D&D 5E Are Mind Flayers slimy?

[Wiseblood]

I ask because I wonder what they smell like. They appear to be wearing clothes. Why do that if you are slimy? I also think they are warm blooded. What do you think?

 

[77IM]

They are not slimy, but are rather soft and squishy. They have kind of a weird, almost chemically smell, like moldy leaves mixed with windex; but it's not a very strong smell. Like, you have to be standing right next to one, or have its tentacles wrapped around your head, to notice it. They are cold-blooded, but not very sensitive to temperature changes (there are many different types of "cold-blooded" and "warm-blooded" and some of them don't quite work the way we were taught in elementary school). That's what I imagine, anyway.

 

[Xenonnonex]

What they feel like and smell like is subjective at a distance. I would recommend getting really up close to them just for that objective conclusion.

 

[Blackrat]

I do believe the description from the novel Exile states that they do indeed have a slimy skin, but it has been two decades since I read it, so I might ’member wrong...

 

[ccs]

I guess I've always assumed kinda leathery. Or maybe rubbery.

I've never once pondered the temperature of their blood.

 

[Leatherhead]

Apparently:

They are warm blooded, but have a silvery blood (presumably to better carry the psychic energies they feed on as nutrients). Their skin is soft and is moistened with mucus, which gives off a smell that can best be described as extremely faint and akin to a combination of garlic or onions and vanilla. However, because they are totally bizarre creatures, they don't breathe through their skin like a normal slimy creature does. Instead they are forced to use the lungs they "inherited" from whatever host creature they were morphed from. The mucus only holds in water, and more importantly, psionic energy.

But the kicker is:

The reason they put on robes is because they develop a warped sense of aesthetics as a byproduct of eating humanoid brains and being subtly influenced by their thoughts. Most peoples think that people with mental powers (A.K.A spellcasters) wear robes, therefore the Mindflayers think they should wear robes, as a kind of memetic infection. Mindflayers of Thoon don't suffer from this "contamination" (they have a bigger contamination problem), and don't wear robes as a result.

 

[Guang]

I always figured they felt and smelled like octopus. Octopus-on-a-stick is a pretty common snack around here (tiny ones - about the size of an oreo), so I when I see a pic of a mindflayer I remember the last time I bit down and chewed on the little orange things. Now I'm getting hungry - I'd be at high risk of getting infected by one of their tadpoles hiding among the snack food I guess!

 

[Paul Farquhar]

In Expedition to the Barrier Peaks the mind flayer wears a crew jumpsuit.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

They are warm blooded, but have a silvery blood (presumably to better carry the psychic energies they feed on as nutrients). Their skin soft and is moistened with mucus, which gives off a smell that can best be described as extremely faint and akin to a combination of garlic or onions and vanilla. However, because they are totally bizarre creatures, they don't breathe through their skin like a normal slimy creature does. Instead they are forced to use the lungs they "inherited" from whatever host creature they were morphed from. The mucus only holds in water, and more importantly, psionic energy.

What is your source for this information?

 

[Leatherhead]

What is your source for this information?

Not going to lie, I forgot most of that. So I went over to Mind flayer

Which lead me to Lords of Madness, The Illithiad, and Volo's Guide to Monsters.

The bit about Thoon was extrapolated from Monster Manual V after I realized that cult doesn't wear robes.