It seems likely that D&D/AD&D‘s wererats have a connection with The Swords of Lankhmar.
Wererats prefer to move about in a rat-like shape smaller than a man, but much larger than a normal rat. Wererats are able to take three forms – human, human-sized ratman and giant rat…. Sometimes known as ratmen, these sly and evil creatures inhabit subterranean tunnel complexes beneath cities. – Gary Gygax and Rob Kuntz, Greyhawk (1975) The Wererat or Rat Man…can assume the shape of a normal man in order to dupe persons, but they prefer to maintain a rat-like shape, although nearly man-sized. Originally D&D‘s wererats existed purely as humans or giant rats, but AD&D added an intermediate ratman form. Other significant antecedents are the wererats of D&D/AD&D. They only loosely resemble skaven: even the hybrid rats have the size and body shape of normal rats**. So tricky were some of the traps the rats set and by circumstantial evidence so deft their wielding of their weapons, that many folk began to insist that some of them, especially the rare and elusive albinos, had on their forelegs tiny clawed hands rather than paws, while there were many reports of rats running on their hind legs.Īlthough more forms are suggested, rats are only shown in three shapes in The Swords of Lankhmar: conventional rats hybrid rats, which have dextrous hands and walk upright and creatures indistinguishable from humans save for minor features, such as pronounced front teeth or piebald skin on the tongue.
The inter-breeding has also resulted in many rats with human-like hands and minds.
Those latter of my family stay always below ground, but the rest of us enjoy the advantages and delights of living in two worlds. During those same centuries we have interbred with the rats, resulting in divinely beautiful monsters such as I am, but also in monsters most ugly, at least by human standards. With her dagger she pointed somewhat languidly toward the vanity table holding the black and white vials, informing him, “My family has used the same potion as Sheelba’s for countless centuries, and also the white potion, which restores us at once to human-size. The skaven’s physical form is an evolution of similar ideas elsewhere in fantasy literature and gaming, the earliest of which appear in Fritz Leiber’s The Swords of Lankhmar (1968). Skaven from the third Citadel Journal (April 1986) Gideon on ENEMY IN SHADOWS: GAMESMASTER’S AIDSĭavid Warrington on ENEMY IN SHADOWS: GAMESMASTER’S AIDSĪmhar on ENEMY IN SHADOWS: GAMESMASTER’S AIDS.
0 kommentar(er)
