History EldritchAbomination / TableTopGames

*** Oh, but we're not out of the woods yet, as there's an entire class of mosnters based on theme, called the Unknowns .These creatures include such lovely things as [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/psychodrome.htm a creepy interdiemensional television "signal"]] [[TouchedByVorlons implied to have bounced off of]] [[EldritchAbomination Eldritch Abominations]], [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/hobkin.htm a thing that's biology is]] [[BizarreAlienBilogy so alien]] that nobody has the foggiest idea how the thing works, [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/xenogog.htm a diver-masked thing]] that can make itself intangible at will; spawns from AlienGeometries; and can see something [[UltimateEvil so horrible in television static that it breaks the TV in fear]], [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/underfiend.htm a horrible thing that is pretty much the embodiment of]] NaughtyTentacles, and [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/avazoth.htm the]] [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/grenzo.htm Meteor]] [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/ziafel.htm Series]]; [[BizarreAlienBiology which aren't even technically alive]].

*** To clarify further: The player's role is that of a Planeswalker, one of the most powerful kinds of beings in existence. The starting life total is sufficient to survive multiple attacks from [[KrakeAndLeviathan Leviathans, Kraken]] or [[InstantAwesomeJustAddDragons Ancient Dragons]]. Marit Lage will kill you in ''[[OneHitKill one hit]]''.

** Sixth, well, apart from Gugs, other Mythos creatures found their way to the setting, such as the [[BlobMonster Shoggoths]], [[ClockRoach Hounds of Tindalos]] and [[HumanoidAbomination Denizens of Leng]]; in fact, [[EldritchLocation Leng]] is AnotherDimension that has infrequent bleedovers with Golarion, [[RealityIsOutToLunch with obvious results]]

*** And now there's spinoff ''Mansions of Madness'', which is contained in a compact HauntedMansion format.

* In the world of ''EarthDawn'', the cyclical ebb and flow of magic periodically allows Horrors to slip from their own dimension into the world and devour anything that moves. If you're lucky, they will devour your body before they start on the good stuff.
** ''{{Shadowrun}}'' is more or less on the opposite end of the scale from ''EarthDawn,'' with ''Shadowrun'' a world where magic is on the increase and the Horrors not terribly far behind. While there's at least one group working to speed the process, there's also [[OurPresidentsAreDifferent others]] working to delay things, with the hope that this new-fangled technology thing can prevent TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt.

*** Said Supernal beings include the [[GodInHumanForm Ochema]], avatars of the [[BigBad Exarchs]] in ''Seers Of The Throne''. [[HumanoidAbomination Sure, they look]] [[{{Pride}} (and act)]] [[HumanoidAbomination like people]], [[StarfishAliens but look at them with Mage Sight]]...Unlike many examples, this is actually because they're ''less'' corrupted than everything else: [[CrapsackWorld The Fallen World]] simply [[DivideByZero can't handle]] [[{{Heaven}} Supernal]] beings like them...Although they stay significantly longer than and don't cause unintentional damage like Abyssal creatures, since they're ''supposed'' to be a part of reality.

*** And the Primordials that didn't get killed are now the Yozis, demon-kings who have had their very beings turned inside out and who live in [[GeniusLoci the broken body of their leader]]. They wish to turn Creation into Hell as part of a rather demented plan to escape their prison by expanding it.

*** Return of the Scarlet Empress revealed Yozi Charms which define the ability of Primordials to exist in their [[GeniusLoci worldform jouten]]. Which a Green Sun Prince can learn. Which means that ''[[TranshumanAliens every Green Sun Prince is actually an infant Primordial]]''. Did we also mention that once the shard becomes redundant, it is released to be implanted in another Infernal...?

* The Greater Titans of ''{{Scion}}'' are beyond mortal ken. They're beyond ''divine'' ken. They are so divorced from reality that they had to divide their power among Avatars just to have a clue what they were doing. Each one is its own internal world.

* In the TabletopGame ''Monsters and Other Childish Things'', one of the types of monsters used in its dark and twisted take on {{Mons}} are Eldritch Abominations. The non-statted sample monster Dewdrop is an Eldritch Abomination take on a unicorn, while one of the statted sample monsters is a Lovecraftian monstrosity merged with a teddy bear named [[ShoutOut Yog-So`Soft]]. Both these and the more "normal" monsters tend to cause bouts of panic and madness in people who see them as well, further adding to it. There are also a few non-{{Mon}} antagonists that are also abominations.

*** To clarify further: The player's role is that of a Planeswalker, one of the most powerful kinds of beings in existence. The starting life total is sufficient to survive multiple attacks from Leviathans, Kraken or Dragons. Marit Lage will kill you in ''one hit''.
*** The fluff for the ''Zendikar'' block strongly hints at the existence fof an ''entire race'' called the Eldrazi, all of which got locked away inside planets by a coalition of aforementioned planeswalkers. The name of the final set in that block? [[OhCrap Rise of the Eldrazi]].\\
The (comparatively) good news is that this is probably localized for now to Zendikar, and (hopefully) will be stilled there by Jace and/or Chandra. Still, there's something very unsettling about them. In M:tG, everything except lands and artifacts have at least one out of the five colors of mana associated with them; those mana colors define what aspects of reality they are most attuned to. Lands, meanwhile, almost always supply mana, and when colorless mana is supplied, that usually means mana too raw to have a particular slant; think of "colorless" as actually meaning "no particular attunement to a specific aspect of existence". The Eldrazi in question? ''They don't '''have''' a color.'' And no, they're not artifacts. They're alien to ''the structure of the known multiverse''. And if that Annihilator keyword is anything to go by, wherever they go, a bit of the multiverse there gets destroyed. And to think that they were once worshipped as the main gods of Zendikar...

* ''CthulhuTech''. An RPG set about 80 years in the future after the Migo have attacked earth and the Great Old Ones are stirring. It combines HPLovecraft with NeonGenesisEvangelion of all things (what with the gigantic biological weapons called Engels that pilots mentally sync to and ride in their spines).

* The Ancients in ''{{Traveller}}''.
* The {{Mad God}}s from ''{{Witchcraft}}''. When they intrude on our reality, they spread [[TheCorruption taint]], which causes mutations, madness and a weakening of the veil separating universes, potentially allowing more to come through. In the follow-up game ''Armageddon'', a ReligionOfEvil dedicated to one of them is currently trying to conquer the world in its name; [[ItGotWorse it's about halfway done]]. You know it's bad when some angels and demons get to the conclusion that [[EnemyMine they have to work together if they want any chance of stopping it.]]
* EclipsePhase: Encountering ''any'' alien life triggers a stress check, the only canon sapient species that transhumanity has contacted resemble [[StarfishAliens giant slime molds]]. And then there's the [[DeusEstMachina Seed AI]] that can potentially achieve god-like intelligence and the effects of some strains of the [[TheVirus Exsurgent virus]] are [[{{Understatement}} not]] [[BodyHorror pretty]].
** Warning, GM only info ahead [[spoiler: the ETI, [[AbusingTheKardashevScaleForFunAndProfit a Kardashev III or maybe IV entity]] that created the Exsurgent Virus. Described as being eons old and capable of megascale engineering with an understanding of physics, matter, energy, and universal laws that makes all of transhuman knowledge seem insignificant. And for some reason it has seeded the galaxy with probes that infect near-singularity intelligences with civilization destroying viruses.]]

* ''{{Nobilis}}'' has three main types. First, the True Gods- some of the earliest gods to come into being, to be found below the world in an enormous mass of tentacles and weirdness, simultaneously fighting and mating with each other. Next, the Excrucians, beings of not-being from outside reality who aim to destroy the universe, and finally the Actuals, the precursors to the True Gods- the movement like life, before it learned to live. The Actuals are vital to the existence of reality- but if one is summoned into the world, it will consume ''everything'' in a futile attempt to attain self-awareness if it isn't stopped. The True Gods, on the other hand, could quite possibly be the guys who empower the [=PCs=].
* The ''Gumshoe System'' has openly embraced the concept for its first settings- there is of course ''TrailOfCthulhu'', their own take on the [[CthulhuMythos Mythos]], but there is also the basic campaign world for ''Esoterrorists'' and ''Fear Itself'', which they have given the [[SarcasmMode cutesy moniker]] of '''[[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast World of Unremitting Horror]]'''. The monsters, most of them described in the supplement ''The Book of Unremitting Horror'', are for the most part ghastly {{humanoid abomination}}s that seem straight out of one of CliveBarker's more horrifying stories, many also blurring the line with other monster types such as [[OurDemonsAreDifferent demons]], [[TheUndead undead]] and [[TheFairFolk fairies]], the worst being {{Reality Warper}}s from "The Outer Black"; many others [[TheHeartless feed on and/or are created by the worst aspects of human nature]]. The descriptions, numerous fiction pieces and detailed descriptions of how to identify the things' depredations through forensic sciences all add up to some seriously HighOctaneNightmareFuel.

** There is [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/hestermoan.htm Hestermoan]], a horrible Nuckleavee-sque monstrosity created [[HighOctaneNightmareFuel "as an instrument of genocide against an entire civilization, and so effective that their very name remains unrecoverable"]]. It is basically every variant of PlagueMaster rolled into one horrible monstrosity, including a HatePlague to boot.

** And finally, there is [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/mothneaser.htm Mothneaser]], an enormous pillar of flesh with such perfect control over its blood that it can create massive [[ShapeshifterWeapon Shapeshifter Weapons]], enormous Blood {{Golem}}s, and even use victims as PeoplePuppets. And also, [[FromASingleCell even a single blood cell of it's can multiply inside other creatures]] [[HighOctaneNightmareFuel and consume them from the inside-out]]

* ''[[DungeonsAndDragons Dungeons & Dragons]]'' has whole races of Eldritch Abominations; from 3rd edition onwards, they have been increasingly linked with the Far Realm, an impossibly vast, incomprehensible place far beyond the cosmology of most ''D&D'' settings. A 3.5 sourcebook, ''Lords of Madness'', gave greater detail to the "Aberration" creature type, which is mainly used for such creatures (many of the weirder/most horrible Outsider-type creatures also count).
** One of the various backstories of Asmodeus, the Lord of Nessus and King of Hell, is that he is actually one of these. What others see when dealing with him is actually an advanced illusion. Asmodeus' real body is that of a titanic, ''miles long'' serpentine creature who is still injured from being thrown into hell. Because he was some sort of primordial entity who predated the Gods, and who literally created the Nine Hells when the Gods threw him into them.

*** Illithids aren't even naturally humanoid - they reproduce by [[TheVirus infesting]] humanoids with their larva, which then take over and mutate the victim into a new mind flayer. Occasionally they manage to infest nonhumanoids creatures, such as dragons. And larvae that survive long enough without being implanted eventually become neothelids, gigantic tentacled worm-things with massive PsychicPowers.
** Several kinds of demons in the game invite comparisons to Lovecraftian beasties as well, especially the various Obyrith subspecies: they've existed since before the dawn of time, often have incomprehensible biologies, and just glancing at one is enough to induce new phobias or temporary insanity. One of the oldest horrifies ''reality itself'' and can ''kill'' [[BrownNote if you get a glance]] at [[YouCannotGraspTheTrueForm its true form]].

*** The obyriths recently showed up in 4th edition with a revised backstory. Whereas the other demon lords seek to eventually destroy reality, the obyriths have already succeeded at least once before. The obyriths crippled their home dimension and started it on the unstoppable path to complete oblivion before even bothering to work-out how they would survive the end of their own reality. They escaped to another reality and inadvertently created the demon lords. Basically, both the obyriths and the new demon lords plot to destroy reality, escape to a new dimension before the previous dimension completely collapses, destroy that new dimension, escape to yet another reality, destroy that reality, and so on until there are no more realities left.

** Perhaps closest to the Lovecraftian mold are the aboleths, giant psychic fishlike aberrations that dwell in the deepest, darkest parts of the world in unspeakable aquatic cities and have racial memories stretching back to before the births of many gods (and maybe even the current universe). They can enslave people by sliming them; the slime turns skin transparent. Ironically, these monsters are terrified of the illithids, who they, despite their long memories, have no recollection of.

*** For some reason, though, all of the six Daelkyr who were trapped on Eberron look like unnaturally handsome male humans with one feature changed. The Master of Silence, the Daelkyr BigBad in the TheDragonBelow Trilogy, has smooth skin where his mouth should be. According to WordOfGod, however, the question is not to ask why daelkyr look so humanoid, and to ask why ''humanoids'' look so ''daelkyr''...

** One of the last 3.5 books Wizards released is called "Elder Evils", which features a guide of how to create your ''own'' CosmicHorror, as well as several examples of BigBad Eldritch Abominations, including Ragnorra, the MookMaker SpaceWhale with an EvilutionaryBiologist streak; Pandorym, the living ForgottenSuperweapon with a personality you don't want ''anywhere near'' a ForgottenSuperweapon; Atropus the [[OmnicidalNeutral undead planetoid]] (who is the quasi-sentient remains of the thing that birthed the universe); Kyuss, TheWormThatWalks (that's his ''actual title''); and of course, [[AlienInvasion the Hulks of Zoretha]].

*** The Dark Powers, the force(s) that created Ravenloft itself, could also apply, since both their methods and motives are entirely unfathomable. As well, the Nightmare Court could qualify.

* The [[PsychicPowers psionic]] Slarecians of the third-party (by a White Wolf subsidiary, unsurprisingly) ''ScarredLands'' setting. They're revealed to originally have been beings of pure thought, who were trapped in the world as it was forming, and now they want out. They've decided the only way to do that is to completely destroy the world. The guide book detailing them goes into details of their various experiments during their time on the world Scarn, which, befitting their origins, are pretty damn weird.

** Second: Kytons, a formerly unremarkable race of fiends whose main characteristic was looking like people wrapped in chains, have become {{expy}}s of [[{{Hellraiser}} the Cenobites]] (see film and litterature sections), and the more powerful types, while still chain-covered, look like huge, misshapen and lumpy modern art statues made from alien flesh.

** Fifth: And of course, the deepest parts of [[BeneathTheEarth the Night Below]] are filled with gibbering, unsane things.

** And, driving the trope home, increasing your Cthulhu Mythos skill ''directly'' reduces the extent to which your lost Sanity can be regained.

** Abyssal entities from ''[=~Mage: the Awakening~=]'' come from what could best be described as an "anti-universe," a world that lives by rules wholly antithetical to those of Earth. An Abyssal entity that's been known to sell a lot of prospective players on the setting is the Prince of 100,000 Leaves, a demon made of living anti-history whose first summoning [[RetGone rewrote history]] and spawned a cannibal cult that ''literally'' eats its victims out of history in an attempt to bring the world in line with the Prince's native timeline.
*** Truly, however, the most horrifying thing about Abyssal entities is that the idea that beings of the Abyss always take such predictable - horrifying and maddening, but predictable - forms as "monstrous, unclean abomination" is actually a comfortable lie that Mages tell themselves to hide from the fact that the Abyss is, in fact, in no way as banal and quantifiable as that.
** There's also the Nemesis Continuum. It's the [[MadScientist scientific]] CosmicHorror to the Prince's [[MadArtist perversion of the humanities]]. It's an altered set of the laws of physics. Bits of the material world it contaminates are twisted; what if anything green was suddenly boiling hot, and the speed of light was slower than the speed of sound? [[ItGotWorse It gets worse.]] The Nemesis Continuum is summoned by intelligent scientists "accidentally" (the book says that most proofs are found through indirect interference by [[EldritchAbomination acamoth]]) finding a proof for it, which then becomes true. And they become obsessed with finding more proofs.

** Then There's Neth, The Plane That Lives. A whole freaking demiplane that is ALIVE introduced in The Manual of The Planes. It qualifies as both an Eldritch Abomination and an Eldritch Location. Though the Far Realm suggests that it contains creatures possibly just as large or maybe even larger leading this troper to believe that Neth is one such native of the Far Realm that just so happens to have a portal to the Astral Plane inside itself. It learns by absorbing the denizens of other Planes that visit it.

** There is [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/hestermoan.htm Hestermoan]], a horrible Nuckleavee-sque monstrosity created [[HighOctaneNightmareFuel "as an instrument of genocide against an entire civilization, and so effective that their very name remains unrecoverable"]]. It is basically every variant of ThePlaguemaster rolled into one horrible monstrosity, including a HatePlague to boot.
** Then there is the [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/tormanshee.htm Tormanshee]], a creature that creates that can be best described as a neural network of MindRape. [[OhCrap And every mind it adds to the the network increases its horrible Midn rape radius]]. Oddly enough, it is also a NonMaliciousMonster, which just serves to make it more disturbing.
** And finally, there is [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/mothneaser.htm Mothneaser]], an enormous pillar of flesh with such perfect control over its blood that it can create massive [[ShapeshifterWeapon Shapeshifter Weapons]], enormous Blood {{Golem}}s, and even use victims as PeoplePuppets. And also, [[FromASingleCell eve na single blood cell of it's can multiply inside other creatures]] [[HighOctaneNightmareFuel and consume them from the inside-out]]

*** Oh, but we're not out of the woods yet, as there's an entire class of mosnters based on theme, called the Unknowns .These creatures include such lovely things as [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/psychodrome.htm a creepy interdiemensional television "signal"]] [[TouchedByVorlons implied to have bounced off of]] [[EldritchAbomination Eldritch Abominations]], [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/hobkin.htm a thing that's biology is]] [[BizzarreAlienBilogy so alien]] that nobody has the foggiest idea how the thing works, [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/xenogog.htm a diver-masked thing]] that can make itself intangible at will; spawns from AlienGeometries; and can see something [[UltimateEvil so horrible that it breaks the TV in fear]], [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/underfiend.htm a horrible thing that is pretty much the embodiment of]] NaughtyTentacles, and [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/avazoth.htm the]] [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/grenzo.htm Meteor]] [[http://www.bogleech.com/mortasheen/ziafel.htm Series]]; [[BizarreAlienBiology which aren't even technically alive]].

** Warning, GM only info ahead [[spoiler: the ETI, a Kardashev III or maybe IV entity that created the Exsurgent Virus. Described as being eons old and capable of megascale engineering with an understanding of physics, matter, energy, and universal laws that makes all of transhuman knowledge seem insignificant. And for some reason it has seeded the galaxy with probes that infect near-singularity intelligences with civilization destroying viruses.]]

* ''{{Nobilis}}'' has three main types. First, the True Gods- some of the earliest gods to come into being, to be found below the world in an enormous mass of tentacles and weirdness, simultaneously fighting and mating with each other. Next, the Excrucians, beings of not-being from outside reality who aim to destroy the universe, and finally the Actuals, the precursors to the True Gods- the movement like life, before it learned to live. The Actuals are vital to the existence of reality- but if one is summoned into the world, it will consume ''everything'' in a futile attempt to attain self-awareness if it isn't stopped. The True Gods, on the other hand, could quite possibly be the guys who empower the [=PCs=].

** Second: Kythons, a formerly unremarkable race of fiends whose main characteristic was looking like people wrapped in chains, have become {{expy}}s of [[{{Hellraiser}} the Cenobites]] (see film and litterature sections), and the more powerful types, while still chain-covered, look like huge, misshapen and lumpy modern art statues made from alien flesh.

** Worst of the lot, though, is Hundan, the Titan of Chaos. It alone of the Titans couldn't be bound, for doing so requires definition - and Hundan ''cannot be defined''. An easy way to enter Hundan is to have a God become the Void, the living embodiment of all things chaotic... and then jump in.

*** To clarify further: The player's role is that of a Planeswalker, one of the most powerful kinds of beings in existence. The starting life total is sufficient to survive multiple attacks from Leviathans, Kraken or Dragons. Marit Lage will kill you in ''one hit''. The worst part? Recent fluff strongly hints that Marit Lage is just a single member of an ''entire race'' called the Eldrazi, all of which got locked away inside planets by a coalition of aforementioned planeswalkers. The name of the set due to be released in 2010? [[OhCrap Rise of the Eldrazi]].
**** Well, the (comparatively) good news is that this is probably localized for now to Zendikar, and (hopefully) will be stilled there by Jace and/or Chandra. Still, the two mythic-rarity Eldrazi and one Eldrazi-generating card revealed show something very unsettling. In M:tG, everything except lands and artifacts have at least one out of the five colors of mana associated with them; those mana colors define what aspects of reality they are most attuned to. Lands, meanwhile, almost always supply mana, and when colorless mana is supplied, that usually means mana too raw to have a particular slant; think of "colorless" as actually meaning "no particular attunement to a specific aspect of existence". The Eldrazi in question? ''They don't '''have''' a color.'' And no, they're not artifacts. They're alien to ''the structure of the known multiverse''. And if that Annihilator keyword is anything to go by, wherever they go, a bit of the multiverse there gets destroyed...
**** Now that the entire [[http://www.wizards.com/Magic/TCG/Article.aspx?x=mtg/tcg/riseoftheeldrazi/spoiler# Spoiler List]] has been revealed, there are THREE Mythic Rare Legendary Eldrazi: Kozilek, Emrakul and Ulamog. These can't be killed permanently unless you exile them since as soon as they hit your graveyard from anywhere, you shuffle your entire graveyard into your deck. There are six more non-Legendary Eldrazi, the smallest of which is a 7/7 and is COMMON. Of these six, 2 are common, 2 are uncommon, and 2 are rare. All of them have the Annihilator ability. Plus there are several cards that create Eldrazi Spawns (small creatures that can be sacrificed for mana to help cast the big guys). And there are four non-creature colorless Eldrazi spells with considerable power. Notably, the mythic rare All is Dust destroys everything that has a color and the rare Eldrazi Conscription turns any creature into an extremely powerful Eldrazi. And did we mention the Mythic Rares were once worshipped as the main gods of Zendikar?
*** Although this means that Marit Lage probably isn't one, since Marit Lage has a colour: black.

* The [[PsychicPowers psionic]] Slarecians of the third-party (by a White Wolf subsidiary, unsurprisingly) ''Scarred Lands'' setting. They're revealed to originally have been beings of pure thought, who were trapped in the world as it was forming, and now they want out. They've decided the only way to do that is to completely destroy the world. The guide book detailing them goes into details of their various experiments during their time on the world Scarn, which, befitting their origins, are pretty damn weird.

* ''{{Nobilis}}'' has three main types. First, the True Gods- the first gods to come into being, to be found below the world in an enormous mass of tentacles and weirdness, simultaneously fighting and mating with each other. Next, the Excrucians, beings of not-being from outside reality who aim to destroy the universe, and finally the Actuals, the precursors to the True Gods- the movement like life, before it learned to live. The Actuals are vital to the existence of reality- but if one is summoned into the world, it will consume ''everything'' in a futile attempt to attain self-awareness if it isn't stopped. The True Gods, on the other hand, could quite possibly be the guys who empower the PCs.

* Spoofed in ''Pokethulhu''. Yes, there are hideous, evil non-Euclidean critters. But you can tame them and use them as {{Mons}} (and they still drive you to insanity).

* In Glorantha (as seen in RuneQuest and other sources), Chaos is like this. One major empire has an enslaved Chaos god/demon/thingy called the Crimson Bat. It's huge, it flies, it is covered with eyes, it glows with unholy energy, and it will eat your soul. It ''is'' crimson, and I suppose it's at least as much like a bat as it's like anything else... which isn't much.

* ''Dragon Warriors'' brings us Balor, the god of darkness. A humanoid being, but of of such immense size and power that he can rampage across the world unstoppable. It's a good thing that he's [[SealedEvilInACan entombed in magical ice.]] His cultists, [[ElementalPowers the Darkness Elementalists,]] are granted some of the best elemental spells.

* EclipsePhase: Encountering ''any'' alien life triggers a stress check, the only canon sapient species that transhumanity has contacted resemble [[StarfishAliens giant slime molds]]. And then there's the [[DeusEstMachina Seed AI]] that can potentially achieve god-like intelligence and the effects of some strains of the [[TheVirus Exsurgent virus]] are [[Understatement not]] [[BodyHorror pretty]].

** Warning, GM only info ahead [[spoiler: the ETI, a Kardashev III or maybe IV entity that created the Exsurgent Virus. Described as being eons old and capable of megascale engineering with an understanding of physics, matter, energy, and universal laws that makes all of transhuman knowledge seem insignificant. And for some reason it has seeded the galaxy with probes that infect near-singularity intelligences with civilization destroying viruses.]]

* ''[[DungeonsAndDragons Dungeons & Dragons]]'' has whole races of Eldritch Abominations; from 3rd edition onwards, they have been increasingly linked with the Far Realm, an impossibly vast, incomprehensible place far beyond the cosmology of most ''D'' settings. A 3.5 sourcebook, ''Lords of Madness'', gave greater detail to the "Aberration" creature type, which is mainly used for such creatures (many of the weirder/most horrible Outsider-type creatures also count).

** Several kinds of demons in the game invite comparisons to Lovecraftian beasties as well, especially the various Obyrith subspecies: they've existed since before the dawn of time, often have incomprehensible biologies, and just glancing at one is enough to induce new phobias or temporary insanity. One of the oldest horrifies ''reality itself'' and can ''kill'' if you get a glance at its true form.

** Its not so much that they are arrogant, they are just older then pretty much all of the modern day Gods and have seen how they came to power. They pretty much view them has young upstarts who have no business messing with them or demanding worship from creatures far older then they are.

*** Aboleths have enough parallels to abominations of the Cthulhu mythos that the question was directly addressed in the ''Lords of Madness'' sourcebook:

** 3.5 Edition also included the Alienist class. The class features made all your Summoning spells summon creatures from the aforementioned Far Realm, which took the forms of creatures you could normally summon, but took on a template that gave them more hit points, resistances, tentacles or other deformities, and the ability to shift into their "true(r) form" which scared everything like crazy. Further, your familiar became one of these creatures. Basically, you're calling tiny C'thuloid monsters. In addition to that, the caster who takes the class eventually starts ''becoming'' like one of these creatures, goes more then a little insane, and (with the timeless body class feature) is taken to the Far Realms by the unspeakable Eldritch Horrors when they would normally die of old age, specifically ''never seen again'' by people on the prime material plane. If you manage to reach the maximum level, you can cheat dying of age altogether, gain the "Outsider" trait and become an Eldritch Abomination. Your character grows a tentacle or two at this point.

** Aboleths are too arrogant to worship anything, but they ''respect'' beings they call the Five Elder Evils. These are [[{{Expy}} thematically based on]] HPLovecraft horrors, and include flames surrounding a body that will [[GoMadFromTheRevelation drive you mad if you see it]] (if it does not kill you outright), a ball of sentient goo the size of a planet, and a drilling subterranean squid / centipede thing that appears to be eating its way very, very slowly through the crust of the planet. [[BrownNote Whose feces will make your head go wonky if you get too close to it.]]

* The {{Pathfinder}} system, being effectively D&D 3.75, has of course included those in its base setting, to the point of obvious AuthorAppeal. The Aboleths have an extensive undersea/underground empire [[spoiler:responsible for the rise and fall of that world's {{Atlantis}} stand-in]], and two of the basic pantheon's gods fit pretty well: Rovagug the Rough Beast, a ravenous, slavering monster whose reason for being is destroying the world, and who had to be stopped by all the other gods working together to [[SealedEvilInACan imprison him inside the Earth]] (many dying in the struggle), and who periodically disgorges horrid spawn to devastate the surface (like [[{{Kaiju}} the Tarrasque]]); and Zon-Kuthon the Midnight Lord, whose jealousy towards his half-sister drove him to a self-imposed exile in remote corners of the cosmos, from which he came back changed into a thing of darkness, pain and loss. Both tend to attract insane cultists (or to drive cultists insane, depending).
** ItGetsWorse, on several fronts. First: In this setting, Asmodeus is a reworked version of the above-mentioned backstory, only moreso: he is literally one of the two creator-beings of TheMultiverse, and his wounds are from a fight with the other, good-aligned creator-being, [[DevilButNoGod who was killed in the battle]].
** Second: The Qlippoth are basically Obyrith with the serial numbers filed off (or rather [[OlderThanTheyThink the reverse]]; see the Obyrith entry above), and cosmology-wise, the Abyss is basically a cancerous sore that's wrapped itself around reality.
** Third: Not only is there a Far Realms equivalent, called the Dark Tapestry, but it isn't very far, relatively speaking- it's actually ''outer space'', and to top it off, [[OhCrap it's the domain of literally Lovecraftian entities, Azathoth and Yog-Sottoth included]].
* The Forgotten Realms has three Elder Evils. Ityak-Ortheel the Elf-Eater was created when the blood of the orc god Gruumsh and the elven god Corellon Larethian merged. Its appearance is Lovecraftian-inspired (a massive body supported by three legs, tentacles everywhere) It lives in between the planes and is occasionally released by mad cultists (mostly of Malar) to, well, eat elves. And anything else in its way, of course, but it takes pleasure in destroying elven towns and cities and slowly devours them over hundreds of years. The second is Kezef the Chaos Hound, who appears as a massive, skinless hunting dog, its coat covered in maggots. It hunts for the Faithful, those who worship a god, and kills them, and then the maggots swarm over the body before returning to Kezef. The soul of the person slain is utterly destroyed, and not even the gods can bring them back. It also [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything bit the hand off Tyr when the gods were trying to chain Kezef down]]. The third is Dendar the Night Serpent, a serpent several hundred feet long that came into being when the first creatures had a nightmare. It feeds on (and causes) nightmares of every sentient being in the world. As far as Eldritch Abominations go, Dendar serves a somewhat useful purpose: if she wasn't around, people would remember every nightmare they've had in exact, excruciating detail, never wanting to sleep again, for fear of adding to their terror.

** In addition to the Wyrm, the Weaver and Wyld deserve mention. All three are incomprehensibly vast primal forces, arguably the prime movers of creation, and their conflicts with each other are all that stop any of them from bringing about TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt. If each were given its way, the Wyrm would destroy everything, the Weaver would freeze everything in eternal stasis, and the Wyld would dissolve everything into perpetual chaos.
** In addition to mentioning the above Cthonians, ''GeistTheSinEaters'' features Kerberoi -- wholly alien in mindset, bizarre in appearance, and nearly unstoppable, they exist solely to enforce the Old Laws of the Dead Domains. Geists can also border on this -- they're universally completely or near-completely alien in mindset, and varying degrees of bizarre in appearance.
*** Speaking of Kerberoi, the supplement ''Book of the Dead'' introduces the Leviathan, the Kerberos of the Ocean of Fragments, who pretty well embodies this trope. It's an [[GiantSwimmer impossibly vast sea creature]] of some sort -- it's assumed to be a [[EverythingsSquishierWithCephalopods cephalopod]], but that's just because it has tentacles; it's too big for anyone to ever see enough of it to make out its true form. Every human in the world has had nightmares of it lurking beneath them in an endless ocean, even if they've forgotten them. It cannot be killed or placated, any more than you could the tide or any other force of nature, and stats are provided solely for the purposes of escaping it or inconveniencing it enough to drive it off temporarily. Fortunately, it's rarely seen -- to the point that most people think the Dead Dominion's only other notable inhabitant, the Admiral, is actually its Kerberos.
** The [[FairFolk True Fae]] of ''[=~Changeling: The Lost~=]'' deserve at least an honorary mention. Now, they're more recognizable than their stablemates above, capable of great {{pride}}, vanity and twisted creativity, but they are ultimately alien, incredibly powerful and terrifying beings with [[EvilCannotComprehendGood no concept of empathy, kindness or selflessness]], capable of rending souls and striking pacts with aspects of reality itself, and within their [[RealityIsOutToLunch home dimension]] they are capable of [[RealityWarper just about anything]], and can twist their kidnapped human subjects to meet their needs. That they happen to have inspired fairy tales perhaps only makes them ''more'' frightening. [[HighOctaneNightmareFuel And do you wanna know how they're born?]]
*** [[spoiler: [[AndThenJohnWasAZombie No. No, you don't.]]]]
** The sourcebook ''Second Sight'', whatever its [[ScienceIsBad other]] [[BrokenAesop issues]], does have a pretty good chapter on building your own abomination, a MisanthropeSupreme or FallenHero to serve as their high priest, and a cult to worship them. The creation example is a being of dissonant sound. (Although one suggested weakness for this being - music of unity - seemed uncannily reminiscent of ''{{Ghostbusters}} 2''.)
** BIG ''[=~Hunter: The Vigil~=]'' spoiler: [[spoiler:The Cheiron Group is run by ten of them, with [[HumanoidAbomination illusions of human beings]] to let them interact with people. It's the Storyteller's choice whether they're working to defend our world or are planning to exploit it for everything we've got.]]
** ''[[GeniusTheTransgression Genius: The Transgression]]'' has the Cold Ones, entities living at the end of time, who'd like to go back and experience things like heat and movement.
* In the TabletopGame ''Monsters and Other Childish Things'', one of the types of monsters used in its dark and twisted take on {{Mons}} are Eldritch Abominations. The non-statted sample monster Dewdrop is an Eldritch Abomination take on a unicorn, while one of the statted sample monsters is a Lovecraftian monstrosity merged with a teddy bear named [[ShoutOut Yog-So`Soft]]. Both these and the more "normal" monsters tend to cause bouts of panic and madness in people who see them as well, further adding to it.
* In ''The Whispering Vault'', the player characters are all minor Eldritch Abominations who act as a "police force" that apprehends and retrieves other abominations who have illicitly made their way to Earth.

**** Now that the entire [[http://www.wizards.com/Magic/TCG/Article.aspx?x=mtg/tcg/riseoftheeldrazi/spoiler# Spoiler List]] has been revealed, there are THREE Mythic Rare Legendary Eldrazi: Kozilek, Emrakul and Ulamog. These can't be killed permanently unless you exile them since as soon as they hit your graveyard from anywhere, you shuffle your entire graveyard into your deck. There are six more non-Legendary Eldrazi, the smallest of which is a 7/7 and is COMMON. Of these six, 2 are common, 2 are uncommon, and 2 are rare. Plus there are several cards that create Eldrazi Spawns (small creatures that can be sacrificed for mana to help cast the big guys). And there are four non-creature colorless Eldrazi spells with considerable power. Notably, the mythic rare All is Dust destroys everything that has a color and the rare Eldrazi Conscription turns any creature into an Eldrazi. And did we mention the Mythic Rares were once worshipped as the main gods of Zendikar?

* The Greater Titans of ''{{Scion}}'' are beyond mortal ken. They're beyond ''divine'' ken. They are so divorced from reality that they had to divide their power among Avatars just to have a clue what they were doing. Each one is its own internal world.
** Worst of the lot, though, is Hundan, the Titan of Chaos. It alone of the Titans couldn't be bound, for doing so requires definition - and Hundan ''cannot be defined''. An easy way to enter Hundan is to have a God become the Void, the living embodiment of all things chaotic... and then jump in.

* The [[PsychicPowers psionic]] Slarecians of the ''Scarred Lands'' settings. They're revealed to originally have been beings of pure thought, who were trapped in the world as it was forming, and now they want out. They've decided the only way to do that is to completely destroy the world. The guide book detailing them goes into details of their various experiments during their time on the world Scarn, which, befitting their origins, are pretty damn weird.
** To a lesser extent, the Titans, the original rulers of Scarn. While they usually appear humanoid, and can easily interact with mortals without driving them insane, they're also powerful to the point of not having statistics, they usually see mortals as irrelevant, and their mindsets are incomprehensible.

* ''Dragon Warriors'' (formerly known as ''Lands of Legend'') brings us Balor, the god of darkness. A humanoid being, but of of such immense size and power that he can rampage across the world unstoppable. It's a good thing that he's [[SealedEvilInACan entombed in magical ice.]] His cultists, [[ElementalPowers the Darkness Elementalists,]] are granted some of the best elemental spells.

** Now with a second expansion, based on TheUnspeakableVaultOfDoom, with atrwork by the webcomic's artist! Yum Yum!

* The {{Mad God}}s from ''{{Witchcraft}}''. When they intrude on our reality, they spread [[TheCorruption taint]], which causes mutations, madness and a weakening of the veil separating universes, potentially allowing more to come through. In the follow-up game ''Armageddon'', a ReligionOfEvil dedicated to one of them is currently trying to conquer the world in its name; [[ItGotWorse it's about halfway done]]. You know it's bad when some angels and demons get to the conclusion that [[EnemyMine they have to work together if they want any chance of stopping it.]]

* The {{Mad God}}s from ''{{Witchcraft}}''. When they intrude on our reality, they spread [[TheCorruption taint]], which causes mutations, madness and a weakening of the veil separating universes, potentially allowing more to come through. In the follow-up game ''Armageddon'', a ReligionOfEvil dedicated to one of them is currently trying to conquer the world in its name; [[ItGotWorse it's about halfway done]].

** One of the various backstories of Asmodeus, the Lord of Nesus and King of Hell, is that he is actually one of these. What others see when dealing with him is actually an advanced illusion. Asmodeus' real body is that of a titanic, ''miles long'' serpentine creature who is still injured from being thrown into hell. Because he was some sort of primordial entity who predated the Gods, and who literally created the Nine Hells when the Gods threw him into them.

*** Illithids aren't even naturally humanoid - they reproduce by [[TheVirus infesting]] humanoids with their larva, which then take over and mutate the victim into a new mind flayer. Occasionally they manage to infest nonhumanoids creatures, such as dragons.

*** [[spoiler:That's because illithids are from the future, refugees from the destruction of their vast empire.]]

** Don't forget the [[{{Eberron}} Daelkyr]]. Extradimensional invaders who mess with the fabric of reality for shits and giggles. They also like to mess with mortal biology like a kid plays with Play-Doh.

** Recently, Wizards has released a book called "Elder Evils", which features a guide of how to create your ''own'' CosmicHorror, as well as several examples of BigBad Eldritch Abominations, including Ragnorra, the MookMaker SpaceWhale with an EvilutionaryBiologist streak; Pandorym, the living ForgottenSuperweapon with a personality you don't want ''anywhere near'' a ForgottenSuperweapon; Atropus the [[OmnicidalNeutral undead planetoid]] (who is the quasi-sentient remains of the thing that birthed the universe); Kyuss, TheWormThatWalks (that's his ''actual title''); and of course, [[AlienInvasion the Hulks of Zoretha]].

** 3.5 Edition also included the Alienist class. The class features made all your Summoning spells summon creatures from the aforementioned Far Realm, which took the forms of creatures you could normally summon, but took on a template that gave them more hit points, resistances, tentacles or other deformities, and the ability to shift into their "true(r) form" which scared everything like crazy. Further, your familiar became one of these creatures. Basically, you're calling tiny C'thuloid monsters. In addition to that, the caster who takes the class eventually starts ''becoming'' like one of these creatures, goes more then a little insane, and (with the timeless body feat) is taken to the Far Realms by the unspeakable Eldritch Horrors when they would normally die of old age, specifically ''never seen again'' by people on the prime material plane. If you manage to reach the maximum level, you can cheat dying of age altogether, gain the "Outsider" trait and become an Eldritch Abomination. Your character grows a tentacle or two at this point.

*** 4E also has the Primordials -- a primeval race of elementals who ''created the universe'', and are powerful enough to ''destroy gods''. They would like nothing more then to destroy said creation, since as their nature as elementals dictate, they wish to continue an endless cycle of death and rebirth. Most mortals are perfectly fine with the world as it is now, especially since said death and rebirth would include them.

*** [[DarkIsNotEvil And at least one of those stars is good]]. While featured in a Dragon article, Ulban the Messenger is a mostly benevolent comet god who wants to change the future-thus averting TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt, but his Star Spawn was featured in the Monster Manual Three, and oh looky, [[OhCrap it's evil aligned]]

** The {{Pathfinder}} system, being effectively D&D 3.75, has of course included those in its base setting. The Aboleths have an extensive undersea/underground empire [[spoiler:responsible for the rise and fall of that world's {{Atlantis}} stand-in]], and two of the basic pantheon's gods fit pretty well: Rovagug the Rough Beast, a ravenous, slavering monster whose reason for being is destroying the world, and who had to be stopped by all the other gods working together to [[SealedEvilInACan imprison him inside the Earth]] (many dying in the struggle), and who periodically disgorges horrid spawn to devastate the surface (like the Tarrasque); and Zon-Kuthon the Midnight Lord, whose jealousy towards his half-sister drove him to a self-imposed exile in remote corners of the cosmos, from which he came back changed into a thing of darkness, pain and loss. Both tend to attract insane cultists (or to drive cultists insane, depending).
* The Forgotten Realms has three Elder Evils. Ityak-Ortheel the Elf-Eater was created when the blood of the orc god Grummush and the elven god Corellon Larethian merged. Its appearance is Lovecraftian-inspired (a massive body supported by three legs, tentacles everywhere) It lives in between the planes and is occasionally released by mad cultists (mostly of Malar) to, well, eat elves. And anything else in its way, of course, but it takes pleasure in destroying elven towns and cities and slowly devours them over hundreds of years. The second is Kezef the Chaos Hound, who appears as a massive, skinless hunting dog, its coat covered in maggots. It hunts for the Faithful, those who worship a god, and kills them, and then the maggots swarm over the body before returning to Kezef. The soul of the person slain is utterly destroyed, and not even the gods can bring them back. It also [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything bit the hand off Tyr when the gods were trying to chain Kezef down]]. The third is Dendar the Night Serpent, a serpent several hundred feet long that came into being when the first creatures had a nightmare. It feeds on (and causes) nightmares of every sentient being in the world. As far as Eldritch Abominations go, Dendar serves a somewhat useful purpose: if she wasn't around, people would remember every nightmare they've had in exact, excruciating detail, never wanting to sleep again, for fear of adding to their terror.

** An entity that actually exists on Oerth itself is the Mother, a bizarre entity served by a colony of degenerate and inbred humans who found it while they fled the destruction of their old empire. Physically, the Mother looks like a large mass of disgusting white ooze that slithers across the walls, floor and ceiling of the caverns it inhabits, with the ability to drain the life out of anything it makes physical contact with. Unlike the other examples, it's possible for the PlayerCharacters to actually [[DidYouJustPunchOutCthulu punch the Mother out]], as it's mentioned in one of the adventure ideas provided by GaryGygax in the original 1983 Greyhawk boxed set.

*** Said Supernal beings include the [[GodInHumanForm Ochema]], avatars of the [[BigBad Exarchs]] in ''Seers Of The Throne''. [[HumanoidAbomination Sure, they look]] [[{{Pride}} (and act)]] [[HumanoidAbomination like people]], [[StarfishAliens but look at them with Mage Sight]]...Unlike many examples, this is actually because they're ''less'' corrupted then everything else: [[CrapsackWorld The Fallen World]] simply [[DivideByZero can't handle]] [[{{Heaven}} Supernal]] beings like them...Although they stay significantly longer and don't cause unintentional damage then Abyssal creatures, since they're ''supposed'' to be a part of reality.

*** The Neverborn are ''dead'' Abominations that you have to meet face to architecture. Autochthon is a giant hollow machine-deity approximately the size of a planet (and he's a good guy. Sort of.) Some of the gods fall into this, including Nara-O (who's actually quite a nice guy).

** The [[FairFolk True Fae]] of ''[=~Changeling: The Lost~=]'' deserve at least an honorary mention. Now, they're more recognizable than their stablemates above, capable of great pride, vanity and twisted creativity, but they are ultimately alien, incredibly powerful and terrifying beings with [[EvilCannotComprehendGood no concept of empathy, kindness or selflessness]], capable of rending souls and striking pacts with aspects of reality itself, and within their [[RealityIsOutToLunch home dimension]] they are capable of [[RealityWarper just about anything]], and can twist their kidnapped human subjects to meet their needs. That they happen to have inspired fairy tales perhaps only makes them ''more'' frightening. [[HighOctaneNightmareFuel And do you wanna know how they're born?]]

** From the same cheery universe we have the C'Tan - one of whom is responsible for all mortal creatures (except orks) ''fearing death'' - and arguably the Tyranid Hive Mind.
** Most obviously, the Chaos Gods and the gibbering hordes of daemons at their command.

*** To clarify further: The player's role is that of a Planeswalker, one of the most powerful kinds of beings in existence. The starting life total is sufficient to survive multiple attacks from Leviathans, Kraken or Dragons. Marit Lage will kill you in ''one hit''. The worst part? Recent fluff strongly hints that Marit Lage is just a single member of an entire race called the Eldrazi, all of which got locked away inside planets by a coalition of aforementioned planeswalkers. The name of the set due to be released in 2010? Rise of the Eldrazi.

**** Now that the entire [[http://www.wizards.com/Magic/TCG/Article.aspx?x=mtg/tcg/riseoftheeldrazi/spoiler# Spoiler List]] has been revealed, there are THREE Mythic Rare Legendary Eldrazi: Kozilek, Emarakul and Ulamog. These can't be killed permanently unless you exile them since as soon as they hit your graveyard from anywhere, you shuffle your entire graveyard into your deck. There are six more non-Legendary Eldrazi, the smallest of which is a 7/7 and is COMMON. Of these six, 2 are common, 2 are uncommon, and 2 are rare. Plus there are several cards that create Eldrazi Spawns (small creatures that can be sacrificed for mana to help cast the big guys). And there are four non-creature colorless Eldrazi spells with considerable power. Notably, the mythic rare All is Dust destroys everything that has a color and the rare Eldrazi Conscription turns any creature into an Eldrazi. And did we mention the Mythic Rares were once worshipped as the main gods of Zendikar?

* The psionic Slarecians of the ''Scarred Lands'' settings. They're revealed to originally have been beings of pure thought, who were trapped in the world as it was forming, and now they want out. They've decided the only way to do that is to completely destroy the world. The guide book detailing them goes into details of their various experiments during their time on the world Scarn, which, befitting their origins, are pretty damn weird.

* The Ancients in ''{{Traveller}}''.

* Naturally, Chaosium's ''{{The Call of Cthulhu}}'' game is just ''full'' of them. One of the basic stats of [=PCs=], along with the normal STR, DEX, CON, WIS, INT and such, is SAN. That's ''Sanity''. It's arguably the most important single stat unless you ''want'' to keep rolling up new characters.

* Naturally, Chaosium's ''{{The Call of Cthulhu}}'' game is just ''full'' of them. One of the basic stats of [=PCs=], along with the normal STR, DEX, WIS, INT and CHR is SAN. That's ''Sanity''. It's arguably the most important single stat unless you ''want'' to keep rolling up new characters.