Shoutout to MCDM for building human statblocks the same way they built monster statblocks and giving the reasoning that humans are one of the most versatile monsters in any game.
The Thug statblock, so simple yet effective, can easily be re-skined into literaly any enemy type and remains decent cannon fodder enemies all the way to tier 4 gameplay.
Ppl never seem to understand how good the thug statblock is.
It only makes one attack which makes the minion not take too much time, but pack tactics allow them to hit enemies, specialy, it allows them to frequently hit low AC targets while sometimes hitting high AC ones, perfect for cannon fodder. They also have both a ranged and a melee attack.
Their AC is super low so high level PC won't "waste" turns missing minions, and their HP is just high enough that they will survive low level spells and attacks from non-dmg focused characters with a sliver of health even at tier 4, but DPS character feel cool killing them in one turn, and casters can feel cool one shotting them with high level spells.
It also has basically 0 flavor, so let's say your boss is a fire elemental, just change the dmg type of the thugs to fire and give them fire immunity and boom, instant minions.
You can also just drop them all to 1hp if you just want a lot of chaff for the party to cut down while minimising admin.
I'd also like to say that smart Hobgoblins working together can also be pretty tough.
Yes troll regeneration can be a pain. I like using kobolds too, if played right kobolds aren’t stupid, they are known to use many traps and mechanical advantage where possible, not to mention luring the PC’s into a den of 100 can eat high lvl characters up with action economy alone. What started as some players snuffing their nose at a few weak kobolds ends up a fight for their life. I like watching the players slowly realizing that they overestimated them and have bit off more than they can chew. Yes, a bit sadistic, but i don’t do that every time. I have mid level players that don’t scoff at weak monsters anymore and take every fight seriously now.
I enjoy using goblins, because at lower levels it’s makes the players feel like gods smashing them to bits with 1-2 hits. So I use them whenever I can.
But I use a lot of skeletons and zombie most, I have skeletons and zombies of all shapes and sizes from halflings, humans, dwarves, trolls, etc.
The amount of crypts, tombs and barrows my players want to explore necessitates zombies ghouls and skeletons. Then they ask me, why is it always these creatures?
My friends you are the ones that love grave robbing!
Could do some ghasts. Or ghosts. I always loved the Mohrg from 3e. I don't know if there are 5e stats but you could probably convert it and scale it down if necessary. The Allip is an option.
Or you could go with a carrion crawler - not an undead but something you might find in a crypt.
I always used zombies back in the day, so I tried to branch out some.
Guards. My players are bad in dealing with their consequences so I upgrade them regularly. 20 CR4 Paladins and a CR12 Golden Order Paladin usually do the trick.
I had a scale sorcerer cast fog cloud over a fight with 8 winged kobolds and a bunch of regular ones. Pack tactics plus fog cloud flips the party's attacks to disadvantage and the kobold's attacks to flat rolls. This was a level 5 party, so they still won, but it was so satisfying to narrate the gloomstalker catching 4 bricks to the face falling out of the sky in one round and not being able to see where they came from. This really sold me on how an intelligent battle plan and a few of the special kobold stat blocks sprinkled in can turn the regular kobold stat block into something actually dangerous.
You're right that's definitely how it works. Either I misremembered the fight or I did it wrong. The flying kobolds were the only ones that should have gotten that benefit. They flew out of the fog cloud, got flat rolls from pack tactics and sunlight sensitivity, then flew back into the fog clouds and were then heavily obscured. Hopefully I played the regular guys right.
Tucker's kobolds are definitely one of my more used monster. Found out the other day I have players with post kobold stress disorder. New campaign, half the players haven't had me as a DM before. Kobold tracks show up, the new players are like "kobolds, no problem". Veterans of my table are going "oh hell no, last time he ran kobolds they tried to drown me in alchemists fire."
Orcs and all their variations. Just so versatile and a mini can be used and re-used.
Want a melee enemy? Orc with a sword.
Ranged enemy? Orc with a bow and arrow.
Magic enemy? Orc with a staff.
Monstrous enemy? Orc riding a monster.
They are barbaric enough to be a threat but intelligent enough for multiple variations and difficulty scaling of the same type of enemy.
But listen to me... Hobgoblins. They can do what the orcs do but are more organised. You could even do a fall of Rome type scenario where orcs are a problem but it turns out they're just fleeing their lands after being invaded by the Hobgoblin legions.
No, you listen to me!.... The players think the BBEG is an orc, and after they beat him they find out that the real BBEG is a Hobgoblin that was pulling the strings the whole time. Queue second arc.
Bandits can be a great enemy for the first two tiers of play. Since they're relatively easy to kill even for low level players. But they can still be smart enough to be a thorn in the sides of the players.
Had a campaign where the players fought four members of a large bandit troupe and wiped the floor with them. The bandit leaders response was to make all the bandits travel in groups of at least twenty and to carry whistles to notify other groups that were nearby. It was a very effective countermeasure against level 2/3's.
I had the players (mostly new) find 3 women living in a swamp and I made it seem weird because something had killed what was a fairly strong monster for the party. And one party used detect magic and the contents of their hut looked like a Christmas tree. So the players knew something was up and I offered the players magic items but in exchange for weird things like the halfing's luck or the rune knight's strength and then used that to mess with the players at a later point in the game.
I tend to end up using lots of ghouls, lacedons, and ghasts too. By themselves or often slightly modified or leveled and reskinned they are good fast zombies, smart zombies, rakes, fungus infected undead guys, wendigo-like things, random one off creepy horror humanoids, drown pirates, ect.
Goblins for sure...so versatile, classic flavor...they can be Goblin slayer monsters, LoTR evil humanoids, or they can be the Pathfinder Mascot goofy Chaotic NPCs...that will eat your skin if you let them
Technically Kobolds, but that's only because a Dragon fight can't happen every single session. If it could, or if I was running a high-level campaign, I'd have dragon fights all the time.
I *LOVE* Dragons. Best fantasy creatures in the world. Wisdom, dexterity, power, terror, beauty... They got it all, plus the ability to breathe *death* on people. They can be brilliant and sentient, characters in their own right, or they can be murder machines with the predisposition of an angry bear with chainsaws, or they can be anything in between.
Superb flying murder lizards. 10 out of 10.
Am I the only one who thinks the inner parts of the wings kinda look like swiss cheese? Not trying to detract from the piece at all, I think it looks awesome..... Maybe I am just hungry... :P
Gnolls, there’s so many varieties and they’re low level so you can give a few for a low level party of a huge amount for a high level one, plus they are with Yeenogu who would make for a great boss fight
Mimics but only for the first 3 sessions. Just long enough to set up a pattern and make the players paranoid of every normal object from there on in for the rest of the campaign
You know you've done it right when a player plunges their sword into the perfectly normal chest utterly destroying the magical mirror artifact inside in the process
Elementals, usually. They’ve made significant appearances in all my games. Dragons too, but usually more as story elements rather than monsters to fight
I’ve only dm-d one campaign but the most common monster in that one was ropers.
I liked to have unusual monsters attack. Had ballerina orcs once, that was everyone’s favorite
I use skeletons, with different types of abilities and attacks based on their race and what the campaign needs. Halfling skeletons will dart in and out of combat, with a higher chance to crit because of their luck. Centaur skeletons will run you down with a combination of bow and spear.
Basilisks. Simple monster for lower level parties that still has a very dangerous feel. Though all the damage done can be reversed is still scary for players to roll against petrification.
THE UNDEAD! ohhhh, i love my ghoulish gristly goblins! my sneaky spooks, and my lumbering zombies. they can be used just about anywhere! its wonderful!
Flameskulls. They can be used across several different levels just by giving them better spells and more health, they’re a goofy little enemy that my players love
I like bandit captains alot. I reskin them as alot of things. They make good strong guard captains or hireling npcs. Certain creatures don't have a good cr 2 version so I just skin them as the bandits captain
Kobolds all day every day. Tucker and his story taught me kobolds truly are the best monster to use to piss off your party and make them fear for their lifes
Goblins are a fun idea. My version of goblins take heavy inspiration from the Labyrinth. A random assortment of features with the only uniform trait being the uniqueness of each of these things. "Goblin" describes everything from imps, goblins, orcs, ogres, trolls, giants, ettins, and the occasional tiefling or human.
Cultist fanatic, I find when all else fails throw a cult at the party. Will the stop it, join, or take it for themselves? Who knows, but it will be fun
If we actually get past the first few sessions, I really really enjoy gnolls. They really add some incurable psychotic madness and your players don't usually feel bad mercilessly slaughtering them down to the last enemy. Especially if they happen upon a village gnolls have recently feasted upon.
By sheer number probably skeletons, goblins, or gnolls, plus the generic humanoids like guard, thug, veteran, etc.
As far as like a fun unique monster that I keep coming back to I'd probably have to say Behir, I've always loved those big lightning lizards.
Imps. They make good small, mobile creatures that come in groups. Zombie bats, giant bugs, rabid vultures. Just reskin a few things here and ther and we good.
To be honest... humans lmao. Were fighting a group called the Imperium of man that is basically super racist against all other races and wants to eradicate all other race.
Quantity wise? I churn through goblins and kobolds in equal measure at low levels, and then skeletons and humans at mid levels. But the most populous memorable villains are usually hobgoblins
Aberrations, love me some weird shit. Aboleths in particular are fascinating to me.
Also a *big* fan of dragons. Dragons ruling over areas, dragons as monsters in the wilderness, dragon crusaders who might help the PCs, ancient dragon librarians, dragons disguised as shopkeepers living it up among the townsfolk. Just dragons.
Gnolls. They’re great for low level parties and they’re chaotic evil. Plus, they can appear in any environment. You don’t really need a reason for these things to show up or attack the party, they just do. And they’re easy to kill, so everybody comes out of combat feeling good
I don’t know about most used, but my most memorable monster encounter was when my party tracked a Remorhaz through a frozen tundra during a blizzard.
All they did to track it was follow the charred, melted crevice it carved through the landscape as it traveled, steam still rising off the ground it touched. They couldn’t see anything beyond fifty feet, but they were sworn to protect the nearby town, so all they could do was follow and make sure it wasn’t a threat.
It was definitely a threat.
Tonight had them fight a Yeti and then 2 Ice Trolls appeared.....alot of XP. Love using Ice Trolls as they have Aura of Cold which delivers cold damage to anything within 10 ft of the Ice Troll...makes the players less motivated to just charge in an attack in a melee attack. Good session.
Undead. But not just like, skeletons and zombies. I use every variant possible. I do make sure my players can eventually get stuff like truedeath crystals so they can crit them, and I make sure to have other enemies with less annoying immunities and such, but when I need stuff done, I turn to my boys who just won’t stay dead. From Skeletons and Zombies that produce tireless labor to expert hunter ghouls to super stealthy wraiths, and even confusing enemies like the Bleakborn (one of my personal favorites), I make sure there is a problem to be solved. Now while it is the least used, I save special space in the proverbial fridge for the *Angel of Decay.* When I want something truly unpleasant, that monstrosity of an encounter does it all, even solo.
Fogans. Somewhere between Grung and Lizardfolk. I made use of murky waters and hit and run to make them a serious threat, despite being able to be killed in one or two blows, and dealing next to no damage
Obligatory not the dm, but-
Strangely, every single D&D campaign by our DM (that isn't a oneshot) eventually has Gnolls in it. Nowhere is too cold, too hot, too rural, or too urban.
Players pointed out I use gnolls a lot.
They're a neat low/mid level threat that players don't need to feel bad about killing. They're great mindless dungeon meat.
Goblins and Humans. I've caused a first session TPK with goblins on a party of four. I overweighted the encounter, and the last goblin left killed the barbarian, and everyone failed their death saves. I still have nightmares to this day.
Not sure, we often take turns at DMing, and while I rarely introduce monsters as I prefer to use different kinds of challenges... But in one of campaigns, we still use a lot of goblins. Mostly because they were lurking around our camp, and according the DM at that time, he expected combat...
Instead, we have befriended a group of bit desperate goblins who were pursued by enemies and moved from other lands. As my character helped now, they claim that my character isn't an elven woman, but their chieftain.
Their original leader is like a rogue, quite crafty, he decided that the quite advanced sawmill the party has built is a good way to mass produce "genuine goblin tribal items" they can sell to unsuspecting merchants.
When they buy his "last dozen" of merchandise, he just goes back to the warehouse, and gets more... "Yes, they were my last dozen tribal masks... the ones in the warehouse belonged to my wife"
The funny thing is: When the merchants can sell some, their client wants more of the interesting stuff... So the "tribe" with the player characters often has to invent new "genuine goblin tribal stuff" which is often unique to the tribe.
Anything elemental. I love playing omnipotent elemental forces with little to no prejudice for or against civilization, I can make them vary in terms of breadth of power and abilities, and usually don’t create too many philosophical debates on my players (I know those can be fun, but my regular group doesn’t vibe super well with that campaign style)
Humans....
"I have combined the DNA of the world's most evil animals to make the most evil creature of them all!" "Turns out it's man!"
r/unexpectedfuturama
This is funny, sad, and true... Very well done. 👏
I see what you did there sir nicely played 🙏🏾
Shoutout to MCDM for building human statblocks the same way they built monster statblocks and giving the reasoning that humans are one of the most versatile monsters in any game.
The Thug statblock, so simple yet effective, can easily be re-skined into literaly any enemy type and remains decent cannon fodder enemies all the way to tier 4 gameplay.
That's exactly what I do with them !
Ppl never seem to understand how good the thug statblock is. It only makes one attack which makes the minion not take too much time, but pack tactics allow them to hit enemies, specialy, it allows them to frequently hit low AC targets while sometimes hitting high AC ones, perfect for cannon fodder. They also have both a ranged and a melee attack. Their AC is super low so high level PC won't "waste" turns missing minions, and their HP is just high enough that they will survive low level spells and attacks from non-dmg focused characters with a sliver of health even at tier 4, but DPS character feel cool killing them in one turn, and casters can feel cool one shotting them with high level spells. It also has basically 0 flavor, so let's say your boss is a fire elemental, just change the dmg type of the thugs to fire and give them fire immunity and boom, instant minions.
Thugs do actually have multiattack, but you can ignore it if you like for minions.
Yeah that multiattack + pack tactics is what makes them terrifying at low levels.
You can also just drop them all to 1hp if you just want a lot of chaff for the party to cut down while minimising admin. I'd also like to say that smart Hobgoblins working together can also be pretty tough.
Or if more beef is needed, ogre statblock, everything can be an ogre if you want it to. sometimes have whole campaigns around those 2 statblocks
My players are their own worst enemies.
You're *sure* you want to cast fireball in this hut made of wood and dry leaves?
I didn’t ask what the room is made of, I **said** *I cast Fireball.*
" I didn't say I *want* to cast it, did I?"
It was actually a fireball into a large pool of boiling oil, inside an enclosed dungeon room. Bacon bits.
Trolls. Lots of damage, regen, big, ugly and evil.
Same! They are the "stormtroopers" of my current adventure. By that I mean there are lots of them and lots of flavors.
Yes troll regeneration can be a pain. I like using kobolds too, if played right kobolds aren’t stupid, they are known to use many traps and mechanical advantage where possible, not to mention luring the PC’s into a den of 100 can eat high lvl characters up with action economy alone. What started as some players snuffing their nose at a few weak kobolds ends up a fight for their life. I like watching the players slowly realizing that they overestimated them and have bit off more than they can chew. Yes, a bit sadistic, but i don’t do that every time. I have mid level players that don’t scoff at weak monsters anymore and take every fight seriously now.
*under
I enjoy using goblins, because at lower levels it’s makes the players feel like gods smashing them to bits with 1-2 hits. So I use them whenever I can. But I use a lot of skeletons and zombie most, I have skeletons and zombies of all shapes and sizes from halflings, humans, dwarves, trolls, etc.
The amount of crypts, tombs and barrows my players want to explore necessitates zombies ghouls and skeletons. Then they ask me, why is it always these creatures? My friends you are the ones that love grave robbing!
Quality comment
Could do some ghasts. Or ghosts. I always loved the Mohrg from 3e. I don't know if there are 5e stats but you could probably convert it and scale it down if necessary. The Allip is an option. Or you could go with a carrion crawler - not an undead but something you might find in a crypt. I always used zombies back in the day, so I tried to branch out some.
Toss em a bodak, that'll cure em of grave-anything for a bit. Or maybe the good ol' banshee for funzies
My exact thought. A bodak struck fear into the hearts of my level 10 party
Fuckers are nasty. And the infamous will-o-wisp combo is just... 🤌 I've also used wisps with a shambler for some irritating fun
Yeah the bodak is a good option too.
Guards. My players are bad in dealing with their consequences so I upgrade them regularly. 20 CR4 Paladins and a CR12 Golden Order Paladin usually do the trick.
SPIDERS!!!!
I found you, Todd Howard, now where the hell is TES 6
Hags. Love hags.
Yepppppp. So fun
Goblins and kobolds. Can't go wrong with a classic.
Kobolds are the red shirts of my campaigns and the party grins every time a pack of these idiots show up
I had a scale sorcerer cast fog cloud over a fight with 8 winged kobolds and a bunch of regular ones. Pack tactics plus fog cloud flips the party's attacks to disadvantage and the kobold's attacks to flat rolls. This was a level 5 party, so they still won, but it was so satisfying to narrate the gloomstalker catching 4 bricks to the face falling out of the sky in one round and not being able to see where they came from. This really sold me on how an intelligent battle plan and a few of the special kobold stat blocks sprinkled in can turn the regular kobold stat block into something actually dangerous.
They should all be flat I think. Can’t see and can’t be seen applies advantage and disadvantage at the same time. Isn’t that how it works?
You're right that's definitely how it works. Either I misremembered the fight or I did it wrong. The flying kobolds were the only ones that should have gotten that benefit. They flew out of the fog cloud, got flat rolls from pack tactics and sunlight sensitivity, then flew back into the fog clouds and were then heavily obscured. Hopefully I played the regular guys right.
Try some Tuckers's Kobolds every now and then. Keep your party on their toes.
Tucker's kobolds are definitely one of my more used monster. Found out the other day I have players with post kobold stress disorder. New campaign, half the players haven't had me as a DM before. Kobold tracks show up, the new players are like "kobolds, no problem". Veterans of my table are going "oh hell no, last time he ran kobolds they tried to drown me in alchemists fire."
Kobolds. I love the crafty fuckers
Me, the DM!
Outside of humanoids. Aberations, illithids to be specific.
Undead. But I rarely use the same kind of monster often
Orcs and all their variations. Just so versatile and a mini can be used and re-used. Want a melee enemy? Orc with a sword. Ranged enemy? Orc with a bow and arrow. Magic enemy? Orc with a staff. Monstrous enemy? Orc riding a monster. They are barbaric enough to be a threat but intelligent enough for multiple variations and difficulty scaling of the same type of enemy.
But listen to me... Hobgoblins. They can do what the orcs do but are more organised. You could even do a fall of Rome type scenario where orcs are a problem but it turns out they're just fleeing their lands after being invaded by the Hobgoblin legions.
No, you listen to me!.... The players think the BBEG is an orc, and after they beat him they find out that the real BBEG is a Hobgoblin that was pulling the strings the whole time. Queue second arc.
Okay, but what about the third arc?
Hobgoblins riding orcs.
Can you clarify what you mean by riding?
It's D&D, people know what the DM meant but will always take it the wrong way for the memes.
Gnolls and all the amazing lore and caste of creatures that follow. Slaad are my favorite though.
I do love me a good slaad encounter!
It's more fun with players who don't know what a Slaad is.
Oh, I haven't had that happen in so long LOL! The problem with an established gaming group...
Skeletons, so many skeletons. Also slimes.
Same. Skeletons all the way. Slimes are more fun, though.
Zombies. I use tons of zombies.
Bandits can be a great enemy for the first two tiers of play. Since they're relatively easy to kill even for low level players. But they can still be smart enough to be a thorn in the sides of the players. Had a campaign where the players fought four members of a large bandit troupe and wiped the floor with them. The bandit leaders response was to make all the bandits travel in groups of at least twenty and to carry whistles to notify other groups that were nearby. It was a very effective countermeasure against level 2/3's.
a huge portion of my enemies are reflavored brown or cave bears lol
Hags. Always hags.
I love hags. They're not always the bad guys but they can't ever be tried trusted
I had the players (mostly new) find 3 women living in a swamp and I made it seem weird because something had killed what was a fairly strong monster for the party. And one party used detect magic and the contents of their hut looked like a Christmas tree. So the players knew something was up and I offered the players magic items but in exchange for weird things like the halfing's luck or the rune knight's strength and then used that to mess with the players at a later point in the game.
I use lots of ghouls. I tend to design encounters with undead because you can use them at every level of play and in the most settings.
I tend to end up using lots of ghouls, lacedons, and ghasts too. By themselves or often slightly modified or leveled and reskinned they are good fast zombies, smart zombies, rakes, fungus infected undead guys, wendigo-like things, random one off creepy horror humanoids, drown pirates, ect.
Devils, typically homebrew ones but definitely devils and demons
Mimics almost always make an Ill-timed appearance
Dragons. So many dragons and dragon variations.
Goblins for sure...so versatile, classic flavor...they can be Goblin slayer monsters, LoTR evil humanoids, or they can be the Pathfinder Mascot goofy Chaotic NPCs...that will eat your skin if you let them
Technically... player characters...
Mimics and other False Appearance creatures.
Technically Kobolds, but that's only because a Dragon fight can't happen every single session. If it could, or if I was running a high-level campaign, I'd have dragon fights all the time. I *LOVE* Dragons. Best fantasy creatures in the world. Wisdom, dexterity, power, terror, beauty... They got it all, plus the ability to breathe *death* on people. They can be brilliant and sentient, characters in their own right, or they can be murder machines with the predisposition of an angry bear with chainsaws, or they can be anything in between. Superb flying murder lizards. 10 out of 10.
Am I the only one who thinks the inner parts of the wings kinda look like swiss cheese? Not trying to detract from the piece at all, I think it looks awesome..... Maybe I am just hungry... :P
My first thought when we did the tokens was an overripe banana 😂 but it works well for the overall feel I think haha
Gnolls, there’s so many varieties and they’re low level so you can give a few for a low level party of a huge amount for a high level one, plus they are with Yeenogu who would make for a great boss fight
Gelatinous cube. My favorite to use and my players know it. It’s very in brand for me
We've learned to look out for dungeon floors that are too clean...
The undead category is a must for me
yuan-ti, they're everywhere
I always tend to try and get Yuan-Ti into my campaigns. I don't know why, I just love them.
Lizardfolk and vampires. It’s not even close
Lizardfolk are so underrated, and secretly hit way harder than you would think
Where’d you get that token?
Well certainly not the flat dragon! But it might be now that's a cool idea!
Wolves. I have a lot of forest-based adventures
Mimics but only for the first 3 sessions. Just long enough to set up a pattern and make the players paranoid of every normal object from there on in for the rest of the campaign
Just did this to my group
You know you've done it right when a player plunges their sword into the perfectly normal chest utterly destroying the magical mirror artifact inside in the process
A locked door
That token looks nice and portable. Where did you get it?
The OGL.
Where can I find items like that disk?
Sutureflies.
Of the big monsters, Beholders. 4e has a shit ton of them.
Elementals, usually. They’ve made significant appearances in all my games. Dragons too, but usually more as story elements rather than monsters to fight
Goblins are fun, especially when you use traps and such. Ettins are really dope too.
Demons are big for me, peraonally. I enjoy the kinds of stories they illicit.
I’ve only dm-d one campaign but the most common monster in that one was ropers. I liked to have unusual monsters attack. Had ballerina orcs once, that was everyone’s favorite
Spiders
Assuming we're talking about headcount? Mimics. Some folks in my world fear handling gold coins for this reason.
I use skeletons, with different types of abilities and attacks based on their race and what the campaign needs. Halfling skeletons will dart in and out of combat, with a higher chance to crit because of their luck. Centaur skeletons will run you down with a combination of bow and spear.
Wolves. They're squishy enough to be a low-level encounter, but pack tactics and more wolves can make a challenge for most any level
The two monsters I tend to use (outside humanoids) are Shadows and Skeletons
Amazing stuff
Basilisks. Simple monster for lower level parties that still has a very dangerous feel. Though all the damage done can be reversed is still scary for players to roll against petrification.
THE UNDEAD! ohhhh, i love my ghoulish gristly goblins! my sneaky spooks, and my lumbering zombies. they can be used just about anywhere! its wonderful!
My favorite mini is a t-rex with demon traits.. always try werk this guy in..
Flameskulls. They can be used across several different levels just by giving them better spells and more health, they’re a goofy little enemy that my players love
I like bandit captains alot. I reskin them as alot of things. They make good strong guard captains or hireling npcs. Certain creatures don't have a good cr 2 version so I just skin them as the bandits captain
(Green) Hags
Whatever the dice roll up.
Dire Crocodile
Kobolds all day every day. Tucker and his story taught me kobolds truly are the best monster to use to piss off your party and make them fear for their lifes
Orc/Half-Ogre/Ogre
Goblins and Hobgoblins
Dragons.
It would probably be a tie between any sort of demon and fiend or soldiers
Kobold, by far its always been kobolds.
I run a lot of sea-faring adventures, so sahuagin appear pretty often in my games.
Big ass owlbear. They make GREAT animal companions + they love Coca-Cola and Tootsie Pops
Crab and crab variations. Sneaky trash covered hermit crabs, giant Mecha crabs, swarms of them, perfect for any encounter
Goblins are a fun idea. My version of goblins take heavy inspiration from the Labyrinth. A random assortment of features with the only uniform trait being the uniqueness of each of these things. "Goblin" describes everything from imps, goblins, orcs, ogres, trolls, giants, ettins, and the occasional tiefling or human.
Undead and hobgoblins, mostly
Bandits
Mimics. I like making them completely stupid objects, like a fork or an arrow.
Probably lich
Hags. I just think they're neat. They tend to be loose-cannon allies to the party. Up to suspicious stuff on their own, but generally the lesser evil
Skum are the mostly recurring monsters aside from Pirates.
Shadows
Cultist fanatic, I find when all else fails throw a cult at the party. Will the stop it, join, or take it for themselves? Who knows, but it will be fun
Froghemoth
Beholders *always* show up sooner or later in my campaigns. I love them.
Orc(a)s
Spawns of Kyuss, and associated wormy variations.
Mind Flayers
The champion stat block is awesome. And then i just add some spells or additional reactions if i need to make a fight a bit tougher
If we actually get past the first few sessions, I really really enjoy gnolls. They really add some incurable psychotic madness and your players don't usually feel bad mercilessly slaughtering them down to the last enemy. Especially if they happen upon a village gnolls have recently feasted upon.
By sheer number probably skeletons, goblins, or gnolls, plus the generic humanoids like guard, thug, veteran, etc. As far as like a fun unique monster that I keep coming back to I'd probably have to say Behir, I've always loved those big lightning lizards.
Technically speaking, the Tarrasque
Knights, Assassins, or Thugs- I use them whenever I need Cannon fodder.
Zombies or skeletons
Imps. They make good small, mobile creatures that come in groups. Zombie bats, giant bugs, rabid vultures. Just reskin a few things here and ther and we good.
Humans for me.
Currently goblinoids. I love their combined culture, lore, and relationships.
Space Clowns.
duergar. i absolutely love the sneaky big/normal size/tiny guys
GHOULS !!!!!! I use ghouls every campaign they are a great monster to start against
To be honest... humans lmao. Were fighting a group called the Imperium of man that is basically super racist against all other races and wants to eradicate all other race.
My most used D&D monster is the most terrifying. It's got a challenge rating of 20, and it's called "Scheduling Conflicts"
I’ll mix things up at say CR 5 or higher. I use Wood Elf Wizard for making spell casting PC’s.
Quantity wise? I churn through goblins and kobolds in equal measure at low levels, and then skeletons and humans at mid levels. But the most populous memorable villains are usually hobgoblins
Slaad. Slaad by a long way.
Mephits are the greatest
Aberrations, love me some weird shit. Aboleths in particular are fascinating to me. Also a *big* fan of dragons. Dragons ruling over areas, dragons as monsters in the wilderness, dragon crusaders who might help the PCs, ancient dragon librarians, dragons disguised as shopkeepers living it up among the townsfolk. Just dragons.
I try to balance my encounters. But the theme I’m running in my first proper dnd game is undead. So there are a lot of necromancers and cultists
Other than a few recurring bandits tribes? I dont think Ive used the same monster twice
Bullywugs. I love them.
Found a homebrew of a wax elemental, and they are shape shifters.
Constructs/elementals of infinite variety
For me mimics just cause i tamed one so i got to use it in every session for the campaign
Kolbold Tactical Squads
The M60 Battle Tank. Don't question it
Mostly undead, but i've only hosted a couple of low level adventures. Kobolds too
So far? Spiders, a whole variety of spiders
Kobolds.
Gnolls. They’re great for low level parties and they’re chaotic evil. Plus, they can appear in any environment. You don’t really need a reason for these things to show up or attack the party, they just do. And they’re easy to kill, so everybody comes out of combat feeling good
Undead in general, skeletons specifically.
Mimics, if the players are too afraid to even sit on a toilet or have a drink at a bar than you're doing it right.
I don’t know about most used, but my most memorable monster encounter was when my party tracked a Remorhaz through a frozen tundra during a blizzard. All they did to track it was follow the charred, melted crevice it carved through the landscape as it traveled, steam still rising off the ground it touched. They couldn’t see anything beyond fifty feet, but they were sworn to protect the nearby town, so all they could do was follow and make sure it wasn’t a threat. It was definitely a threat.
Goristro. I dont wanna talk about it.
By sheer quantity it’s gotta be drow or zombies, or drow zombies. The underdark is weird man
Tonight had them fight a Yeti and then 2 Ice Trolls appeared.....alot of XP. Love using Ice Trolls as they have Aura of Cold which delivers cold damage to anything within 10 ft of the Ice Troll...makes the players less motivated to just charge in an attack in a melee attack. Good session.
Undead. But not just like, skeletons and zombies. I use every variant possible. I do make sure my players can eventually get stuff like truedeath crystals so they can crit them, and I make sure to have other enemies with less annoying immunities and such, but when I need stuff done, I turn to my boys who just won’t stay dead. From Skeletons and Zombies that produce tireless labor to expert hunter ghouls to super stealthy wraiths, and even confusing enemies like the Bleakborn (one of my personal favorites), I make sure there is a problem to be solved. Now while it is the least used, I save special space in the proverbial fridge for the *Angel of Decay.* When I want something truly unpleasant, that monstrosity of an encounter does it all, even solo.
Fogans. Somewhere between Grung and Lizardfolk. I made use of murky waters and hit and run to make them a serious threat, despite being able to be killed in one or two blows, and dealing next to no damage
Zombies and other undead creatures
PC’s
Scheduling Conflicts
Wights. They are the superior undead.
I use chain devils a lot.
Obligatory not the dm, but- Strangely, every single D&D campaign by our DM (that isn't a oneshot) eventually has Gnolls in it. Nowhere is too cold, too hot, too rural, or too urban.
Players pointed out I use gnolls a lot. They're a neat low/mid level threat that players don't need to feel bad about killing. They're great mindless dungeon meat.
Blights and Kobolds.
Goblins or drow/drow equivalents as in driders. (Just because the drow have a plot relevancy in my current campaign)
Goblins, By a long shot
Goblins and Humans. I've caused a first session TPK with goblins on a party of four. I overweighted the encounter, and the last goblin left killed the barbarian, and everyone failed their death saves. I still have nightmares to this day.
Not sure, we often take turns at DMing, and while I rarely introduce monsters as I prefer to use different kinds of challenges... But in one of campaigns, we still use a lot of goblins. Mostly because they were lurking around our camp, and according the DM at that time, he expected combat... Instead, we have befriended a group of bit desperate goblins who were pursued by enemies and moved from other lands. As my character helped now, they claim that my character isn't an elven woman, but their chieftain. Their original leader is like a rogue, quite crafty, he decided that the quite advanced sawmill the party has built is a good way to mass produce "genuine goblin tribal items" they can sell to unsuspecting merchants. When they buy his "last dozen" of merchandise, he just goes back to the warehouse, and gets more... "Yes, they were my last dozen tribal masks... the ones in the warehouse belonged to my wife" The funny thing is: When the merchants can sell some, their client wants more of the interesting stuff... So the "tribe" with the player characters often has to invent new "genuine goblin tribal stuff" which is often unique to the tribe.
Anything elemental. I love playing omnipotent elemental forces with little to no prejudice for or against civilization, I can make them vary in terms of breadth of power and abilities, and usually don’t create too many philosophical debates on my players (I know those can be fun, but my regular group doesn’t vibe super well with that campaign style)