Brainstorm

I haven't fought too many grells in my time. I have probably battled more beholders and gas spores than grells, and the former of those two monsters are fairly terrible to tangle with, unless the party is quite prepared, which, frankly, does not describe most of the parties I adventure with. Mirth-filled, yes; blood-soaked, sure; gold-driven; undoubtedly; overly prepared, not so much. Grells, on the other paw, I don't have much experience with.

Off the dome, I can only think of two grells that I ever had the pleasure of slaughtering. The first was on a dungeon crawl a couple hexes west of Gradsul. I met other characters--two fighters, a cleric, an extremely weird illusionist, and an even more boring monk--at Shriekers, a local inn, and after about ten meads, we made a pact to clean out a couple levels of a local hole in the ground. One thing led to another, and soon enough, I am launching crossbow bolts into a floating brain, trying not to hit one of the fighters who had been tentacled. Lucky for him, I am pretty good at shooting bolts into brains, and, along with a surprisingly well-placed kick by the monk, we pulped that beaked bastard.    

My other grell encounter was in a huge abandoned house that a couple of my usual partners and I used to sleep off our revels in. Sometimes, it isn't worth the hassle of renting a room for the night when there is a perfectly good roof waiting to be used for free. Sometimes, like when that house has a grell squatting in it, it is worth the hassle of renting the room. I was several horns deep into some local brew and winding down for the evening when I noticed what I thought were vines on the ceiling coming closer to me. Turns out they weren't vines; they were grell tentacles [grentacles?] looking to give me a hug and kiss and a shove down a grell gullet. But both of my companions were a little more on their A game that night; a burning hands and three sword hacks later, I was down on the ground, covered in thick, thick grell goo.

Hawkwind's third album, Doremi Faso Latido, starts off with one of my favorite Hawkwind numbers, "Brainstorm." Heavy riffs, pounding drums, super-long spacey part, it has it all. The live version on Space Ritual is slightly faster and will get covered by one of our other projects, The Redeye Ballers.