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I am planning a campaign arc where the antagonists are followers of the entity known as Cthulhu from H.P Lovecraft's strange tales. In the end of the campaign I'd like to have the adventurers fight Cthulhu or at least an aspect of cthulhu and I am wondering if there is anything published for d20 system (official or otherwise) with a stat block inspired by the original Cthulhu, or am I just better off making my own?

The following descriptions are from Wikipedia:

The original Cthulhu is described as "A monster of vaguely anthropoid outline, but with an octopus-like head whose face was a mass of feelers, a scaly, rubbery-looking body, prodigious claws on hind and fore feet, and long, narrow wings behind."

Cthulhu has been described as a mix between a giant human, an octopus and a dragon, and is depicted as being hundreds of meters tall, with human-looking arms and legs and a pair of rudimentary wings on its back.

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Yeah, the d20 version of Call of Cthulhu is pretty complete. It has a stat block for a demigod version Cthulhu on p.292. You likely don't want to fight Cthulhu himself however...

Try on this CR 20 Starspawn of Cthulhu (a mini Cthulhu) for Pathfinder. Cthulhu himself is more of a god, no stat block.

Update: Cthulhu himself is now found in Pathfinder's Bestiary 4 as a CR 30 creature.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ Thanks for the links! I was un aware that they had a d20 call of Cthulhu book. \$\endgroup\$
    – Antonio
    Commented Mar 13, 2013 at 3:08
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Well, first of all, this thread is all about the concept, starting with a variation on the katanas are underpowered in d20 meme. Several posters are unimpressed with Cthulu’s accomplishments as described in Lovecraft’s novels.

This leads me to point out that the reason Cthulu was terrifying and dangerous in Lovecraft’s work is because he was invading the real world, the one without magic. In Dungeons & Dragons, where you have actual gods and archfiends running around mucking things up, Cthulu as described by Lovecraft would be a non-entity.

That said, Elder Evils is a book that’s basically “how to turn your D&D campaign into a Lovecraftian horror story.”

Also, Lords of Madness focuses on the aberrations of the Far Plane, which itself was obviously inspired by Lovecraft. The Illithids, the most famous aberrations and one of the major “Product Identity” monsters for D&D, has the Cthuloid octopus-as-a-head. Other creatures reference Cthulu, or the Lovecraft mythos in general, such as aboleths, kuo-toa (who supposed to be the Deep Ones from Shadow Over Innsmouth), and so on. Bolothamog and Piscaethces, aboleth deities mentioned in Lords of Madness, reference the Cthulu mythos as well.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ I did not know kuo-toa were supposed to be Deep Ones! I always wondered why there were so many redundant "evil deep-sea fish people"; that one of them was a Mythos reference explains how they're not quite so redundant. \$\endgroup\$
    – SevenSidedDie
    Commented Mar 13, 2013 at 3:02
  • \$\begingroup\$ The inspiration for the campaign came from Elder Evils and lords of madness along with the video game terraria which has a boss featured as the eye of Cthulhu, I then did some research on the actual Cthulhu and decided it would be cool to run a D&D campaign based on it. I see your point that Cthulhu would be of non-deity status but I am going for more of an elder evil. (like the Kraken from the 80's movie Clash of the Titans) \$\endgroup\$
    – Antonio
    Commented Mar 13, 2013 at 3:18
  • \$\begingroup\$ Accerak the Demi-Lich is not of godlike power and is still extremely powerful, so are many other world shaking villains. I would like to have that same level of power in Cthulhu \$\endgroup\$
    – Antonio
    Commented Mar 13, 2013 at 3:20
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    \$\begingroup\$ @John_Underwood Acererak had a power-grab that failed; he was never a big player on the multiplanar level. He's now a non-entity Vestige (Tome of Magic). Still, if you have a setting based around this (limited, if any, contact with other planes, most creatures of note are low-level humanoids), and you keep player levels low, power well under multiplanar-level can still be overwhelming. \$\endgroup\$
    – KRyan
    Commented Mar 13, 2013 at 3:24
  • \$\begingroup\$ @KRyan Ok Accerak was a bad example. I'm going for a consealed powerful cult that is extremely secretive, but I want Cthulhu to be on par with like a demon lord in terms of power and influence. \$\endgroup\$
    – Antonio
    Commented Mar 13, 2013 at 3:34

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