Make Your Own Oblivion Moss and Mossling Minions
My favorite monster from Monster Manual 3 is the Oblivion Moss, a giant psychic moss creature that steals your memories and makes mossling duplicates of you. If you’d like to use these creatures in an encounter, here’s how to make your own moss monster minis.
As your base models, you’ll need some surplus D&D minis. If you’ve been collecting for awhile, chances are you have extra peasants, human bandits, etc. I happened to have an extra treant, so I used that for the Oblivion Moss itself. Technically, an Oblivion Moss is only large, not huge, so a Shambling Mound would be a better option. I figured why not make it huge and ramp the encounter’s awesomeness up a few notches?
I trimmed some of the pokier weapons off before I mossified the minis, since the mosslings wouldn’t necessarily have weapons (and things like swords would be harder to cover with fake moss). You can try to find minis that accurately duplicate the appearance of your PCs, but once they get mossed it’ll be pretty hard to tell, so any old minis will work fine.
The other materials you’ll need: fake grass powder (also known as scatter grass), commonly used in model train sets; dark-colored spray primer; spray adhesive; clear matte sealer/overcoat; rubber gloves. Trust me on the rubber gloves — I ended up having to use to razor to shave a layer of skin off my fingers to remove the accumulated adhesive/grass gunk.
I keep the scatter grass in these old-fashioned restaurant sugar containers, which you can find at craft stores or restaurant supply stores. They make it easy to shake out some grass wherever you need it. You don’t need two different kinds, but having two colors and textures gives you a richer, more realistic look.
Ok, onto the project itself. Working in a well-ventilated area, first primer the minis. A light coat is fine — the key is to cover up any brightly colored areas that will show through the moss. The primer helps the adhesive spray stick better, but in a pinch you could just use green spray paint.
Once the primer is dry, you’re ready to use the adhesive. Because the adhesive sets fairly quickly, you’ll have to do one mini at a time. Hit the figure with a light coat of adhesive, but make sure you get the whole thing, from all sides and angles.
For the smaller minis, I just dipped them head first into the green grass. They come out pretty heavily clumped and covered, so shake off the excess, then go for another dip as necessary. Then I sprinkled the second grass (which has a finer texture) onto the figure from above, taking care to cover any unmossed areas that were showing through. Then just set it down and let the adhesive set for about ten minutes (you can moss the other figures in the meantime).
When the glue is fairly well set, the moss will still be really fragile and will fall off with any kind of handling. This is where the matte clear coat comes in. Hit them with a coat of this stuff. Be careful, because the force of the spray itself will blow the moss away. You’ll have to sort of “feather” the spray nozzle to get a gentle spray. After the first coat, this will be less of a problem. Definitely use two to three coats of the clear coat, don’t be stingy. Once this stuff dries, the moss will still look loose and mossy, but the figures can actually handle a good amount of handling without leaving a ton of moss behind.
For the huge figure, I obviously couldn’t dip it. I sprayed the adhesive then sort of sprinkled/rubbed the green grass onto it, applying it to key areas. I wanted to make sure and cover the face, and “build up” from the base so it looked like the creature was emerging from the jungle floor. Then I sprinkled on the second type of grass. After that, I spot sprayed adhesive onto a few spots without enough moss, and applied some more. Then it got a lot of clear coat.
I’m pretty happy with how these turned out, and it only took about an hour. The encounter resulted in one PC dying (an ambush vine pulled a decapitation critical hit card on him) and another narrowly avoiding death via a 20 stabilize roll. Frankly, none of that was because of the Oblivion Moss, but since the party retreated, they still have to fight their way past it.
Below is a gallery of larger images of the minis, including one or two shots that probably look a lot like what the PCs saw of the Oblivion Moss.
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July 2nd, 2010 12:56 PM
I never was quite sure, was it one of the visegrip vines that ripped my head off? Rotten F@#$%. Maybe I should go with a wizard or priest with herbicide powers.
Seriously those were pretty cool minis though. I still think we could have taken them if not for that damn card. I was thinking on the chances of it . . . 5% for a crit, 1 in 52 (or 1.9%) for that specific card (the only on that could take me out in a hit . . . i looked), tehn a conformation fort attack (I don’t know what the attack roll for the creature was), and THEN a failed death save 45% . . . wihtout the fort attack, I calculate that there was a .04275% that arkus would be killed by that attack. The gods were definitely NOT on my side . . . something to remedy?
July 2nd, 2010 1:14 PM
I think there is some sort of rift in space-time at your dining room table that throws off the odds.
July 2nd, 2010 1:39 PM
It was an ambush vine (MM2 I think) – although it seems realistic that Arkus never really knew what suddenly tore his head off. I believe, working from memory here, that it had a +20 vs. Fort on the confirmation attack.
July 2nd, 2010 3:02 PM
Delightful mod. I’m curious now; what are you going to DO with the moss minis? I mean– did any duplicates escape? Are there moss-versions of the party out there now?
July 2nd, 2010 3:04 PM
Speaking of the gods; none of my players ever pray in game, despite me telling them that the various powers of the world are listening. I find it funny.
July 2nd, 2010 3:24 PM
I prayed a couple times as my Invoker/Cleric/Wizard character thing guy.
July 2nd, 2010 4:02 PM
Well, the party does have to fight the Oblivion Moss one more time. After that, they make pretty good generic plant monsters. I did consider auctioning them on ebay though.
July 4th, 2010 5:10 PM
I wish the D&D minis weren’t randomized. I love them so much, I just wish they had a ‘generic party box’ with a fightery looking dude, a wizardy thing, an archer a guy in a cape, and someone clerical. Maybe multiple packs with different models, because as cool as the ‘Martial Power’ packs are, who has a party of three fighters?
July 5th, 2010 3:31 PM
That encounter was intense. I’m both looking forward to, and dreading, fighting that thing again. When you first said you would have wasted a lot of effort if nobody got hit with that moss attack I was wondering what the hell you were talking about. Craziness… but craziness with a nifty result. They came out really cool lookin’, and it’s just interesting to see ways you can modify minis to make them suit your needs.
July 6th, 2010 6:46 PM
ggodo: I buy singles on Paizo. The Star Wars minis are especially cheap. Well, relatively.