DnD's Worst Monster

[@atlasminty-jq7fy]

You did point out something unique about them, that everyone hates them! You could have a confrontation between the party and any monster and have a neogi show up and then have the monster just say “hold that thought, these guys are literally the worst” and then the party and the monster take a brief pause to stomp the neogi

[@henryhere]

Now I'm just picturing two players and a beholder giving the neogi a "the gang beats up a dude" scene from JoJo lol

[@MGDrzyzga]

@@henryhere Mind flayer: *sips wine, then joins everyone else in kicking the heck out of that wretched neogi.*

[@oichuckitinmegash8778]

The inevitable episode of a Saturday morning cartoon where the heroes have to join forces with the villain they've been thwarting every week to fight something more stupidly evil.

[@spaniard35]

Party and Dragon are fighting and Neogis show up saying they will enslave you all. Dragon just says put this fight on hold, I hate these fuckers. Then party also says they hate those fuckers too. Beat there ass and remember you guys are in a fight. Dragon asks "what was our fight about" and you just say that you are here kill him, cause he terrorizing their land. He just goes, "well you hate those fuckers and helped me out. Look how about you guys take some of my old scales and teeth and tell town you dealt with me. Ill fly to another area for a year or so and then return later. You guys get your gold, and no one has to die today." With this comment I will now actually work this into my campaign because its funny and I know my greedy ass players will make deal and try to milk killing a dragon as heros of area.

[@MoriShep]

I wnt to be at the table for this, that sounds amazing.

[@icarusty6481]

I think the one potentially redeeming factor of Neogi would be to play up the “everyone hates them” facet of their lore to eleven. The neogi are so despised that they can get Mind Flayers and Gith teaming up to deal with them. Then at least they’re spawning some cool unlikely alliances.

[@sweetbeetyourfriend1808]

Agreed! I feel like we all had the same-ish idea of "everybody hates them and they're the epitome of evil" as "beat up the cartoon villain like they're a ragdoll."

[@leguan278]

God damn that sounds like a cool plot point, i can already see it now, the party is transported with a gith ship, gets a call from mindflayers and the gith dont emideatly end the call! Anyone that know anything about both races will know something is up.

[@Will-cf1ob]

That's sick. Stolen.

[@sweetbeetyourfriend1808]

Not theft if they aren't making money off of it lol @@Will-cf1ob

[@Attaxalotl]

An encounter between some Giants, Mind Flayers, and Gith with their Dragons is defused by a single Neogi entering the wrong room and getting collectively assblasted by every individual in that vicinity.

[@Tomha]

"You're so evil, it's boring. You're basic!" - Finn the Human Fighter

[@TheNerevahkiin]

Perfect quote. I think Finn could arguably be a barbarian too tbh

[@ascrub8527]

​@@TheNerevahkiinthe show normally defines him as a fighter and normally his combat is normally more "technique" based then getting really mad. But I can kind of see where you're coming from

[@Rinne0000]

Chad Human Fighter Enjoyer(Mle) vs virgin other classes and races fan (you)

[@exzyyd392]

​@@ascrub8527Finn's player: "Human male fighter" The DM adding the grass sword: "Warlock?" Finn's player, holding more swords: "Human male fighter"

[@xk445g]

Okay, but what if Fern is the Finn that took levels in GOO warlock (Grass Old One)@@exzyyd392

[@taterenforth6433]

I actually quite like the Neogi. It's probably because in an old spelljammer comic I read as a kid the writers treated them like evil pokemon trainers mixed with pirates. Boarding spelljammers trying to collect one slave of every species.

[@tctc4413]

if u use them as setting spec. monsters they work esp . if the players are unfamiliar with them and what they can do. they really can surprise players .

[@HaughtyToast]

So regular pokemon trainers then?

[@crolithebard4964]

I actually think these monsters are perfect for one thing in particular. Sometimes, it’s just fun to have a swarm of monsters that are 100% evil with no moral repercussions for defeating them. They’re a low enough CR to where it’s fun to defeat them especially if they act cocky, and it could just be fun to let out some frustrations on some goofy alien maniacs

[@BigusGeekus]

You can have irredeemable evil without making it a race. Just saying.

[@mixmastermind]

They actually, in fact, EXIST for that purpose. Because Spelljammer expanded the Mind Flayers to lightly sand some of their edges off, the setting needed a different set of irredeemable monsters.

[@johngleeman8347]

Just be careful with the umber hulks. They are definitely not CR 3. XD

[@mixmastermind]

@johngleeman8347 yeah Neogi are kind of neat because they're not very powerful themselves but every one of them has at least one Umber Hulk, which is not something to be trifled with

[@gabrieladerre2862]

Their Mind Control attacks can devastate an entire party though. So there is that! But at least they use it to enslave more often than to outright just wipe everyone out. Usually. I think! 😹

[@justincarrel7930]

They look incredibly stompable, like any battle with these things, could be ended by lowering my boot to the ground and ignoring any resistance I may or may not encounter.

[@dragontear1638]

No. Stomp harder.

[@AW-sx8hm]

Butt-kicking! For goodness!

[@lorekeeper685]

They would mind control you unless you have some defense Tho their slaves might weaken you

[@paul_ujb]

"Why use themselves?" Matriphagy (young eating their mother) is a thing in several spider species, so that part is kind of accurate for a spider people.

[@nathanbrent4295]

It could be used as a joke enemy. You're venturing through a dark cavern and come across an Elder Brain Dragon, but as you turn to flee it notices a horde of Neogi lurking around for some unknown reason. You glance at the horrifying entity from which you fled and, without the need for words, you work together and gank those nasty spidercocks before getting back to running away.

[@tvhead2426]

Or you could make a neogi that's impossible to kill but can't hurt anything, and it just goes around trying to hurt everything. It's best for a recurring joke character

[@bengal4047]

​@@tvhead2426 Doofenschmirtz vibes, incompetent evil for the win

[@TheSaylesMan]

I dunno. Sometimes you just need an unrepentant bastard that absolutely nobody likes. In that vein, Neogi are the perfect pencil-pushing villain. Administrative evil is not a niche that DnD has filled these days given its need for its villains to be things to be fun to stab. I like to adapt Neogi to be the guys who require their forms in triplicate.

[@nazek4216]

Administrative, pencil-pushing, forms-in-triplicate evil screams devils to me personally

[@lottesghost]

that's literally devils homie

[@grinninggoblin3698]

I love the Neogi being D&Ds version of the Vogons from Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Just these nasty space bureaucrats. I think to differentiate them from devils, the Neogi don't bother hiding their evil or trying to be charismatic in the slightest.

[@TheSaylesMan]

@@lottesghost Eh, devils are more of a using contracts to tempt you with massive powers to entrap you with their legalize. Those are lawyer baddies. Administrative villains are different.

[@companyoflosers]

Administrative evil? Do you mean devils?

[@thegnarledpirate9198]

The mother comparasion is too specific. Are you okay, Runesmith?

[@ViscountGaming-oe2df]

Yeah, there's phone numbers for stuff like that.

[@planescaped]

Yeah that analogy was uhh... not one I'd consider very common. lol

[@jonathanreichandco]

@@planescaped no no, he was actually right on the money

[@ShitpostingJoJo]

Yeah, honestly that's... It kinda explains some attitudes I've seen him display on his videos. 💀

[@yamiyomizuki]

​@@planescaped finding people who don't have long term issues of some kind with at least 1 parent is not very common.

[@shortcaveman1583]

It feels like an amazing race to use as a gag villain that introduces actually cool monsters from different movies, games, and books et.!😮

[@samuelrodriguez9801]

Your giving me ideas for how to introduce creatures from Deities and Demigods.

[@ianyoder2537]

Personally I like to imagine spelljammer settings as having 3 main galactic "bad guy" empires to watch out for. Beholders, Mindflayers, and these guy's. And with every trio there's gotta be one at the bottom. The Neogi are the bottom, the "least" of the evils. Not because they're the least evil, they're the most vile, untrustworthy, conniving, backstabbing, profit hungry cantankerous, sellout, gromless, mingers, you'll ever meet. And that's why they're not as big of a threat as the Mindflayers and Beholders. Every one hates them, even themselves.

[@Beepers559]

I love how you used so many descriptors to describe how evil they are

[@ianyoder2537]

@@Beepers559 If you're gonna say something make sure it's worth being heard.

[@georgeuferov1497]

Rule of three once again

[@RipOffProductionsLLC]

Let me sum up my thoughts on those three races: Beholders are always a singular threat due to the nature of their intrusic psychology of egotistism and paranoia. At best they might have a few minions of lesser beings, but for the most part they will be by themselves, but will always be extremely dangerous(seriously, a Beholder played as smart as Beholders shpuld be, with the stats they have, should be terrifying) Mindflayers are literally a hivemind, and thus will always work together(barring extremely weird edge cases), and each one of them are dangerous in its own right. Naogi? I'd think their main threat should come from their eclectic collection of slaves, which are often far bigger and deadlier then they are, and could be a mix of any sort of creature; be they dim beast or brilliant sapient, rare or common, magical or mundane, predator or prey, all working together in ways that could never happen naturally. Sure, Mindflayers have thrawls too, but they're limited to keeping thrawls who are intelligent enough to serve as adequate food or hosts for tadpoles, but Naogi can use anything as a slave. You could also do something interesting with the backstabbing internal politics of a local Naogi... "society". Honestly, I think them being so university reviled might be a missed opportunity to have their nature as slavers tie into some kind of trade with other evil factions, since Mindflayers 100% never engage in diplomacy, and Beholders are a case by case thing and not exactly the mostvtrust worthy long-term, but Naogi? A clan could be running a very successful slave market for generations buying and selling people and creatures of all types from every corner of reality to every other corner of reality where slavery is exceptable. And you better be on your best behavior and pay up properly while there, or you're going to end up merchandise yourself.

[@ianyoder2537]

@@RipOffProductionsLLC Honestly this is an old post and my opinions have changed and I like the Niogi a lot more now and have plans for a major NPC to be a Niogi. Here's the state of 3 major threats of the galaxy: Beholders, chaotic evil empire, basically the Daleks from Dr. who but less unified and slightly more likely to take prisoners/ hostages/ slaves/ test subjects/ whatever horrible thing is gonna happen to the party when they overestimate themselves and louse to beholders but still have a major character plot to follow. The main reason they haven't taken over the galaxy is they're at war with literally every one. Mind flayers (my favorite DND monster): Neutral evil, for the most part what you'd expect to see from the cannon lore. However the hive mind isn't as strong as you think. There's a massive civil war between the traditionalists (cannon mind flayers) who are the largest, richest, and most unified force of mind flayers. And the wildly unpredictable radical cells who've spit off from the hive mind and explore other means to power such as magic, non biological technology, inventing a cult in order to give oneself divine powers, actually using your body to fight like those dumb bruits in armor we control, and capitalism. The main reason(s) they haven't taken over the galaxy is the civil war and their plans are so careful and long term that like tree growing you don't see it come to fruition until it's bearing fruit. The neogi (who I like now): Lawful evil, the galaxy's mega-corp. No other empire has as many high quality goods, in such variety, and at such a competitive cost. Sure if you care about things such as ethics, sustainability, not letting an evil empire grow more powerful in this region, and concerns about standing in the same room as something with mind control powers, you could shop some where else. But who else sells a grapple gun, potions that positively affect only you and harm your enemies when drunk, and automated ship repair drones in the same place? (Guaranteed not to be cursed ... so long as you come back and shop again.) The Neogi are reliable business partners who would never do anything as shady as manufacturing wacky threats to sell their own weapons such as space clowns.

[@itsjaivn]

You can use a Neogi like you would a shitty slave driver or positively repulsive crime lord--think Watto or Jabba the Hutt. You wouldnt use a mind flayer or beholder in those spots because theyre just too damn powerful to reasonably see skittering around in a port city haggling people-wares. Aboleths devastate. Neogi mingle.

[@masonabbey6353]

I generally hand these guys laser guns and make them like evil Ferengi if I can. They are the aberrations that have the least amount of variation in what they do. If u need unrelenting evil though you won't find much worse than the Neogi They also have a few neat lore interactions with other races - they are usually the reason humans are on any d&d world

[@martinramirez1856]

Explain about humans

[@mindlessscientist3772]

​@@martinramirez1856 They have lots of human slaves, and when they're wiped out for being evil their slaves are left behind

[@martinramirez1856]

@@mindlessscientist3772 a ok

[@queenannsrevenge100]

I always loved the Neogi in spell jammer, perhaps because of their simplistic evil. I don’t recall the books ever giving a good explanation about their enslavement of Umber Hulks, so in my campaign canon, they exhibited a pheromone that made Umber Hulks Almost trancelike and servile. This meant pretty much any umber hulk that they encountered they could immediately dominate and put to use, explaining their power. On paper, they are horribly weak little monsters.

[@RonaldMcJuicy]

I do think their "universally hated by everyone" schtick could be a fun gimmick for a shorter, more light-hearted campaign. Something like this: Somehow, a Neogi has managed to gain indomitable, godlike power, which threatens to subjugate all realms. So, over the course of five or so sessions, you and your rag-tag group of bastards have to travel across all elemental planes, the depths of hell AND the highest reaches of heaven, all realms of chaos and law, the deepest dark in the underdark, and the lairs of every warlord, vampire, lich, mad wizard, and anything else with any degree of power in an effort to assemble a team strong enough to defeat the stupid spider-dick. Most creatures are reluctant to team up, until the exact instant mention that you're fighting a Neogi, and then they immediately agree to help without any complications or compensation. The final session lasts a total of 15 minutes, and consists entirely of the DM explaining how each group of creatures beats the ever loving shit out of the Neogi in their own unique ways, and ends with everyone agreeing to go their seperate ways and never speak of this again.

[@stingerjohnny9951]

The Dawnfather and Asmodeus taking turns stomping on their giant spider nutsacks while Moradin and Vecna point and laugh.

[@user-gj7lp5iz6k]

cringe

[@theenderdestruction2362]

The demons and devils pausing the bloodwar is hilarious

[@federicopalacios7439]

You should talk about the Nilbog, I think they're really cool for roleplaying them as NPCs, you can even have an entire session centered just around one.

[@boinkmcbingo8890]

I feel like it'd be a pretty short video but them plus a few other goblin adjacent monsters would be sick

[@starwolf27]

I had an entire two year long campaign centered around nilbogs, so I second this idea.

[@donniejefferson9554]

I've been really wanting to play one as a pc. Would have to change the abilities but it could work well enough as a wild magic sorcerer

[@the24thcolossusjustchillin39]

I used them in a combat encounter once, it was hilarious😂 10/10 would do it again

[@Yurt_enthusiast7]

Nilbog! It's goblin spelled backwards! This is their kingdom!

[@chrishubbard64]

I liked the one part you mentioned with relative cr of umberhulks and these guys as well as their size. The idea of small weak monsters that control more powerful units as their slaves and tools in a fight could be interesting. Like going up to this skinny asthmatic italian guy and trying to hassle him only for him to say "Yo, tony no knees, these gentlemen seem to have a problem, solve it for them." Then crunching and screaming happens. But yeah, the fact that we already have xenophobic mind controlling aliens in love with owning slaves in the form of mindflayers really does wear down the interest level. I guess if you want to run an insectoid based campaign with that theme it can work. The real threat is dealing with the underlings while these guys hang back screeching orders at their minions while trying to mind control you.

[@thesatelliteslickers907]

dnd has a thing with enemies generally getting stronger the higher up the chain of command you go, so this could be a funny subversion of that

[@BlazenBeard]

They could work super well as black market dealers. I can see good uses for these guys. They are also universally hated in universe which is kinda unique. Most creatures in DND share a huge chunk of their personalities or lore with some other creature anyways.

[@salempistorius7395]

I typically use them as gag villains or henchmen to stronger evils (I know that's not lore accurate but it gives them something interesting), treating them as Grunts from Halo, harmless and even humorous alone, but when in large groups or allied with more intelligent aberrations, they become an unstoppable wave of two of the most common phobias combined. I also keep their desire to enslave everyone but they're too weak to do it so they just hold a silent contempt for the world. Also, them laying eggs in their elders makes for a really good horror scene to hide aboard a neogi ship, which I did in my first Spelljammer campaign and caused my table to erupt in disgust, in a good way. Just throw out all the bad lore and make them funny.

[@chongwillson972]

@salempistorius7395 kobolds and goblins fit the grunt from halo role far better.

[@arandomcheese]

It would make sense if the Neogi were tricked into believing they were the ones manipulating the bbge and had agency.

[@ohmygoditisspider7953]

well that bit about childhood trauma was extremely real.

[@sirtill8502]

Their sole purpose in the setting is to give every evil creature a reason to work with good ones, I swear.

[@potatolord9715]

Dnds worst monster is usually the player

[@TheBigFormerlyPurpleT]

I wanna be the very best...

[@marcogenovesi8570]

murder hobos at the best of times, XP junkies at the worst of times

[@deltarno7502]

The Neogi are a fun monster when you're making either a fight against an evil capitalist, or when you want a guilt free genocide. I usually play them as Skelator, so over the top evil that it's a blast to, well, blast them.

[@pancakes8670]

True, but there are more fun races to do that with. Heck, you could just have an over the top human Capitalist. The point of the video is that Neogi are unoriginal, and there's no role they fill that isn't already filled by something else.

[@FirstnameLastname-bp2pg]

Capitalism is not really evil.

[@UGNAvalon]

@FirstnameLastname-bp2pg That’s why they specified “*evil* capitalist” as opposed to “just another capitalist”.

[@FirstnameLastname-bp2pg]

Yeah fair enough

[@FirstnameLastname-bp2pg]

Yeah fair enough

[@LazyManFantastico]

My DM let me play a Neogi (reskinned Thri-kreen) that was a battle smith artificer for Tomb of Annihilation. I also reskinned the steel defender to look like an Umber Hulk. They fit in pretty well after they explained how "they weren't from around here" and created some pricey magical items for leaders of criminal organizations.

[@typhoon6346]

I think one way you could make them interesting is to make them like the helmacrons from Animorphs. They're tiny, comically evil, comically full of themselves, and comically weak despite possessing powerful technology. They're joke villains, things to be annoyances that you can never fully shake, and villains so annoying and so tedious to deal with that unlikely sides are willing to work together (and potentially try to screw each other over both in the process, as a fun little treat) just to make them go away.

[@matthewmoran1866]

The most interesting set up I've seen for Neogi is having them be hyper capitalist traders in larger morally dubious locations and planar bazaars. Neogi can be found in Markets in places like the City of Brass or Dis in the 9 hells. They can also show up in Drow cities (usually just setting up a small stall on the outskirts or something) or even just moving through the under dark as a travelling caravan looking to trade.

[@gaylordzapikowski9053]

Ahhh, the Neogi. Love these guys. I made some minor lore tweaks and used them as the BBEG of my campaign, and my players had some terrifying interactions with them and only once did they ever fight them directly. *The Neogi won that fight.*

[@clintriggen3554]

what tweaks did you do?

[@gaylordzapikowski9053]

@@clintriggen3554 Divorced them from their spelljammer origins and made them former underdark denizens. Took their connections to the Far Realm Infested Stars and fucking ran a marathon with that. What I ended up with basically is that they were hunted to near extinction by the Drow to the point where everyone thought them dead, the Neogi then fell into a deep religious fervor with the Nine Far Realm Infested Stars and the survivors migrated into more surface adjacent caves and caverns. In play I had them operating as scheming string pullers, their ultimate plan to summon their gods to the star system and thus be able to gain a safe place to live on the surface and begin *settling their debts* with other races. Because they clearly weren't worthy of the genocide they received, I additionally made them even more fucked up to the point of brainwashing and conditioning slaves to the point that mind control wouldn't be totally necessary anymore. Things are slightly different now, they succeeded in summoning their gods and now are in a cold war with the Trolls. Explaining that will take a while though lol.

[@Freekymoho]

The whole "going around leaving invasive species everywhere" angle might have some potential. You could tune down some of their stupid blatant evil and have them essentially be extremely unscrupolous exotic space animal traders (and effectively arms dealers)

[@planescaped]

Wait, so they're literal spacefaring aliens and not just planar ships? Uhhh.... if they have ftl travel and presumably lasers and space-age weaponry, how have they not glassed and conquered Toril? wtf. Putting that level of sci-fi into a high fantasy setting like Forgotten Reams feels like mixing M&M's into my mac and cheese...

[@dew-it8744]

(Light of xarterax spoilers) In light of xarterax, or at least the one I played in, they literally had these guys in a ship you investigate that was taken over by worm like guys that to my knowledge seem like better versions of them

[@dannydicheeto8353]

No those are just Psurlons, they came from dark sun.

[@AndrewJohnson-oy8oj]

Umber Hulks were originally introduced as thralls for Mind Flayers, so they don't even have that going for them.

[@Lyze]

They fit well in their original setting of Spelljammer. They were universely despised. You could trade with the Mind Flayers, Beholders were mostly just genocidal with each other but Neogi were fast breeding slaver extreme. Letting them land on a planet and establish a colony was unthinkable, everyone would drop what they're doing to stomp it out. If I remember right, one of the introduction adventures to Spelljammer was a Neogi ship crash landing somewhere near the party and the characters go to stomp out the space horrors and get introduced to spelljamming by salvaging the rest of the ship for the helm.

[@Katosepe]

Sometimes you just need a monster so despicably evil that nobody in the party will try to seduce it.

[@luisfuentes3846]

The real reason they look like that. Bard repellant.

[@gmkgoat]

“Talking to your mother about her place in your childhood trauma” oof… really cut deep there.

[@moblinmajorgeneral]

3:46 They're so ass the blue dragon had to reach back to 2006 and combine memes to wipe them from existence

[@lucaballarati9694]

I think it would be super funny for them to show up in Avernus, prompting the assembled demons and devils to briefly stop the Blood War to stomp them. Honestly, the more evil of a villain you're confronting, the funnier it is for them to find these things revolting. Like, say, Pale Night pausing in the middle of trying to embrace a player into her shroud to go "Ew" and disintegrate one of these.

[@TsulaAngenati2292]

The only thing I can think of to make them interesting is to take inspiration from the San’Shyuum/Prophets from Halo and make them space politicians that like collecting a menagerie of diverse and more interesting monsters to fight for them to take over planets and sell them to presumably the Illithids at first but now the Gith?

[@LupineShadowOmega]

Them being planet brokers is at least interesting. Way better than generic evil, mcevilson..so fair idea.

[@TsulaAngenati2292]

@@LupineShadowOmega Thank you

[@laayiv9449]

When you put up the picture of the neogi with their make-up, I instantly thought "That looks like The Dark Crystal", and then you actually compared them to the Skeksis like two sentences later! This isnt very remarkable but I love that movie.

[@Ryu1ify]

What's even better is how there's the nagpa who are even more skeksi like on account of literally being accursed bird sorcerers

[@laayiv9449]

@@Ryu1ify Yeah I've seen them. They aren't even hiding that one.

[@asurabloodworth8673]

Coincidentally I was just thinking about this as an Arathim Ascendancy stand end, and having them as minions of the Nagpa. Just like how the Skeksis used the Ascendancy briefly

[@derickpelton3107]

I use them because I didn't want to use Mind Flayers in my homebrew world and I liked the idea that one of them on an Umber Hulk reminded me of Krang. And I had Gnomes use their blood to create Dogpeople, Ratpeople, Turtlepeople, Lizardpeople, and Batpeople after repelling an invasion that brought most of the world back to the Stone Age.

[@epicwisp7450]

Youre hired to escort one (who is a key witness in a major villian's upcoming trial) to said trial alive. You must face the threat of not only the villians' henchman, but the Neogi's enemies, the shame of having to assosiate with a Neogi, and most difficult of all, resisting the urge to stomp on it repeatedly for its crime of existing

[@gigabytebulldog5989]

I find them best used as a part of history. Extinct, (as far as anyone is aware,) but with a lasting impact on the worlds. Pirates and slavers still use their terrifying ship designs and cruel technologies. They may be gone, but their philosophies are a license for people with power to indulge in the worst versions of themself. They inspire evil, even if they themselves weren't a particularly exciting rendition of it.

[@enterchannelname8981]

I think their small size is the most interesting. If you're fighting some big giant who was enslaved by a Neogi, the party could try to kill only the neogi while leaving the innocent giant alive and unharmed. The mental image of the party scrambling to kill only the scuttling spider-thing as it crawls around on a beefy giant is tempting to me.

[@TheSneakyHunter]

He really said “You can adopt this thing” I need this

[@jellebaas6475]

In my world neogi are exotic collectors who pit creatures against eachother for fun. Kind of like a mix between the Collector and the Gramdmaster from Marvel comics.

[@caramelfrappe402]

You are such a great KZbinr and clearly have inspired me a lot as a DM for my campaigns, I decided to buy your book(s), anticipating to buy the Enchanting Emporiums. Thank you for all of your hard work and of course, being really funny, as always. Love your content dude.

[@ratoh1710]

Apparently Neogi are also a delicacy to Gith, partially for its taste but also simply to spite the Neogi

[@jordanloux3883]

So they're basically DND's saturday morning cartoon villains.

[@emilyburkert7061]

transylvanian packers come to life got me. Now i can never look at those Neogis with a serious look again :(

[@Dintinosanto]

Neogi make for good RP because they’re the excuse to team up with races you’d otherwise NEEEEEEEVER work with. That’s it. That’s the only compelling RP I can see coming from a Neogi campaign.

[@annakoutsandreou2214]

They look like a yugioh normal monster except normal monsters have interesting flavor text

[@supahshadow9]

I could probably make it so an area is infested with Neogi, and it's the party's duty to just eliminate each one.

[@connorjohnson8590]

The only time I ever used a Neogi in my game was to have one sell a bunch of unethical magic items like a staff of charming

[@ImusakHctividar]

Personally I think they're fun little critters. Like the vanilla stats are kinda meh but conceptually of course a smaller or weaker guy would want big tough body guards, so them having things like umber hulks at their side to do the heavy lifting makes a ton of sense. Plus I think it's important to keep in mind that while D&D games have a specific setting, I'd argue a good chunk don't stick 100% to what the setting is. They just get the party together, skim through the monster manual for ideas, then write up something. One DM may want the intimidating but alluring Drow to be their go-to for underground slavers and evil dudes, or another DM might want funny spider creatures to be their underground slavers and evil dudes. All comes down to personal preference!

[@EvilBakaCat]

thanks I love these guys and will be using them for the slavers in my campaign. They look like they make execellent punching bags

[@AwesomeWookiee]

I actually quite like that they're so lame and pathetic. They've featured in my games as dangerous villains - that always get wiped off the board immediately while I introduce an actually fun or scary monster.

[@SuperUnnamedplayer]

Neogi are the enemy you pick if you don't want to have any gray morality in your games or your players trying to talk their way out of all encounters. Especially after BG3 players want to bang (or at least be friendly with) everything from Vampires (already did, but had to mention), Mindflayers, any humanoid race from the Underdark, Goblinoids, Devils and some demons, fae and probably something else I'm forgetting, so a race so repulsive everyone in the party goes "Yep, let's kill that thing!" could be useful. The "depth" could come from the whole mindcontrol aspect, where innocents are being controlled by them, so you'd have a reason to be cautious with fireballs.

[@Not_Alpharius]

Fin said it perfectly. “You’re so Evil it’s Boring. You’re basic, man.”

[@grayrook8637]

Here ya want an immediately more interesting option: Morkoths. They are crazy demigod fragments who role around reality in demiplanes who compulsively collect odd things. All the Snek Scrotum features but better. I love them for a random "my players got Lost'ed to a mysterious island and now this thing is watching them like a movie" adventures.

[@rinarina6247]

I gotta say, Neogi might be fun to include as jobbers so annoying that the Aboleths will form a temporary alliance with the party to easily stomp them into extinction in like, 2 turns

[@morganfurnas4242]

Neogi only work in spelljammer. I have never even considered just putting them on Toril In the underdark as just another thing to fight. To me, this they should always be spacebound slave traders doing their evil thing.

[@hollowknight4630]

Speaking of fun magic shops, I have a wand maker in my campaign who makes custom wands for spells but makes all of the trigger phrases stupid rhymes. My favorite being web, which is “icky icky, make them all sticky”

[@Tengu125]

What would be your trigger phrase for Fireball, and how would it differ from trigger phrases for lesser flame projectile spells? I'm genuinely curious to hear what you might have come up with using this idea.

[@hollowknight4630]

@@Tengu125 I was toying with stuff like “you know what doesn’t tire, a great raging ball of fire” or “you’ll surely finish last, behold my fire blast” and if I’m being honest the second one could be fire bolt or fireball the thing is I don’t think it matters as long as it’s different and fitting

[@SgtGonji]

Actually I really like the idea of Neogi bringing random alien species to other planets, but it's not as interesting when they do it as slaves. Like if they did it just for shits and giggles it would be funny and terrifying. "I wonder what happens if we drop this nightmare slug into a svirfneblin village. *hits space blunt* Let's find out."

[@altromonte15]

Plot idea: due to a freak psychic accident all the neogi suddenly get amnesia and forget being evil or wanting slaves

[@eldesconocidosenork5981]

I use them as a secondary/extra villan when my players would benefit from a bit of chaos. Also it really helps with new players that are already fantasy nerds and are looking dor something new and different. A little tweak I did was that if one of your players has some sort of charm ability/spell I let them conteract the mind control on a versus check.

[@SeventhPlacePace]

This just helped my campaign a lot.

[@liamcullen3035]

I imagine if I was going to use them, I’d give them ray guns and have them based around a crashed starship. A few scouts went off to look for resources and murdered some commoners in the exact same way that humans do when they crash land on alien planets in movies, giving the players the hook to hunt down the source of the threat. And when one gets away, it hides itself and uses its advanced technology to create some sort of communication device to call for help. When the players realise this, they have to race against the clock to prevent it getting to the peak of the highest mountain with its device and beaming Earth’s coordinates to a rescue/invasion fleet.

[@WMFrenzel]

I think neogi’s are useful for an encounter as an intelligent creature that can act like humanoids but look thoroughly alien. They work really well for their spot in the spelljammer adventure Light of Xaryxsis because it immediately says “space fight”.

[@grimulkin7111]

I feel like you could spin them into something fun, by having them as a sort of comically evil side antagonist that pops up to annoy the party every now and then lol

[@preyasmanthedemopan2854]

actually, the fact alone that everyone hates them can make for some interesting campaign ideas. especially with the fact they have all those traits you talked about. it could make for a cool arc where the party has to temporarily work with their true enemies or somehow convince them to stop fighting due to the greater threat. the neogi themselves are weak, but there could be armies of them, so it can be a really good war of the worlds type thing. imagen the party having to convince the various types of dragons and the giants to work together to take down the neogi fleet, or set up a situation where gith and mind flayers have to come together, that's sick af. im sorry, but despite your hatred of them, i can see alot of potential for some really cool and unexpected things in a dnd campaign with their inclusion.

[@T.BG822]

The Neogi are for what I call 'Skeletor Moments' - they're a common enemy horde that just sucks so hard that enemy factions band together against them, and can humanize a bad guy without risking the bad guy's status as still a 'bad guy' They or their expies are thoroughly necessary as a conceptual shorthand to introduce and maintain campaigns where old-school alignment and its balances are important, but you've got a time crunch.

[@pheivins99]

I actually use the fact they are aliens to the advantage. In one of my games a Neogi ship crashes and they slowly start fixing it by capturing people and forcing them to work on it. The party had no idea they were aliens and the shock enough was worth it. It was a good excuse to pur sci-fi gear into a fantasy setting

[@AzraelThanatos]

The ones on Toril are more of the survived through crashes or similar ways since they aren't native there. While they're pretty much evil for being evil's sake, it's with their main goals that they differentiate in a normal D&D game, they want to build up wealth and then GTFO and go to the "nicer" worlds that they control rather than being trapped/exiled on whatever world you encounter them in. They're SpellJammer creatures after all. There is a rather interesting rogue Neogi that is the bouncer in the World Serpent Inn that also runs their fighting pits.

[@boinkmcbingo8890]

Yeah I think they'd also be really good in for giving the players a spelljammer (idk their CR off the top of my head so maybe not) . Didn't know they actually had their own so I just usually threw mindflayers with a nautilus in the few times I wanted to let people have spelljammers.

[@WillTribble]

Never heard of these before, but the picture of one in a dressing gown and wifebeater at 1:30 immediately aroused my attention, because why wouldn't you want to use a character that looked like an XCOM Chryssalid ran a porn shop, and then the picture of them looking like Skeksis spiders at 5:03 made me 100% want to use them

[@TheSmart-CasualGamer]

So bad that the Dalek Supreme would tell them to turn it down a notch.

[@lordetern]

Does no one see the potential of them being the ultimate gag villain? I am getting mooninite's from Aqua Teen Hunger Force vibes from them. As in they try to be the most evil things in the universe but they suck at it and are the butt of jokes by every other evil race. Nevertheless, they are super serious and don't get why everyone thinks they are a joke.

[@matiasluukkanen7718]

These actually could be really fun encounters and antagonists in campaign with Gith players to prevent mindflayer overuse.

[@nerco8194]

My party just "fought" one. A wizard had promised it meat and it was super hungry because the big guy wasn't fed in a while. I threw him an arm that I had cutt off from a grunt and he just helped us the WHOLE time we were in that dungeon becase he was so happy that I was kind to him

[@potatoboooi5168]

You should rewrite Neogi to make them interesting like you did with Thri Kareen

[@skybladebloodheart4247]

so i just wanted to say and while i like the creator i really do i feel i have to reiterate this, i got the guide to twisted taverns i got the mugs two, he said he revised them many times, but i wanted the original design, and unfortunately the design ultimately decided on was a plain wood mug with a stainless inside, that had dark fabric bands instead of metal ones, which honestly seemed of cheap construction even compared to the original. additionallythe handles were held in by the smallest of pegs, and by the time they arrived the handles of most of the mugs fell off while handing without even drinking from them. on top of all this though i lament it was during that tough time for shipping and there were many delays because of it, even many months later when he said they should be arriving mine still didn't arrive for more months, it took exactly a a year -1 day to arrive. while i appreciate the creator and all he does i therefor cannot endorse the quality of his products, i also have stibbleses codex, which feels oddly barren and does not live upto the detail i would've expected.

[@dank_smirk2ndchannel200]

You know, I think the Neogi have some potential if you double down on how evil they are to a comedic degree so that you eventually get the equivalent of space-D&D Skaven. Just don’t forget to add the Neogi's version of radioactive-cocaine.

[@clericofchaos1]

good points all around... i guess you could make one that's super pathetic and lonely, cause i've never heard of anything else in the game that's universally hated, but i'm not sure what kind of campaign that fits into. It's an idea for a side quest. Help the pathetic neogi find a real friend, like it's sesame street or something.

[@TyphosTheD]

5:10 MAAAAN. The idea of an evil faction of creatures that tatoo the number of and varieties of slaves or powers they have on them as posturing of their power is suuuuper inspiring.

[@owlson2527]

That part about childhood trauma really hit home.. Damn

[@MrChoco409]

They absolutely have a purpose. I imagine encounters with them will be kinda like the replicators from Stargate SG1 (when they were still little spider guys). Filling every piece of the wall. There needs to be comically bland evil for there to be grey-zone intriguing evil.

[@ShadeMeadows]

The Neogi and Umberhulks reminds me of the Skeksis and Garthim... 😳

[@samuelrodriguez9801]

Remember that scene from that episode of The Sweet Life on Deck where they were in the future and they were being threatened by these intimidating aliens that later turned out to be tiny? They’re basically these guys.

[@Publiusaurus]

I'm only grateful for them as their Nightspider ships are great for space drow.

[@curtisthornsberry4236]

These spider-eels are fun for the party to blow off steam on. Like, the party just needs an evil thing to slay once in a while. When even my zombies where giving the party some feels, they just needed unapologetically evil thing, no questions asked. But that it, if I bring them in they are there to be slain for fun.

[@jandocarrillo2731]

I ran an entire campaign about a neogi invasion. They had all sorts of spaceships and lazer weapons and other advanced technology. That made them unique at least for my game. They also had no magic, only tech

[@BasicallyBaconSandvichIV]

Personally, and I think everyone else agrees here, I think they should get a little more variations and a little more power(or a lottle). Then they are perfect as an everyone enemy. Say you're fighting in a brawl with some dragons, giants, drow, duergar, goblinoids, kobolds, gith, naga's, yuanti, devils, demons, yugoloth, a couple beholders, aboleths, local thieves guilds and liches, and the mindflayer faction waiting to take over whoever wins the battle. Then the Neogi show up. And everyone stops fighting to go fight the Neogi. PS. I immediately knew it was the Neogi when you said it was the most evil and bland monster in DnD.

[@Babbleplay]

The Lifejammer. This is how Neogi travel space. It is a flying ship engine powered by life force. They just slap a slave into the fuel tank, and can travel around till he kicks the bucket, and is replaced by another prisoner.

[@KnicKnac]

I'm looking forward to that second book. I figured you might be working on it. Loved the first one.

[@prettysalty8447]

Given how you brought up steven universe towards the end, I feel the diamonds would make amazing storm giants in a DND campaign, or something else more fitting for them

[@koreboar4646]

I think a bbeg being an anit-climactic CR3 monster could be fun and silly

[@tristanmoors7835]

Random line about mothers in childhood trauma hit me outta nowhere

[@leebard9335]

Are you high? These guys seem awesome! Drow are boring, beholders are too silly, and illithid are too alien to be relatable. A Neogi are the best of everything - an in-your-face evil that can be too well connected to get rid of despite everyone hating them, living down the street from the party's favorite tavern that collects weird and bizarre servants from everywhere while being a sleazy scumbag with no backbone if you get it alone in a dark alley would be such a fun npc. Jabba the Hutt has just found his way into D&D

[@precascer8221]

The old Spelljammer design kinda slaps tbh, at least from the "waist" up. I love this evil ass creepy grin.

[@artemisday]

I kinda like the idea of a pathetic little eel-spider that literally every single creature despises to an extreme level. Could be a goofy npc to give the party and let them take pity on, or to just kill if they want

[@catalin2766]

I actually like the idea down below of them becoming a literal joke in a campaign. You reach the layer of the evil dragon, you start having your epic speech with the beast and through the wall a bunch of neogi appear and all vitriol between the party and dragon is redirected at them. You are having a heated argument with the shopkeeper? Neogi appear, every civilian and party member takes a weapon and beats them in wholesome fun.