Elder Thing

thingiverse

So I was frustrated with the available Lovecraftian Elder Things (ones) designs available and made my own. I am a huge Lovecraft fan and I went over the Elder Thing description in The Mountains Of Madness carefully. Elder things are laid out like plants, They have a 'top to bottom' symmetry of plants rather than the front and back layout/symmetry of animals. They had Five Eyes, mouths, head like a starfish, five wings equidistantly spaced around the body and retractable. This last is the point most people get wrong. I imagine that they fly by spinning, much as a helicopter of buzz bomb firework does. My model only lacks the tentacles they used as 'hands' and I did that to simplify the print. Besides at the size I was printing them it wouldn't show anyway. I made this to use as a monster in Pathfinder. There is a creature in Bestiary 4 'Elder One' but like most people, the Pathfinder people got it very wrong. Elder Ones (a.k.a. Eldar things) are described as a race with extraordinarily tough hides, nigh immune to most hazards. Resistant to the elements and able to fly through the air, and even the space between planners. They could breath both air and water. They fought the Shoggoths (an amorphous slave race they created to build their cities) with technology that included beam weapons of some sort. They also tended to live simply, avoiding their advanced technology when possible, which I think, combined with their alien mentality and physiology, makes them the single most compelling alien ever imagined. I wish people did them more justice. I hope you enjoy this print.