What is your favorite monster as a DM?

[NecroDancer]

I'm a fan of the succubus because it lets me introduce a "friendly" NPC who can act as a quest giver of sorts that slowly leads the PCs into corruption while still acting friendly. It also lets me give the PCs magical fiendish items as foreshadowing (although they have yet to put two and two together).

It's always funny to see the look on the PCs face when they realize that they just helped a fiendish cult eliminate the competition.

[Waterdeep Merch]

Call me old-fashioned, but I love using dragons. I have to be somewhat sparing with them to keep their appeal, but when I want an awesome boss or a powerful ally, they're my go-to. You can even combine them with other cool monster concepts to make something wicked awesome instead. Lich dragon? Vampire dragon? Demon dragon? Ghost dragon? Illithid dragon? Come on, you know you want to try to kill these things.

For run of the mill monsters, I've got a soft spot for goblins. I can very easily make a believable society out of them that isn't just evil for no good reason that are still antagonistic to outsiders like the party, fitting all my favorite roleplaying criteria in a race that also likes setting vicious traps and using fun skirmishing tactics. You can probably cut a deal with them if you try hard enough, but is it worth the effort? And can you survive long enough to do it?

[JellyPooga]

As a GM? I really like Wererats; they're an intriguing challenge for low-level adventurers, forcing them to prepare appropriately or think outside the box. Because their animal form is so small, they take Tuckers Kobolds to the next level. At higher levels, they do tend to be less of a challenge, but I like them nonetheless; deciding whether to genocide an entire warren of them or make a deal remains a challenge; they're tough enough to make the resource expenditure a worthy consideration. And there's always the threat of contracting lycanthropy to consider...

[Foxhound438]

anything that casts spells as its primary way of attacking, though I've attained a particular liking to the Annis hag from volo's despite it being a brawly beater. Just gotta love that 9d6 hug.

[Findulidas]

Goblins. Although they arent stupid mook pushovers when I use them.

[UnwiseAlistair]

I have to agree with waterdeep merch. Dragons have always been my favorite monsters to use. Powerful and iconic, and so much fun both to fight and to play as the DM.
Also, I slightly customize my dragons. All dragons of young age or above can use the metallic dragon change shape, and most get spellcasting as if they had 1-4 levels of sorcerer or wizard.
I just love the idea of dragons in disguise hiring the party or them fighting one in human form for a round or two without knowing what they are, only to reveal their true form and see the "we messed up" expression on the player's faces. 😁

[LaserFace]

At the moment I think I most enjoy using evil spirits against PCs. They ignore a lot of limitations the heroes have, and can be pretty lethal under the right circumstances; I think both make them credible threats that keep people on-edge.

Sometimes I think it's cool to not necessarily have them be directly hostile; maybe they just create complications by trying to persuade people to do things that get themselves hurt.

I gave our Wizard a magical amulet inhabited by a demonic spirit that provides him knowledge, but also could be twisting and corrupting him for its own purposes. The player is a cool dude who is just along for the fun of it, and we get to laugh at the rest of the party's exasperation when he actually takes the spirit's advice.

[Sariel Vailo]

Aside from evil pcs.Nalfeshne

[Potato_Priest]

I'm a huge fan of pixies. They can help, annoy, or seriously threaten the party dependent on their actions and my mood, they're pretty much always invisible, and they have a super fun spell list.

[JackPhoenix]

Though they are not monsters (or are they?)... humanoids. Doesn't matter if they are humans, elves, orcs or any other species.... huge variability between various assassins, warriors and mages, can be bargained with, actually make sense to have loot usable by players... and they fit pretty much anywhere.

For actual monsters... that's much harder choice, I love many of them. Though I've, funnily enough, never actually used one in a game, I'd say Mind Flayers win for me.

[Nifft]

I've had some good experiences using Yugoloths as "smart evil".

In my games, Dragons tend to be individuals rather than color-coded morality-slaves, so I use them very sparingly -- but if there's a Dragon antagonist, then it's planned as a long-term campaign antagonist. (The plan may not survive contact with the PCs, of course, but that's how I generally intend to use a Dragon.)

[Nod_Hero]

Anything insect.

[FreddyNoNose]

I like my players to face an enemy party of humans, dwarfs, elves, and such.

[Sigreid]

Rakasha or however it's spelled. Always fun with a few rounds into the fight the party spellcasters finally realize that half their prepared spells are useless.

[Pazerniusz]

Vampires and Beholders
Vampires because immortal humanoid who is physically superior to almost everything in his size category is definition of antagonist.
Beholders because alien entenity which have superior intelect, gigantic ego and ability to shape reality by dreaming is another definiotion of antagonist in my book eye lasers a lot of them.
Both can be greatly flavored have unique personality and backstory and quirks. Their ability are well know but can also be easily change or expanded.

[Falcon X]

I am partial to Mind Flayers. Part of it is because the players know to fear them. The other part is that most players don't even know half of what they are capable of when you dive deep into sourcebooks, theories, and plots.
Last time I pulled them out, I had them developing anti-matter technology and the one hunting them was basically The Predator.

[pwykersotz]

Dragons. They are my favorite.

My second favorite is any monster that I haven't used before. I'm always looking for new creatures to use, mostly through the monster manuals of previous editions.

[Estrillian]

Running 5E I've gotten very fond of Hobgoblins. They have martial organisation which means that they can be a serious threat on both the personal scale and to towns and cities, and they are smart fighters. They use shield walls, crossfires, defensive positions — but without the implausibility of Tucker's Kobolds — and they have concepts of honour and bravery that make them interesting to RP with as well.

Their only big flaw is that the standard Hobgoblin has pretty low HP. They rely on armour and shields, which means that they tend to just go down to the first Fireball, and without their martial advantage they are not a threat. I might try reskinning some Bugbears as Hobgoblin elites.

[Gastronomie]

Ropers. They're awesome. Amazing field control that disrupts various strategies, especially devastating when combined with enemy casters and other guys that utilize AoE or area-traps. Tugging a PC into the area of Evard's Black Tentacles, all that evil stuff.

[CursedRhubarb]

Otyugh are fun to use. Each one can take on 3 PCs, potentially shutting down 2 of them for the fight as it hold them with it's tentacles and smashes them together, stunning them each round while it still bites at the third and gives nasty diseases that can be a slow death (reduces max HP each day until cured or dead)

[ShikomeKidoMi]

I'm a fan of the succubus because it lets me introduce a "friendly" NPC who can act as a quest giver of sorts that slowly leads the PCs into corruption while still acting friendly. It also lets me give the PCs magical fiendish items as foreshadowing (although they have yet to put two and two together).

It's always funny to see the look on the PCs face when they realize that they just helped a fiendish cult eliminate the competition.

I did pretty much the same thing with Rakshasa. They're especially fun in Eberron. The climax of the campaign was stopping the awakening of one of the Lords of Dust... that all the adventures the PCs had previously been on had enabled.

Besides them, I concur with Pazerniusz that vampires and Beholders are a lot of fun as antagonists.

[napoleon_in_rag]

Paladins. I Like the idea of someone thinking that they are doing good but are actually doing evil.

[Afrodactyl]

I'm a big fan of trolls and hags. Particularly when I can use them as NPCs.

My current campaign has a pair of trolls that consider themselves the better of humans, because they've been around for millenia, and their heads are so much bigger than that of a human, so their brains must be bigger, and thus that much smarter. Troll logic.

And hags just make great NPCs in general.

[Astofel]

For me it's definitely hags. If you can somehow coerce a PC into making a bargain with one, it basically gives you free rein to screw them over as hard as you can in new and interesting ways*. What's more, when they complain you can just shrug and say "This is what happens when you bargain with hags."

*This user does not endorse or even encourage being an adversarial DM. This user does, however, encourage causing any given PC's stupid actions to bite them in the butt later, including but not limited to making the thieves' guild angry, stealing from the hoard of a still-living dragon, or bargaining with the aforementioned hags.

[Decstarr]

Clearly Illithid and all their "minions". My PCs have no fear taking on a dragon, but once they see Intellect Devourers, they rightfully soil their pants. Also the entire Alien theme is so weird and "off" that it is immensely fun to play around with from time to time.

[Vaz]

PIt fiend. Devils in general. They're lawful, so clever players willing to overlook their morality can use them for their benefit, or use them as an end game boss and tease for the party.

They are humanoid, work well with stolen abilities from Character classes.

Plus, I have a Be'lakor model from Games Workshop which is incredible and makes a fantastic centrepiece for the battles.

[MrStabby]

The gibbering mouther is great. I often have them as waste products from magical research and they add a real arcane flavour to an area. Depending on setup they can be a flavourful pushover or really dangerous.

In my campaign world there is also a "conjure mouthers" (phone tried to autocorrect to "conjure mothers", which is a very different spell) spell usable by old one warlocks and sufficiently strange wizards.

I have also added variations that discharge spells when you hit them and can absorb magic directed at them (for bigger higher CR versions).

[Gryndle]

Hard to pick just one, I tend to favor (but use judiciously) critters that make the players cringe or have "Oh crap" moments. Not so much to punish characters in anyway, but just because I like the look on the player's faces when I put the mini's on the board. I love to see the scramble (subtle as it is) as the guys rethink there tactics.

So- Mindflayers, Beholders, Intellect Devourers and Rust Monsters. Those scare my group more than dragons, giants demons and devils.


edit: I forgot werecreatures....my players are so paranoid about being infected with lycanthropy for some reason. Has absolutely nothing to do with that one game that turned into a howling wolf pack....

[mephnick]

Ropers. They're awesome. Amazing field control that disrupts various strategies, especially devastating when combined with enemy casters and other guys that utilize AoE or area-traps. Tugging a PC into the area of Evard's Black Tentacles, all that evil stuff.

This is my pick too. Put them in a tight area so no one can escape it's grasp. Or put them on the ceiling and start reeling people into the air. It's great to see the panic once someone's getting reeled towards that nasty chomper.

[Logosloki]

Bulette is my favourite by far. Can't go wrong with the walking landshark. Out of the sentients though I have a soft spot for dragons and giants. Demons and Devils also feature prominently but usually not for combat.

[tenshiakodo]

Not all of these monsters are in 5e yet, but I plan on updating them soon!

-The Glabrezu Demon. These guys are great, they make great masterminds for plots, and I like their hat of being tempters and seducers, but instead of attracting you with beauty and promises, like the Succubus, the Glabrezu tempts you with greed and ambition. My only regret is that my Pathfinder mini for the creature is too big for the 5e Glabrezu, which is only Large.

-The Achaierai. It's such a strange and unusual looking creature, fast and mobile, with a nasty breath weapon. The kind of thing that could only originate on the Outer Planes, and I think I've used an encounter with one in every D&D campaign I've run.

-The Retriever. An infernal construct, sent to "fetch" people. It can track you anywhere, is ridiculously tough, can travel the planes, and has fiendish eye rays.

-The Grisgol. A construct made from scrolls, wands, rods, and other bits and scraps of magic items. Unique appearance and magical abilities, it's not an encounter your party will soon forget!

-The Ogre Mage (Oni). What isn't there to love about these guys? Shapechanging magic using giants! They're iconic and can be used as recurring villains.

-The Remorhaz. It's been consistently nerfed in every edition since 3e, when it's heat aura inflicted an insane 10d10 fire damage- and it doesn't matter, it's still a challenging encounter. Since an infamous run in with a Remorhaz about 10 years back, most of my friends turn tail and run the other way when they see one of these things to this day.

[ShikomeKidoMi]

-The Glabrezu Demon. These guys are great, they make great masterminds for plots, and I like their hat of being tempters and seducers, but instead of attracting you with beauty and promises, like the Succubus, the Glabrezu tempts you with greed and ambition. My only regret is that my Pathfinder mini for the creature is too big for the 5e Glabrezu, which is only Large.

I wish Glabrezu had some spell-like abilities that actually supported it's fluff this edition. Like Geas.

[Sariel Vailo]

I wish Glabrezu had some spell-like abilities that actually supported it's fluff this edition. Like Geas.

Than give it geas

[Desteplo]

Mind flayers!

[Hrugner]

Ogre Magi. Smart, powerful, associated with dumb as dirt minions. They're a pretty great boss type dude.
My runner up is the Barghest. There's nothing like throwing in a smart powerful shape shifting wolf into your pack or goblin horde to send your players over the edge.

[Elminster298]

Absolutely the Displacer Beast. I have several times ran entire sessions with just one Displacer Beast hunting a party through a forest or set of caves repeatly ambushing. With there intelligence and cunning they can be terrifying if ran properly.

[MeeposFire]

Kobolds.

Well known for clever traps, fighting dirty, fighting in bad situations (bad for you), can have some nice casters (low level sorcs), and pack tactics make them nasty ad deadly in the right scrum.

Tuckers Kobolds are a real thing trust me...

[2D8HP]

Some adventure "Module" I read in the 1980's had an animated Dragon skeleton.as the big monster of the Dungeon, and that captured my imagination. Seeing the Dracolich in the 5e Monster Manual has set a similar fire.

[ShikomeKidoMi]

Than give it geas

Oh, any I run will have at least the ability to assume human form and maybe Geass, but it's just annoying that the demons that spend all their time bargaining with mortals don't have any powers optimized for bargaining with mortals by default. They don't even have powers they can use as bribes, like healing magic.

[Regius]

Since it hasn't been put out there yet I'll give my favourite a voice

Hobgoblins!!!
essentially they are just evil romans but that means that they are just excellent because pretty much any creature can be combo-ed with them, that and as an organised millatary force they tend to be horrifying in pitched battles, many a battle has led to a cackling regius dealing out a TPK with his Hobgoblin turtle formation. With the volos guide expansion we now have hobgoblin wizards and they are everything K could have wanted from this threat. A threat that really delivers on 5e mission statement, that a monster can be dangerous at any level.

Oh and then you can be really mean and think of the abominable combo of Hobgoblins with an auxillary of tucker's Kobolds!😈😈

[Tetrasodium]

The unknown, especially with experienced players who tend to know things like"displacer beast?... I think that's like cr3, we should be ok" remove the tentacle things, give it scales & drippy fangs, it becomes "OMG #$&% SQUEEEE!!!11!!! I have no idea what this is!" You just have to be sparing of it or it gets too predictable

[Joe the Rat]

The unknown, especially with experienced players who tend to know things like"displacer beast?... I think that's like cr3, we should be ok" remove the tentacle things, give it scales & drippy fangs, it becomes "OMG #$&% SQUEEEE!!!11!!! I have no idea what this is!" You just have to be sparing of it or it gets too predictable

Reskinning does wonders. The giant green boar (Gorgon), the cursed carnivorous tree stump (Roper), Root blights (Vine Blights). I've trained my players to ask more questions than assume answers.


I have a passion for Nothics. They are insanely creepy, and look so happy to see you and melt your face and steal the secrets straight out of your head. Nothing distracts a player like having their secrets alluded to in front of the whole group.
I find you can tie them to other abberations as a scout/warning/byproduct.
I'm using them as the primary mooks for a beholder in a dungeon crawl - they act as its eyes.
The conversion process requires the soon-to-be Nothic to lose it's mind... so for each Nothic there is or was an Intellect Devourer created.
Yes, I'm evil.

In terms of mileage, I love me 5th level cleric casting. Spirit Guardians always freaks them out.

[Protato]

I use human bad guys and Nothics as foot soldiers a lot for my big bad, or I did. Right now I'm setting the game on the high seas for a bit before the high fantasy stuff begins, and the party just might fight a Kraken, always liked Krakens.

[kingheff1]

Trolls, I like using them in a way that emphasises their abilities as much of a vicious hunter as possible. Whether as mooks for bbeg's or as protagonists themselves their savagery backed by their regeneration makes them enemies my players have always been wary of. The ease of access to fire damage via cantrips in 5e is a bit of a bummer in this respect.

[Kane0]

Bulette is my favourite by far. Can't go wrong with the landshark.

Here, here! Can never have enough bulettes.
Runner ups for unintelligent monsters are umber hulks and grey renders.
For intelligent foes i'm a fan of good ol' orcs and lizardfolk. The gameworld i run has three major types of humanoid differentiated by blood, with orcs and lizardfolk at the tops of their respective herarchies (greenbloods and bluebloods).

[Hollysword]

Good succubi and mermaids. Fav two fantasy races. As DM and as PC, if either are usable, expect them from me.

[Ixidor92]

I unfortunately have to use them sparingly for fear of making my players riot, but I always love when I get to incorporate a mimic into the dungeon. As soon as I started having it become things other than chests, that opened up numerous fun ways to have them hide. Made all the more hilarious by the fact I think they are my brother's least favorite monster.

[Joe the Rat]

I'm running White Plume Mountain, and for the stream room, I replaced half the canoes with pairs of mimics. Still waiting to see if they get there.

Some of the oozes work well as environmental mimics - Ochre Jellies and Grey Oozes (and Slithering Trackers) are invisible in, or indistinguishable from wet stone or pools of water.

I have heard stories of Black Puddings held in stasis in the shape of statues or art objects.

[Galactkaktus]

I like the faerie dragon. Minor illsuion and invisibilty on a bonus actiond with a breath weapon that makes characters run around randomly. Really fun CR1 monster.

[sky red hunter]

I am currently using a Famorian as a recurring villain. Nothing unusual there but I have it holding a pixie almost like an arcane focus, squeezing it and forcing it to cast spells on people!

Been fascinated by cyclops since I was a kid too, love the type of cyclops thats seen in the movie Krull too. They work well with the above Famorian too as bodyguards or hired muscle. Just love the raw power they exude, they can easily be used as aggressive enemies or as wise helpful entities that can help your PC's

Lastly, Goblins. Goblins are so much fun! Have em chucking rocks, spears, other goblins, have em riding wolves, spiders, awakened trees, I have this great idea to have a goblin druid ride an awakened tree into battle with a rickety 'treehouse' on top :) Goblins are iconic and great fun to play, super squishy means you can throw loads at a party and make em feel truly heroic when they defeat the hoard. Play em stupid for comedy relief, play em vicious for a cruel flavour, play em bad, play em good. Goblins are easily one of the most fun and versatile monsters to use.

[Shining Wrath]

Cultists are a personal favorite, because you can add anything to them. Warlocks, Clerics, Champions, allies in the form of undead or fiends or fey, corrupted town officials and guards. There's no way to predict what cultists are up to.

I believe this moment calls for a brief DM guffaw: MWAHAHA!.

[90sMusic]

I too love succubi. I always have at least one in my games that tries to manipulate things behind the scenes.

I'm also a sucker for dragons. Red and Green ones mostly. Red for the sheer power and massive fire breath, the most horrifying thing you can imagine really. Green's I like because I tend to make them tricksy and usually impersonate people and fool people into following it willingly under false pretenses and being ignorant to the fact that it is a dragon.

They're both so good just for story telling purposes. Most monsters are basically just combat encounters, even if there is a history or lore behind them, they are generally just a combat encounter at the end of the day. Those kinds of social, manipulative creatures are very cool because they can interact with players and manipulate them as well as other NPCs and no one is the wiser.

I like for my villains to have more depth to them than just killing everyone. They have reasonable goals and desires and it's always possible to make a deal with them under the right circumstances.

Another type of monster I love to use is a Death Knight. But not really like the one in the 5e monster manual, more of the old school themed death knight with my own blend of homebrew. They act like liches but instead of a standard item phylactery, they bind their souls to their weapon (which is usually a +3 greatsword artifact). If their body is destroyed, they reform next to the sword, and while their body is destroyed the weapon becomes a sentient weapon because it is housing their soul so it is still possible to communicate with them and they will resist your attempts to wield them. It just makes for a whole lot of interesting interactions when you have an enemy that essentially can't die permanently that you can keep bumping into as well as the risk vs reward of trying to use this powerful artifact weapon that hates you and wants you dead and is constantly trying to generate a new body to use against you.

Other than that, I throw in some monsters here and there but I like most of my combat encounters to be against other humanoids. I have always found it difficult to swallow that any reasonable kingdom isn't going to have an army that will sweep through the countryside and wipe out it's enemies. The thought of orcs living up in the hills unchallenged in the heart of your kingdom is crazy, no one is going to allow that to happen. Even if those orcs have set traps and have advantageous positions in those caves, you can setup a siege line and prevent them from ever leaving to forage for food. Even powerful enemies that are far stronger than regular town guards or basic soldiers could be overwhelmed by an organized army. But I digress...

Humanoids are some of my favorite enemies. I use a blend of a little of everything at some point or another, but my favorites will always be the succubi, dragons, death knights, and humanoids. Humans are the worst monsters of all most of the time.

Oh and Kobolds. When I use dragons, especially that certain manipulative green dragon i'm so fond of, she always has a society of kobolds that worship her as a goddess. But these are more intelligent, educated, and trained kobolds than your run of the mill. They are heavily indoctrinated and trained for warfare spartan style where every single one of them would claim soldier as their profession, even if they happen to do other things in their down time. They work in cohesive fighting units using high quality equipment, are fond of traps and setting ambushes, and so on. They may be physically weak, but with intelligence behind them they are ferocious.

[mephnick]

My only problem with mimics is how weak they are. Only a CR 2 with a fairly weak attack, therefore they aren't much of a problem for 90% of characters. After playing the Souls games for so long, I feel like mimics should be really tough. But then I guess you couldn't use them on low level parties. *shrug*

[mephnick]

Other than that, I throw in some monsters here and there but I like most of my combat encounters to be against other humanoids. I have always found it difficult to swallow that any reasonable kingdom isn't going to have an army that will sweep through the countryside and wipe out it's enemies. The thought of orcs living up in the hills unchallenged in the heart of your kingdom is crazy, no one is going to allow that to happen. Even if those orcs have set traps and have advantageous positions in those caves, you can setup a siege line and prevent them from ever leaving to forage for food. Even powerful enemies that are far stronger than regular town guards or basic soldiers could be overwhelmed by an organized army. But I digress...

That's why I think D&D works better in more remote settings where there aren't powerful kingdoms and standing armies. That's why the Nentir Vale was actually the perfect D&D setting for all the hate 4e gets. Adventurers trekking into the rumoured lava caves days away from the southmost outpost of a small kingdom is where D&D shines. Adventurers doing stuff a few hours away from Waterdeep is where D&D goes to die, but apparently everyone loves it.

[Aett_Thorn]

I've always been a fan of Copper Dragons. Why? Because while they're generally friendly, they do make it a pain in the ass to get to them. Mazes, traps and tricks, along with whatever else they want to put in your way, and they pretty much do it to have fun. Makes going to see the "good dragon" on the mountain more of an adventure in its own right.

[Yagyujubei]

wow im surprised noone has mentioned Aboleths yet...I love playing them in their own layers versus heroes. so few people playing DnD ever expect to be fighting in/underwater and dealing with powerful telepaths that its interesting to see how they handle a panic situation

[Easy_Lee]

Unsure of favorite, but gelatinous cubes are up there. So simple, so direct, and so many players don't know what to do even though they feel like they should. It's like a litmus test to see whether the party will work well together. Plus the low CR means you can throw one at a party almost immediately.

[Clone]

I enjoy many different types of monsters and often find myself creating new ones from art or themes.
But from the MM, I love both Dragons and Giants equally.

Dragons, when played intelligently, can be extremely devastating and scary to any party. They are also great for mixing in other types of creatures and dungeons where monsters either resist, are immune to, or even benefit from their breath weapons. Not getting blasted by that Blue Dragon's lightning breath is sometimes easy by splitting up or hiding behind cover, but its FAR more difficult to hide in the back when Flesh Golems are grappling the wizard or archer and place them in a line for that double bolt blasting.

I've recently fallen in love with Giants however. I've always enjoyed the political aspect of campaigns and conversing to get your way rather than kick down doors and kill things, which normally is accomplished by humanoids. Giants can do everything humanoids can do while also being FAR more intimidating and challenging when you get higher up the ordning food chain.

Running a homebrew campaign set in a Cloud Giant Cloud Metropolis currently and its allowed Giants to not only be big bad guys but also represent the higher social status, a version of the ordning which extended to the common PC races if you will. So fun fleshing out the world and structure of the city tying in aspects of the giants.

[guachi]

Goblins.

Humans that aren't clerics or magic-users. I've been going through lots of old modules and, boy, are there lots of BBEG who are clerics or magic-users. So I like human bad guys, especially non-caster human bad guys.

[gloryblaze]

My go-tos are the Sahuagin, I love those shark people haha. At higher levels things like dragon turtles and the Kraken.

And since we're throwing out our favorite True Dragon colors, mine is definitely blue.

[Beechgnome]

Doppelgangers and hags. I once ran a dinner party set-piece where the party of 4 and a linear guild of 4 both were invited as heroes to a noble dinner. half the 10 nobles were doppelgangers trying to goad the parties into attacking each other. There was also one chair that remained empty for most of the dinner... A green hag, an old enemy named Evie Starlight, eventually arrived and took her seat and promptly threw kerosene on the dinner by drawling to the lord 'My poor dear, how long has your family been murderous shapeshifters?' Cue brawl.

[EvilAnagram]

Two words: Flail. Snail.

[MxKit]

Keeping (mostly) to ones that haven't been listed yet...

Ettercaps. I love how they're not even that difficult (only CR 2!), but you get an infestation of them along with giant spiders and even regular spiders and then suddenly they can be a huge, huge deal.

Rakshasas. I love them best as a big surprise. Have one in disguise as a wealthy merchant who even hires the PCs for certain things. Have them think he's just a normal human, or maybe set down some clues that he might be a (true neutral!) weretiger. And then you realize he's evil and start combat, and then suddenly he's casting spells and cursing you and you realize a whole lot of your spells are doing jack **** against him... It's great.

Scarecrows. I don't even know why. I just really like them.

Shadows. I do know why. I want my players to have their PCs walk into a town that's been entirely overrun by dozens of these things someday.

Spawn of Kyuss. Like zombies? How about zombies with zombifying worms? Yeah, that's even better.

Vargouilles. See why I love ettercaps, honestly. Yeah, one is easy as pie, but it never stays as just one. Having one slip through and fly off real fast after a PC makes the arrogant mistake of summoning a demon would make for hilarious in-game consequences. Let's try to find it before people's heads start popping off!