What monsters were cooler in the older editions?

[stenver]

I've been diving into original lores and discovered they are fascinating. I'm definitely bringing this stuff to my 5e games.

Examples include rust monsters, who destroy armor/metal with a single touch, but ultimately, it comes down to blood, which causes the rust. You could actually harvest the blood and weaponize it.

Or Rakshasha, who are immune to most damages, but a single blessed bolt will kill it. I find that way more interesting than vulnerability to piercing from good characters, especially considering most 5e players don't bother assigning an alignment anymore anyway and forcing them to do it would be a big hint.

What else was cooler in the older editions?

[Tanarii]

Almost all humanoids are cooler when they were unambiguously Team Bad Guy. They can even be fun as PCs that way. c.f. Orcs of Thar from BECMI.

But in particular Kobolds were cooler when they were dog-faced people with scales and not dragon-people.

[Psyren]

I think Spell Resistance was scarier back when it was simply the ability to no sell magical attacks entirely rather than being a boost to the save. It was annoying to deal with as a spellcaster - well, it was until Orbs were made into instantaneous conjurations - but it made some monsters truly worrisome to run into.

[Telok]

Golems were way cooler AD&D. They were flat out immune to magic outside of a few specific spells. Casters got pretty creative in using the scenery and spells that affected the environment (literally affected the environment, web, grease, and such didn't cut it) when golems showed up. And honestly even the warriors didn't want to face-tank them because they hit reasonably well. Because they were ordered around you could win the encounter if you figured out the orders and hijacked them, or took out their master. If you could snipe & run until a clay or flesh golem went berserk you could get them to chase other creatures while you hid.

I always thought demons were better when they were typed and the ones in the MM were explicitly just examples of posibilities. There was a random generator in the DMG too. The whole soul-gem thing was pretty flavorful as well (or was that bit for devils? been a long time since I looked).

AD&D terrasque was better. Not so much for the stats (tho those were really nasty for AD&D) but simply because it wasn't a joke monster you could snipe or kite to death with low or mid level characters. People will argue about it, but the fact they need argue details & specific interpretations to instead of it being generally accepted the critter is a major death machine is the big strike against the later versions.

[Mordar]

Though I only have feel to base this on, I think the trap monsters and dungeon ecology monsters were more entertaining/engaging in the AD&D era. Things like:


Trapper
Shrieker
Piercer
Cloaker
Roper
Otyugh and Neo-Otyugh
Gelatinous Cubes
Slimes and Puddings


In my experience the aesthetics of the dungeon crawl have been replaced by higher-minded adventures that build on a homogenous ecology rather than a more "organic but gamelike" dungeon ecology. The critters above are, I think, part and parcel of that loss. Obviously YMMV. Confident all of these existed in 3e, but not sure about 4e or 5e, so I'm mostly old-manning here.

- M

[KorvinStarmast]

Almost all humanoids are cooler when they were unambiguously Team Bad Guy. They can even be fun as PCs that way. c.f. Orcs of Thar from BECMI.

But in particular Kobolds were cooler when they were dog-faced people with scales and not dragon-people.
+1

AD&D terrasque was better. Yes.

Though I only have feel to base this on, I think the trap monsters and dungeon ecology monsters were more entertaining/engaging in the AD&D era. Things like:


Trapper
Shrieker
Piercer
Cloaker
Roper
Otyugh and Neo-Otyugh
Gelatinous Cubes
Slimes and Puddings


In my experience the aesthetics of the dungeon crawl have been replaced by higher-minded adventures that build on a homogenous ecology rather than a more "organic but gamelike" dungeon ecology. The critters above are, I think, part and parcel of that loss. Obviously YMMV. Confident all of these existed in 3e, but not sure about 4e or 5e, so I'm mostly old-manning here.

- M Green slime exists in 5e, but it's a trap in the DMG. All of those oozes and trappers made dungeons scarier.

[Leon]

Everything. Because if it still exists it got watered down a lot.

[SimonMoon6]

Water Weird If you didn't have "purify water" (a spell nobody would have chosen), then you couldn't beat it.

Vampires and anything else that drained levels. Because you actually lost levels. You didn't just get a generic "-1 to do stuff". Your levels were gone. All that experience was gone. Yeah, you could still use restoration to get those levels back, but without clerics, you were toast. So, these undead were like really scary. PCs generally aren't scared of any monsters, but anything that can take their levels away permanently? That's different. PCs would actively try to avoid fighting these monsters, which doesn't happen with any other monsters.

Rot Grub Oh, you can't cast "cure disease"? I guess you're dead.

[Yora]

Compared to 5th edition, everything that used to have spell-like abilities but no longer doesn't.

Aboleths and mariliths are the two where I spotted it first, but there are so many. When all they can do is make melee attacks, then what's the point of even including them? It's all the other things they can do that makes it interesting to descend into their lairs.

[Telok]

Compared to 5th edition, everything that used to have spell-like abilities but no longer doesn't.

Aboleths and mariliths are the two where I spotted it first, but there are so many. When all they can do is make melee attacks, then what's the point of even including them? It's all the other things they can do that makes it interesting to descend into their lairs.

Wait... 5e aboleths just make attacks? The illusion mazes, mind controlled monsters, and people turned into horror minions by the mucus aren't a thing any more?

Wow, checked and you're right. They kinda sort-of still have the mucus stuff (although weaker) but the rest are seriously gimped or just outright missing. Its a beat stick with a disease and some weak-to-middling mind control. Maybe scary if you meet it in the desert, but the disease is just a minor nuisance otherwise. That version of mind control breaks really easily.

[thorr-kan]

All of them.

Anything I used for 3E and use for 5E is informed by the encyclopedic depth of lore for 2E. Though I'm not above poaching something from later if it catches my eye.

[ngilop]

All of them.

Anything I used for 3E and use for 5E is informed by the encyclopedic depth of lore for 2E. Though I'm not above poaching something from later if it catches my eye.

Yeah... this

and also this..



But in particular Kobolds were cooler when they were dog-faced people with scales and not dragon-people.


what 3rd did to kobolds for some reason angered me so much more than what they did to any other humanoid.

really anything that was actually neat in 1st and 2nd (and to a lesser degreee 3rd) was tiers betters than the later editions.

[icefractal]

*put on flame-proof armor*
YMMV obviously, but I prefer draconic kobolds. There's an interesting contrast in them being generally weak foes who need to use traps and tricks to survive, while being visibly related to the strongest (flavor-wise, if not always mechanically) creatures around. Where-as dog kobolds overlap a lot more with goblins, IMO.


Definitely agree with this though:

Compared to 5th edition, everything that used to have spell-like abilities but no longer doesn't.A lot of 5E monsters are just ... lacking. They're not much different than fighting an extra-tough Ogre. Which feels like a waste - with 5E's looser math/balance, it should be fertile ground for strange and unique monster abilities. Ironically, it ends up being the more rigid 4E that does way better in that regard (in terms of WotC-published stuff anyway, plenty of wacky 5E homebrew around).

[thorr-kan]

what 3rd did to kobolds for some reason angered me so much more than what they did to any other humanoid.
Strangely, I like the draconic kobolds. This scratch a reptilian itch that lizard men never did for me.

I also like the yippy little dog-men. I am large; meesa contain multitudes. (Back in the jar, Jar-Jar.)

Minotaurs. Dragonlance's League of Minotaurs on the continent of Taladas are cooler in 2E. The enduk of Mystara are winged minotaurs. That's epically cool right there. The yak-men of Zakhara a e-VUL body snatchers from the Roof of the World. Terrifyingly effective foes.

[Catullus64]

especially considering most 5e players don't bother assigning an alignment anymore anyway

Citation needed?


What else was cooler in the older editions?

With the caveat that this comes from limited play experience in BECMI & AD&D, I'm going to contend that your basic low-level Undead (Zombies and Skeletons) were much more threatening, and thus cooler. Not because they've changed, but because the game changed around them. In those editions, Morale checks were still an explicit part of the rules; a significant portion of encounters ended with routing the enemies rather than killing them all. In that context, a creature that never checks Morale, and is immune to a lot of spell effects to boot, is pretty tough when fought in numbers. Not only did this make The Restless Dead actually scary, but it also made the Cleric's ability to turn the undead feel really, really useful.

[KaussH]

I agree with the "All of them". There is an air of "The monsters must be fair" that was not really a thing. Level drain, insta death poison, liches whom could toss harm and time stop, ect. Even some of the lesser effects are looked down on now. Anything that can knock you out of the fight, mind control you for longer than a moment, ect... A lot of the monsters are just Damage dealers, and thats a little boring.

[Irongron]

Firbolgs. Actually one of the few creatures I thought better in 4e.

Also imps, purely because I love the illustration in the original fiend folio.

[Xuc Xac]

Dragons.

Back when alignment was limited to Lawful, Neutral, or Chaotic and there was a Reaction Chart for the attitude of monsters, you couldn't know what to expect just by looking at what color a dragon was.

[Pauly]

Tengus.
Flight and invisibility at will plus some other cool abilities. They were truly terrifying especially in the hands of a DM with any tactical nous.

In 5E the get featherfall, no invisibility and some watered down abilities

[Witty Username]

Bookworms, by existing.

[Trafalgar]

Goblins

In B/X, goblins had 90' Infravision which was 30' better than any PC. It makes for some interesting ambush encounters.

[Prime32]

IIRC oldschool Ghosts had an aura which accelerated aging, causing PCs who fought one without appropriate prep/tactics to rapidly grow feeble and die regardless of stats (and yes, dying of old age prevents all forms of resurrection). If you didn't have a cleric or at least an elf, you were screwed. Even if you survived, you remained old until you found a cleric to undo it.

3e mongrelfolk was a weird take on the original mongrelman, changing their origin from "patchwork children of a cannibal-shapeshifter with unstable DNA, born with random patches of fur and hooves and lobster claws" to "tall goblin-men with lopsided ears born from miscegenation" and then trying to backpedal by showing them as everyman types. I think 5e reverted it.

[JellyPooga]

Strangely, I like the draconic kobolds. This scratch a reptilian itch that lizard men never did for me.

I liked the distinction/range in 3.5 that (I think) Monster Manual 3 introduced with the Poisondusk and Blackscale(?) Lizardfolk, though I'd have liked to have seen more still (reptiles are and should be a diverse bunch!). Until then, I was also disappointed at the lack of diversity in the lizardfolk/reptilian offerings. Kobolds becoming draconic made them stand apart as inherently magical, as opposed to their rougher/tougher, but more mundane lizardfolk cousins, which I liked.

I was never really a fan of the old-school dog-face kobolds because they seemed too much like "just another goblin" (small, weak, cowardly mook squad) rather than their own distinct race. I applauded 3.5ed for giving them something to differentiate them from other small-folk.

[Beelzebub1111]

I like poisons better in 3rd edtion. mostly becasue they harm you like real life poisons and presented a threat beyond just your hit points. when all damage can be healed with a good nights sleep, an asp lurking in a dark corner doesn't pack the same punch or level of terror that it could.

Older editions than that, I kind of hate how psionics and all things related got downgraded from "weird not-magic effects by alien creatures" To "spells with a different resource system" to "Literally just spells" as the editions went on. Nothing really makes it feel like its own thing.

[SimonMoon6]

I didn't like how poisons were almost completely inconsequential in 3rd edition. Poisons had to be really over the top to even be worth using. Out of the dozens of poisons in the game, how many actually saw play?

On the other hand, I'm not suggesting a return to 1st edition's poisons which were all "save or die", sometimes with a bonus to your save. Like even a mere giant centipede could kill a character of any level with a single bite, if they rolled a 1 on their save vs poison.

[Mordar]

I didn't like how poisons were almost completely inconsequential in 3rd edition. Poisons had to be really over the top to even be worth using. Out of the dozens of poisons in the game, how many actually saw play?

On the other hand, I'm not suggesting a return to 1st edition's poisons which were all "save or die", sometimes with a bonus to your save. Like even a mere giant centipede could kill a character of any level with a single bite, if they rolled a 1 on their save vs poison.

But...they weren't all save or die. Just the ones from monsters.

And, well...that was kind of the point. It is a darn deadly place out there!

- M

[Beelzebub1111]

I didn't like how poisons were almost completely inconsequential in 3rd edition. Poisons had to be really over the top to even be worth using. Out of the dozens of poisons in the game, how many actually saw play?

On the other hand, I'm not suggesting a return to 1st edition's poisons which were all "save or die", sometimes with a bonus to your save. Like even a mere giant centipede could kill a character of any level with a single bite, if they rolled a 1 on their save vs poison.

I was thinking more in terms of how it felt to be poisoned as a player. Ability damage wasn't character ending like it was in older editions but it was still enough to give you pause. you might not use anything besides con or unconsciousness poisons as a player, but fighting a giant spider was a threat to your day when it's "Guys, I don't feel so good" and a minute later you can barely lift your weapons. Again, reflective of poisons and venoms in the real world. Unlike earlier and later editions where it was "instantly liquify your organs" or "Ouch, okay put a bandaid on it, I'm good". It was tense and threatening at low levels but something still worth preparing against at high levels without being immediately life ending.

[Catullus64]

IIRC oldschool Ghosts had an aura which accelerated aging, causing PCs who fought one without appropriate prep/tactics to rapidly grow feeble and die regardless of stats (and yes, dying of old age prevents all forms of resurrection). If you didn't have a cleric or at least an elf, you were screwed. Even if you survived, you remained old until you found a cleric to undo it.


Lord help the person who got carelessly buffed with Haste while fighting ghosts.

[Metastachydium]

I didn't like how poisons were almost completely inconsequential in 3rd edition. Poisons had to be really over the top to even be worth using. Out of the dozens of poisons in the game, how many actually saw play?

Well, poison as a player option is quite lackluster. Poison as a monster ability, on the other hand… Well, it does, by neccessity, see use, since it's usually delivered by something the monster in question uses to attack anyhow and its scaling with HD and CON can make it worthwhile against the right opponents.

[Yora]

Poison is one of those effects that has more of an impact after a fight than during it. On hit, it's usually just a minor debuff. It takes one more minute to deal addititonal damage, which might even be the main damage. And then its effect can trouble the target for every fight for several days.

99% of the time, players will fight a monster only once and there won't be any longer lasting effects that will matter to the game.

The best use of poisons for players would be when hunting enemies that try to get away from them. Being poisoned will hamper their ability to stay ahead of their pursuers.

[Psyren]

I was thinking more in terms of how it felt to be poisoned as a player. Ability damage wasn't character ending like it was in older editions but it was still enough to give you pause. you might not use anything besides con or unconsciousness poisons as a player, but fighting a giant spider was a threat to your day when it's "Guys, I don't feel so good" and a minute later you can barely lift your weapons. Again, reflective of poisons and venoms in the real world. Unlike earlier and later editions where it was "instantly liquify your organs" or "Ouch, okay put a bandaid on it, I'm good". It was tense and threatening at low levels but something still worth preparing against at high levels without being immediately life ending.

On the one hand, I agree that ability damage did a good job of feeling different/more dangerous than HP damage. I also agree that healing to full on a Long Rest doesn't feel sufficiently threatening.

On the other hand, I hated that healing ability damage in 3.5 essentially said "either you have a cleric in the group or Bob doesn't get to play this session, and possibly even several sessions depending on the party makeup and whether you can find an NPC or Magic-Mart outlet." Especially since the vast majority of ability damage poisons affected physical stats more than mental ones, so the martials were the ones getting punished by them the most. Oh, and let's not forget "hey Bob, while we look for a cleric, can you do a bunch of math on your sheet to figure out what your much weaker temporary character looks like in the meantime."

(And Ability Drain, i.e. the stuff undead would do, was even worse.)

[SimonMoon6]

One day, I was looking through the monsters in Pathfinder 1e and thought about a couple of monsters that I hadn't thought about in a while, two monsters that were scary for the possibility of turning people to stone instantly: the basilisk and the cockatrice. Quite scary in pre-Pathfinder editions.

Well, in Pathfinder 1e, if your party can kill the basilisk, then it's no problem. You just bathe the affected person in the blood of the basilisk and they immediately turn back to flesh.

And a cockatrice? They're even more pathetic. If they can hit, you get an incredibly easy Fort save... not to turn to stone, but to lose d4 Dex. And if somehow the cockatrice lives long enough to drop someone's Dex to 0, they are turned to stone permanently! Well... not permanently. Not really. They still get a Fort save each day to turn back to flesh. And if they fail three more of these daily Fort saves, *then* the effect is permanent. But who's going to fail that many DC 12 Fort saves?

[icefractal]

TBH, I'm ok with that for the Basilisk, because "kills you by looking" foes are more of a luck thing than a skill/tactics challenge, IMO.

Like, a Rust Monster approaching you? Ok, people in metal armor retreat for a moment, everyone switch to backup weapons (or ranged), there's a strategy to fighting it.

Basilisk? Yeah, you just walked around a corner and you're dead. There's no counter-play to that (other than going blindfolded everywhere, I guess). Sure, *if* you know they're coming, you can prepare, but if the GM is running things in a naturalistic/simulationist way (which I generally prefer) then information is limited and monsters aren't arranged for convenient challenge-providing.

Like, Medusa (the original) was a known individual in a known location. The myth isn't "One day Perseus was exploring a ruined building, opened a door, and suddenly Medusa was there!" But that's how killer monsters show up in D&D more often than not, IME.

[Metastachydium]

On the other hand, I hated that healing ability damage in 3.5 essentially said "either you have a cleric in the group or Bob doesn't get to play this session, and possibly even several sessions depending on the party makeup and whether you can find an NPC or Magic-Mart outlet."

Hey, it's 3.5! There always is a Magic-Mart, especially if iot doesn't make sense!


Especially since the vast majority of ability damage poisons affected physical stats more than mental ones, so the martials were the ones getting punished by them the most.

To be fair, losing DEX and CON is very bad for everyone. But yeah, the default assumption of "martials get shafted" shines through there once more.

[Witty Username]

Especially since the vast majority of ability damage poisons affected physical stats more than mental ones, so the martials were the ones getting punished by them the most.

Sorta. Martials would be penalized more from a couple points of damage, but that would heal fairly quickly. 5-6 points though would become a significant threat to casters.
Reducing a stat to 0 would cause paralysis or unconsciousness at the light end.

Ray of Stupidity was powerful not as a debuf for casters, but because it could one tap low Int enemies.

No one was really comfortable taking any kind of ability damage.

--
I have noticed that slow healing of any kind does have a positive effect on downtime. If you just need a few days to recover from spider venom. It gives reasons to stay in town for a bit: develop contacts, work on long term projects, etc.

[Bacon Elemental]

And a cockatrice? They're even more pathetic. If they can hit, you get an incredibly easy Fort save... not to turn to stone, but to lose d4 Dex. And if somehow the cockatrice lives long enough to drop someone's Dex to 0, they are turned to stone permanently! Well... not permanently. Not really. They still get a Fort save each day to turn back to flesh. And if they fail three more of these daily Fort saves, *then* the effect is permanent. But who's going to fail that many DC 12 Fort saves?

3.5e cockatrices look terrifying in the "Beware DMs who bring it" way. A low-CR swarm enemy who make you save vs instant petrification with every bite attack? Its not a high DC but you can only roll well so many times, and if anyone fails a save its off to the magic shop after the fight for a very expensive 6th level spell casting. And then a chance of instant death on top of that, followed by another expensive spellcast...

That said, if you want a scary petrifier in Pathfinder, consider the Medusa. Essentially the same as the 3.5 counterpart but the DC is actually higher

[Leon]

Basilisk? Yeah, you just walked around a corner and you're dead. There's no counter-play to that (other than going blindfolded everywhere, I guess). Sure, *if* you know they're coming, you can prepare, but if the GM is running things in a naturalistic/simulationist way (which I generally prefer) then information is limited and monsters aren't arranged for convenient challenge-providing.


If they are running it "naturalistic" there is likely to be signs of other things that have been stoned in and around where it is

[Tanarii]

Basilisk? Yeah, you just walked around a corner and you're dead. There's no counter-play to that (other than going blindfolded everywhere, I guess). Sure, *if* you know they're coming, you can prepare, but if the GM is running things in a naturalistic/simulationist way (which I generally prefer) then information is limited and monsters aren't arranged for convenient challenge-providing.
That's not at all how old school monsters worked. At least if you go by OSR or CAW, which are admittedly codified new school trying to replicate what folks envisioned as the experience.

If information is limited and monsters aren't necessarily level zoned then the players are supposed to be careful and scout to get that info. Not blindly stumble around a corner into monsters.

In addition the entire point of DM environment description is everything that said matters, and clues are telegraphed, although you may need to take your time and examine the environment to get it. As opposed to late-TSR new-school storytelling, where it was (usually very long and flowery) envision-the-scene descriptions. So information shouldn't BE limited, it just isn't delivered for free/bluntly. It depends on players attempting to gather it and paying attention, and then is delivered as part of the environment description.


If they are running it "naturalistic" there is likely to be signs of other things that have been stoned in and around where it isMuch shorter than the way I said it. :smallbiggrin:

[Witty Username]

A thing I have been realizing is generally humanoid monsters were handled better in older editions:

5e tends to have two flavors, dumb brute monsters in humanoid shape like gnolls, or human with pointy teeth, like hobgoblins.

3.5 at least managed some nuance, with monsters having enough range of performance to be used in multiple ways, but also feel distinct from the standard humanoids and each other. I think the only one to mostly come to 5e in one piece was Kobolds, as they got more of a chance for their particulars to be baked into their abilities. Pack tactics being a pretty good way to show how much group oriented thinking is ingrained into them.

[NeptunianOM]

Pretty much all humanoids were more interesting to run in 4E, as they all had unique & fun attacks. In 5E, so many of them barely have any cool abilities or tricks. They as just sacks of hit points.

Spellcasters were more interesting in 3.x, usually because they had a much larger assortment of spells to draw from.

[sandmote]

As a general response, 2e lore is so much more in depth than newer editions, and 3.5e bakes in a decent number of subsystems that monsters can grab effects from. A lot of the alternate subsystems published late were made with monsters incorporating the new PC options, and there's a lot of templates for modifying creature types to make individual encounters more memorable.

4e was also really good at including flavorful and mechanically distinct abilities, as well as making variants. the 5e Kobolds get pack tactics and not much else. 4e has something similar on most kobold stat blocks that want to be in melee (+1 to attack rolls for each kobold adjacent to the target) but the two main benefits they share are a bonus to avoiding trap and a quick shift effect on their turn which makes them extra slippery. Because these benefits change how kobolds move and attack in combat, they end up feeling much more different than other low level humanoids.

Contrast some other common mooks:

Gnolls deal extra damage when there's at least three around an NPC, encouraging them to clump up on top of you.
Kua-Toa can can't shift quickly shift away from PCs like Kobolds can: instead their quick burst of movement moves them to a different side of a PC, making it easier for them to surround you and to get through choke points.
Orcs below half health can heal while attacking, making it a slog to leave damaged orcs alive.
Goblins can do a quick move like kobolds, but when missed by an attack rather than on their turn.
Hobgoblins can make an extra saving throw when affected by a longer lasting effect, and a number of them get a boost AC while standing in a tight formation, encouraging you to have them fight in a close unit.

Some of these overlap, but I like that it tends to quickly make the optimal combat choices for PCs and DMs different. 5e tries this with Hobgoblins getting the 4e Gnoll's effect and Gnolls getting an effect while lets them kill large groups of commoners for their CR, but a lot of combat with all of them turns to "creatures with a melee attack," and some ribbon making their melee attack more effective in specific cases. It doesn't help that 4e monsters get specific abilities making them more effective either at range or in melee while 5e slaps a ranged weapon and a melee weapon on most humanoid stat blocks and calls it a day.


Older editions than that, I kind of hate how psionics and all things related got downgraded from "weird not-magic effects by alien creatures" To "spells with a different resource system" to "Literally just spells" as the editions went on. Nothing really makes it feel like its own thing. I'd just like to give a +1 for noting how so may subsystems keep getting rolled farther and farther into spells. That or rolling an extra die, which I don't like as much as having an alternate system to work with. Yes, a separate subsystem is harder to balance against magic than adding more spells, but constantly making everything spells kind of makes magic much stronger compared to other options anyway.


Strangely, I like the draconic kobolds. This scratch a reptilian itch that lizard men never did for me.

I also like the yippy little dog-men. I think having a very weak race tied to dragons is much more thematic than the old version, but I hate their long, almost rat-like tails which look like a serious hassle when trying to avoid traps. I'd much prefer straight dog-like tails which can be held flat against the back when avoiding a trap and also work for a rudimentary sign language that can be used to signal kobolds behind you without needing to turn around. I like the image that one kobold is halfway up a wall looking through a peephole to the next room over and signaling to drop the manually activated traps without needing to shout, look away, or let go of the wall.


If they are running it "naturalistic" there is likely to be signs of other things that have been stoned in and around where it is I would however like to note that having a good idea there's something capable of petrification in the area is neither going to tell you which creature capable of petrification around nor its exact current location. The proper way to prepare for a cockatrice is to not be blindfolded, while the proper way to prepare to fight a basilisk is avoid looking at it.

Although another thing that older editions handled better was rewarding you for carrying around small mirrors of other marginally helpful items, partially by being clearer what those items were for. My personal experience is that the point you really want to use a mirror is well after the point you've left town, and then its to late too grab one. Once this stuff was used so regularly you'd likely be using one even before you ran into a creature capable of petrification, but the books seem to have stopped advocating that sort of dungeon design after 2e.

[Pugwampy]

Nymph . In 2nd Edition could kill you by stripping naked :smallbiggrin:

Lost that super power in 3.5 edition .

[Witty Username]

Nymph . In 2nd Edition could kill you by stripping naked :smallbiggrin:

Lost that super power in 3.5 edition .

Permanent blindness was no picnic either. D&D didn't mess around in the previous editions.

[Pex]

For a reason I don't know why I miss the hecueva. Their last appearance was 2E. I suppose I find their concept intriguing. They're clerics punished by their deity for betraying the faith and thus have an innate hatred for cleric characters.

[Beelzebub1111]

For a reason I don't know why I miss the hecueva. Their last appearance was 2E. I suppose I find their concept intriguing. They're clerics punished by their deity for betraying the faith and thus have an innate hatred for cleric characters.

They were in 3e as well. I want to say in the fiend folio but I'm not 100% on that.

[Leon]

They were in 3e as well. I want to say in the fiend folio but I'm not 100% on that.

They are, along with the template rules for making them

[Metastachydium]

Lost that super power in 3.5 edition .

And exactly in 3.5, I might add. In 3.0 they still had it; it's one of the few major changes in the MM that wasn't mandated by the rules changes.

[Flashkannon]

Though I only have feel to base this on, I think the trap monsters and dungeon ecology monsters were more entertaining/engaging in the AD&D era. Things like:


Trapper
Shrieker
Piercer
Cloaker
Roper
Otyugh and Neo-Otyugh
Gelatinous Cubes
Slimes and Puddings


It's worth noting, while I can't say precisely how they stack up to older edition versions, all of these monsters exist in 5th edition, with the vast majority having been introduced in the Monster Manual. That said, Mimics lose their cachet real fast in 5th edition - they just don't have any staying power a few levels in, which is sad. The Hoard Mimic helps fill that gap, but it's cold comfort.


I was thinking more in terms of how it felt to be poisoned as a player. Ability damage wasn't character ending like it was in older editions but it was still enough to give you pause. you might not use anything besides con or unconsciousness poisons as a player, but fighting a giant spider was a threat to your day when it's "Guys, I don't feel so good" and a minute later you can barely lift your weapons. Again, reflective of poisons and venoms in the real world. Unlike earlier and later editions where it was "instantly liquify your organs" or "Ouch, okay put a bandaid on it, I'm good". It was tense and threatening at low levels but something still worth preparing against at high levels without being immediately life ending.
I actually like, to a degree, 5th edition poisons - the Poisoned effect, anyways. It's debilitating, and depending on the effect it can stay with you a long time. Some creatures just deal extra poison damage, which is alright, but the condition rider feels necessary.

Personally, I thought Mindflayers were much more threatening in prior editions - having fought a few in 3.5 (and almost dying) and a few in 5e (beating them into the ground like a caster who strayed too close to the front lines) it feels as though their teeth have been blunted, somewhat.

[QuickLyRaiNbow]

It's kind of a cheaty answer, but eladrin. Eladrin were way cooler as the CG exemplar race in 2e than they are now as elves-with-extra-feelings in 5E.

[Metastachydium]

It's kind of a cheaty answer, but eladrin. Eladrin were way cooler as the CG exemplar race in 2e than they are now as elves-with-extra-feelings in 5E.

…and even though barring two types, all of them were BoED material in 3.5 (which, needless to say, automatically erodes some coolness factor off of stuff), in 3.x too. I thnk this one really was 4e's fault.