Howling at the Moon

Guys! We are super excited to share our very first print & paint partnership post here at 3D RPG and how the final brilliantly painted 3D-printed miniatures fit into our Wandering Monster series. Let’s gooooooo!

First off, let’s introduce Laughing Bear Gaming. They’re a professional custom paint service with immense skills and attention to detail. We traded some DMs on Instagram and settled on a small series of prints for them to really sink their brushes into.

Their chief proprietor, whom we playfully dubbed “Arkansas Adam,” asked for some of our favorite detail-stuffed prints. So, we ran off some great models by Loot Studios, STL Miniatures, and Cast n Play – three industry-leading model makers who are known for really comprehensive STLs. “Challenge accepted!” he quickly retorted.

In this post, we’re going to take the opportunity to showcase Laughing Bear Games’ amazing brushwork and update our Wandering Monster Wilderness Trek table by featuring their first painted models: some especially mean Howlers by Loot Studios!

This Howler STL is from Loot Studios’ Buried Tomb release. This classic fiend wanders the grasslands and basically takes up a 2×2 d20 spot on your gameboard.

We didn’t pass along the assigned base to Arkansas Adam, so that was our bad (but it was no big whoop because it looks like the front claw is in mid-step). We have a large box of flat bases from the old Gen Con days when there was a giant laser cutter vendor on the convention floor, and you could purchase a huge bag of assorted bases for pennies. So we just can’t help but use them, as we get such good nostalgia vibes.

Laughing Bear Games did such a great job on these two sculpts. The colors just scream (pun intended), “What the heck did we just run into?” here within the rolling landscape of Evermoors (which is north of both Waterdeep and Phandalin).

In terms of monster stats; Howlers typically travel in packs, so we used two of them in this encounter build. With six fourth-level characters, that’s an initial encounter challenge rating of “deadly,” and that’s rather brutal for a wandering monster roll (although it’s nice for a table to have one very unfortunate event possibility).

Thus, we’ll take their hit points from 90 down to a more manageable 50 per fiend. The rest of the core stats, like AC 16 and +6 to hit bite attack, will remain the same.

For the nastiest part, the Mind-Breaking Howl, the effect has a DC 16 Wisdom save, and we’ll nudge that down to a DC 14. These aren’t quite full-grown Howlers, ya see. 😉

Now let’s set the scene and talk tactics. It’s another typical long and boring night of guard duty until the player(s) noticed some distant trees rustling a little more than usual. DM Ben will ask for their perception roll against the Howler’s +3 Dex stealth roll. If the monsters win, they’re going to get within 60 feet and attempt a Mind-Breaking Howl (WIS SV DC 15) to incapacitate as many of the players as possible!

Then they’ll use that 40 ft speed to just rush the group’s campsite and start biting. A Howler can receive advantage on its attack rolls if it’s within 5 ft of its buddy. They also have non-magical weapon damage resistance.

This won’t be a fight to the death. If one Howler goes down, the other will attempt to flee (in the hopes it can get more of its pack and return if the players are silly enough not to break camp).

We made some slick videos to better highlight Laughing Bear Games’ quality work so check them out on our Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube channels.

Once again, a huge thanks to Arkansas Adam for his fantastic paint jobs!! We’re really jazzed to share more of his excellent works in future posts. Be sure to visit his Instagram, Facebook, and Etsy (where you can request a custom quote for some paint jobs on your own pile of shame).

Now, all we need to do is, once again, update our Wilderness Trek Wandering Monster Table!

Until next time!