The mind flayer, also known as Illithid is one of my favorite aberrations, the nature of their attacks and appearance immediately generate concern among players and change the tone of a typical high fantasy game. With tentacles in their mouth, specialized in extracting brains, telepathy and mental attacks, they mark an unusual type of confrontation that could only be compared to creatures such as wraiths or oozes due to the uniqueness of facing them.
From the first to the fifth edition of D&D the effectiveness of their attacks is related first hand to the Intelligence attribute, which can be for some classes a "dump stat" to which it is not worthwhile to place high numbers. With the mind flayer the situation is modified, especially with 5th edition where most adventurers have a low intelligence, which leaves them vulnerable to be paralyzed by the psychic attacks of the brain-hungry creature.
Introduction in 5th edition
What I prefer about the Illithids is the way in which I have introduced them in different adventures. Imagine a group of 4 adventurers that with difficulty manage to defeat their first ogre in a random cave. The curious thing is that while they were fighting something strange happened with their opponent, it moved erratically and kept a blank stare.
The ogre ended up on the ground, defeated, the group relaxed and decided to cautiously explore its hiding place, while suddenly the skull cap of the ogre burst and a bizarre creature was expelled and vanished into the shadows. Only the rogue managed to spot it and commented to his companions "it was, it was... a brain with fat chicken legs. A BRAIN".
Oh I can easily imagine another scenario where the corrupt nobleman of a town is caught by the adventurers and subsequently imprisoned. The moment he is brought to justice, the guy convulses, his head explodes, and out shoots the "Intellect Devourer" in search of a new body to steal in the middle of a room full of villagers.
But if the group was of a high level, what if after defeating a clan of gnolls that did not stop kidnapping in a nearby village, when looking for the trail of those who were kidnapped, the more than 12 gnoll corpses begin to shake, to end up releasing a group of brains with legs that immediately start a fight against our heroes.
And although it is true that the same presentation can be done with other creatures that steal or hide their identity, it seems to me that the one with the brains is the most grotesque and does not fully reveal what is happening, making the characters too shocked. Even more so if any of your characters end up being snatched by one of the evil creatures, resulting in an unfortunate death, but providing a great opportunity for suspense if the adventurer died unseen by his companions, now it can blend in.
Mind over body
The brains with paws are the dogs/servants of the Illithid and are usually the introduction to this type of enemy, while the mind flayer is the quintessential psychic warrior (leaving aside the species they enslaved) and at first could be the big threat of a low level player campaign. And I say this, because although it has great ease to kill a player, by pure economy of turn the piñata effect will present itself and all the adventurers in single file will give some damage to the Illithid and well, it may be psychic, but it is still a wizard.
But returning to the Mind Flayer's capacity as the main villain, in this area he stands out for being a scientist/magician with the need to investigate and devour the brains of the reality in which he finds himself, make use of bizarre artifacts; laser beams, some gas or substance of neuronal effect, as well as maintain control of a wide range of creatures, which serve to justify why so many different beasts are crammed inside the dungeon.
The octopus sorcerer has among his resources the domination of creatures and pnjs of importance by means of brains with chicken legs, spells to deceive and manipulate, as well as bizarre technology that would take a long time for the characters to be able to understand it. And if we want to increase the difficulty, then we can invoke the presence of a giant brain, which functions as master chief of the operation and central planning node of the activity of all the Illithids in the region or the world.
Making the race can very easily generate plots and produce a feeling of paranoia in the players, so that they can not know who to trust. Which puts them very high, as creatures to be used in campaigns focused on mystery and horror.
In the new module of "Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft" a small region is included where some raids could be made making use of the Illithids in a demi-plan of terror, namely "Bluetspur", region in which they want to focus on the aspect of abductions and experiments, making the aberrations look more like the greys, which is interesting to me, which is why I decided to make a module based on this region that in a couple of weeks goes on sale and I hope that if it catches your attention you can check it out.
The background
The Illithid's background, in my opinion, tries to give a lot of sense to what would be better to keep in mystery, it seems to me that they forgot the fact that giving too many details about something ends up erasing the fear.
For example, of the mi-gos (creature from the world of the Cthulhu Myths), it is enough to know that they are interested in the functioning of the human brain and its ability to obtain favorable results through irrational thinking, so to extract as many brains as possible, they will resort to any trick that the writer in turn gives them. And that's it, nothing else is needed.
But in the case of the Illithids, they have already been given a clear historical past, religion, important characters, description of the world of origin as well as the type of activities they perform according to their type of lair, which is not a bad thing, but it takes away a certain halo of mystery.
Personally, knowing that they are creatures that seek to destroy the stars of all realities so that everything is in eternal darkness, that's enough, there is a motivation and from that point, everything is possible. They have a plan, seriously!
They have a plan....
First Appearance
The first appearance of the Mind Flayer in the role-playing world, came out of the fanzine "The Strategic Review #1", edited by TSR, so the creature is an original idea from the world of DnD. The description given of the aberration is simple but terrifying, as its innate ability to extract brains via the four tentacles surrounding its mouth manifests itself.
The octopus with a cape and witch-like appearance would come until the appearance of the monster in the "Monster Manual 1E" back in 1977. Then came the novels and adventures that would build the extensive background of the Illithid, from which I recommend to take only the most general details.
At least in my opinion the creature has not changed much in appearance, since it is still a warlock with an octopus face, which in their first encounters will generate an atmosphere of strangeness in the players, making it clear that they are about to experience something unique and bizarre.
