Angel Dogs With Human Hands? Sure, Why Not.

hello and welcome to monster of the week the only show on the internet that thinks dogs should be allowed to vote today we are talking about a creature that I suspect many of you have never heard of before but is sure to leave a lasting impression for both good and uncanny reasons the moon dog at first glance this may look like just about any other fantasy can9 creature but if we scroll down just a little bit yep those those are human hands why does this dog have human hands well today we're going to answer that question and more as as always we're going to go over the moond dog's publication history throughout the additions of DN d as well as its lore and ecology then we're going to talk about how we might use it at the game table and of course convert the thing into DND D fifth edition so if you're ready to learn everything there is to know about the celestial dog creature with human hands and a telepathic Burk I am more than ready to take you on this journey the moon dog first appeared in the monster manual 2 for ad and the artwork here like most DND art at the time is pretty simple and a little bit uncanny it's just one of those creatures that at first glance doesn't look like anything too weird but the longer you look at it the more you start to notice aside from various monster compendiums and Adventure appearances the next time we'd see the moon dog would be in the pages of a third edition DND D product called the book of exalted Deeds this book was released in October of 2003 20 years ago exactly one year after the book of vile darkness and was meant to be an inversion of the horrible and vile things presented the year previous while the book of vile Darkness was all about the most heinous and evil character options Monsters and magic items you could find the book of exalted Deeds was filled with character classes spells and magic items for only the most dedicated champions of good good and righteousness something really interesting about this book is that much like its edgy cousin it too came with a mature audience's only sticker slapped on the front however where the book of vile Darkness wore this sticker as a sort of warning about the tremendous amount of Gore and sexual content within its Pages the book of exalted deed Bears the sticker because of the implied questions surrounding morality it poses there isn't too much in the way of shocking imagery but the book does get pretty wrapped up in ethics and morality something that is definitely geared towards a more mature audience but aside from all the new player stuff there is of course a whole bunch of monsters both old and new included in this book for the dungeon master and one of our returning monstrous faces was of course the moon dog this depiction of the creature is a lot less uncanny than their original art making the humanoid hands look a bit more natural but the creature of course generally Remains the Same just with a few cool new tricks in the Forgotten Realms Moondogs hail from the plane of elisium which is the plane of pure good if you were to assign this plane in alignment it would be neutral good just good stuff all around without too much of a focus on Law and no chaos to kind of mix things up all the time it's basically the most idyllic version of the good aligned planes and can pretty well be described as heaven in any other setting Moon dogs are most likely to hail from whatever the most kind of neutral good aligned plane happens to be as Celestial creatures they are generally good-natured and tend to make company with the likes of solars planetar and other Angels or archons they have an intelligent score of 15 making them not just sentient but pretty smart by most metrics as well they can of course speak several different languages but they often choose to communicate telepathically outside of their home plane Moon dogs can be found all throughout the Multiverse acting out missions assigned by whichever deity they happen to be aligned with and in many cases that deity is saluna the goddess of the moon and stars and balers Gate 3 makes sense but wherever they happen to be they are always pushing towards their goals of protecting those who can't protect thems real book of exalted Deeds kind of stuff sometimes they will also be dispatched to Aid other creatures such as the aforementioned angels on whatever Mission they're trying to accomplish which is kind of awesome I especially love the idea of a moon dog working with a Hound archon because they're just varying degrees of dog and humanoid but I digress according to their lore they are also sometimes confused with ye hounds who were introduced to fifth edition in volo's guide to monsters and in many ways much like the book of vile darkness and exalted Deeds the Moondog and the ye Hound are inversions of one another while ye hounds are significantly weaker they tend to serve a dark master of some kind while the moon dog can be found on the other side of the battlefield serving the goals of the righteous in fact where the moon dog really shines is on the battlefield they have a slew of abilities that make them fantastic allies and fearsome foes so let's talk about just exactly what this puppy can do [Music] clocking in at cr10 the moon dog has a ton of different options in combat that make it unpredictable as an opponent for starters it has a bite attack I know seems pretty crazy but stick with me a bite attack combined with pack tactics is something we definitely have seen many times before with basically every K9 monster the moon dog is no different and it is very effective but where things really start to get interesting is when we look at its next ACT called bark this dog's bark is indeed worse than its bite especially if you're some kind of creature from the lower Plains when the dog barks as an action it can choose one of three magical effects to impose the first is called Ward The warding Bark protects either itself or an ally of its choosing within 30 ft from celestials Elementals faay fiends and Undead all the creatures I just mentioned have disadvantage on the chosen Target when they make attacks against them the second mode is called Break enchantment which Believe it or or not breaks enchantments this allows the moon dog to end in effect that is charming frightening or possessing another creature which brings us to the third and final Mode called dismissal which acts essentially the same as the banishment spell it can force a creature to make a saving throw and if they fail banishes them back to their home plane assuming they're not already there it also has an action called baay that allows it to baay loudly and force All Creatures within 30 ft to make a wisdom save or become frightened of the moon dog for 1 minute but if more damage is what you're after the moon dog can instead opt to howl causing 3d10 psychic damage to All Creatures within 40 feet or half as much on a successful wisdom save and of course if the moon doog or one of its allies is wounded in battle it can use the soothing ministrations action to lick the creatures wounds and heal them for 2d6 plus 4 much like the paladins lay on hands ability this action can also be used to remove a poison or disease affecting the target instead of healing them which is honestly really good even though it is situational anytime a creature or a spell has an ability that allows for a specific Fringe circumstance while not subtracting from what the primary spells purpose is it's good so every round of combat the moon dog can choose to either howl bark or baay and then make two bite attacks by using its multi-attack action whether it's going for Pure offense a mix of bites and defense or just straight up healing there are lots of strong choices the moon dog can make on its turn and again having pack tactics is going to make it exceptionally good in melee combat when fighting alongside an ally and speaking of allies the moon dog can cast a few spells I promise the segue makes sense just stick with me at will it can cast Dancing Lights Darkness fog Cloud hypnotic pattern and moon beam the latter of which are both exceptionally useful spells and it can cast speak with animals but in a way that only allows it to talk with canine creatures which is a fun little detail but its big spell which you can only use once per day is planer Ally planer Ally is a really interesting spell that requires some extra attention the first chunk of the Spell's text reads you beseech an otherworldly entity for Aid that being must be known to you a god a primordial a demon Prince or some other being of cosmic power that entity sends a Celestial an elemental or a fiend loyal to it to Aid you making the creature appear in an unoccupied space within range if you know a specific creature's name you can speak that name when you cast a spell to request that creature though you might get a different creature anyway DM's choice in the case of a player casting this spell there's a whole other section about hiring that creature and what their price is for doing whatever task it is you're trying to assign the summon to do but that's not really relevant here in the case of the moon dog it is going to use this spell almost always to summon whatever Celestial creature it is working with for the dog owners out there it's like when your dog just starts barking randomly and you come into the room to see what's wrong except Magic say the moon dog is teamed up with a solar and they're out hunting for a fiend if the moon dog Finds Its Target first it's going to cast a spell to bring its Master straight to it so that they can get to work it is worth noting that this spell takes 10 minutes to cast so it won't be doing this in combat but it's a great way to move some pieces around on the board so to speak and it's thematic as hell that said though strictly speaking it doesn't have to use this spell to summon the creature that it's allied with it could still use it to summon a demon or devil or some kind of Elemental or whatever why it would ever do that really depends on the situation at hand but that's a perfect segue into our next topic which is how we might actually use this creature within the context of a story as we've discussed one of the most common roles for a moon doog to play is that of a powerful Celestial creature's companion a moon doog acting alongside an angel or high level asimar is going to be a great little bit of extra flavor and will make any potential combat encounters a bit more Dynamic whether the pair is out hunting fiends seeking powerful relics or just playing out the weirdest buddy cop film of all time it'll be great if I've learned anything over a long career of being a dungeon master it is that players love interacting with animals especially animals that can talk it doesn't matter if you're playing the moon dog as a pompous well-to-do creature set on doing his duty or a playful puppy out to explore the Multiverse everyone is going to want to talk to the telepathic Angel dog with human hands if you happen to be running a particularly highlevel campaign perhaps the deity of a particular player character even sends the moon dog to act as their companion it is a cr10 creature so adjust the stats as needed but thematically a moon dog would be a really cool animal companion for a highle ranger Druid cleric Paladin or honestly anyone who fits thematically with their whole deal maybe the moon dog even uses its planer Ally spell to summon the player on occasion which isn't really how that spell works but you could stretch it to do something kind of fun here we can also look for inspiration in one of the modules that has a Moondog playing a minor role in third edition's Shadow Veil The scouring of the land a Moondog appears as a potential ally his name is kouto and he has formed a massive pack of wolves which he leads unfortunately his leadership has been usurped by a monstrous winter wolf who was corrupted by the villains of our tale so the party has a chance here to help Kau regain control of the pack by destroying or banishing or just getting rid of the winter wolf named frostbite if they defeat the winterwolf the pack disperses and couto is free from the burden of his failure to maintain control however if the party challenges the winterwolf to single combat and defeats him honorably kouto is able to regain control of the entire pack and the party now has a new faction to be aligned with now this whole situation of course has broader implications in the actual module itself but this little piece of it could be used as a random encounter for pretty much any game I can even see a version of this where instead of wolves there's a moon dog leading all the pet dogs in a city or town as if they were some kind of secret organization if you've ever seen the movie cats and dogs basically just do that for those who haven't seen the Cinematic Masterpiece that is cats and dogs basically you would have all the dogs in town acting as a spy Network watching all the going on in the city keeping an eye out for evildoers and Reporting anything uncouth from dog to dog until word reaches the Moondog leader and they can call for help from their planer Ally maybe through this spy Network the party is even caught doing something they shouldn't be doing or even better there's a misunderstanding in the Moondog believes them to be a threat this could lead to an interesting encounter where the moon dog confronts the party about their perceived crime combat might break out or if the party truly is innocent maybe they even team up to find the true culprit but no matter how this plays out I can guarantee a network of pet spy dogs wasn't on your players prediction list I also really like moond dogs as custodians of a strange and alien place I keep imagining them as assistants working in a library sort of like the dogs in that one episode of avatar The Last air bender they have human hands too so sorting books would be a breeze as pretty intelligent creatures they could also have politics and factions within their own organizations maybe the Moon Dogs working in a library and sigil the city of doors are all trying to unionize for better pay or something I don't know I just like the idea of taking a very human plot and applying it to the dogs with human hands but no matter how you choose to deploy this creature if you do want to use it in your DND campaign you're not playing Third Edition D and D but you are playing fifth edition Linked In the description down below is a Google document that contains all the information you will need to successfully run this creature at the game table and if you are one of my lovely patrons over on the dungeon dad patreon page you can find the dungeon dad patreon stat block which contains all the same information but it's just presented in a highres PDF stat sheet with new artwork and all the fancy schmancy ribbons and whatnot speaking of patrons thank you so much for supporting what I do here I literally couldn't do it without you which brings us to our next point it's time for patron of the week this week's randomly selected Patron is Jordan Roberts thank you so much for the support my friend I would never rob you of the recognition you deserve and thank you for watching as always if is a creature from an older version of DnD or Pathfinder or some other tabletop role playing game that you would like to see me cover on this channel and convert into fifth edition let me know in the comments down below or over on the Discord server in the creature suggestions Channel and put forth your suggestion it will be added to the master list and who knows you might just see it show up on an episode of Monster of the week I had a ton of fun talking about this creature so hopefully you enjoyed listening to me talk about it and hopefully I'll see you next week for something very special but that's all for now I'll see you in the next one till [Music] then this monster is going through an awful breakup it seems like the poor guy just can't hold himself together but maybe if it can learn to control these rampant fragments it will assemble a sense of self next episode puzzle [Music] Golem tune in next time for lots more fan service

Channel: Dungeon Dad

Views: 73,125

Keywords: How to play Dungeons and Dragons, dungeons and dragons lore, dungeons and dragons combat, d&d lore, d&d story, d&d online, d&d basics, d&d battle, dnd monsters, d&d monsters lore, dnd monsters explained, dnd monsters for level 1, d&d game breaking monsters, best d&d monsters, d&d cool monsters, creepy d&d monsters, d&d 5e custom monsters, classic d&d monsters, Dungeon Dad, Monster of the Week, D&D 5e, Dungeons and Dragons 5E, aj pickett, mr rhexx, D&D explained, homebrew

Id: XDRS3a0hA_E

Length: 15min 53sec (953 seconds)

Published: Thu Nov 02 2023