Thought of the Day Thursday: Creature Extinction

In the development of my latest campaign project, I find myself tackling all sorts of theoretical issues. One that came to me the other day was the idea of creatures/monsters/entities as resources in a campaign world and what happens when those resources are depleted? Now I know the idea of monster ecologies is anathema to some in the OSR and that is fine. However, I want this world I’m crafting to have a specific feel and the idea of the creatures within that world being a finite resource and the depletion/extinction of that resource could possibly have a dramatic effect on the game world. For instance, I’ve been posting some monsters here on my blog over the past few weeks. There is a method to this madness, I’m not just creating or stating up random critters. Each of these creatures will be a denizen of the campaign world I’m working on. For instance, the Amarok is limited to a group of nine. These fierce creatures prey on those foolish enough to let themselves be caught out in the northern forests at night. Beyond that, I haven’t developed it much farther yet, but the Amarok will definitely be tied into the cultures of the realm and actually serve a function more than just brutalizing and killing hapless victims. So, if the Amaroks were all hunted and killed so that there are now none left, it probably is going to have a social and cultural impact on the peoples of the region. Further, it could have very real physical consequences that were not foreseen (maybe the Amarok were responsible for keeping certain malevolent spirits at bay and now they are extinct, the spirits are now free to roam the night). So this might mean that killing off one thing might inadvertently cause something far worse to happen. I’d be interested in seeing what others have included in their campaigns and how the extinction of creatures affected the rest of the campaign world.

Comments

  1. HiggipediaDecember 9, 2010 at 2:59 PM

    I think this idea works very well in a sandbox paradigm, moreso than a more linear structure. In a linear adventure, the players might be more compelled to hunt the Amaroks, whereas if they were mostly found in random encounters and rumor sheets, the extinction event might never actually be known to the players.

    How is this for an idea? As Amaroks are killed, the random encounter table changes for the worse? That could even lead to an adventure where the characters have to catch Amaroks in an attempt to BREED them.

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  2. XyanthonDecember 9, 2010 at 11:22 PM

    Higgipedia, thanks for the idea! I'm pretty much working on a sandbox campaign setting. I think as part of it instead of saying, oh that there are nine Amarok in the world, that I'll randomize it. I LOVE the idea of the random encounter table changing for the worse. That really gets at the heart of what I want the feel to be.

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