What's your single favorite D&D creature?

[tkilburn]

For prime creatures I prefer hobgoblins. A highly regimented society combined with their tendency to bring their cousins under their control makes them seem much more menacing than a orcish horde. They can be smart as any human or dwarf, so I can also see them using technological advances to aid their wars of conquest. Imagine a group of hobgoblins sneaking in the night to create a flanking position against an opposing army. They send in their goblin fodder as a distraction before the two sides of the hobgoblin pinzer catch the enemy in a crossfire.

If we're talking about planars I'd have to go with yugoloths, specifically the arcanoloth. Just something about their pure evil nature combined with a veneer of gentility.

 

[Henry]

My personal favorite has always been beholders. Those racial purist bigots with the death rays and the anti-magic eyes and the floating ugly orbs have always captured my imagination. Those things are just freaking machines of evil, they are! They float instead of walk, they have every magic power in the book, they freak out at the slightest sign of racial mutation, and they can't even be eaten when killed, because they TASTE bad! A DM's dream, they are!

 

[ElvishBard]

The Yak folk from MM2. I will never forget my players finding them in the mountains, thinking they are kind, gentle people who will help them recover from the damage they took getting there when during the night they tried to make them into slaves. The mere mention of Yak people has them ready to kill me.

 

[palleomortis]

Really? I don't know much about them, do you know much about other civilizations of things in the MM?

 

[CRGreathouse]

Umber Hulks -- intelligent, burrowing, alien mindset; evil, but redeemable.

 

[KB9JMQ]

My #1 favorite has always been Tiamat.

But for creatures I actually get to use more than once a campaign I really like Troglodytes.

 

[The Shaman]

The sheer ridiculousness of it is impressive. Here we have yet another monster with no reason to exist in a dungeon-free ecosystem. It's genetically adapted to graph paper, for God's sake!

I haven't laughed so hard in a long time - thanks for that!

 

[Goblyn]

The zombie, Illithid and goblin are all worthy contenders but in the end the humble goblin wins: nothing in my mind is more essential to a campaign setting than the little green blighters. Raiders, pests, servants, tinkers, mechanics, overlords and so much more...the goblin is why evil is sooo much cooler than good. Especially mischievious evil.

Goblins. In my campaigns goblins reproduce like rabbits. You never run across one, it's always a scene like in the Mines of Moria in LotR. I always like a dungeon full of crafty devious goblins, led by their levelled leader.

Gorsh, a-hyuk. I'm blushing over here.

Seriously, though. They're a really good 'bad-guy' race that don't have to live down the stigma of historical similarities with certain animals(pigs, dogs, bulls, frogs, lizards, etc.)

 

[Shade]

I couldn't narrow it down to one creature, but I do have a few categories that are always faves:

-Fiends (demons, devils, yugoloths, demondands/gehreleths, you name it)--I can't get enough or use enough of 'em.

-Dragons (true, planar, linnorm, landwyrm, lesser...they're all great)

-Illithids and related creatures

-Beholders and their kin

-Drow (I know they are overused and tired, but they are always great in small doses)

 

[Sejs]

Half-Celestial Gelatinous Cubes with Cleric levels

Goblins.