The discussion surrounding the depiction of gnolls in TSR era Dungeons & Dragons has been quite lively, both in the comments and in emails sent to me privately. Another commenter pointed me toward an even more obscure gnoll illustration.
In any case, Sullivan's gnolls teeter on the line between looking properly hyena-like and more canine/lupine. Personally, I prefer it when monsters are their own thing, not just real-world animals with a few bits added or subtracted, so I don't want gnolls to look exactly like hyenas. At the same time, I also don't want them to be dog or wolf-men either (though, interestingly, The Keep on the Borderlands) does, on its rumor table, describe them as "big dog-men," so what do I know?
The standing gnoll here looks more like a red panda.
ReplyDeleteHe does a bit!
DeleteMy first thought was European badger. In any case, it doesn't look like a hyena or a wolf.
DeleteThough if he was based on a red panda, he wouldn't be attacking with an axe, he'd just be standing there with his arms upraised like he was being held up at gunpoint.
DeleteRed panda threat response needs to be an actual monster reaction the next time I'm running something. "The creature stands up on its hind legs, raises its forelegs high into the air, and attempts to look large and frightening."
I haven't looked through U1 in many, many years! I don't remember that illustration at all. There's also another gnoll illustration on page 27! (Looks like Holloway to me.) I love the gnoll on Caverns of Thracia that another reader pointed out... captures more of the diseased, patchy humanoid/hyena head that I feel the original DCS drawing feels like.
ReplyDeleteI begged and begged and begged - it got just that rambling and ponderous - my father to buy me Sinister at the Bloomingdale's in Tyson's Corner VA. He did. I shined about thirty pairs of his old Florsheim black hard-business shoes as compensation. Wore out a whole tin of Kiwi (that's an old reference for the suit & tie guys) but it was worth it. After playing Sinister, my friends and I all became smugglers. Black market candy from 7/11, mostly.
Delete(I forgot) I have always thought that Smugglers' Cave encounter looked like Bela Lugosi zapping Mae West.
DeleteAlso from the earlyish years and definitely gnoll-adjancent, are the late great Russ Nicholson's depiction of the Flind in the Fiend Folio, and Bob Maurus' illustration of the Ghuuna from Dragon Magazine #89's Creature Catalog I. :-)
ReplyDelete