In reality, there's a pretty limited set of creature types that live in caves - bat, fish, arachnids, a few amphibious types, and then some bigger mammals that just chill at cave openings sometimes but don't really count as 'cave-dwellers'.
I'm trying to come up with interesting creatures for a cave system in a world I'm building, but I want it to remain pretty low-fantasy, so no dragons or trolls, unfortunately. (seems like high fantasy worlds have a whole set of skeletons, trolls, lizards, and ghouls to fill their caves because other people were having the same problem)
Anybody have any ideas/other interesting works to reference?
Albino cannibals who only leave the caves under cover of darkness. Basically morlocks.
What about pale skinned, blind neanderthals that have lived and evolved in caves since the beginning of man? You could make a story on this that there has been a town legend or something about these "people" because they have been scene once or twice wandering outside the cave since [change] happend.
>>47945179
Aaahhh shit.
>>47945195
Another idea I got is a non-existing enemy. There could be legend about a bigfoot-type thing in a cave system and the party need to check it out. While searching deeper and deeper for the non-existing creature the party realizes that the real enemy is actually the cave itselve, with it's chasms and many, many different turns and forked paths. Which is pretty much the one threat of a real cave.
>>47945141
For low fantasy I would run with blind carnivorous amphibians. Not exceptionally large, either. Driven to frenzy if blood is spilled in their ecosystem causing them to rip and tear and surge towards to source and anything nearby.
You have, as others have mentioned, cave adapted humanoids who are cannabalistic.
Feel free to reference throwbacks. Caves are isolated ecologies. Strange permutations of generic animals are possible. Mushroom bears are black bears who survive in the mushroom forest by climbing the stalks of giant cave mushrooms and using their bulk to crush prey underneath them. Blind and constantly high due to the concentration of spores they inhale they developed a crude echolocation or fall when the base of their stalk is disturbed.
Then you have he formorians. Despite their legend these mishapen giants are caused by insular communities of giants inbreeding after being driven deep underground by conflict and genocide. They are dumb instinctual creatures who are so far removed as to have lost all the traits of their forebears instead suffering from extra tertiary limbs, missing organs and various birth defects.
They are ravenous and eat all that comes within their reach, including mushroom forests, requiring other species such as the myconid colonies and their vassals to wage constant war to save their home.
>>47945322
Could also just be morlock esque but with extra limbs and wilder variations.
>>47945275
Ooh, that's a really good point. I hadn't given enough thought to the maze aspect.
>>47945322
What do you mean with "You have", are these from existing monster manuals? (not OP)
>>47945322
These are all pretty great. +1 for great explanations of why those things exist how and where they do. I'm definitely going for a 'twisted normal' like with the mushroom bear.
>>47945348
>>47945424
(OP) oh by the way these are me
How about a creature that's grown to fill the whole cave, with its limbs and roots growing along the walls everywhere, that eternally fucks with the party until the find its core?
Not really a creature idea but I was thinking about how rats are really commonly associated with caves and underground business, although afaik rats don't actually chill in caves very much.
If you havent already, take a look at some of the dwarf fortress creatures.
http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/v0.31:List_of_subterranean_creatures
lots of interesting cave creatures. kind of high fantasy tho.
additionally you can just use actual cave species and make them as magical as youd like. instead of plain bats, try dire bats for example.
Giant ants, killer worms and the giant moles that eat them. Octopi that live underground for some reason.
