Monsters of Cool

[CruelSummerLord]

One thread recently posted on here talks about the suckiest monster concepts ever submitted to D&D.

That begs the question: What are the coolest, most original monster concepts ever made for D&D? What makes them good? What makes them original?

Well?

 

[Doug McCrae]

Drow (though they've suffered from overuse), nightshade, zelekhut.

 

[Sejs]

Half-Celestial Gelatinous Cubes (with Cleric levels!) are the very apotheosis of cool.

 

[HeavenShallBurn]

Elves of course, they're so cool they get a subrace for every possible character concept and design niche

 

[Mr Samedi]

Two words. Howler. Wasps.

 

[heirodule]

Mind flayer: great concept for alien horrors

Githyanki: nice historical background, and tied to mind flayers. Dangerous, but MIGHT share your goals if youre against mindflayers.

Quori. secret master menaces that the PCs don't have to understand for a long time.

Warforged. seem like magic robots AT FIRST, then you bring in the quori connection...

 

[HeavenShallBurn]

Two words. Howler. Wasps.

Sudden Inspiration
Enemy warriors riding flying wasps with the howl attack from the Howler. The warriors are covered in demonic black and white face paint and wear ornamented and studded black armor. They play bizarre stringed instruments that cast rays of damaging noise(sonic energy) as a ranged attack and cause deafness on a failed save(as thunderstone duration is cumulative for each failed save). The cacophany provides a -30 penalty to move silently checks.

 

[el-remmen]

Bullywug
Death Knight
Grell
Needleman
Penanggalan
Shadow Demon
Slaadi

 

[Mr Samedi]

Sudden Inspiration
Enemy warriors riding flying wasps with the howl attack from the Howler. The warriors are covered in demonic black and white face paint and wear ornamented and studded black armor. They play bizarre stringed instruments that cast rays of damaging noise(sonic energy) as a ranged attack and cause deafness on a failed save(as thunderstone duration is cumulative for each failed save). The cacophany provides a -30 penalty to move silently checks.

I was actually referring to the ones from MM4, but that works too I guess...

 

[ColonelHardisson]

Owlbear - a strange combo at first glance, but that strangeness helped define D&D as having its own sub-genre of fantasy.

Beholder - Another icon. Nothing says D&D like the beholder. A bit overdone in settings like the Forgotten Realms, but still capable of wowing newbs to the game.

Gelatinous Cube and Carrion Crawler - critters that either evolved to take advantage of dungeons, or were created magically. Either way, they are quintessentially D&D.

Rust Monster - Another highly specialized critter that seems to have evolved solely to vex adventurers. Again, pure D&D.

Delver - Oft-overlooked, the delver is a creature that helps rationalize all those caverns adventurers so love.

Bulette - a landshark, with dorsal fin and everything, that loves digging halflings from their holes. One of the first tough monsters my first PC fought against. Scary.

Displacer Beast and Blink Dog - the first monster rivalry that caught my imagination. Both had odd, and oddly similar, powers that made them natural rivals - in D&D logic, at least.