I can see the party barbarian enjoying outwitting the party wizard before realizing that such a thing never happens and alerting the others that the poor mage is being attacked!
I almost forgot about this monster. I'm so used to Intellect Devourer, Thought Eater, Illithid and Aboleth, that I forget there are other abominations.
I feel like a statblock like this would be utterly unkillable for many characters that aren't high level, which makes its CR broken and impossible to fix. I mean, it has FOUR hit points, but that hardly matters if it can't be hurt without jumping across the planes.
Ah, you are making an assumption that is not included on the stat block.. nowhere does it say the Thought Eater is immune to attacks from the Material plane, it is invisible, not invulnerable. The clue to its unusual transdimensional nature is in the fact it pops fully back into the prime material plane when it dies, and that it is "burrowing" into the Ethereal plane, so, it exists in both, to some extent, at all times.
I'd imagine mind flayer enclaves have some way to deal with these. If not, they could quickly be swarmed by the little buggers and be left vulnerable to every other nearby race they pissed off. Hmm, Maybe drow wizards would be the ones to develop the spell to call/direct thought eaters.
Somewhere, I am imagining a magic user just sitting in a home library, reading all the books they can while drinking cup after cup of coffee. Meanwhile behind their chair, reading the same book drinking up their thoughts is the thought eater.
Seems like more of a "go home, WhiteDwarf or Fighting Fantasy (or did Gigax think of this one?), you're drunk." since it debuted on old school 1st ed books.
@@theblocksays it's in the 1st edition Monster Manual, so it predates most sources, but not so far back that I can be sure it's from Gygax himself, but it's also not "new" enough to rule out his direct hand.
I really hate how the 3.5 version of the thought eater was redesigned to look like a big skeletal griffin in the name of making it look more "badass". The whole appeal of this kind of monster it that something that looks silly and harmless can devour your mind without even touching you, so redesigning them as something that looks like it can maul your face off just misses the whole point of them in my opinion.
Coffee and the psychic drain platypus what a way to start the morning, think you found the Bain of deep old one warlocks and brain eating dhampirs alike. I also like the statblock update. ❤
That was my first thought as well, but say you find a way to trap one, get them in a soul jar maybe, and I'm pretty sure Illithids would consider them a delicacy like no other. edit: A bit like puffer fish, if the chef messes it up people might die, but some people like to live dangerously.
Detect thoughts but what would you detect? "Food, energy, thought" no even better "BRAAAIIINNNSS!!" One more weapon in the arsenal for a dreamlands+deep ethereal+Far Realms+Osse outback campaign.
Excellent video as always aj I always love it when you do monsters on the weird end of the spectrum of dnd! Also do you think they have a poisonous Spike on the back of their feet like real-world platypuses?
If they learned to detach from victims they could keep a Plane's psychics & magic users effectively nullified. If this was going on for long enough such powers might fall in to the realm of myth.
I see these as one of those cheesy horror/comedy villains. The party is out at a tavern that has the absolute strongest ale. I mean every single wizard student is here acting like a toddler. Only the warforged can see the truth.
Crafty Dm: this creature would make spells like "Blink" dangerous. Player blinks and their momentary presence would be like a beacon of food for these critters.
AJ. Thank you. You given me so, SO much inspiration. I love listening to your videos while working. I would love to hear your opinions or lore about the Goblin god who became nilbog/-s. Ps. My players hate you. Sorry, my bad
I like the idea of my archmage having one as a pet for draining harmful magics and keeping it well fed on spell slots and in an enclosure surrounded by a permanent high level wall of force
Would you mind doing a vid about a "Vecna's nuaghty list" ? I really loved the parts about this in the Spell Weavers and Astral Dreadnought vids, they are awesome inspiration for high level scenaris. And i love Vecna.
I would love it if you would do a video on the nobility of the sword coast and the realms in general. I’ve been playing crusader kings 3 and now I’m really curious about the noble hierarchy of the lord’s alliance.
Ed Greenwood has detailed and up to date notes on a whole lot of nobles and important persons in the realms, particularly Cormyr. He might answer you if you tweet that question at him.
@@AJPickett I am thinking size large, can live anywhere from the deep ethereal to the astral, can levitate and phase throw walls, more or less immune to magic can eat your soul has a beam attack like a line dragon breath made of a mix of force and psychic damage, levitates but is weak to the simple weapon attacks. looks like a platypus merged with a giant croc with the see throw flesh and a crystalline skeleton.
Love your videos! I think it's time I become a channel/patreon member. I've got a question for you, Do you think the Thought Eater could become the carrier of an Psionic Disease? if I recall the 2E complete Psionics Handbook there were psionic diseases. What kind of disease would that be in 5E? would being a plaguebearer change the statblock at all?
Not sure it would show up in the stats at all, but yes, there are psychic diseases, also, there are diseases specific to aberrations, for example, the Mindflayers have a kind of cold that they catch, only their species can catch it.
Hey AJ, you might have wanted to say how seriously horror-movie type these buggers could be. I think the CR system needs re-vamping. I've only used these creatures in mid to high-level adventures... when a party could feasibly figure out what's going on and figure out how to defend against these. I ran a module once, read the whole thing and shrugged and said that it might be too easy for the party but okay. They were a fighter-heavy group, the mage was a bard... the priest was a ranger... the heavy-hitter was a barbarian and the other two were fighters of different types. While camping and recovering a trio of Thought Eaters swam through the Ether to the campsite. Those buggers TPK'd the party. They literally had no way of hitting or detecting Ethereal targets nor defending against their draining attacks. I had to improv one of my after-death scenarios where some outer planar beings were arguing their cases with the party locked in a cage being mere spectators, looking like game piece manifestations of themselves. The God of Mischief and Abyssal Lord lost their case and were banned from influencing Thought Eater migrations for one generation and the party was restored. The party was picked out of their cage and set down on what looked like a game representation of their adventure map... then they woke up at camp.
@@victorym744 I've used it once in a blue moon for decades since watching Clash of the Titans (the original movie) as a kid. So, I can't take all the credit. Thanks though!
@@victorym744 You're welcome and I suggest not going "buck-wild" but being a master storyteller. The game is all about roleplaying a story. It's not about controlling the story, not about writing the story, it's about creating the story with your players that (most importantly) that they would enjoy. I'm not saying you cater to some princesses who wish to be the heroes and whatever. You are about to run your first mission... YAY! Just follow the core rules this time. Do that most of the time you DM until you get your mojo. Do the tweaks for the TPK's that happen, they do happen. Until you get the mojo, just do replays. Don't be ashamed to steal great ideas as a DM. Good DM's, like good writers, create. The best steal the best ideas. I am ranting but you get the idea. The game is both a game and a story. It's roleplaying. If your players are morons that walk into being TPK that they deserve, let them die and make them create new characters. However, if they unfairly die due to... you know... let them restart the mission or go "buck wild" like what I said to have the gods themselves do what I did. Sorry for the rant but you do understand why I did it, right?
Do you have any more videos about spooky ethereal plane creatures? I was thinking about having some ethereal plane shenanigans happen in my game in the future.
@@starslayer8390 Oh, I meant I do plan on doing more... erm... I have videos on Phase Spiders, ghosts, Nagas, Allips, Nabassu, Soul Eaters, liches, demiliches, etc. I don't think I have done the Ethereal Filcher yet.
You challenged me! You're right though, there is precious little actual lore on these critters, also the more modern artwork for these monsters is just... not right.
@@AJPickett I always looked for ways to deal with Psionics in Second edition due to it being so powerful, these little buggers helped out a lot. LOL!!!
Truly a interesting creature. I have first read about them on bogleech. Since you have you have used his illustration of this creature, I would like to ask you: What do you think of the other D&D creatures he wrote articles about? Some of them might be worthy for a video. I am especially intrigued by the wingless wonder (also known as the Alkada), the Suwyze and the Death Minnow.
I have yet to delve into the work there in depth, from what I have seen it looks great, a few similarities to what I write for my scripts so, I think I will enjoy them.
I've given one of my players one of these eggs as he rolled a -9 on a d100 at my npc shop that has random eggs. Now I'm scrambling to make a sheet for a baby one of these for a game tonight lmao
@@AJPickett so far he has really enjoyed it its been fun. The thought eaters name is ghost. It was made sentient by the party druid casting awaken on it and me allowing it dispite spell the int barrior and now its incredibly self conscious that it's ugly and proud, everyone is scared of it.
Or this could recreate a classic scenario from sci-fi: a mysterious ailment is slowly incapacitating the crew (party), and it's up to the character least taken seriously to save them.
its creatures like these that caused me to think about creating "trans planar" spells, a couple years ago. imagine a fireball that does damage in the prime material plane and another plane of choice.
Gave my pirate crew a magic room on the ship ( ship slowly feeds on the life of crew members picked up at ports...or slaves bought by crew) gonna use this to eat at the magic room make them hit up there demon homies to figure out wtf is going down. My first dm AD&D said "The one thing I love more then giving magic items out, is taking them away"
Are intellect devourers more physical predators (brain eaters like illithids) or more like thought eaters(eating psychic or mystical energy or raw intelligence)?
Females lay two leathery eggs in a haunted location, these hatch after ten days, the pups instinctively drain the haunting entities before shedding a set of vestigial baby teeth and popping into the ethereal realm to join their mother. Typically only one pup will survive to adulthood.
There are two things I don't like about this lore. 1. Feeding until the target dies. If thought eaters kill rapidly; than the party has the means to deal with them or they die. They're completely trivial or too powerful to use. 2. Targeting intelligence over wisdom. This is just wizard bullying. Wis and Cha based casters should be just as susceptible to this nonsense. My ideal thought eater would act like a status effect. Once attached to a party it would feed on a random player each night. During the first feeding it would drain 1 point of intelligence. Each night this amount would increase as the thought eater grows more powerful. In addition to loosing intelligence, the targeted player would gain a special condition called "dumb as hell." A player who is "dumb as hell" acts like a drunk, auto fails most skill checks, and looses the ability to choose which spells he casts. This effect lasts until the player gets a full nights sleep.
I don't really disagree with your logic here, but in older editions, there certainly was a lot more "save or die" situations and the game had some grim, meat hook realities to it... sometimes in life, not knowing about something can be deadly, and as soon as you learn how to deal with it, it becomes trivial, even useful.
@@AJPickett Early D&D had "save or die" situations because it was meant to be played with 3 to *50* player characters. You weren't supposed to start out with a character. You were supposed to start with 10+ expendable goobers. Most would die. A few would grow into powerful heroes. D&D was built this way because that was the core of Chainmail. Chainmail, if you aren't familiar, was a miniature war game created by Gary Gygax. It was so instrumental to D&D's creation that the original D&D manual directed you to look for rules in the Chainmail manual. Arguably, modern D&D came about because new players (players unfamiliar with miniature war gaming) didn't realize they were supposed to control multiple PCs.
In much the same way vampiric, real-world, animals apply some kind of pain killer to ensure their bite isn't detected, a stealth mechanic would look good on the stat block. Yes, it is attacking from the ethereal, but putting up Stealth Attack emphasis the point. This way an encounter with them is more nested. Detecting that you're getting dumber, identifying why, and then dealing with the creature itself. I truly think that should be a paragraph somewhere "Because their attacks are not usually painful, many mages will believe themselves afflicted by a disease..." Also, it seems they would make great guards within vaults that carry dangerous magical artifacts, especially if you accompany them with warriors whose thoughts are far less appetizing than the magically-saturated air around them. By the Nine Hells, just put them in mage jails!
They have the stealth skill, so can apply proficiency bonus to it, such as it is, but yeah, they rely almost entirely on hiding in the border ethereal plane.
![ROSÉ(로제) - APT. (Band VER.) (With. 이영지) [더 시즌즈-이영지의 레인보우] | KBS 241129 방송](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/IW8qaemx74g/mqdefault.jpg)
Dr. Mindflayshmirtz: "A Thought Eater?"
*_*add hat with sound effect*_*
"TERRY THE THOUGHT EATER?!"
Shut up and take my mony
Hey where's Terry?🤔
I would assume the reason these things are not common is because mindflayers hunt their populations down as frequently as they dare.
Ahhh...great show!
so this is the platypus-like creature the Aberrant Mind Sorcerer background table refers to.
Yeah
Now to design an evil artificer whose plans are constantly foiled by one of these guys appearing
Pfineas and Ferb ;)
Yes the two young artificers in the setting with a pet platypus who doesn't do much
This is why he is always outsmarted by the platypus
So who wants to introduce an invasive species to the Mindflayer ecology?
You're crazy I love it!
@@adamwelch4336 not the craziest canonical idea I have had before. I must admit.
@@Arius_Astronomy I just like the idea of a army of platapuses suddenly infesting a mindflayers lair! It tickles the piss out of me!😂
Design a polymorph spell that ONLY turns beings into Brain Moles...
I can see the party barbarian enjoying outwitting the party wizard before realizing that such a thing never happens and alerting the others that the poor mage is being attacked!
OMG, I am so using that concept - one of my biggest problems with a thought eater attack was always in how to announce it to the party.
The platypus looks like it escaped another dimension and I've always been suspicious of them, this doesn't help my paranoia.
The chanced of being attacked by a platypus are low but never zero
It's a semi-ethereal, psychic-draining mammal of action!
... A platypus?
Ah, a psychic vampire platypus!
...
Wait what?
There's a platypus controlling me, he's underneath the table!
I wonder if githyanki could use these like bloodhounds to find mindflayer stronghold and githzerai monasteries?
I don't see why not.
I almost forgot about this monster. I'm so used to Intellect Devourer, Thought Eater, Illithid and Aboleth, that I forget there are other abominations.
I feel like a statblock like this would be utterly unkillable for many characters that aren't high level, which makes its CR broken and impossible to fix. I mean, it has FOUR hit points, but that hardly matters if it can't be hurt without jumping across the planes.
Ah, you are making an assumption that is not included on the stat block.. nowhere does it say the Thought Eater is immune to attacks from the Material plane, it is invisible, not invulnerable. The clue to its unusual transdimensional nature is in the fact it pops fully back into the prime material plane when it dies, and that it is "burrowing" into the Ethereal plane, so, it exists in both, to some extent, at all times.
I'd imagine mind flayer enclaves have some way to deal with these. If not, they could quickly be swarmed by the little buggers and be left vulnerable to every other nearby race they pissed off. Hmm, Maybe drow wizards would be the ones to develop the spell to call/direct thought eaters.
Platypus
Into: the brainy type
Is it safe to use this for wizards??bcos I can call it n use it...
Mama always said the planes of existence was like a box of chocolates...
You never know when it's a platypus like psychic vampire creature 😅
Somewhere, I am imagining a magic user just sitting in a home library, reading all the books they can while drinking cup after cup of coffee. Meanwhile behind their chair, reading the same book drinking up their thoughts is the thought eater.
A mindflayer and thought eater captured my players once. They starved to death and my players walked out.
You have no idea how long I've been waiting for you to talk about these guys!
Title: Thought eater
Thumbnail: PLATYPUS OVERLORD
"So I've got this idea for an ethereal platypus psychic vampire."
"Go home WoTC, you're drunk."
"No, no really, hear me out!" 😄
Seems like more of a "go home, WhiteDwarf or Fighting Fantasy (or did Gigax think of this one?), you're drunk." since it debuted on old school 1st ed books.
@@theblocksays it's in the 1st edition Monster Manual, so it predates most sources, but not so far back that I can be sure it's from Gygax himself, but it's also not "new" enough to rule out his direct hand.
I really hate how the 3.5 version of the thought eater was redesigned to look like a big skeletal griffin in the name of making it look more "badass". The whole appeal of this kind of monster it that something that looks silly and harmless can devour your mind without even touching you, so redesigning them as something that looks like it can maul your face off just misses the whole point of them in my opinion.
I can easily see one of these "haunting" a large wizard's library or drawing sustenance from a bardic school's students.
Bad kids get snuggled by the thought eater
Coffee and the psychic drain platypus what a way to start the morning, think you found the Bain of deep old one warlocks and brain eating dhampirs alike. I also like the statblock update. ❤
This is the scariest one yet, a platypus that eats thoughts.
I'm finally back to watching dnd and fantasy content
So my barbarian is safe yay
A thought eater?
*Puts on a Fedora*
THEO THE THOUGHT EATER!
How did you get in? My dreamscape? That doesn’t make anysense!
Shout out to Locrius. Next up "THE DUCKBUNNY"
Let's fucking goooooi
Never heard of a thought eater before. Very interesting lore video. Love the little Platti! :). Thanks AJ!
My pleasure!
Thought Eaters are SUPER weird things. I wonder who's feverish brain they poped out of, and how they ended up in official D&D material
I mean, not as weird as any of the far realm entities
Pretty cool you included Jonathan Wojcik's artistic take on the critter
I always knew platypuses were aberrations
Oh good, A creature illithids would fear.
That was my first thought as well, but say you find a way to trap one, get them in a soul jar maybe, and I'm pretty sure Illithids would consider them a delicacy like no other.
edit: A bit like puffer fish, if the chef messes it up people might die, but some people like to live dangerously.
We're on vacation, and still can't miss my stories. You have created an addict. I'm ok with it 😉
Psionic monsters have always been bizarre in D&D, illithids being the rare exception.
They’re not we just have explored them so much we start to understand them
Yeah because bipedal brain eating squid with psionic powers are not bizarre. Only in dnd😁
Belle Delphine's worst nightmare.
Put enough of these guys in an area and you have a pretty mean trap
exceptionally dangerous.
Admit it. You already know that they came to be by forcing a platypus to eat too much Vegemite
... maybe it's not spoken of because we don't want to draw the connection between the thought eater and rural Australia... wait, don't pos---
3:08
Awww. Whose a good space platypus? You are!
Detect thoughts but what would you detect? "Food, energy, thought" no even better "BRAAAIIINNNSS!!"
One more weapon in the arsenal for a dreamlands+deep ethereal+Far Realms+Osse outback campaign.
Cant fool me, that's a phantom-kangaroo. Do not pet.
WTF was that intro? That was kinda scary.
When they come to the prime material plane they have 24 hours to return to the ethereal plane or they become a regular platypus lol
Excellent video as always aj I always love it when you do monsters on the weird end of the spectrum of dnd! Also do you think they have a poisonous Spike on the back of their feet like real-world platypuses?
No spike.
Because there’s nothing more terrifying than a psychic platypus!
If they learned to detach from victims they could keep a Plane's psychics & magic users effectively nullified. If this was going on for long enough such powers might fall in to the realm of myth.
I see these as one of those cheesy horror/comedy villains. The party is out at a tavern that has the absolute strongest ale. I mean every single wizard student is here acting like a toddler.
Only the warforged can see the truth.
The yellow Thought Eater at 8:10 really reminds me of Psyduck, ayayaye!
I can’t help but wonder how a learned arch mage from Toril would react to seeing a platypus on earth. Or other animals that might not exist on Toril.
Ask Elminster. He gets his beer from Earth.
Crafty Dm: this creature would make spells like "Blink" dangerous. Player blinks and their momentary presence would be like a beacon of food for these critters.
AJ. Thank you. You given me so, SO much inspiration. I love listening to your videos while working.
I would love to hear your opinions or lore about the Goblin god who became nilbog/-s.
Ps. My players hate you. Sorry, my bad
LOL, that comment escalated quickly.
I like the idea of my archmage having one as a pet for draining harmful magics and keeping it well fed on spell slots and in an enclosure surrounded by a permanent high level wall of force
Why do so many pieces of medium look at things with bills and say "yeah, *this* thing can read my mind"
because ducks are freaking scary.
@asdrubale bisanzio I own ducks. I feast on your fears.
Far realm, Crystal prison. You have drawn the attention of my patron, speak his name and he shall bring forth the SixthEd
Perry's gone over to the dark side.
Awe it's so cute......oh gods it's eating my brain!
Video 420 is the thought eater...
I wonder what inspired that?
Fate, honestly I just made it because a viewer suggested it.
Ohhhh perfect.. tea time it is then!
Agent P!!!
This is the ideal low level anti caster.
Love it! Will use. I really enjoyed the Psionics of older editions. Particularly those in Dark Sun.
Drop one of these near the mind flayers and watch them cry 😂
Would you mind doing a vid about a "Vecna's nuaghty list" ? I really loved the parts about this in the Spell Weavers and Astral Dreadnought vids, they are awesome inspiration for high level scenaris.
And i love Vecna.
I would love it if you would do a video on the nobility of the sword coast and the realms in general. I’ve been playing crusader kings 3 and now I’m really curious about the noble hierarchy of the lord’s alliance.
Ed Greenwood has detailed and up to date notes on a whole lot of nobles and important persons in the realms, particularly Cormyr. He might answer you if you tweet that question at him.
I have also consider these as the lavel form of something much more horrible as in the predator of the big smart aberrations.
I am fully on board with this idea.
@@AJPickett I am thinking size large, can live anywhere from the deep ethereal to the astral, can levitate and phase throw walls, more or less immune to magic can eat your soul has a beam attack like a line dragon breath made of a mix of force and psychic damage, levitates but is weak to the simple weapon attacks. looks like a platypus merged with a giant croc with the see throw flesh and a crystalline skeleton.
also, ten limbs, why it would look cool.
As soon as I read this my mind screamed ASTRAL DREADNOUGHT.
Or maybe it was Tharizdun screaming. I'm not sure.
In 2e their intelligence stat was actually listed as "Not Rateable," which I'm sure was very helpful to DMs when it needed to roll save vs spell.
@asdrubale bisanzio I wouldn't know, I never actually DMed when we were playing 2e
Love your videos! I think it's time I become a channel/patreon member.
I've got a question for you, Do you think the Thought Eater could become the carrier of an Psionic Disease?
if I recall the 2E complete Psionics Handbook there were psionic diseases. What kind of disease would that be in 5E? would being a plaguebearer change the statblock at all?
Not sure it would show up in the stats at all, but yes, there are psychic diseases, also, there are diseases specific to aberrations, for example, the Mindflayers have a kind of cold that they catch, only their species can catch it.
Good thing there is a simple spell to ward off this creature: [clears throat] "Be gone *THOUGHT!* . . . Eater"
@The Prime Suspect 🤣❤️
MOM!!! Dad's making jokes again!!
@@theHedgex1 LMAO 🤣
Underrated channel
Hey AJ, you might have wanted to say how seriously horror-movie type these buggers could be. I think the CR system needs re-vamping. I've only used these creatures in mid to high-level adventures... when a party could feasibly figure out what's going on and figure out how to defend against these. I ran a module once, read the whole thing and shrugged and said that it might be too easy for the party but okay. They were a fighter-heavy group, the mage was a bard... the priest was a ranger... the heavy-hitter was a barbarian and the other two were fighters of different types. While camping and recovering a trio of Thought Eaters swam through the Ether to the campsite. Those buggers TPK'd the party. They literally had no way of hitting or detecting Ethereal targets nor defending against their draining attacks. I had to improv one of my after-death scenarios where some outer planar beings were arguing their cases with the party locked in a cage being mere spectators, looking like game piece manifestations of themselves. The God of Mischief and Abyssal Lord lost their case and were banned from influencing Thought Eater migrations for one generation and the party was restored. The party was picked out of their cage and set down on what looked like a game representation of their adventure map... then they woke up at camp.
That's such a creative solution, though!
@@victorym744 I've used it once in a blue moon for decades since watching Clash of the Titans (the original movie) as a kid. So, I can't take all the credit. Thanks though!
@@That80sGuy1972 I'm super nervous about a game I'm running for the first time, so this comment inspired me to just go buck-wild :) thanks!
@@victorym744 You're welcome and I suggest not going "buck-wild" but being a master storyteller. The game is all about roleplaying a story. It's not about controlling the story, not about writing the story, it's about creating the story with your players that (most importantly) that they would enjoy. I'm not saying you cater to some princesses who wish to be the heroes and whatever.
You are about to run your first mission... YAY! Just follow the core rules this time. Do that most of the time you DM until you get your mojo.
Do the tweaks for the TPK's that happen, they do happen. Until you get the mojo, just do replays.
Don't be ashamed to steal great ideas as a DM. Good DM's, like good writers, create. The best steal the best ideas.
I am ranting but you get the idea. The game is both a game and a story. It's roleplaying. If your players are morons that walk into being TPK that they deserve, let them die and make them create new characters. However, if they unfairly die due to... you know... let them restart the mission or go "buck wild" like what I said to have the gods themselves do what I did.
Sorry for the rant but you do understand why I did it, right?
Do you have any more videos about spooky ethereal plane creatures? I was thinking about having some ethereal plane shenanigans happen in my game in the future.
I do.
@@AJPickett Excellent. Any recommendations?
@@starslayer8390 Oh, I meant I do plan on doing more... erm... I have videos on Phase Spiders, ghosts, Nagas, Allips, Nabassu, Soul Eaters, liches, demiliches, etc. I don't think I have done the Ethereal Filcher yet.
@@AJPickett Thanks. I look forward to watching them all.
Lol!! Did I remind you of the little psychic beasts?
You challenged me! You're right though, there is precious little actual lore on these critters, also the more modern artwork for these monsters is just... not right.
@@AJPickett I always looked for ways to deal with Psionics in Second edition due to it being so powerful, these little buggers helped out a lot. LOL!!!
Nice try but thats just a platypus. Also not quite April fools day.
Oh.. This is not an april fools day video.
As if four legged duck wasnt bizzare enough
Great thumbnail, I see a giant platypus I click
Truly a interesting creature. I have first read about them on bogleech. Since you have you have used his illustration of this creature, I would like to ask you: What do you think of the other D&D creatures he wrote articles about? Some of them might be worthy for a video. I am especially intrigued by the wingless wonder (also known as the Alkada), the Suwyze and the Death Minnow.
I have yet to delve into the work there in depth, from what I have seen it looks great, a few similarities to what I write for my scripts so, I think I will enjoy them.
@@AJPickett I wish you as much fun as I had reading them. I can also recomment the biology articles there.
I've given one of my players one of these eggs as he rolled a -9 on a d100 at my npc shop that has random eggs. Now I'm scrambling to make a sheet for a baby one of these for a game tonight lmao
Oh man... that sounds like fun!
@@AJPickett so far he has really enjoyed it its been fun. The thought eaters name is ghost. It was made sentient by the party druid casting awaken on it and me allowing it dispite spell the int barrior and now its incredibly self conscious that it's ugly and proud, everyone is scared of it.
My history said i ve watched this clip 8 times, but i don't remember
Thanks.
Or this could recreate a classic scenario from sci-fi: a mysterious ailment is slowly incapacitating the crew (party), and it's up to the character least taken seriously to save them.
It's not too threatening if a mere rest fixes everything.
Yeah, nothing to worry about... *sips tea*
@@AJPickett Is there something you left out?
@@nullpoint3346 No, nothing's left out. *sips tea*
@@leandersearle5094 Ah, a platypus corpse.
@@leandersearle5094 May I have some tea?
its creatures like these that caused me to think about creating "trans planar" spells, a couple years ago. imagine a fireball that does damage in the prime material plane and another plane of choice.
04:55 nicely highlights its desiccated, psionic balls
good video AJ
Gave my pirate crew a magic room on the ship ( ship slowly feeds on the life of crew members picked up at ports...or slaves bought by crew) gonna use this to eat at the magic room make them hit up there demon homies to figure out wtf is going down.
My first dm AD&D said
"The one thing I love more then giving magic items out, is taking them away"
Are intellect devourers more physical predators (brain eaters like illithids) or more like thought eaters(eating psychic or mystical energy or raw intelligence)?
the intellect devourer magically consumes the target’s brain, so, they are physical and psychic predators.
Are these immortal? If not how do you think they reproduce?🧙♂️
Probably jump into the prime material plane and mate like regular platypuses then return to the border ethereal when they are born
Females lay two leathery eggs in a haunted location, these hatch after ten days, the pups instinctively drain the haunting entities before shedding a set of vestigial baby teeth and popping into the ethereal realm to join their mother. Typically only one pup will survive to adulthood.
So you're a Fan of Bogleech too? The World truly is a small Place.
These lil critters can be VERY NASTY😈😈😈
another thing from a ‘DM’s Bag o’ Nasty Tricks to Screw with Players’
@7:18 beaver? Platypus
Finally!!
*reads title*
I'm sorry what?
Since INT is the dump stat they all starved to death
So how dumb-dumb does it make a Mind Flayer?
Mind flayers most likely deal with these things from time to time and have the equivalent of a Psychic bug zapper on their front porch.
There are two things I don't like about this lore.
1. Feeding until the target dies. If thought eaters kill rapidly; than the party has the means to deal with them or they die. They're completely trivial or too powerful to use.
2. Targeting intelligence over wisdom. This is just wizard bullying. Wis and Cha based casters should be just as susceptible to this nonsense.
My ideal thought eater would act like a status effect. Once attached to a party it would feed on a random player each night. During the first feeding it would drain 1 point of intelligence. Each night this amount would increase as the thought eater grows more powerful. In addition to loosing intelligence, the targeted player would gain a special condition called "dumb as hell." A player who is "dumb as hell" acts like a drunk, auto fails most skill checks, and looses the ability to choose which spells he casts. This effect lasts until the player gets a full nights sleep.
I don't really disagree with your logic here, but in older editions, there certainly was a lot more "save or die" situations and the game had some grim, meat hook realities to it... sometimes in life, not knowing about something can be deadly, and as soon as you learn how to deal with it, it becomes trivial, even useful.
@@AJPickett *coof coof*
@@AJPickett Early D&D had "save or die" situations because it was meant to be played with 3 to *50* player characters. You weren't supposed to start out with a character. You were supposed to start with 10+ expendable goobers. Most would die. A few would grow into powerful heroes. D&D was built this way because that was the core of Chainmail.
Chainmail, if you aren't familiar, was a miniature war game created by Gary Gygax. It was so instrumental to D&D's creation that the original D&D manual directed you to look for rules in the Chainmail manual.
Arguably, modern D&D came about because new players (players unfamiliar with miniature war gaming) didn't realize they were supposed to control multiple PCs.
These creatures have been known to evolve into politicians.
@@Self-replicating_whatnot no, they are the same
Thot Eater was my nickname in college.
after spending several hours near the haunted house your party discovers Donald Trump logic make sense
Love the videos
I forgot these existed
There job have been done well.
4:35 - eww that image is actually kinda creepy
In much the same way vampiric, real-world, animals apply some kind of pain killer to ensure their bite isn't detected, a stealth mechanic would look good on the stat block. Yes, it is attacking from the ethereal, but putting up Stealth Attack emphasis the point. This way an encounter with them is more nested. Detecting that you're getting dumber, identifying why, and then dealing with the creature itself. I truly think that should be a paragraph somewhere "Because their attacks are not usually painful, many mages will believe themselves afflicted by a disease..." Also, it seems they would make great guards within vaults that carry dangerous magical artifacts, especially if you accompany them with warriors whose thoughts are far less appetizing than the magically-saturated air around them. By the Nine Hells, just put them in mage jails!
They have the stealth skill, so can apply proficiency bonus to it, such as it is, but yeah, they rely almost entirely on hiding in the border ethereal plane.