate Monstrous Compendium-style write-up for each monster but I got writers' block. The appendix features:

• Burrowers from Bastards & Bloodlines
• Cave giants from Bestiary 3
• Kongamoto from Nyambe
• Merrow from D&D 5e (one of the few "new" ideas the 5e SRD made OGC)
• Miasma serpent and avesa rakshasa from 101 Variant Monsters
• Tunnel brutes (lawyer-friendly umber hulks) from The Iconic Bestiary

Volume II will probably tackle Green Ronin's eye kings.

Next is one that needs explaining. A guy called Skerples wrote this thing called the Monster Menu-All with rules on what happens when you eat 1e Monster Manual creatures (unfortunately he uses some homebrew hipster trash for his rules so it's less useful than it could be). We run in similar circles and someone half-jokingly dared him to do something similar for Supplement IV: Gods, Demi-gods, and Heroes. He backed out but I seized upon the idea. Now with Gods, Demigods, & H'orderves Volume I with your PCs can get cool powers from eating the Olympian gods. Incidentally, my opening blurb is an homage to this line that prefaced the RTF download for Legends & Lore on the WOTC Previous Edition Downloads page:

"There comes a desperate moment when every hero looks skyward in search of divine favor, when he raises his arms to the heavens and calls upon the cruel fates to spare his life. Who hears him?"

Last but not least is a Human racial class for B/X and Labyrinth Lord, the fruit of a old post I made a while ago. The art in the PDF is by Luigi Castellani and it's from the Scarlet Heroes Art Pack. I recommend it and all the other Sine Nomine art packs to anyone looking for free art, although there's a lack of "traditional" medieval European subject matter. 

Free Adventures for OSR/TSR D&D

It's been a while, huh? I've uploaded some adventure modules I did a while back. If you're an /osrg/ regular then you've probably seen them but for some readers I expect this to be new. There's also other, less great stuff on the "OSR Downloads" link to your right >
People don't seem to look at those pages though. Anyway, I was going to talk a bit about the adventures, what inspired them, etc. RPGnow links contain affliate links but no one who read my blog buys anything so that doesn't matter ;_;

1. DUNGEON PLANET preview edition

As is so often the case, DUNGEON PLANET is a weird chimera born from bits and bobs. Man-centipedes were inspired by Dark Souls' Man-snakes and they've kicking around in my head for a year(s?). Zhang Zhong was just a random name I came up with while working on a spell document. A planet (moon if we want to get picky) that's also a dungeon was inspired by a random thread I found ages ago asking if Dungeon World was a setting where the world was a  planetary megadungeon (hint 1: it isn't; hint 2; DW was a mistake). It was also inspired by a module called ZH-01 An Overwhelming Sense of Loss which unlike DW I do recommend (and it's free).

Structurally, the DUNGEON PLANET (yeah, the name is in allcaps all the time) is based on traditional nerd dice in a matryoshka-style configuration: Level 1 is a d20, level 2 is d12, level 3 is a d10, etc. As for the innermost level, I haven't really thought about it.

2. HELL METRO

This is another weird frankenstein. As a kinda sorta weeb (Japanese media nerd) I've had a desire to do an anime- or manga-themed OSR thing for a while. The three biggest influences were Mugen Senshi Valis (the Genesis/MD game not what it has sadly become now), an OVA called Dragon Century (1st episode/god chapter only), and last but not least the manga Metro Survive. Although the Control Brain was inspired by Shin Mazinger Shougeki! Z-Hen (which was inspired by Mazinger Z: Relic of Terror). I was also playing a lot of Battle Mania Daginjou/Trouble Shooter Vintage at the time.

Charisma gives a bonus to saves because in the context of Japanese fantasy I imagined it could also represent guts/luck. If I were running it I'd have the outcome be a National Dimensional Overlay.

3. VILE VENGEANCE OF THE BEES

Yes, this entire module was written just because I thought an old pre-Weatherlight Magic: The Gathering card was really cool. Fuck the Jacetice League btw

So there it is.
tl;dr click on this for free stuff.

Blind Homebrew: Playable Zombies for AD&D

After a grueling senior semester I have returned to bring more you more ill-advised material for role-playing games. In case you're wondering what "Blind Homebrew" means, it means that I have a very shaky and incomplete grasp of the AD&D rules but I could not results the sweet siren's song to create, and so I made this. It's basically a 3.X-style template that uses the rules from The Complete Book of Humanoids. I should also note that technically this template is for Cannibal Zombies or Ghouls (I know some grognards bristle at the notion that regular zombies eat people in D&D). I conceived this template as part of a campaign idea - huge magical cataclysm, heroes dies, decades/centuries later spontaneously rise as smart zombies, struggle to save the world while avoiding fearful mobs and looking for some of that sweet sapient flesh.

 

Zombie Player Character Template

Ability Score Adjustments. The initial ability scores are modified as follows:

• +2 Str; -2, Dex, No Con, -2 Cha

Ability Score Range

Ability	Minimum	Maximum
Strength	6	As base creature +4
Dexterity	As base creature -2	As base creature -4
Constitution	-	-
Intelligence	As base creature -2	As base creature -2
Wisdom	3	As base creature -2
Charisma	1	As base creature -4

Class Restrictions and Level Limits

Same as base creature (i.e. Human Zombies have all the normal class restrictions and level limits for Human characters, Elf Zombies have all the normal class restrictions and level limits for Elf characters, etc).

Hit Dice.

Player character Zombies receive hit dice by class. In addition they receive 1 bonus hit point at each level.

Alignment

Zombies tend to either True Neutral or Neutral Evil depending on their creators. PC zombies may be of any alignment.

Natural Armor Class

Zombie have a natural armor class of 8.

Languages

Whichever languages the base creature could speak.

Special Advantages

• Do not need to eat (but see the Monstrous Craving trait below), drink, or sleep.

• Are immune to all mind-affecting effects (charms, compulsions, phantasms, patterns, and morale effects), poison, sleep effects, paralysis, stunning, disease, effects that require a save vs. death, damage to its physical ability scores (Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution), fatigue/ exhaustion effects, and critical hits.

• Always pass System Shock rolls.

Special Disadvantages

• Cannot heal naturally: Negative energy and Inflict spells heal damage. At the DM’s discretion certain unholy sites or artifacts may grant the equivalent of natural healing as long as the Zombie remains in that area or near that object.

Monstrous Traits

Bestial Fear (holy symbols and/or fire), Bestial Odor*, Monstrous Appearance 3*, and Monstrous Craving (once a week, at least 10 pounds of flesh from a sapient creature).

*for a total -8 penalty to reaction checks

Superstitions

Generally none but the Zombie may select personal superstitions as outlined in Chapter 6 of The Complete Book of Humanoids.

Weapon Proficiencies:

Same as the base creature.

Nonweapon Proficiencies:

Same as the base creature.

Big random list of ideas and things that I think are cool

Sometimes while browsing the internet or flipping through a fantasy book I see something and I think "that's neat, can I work that into a setting?" The following is a list I made of random stuff that struck a cord with me. I want to be perfectly clear that the vast majority of this stuff was all someone else's ideas. A few items have comments in blue.

-Metallic dragons are fully bipedal, Chromatics are partial bipeds/quadrapeds
 
-Cave creatures: can climb, have claws, blinded by light
 
-Bound outsiders, produce different effects based on type
 
-Crystalline creatures created by a plague; Elemental evils involved
 
-Flesh plants: plant creatures made of meat
 
-Miniature (>6 inch) fiends and giants?
 
-Weredisplacer beasts, Wereorcs, Weretreants
 
-Nocturnal template: light sensitivity, low-light vision
 
-Primitive template
 
-Prismatic/rainbow creatures; prismatic castes
 
-Quadrepedal mutants: general form of horse/lion, elongated torso/neck, paws instead of hands
 
-Quadrapedal Succubus turns into beautiful horse or livestock to lure mortals near
 
-Elder beasts: Animals almost as old as the world itself; sapient and capable of speech
 
-Demi-"Gorgon"
 
-Enchanted creatures exposed to too much magic/fey
 
-Efreeti...forbears of Tieflings?
 
-Evolved magical hiveminds
 
-Endless twilight swamp plane home to hags and other muck-fiends
 
-Madness Giant: crawling, many-faced, chaos servant

-White Beast: infused with sacred energy, guardians of nature vs undead
 
-The dragon concept always sat right with me, because I always pictured Malal as this daemonic ouroboros-like monstrosity mixed with a hydra: Constantly eating his own tail to swallow himself whole in an endless, suicidal loop, but every now and then spawning new heads to consume himself in even more twisted ways while also ensnaring everything around him in a chaotic maelstrom of pure, chilling hate. One anonymous poster's version of Malal, a now-retconned Chaos god from Warhammer.
 
- (OC) Intelligent, giant golden crocodile demands tobacco or meat for passage through his swamp Inspired by part of the Bangles' Walk like an Egyptian (gold crocodiles oheoh/they snap their teeth on your cigarette)
 
- a "young" world, one that was created in living memory. In the beginning there were no steel weapons, no written language, and only a few generations’ worth of history.
 
-"Good people are like extremely rare gems. They are something to be highly valued."
 
-Chimeric Chimera: an eight-headed creature with five dragon heads, two goat heads, and a lion head (kind of like a mutated aspect of Tiamat). The lion head is in charge, though the other heads offer opinions and try to assert authority from time to time. The dragon heads span the evil chromatic types for interest; if you're a purist you can give it four green heads and a red head.
 
-The golems and other animated guardians created by the ancients simply remained at their posts, patient and silent, awaiting new orders that would never come. Eventually, the elements wore down even these ancient constructs, and their bodies fell apart from disuse.Yet so strong was the binding magic that anchored the animating elemental spirits to these ancient golems that when the bodies died, their elemental "souls" died as well -- yet they did not return to the elemental planes once their bodies wasted away. Still bound to a body that no longer existed, these disembodied elemental spirits transformed into strange undead known today as golem remnants.
 
-Poachers and hunters are naturally drawn to certain creatures whose body parts are valued as trophies. Unfortunately, beasts that are slain by hunters sometimes rise as undead monsters cursed to forever stalk those who inflicted such a distasteful end upon them.
 
-What at first appeared to be a fast-moving cloud of volcanic ash resolves into something far more terrible. Thousands of burning bodies and blackened skeletons tumble and roil in the cloud. The unliving bodies emit a constant thunderous scream, as if a volcano had learned to wail in agony from the fire in its core.The necroclasm is one of the largest forms of undead; fortunately, they are limited in range to the volcano that spawned them. One of WOTC's old Far Corners of The World monsters.
 
-A large, brass chest, large enough to be a coffin. It contains the corpse of whoever opens it. This effect is similar to the clone spell except that the clone comes out dead. The corpse has all the same scars and body markings as its living counterpart, but it does not have any clothes or possessions. The chest can be used to produce an infinite number of corpses.
 
-Reptilian variants of races: were they created by interbreeding, gods, or dragons?
 
-Insectoid variants of races: see above
 
-Winged variants of race: ditto
 
-arctic apes worship evil ice deity
 
-vampires based on the egyptian god Shezmu; Lion-related rather than bat-related
 
-Fetid Heath of the Death Giant Overlord A pastiche of the classic D&D Giant modules I was wanting to make for All Flesh Must Be Eaten
 
-"I wish that I was the sultan...that I was always the sultan!" Supposedly the original version of Jafar's wish from Disney's Aladdin. I like the paradoxical situations it creates, such as a sultan existing before the nation or even the city did.

-Each has a unique name and when this name is spoken, the creature is released from the ___ and immediately makes its way to to the speaker of the name.  It's sole purpose is to kill the speaker and return to the ___.  Part of a monster description from an old AD&D netbook. The monster didn't impress me but this part did.

-Blinded Medusae/Gorgons are immortal, hunt by scent.
 
-Giant that bleeds snakes Pretty sure this one came to me in a dream. I don't know how it works.
 
-1945-1960. The sudden rush of magic into the world means that a whole new arms race is just beginning, and the fear of Red Witches is everywhere.
 
-Ant-Mimicking Spiders are weird. They look like ants. But they're spiders. And they go into ant colonies all incognito, and eat ants when no one is looking. So do that, but have them be Human-Mimicking Spiders. Don't ask me how that works. It just does.
 
-You could do GIANT ANTS that Anteater-men hunt for their meat and carapaces
 
-Demigods who embody ideals: not immortal
 
-BatMonkey Vampires devolved from bigger vamps
 
-Gang war between two gangs of intelligent weapons.
 
-Planetoid on fire: inhabited by salamanders, mephits, etc
 
-Cult/sect seeking to combine specific gods into a single entity
 
-Essential words for fantasy languages: to, from, above, below, beside, son (of), daughter (of), man, woman, hill, mountain, tree, bear, river, forest, plain, desert, meadow, canyon, great, big, small, dry, wet, [colors], N/E/S/W, horse, city, village, dangerous, fire, wind, water, rain, cloud, holy, cursed, peace(ful), famous From a very good article in Dragon magazine.
 
-Am-heh, "eater of eternity" "devourer of millions", dog-headed demon-god of the Egyptian underworld
 
-Hezur, deified baboon/reincarnated ancestor. Egyptian.
 
-Erlik, bear/pig/man god of evil, death, and the underworld. Turkic/Mongolian.
 
-Whiro, eats the souls of uncremated dead, grows stronger, threatens to break out of the underworld. Maori.
 
-Ancient frog deity served by frog-men and frog-things
 
-Witches can't affect clerics or genies (djinn/efreet) Just an interesting tidbit from Dragon magazine
 
-"Gnolls"-Troll/Gnome hybrids Chainmail-era Gnolls seem more interesting than the hyena-men we got later.
 
-Green and red monkeys: reds are lust monsters European bestiaries are pretty whacky.
 
-"Troglodytes": maned apes
 
-Multiple Camelots (or other archetypical/mythic realms...Atlantis?) reflecting a different facet of alignment/mortal emotions. Specifically cribbed from an old AD&D website but this idea has shown up in other places too. The Atlantis spin is an original idea donut steal
 
-Elementalist cults that worship evil elementals
 
-Black gods (Olmec) vs White gods (Aryan): Obsidian Giants vs Pearl Giants? From a pseudoscience website run by a Russian geologist. I almost immediately discarded his original racial schema in favor of shiny space gods inspired by Jack Kirby's comics and DC's Millennium Giants.
 
-Petrification as fantasy equivalent of cryogenic sleep
 
-Shamen wear skins of monsters to prove their mastery over them
 
-Aaatxe: the evil storm-bull
 
-Abhiyoga: Spirits of rain and darkness
 
-fire+earth+water=clay; metal+water=rust Just fleshing out elementals a little more here. I made a much longer list as well.
 
-Bardha: white-skinned, underground-dwelling elves who demand cakes and sugar
 
-Bes: Dwarves + lion ears/tails. Evil
 
-land of the dead is literally in the west; land of the gods is literally in the east
 
-Army of severed undead hands
 
-. . .an expanse of earth that has been scoured of all fertile soil . . . No ground can be seen, however, because obelisks and pyramids occupy every inche of the surface. Beneath and inside these structures lies a series of catacombs and passageways that are likewise crowded with statues and sarcophagi.
Pretty sure this is from Deities & Demigods or another 3.5 splat. It's Set's realm.
 

-Greek gods were limited. They couldn't go back on their word. They couldn't change another god's work.
 
-Naga with an Illithid head
 
-Lightless seas and the evils that dwell therein
 
-Drug-using witch cult with super shrooms
 
-Snakes/slugs with prehensile forked tongues but no arms
 
-One of the gods is actually a goddess
 
-Mystic pyramids that keep sand at bay
 
-Conical pyramids that are the tombs of a legendary alchemist
 
-Egyptian hobgoblins
 
-Lawful god vs chaos god This and the next five things are original content. Yay me!
 
-Chaos god is associated with cats, night, darkness
 
-Lawful god is associated with frogs/salamanders/amphibious reptiles, day, sun
 
-Dragons are creations of the Lawful god and are amphibious
 
-Most cultures worship the Lawful god
 
-Most cultures hate cats but there are superstitions that prohibit them from directly killing/harming cats

Obscure D&D Lore

Dungeons & Dragons has been around for 40 years now. As you can imagine, both the roles and the fluff (lore) of D&D have changed a lot during that time. Some fluff remained pretty constant throughout all edition (the difference between arcane and divine magic), some got tweaked between editions (alignment), and a few were radically changed (OD&D's Gnolls and 4e's Eladrin ). This short list isn't going to be too surprising to veteran players but there are some tidbits here that are interesting.

-Gnolls were originally Gnome/Troll hybrids.

-The Gold Dragon was originally the only Lawful (i.e. Good) dragon in OD&D. The remaining five dragons were Chaotic (i.e. Evil) and correspond to what would later be referred to as the Chromatic Dragons.

-There was a UK-published adventure where D&D unofficially crossed over with Warhammer Fantasy. To paraphrase: "In a distant land, the men do not worship the same deities as us . . . they bow to a pantheon of Hope, Anger, and Love . . . and those who will not worship these deities they execute." Hope, Anger, and Love are what Warhammer's Tzeentch, Khorne, and Slaaneesh are embodiments of.

-At one point during AD&D 2e, Yeenoghu (variously the god of Gnolls or the demon prince of Gnolls) was identified as a god of the Giants, and a Giant himself.

-The AD&D 2e multiverse was created by two supergods cosmic snakes who are/were the most powerful beings in the multiverse. 

-In AD&D 2e, Archons (Lawful Good celestials), Asuras (Chaotic Good celestials), and Aasimon (angels) are the transformed souls of Good creatures in the afterlife but Guardinals and Eladrin are actually extraplanar races whose origins have no ties to mortal souls.

-Adding to the above, Asuras, Guardinals, and Eladrin are not immortal like Archons and Aasimon. They do live for a long time though. Guardinals seem to have the shortest lifespans of the three.

-OD&D and Chainmail Gnomes are just Dwarves that live in hills instead of mountainous areas.

-In AD&D 2e, Stygia (one of the Nine Hells) has "ancient tentacled gods" frozen underneath the ice. These descriptions seem to reference the art in Planscape that showed an "evolved" Nupperibo (minor devil) and an "ancient Baatorian" (the inhabitants of the hells before devils moved in).

-In D&D 3.5, probably based on the lore above, Zargon from the Basic D&D module B4 The Lost City was retconned into being an ancient Baatorian despite the fact that the concept had been discarded by the tail end of AD&D 2e.

-Wizards of the Coast created a campaign setting for AD&D 2e based on wuxia. It was only released online (with each chapter as a separate PDF), regarded as crap, and was never again mentioned by WOTC.

-The Witch, an AD&D arcane spellcaster class created by Gary Gygax and published in Dragon Magazine, could not effect clerics, Djinni, or Efreeti.

Weird Dreams

I stayed up a little too late while reading excerpts from the late AD&D supplement called Guide to Hell, a detailed look at the Nine Hells of Baator and the Lawful Evil Baatezu. I've never cared much for D&D's Devils but it did have some interesting little tidbits that I'll probably detail in another post.

This morning I had a dream inspired by what I read. A Lovecraftian Great Old One (unnamed in the dream) somehow took over a swampy layer of Baator. Due to declining power it was forced to assume a three-dimensional form based on its worshipers' beliefs: The entity appears as a light-skinned and powerfully built old man wearing buckskin robes. He has a long, neat white beard and equally neat white hair (think of Christopher Lee in his role as Saruman in LOTR). His eyes are pupilless and solid white. Twig-like horns emerge from the crown of his head. This interloper wanders through the swamp, untouched by layer's water, mud, or beasts. Explorers surveying the layer have discovered areas where bramble weaves together with many-eyed green tentacles to block off some areas. It is unknown what these eldritch cordons guard.

Going Ape in Fantasy: More D&D/Pathfinder Monsters.

I previously talked about the notable fiendish apes of D&D, and now I'm going to summarize some the mortal(?) simian monsters of D&D (and some Pathfinder monsters too).

Ahuizotl
Based on Central American legends, the Ahuizotl is an ampihbious and very evil monkey-dog-thing with a claw on the end of its tail. Interestingly, the first D&D version of the Ahuizotl in the Maztica setting is more of an anthropomorphic crocodile.

Alaghi
Goat-horned temperate-environment cousins of the Yeti that look sinister as fuck. They are actually rather peaceful though.

Ba'atun
Evil bat-winged baboons rumored to be from an parallel icy parallel world. They are practically immune to cold. From an obscure UK module called Dark Clouds Gather.

Blood Apes
Despite their name, blood apes are actually peaceful sapient creatures: the name comes from their bright red fur. The alpha male of the a pack can use an "animal growth" ability on himself, perhaps the best phallic joke in all of D&D.

Charau-ka 
From Pathfinder. These guys are basically more upright and (barely) murderous versions of chimpanzees. They're advanced enough to make leather armor though.

Chemosit 
It seems that someone was a big fan of the Gorilla-bear below and basically ended up copying it while adding in a brain-eating ability. Bravo, game designers!

Cloaked Ape
Technically more like monkeys, these creatures have raccoon tails and leathery skin-flaps they use to glide/fly.

Dakon 
Law-abiding, common-speaking, sapient apes. Come on, 3rd party publishers, this is AD&D Fiend Folio-tier.
...
After the last sentence, I flipped through the AD&D Fiend Folio and the Dakon was in it. Get your shit together, 3rd party publishers.

Forestkith Goblins
Like regular Goblins but hairier and and better at climbing. They also tend to knuckle-walk.

Feylaar
From the post-apocalyptic world of the Dark Sun campaign setting, these evil four-armed psychic gorillas have exposed brains. Despite being evil they seem to have a rather loving and egalitarian family life.

Gambol
Big blue baboons with a spooky howl and lots of speed.

Gibberling
Furry hunched humanoids. They have no language but communicate via hoots and howls.

Girallon
Four-armed albino gorillas.

Girallon, Anghazani 
Smart four-armed albino gorillas with swords.

Gorilla-Bear 
"These monsters have the head, body and legs of a gorilla with the sharp teeth and powerful arms of a bear."

Hadozee
Often called "winged deck apes", these simian humanoids are often sailors and pirates.

Hengeyokai, Monkey
A D&D monster and a player character race in Pathfinder that can assume Human, monkey, and monkey-faced Human/hybrid forms.

Horrid Ape
Part of a broad class of Druid-created living weapons, this giant gorilla has red scales, lots of fangs, spikes, horns, and a tail. Their claws also secrete acid. Talk about overkill...

Howler Wasps
Baboons + wasps = horrifying

Hsing-sing
These white-furred apefolk have Human faces. Despite personifying "the principles of pacifism and harmony with nature", once every year they go apeshit* and murder a whole bunch of people.

*I had to say it :^)

Hulking Growler
A creature that's a cross between an ape and a caveman, from the licensed Kingdoms of Kalamar setting for D&D 3.5. They're gender egalitarians! Also, if you kill a Hulking Growler's mate then be prepared for relentless murderous revenge.

Julajimus
A gigantic freaky black-furred baboon with a rat's tail. It can shapeshift into rabbits, puppies, kitties, or other fuzzy wuzzy animals, an ability which it uses to eat children.

Kech
There are two types of Kech: One is from D&D and is monkey-like, the other is from Pathfinder and is ape-like. Both have weird leaf-like skin that functions as camouflage. D&D Kechs are predators that stick to jungles; PF Kechs are more likely to stray from their territory. PF Kechs also have a taboo against eating apes and monkeys.

Lhosk
A sapient tauric creature with the upper body of a gorilla and the lower body of a spider. Strangely, the Monster Manual III doesn't mention Driders (evil Elf-Spider creatures) in their description. Drider-Lhosk interactions could prove very interesting indeed.

Limbo Stalker
A beast from the plane of Limbo, it's described as an "anthropomorphic serpent" but is really just a gorilla with some scales and an ugly face.

Monkey Goblin 
Like regular Goblins but with more hair and monkey tails. They're also not spineless cowards, unlike their common cousins.

Monkey Spiders
1-inch tall monkeys. They are also sapient, Good-aligned, and their bites are poisonous.

Quaggoth
White-furred ape-men that dwell underground.  They also hate surface-dwelling Elves for some reason. 3rd edition made them look a little more like bear-people.

Saqualaminoi
These guys are "Yeti-kin". They're rather well-adjusted tribal carnivores who surprisingly don't eat humanoids. They're also immune to cold.

Sasquatch
A Pathfinder-only race as far as can tell, these creatures are based on pop culture Bigfoot with some skunk ape and weird hippie vibes thrown in.

Shadowperson
Supposedly resembling "thin, gangly apes", these guys look more like really hairy Orcs. They are also mildly psychic and can have ESP. Also, more skin-flaps for gliding.The can also create a friendly psychic ghost-monster called a Revered Ancient One that's an omega-level healbot.

Skindancer
Imagine a shaved gorilla with a lizard face and magic chitin armor. Wizards truly have no sense of right and wrong.

Snow Goblin
White-furred variants of the average Goblin that dwell in cold areas. Look like ugly tailless monkeys.

Spirit of the Air
Golden monkeys with freaky arm-wings that serve gods of air. They cast spells like Clerics and can transform into a whirlwind once per day.

Su-Monster
Big gray psychic monkeys.

Taer
Clan-based apefolk similar to cavemen. Dwell in cold mountain regions. Very low tech levels.

Tall Mouther
A creature that looks like a tusked gorilla head with six arms sprouting from it. It eats Halflings/Hobbits.

Umber Hulk
One of the "iconic" D&D, it's especially evident in older edition art that Umber Hulks are insectoid apes.

Vanara 
Extroverted monkeyfolk from Oriental Adventures. They get along with every except Evil beings.

Warforged Charger
Magic robot gorillas.

Wendigo
Not exactly simian, this creature is a fey/fairy equivalent of a werewolf. A terrible flying hunger spirit that flies through the air, instilling madness and paranoia into its prey.

Yeti 
White-furred ape-people of the cold mountains. They are invisible if even lightly covered in snow or ice and their fur drains the heat out of living creatures, making them a weird heat-vampire-ape. 

AD&D weirdness: And then the Elf girl was a snake

Carnival was an AD&D supplement detailing a wandering carnival led by a fallen(?) angel for the Ravenloft (although the cover hastily tacks on "OR FOR OTHER SETTINGS!" to milk those sweet, sweet dollarbux). It's full of various D&Disms like Elves, Wizards, Orcs, and Lycanthropes but there is one bit that is so utterly bizarre that I wanted to single it out.

Take a look at the cover here http://www.museumofplay.org/online-collections/images/Z004/Z00493/Z0049356.jpg. It's very late 90s cheesecake-y goodness, although the number of shirtless fit men outnumber the lone busty blonde Elf. There's a kind of "innocence" to this type of art, much like Frank Frazetta's art, where a weird sensual (or perhaps sexual?) energy objectifies both men and women, making it comparatively inoffensive (at least to me).

So what's the story on our nearly-naked Elf maiden with huge knockers?

She's a snake. No, literally. Someone, somewhere for some (perverted) reason turned a snake into a Elven bombshell who now prances around practically nude. Imagine if a PC ends up romancing her and then learns the truth. At least she's sapient though!

Seriously, look at the butt. Wizards truly have no sense of right and wrong.

JoJo before JoJo: or Fabulous Magic Kung-fu Goblins and Weaponized Life Force

Some of you may or may not be familiar with JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. The early installments are summarized as huge muscled martial arts striking bizarre and almost impossible poses while using life energy to punch vampires and SUPER vampires. This is a JJBA image macro:

Now compare the above to this, from the Deities & Demigods supplement for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons;

 

As you can see, Maglubiyet is also pretty fabulous in the posing department. As the creator of Goblins, it seems like his creations would take after him.
So what about Goblins that are some form of bizarre magical martial artists? If based on JoJo's concept of weaponized life energy then Goblins could perhaps be a race apart from all others, supernaturally linked to a plane or dimension of life force.
Maybe they never die of old age like Tolkien's Elves. They could be walking bombs of "positive energy", anathema to the undead. Maybe they have innate healing powers.
Another thing worth considering is if non-Goblins can learn their mysterious martial arts. It could just be plain impossible, making Goblins the kung-fu race of the campaign world; it could be partially available but Humans/Elves/Dwarves/whatever lack the link to the mysterious "life-force" and must content themselves with mundane techniques; or it could be possible for anyone to learn with a healthy dose of hard work and guts.