KYPW: Mind Flayers - Dungeons and Dragons 5e

[@Taking20]

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[@Ozhar1]

The world desperately needs a kypw: Goblins. They have so many templates and archetypes but everyone just uses the base gobby with maybe a bugbear leader or something. Now, if you wanna wait to upload it until Goblin Slayer S2 is nearing to be aired, you might reel in more views 👀

[@digunder14]

you missed a major problem with your illithid slaad hybrid idea, the way they reproduce would only work if an illithid were to be infected by the chaosphage disease effect, of the blue slaad, would not even make sense if the slaad was a red

[@seanlawrence8784]

This video, is pure gold. Having a balor summoned to consume a whole town, the cuthulu-esque thrall mass suicide, the mental gymnastics you can have. I never really looked into mind flayer but something with them always stuck to me. This doesn't open a door, this video opened up a castle gate. I can see it now: entire enthralled towns trying to capture you as you sleep at the inn, drugged food given to the unwary, a thrall corrupting a town or acting as a scout to pick people off, manipulating the party to go kill some big bad enemy that secretly advances their plans, suble manipulations of both npcs and players with voices. This is pure genius.

[@uzernamefail]

So in my last pirate campaign, the main city had a seedy underground with a masked, telepathic slave trader. The party didn't take a great interest in the slaver, and the warlock appreciated the source of "cheap" bodies for necromancy. When the party developed their own island city, the slaver offered to move to their city in exchange for dozens of free slaves per month. Later, when demons attacked the island, an NPC wizard went missing, and scrying revealed that the wizard was captured by someone else, sitting unconscious in chains with a bleeding ear on a ship as her skin turned purple. The slaver, revealing himself to be a mind flayer, then confronted the party after they defeated a mage wielding ancient magic. He managed to not only get away with "killing" the NPC, but he got to eat the mage's brain in exchange for instructions on how to recreate an airship the party had found. Next campaign will take place several centuries later. The mind flayer used the knowledge he obtained to take over the world's largest wizard's college, replacing the entire high council with his "children". He is now sitting on a vault of artifacts from across the multiverse, an army of wizards spanning the globe, massive political capital, and is partly responsible for the setting's development of warforged and passenger airships. And all because be practically bribed the party twice.

[@Licjr]

So the party inadvertently helped create the Illuminati? I can dig it

[@Storyman09]

Steven Moncrief that is awesome XD

[@X23Natalie]

@@Licjr Illithinati

[@anderslundtoft2315]

Love it!

[@emophobe]

The 1 dislike is from a Gith

[@quintinsteevessenior5568]

🤣

[@scottyp1722]

My favorite illithid based encounter that I ran was one where my players encountered a group of centaurs that appeared to have psionics but also seemed to be strangely disoriented. Their eyes lolling in their skulls, seeming to be having a hard time holding up their torsos, and wielding their weapons erratically (if still effectively). It was only after they dispatched a few that the real horror began as the horse like beast ends started to vomit out the humanoid parts and attack the players with gaping maws (with of course four tentacles) where the centaurs human waists once were. The tentacles had paralyzing poison similar to carrion crawlers and once a victim was immobilized the creature would swallow their lower half, insert their tentacles into the victims spine, and take control of the body. Then they would use their new top half to protect themselves with. These creatures had been created by the illithid to go out and hunt down intelligent humanoids for them and bring them helplessly back to the illithids to feed the colony without risking illithid lives. The were a really fun monster to DM!

[@fahmikhairullah5501]

I've seen this in a hentai manga before

[@scottyp1722]

@@fahmikhairullah5501 LOL, you've got to be kidding! I guess they can make smut out of ANYTHING.

[@Menzobarrenza]

That is absolutely brilliant.

[@xaviercarmona4439]

My word... bravo.

[@DungeonDad]

This is exactly why mindflayers have stuck around through so many editions of D&D as fan favourite creatures. They are honestly one of the most unique and terrifying species. No matter what level the party is, the second they catch a whiff of mindflayer shenanigans the tone of the session always changes to a much more cautious one, almost immediately.

[@TodlicheVerwuste]

One of the worst things about the Illithid are just how intelligent they are, and their ability to just wreck your PCs. They're one of the few species in which the dm can use meta knowledge of the setting, campaign, or even the party themselves, to their benefit. Just by absorbing the right creature can brief the Illithid on party tactics and thus lend them the ability tio prepare for it. Obviously, you seed your players with information to "pretend" you're not just an evil prick. I once had an Illithid devour a commoner the party saved and became fond of. When they discovered their disappearance they spent several sessions investigating. Finally finding her body, hole in the skull, they flung themselves at the Illithid enraged and nearly died. They savored the victory(right up until I slapped them with another gut-check) Edit: engaged = enraged

[@beepboprobotsnot3748]

Kill your party with mind flayers? That sounds super easy.

[@ShrankTheFirst]

Barely an inconvenience

[@beepboprobotsnot3748]

@@ShrankTheFirst That reference was tight.

[@jerrybeard8995]

aw we want a KYPW "kindness" lol

[@cypher4783]

Wizards mind a gleaming fortress city. Barbarian's mind a wide open valley, or rough mountains, or raging sea. Rouge's mind hallways of locked doors, or for the master mind a hall of mirrors, or inquisitive a web of constantly changing of connections. Paladin/clarric a shrine or temple of their God Druid/ranger places of significant to them. For dream druid who understand the sub conscious would be their ideal battle ground

[@ThreadbareInc]

In my current campaign, I introduced the party to illithids by having one make a deal with a local adventurer's guildmaster. The guildmaster would choose targets that the illithid would dominate and either force them to spill secrets worth blackmailing over or force them to commit such acts and give proof to the guildmaster. When they captured him in the street, he talked them into going back to his office together since that's where he kept all his evidence. However, he then flipped a switch on his desk and a hidden compartment containing the illithid opened up. The guildmaster shouted that the party was doomed now. Everyone prepared to roll initiative... Then the illithid said "No, I don't think so." "Wait, what?" the guildmaster asked. "You've been caught; your use to me is at an end. Good luck beating him. Goodbye." The players tried to kill it anyway, but it planeshifted out on its turn despite a counterspell attempt by the bard. And so what appeared to be the villains of the campaign were revealed...

[@stevewinkleburg5300]

Kill your party with goblin lids Kill your party with mimics This is my favorite series

[@gargoyle3333]

I love these KYPW videos! Some backstory for cool monsters is great, but when you start getting into how to use them, it gives me so many ideas that I want to just go immediately start a game... If you've got time to make some more, that would be awesome!

[@sorrazknightley1969]

This video just saved my campaign!

[@TheMrg59]

Mind Flayers, along with Yuan-Ti are two of my favorite tribal type enemies in campaigns!

[@poisonisFunguy182]

My campaign that I have been running for a year and a half revolve around both Yuan Ti and Mind Flayers, with devotees on both sides with the cults of The Adders, those who devote themselves to Dendar in hopes to be spared from the nightmare that envelopes the world and The Lotus, researchers of all sorts hoping to gain higher knowledge of the forbidden as well as seeking the chance to possibly become one of the higher beings. There are two core mechanics that both of them play; The Adders provoke the fears of others putting them under a terrifying curse to make their very nightmares come to life and The Lotus creating a plethora of abominations fusing magical creatures and people alike into terrible beasts the world has never seen Sorry for dumping all of this, I am just really passionate of my campaign

[@fardareismai4495]

@@poisonisFunguy182 that sounds so great!! I'd love to play in that campaign, your players are lucky to have you.

[@poisonisFunguy182]

@@fardareismai4495 Hey to be honest, I am lucky to have my players, can't have the game without them, which is why the campaign is tailored specifically for them. Thank you for the compliment however. I would offer a spot, but this far in the campaign wouldn't work well. Nonetheless I wish you luck in finding a game you can enjoy with others.

[@MrBanshee312]

Thank you! First time Dm running a session with my young brothers and the mindflayer seemed awesome and you gave me the best advice I've found!

[@davewhyare]

The Cranium Rats from Volo's Guide gave me an idea for a Mind Flayer whose body was destroyed when he attempted to increase his psionic powers and he had to transfer his consciousness into a swarm that now acts as his body. The swarm either forms a rough humanoid shape wrapped under a cloak or splits off into individual rats which act as spies. I added School of Divination Wizard class to the swarm to give him access to the future predicting abilities, suggesting that the Illithid did increase his mental powers. The Mind Flayer Rat Swarm was supposed to have been exiled for his work, as it would have been seen as dangerous and his resulting transformation an abomination. I have yet to introduce him into my game but this gave me a few ideas for where to lead a story with him, but I was considering a plot where he sought vengeance for being exiled.

[@forrestwood5796]

Thanks so much for this! In my very first campaign that I just finished a week or so ago, we faced a mind flayer and it was intense!

[@WylliamJudd]

This is great! Thanks! I think you could have touched on the Intellect Devourer, but this still gave me lots of ideas for how to include these guys.

[@brochogan3579]

Feel free to use this other DMs: I had a mid game arc with the FINAL 3 Illithid of this campaign setting.... They were using forces built up over a long time and very carefully as to not be hunted again, they needed to work together to undo a curse set upon them by ancient magi who set up 3 keystones to nullifi the ability for mindflayers to reproduce and were then hunted to presumed extinction . The three Mindflayers I made special...1 was blind and no longer able to use his sight based abilities but made up for it with basically using those moves via reskined monk abilities and boosted to a degree(baked in stuns with an aoe form of flury of blows. Himself with uncanny dodge and other stuff this was. 1v4 fight baked to perfection).. This was a swole mind flayer again blind and missing 1 of 4 tentacles. The second was the arcane mindflayer who was based underwater mind controlling several species of aquatic creatures and humanoids. At war with an Aboleth that has his current lair exactly at the point of the 2nd keystone and finally I basically combined an illithid with an Elder brain and boosted the range of his abilities to control his servants in an entire 2nd lair while the second lair being the last remnant of a ship remaining of the illithid empire...piloted by the last illithid to the keystone in order to suck the energy from 1 of the key stones and moving to another while the party was now fighting their way out of the dummy lair. They loved it and are maybe half a game away from catching up to the ship at this point.

[@ratman505]

Imagine this: A Mind Flayer playing a god as a patron for a warlock that thinks he's actually a chosen cleric

[@PokemonButcher]

15:27 Possibly the only time that I have heard Harry Potter and Lovecraft used in tandem

[@fatesear2028]

i remember someone who said mindflayers are simply slightly stronger kobolds. saying gm's will pit around 7-10 mind flayers against players. saying that low level players could kill a mind flayer. all you have to do is avoid being grappled. and if u do get grappled. simply break out. does anyone else think that person is stupid?

[@Mare_Man]

It's as likely as killing the Tarrasque with a clay golem. Possible? Yes. Probable? *_no_*

[@artyyyr2596]

I think he played with bad dm, the kind of guy throwing a beholder charging in front of the party

[@unwithering5313]

They are basically Save or Die.

[@krispalermo8133]

AD&D2e "Complete Psionic Hand Book," follow with "Dark Sun" campaign set, and "Ravenloft" set monster manual . Psionic Lich= TPK

[@Morriepl]

Few points: 1. There actually was an illithid goddess - Ilsensine ;) 2. One of the official campaigns for 2 ed od AD&D - Illithiad - deals with the ruins of the old illithid empire ;) And the prophecy that leads to all the stars starting to disappear... ;) 3. As for alhoons and illithiliches - they are sometimes used interchangebly, sometimes not. It depends on edition and game materials. 4. There was a LN illithid living in Waterdeep in temple of Oghma in late 1300s DR ;) 5. Sometimes ceremorphosis can be stopped before completion - which might lead to someone who keeps his personality, while becoming physically an illithid - there was an example I believe in "Drizzt Do'Urden's guide to Underdark"

[@MastertheGamerpg]

I actually love some of your RP tips in this video. The idea of saving the unconscious character sounds like a blast. Also like the manipulations of the Barbarian and Cleric. Great stuff!

[@samcheung2167]

Thanks again. A good look at Mind Flayers and as always some valuable ideas of how to make a campaign or some adventures about these terrifying creatures. I hope I get the time/ inspiration to write a full campaign for Mind Flayers at some point. Having lots of small adventures eventually building up to a high level confrontation with a Ithilid Community sounds deadly, but amazing,

[@kramerfortuna7228]

Great video (as always!) Perfectly timed too! I recently started a campaign where my players are actually working for a mind flayer (only one player knows that, though.) Their missions, while still fighting against evil monsters and people, are bringing the illithid closer to immortality. Also, as the player's influence grows, so does the mind flayer's by proxy. (I can't figure out how to run a full mind flayer colony, though, since it just seems so overpowered! I just don't want to murder all of my PCs.... yet.)

[@DrMemeD302]

Could you do a KYPW Yuan-Ti at some point? I feel like there's so much content between the MM and Volo's Guide, but I tend to have a hard time thinking of neat and unique ways to utilize them outside of "Wierd Mayan/Egyptian style snake cult"

[@ericjordan1348]

KYPW are some of my favorite D&D vids, cant wait for the next one

[@guyatanosavia8487]

I actually use Gith and Mindflayers as a strong plot hook to bring my campaigns back into the Prime Material Plane if my players accidentally "start" a Planeswalker campaign. They show up in the astral plane, are captured by the Gith, who then say they'll release them if they assist on the next ilithid hunt

[@etanders23]

Awesome video! Last night I ran a game where an Ulitharid was creating a new colony within a school for wizards.... The PC's began to hallucinate as they delved deeper toward the Ulitharid and they saw illusions of their personal failures throughout the trek. Plot hooks for future adventures almost created themselves!

[@jamesjensen7689]

Good work Cody; my mind is totally blown!

[@halfjack2758]

Underrated comment

[@alexmiller1800]

I’m planning a game for some of my friends. The main villain is literally a Mind Flayer Colony. The idea being that the players will begin in a city that has been partially invaded and corrupted by the Mind Flayers from their undersea fortress. My idea was to use Intellect Devourers to perfectly take the place of humans when that is necessary and thralls to complete the tasks that require less finesse and of course there will be s few Illithid commanders in town overseeing the operation as they capture more townsfolk to put ultimate plan into motion.

[@johnstarinieri7360]

We had a barbarian who tried to solo a mind flayer and ended up getting grappled and one-shot by the brain sucking ability. Thankfully myself (the paladin) and our bard were able to slay the flayer and after a LOT of medicine checks we reassembled his head and we able to resurrect him

[@bromora989]

That’s pretty lucky for you with the DM because technically you shouldn’t be able to do that: brains are meant to be entirely destroyed by the mindflayer when eaten.

[@johnstarinieri7360]

@@bromora989 We killed the flayer as it was eating him. Our DM doesn't like PC deaths so we managed to salvage him

[@bromora989]

John Starinieri unless it was due to the flayer getting a critical hit with immense highroll: then they should have let it happen imo. It’s sad but actually letting the PC’s feel like their life is threatened is very important to making things interesting, they should feel their mortality and sometimes a death will do that better than anything else can.

[@johnstarinieri7360]

@@bromora989 That's fair. It was the dude's first campaign with us though, and to be fair the party did put int a lot of work to bring him back. I get that death is definitely a real threat and should be treated as such (we did lose another PC later down the line) but our DM wanted to cut this guy some slack.

[@gavinweidner1332]

Kypw grung those little amphibians seem really fun to play with

[@mercuryneon8964]

Gavin Weidner on 5e they only turn up in tomb of annihilation and are pretty much Bullywugs.

[@SilentGrudge]

Ever since my first encounter with them back in 2nd Edition, Mind Flayers have been my all time favorite creature, race, I love everything about them. Especially the terror our playgroup felt when first facing off against them, and being so woefully unprepared for everything that they can do, and how convincing they can be. 10/10.

[@andykapsar4667]

intellect devourers are fun too

[@MacroAggressor]

Thanks so much! This helped me flesh out a major background piece for a PC I've been working on (it's my first one, hopefully it all makes sense).

[@JadeDRail]

I've watched other mind-flayer videos but this one has given me a much better idea of how to actually roleplay mind flayers.

[@MastertheGamerpg]

I love this series. Glad to see you doing it again.

[@Nixoth]

There is also the mind flayers ability to weave psionics into weapons and armor for their thralls to use. The mind blade and mind carapace armor is amazing. As well as the mind shield. I run these in my mind flayer campaign and its fun to challenge the players

[@damiantey4593]

This was a pretty amazing video. Every suggestion was so interesting.

[@Taking20]

Awwww Glad you dug it!

[@mercuryneon8964]

You should do a KYPW traps or KYPW your party.

[@austinbostrom5304]

I was already planning to have mind flayers as the main villains 🦹‍♀️ in a campaign, thanks for the tips! I have a player who likes the Slaadi almost as much as I do so that one will be way fun

[@BKR1337]

This video came out just at the right time! I am currently running a campaign and next session the players will run into a mindflayer colony

[@Neutral_Tired]

Oh, that Mind Slaad idea is really cool, I’m imagining a the Illithid took a slaad host and gave them the illithid tadpole without realising how dangerous it would be, when it was changed it was immune to the elder brain’s powers and killed and replaced the elder brain, and has started creating more mind slaad as well as controlling the illithid, and has since evolved into a death slaad (death/mind slaad, elder mind slaad?)

[@loadnlock357]

My last campaign was one of pure horror. I spiced it up with some gory psychological imagery. They went to investigate a town only to find it abandoned. Until they entered the tavern to find a woman sitting in a chair singing to what appeared to be a baby in her arms. When they investigated farther they noticed the baby was covered in blood and she was holding a knife. She then looked towards the players with a blank stare and put her finger to her lips and said "shhh.. she is sleeping" then she stood up and with an otherworldly voice said "your all going to die" then she slit her own throat with the knife. They found out the entire town had been enslaved by mind flayers. gave one of my players nightmares lol

[@Adnan-qm1vi]

This aged so well

[@digunder14]

one flaw with the slaad idea, the reds who are the ones who use tadpoles, they eat their way and burst out of the host's chest thus killing the host while the tadpole goes on to grow, the blues leave the host alive and over time transforms them into a red or green slaad

[@okeytay4]

Please do one for Beholders, including the different types!

[@RestlessFrog]

Need more of these vids! Thanks and good job

[@MattChild]

thanks for this! My last session (which was just a few days ago) I cornered the party in a tavern and hit them with a Mind Flayer arcanist, paired with a Bodak and a dozen zombies. Needless to say, it was nearly a TPK

[@Will-zs9ny]

What level is your party?

[@sleadaddy]

What the heck kinda taverns do you have in your campaign?

[@MattChild]

@@Will-zs9ny the six of them are now level 8. It was a brutal knock drag out two parter of a fight, and used up most of our playing time last session

[@Will-zs9ny]

@@MattChild I misread the comment, I thought you meant you killed most of them! Now that I understand it was just a brutal fight, sounds great! Cool encounter!

[@MattChild]

@@Will-zs9ny oh, it was. The last one standing was the goliath bear totem barbarian, and he was down to about 25% HP (psychic damage FTW)

[@nukeomatic]

Still one of my favorite videos!

[@posie6661]

I’m running Waterdeep right now. In the Xanathar hideout at the end sits a mindflayer and I was really hoping that one of my players would try to attack it and the one I had a feeling would said he would’ve except he had low health

[@landshark760]

I picked up monsters and minions as well as legendary dragons and they are AMAZING! totally backed gods and Goddesses!

[@MauroDraco]

I love mind flatters and their deep surprising history!

[@roaringlaughter3812]

So i was homebrewing a lvl 20 champion bbeg with one homebrew skill: upon kill he gets a free dash to the closest player and any leftover attacks get to be used on that player He had 2 lvl 10 arcane archers supporting him Was not expecting it to be that efficient Pretty much murdered the entire party in about 2 turns. Granted i kept throwing hints that it was too early for them to fight this guy.

[@Darknight4434]

Could also be interesting to check on older editions books about illithids, where is shown a lot of mutations that mind flayers do, like merging dark magic and a tadpole on a deep gnome, put a tadpole on a dragon or a semi-functional illithid that is made when a tadpole grow on a lizardfolk

[@SilverSeraph379]

An important part about Mindflayers is that they DON'T use magic (except for traitors/Alhoon). Thus, they should be given a competent list of competent psionic abilities. It takes homebrewing, adapting from Pathfinder and the like, but it makes them so much better.

[@X23Natalie]

You could take a page or two from the Unearthed Arcana Mystic class and encorporate those abilities into a Mind Flayer. There's a lot of spell-like effects a mystic can do with psionics which is essentially what Mind Flayers are all about.

[@SomeonesVideos]

My group just finished with Descent into Avernus and is continuing on their original world, but I'd like to introduce the scariest place they've seen, which would make Hell look like a walk in the park. They're level 13, and I want them to be shaking in their boots when they finally meet a badass Mind Flayer. You bet I'm going to be buffing them up at least a little bit.

[@demonspawnjake]

Me and my group are all new to d and d and I wasn't planning to add mind flayers but you just changed my mind

[@dokscy44]

"So... all of you created dumb stats because it was useless in combat?" *Looks at Berserker Barbarian* Mind Flayer: It's free real state.

[@IntermountainGoldRefiners]

It was interesting to see the old description of illithids.

[@LordMorin]

I have made a homebrewed version of the Mindflayer based on the UA Mystic (Version 3). I have also been making Homebrewed rules for Psionics; Examples: Undead with Intelligence of 3 or less and Constructs are Immune to Psychic damage. I have to individuals in my current Undermountain campaign who are Mystics and their encounters with Intellect Devourers and Gray Ooze (Psionic variant) have been interesting. They have yet to meet an actual Illithid yet.

[@mikitta47]

Changeling Mindflayers takes over the group's Patron complex, creating thralls of the patron and their staff and taking their place to interact with the characters. :D

[@anxez]

My first tabletop experience was with a Newb DM and one of the sessions we had kinda stumbled on a mindflayer doing something that left it vulnerable to actually just being beaten up. It was a fun encounter but at the end he had said he "didn't really use the mindflayer properly" and at the time he did a poor job explaining why he hadn't. This is what he meant.

[@elrikard7909]

Beautifully done.

[@jamesstaton3265]

Whelp, I'm gonna field the idea to my DM to use Illithids somewhat soon. My Archfey warlock needs more monster groups to broker contracts with. Looking forward to more opportunities to turn any charm affects on its head.

[@dirmusloner7963]

The lair of the mind FLAYER in my campaign is called "The Silk tower" It is a HIVE of mind flayers. The villain actually acts as an elder brain (mind FLAYER arcanist) Inside the tower there are traps with gelatinous cubes await, intellect devourers, craabs, traps that are setting rooms on fire, the entire tower is under an alarm spell in every room, glyphs of warding await the mistake of any player, constructs were summoned as "guards" a Bodak await the players in a torture chamber

[@rateater1857]

I can't use mindflayers. Every time my players catch the merest whiff of an illithid, the seduce rolls come out. I can't do it. I'm not strong enough.

[@magiv4205]

Godspeed my friend. You'll need it.

[@noehonegger4624]

Use that if they wanna seduce a mind flayer, beat them with their own weapons make a mind flayer flirt with them sew chaos make them fight over him/her and theeeen inplant them with tadpoles. You can also go into the other direction and have one mind flayer really care about the party. And you could either let it help them or get killed by the mind flayer colony

[@csyarr]

Perfect timing for this video! My players are trying to infiltrate a mind flayer lair as of last night's session. This will help me plan for the next one. :-D

[@bobbyLNZ]

The necroranchers campaign on giants in the play ground uses mind flayers in a great way I think

[@anonymouslyknown6530]

I got this idea for an all out war on the Ethereal plane between Alhouns, Illitihiliches, and a giant Mother Brain all trying to get the remains of a working Nautiloid. Once obtained they could rule all of the Material planes and rebuild their Empire. Unless the PC can stop them.

[@ThreadbareInc]

They'd probably need a fleet of nautiloids for that, not just one.

[@anonymouslyknown6530]

@@ThreadbareInc I was thinking that they would use the one working one to start mass production across multiple planes. Nautiloids need a lot of different materials to make so after completing one they would need to plane jump to make more. This gives the PC's a chance to chase them. This could lead to multiple factories popping up that need to be destroyed. The Gith could form an alliance to stop them and the PC's could get help from them or one of the other factions.

[@ThreadbareInc]

@@anonymouslyknown6530 Well, there's a couple of problems I can see with that approach. First, knowledge is never really "lost" where Elder Brains are concerned: even when an ulitharid forms a new colony, it carries all the knowledge of the old colony and of that Elder Brain's old colony with it. So the Elder Brain's faction, at least, wouldn't need a ship to copy (if that's what you were going for). Second, all illithid can use plane shift once per day. It would be slower, but they could potentially assemble the parts they needed to make that first nautiloid without having to go out and find one. What if the target was a nautiloid manufacturing center that also happened to have an intact ship? The ship would be valuable to the undead factions that lost the knowledge to build them when the broke from the collective while the buildings and resources would be valuable to all three. It would create a reason for one faction to act differently from the other two, and since the collective faction can build a nautiloid on their own it gives you a way to keep the campaign going (or keep two factions competitive) after the players battle it out in the facility.

[@anonymouslyknown6530]

@@ThreadbareInc that would work. My intention was for them to realm hop once they got the Nautiloid not just plane shift. The building of the fleet would be part of the build up. The last working Nautiloid would be used to reconnect with a larger collective. Making it a race to the factory would work well and once there the PC's could steal the ship if they got there first and destroy the factory. Or fail and hope to sneak in and sabotage before the fleet was made.

[@ThreadbareInc]

@@anonymouslyknown6530 Sounds fair. Incidentally, be sure to give each mind flayer faction contingency plans so they can all stay in the game after the factory strike. Other spelljamming ships they can steal, infiltrators in each other's factions, smaller resource piles to seize, and so on. The victor at the factory would get a sizable head start, hence the rush, but illithids and liches are both too good at planning to let a single setback ruin everything.

[@zacharyuphold5663]

Kinda funny that "The Dungeon Dudes" posted a Mind Flayer video one day after Taking20's. Coincidence?

[@andrewsmith9528]

Actually nice to have them both to view and compare. But Cody’s marketing pitch is much more inspiring and succinct. The DD need to up their game a bit.

[@zacharyuphold5663]

Agreed, Taking20 FTW.

[@neilpalmieri9028]

Im interested to eventually use mind flayers in my game, we started recently and one of my players is an Illithid so him meeting others will certainly be *interesting*

[@cameronscott9399]

An illithid, player? Wha- what? How? How will that work, on any level? Please give us updates that sounds hellishly interesting

[@neilpalmieri9028]

Cameron Scott i haven’t mentioned the best part, since he’s playing a mystic and he knows I don’t like them he decided to “nerf” himself by making it so he needs to eat brains about once a week as opposed to once a month. I should mention that we made the illithid player race much weaker, he gets a plus two to intelligence and a 1 to wisdom, he gets some innate spellcasting with psionics and he uses a disguise kit to hide the fact that he is a brain eating monster, I’ll be sure to update you as to how it pans out, it’s been two sessions so far and only one pc has found out and is keeping the secret to himself

[@cameronscott9399]

@@neilpalmieri9028 oh my, oh my oh my oh my. Please keep us updated on that monstrosity

[@MRSterling78]

In honor of Baldur’s Gate 3... How would you role play a Mind Flayer? Would it be different if it was a community? A Ulitharid? An exile? An Elder Brain?

[@harleybanting4865]

My party was exploring the underground sewers beneath the city they were making there home. And they found a Mind Flayer colony and they began the effort of exterminating them over months. I had the Elder brain have a mind flayer leave the colony and present himself to the party as a Deviant oitside its influence, with a plan to take down the elder brain that made enough sense to convince the party. They readily allied with the "Deviant" who led them into the depths of the Underdark right into a Enthralled Drow village.

[@jek__]

You make your way in to a pitch dark wide open room, it's quiet except for the sound of the party's footsteps on the damp stone floor and faint dripping coming from a direction you can't pinpoint. With darkvision and torches you can see further into the open area, but as you make your way into the room you find you don't see any features, no support beams, no walls, the ceiling is too high to see, nothing but the stone bricks under your feet. Looking around, you realize you've lost sight of the entrance. You stand still for a moment, trying to orient yourself in this strange featureless room, with nothing but the flickering light of your torch bouncing off of the slick floor. You start off in one direction, hoping to eventually reach a wall. You walk straight for what feels like hours staring into the darkness looking for anything to no avail, it doesn't even seem like the dripping sound has moved in all that time. You quicken your pace, panicking a bit. But as you do the floor seems to get slipperier in turn, causing you to stumble and fall. You have no idea what direction you came from or were going, the only thing you have seen for what must be miles is the repeating floor tiles and you start to worry that you'll never get out of this room. You slump down on the floor dejected, listening to the silence and peering into the dark desperate for anything that might lead you out of here, or anything at all that isn't just these shiny moist stone tiles that you fear will be the last thing you ever see. Out of the darkness you hear a bell ding twice, the sound is shocking after so long in sensory deprivation, and the room flashes momentarily with a bright white light. You're stunned and nauseated by the sudden overload of sensation and you barely have a second to react before the bell tones twice again, this time significantly louder, the room flashes white and you feel a piercing headache throb with each flash and ding of the bell. Roll me initiative

[@benjaminhenderson7059]

I run a high power campaign where the group is flung to a far future world of permanent darkness where the illithid have reigned for eons. the only resistance left has almost entirely converted to undeath in order to resist the mind flayers psionic powers. The refuse of massive mind flayer colonies is millions of corpses, so there is a significant built up supply. The mind flayers response is an army of golems of all sorts, to counteract the necrotic powers of the undead. The party comes in at the crux of the undead losing their final stand.

[@GrandToast]

We faced an Alhoon when the party of 6 was lvl 4-5. We got lucky, really really lucky. Our paladin hit him for over 100 in 2 hits. It could've easily been a TPK. We should of at least lost one or two of us but with those hits we won. Everyone leveled up after that session.

[@JadeDRail]

My big bad is gonna be a Beholder and a mind flayer colony that teamed up. They have performed a ritual to implant the elder brain into the beholder, and the beholder just spawns tadpoles from its imagination.

[@AlphaEmery]

Suggestion for the next kypw. Hobgoblins. Why? They are tacticians who are willing to fight to the death, but employ an intelligent retreat if things turn south. I'd like to see Cody's ideas on a severely tactic-driven monster that will use foresight, planning, and knows when to retreat in order to survive later. They use goblins and bugbears tactically, even knowing those beings lack dedication to the true cause. I believe Hobgoblins could be the central theme to a campaign, or st least a story arc.

[@thomasalegredelasoujeole9998]

Yeah. Truly well played you can have a party go bonkers. Well, a group of my players once kinda wrecked my plans for the campaign when a cult led by an illithid framed them. They never suspected an illithid, but were scared shitless that they didn’t understand at all what what going on. They decided to leave the city and never return soon as they got a chance. Took me about 6 or 7 sessions to prepare their return to said city, but that’s another story ^^

[@ShadowKatt]

How to kill your party with a mind flayer: Add a mind flayer. I dont think I have ever had a party that could, without preperation, face a mind flayer. I have only had ONE that could have with preperation. I have essentially banned myself from using them because they are unbalanced and practically unbalancable.

[@paradoxdriver4094]

I personally tend to be very careful with the introduction of Illithid... because every time I've had a group encounter a colony, the players all die. xD They are, by far, some of the coolest and most terrifying monster groups in the game, because as another commentator said, it gives you an excuse to get really meta with the players. The Illithids see and know what the other Illithids know, and they can learn otherwise uncommon knowledge by consuming the right person, and its that last tactic that really gives the DM the chance to tug on the emotional strings of your players by having a trusted NPC ally devoured. I LOVED the idea of the townsfolk coming to warn the PCs and then committing mass suicide. I don't know if any other tactic would bother me as much as a person as this one would. Bravo for being twisted enough to think of it. ;)

[@Tpunkzilla]

Please do a KYPW Goblins edition. Also, how do you do mass combat? Such as an open battlefield?

[@artyyyr2596]

There is a rule for hordes in the dmg, i don’t remember the page. If you have too much monsters to roll each attacks individually and keep it fun, they auto hit depending on the AC of the target and their bonus to attack rolls. Imagine if you have 8 monsters with a +5 to hit targetting a character with 16 AC. Deduce the +5 from the AC, and a monster need to roll an 11 to hit. They will hit 1 time out of 2, so if 2 creatures attack there is 1 automatic hit and an automatic miss. With a group of 8 monsters, 4 of them will hit and 4 will miss. Use the average damages or you will starts rolling 30d6 every turns. Consider every monster as a single monster and give them how many attacks you wish. I am just throwing 2 ideas, combine them how you want

[@p.f132]

I'll have my players make a deal with an Illithid, to go and capture an Aboleth. The Illithid, by leave of his Elder brain, looks for "strong but kinda dumb/naive" heroes that will bait the Aboleth into a fight, and then try to get a chance to insert a spawn into it, effectively capturing the entire knowledge of this Aboleth's previous itterations, turning their hivemind into a position of godlike power.

[@Omegafilmsalpha]

I've done many things like this, but one thing I wonder is about the priest being tricked into summoning the demon (which is an awesome hook) couldn't the deity actually stop the priest from getting spells they wish them to not have? Or is the mind flayer causing it to happen and that's just something I've missed on reading up on them... or is just a DM say's so?

[@X23Natalie]

I'm putting together something along these lines for a campaign. My thought is the Mind Flayer discreetly takes over a temple posing as a clergyman and lines the outer walls with lead, cutting off worshipers from the voice of their deity (since lead can be used to block psychic attacks i'm playing this as prayer being a believer psychically connecting to their deity). This allows them to begin slowly planting seeds of discord and false prophesy.

[@CorbiniteVids]

my thought is that if a human had both a slaad egg and an ilithid tadpole in it, one would outcompete or kill the other since at that point they're still seperate organisms within the same host. But if a mindflayer put a tadpole into an already developed slaad, that's where you would get the unexpected results

[@drizzo4669]

You wove through those drow names masterfully; did that require multiple takes?

[@mrfancypants3423]

So I recently got a copy of Acquisitions Incorporated around the same time I watched this video, and I wanted to Incorporate aspects of both into my campaign. So after the party defeated a particularly troublesome Drow gang, the party’s Gunslinger received a letter, signed in ink so dark it couldn’t reflect light by one “The Shadow Broker”, that his long lost sister had been found. The Gunslinger started asking around the city if anyone knew of this ‘Shadow Broker’ until he came across a scidish looking begger. The begger took him into an ally and cast a spell to create an illusiary wall so he could take him to the Shadow Broker. As it turns out this Shadow Broker was a Mind Flayer Elder Brain who had a taste for wealthy businessmen. After sending for the rest of the party, the Gunslinger asked that his sister be released, and if they could have help with fighting a Lich (BBEG). The Elder Brain then sent them to R&D where the party goofed around trying to buy a few spawn to turn each other into Mind Flayers, as this would cause MANY lawsuits R&D refused the sale. After trying to make goofy purchases from Shadow Broker Inc, the party ended up buying a Mechanical Beholder from the Acquisitions Incorporated book, strapped some jet engines to it so it could fly faster, and blasted off towards the Gnomish city currently under siege by the Lich. Don’t you just love sessions where noting really happens? XD

[@Will-zs9ny]

A kypw gnolls would be neato. I think the monster manual doesn't handle them very well, and despite volo's guide doing pretty well, it would be neat to see your take.

[@Taking20]

Already done. Check the playlist

[@Will-zs9ny]

@@Taking20 oh! Thanks for letting me know!

[@Trodon13]

Please do a KYPW: Hobgoblins

[@thenoobinater123]

Love the ideas 🤘🏻

[@Gamer_G33k]

Once, during a one shot, our DM lead us to a box from a crashed ship. The hatch to the box was open and we saw a hand reach out and grasp for the side of the doorway. Well, earlier my Druid turned into a Mammoth for another thing. So, in this form, I managed to shut the door. We uh, we trapped a mind flayer.

[@cristiaolson7327]

After I finish dragging my players through fighting the homebrew magically-morphed aboleth-turned-cthulu demigod I've created to bring a little Lovecraft into Faerun, I'm thinking a portal to Bluetspur is in order... Elder Brain time! I'm having way to much fun with the whole Eldritch Horror and psionic nightmares theme.

[@SnapDaddy96]

I'm curious to know what your take on having players organize armies I had for a while a large scale conflict planned to happen in the story that the party can influence by maneuvering the armies and attempting to win what is essentially a war. I had the idea they'd be able to either negotiate peace win the war for one side or play both factions since the entire party decided playing neutral was the only alignment they liked "the I can do anything and it's ok because neutral" kind.

[@MG-kb7rl]

Hii!! Do you Know something if will Pisonics class be in future suplements? greettins

[@DnDnBeer]

Kudos on the research

[@taskendeer]

Thinking of my campaign having a new ruler being chosen during the campaign and one of the possible rules get infected by a mind flayer and depending on who is chosen as the new ruler different things happen, but maybe the endgame is that the mind flayers plan was to take over the whole country and bring in more mind flayers.