WIZARDS, PIRATES, PHANTOMS AND SOME VERY BAD NEWS IN A DUNGEON

Brad McDevitt Stock Art – Fantasy Collection 3 is a broad old-school fantasy assortment with one foot in sword-and-sorcery and the other planted firmly on something that has just moved in the dark.

There are recognisable staples—an Amazon, skeletal warrior, dire wolf, lich and dungeon battle—but the pack wanders pleasingly beyond the obvious. An oni shares space with a seraphim. There is an orcish pirate, a golden medusa, a mysterious Lavinda, a sword-wielding madwoman, an infernal seductress and a wizardly gate which almost certainly does not open onto somewhere with adequate tourist facilities.

The collection contains 25 TIFF image files representing 23 distinct subjects. Two illustrations—Infernal Seductress and Sexy Pharaoh—are each supplied in a standard and greyscale treatment. Everything else is a separate piece.

It is particularly useful for publishers who need more than a folder of interchangeable adventurer portraits. There are monsters, characters, locations, battles, victims and magical incidents here: enough visual range to move through an adventure or setting book without every page looking as though the inhabitants have queued for the same portrait painter.

CONTENTS

The contact sheet shows the following files:

• Oni

• Seraphim

• Lavinda

• Amazon

• Madwoman with Sword

• Laughing Witch

• Lich in Hood

• Evil Overlord’s Tower

• Dire Wolf

• Wizardly Gate

• Dead Villager

• Phantom Skull

• Frozen Peasant

• Slightly NSFW Cavewoman

• Skeletal Warrior

• Savaged Remains

• Golden Medusa

• Mountain Encounter

• Orcish Pirate

• Infernal Seductress

• Infernal Seductress – greyscale

• Dungeon Battle

• Sexy Pharaoh

• Sexy Pharaoh – greyscale

• Fantasy Combat

That is 25 TIFF files covering 23 different subjects.

The names above are cleaned versions of the filenames visible on the supplied contact sheet. They tell you what Brad called the pieces; they do not dictate precisely what those people, places or creatures must become in your own setting.

A Madwoman with Sword can become a berserker, escaped prisoner or cursed warrior. Lavinda can acquire whatever biography the manuscript needs. The Sexy Pharaoh need not even remain a pharaoh if you have a better use for the figure.

The picture is stock.

The story is yours.

SWORD-AND-SORCERY HAS ARRIVED

Several pieces have the flavour of proper pulp fantasy: colourful, dangerous and not particularly concerned with behaving itself.

The Amazon can serve as a warrior, champion, adventurer or member of a martial culture. The Slightly NSFW Cavewoman is similarly suited to pulp, prehistoric fantasy, lost-world adventures and sword-and-sorcery with the thermostat turned up.

The Sexy Pharaoh comes in both standard and greyscale treatments. Despite the filename, the figure could become an ancient ruler, decadent sorcerer, immortal noble, priest-king or fantasy monarch whose wardrobe has considerably more confidence than fabric.

Then there is Golden Medusa, which can be a medusa, gorgon, cursed queen, transformed priestess or distinctive monster in its own right.

These pieces are not apologetically generic. They have personality.

That means they can anchor a character entry or inspire one rather than simply occupy a rectangle beside statistics.

AN ONI AND A SERAPHIM WALK INTO THE SAME ART PACK

The Oni and Seraphim give you supernatural beings from very different traditions.

The oni is immediately useful for Japanese-inspired fantasy, demon encounters, folklore-derived bestiaries or any setting that borrows broadly from East Asian supernatural imagery.

If you are placing the piece into a specifically Japanese historical or mythological context, supply the cultural detail from proper research rather than assuming a stock-art filename has done all the work.

The Seraphim belongs at the other end of the supernatural spectrum: angelic, celestial, divine or simply some radiant being whose allegiance may be considerably more complicated than “good”.

Angels are often more interesting when they are frightening.

Old religious art understood this perfectly well.

A being made of divine fire with several wings does not need to behave like a pleasant person with excellent posture.

Put both pieces into the same cosmology and things can become strange very quickly.

THE DEAD HAVE BEEN BUSY

Fantasy Collection 3 has a solid seam of death running through it.

There is a Lich in Hood, Skeletal Warrior, Phantom Skull, Dead Villager, Frozen Peasant and Savaged Remains.

That is enough material to establish that something has gone badly wrong without having to use the same corpse twice.

The hooded lich can be the obvious mastermind: ancient necromancer, undead adviser, tomb-lord or sorcerer who regarded mortality as an administrative inconvenience.

The Skeletal Warrior can serve as a guard, soldier, animated champion or remnant of an army which neglected to stop fighting merely because everybody involved died.

The Phantom Skull is stranger and more flexible. It may be a ghost, magical projection, familiar, curse or spell effect. Put it over a doorway, above a ritual or hovering at the foot of somebody’s bed shortly before they become interested in religion.

The Dead Villager and Frozen Peasant show consequences rather than monsters. They are clues, victims and atmosphere.

The Savaged Remains go further.

Something killed this person.

Something did not stop at killing them.

That distinction is where the investigation begins.

THE EVIL OVERLORD HAS PROPERTY

The Evil Overlord’s Tower gives the collection a proper fantasy location.

Every self-respecting villain needs somewhere inconvenient to reach.

A tower provides height, restricted access, stairs, battlements, laboratories, cells and plenty of opportunities for somebody to be thrown from a window during the climax.

The filename supplies the tone, but the building could belong to almost anyone:

• A necromancer

• A tyrant

• A wizard

• An isolated scholar

• A cult

• A perfectly legitimate nobleman whose architect had a gothic phase

Pair it with the Lich in Hood and the plot is obvious.

Pair it with the Seraphim and matters become less obvious.

Perhaps the tower is keeping something imprisoned.

Perhaps the so-called evil overlord is the person making sure it stays there.

Names are dangerous things.

Especially in adventures.

THE WIZARDLY GATE

Wizardly Gate is another location or magical incident rather than a character portrait.

That makes it useful for teleportation, portals, sealed passages, planar travel or the front door of somewhere deliberately omitted from local maps.

A magical gate raises immediate questions.

Where does it go?

Who built it?

Who currently controls it?

Does it operate in both directions?

That final question is worth checking before anybody steps through.

The gate might connect two kingdoms, link ruined wizard towers, lead into another plane or open only under particular celestial conditions.

It can also be nothing more complicated than a magical entrance into the dungeon.

There is no rule requiring every portal to tear open reality.

Sometimes the wizard simply did not want visitors.

THE LAUGHING WITCH

The Laughing Witch has the kind of face that can carry an NPC entry on its own.

She might be:

a villain;

a hedge witch;

an old woman who knows exactly how foolish the adventurers are being;

a spirit wearing human form;

or the only person in the village currently enjoying events.

The laugh could be malicious, triumphant or simply the reaction of somebody who warned everyone about the curse fifteen years ago and has now reached the satisfying part.

Witches work well as ambiguous characters because folklore has always allowed them to move between healer, outcast, magician and threat.

The players will decide what she is almost immediately.

You are under no obligation to let them be right.

LAVINDA

One portrait is simply named Lavinda.

No class.

No monster type.

No elaborate description.

Good.

That makes her flexible.

She can become a noblewoman, witch, victim, priestess, courtier, adventurer, antagonist or recurring NPC. The portrait supplies a distinctive face without dragging an entire prewritten biography behind it.

Broad character images are often more reusable than very specific ones.

Today she is a noblewoman in a fantasy mystery.

Six months later she becomes the matriarch of a merchant family in another book.

The art has done its job twice.

MADWOMAN WITH SWORD

The file labelled Madwoman with Sword appears to show an armed female character.

The filename suggests instability, but that does not have to become a diagnosis or even a fact in your setting.

She could just as easily be:

• A berserker

• A warrior in battle frenzy

• A fugitive

• A cultist

• A survivor

• Somebody having an entirely proportionate response to whatever is behind the reader

The sword is confirmed.

The circumstances are yours.

PIRACY IMPROVES ALMOST EVERYTHING

The Orcish Pirate gives you an orc doing something besides standing in a dungeon waiting to be killed.

That alone is worthwhile.

He could be a captain, corsair, sailor, smuggler, privateer or member of a whole maritime orcish culture.

Put him in a traditional fantasy setting and suddenly the coastline has another faction.

Who do the orcs trade with?

What ships do they use?

Do they raid human settlements, fight human pirates or operate under letters of marque issued by somebody who has learned that prejudice becomes remarkably flexible when enemy shipping is involved?

One picture can push world-building sideways.

Those are often the best stock pieces.

INFERNAL SEDUCTRESS

The Infernal Seductress comes in standard and greyscale versions.

She could be a succubus-like demon, infernal agent, sorceress, transformed mortal or supernatural temptress working for considerably stranger powers.

Seduction does not need to mean sex alone.

Power works.

Knowledge works.

Revenge works extremely well.

A demon who offers precisely what the character wants is much more dangerous than one who simply attacks.

The greyscale treatment lets the same piece fit naturally into monochrome interiors, while the standard version can receive more visual emphasis elsewhere.

Two files.

One subject.

Useful choice rather than inflated arithmetic.

BATTLES THAT HAVE ALREADY STARTED

Dungeon Battle, Fantasy Combat and Mountain Encounter give the collection several proper scenes.

This matters for layout.

Pages need people interacting with the world, not just individual portraits floating beside paragraphs.

Dungeon Battle can introduce a major encounter, dungeon chapter or combat rules section.

Fantasy Combat is broader and can fit almost anywhere violence is happening.

Mountain Encounter brings terrain into the equation. High passes, exposed roads and narrow trails turn an ordinary confrontation into something where falling may be more dangerous than the opposition.

These illustrations make good chapter openers because they contain movement.

Something is happening before the reader arrives.

THE DIRE WOLF

The Dire Wolf is familiar fantasy territory and none the worse for that.

It might simply be a very large wolf.

That is enough.

Or it could be supernatural, undead, magically bred or bonded to a particular tribe, ranger or monster.

Dire wolves work in wilderness chapters, bestiaries and travel encounters because everybody immediately understands the basic problem.

Wolf.

Bigger.

Hungry.

Rules writers have occasionally improved upon this concept, but rarely by much.

USEFUL ART RATHER THAN JUST MORE ART

Fantasy Collection 3 is strongest when treated as a toolbox.

There are enough monsters for bestiary entries, but it is not merely a monster collection.

There are enough characters for NPC sections, but it is not merely portrait art.

There are actual locations and encounters.

There are corpses and aftermaths.

There is atmosphere.

That gives a publisher room to vary the visual rhythm of a book.

A page with Lavinda can lead into a spread containing the Wizardly Gate. A bestiary can use the Oni, Dire Wolf and Skeletal Warrior. An adventure can deploy the tower, dead villager, savaged remains and mountain encounter.

And the whole thing can easily become one campaign if you are in the mood.

A dead villager is found outside town. The remains point towards a dire wolf, but the laughing witch says the tracks are false. Lavinda has disappeared through an old wizardly gate. Beyond it lies the road to the Overlord’s Tower.

The lich has been expecting visitors.

The orcish pirate remains unexplained.

Sometimes mysteries need texture.

EXACT FILE BREAKDOWN

The official contact sheet shows:

25 TIFF image files

covering

23 distinct subjects.

Two subjects have alternate greyscale treatments:

• Infernal Seductress: standard and greyscale

• Sexy Pharaoh: standard and greyscale

The remaining 21 subjects are separate individual illustrations.

All visible filenames use the .tif format.

Some illustrations may also appear in other Brad McDevitt collections where their subject matter crosses between genres.

LICENCE

The artwork may be used in personal and professional projects, subject to the terms of the licence supplied with the collection.

Read those terms before publication, particularly the provisions regarding credit, alteration and redistribution.

Use the art in finished products. Do not redistribute the raw collection as your own stock-art pack and discover, to general astonishment, that changing the filenames did not create new intellectual property.

More monsters, villains, adventurers and poor sods discovered frozen in the wilderness can be found in the wider Brad McDevitt Stock Art range.

Twenty-five files. Twenty-three subjects. Plenty of trouble.

Exactly as fantasy should be.