The creature in D&D known as the Gelatinous Cube has been a fun toy for DMs to employ against their unsuspecting player characters since early in the game, but what in-game origin story can we attribute to its existence?
I have never seen the monster used in any wilderness settings, only in the confines of caverns or dungeons within adventure modules. Why might that be and what can we do to change that up a bit?
Jeff Kesselman believes that it may be official canon they were created by wizards to act as a kind of street sweeper for keeping dungeons clean.
I recall something along those lines, but it seems like overkill and a dangerous thing to let loose in areas you yourself have to pass through. After-all, why would you make it transparent? That would raise the possibility that you may accidentally run into your own creation while trying to reach the bathroom. There's also the expense of installing all those metal doors to keep it from dissolving wooden ones and getting into sensitive areas.
"I think I'll grab some lunch. Dammit! The cube ate all my Ramen again!"
Anonymous suggested an article in Dragon Magazine #124 by Ed Greenwood. You can find it at this link. https://annarchive.com/files/Drmg124.pdf <----- Link
Ed's article is a short, fun read like the other Ecology articles in Dragon, but it doesn't address the heart of the topic, the origins of the creature.
Cullen Blackthorne imagines a cube of enormous proportions due to all the organic material it could absorb in the event it escaped the dungeon.
An area of barren landscape would certainly be a sign of the presence of an escaped Gelatinous Cube. Per the Greenwood article it would be very likely to split into more hungry cubes often than to get too large, but then you have a problem akin to an out of control forest fire! Wow, heroes needed for sure!
Martin Nussbaum offered this link from Wikipedia about slime molds to aid in thinking about how Gelatinous Cubes might function. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slime_mold <----- LINK
Having read this information I can now see Cullen's previous point about enormous cubes. Imagine a renegade cube in an isolated mountain valley splitting into hundreds of cubes as they devour every bit of organic matter. Then they recombine and surge over the mountain peaks to bear down on a nearby city. No need for a tarrasque when you have a foe like that. Truly horrifying.
Charles Ciaffone posits that mages may have accidentally created Gelatinous Cubes when sealing off a stronghold and trying to protect it with a more potent version of the spell Guards and Wards, and something went slightly awry. It would certainly aid in protecting the location from intruders of the adventuring kind.
Accidental creation could certainly be the case when you think about transparency as discussed above, but what accounts for the untypical shape? If intentional could the original creator have been attempting to build an ooze based golem and used a cubic mold?
Bob Curtis pointed to their possible use deep below a toilet in order to create a stink and waste free disposal.
The drawback here is that Cubes can climb on walls and ceilings like a snail. They also aren't inclined to sit still for long instead wandering on the search for more food. The result could be one fatal bowel movement.
Brian Sailor says the age old answer is always "a mad wizard did it."
Much like the Owlbear is believed to have been created by a mad wizard, so too could the Gelatinous Cube be a product of madness, but here's the real question; was the wizard insane mad or angry mad? It's conceivable that a pissed off spellcaster might drop one of these off in the offender's lair as a nasty surprise.
"You've crossed me for the last time Bantragemus. Here's a gift you'll be dying to receive."
In the depths of a dungeon laboratory Velard Yellow-Wand prepared the Mithril vat. Velard wanted to craft something unexpected for unwanted guests to deal with. Something that could clean up after itself and not leave his abode cluttered with the corpses of interlopers and thieves. It had to be able to ambush prey so it needed to remain unseen until it was too late, but imbuing a creature with invisibility would be very difficult. What if it was simply transparent? It also needed to prevent passage beyond it, to be like a moving wall. Looking down at his desk Velard noticed his pair of bone dice. "Aha! A cube! One born of an ooze!"
Chris Kelly thinks that Gary Gygax may have smoked an enormous biffter, ate most of the Jello, then plunked the remaining cube down on the game table.
We may need to ask Luke Gygax if we want to learn the real life origin of the Gelatinous Cube, but for in-game origins it can be whatever you want as the answer to the mystery. Regardless of the answer, have a little fun with this beastie in your game.
Special thanks to everyone on Facebook that contributed information and ideas to help bring this post to life. Tomorrow's post will be a 5e update of a unique Gelatinous Cube that I created in the early days of the blog for a B/X style rule set.
Have fun and happy gaming!
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