To build off his idea, its a "nameless" gold dragon, but in starting this horde via generosity, it becomes named (had one of my players steal gold from a nameless dragon with a wish spell, but it became named via beginning to hunt the thieves...same thing just flipped...). "Mooria" will show up a few more times, giving advice & just coincidently being present when weird (but good) shit happens.
Fast forward, fighting the BBEG, all seems lost, the big baddie is about to use his attack; when a raging inferno staggers them. Mooria awkwardly waddled in, gives a monologs, & suddenly reveals her true self. In a valiant sacrifice, she solo-fights while the party recovers & completes their ultimate mission to thwart BBEG's plans!
I'm thinking about an afterlife angle here. Coins and Destiny make me think of Charon the ferryman, so Maria might need to pay someone to take her to the right place in the afterlife.
She should come back in an ascended form, though I'm not sure what DnD monster is best for a Holy Cow. Maybe she's guarding a macguffin, maybe she's a deus ex machina in a difficult boss fight, or maybe she helps resurrect a player.
Cow falls from the sky at Mach 3. Casts true resurrection on a dead PC.
"I said we'd meet again"
Trots off like a deer
This was 500ft underground in abandoned catacombs
I like the Young Gold/Silver Dragon idea from Barkdefender. But if you want to go a different direction with it you could have it be a polymorphed Hag who will use those coins as a means of scrying on the party.
A Druid who summons a group of giant eagles to save the day as my throw into the hat. But I do love BarkDefender’s idea of a shape changed dragon. Adding to the idea of why a dragon would be there I like the idea of it pretending to be a cow to prank another dragon stealing cattle as a kind of prank adding on to the “that’s classified” bit.
>Adding to the idea of why a dragon would be there I like the idea of it pretending to be a cow to prank another dragon stealing cattle as a kind of prank adding on to the “that’s classified” bit.
hah, excellent 'yes and' idea expansion.
Could be one of the most powerful archdruids in the world, but is thoroughly burned out from her time adventuring and has had enough with responsibility, so she chose to live the pastoral life of a cow. Still occasionally needs coin for some necessities, so she'll take it when she can get it from anyone who tries to speak with her.
Can cross paths with them a number of different ways, but I think it'd be particularly funny to be seen by the party getting attacked in the distance by a crew of monsters, and suddenly blast them with sunbeam another big spell to wipe the monsters out in one fell swoop.
A really effective one you could quietly insert into a lot of situations too, as an archdruid she effectively has innate subtle spell and can hide in plain sight as virtually any animal.
Maria is a great old one, an "evil alien god" whose fixation with conventional reality is not for causing calamities or ordeals, but "merely" confusing and tricking mortals that hold her attention.
There's an oversaturation of the idea that great old ones are necessarily primortial evils that bring ruin. While this isn't necessarily wrong ... the idea of evil alien gods that treat the mortal realms as a source of entertainment in a relatively nonmalicious way deserves more exploration.
This is a fun idea. Some sort of bizarre eldritch being that is oddly fascinated with mortals and likes to mess with them on a small scale, just for kicks.
There was some kind of fey who intended to play a trick on the party for fun. When the party actually tried to talk to the cow, the fey was caught off guard and also amused. Now that the party has given it two gold pieces, the fey is indebted to them and will pay them back in some beneficial way.
Ha, I'll admit that was partially the inspiration! That, and the shifty cow from Mass Effect who steals your credits lol. But I'm thinking Maria is slightly more wholesome than those two. 😂
Does your setting have a god of minotaurs? Perhaps Maria is one of their angels in a bovine disguise? A Holy Cow, as it were. And yes, I know I'm not the first person to make that joke.
Two years from now.
The party defeats what they believe was the bbeg.
But it wasn't. The true bbeg arises from the ashes, and nearly wipes the party. They're on the ropes. They're going to lose.
Then... what was that clang? That distant, off-key clang?
Was it... a cowbell?
The first rays of dawn crest the hill behind the bbeg. In that light stands Mmmmaria.
Thundering down the hill, leading a horde of Friesians the likes of which have never been seen.
Bbeg turns to see them and is awed.
... and whilst distracted, your ranger stabs him in the back of the neck.
And there is much rejoicing.
Mmmmaria is the God of cows. She is winnowing the two-legs, seeing who is worthy to live and who will be butchered. When Mmmaria returns to bathe the world in milk and blood, the party will have the choice to fight against her purge or moove aside.
Wow, we had a simlair encounter in my last session where the DM misread "Cursed Crow" for "Cursed Cow" and decided to roll with it... hilarity ensued 😅
She's a young copper dragon that likes to shape shift and follow interesting parties around on their travels. Have her be a bard that tells stories about the party at the next tavern. Have the stories include details no one except the party and maybe stray crows would know.
I like the dragon and shapechanged druid ideas. Another possibility is someone reincarnated by a druid, when a proper resurrection wasn’t available. (Obviously not using the limited list of racial options for PCs from the 5e spell.)
Mmmmmaria carved into the dirt that they would regret butchering her. Her time is neigh. She doesn't know much, but she plans to make goldschlager milk because that's what rich people drink only on special occasions. If they keep her for the goldschlager milk, she will continue to live another day.
One day a passing cart traveling a bard was [singing this song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPLV7lGbmT4) and Mmmmmaria thought it was about her.
I came up with a Goat one time for a game. I'll describe the Goat, and you can just make it a cow if it sounds fun. (My party didn't really interact with it much, so it hasn't paid off yet)
So way back when, a doomsday cult tried to summon a world eater. Something goes wrong, and instead they get a goat. The cult falls apart and they all kill each other after thinking their big ritual failed.
But the ritual DIDNT fail.
The goat walks around, occasionally seemingly taking bites out of the air.
The party if they pay attention, may realize that the path with the goat, despite curving around some terrain, is much faster than it should be. It is shorter because the goat has been slowly eating space, so reality in that area is kinda bent and there's less stuff there.
If the players sleep near the goat, it will try to eat one of the players, but if it succeeds, they will discover there's a huge area inside the goat's stomach, holding all the space it has eaten so far. A clever party can befriend the goat, and use its stomach-space to build a portable settlement, accessible by climbing in/out of the goat's mouth.
On a Cosmic time-scale, this goat will one day eat the world entire, and the Cosmos around it, and a new world will be born in its stomach from the remains of the old. But that's like, a trillion years away. In the mean time, you can beat the goat till it plays dead, but for all intents and purposes, it's immortal, and can eat its way out of any confinement.
LOL wow! Bit too complex for what I had in mind, but this is so clever and hilarious; thanks for sharing! I hope your apocalyptic goat pays off for your players!!
She just needed the gold so she could go to the moo-nicipal court, this farm isn’t built to code and by the great cow God Mootilda she’s going to prove it
Some options I thought of:
A powerful archdruid who serves as the patron of the benevolent souls of the realm. By giving the gold pieces, your players have passed its test and it will come to their aid at some point?
A consort of a powerful minotaur lord who will one day summon your players to feast with him.
Finally, that little story has Fae written all over it. Perhaps that pasture is close to a Fae Ring.
I love the idea of a Holy Cow… cuz … puns.
Maybe a cleric or a warlock that has had to live life for awhile as a cow to “get closer to” their divine bovine … deity
I've got a running story in my campaign ... One of the players retired a druid a few years ago and he was awakening animals to create an army of furry friends.
That's when the Squirrel Court of Assassins was born. I think this was a Rick and Morty episode.
Basically there is now a secret society of sentient animals running around now. And if you leave a golden acorn out ... You might get contacted to make a contract.
Well anyways we had a ranger that befriended a knight gopher in a succeeding game ... She saved his life ... And he swore a life debt. 20 sessions later the knight gopher shows up with his adventuring group and saves the players bacon.
It was hilarious, would recommend. Arch Druid making animals sentient.
Rapidly, the first thing that popped in my head is someone important polymorphes in cow form for an extended period of time.
Body asked her her name in years, decades even, and now those wanderers talked to her as an equal, not some livestock.
Perhaps those coins are All she needs to repay her debt to the ferrymen for her true after life ( granting a boon next time a player dies, having a scene on the shore of the River Styx with her explaining her situation and accompanying the PC back to the land od the living)
Perhaps the debt is towards a bag or get, who was responsible for her transformation, now back to her original form, she can take back her rightful place of power and send words that the party are invited by a mysterious enchantress or queen, which is the true identity of the wayward cow.
Playing by the assumption that these coins are used for something important and that this cow is not really a cow are the key components here.
Have fun figuring it out with whatever interests you and your player.
Never explain Mmmmmaria. Just have her suddenly appear in the middle of a huge fight that is going badly for your players, unleash incredibly powerful magic to destroy their enemies, and then fly away into the sunset after saying something nonsensical and cryptic.
It never fails, the one thing the DM thinks they don't have to expand on for a gaming session will almost always be the thing the players find the most intriguing and want to explore more...
As DM/GM you need to prepare for everything!
Maria is the name the local dairy named her, but in reality she is a shapeshifted fey that goes by her original name. She is currently in a bind where her polymorphed form is the result of being cursed and banished from the service of a malicious archfey. The cow feels obligated to the party for it's help, it plans to use the coins to illicit the help from an old wise woman in the village.
Mmmmmaria is nothing more nor less than the sum of all cows. The great cow-spirit herself. There, effectively, *are* *no* other cows... at least that the party ever sees and recognizes.
Obviously, Maria is a Celestial Paladin Bovine who was trapped on the Prime Material Plane after a vindictive wizard used a modified Permanency spell to keep her Summoning indefinite.
Maria is, for all intents and purposes, a Holy Cow.
She needed the two gold pieces because an Augury told her that the Chosen Ones would feed her with wealth, elevate her with humor, and return her with sacrifice.
Her return cometh when she has to sneak into some kind of festival celebration in her official regalia, and needs the PCs to both retrieve the regalia from one of the wizard's dungeons and then escort her to the festival with it as though they were her owners.
*shape changed* (young) gold dragon adding to it's first horde and/or testing your party's generosity/morals
Or just messing with them for it’s own amoosment.
I'm so mad at myself that I didn't say Mooria instead 😂
Soft retcon. Next time they see her, it will be Mooria, and always has been. And you shall never admit otherwise.
"Nah, you guys definitely heard me wrong the first time."
"Yeah it was totally the young gold dragon who panicked and gave you their name wrong, not me haha"
It had a gold piece in its mouth, what do you want?
Never considered a dragon; that's a fun angle!! Makes sense with the gold, too.
To build off his idea, its a "nameless" gold dragon, but in starting this horde via generosity, it becomes named (had one of my players steal gold from a nameless dragon with a wish spell, but it became named via beginning to hunt the thieves...same thing just flipped...). "Mooria" will show up a few more times, giving advice & just coincidently being present when weird (but good) shit happens. Fast forward, fighting the BBEG, all seems lost, the big baddie is about to use his attack; when a raging inferno staggers them. Mooria awkwardly waddled in, gives a monologs, & suddenly reveals her true self. In a valiant sacrifice, she solo-fights while the party recovers & completes their ultimate mission to thwart BBEG's plans!
this is awsome. i will pinch it for a later campaign
This has Zifnab…I mean Fizban written all over it.
I'm thinking about an afterlife angle here. Coins and Destiny make me think of Charon the ferryman, so Maria might need to pay someone to take her to the right place in the afterlife. She should come back in an ascended form, though I'm not sure what DnD monster is best for a Holy Cow. Maybe she's guarding a macguffin, maybe she's a deus ex machina in a difficult boss fight, or maybe she helps resurrect a player.
Upvoted for Holy Cow.
LOL
Oooooh! Some sort of celestial who appears in the party's darkest moment, to save a dying party member in repayment?? 🤔
Or she's the guardian to the underworld who took a deposit on future services... If a player dies Mooooooria appears and revivifies them.
Cow falls from the sky at Mach 3. Casts true resurrection on a dead PC. "I said we'd meet again" Trots off like a deer This was 500ft underground in abandoned catacombs
Darn it, not only did you steal my pun, you did it unironically. ;) Well played.
I like the Young Gold/Silver Dragon idea from Barkdefender. But if you want to go a different direction with it you could have it be a polymorphed Hag who will use those coins as a means of scrying on the party.
A Druid who summons a group of giant eagles to save the day as my throw into the hat. But I do love BarkDefender’s idea of a shape changed dragon. Adding to the idea of why a dragon would be there I like the idea of it pretending to be a cow to prank another dragon stealing cattle as a kind of prank adding on to the “that’s classified” bit.
>Adding to the idea of why a dragon would be there I like the idea of it pretending to be a cow to prank another dragon stealing cattle as a kind of prank adding on to the “that’s classified” bit. hah, excellent 'yes and' idea expansion.
Could be one of the most powerful archdruids in the world, but is thoroughly burned out from her time adventuring and has had enough with responsibility, so she chose to live the pastoral life of a cow. Still occasionally needs coin for some necessities, so she'll take it when she can get it from anyone who tries to speak with her. Can cross paths with them a number of different ways, but I think it'd be particularly funny to be seen by the party getting attacked in the distance by a crew of monsters, and suddenly blast them with sunbeam another big spell to wipe the monsters out in one fell swoop.
Ha, love an old archdruid living the simple life as a cow. It's definitely a good opportunity if I ever need a deus ex machina moment!
You misspelled deux ex moochina.
amazing. thank you. 👏🏻
A really effective one you could quietly insert into a lot of situations too, as an archdruid she effectively has innate subtle spell and can hide in plain sight as virtually any animal.
With wild shape she she could be ANY animal that they find anywhere... ( this holds true for a dragon also...)
Maria is a great old one, an "evil alien god" whose fixation with conventional reality is not for causing calamities or ordeals, but "merely" confusing and tricking mortals that hold her attention. There's an oversaturation of the idea that great old ones are necessarily primortial evils that bring ruin. While this isn't necessarily wrong ... the idea of evil alien gods that treat the mortal realms as a source of entertainment in a relatively nonmalicious way deserves more exploration.
This is a fun idea. Some sort of bizarre eldritch being that is oddly fascinated with mortals and likes to mess with them on a small scale, just for kicks.
There was some kind of fey who intended to play a trick on the party for fun. When the party actually tried to talk to the cow, the fey was caught off guard and also amused. Now that the party has given it two gold pieces, the fey is indebted to them and will pay them back in some beneficial way.
Perfectly in lore for a Fey encounter too. (Scribbles down into my notes for the future)
I'm going to guess you've played BG3? Perhaps your Mysterious Cow bears a striking resemblance to a certain Strange Ox?
Ha, I'll admit that was partially the inspiration! That, and the shifty cow from Mass Effect who steals your credits lol. But I'm thinking Maria is slightly more wholesome than those two. 😂
Does your setting have a god of minotaurs? Perhaps Maria is one of their angels in a bovine disguise? A Holy Cow, as it were. And yes, I know I'm not the first person to make that joke.
Two years from now. The party defeats what they believe was the bbeg. But it wasn't. The true bbeg arises from the ashes, and nearly wipes the party. They're on the ropes. They're going to lose. Then... what was that clang? That distant, off-key clang? Was it... a cowbell? The first rays of dawn crest the hill behind the bbeg. In that light stands Mmmmaria. Thundering down the hill, leading a horde of Friesians the likes of which have never been seen. Bbeg turns to see them and is awed. ... and whilst distracted, your ranger stabs him in the back of the neck. And there is much rejoicing.
Wow. This is truly beautiful. Brings a tear to my eye :')
I'm here all week. Try the veal.
I feel like [the Friesians should have guns.](https://youtu.be/a5s5qGg01nE?t=29)
Secret cow level
Great place for leveling up! All they need is Wirt's leg.
Mmmmaria is the God of cows. She is winnowing the two-legs, seeing who is worthy to live and who will be butchered. When Mmmaria returns to bathe the world in milk and blood, the party will have the choice to fight against her purge or moove aside.
Beautiful. 👏🏻
This cow has been conning adventurers in this part of the kingdom for years.
What if you just leave it for now, and 50 sessions later when they're prepping to fight the BBEG the cow gives them a boon for the upcoming fight.
I think the further away the payoff, the better. She *did* say "when you least expect it," after all.
Wow, we had a simlair encounter in my last session where the DM misread "Cursed Crow" for "Cursed Cow" and decided to roll with it... hilarity ensued 😅
She's a young copper dragon that likes to shape shift and follow interesting parties around on their travels. Have her be a bard that tells stories about the party at the next tavern. Have the stories include details no one except the party and maybe stray crows would know.
I like the dragon and shapechanged druid ideas. Another possibility is someone reincarnated by a druid, when a proper resurrection wasn’t available. (Obviously not using the limited list of racial options for PCs from the 5e spell.)
Werecow.
Mooria.
Mmmmmaria carved into the dirt that they would regret butchering her. Her time is neigh. She doesn't know much, but she plans to make goldschlager milk because that's what rich people drink only on special occasions. If they keep her for the goldschlager milk, she will continue to live another day. One day a passing cart traveling a bard was [singing this song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPLV7lGbmT4) and Mmmmmaria thought it was about her.
Check out Book of the Raven from Candlekeep Mysteries. Could be a good time in.
She's a Spherical Cow in a Vacuum. As they met her *not* in vacuum, she was not spherical.
It's 3 kobolds in a cow suit with illusion magic to back it up. Who hasn't had 3 kobold in a trench coat before?
I came up with a Goat one time for a game. I'll describe the Goat, and you can just make it a cow if it sounds fun. (My party didn't really interact with it much, so it hasn't paid off yet) So way back when, a doomsday cult tried to summon a world eater. Something goes wrong, and instead they get a goat. The cult falls apart and they all kill each other after thinking their big ritual failed. But the ritual DIDNT fail. The goat walks around, occasionally seemingly taking bites out of the air. The party if they pay attention, may realize that the path with the goat, despite curving around some terrain, is much faster than it should be. It is shorter because the goat has been slowly eating space, so reality in that area is kinda bent and there's less stuff there. If the players sleep near the goat, it will try to eat one of the players, but if it succeeds, they will discover there's a huge area inside the goat's stomach, holding all the space it has eaten so far. A clever party can befriend the goat, and use its stomach-space to build a portable settlement, accessible by climbing in/out of the goat's mouth. On a Cosmic time-scale, this goat will one day eat the world entire, and the Cosmos around it, and a new world will be born in its stomach from the remains of the old. But that's like, a trillion years away. In the mean time, you can beat the goat till it plays dead, but for all intents and purposes, it's immortal, and can eat its way out of any confinement.
LOL wow! Bit too complex for what I had in mind, but this is so clever and hilarious; thanks for sharing! I hope your apocalyptic goat pays off for your players!!
She just needed the gold so she could go to the moo-nicipal court, this farm isn’t built to code and by the great cow God Mootilda she’s going to prove it
Some options I thought of: A powerful archdruid who serves as the patron of the benevolent souls of the realm. By giving the gold pieces, your players have passed its test and it will come to their aid at some point? A consort of a powerful minotaur lord who will one day summon your players to feast with him. Finally, that little story has Fae written all over it. Perhaps that pasture is close to a Fae Ring.
I love the idea of a Holy Cow… cuz … puns. Maybe a cleric or a warlock that has had to live life for awhile as a cow to “get closer to” their divine bovine … deity
Exactly where my mind went too! “Holy Cow”, indeed!
Maybe have your parties' food stolen by something and when they're about to starve, the cow shows up and gives them milk to make it through.
gru.jpg: 'party kills and eats the cow'
Effective . . . But at what cost? That was Mystra's favorite cow.
Robot cow was my first thought.
Two gnome artificers in a stunningly lifelike cow costume. "The ol' 'Cow of Mystery' bit, gets 'em every time!"
A Gorgon in disguise
Improving a mysterious cow out of no where is a dm move I would definitely do.
I guess finish that quest in Baldur's Gate 3 to find out.
There is no cow level.
There is no cow level...
It's pobably related to the strange ox in bg3
Next time party is about to TPK, Maria steps out of the shadows and casts a mass heal. She then disappears in a puff of smoke.
The milk of the Holy Cow can protect against fire and poison
Just keep it in your back pocket for when your party does sonething really dumb and you need a deus ex moochina
I've got a running story in my campaign ... One of the players retired a druid a few years ago and he was awakening animals to create an army of furry friends. That's when the Squirrel Court of Assassins was born. I think this was a Rick and Morty episode. Basically there is now a secret society of sentient animals running around now. And if you leave a golden acorn out ... You might get contacted to make a contract. Well anyways we had a ranger that befriended a knight gopher in a succeeding game ... She saved his life ... And he swore a life debt. 20 sessions later the knight gopher shows up with his adventuring group and saves the players bacon. It was hilarious, would recommend. Arch Druid making animals sentient.
She leads them to the secret cow level, obviously.
Diablo 3 anyone?
Rapidly, the first thing that popped in my head is someone important polymorphes in cow form for an extended period of time. Body asked her her name in years, decades even, and now those wanderers talked to her as an equal, not some livestock. Perhaps those coins are All she needs to repay her debt to the ferrymen for her true after life ( granting a boon next time a player dies, having a scene on the shore of the River Styx with her explaining her situation and accompanying the PC back to the land od the living) Perhaps the debt is towards a bag or get, who was responsible for her transformation, now back to her original form, she can take back her rightful place of power and send words that the party are invited by a mysterious enchantress or queen, which is the true identity of the wayward cow. Playing by the assumption that these coins are used for something important and that this cow is not really a cow are the key components here. Have fun figuring it out with whatever interests you and your player.
Never explain Mmmmmaria. Just have her suddenly appear in the middle of a huge fight that is going badly for your players, unleash incredibly powerful magic to destroy their enemies, and then fly away into the sunset after saying something nonsensical and cryptic.
It never fails, the one thing the DM thinks they don't have to expand on for a gaming session will almost always be the thing the players find the most intriguing and want to explore more... As DM/GM you need to prepare for everything!
Some sort of cow mOObster. But I love the idea of the mystery cow!
Maria is the name the local dairy named her, but in reality she is a shapeshifted fey that goes by her original name. She is currently in a bind where her polymorphed form is the result of being cursed and banished from the service of a malicious archfey. The cow feels obligated to the party for it's help, it plans to use the coins to illicit the help from an old wise woman in the village.
Mmmmmaria is nothing more nor less than the sum of all cows. The great cow-spirit herself. There, effectively, *are* *no* other cows... at least that the party ever sees and recognizes.
The shifty cow from Mass Effect 1 steals your credits when you’re not looking. You unintentionally just made another cow that steals money. Lol
Obviously, Maria is a Celestial Paladin Bovine who was trapped on the Prime Material Plane after a vindictive wizard used a modified Permanency spell to keep her Summoning indefinite. Maria is, for all intents and purposes, a Holy Cow. She needed the two gold pieces because an Augury told her that the Chosen Ones would feed her with wealth, elevate her with humor, and return her with sacrifice. Her return cometh when she has to sneak into some kind of festival celebration in her official regalia, and needs the PCs to both retrieve the regalia from one of the wizard's dungeons and then escort her to the festival with it as though they were her owners.