Slaadi

The slaadi were monsters introduced in the Fiend Folio that are now considered part of D&D product identity.

The original creatures written up by Charles Stross and illustrated by Russ Nicholson included the red slaad, blue slaad, green slaad, gray slaad, and death slaad. In later editions, the white slaad and black slaad (among others) were added.

These creatures were never of particular interest to me, so I never used them in any adventures, but in reading up on the slaad, it looks like later editions introduced new material on slaad reproduction that was very similar to the G-virus life cycle from the Resident Evil franchise.

Red slaadi generate blue slaadi by injecting hosts with eggs that grow into blue slaad tadpoles, while blue slaadi generate red slaadi through infection with a chaos phage that mutates a host into a red slaad. These mechanisms are pretty much how the G-embryo and Golgotha virus from RE2 work.

The most common miniature of a slaad seems to be the Gray Slaad, of which I have three. Two come from the D&D Miniatures Icons of the Realms line (Monster Menagerie 3 #21A, #21B), while the third comes from Nolzur's Marvelous Miniatures (WZK73353).

These models scale out to 7½ to 8 feet tall in 1/72, so they are perfect for use as the more common red slaad with just a little modification and the proper paint job.

The next miniatures are a Death Slaad (part of the Nolzur's set with the Gray Slaad) and a Slaad Spawn from the D&D Miniatures line (Legendary Evils #36). The Death Slaad can pass as another red slaad, while the Slaad Spawn can be used as a green slaad.

The Slaad Spawn is a bit on the short side, but I'm willing to let it slide since it is difficult to gauge whether a slaad is standing fully upright or not.

The final miniature is not a slaad, but rather a Nightmare Thing from the Massive Darkness game.

I've included it because the miniature looks almost exactly like one of the G-mutants encountered in the sewers of the RE:2 remake.

These mutants are created when a human host is rejected by a G-embryo, so instead of becoming a horrible inhuman monster, becomes an even more horrible inhuman monster. I'm thinking that the same could be true for when a host proves to be incompatible with a slaad tadpole.

I cut away the weird armpit fins from the gray slaad figures. I think the fins are supposed to represent the webbing seen between the arms and body in the original Nicholson illustrations, but they just look silly in this new form.

The blades on the backs of the hands were removed, as were any fireballs.

I slapped some red paint on a Gray Slaad, some green paint on the Slaad Spawn, and voilà.