Voadam
Legend
So I am slowly making my way through the 5.5 Monster Manual reading each entry and I am mostly through the Ms.
I hit the Mind Flayer Arcanist.
Fine concept, renegade psionic mind flayers who study magic. Unspoken that these are the living mind flayers who later become alhoon illithiliches, but this ties into a lot of D&D history even if the description here is bare bones.
But what is going on with their mechanics, in particular the arcane tentacles?
The normal mind flayer tentacle is a melee tentacle attack that does psychic damage and grapples, setting up for the brain extraction on grappled foes. This works well with the narrative concept of mind flayers through editions, sometimes in past editions they have had the tentacles using psionics to meld into the flesh of the opponent which is a creepy psionic horror thing so psychic damage, fine.
Then you get to the 5.5 mind flayer arcanists where their arcane tentacles are both melee and ranged, cause psychic damage but instead of grappling they teleport the opponent somewhere close and devour the brain on a kill.
What is this supposed to represent? That is like no existing arcane spell I am aware of so it is weird this is the new basic magic they have picked up to augment the base mind flayer. I guess it could be a kind of sort of tentacle spectral hand with another damaging spell, but weirdly with a teleport away rider, plus a steal the brain back to the arcanist on a kill separate rider.
What is it supposed to actually look like? Do their face tentacles get powered up by a touch attack spell? But they can also launch like a spectral hand? Is it like a spiritual weapon of a tentacle/face tentacles? Are their tentacles reaching through a portal at ranged foes? Then pulling them through a shifting portal to a new area? Then on a kill ranged immediate extraction and leaving the bodies as the tentacle goes back through the portal?
That's the best I can come up with after thinking about this for a few days of trying to come up with something after reading it and being stumped at what they were going for and what I would tell a player is happening if I used them in a game.
I get that mechanically they are giving most monsters both a melee and a ranged attack so they wanted a ranged option for this mind flayer. But I really want something narratively to hang my hat on as a DM when they introduce new stuff. The ranged and the teleporting two different ways is all weird and new and unexplained and not obviously connected to anything narratively.
All we have here narratively is from the mechanics, the words arcane tentacle, ranged, psychic damage, teleport, devour the brain.
Is there some mind flayer or arcane spell stuff I am missing that this is referencing so this would make more sense?
I hit the Mind Flayer Arcanist.
Fine concept, renegade psionic mind flayers who study magic. Unspoken that these are the living mind flayers who later become alhoon illithiliches, but this ties into a lot of D&D history even if the description here is bare bones.
But what is going on with their mechanics, in particular the arcane tentacles?
The normal mind flayer tentacle is a melee tentacle attack that does psychic damage and grapples, setting up for the brain extraction on grappled foes. This works well with the narrative concept of mind flayers through editions, sometimes in past editions they have had the tentacles using psionics to meld into the flesh of the opponent which is a creepy psionic horror thing so psychic damage, fine.
Then you get to the 5.5 mind flayer arcanists where their arcane tentacles are both melee and ranged, cause psychic damage but instead of grappling they teleport the opponent somewhere close and devour the brain on a kill.
What is this supposed to represent? That is like no existing arcane spell I am aware of so it is weird this is the new basic magic they have picked up to augment the base mind flayer. I guess it could be a kind of sort of tentacle spectral hand with another damaging spell, but weirdly with a teleport away rider, plus a steal the brain back to the arcanist on a kill separate rider.
What is it supposed to actually look like? Do their face tentacles get powered up by a touch attack spell? But they can also launch like a spectral hand? Is it like a spiritual weapon of a tentacle/face tentacles? Are their tentacles reaching through a portal at ranged foes? Then pulling them through a shifting portal to a new area? Then on a kill ranged immediate extraction and leaving the bodies as the tentacle goes back through the portal?
That's the best I can come up with after thinking about this for a few days of trying to come up with something after reading it and being stumped at what they were going for and what I would tell a player is happening if I used them in a game.
I get that mechanically they are giving most monsters both a melee and a ranged attack so they wanted a ranged option for this mind flayer. But I really want something narratively to hang my hat on as a DM when they introduce new stuff. The ranged and the teleporting two different ways is all weird and new and unexplained and not obviously connected to anything narratively.
All we have here narratively is from the mechanics, the words arcane tentacle, ranged, psychic damage, teleport, devour the brain.
Is there some mind flayer or arcane spell stuff I am missing that this is referencing so this would make more sense?
