Valheim Player displays real bestiary

A talented one Valheim the fan is currently in the process of creating an actual, leather-bound bestiary of the game's creatures, complete with ink illustrations and some flowers that show an astonishing attention to detail. The ambitious project adds to the ever-growing list of arts and crafts that Valheim has inspired over the years.

The bestiary is created by Reddit user Itchy_Mycologist_848, who – despite his username – chose to do something that focuses on Valheims expansive fauna rather than its relatively limited selection of mushrooms and other fungi. They first wrote about the project in late November 2025 and have since offered several updates on their progress.

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The Real-Life Valheim Bestiary comes together surprisingly well

A month later, the bestiary is coming together incredibly well, with Itchy_Mycologist_848's updates continuing to draw steady attention from Valheim community. One thing that has consistently impressed fans is the fact that the book is not just a collection of art prints, but consists of detailed pen and ink illustrations. The letters are just as intricate, and Itchy_Mycologist_848 reveals that they based their script on Valheim's Runestones while typing in Ukrainian.

This Valheim Bestiary was aged with an undrinkable black tea bath

In addition to its elaborate illustrations and lettering, the bestiary shows a remarkable level of detail in its physical presentation. According to Itchy_Mycologist_848, the pages were dyed with a concentrated black tea bath using about 100 grams of tea and 2.5 liters of water. For context, this tea-to-water ratio is about five times stronger than standard brewing methods, producing a liquid with little aroma that is extremely bitter to drink but dark enough to create an aged appearance. The result is a weathered book that wouldn't look out of place resting on a table in one Valheim longhouse.

The updates shared so far suggest that the author began populating the bestiary after a typical Valheim playthrough progression, starting with creatures from the meadows and Black Forest. In most cases, entries are grouped by biome, although there are exceptions. For example, the snake side is not shown together with other sea biomes, but is placed between the Black Forest and Swamp sections. This order reflects the likely sequence of player encounters, with the Serpent prioritized due to how likely it is to stumble upon it after building a ship in search of a swamp biome, which is a relatively common scenario. The author has so far illustrated several animals in the game – boar, deer and crow – along with various mythological mobs, including ghouls, surlings, draugrs and wraiths. The Meadows boss, a tall stag named Eikthyr, is also featured in one of the shared images, with several pages and illustrations dedicated to it.

Valheim Bestiary Creator doesn't plan to sell it, but does have a Patreon

After requests from others Valheim fans, Itchy_Mycologist_848 started the Patreon page Trolaf_sketch, where they promised to share more updates on their progress (although they don't stop with Reddit posts). The first of these articles, published in early December 2025, describes some of the pages dedicated to the Meadows biome. It also includes an update on the status of the project, with the author stating that they had finished drawing the swamp biome and were in the process of sketching illustrations for the mountain fauna at the time. Their Patreon page has half a dozen paying subscribers as of December 21st. In a separate update, the creator recently expressed their appreciation for the community's support but said they currently have no plans to sell the book, which began as a personal project that is still nowhere near completion.

Itchy_Mycologist_848's Valheim Bestiary cannot be completed until 2026 at the earliest

Although Itchy_Mycologist_848 was already done documenting Valheim's extensive fauna by hand, their bestiary would remain incomplete. Developer Iron Gate Studios has yet to finish the game, with another biome – The Deep North – still in development. The upcoming content release will introduce several new beasts in need of documentation, including animals such as seals and enemy mobs, such as the rather unfriendly two-legged creatures with horned horns known as Elakings. According to the studio's latest comments, the Deep North biome is slated to be added Valheims 1.0 update, which is expected sometime in 2026. Next year is also when the hit Viking survival game is slated to finally launch on PlayStation 5, with porting support from German developer Fishlabs, which previously handled the Xbox version.