MitD XV: The Other Dark One

[Keltest]

So your argument is that you can't think of a clue it doesn't fit? That's trivial to disprove: it can't pass for a dragon, because it cannot breath fire.

The idea it can "do anything" is based on misreading the alter shape power.

Grey Wolf

Its sufficiently close to anything that i stand by my statement. It doesnt need to breathe fire, because there are plenty of other abilities that spit out gouts of flame.

I honestly dont get your position here. I could totally understand the argument that its versatility is a feature rather than a bug, but the idea that it doesnt have it is just... needlessly pedantic.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Its sufficiently close to anything that i stand by my statement. It doesnt need to breathe fire, because there are plenty of other abilities that spit out gouts of flame.

Are there? By all means, present some.

needlessly pedantic.

And you had just left my ignore list too.

Bye, Keltest.

GW

[Ruck]

I honestly dont get your position here. I could totally understand the argument that its versatility is a feature rather than a bug, but the idea that it doesnt have it is just... needlessly pedantic.

As has been said over and over, the concept of a Protean as a "fits-any-condition shapeshifter" is just wrong, and yet, over and over, people keep insisting it's a bad choice because it's a fits-any-condition shapeshifter.

[lio45]

The only thing it has going over the plant is that its powers are technically part of the base creature.

Which makes all the difference, though.

A creature that, totally as is in the Monster Manual, has a shapeshifting ability that can explain almost anything... that's not a bug, it's a feature of that creature's candidacy.

Similarly, if there existed a creature that's "a potted plant that is an official published creature 0.00% made up by Rich and that has 50+ STR and all the abilities needed to explain everything MitD is shown to do in the comic" then this potted plant would currently be one of the front runners too, guaranteed.

[Keltest]

Which makes all the difference, though.

A creature that, totally as is in the Monster Manual, has a shapeshifting ability that can explain almost anything... that's not a bug, it's a feature of that creature's candidacy.

Similarly, if there existed a creature that's "a potted plant that is an official published creature 0.00% made up by Rich and that has 50+ STR and all the abilities needed to explain everything MitD is shown to do in the comic" then this potted plant would currently be one of the front runners too, guaranteed.

Like i said, i can get the argument that its a feature rather than a bug. I disagree, but i see the logic. Its the "it isnt incredibly versatile, well beyond anything else that any other monster can do, and the situations its been put in do give us meaningful information for determining that its a protean, specifically." crowd that i dont get.

[Squire Doodad]

Like i said, i can get the argument that its a feature rather than a bug. I disagree, but i see the logic. Its the "it isnt incredibly versatile, well beyond anything else that any other monster can do, and the situations its been put in do give us meaningful information for determining that its a protean, specifically." crowd that i dont get.

For the most part, that's just the circus scene. The circus scene fits the the Protean like a glove, moreso than most other monsters.
The rest of them are the usual "these are situations that fit the Protean well" with one or two being "these are situations that the Protean can pull off without bending the rules TOO much". It's a good candidate for reasons beyond its shapeshifting, even if that is a noteworthy asset. The Protean stats at its size are nothing to sneeze at.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

It's a good candidate for reasons beyond its shapeshifting

My biggest issue with this is that the protean cannot in fact shapeshift, not in the vernacular sense. Every time someone says the protean is a shapeshifter, or worse the above statement "its sheer ability to just do whatever we need it to in whatever way we want it to" I can't help but think that people are picturing powers equivalent or superior to those of Sabine, who can transform herself and her clothes to look like anyone else. Proteans cannot do that - no matter what bits and pieces they copy, they are always fully recognizable as proteans, boiling masses of flesh everchanging. No amount of alter shape will ever allow a protean to be confused with a dragon.

Beyond that, it seems that no matter how often I point it out, people seem to think that "copy four individual EX powers" means "it can do anything". EX powers are the weakest of the three types (SU, EX, SLA), and often it takes more than four to equate a single other creature - a dragon, for example, has at least seven EX abilities*, covering such things as "crush" and "keen eyesight" but dragon breath - the power I challenged Keltest to reproduce - is SU, and any flame power that is EX and thus can be copied by the protean is likely not going to be at all comparable in terms of area of effect, damage and general stats. Back when the protean first was presented, I didn't understand that distinction, and thought it'd be trivial to find a monster with EX wish. A decade plus after that point, it has become clear that it is amazing we've been able to find a creature that can teleport as an EX at all.

Grey Wolf

*Some colours have even more

[Keltest]

My biggest issue with this is that the protean cannot in fact shapeshift, not in the vernacular sense.

If youre going to contest the use of the word, i challenge you to find a more applicable one. Especially because one of the arguments for the protean requires it to use shapeshifting in the vernacular, at least to a point.

[Xhosant]

I think the caveat is that it isn't trying to pass for a dragon, only complete a number of tasks that a dragon could also complete (without taping into its entire arsenal, too).

In that sense, potential access to every physical-linked ex feature can complete most given tasks, and is certainly beyond our means to recognise the tasks it can't (since it would require knowledge greater than that of finding just one perfect fit creature). And if a creature is able (or not demonstrably unable) to complete any set of tasks, our actual clues don't matter: you could replace them with random different ones and Protean would still not be disprovable.

Don't get me wrong; Protean is the one I'm rooting for personally*, it feels like a thematic fit too. But if another equally perfect fit comes along, that would probably win by default

*Only option I feel more likely is a theoretical 'no physical limbs' creature, but I don't know any like that, so it's a footnote, not a contender.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

I think the caveat is that it isn't trying to pass for a dragon, only complete a number of tasks that a dragon could also complete (without taping into its entire arsenal, too).

But that's not what Keltest claimed when this started. He claimed there is no scenario that the Protean cannot explain ("its sheer ability to just do whatever we need it to in whatever way we want it to"). An empty claim, given he can't use Wish for the escape, cannot breath fire, cannot do any other ability locked behind SLAs or SU abilities, i.e. most powerful abilities, and cannot do more than 4 Ex at once.

I'm not talking about how Protean fits MitD here. I'm just trying establishing this: the claim that "the protean can do anything" is nonsense. It is false. It is a strawman. And I am tired of having to explain this to the same usual suspects over and over, hear them claim otherwise with no evidence they have even bothered to read the damn description of the Alter Ability power they think they are using. So when I say "a protean cannot pass for a dragon" it is not a suggestion MitD is trying to pass for one, it is a simple counterexample to "should any future FBS scenes come up, the protean fits them almost by default". No it doesn't.

Grey Wolf

[b_jonas]

it has become clear that it is amazing we've been able to find a creature that can teleport as an EX at all.

But isn't that what makes it difficult to use the Protean? Now you need not just one epic creature that is not very well-known and OotS never mentioned it, but two: the Protean and the Umbral Blot. Even if the MitD stepped out of the shadows and revealed a coinsantly boiling mess of flesh, and the characters looking at it recognized it as the fabled Protean, they would still have no idea how he could do the Escape, unless they also knew about that there's such a creature as an Umbral Blot, and understand enough about the Protean to know that it can borrow the Umbral Blot's teleport ability without also borrowing the property that its touch disintegrates anything that it touches. Update: at that point, how is it an easier explanation than a templated creature?

You do have a point about the Protean though. You explain why it's not as much a wildcard suggestion as creatures that can cast Wish.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

But isn't that what makes it difficult to use the Protean? Now you need not just one epic creature that is not very well-known and OotS never mentioned it, but two: the Protean and the Umbral Blot. Even if the MitD stepped out of the shadows and revealed a coinsantly boiling mess of flesh, and the characters looking at it recognized it as the fabled Protean, they would still have no idea how he could do the Escape, unless they also knew about that there's such a creature as an Umbral Blot, and understand enough about the Protean to know that it can borrow the Umbral Blot's teleport ability without also borrowing the property that its touch disintegrates anything that it touches.

I am not aware that there is any requirement that the characters recognize MitD's species at all. Indeed, the circus scene strongly suggests that not even wizards should be expected to recognize it (V might still do, of course, because they're nerds on top of being a wizard, and O-Chul might have found the right answer from Azure's most learned scholars, but it might just come to Xykon name-dropping the species during the Reveal). I also see no reason, in- or out-of-story that requires the characters to immediately figure out how MitD saved O-Chul.

GW

[Xhosant]

The protean certainly can't do everything, especially at the same time. No question there.

But considering the task at hand isn't multiple tricks at the same time, the , '4 ex' limit doesn't apply. And we must consider our imperfect knowledge of the complete ex arsenal.

So 'the protean can do anything' is inacurate. 'We can't conclusively disprove the protean can do something, one at a time' is accurate, and I think true.

And since this is a challenge of elimination, where what we are doing is disproving options until one is left standing, the existence of an option where we can at best fail to prove it qualifies is a complication.

[b_jonas]

Grey_Wolf_c: In the first posts, section 2d, in the explanation for "Monster of Legend", "which arguably could explain the escape scene" is probably a typo for some other scene, as in the tower scene or the earthquake.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

But considering the task at hand isn't multiple tricks at the same time, the , '4 ex' limit doesn't apply. And we must consider our imperfect knowledge of the complete ex arsenal.

Again, "the task at hand" as far as I am concerned is Keltest's claim that "should any future FBS scenes come up, the protean fits them almost by default". The '4 Ex, no SU or SLA' most definitely applies. And the latter part, i.e. 'no SU or SLA' applies universally to MitD.

So 'the protean can do anything' is inacurate. 'We can't conclusively disprove the protean can do something, one at a time' is accurate, and I think true.

No, it is not accurate and it is not true. If in the next comic, MitD breathes fire (or acid, or swamp gas, or any other of the variations on dragon breath), protean cannot explain it.

And since this is a challenge of elimination, where what we are doing is disproving options until one is left standing, the existence of an option where we can at best fail to prove it qualifies is a complication.

No, it is not a challenge of elimination. That would require a finite set of options, and we don't have that. There will always be the possibility of another source we have not considered. That is why I look at this as a challenge of classification, rather than elimination. Every creature belongs somewhere in the first post. It's just a matter of poking it with sticks until we figure out where.

Grey_Wolf_c: In the first posts, section 2d, in the explanation for "Monster of Legend", "which arguably could explain the escape scene" is probably a typo for some other scene, as in the tower scene or the earthquake.

Indeed - Tower, I believe, given the reference to strength and defences. Fixed.

Grey Wolf

[Xhosant]

Again, "the task at hand" as far as I am concerned is Keltest's claim that "should any future FBS scenes come up, the protean fits them almost by default". The '4 Ex, no SU or SLA' most definitely applies. And the latter part, i.e. 'no SU or SLA' applies universally to MitD.

Well, unless the scene requires 5 EXs in the same turn, it would fit by default, which fits the 'almost by default' description.

No, it is not accurate and it is not true. If in the next comic, MitD breathes fire (or acid, or swamp gas, or any other of the variations on dragon breath), protean cannot explain it.

The protean couldn't use a literal dragon breath, sure. Are you absolutely certain no monster published before our cutoff date has an EX that is (or looks like, coming from the darkness) an elemental damage breath? No, because you don't know every EX out there. That's the point being made. Protean rarely if ever can be disproven, because there's always the potential of an obscure EX patching the hole. Which isn't as good as naming that EX and proving the Protean fits (and that would be a requirement for a full solution imo) but it's there, and that's the issue at hand.

No, it is not a challenge of elimination. That would require a finite set of options, and we don't have that. There will always be the possibility of another source we have not considered. That is why I look at this as a challenge of classification, rather than elimination. Every creature belongs somewhere in the first post. It's just a matter of poking it with sticks until we figure out where.

The options are finite, just like the sources. We are just unaware of them all. In fact, there exists a Gsheet listing everything by name (but no more useful traits, sadly). Every time a suggestion occurs, it's something we haven't managed to eliminate off-hand (it's obviously not a wolf). If anything, a problem of classification is solved when you have a perfect fit, while a problem of elimination when you have a single contender standing. The MitD is one kind of creature, so if we had 2 perfect fits, the problem would be unresolved.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

The protean couldn't use a literal dragon breath, sure. Are you absolutely certain no monster published before our cutoff date has an EX that is (or looks like, coming from the darkness) an elemental damage breath? No, because you don't know every EX out there. That's the point being made. Protean rarely if ever can be disproven, because there's always the potential of an obscure EX patching the hole. Which isn't as good as naming that EX and proving the Protean fits (and that would be a requirement for a full solution imo) but it's there, and that's the issue at hand.

No, that is not the issue at hand, that is the fallacy of shifting the burden of proof, and the fallacy of proving a negative. If you or Keltest truly want to claim that every SU or SLA power can be reproduced with an EX, that is on you to prove. Everything I have seen is that such a claim is completely unsupported.

The options are finite, just like the sources. We are just unaware of them all.

So they are not finite. This is not math, we do not have infinite time or infinite resources. That if given 10 billion helpers and all the money in the world we could compile a list of every creature ever pusblished is a useless scenario to imagine, because we work with what we have, and given that neither you nor Keltest can even rise to the challenge of "find an EX that matches dragon breath", I do not see a reason to entertain the idea that the search space is finite, when experience tells me it can be treated as infinite. And since it can, this is not "a process of elimination" - as I am tired of repeating, if we did do that, and remove every creature that doesn't fit every clue perfectly to the nth degree, we'd have no creatures anywhere in this thread.

Grey Wolf

[Keltest]

No, that is not the issue at hand, that is the fallacy of shifting the burden of proof, and the fallacy of proving a negative. If you or Keltest truly want to claim that every SU or SLA power can be reproduced with an EX, that is on you to prove. Everything I have seen is that such a claim is completely unsupported.

Youve got a pretty big double standard going here then. If you can reject out of hand the claim that the Protean can provide an explanation for most situations because we cant think of a scenario where it cant, we can reject out of hand your claim that the protean cant duplicate a given ability because you cant think of an ability that it can use.

[Xhosant]

No, that is not the issue at hand, that is the fallacy of shifting the burden of proof, and the fallacy of proving a negative. If you or Keltest truly want to claim that every SU or SLA power can be reproduced with an EX, that is on you to prove. Everything I have seen is that such a claim is completely unsupported.

See, I'm not trying to prove that every SU or SLA can be reproduced by an EX. I'm saying that a really wide gamut of eventual effects can be, so a lot of stuff could be dodged by the idea. I don't even care about the 'shapeshifting peg in a square hole' wording, all I care about and claim is that the Protean's whole negative as an option is that it can always hide behind the fallacy of proving a negative, making it an inherently imperfect, if certainly valid, choice. That an equally perfect match not burdened by this tiebreaker would probably be given precedence. But that is only relevant given a different perfect fit, which we don't (yet) have.

Even scrapping the idea that most stuff can be EX, the remaining pool of clues that won't affect us remains massive and the overwhelming majority.

So they are not finite. This is not math, we do not have infinite time or infinite resources. That if given 10 billion helpers and all the money in the world we could compile a list of every creature ever pusblished is a useless scenario to imagine, because we work with what we have, and given that neither you nor Keltest can even rise to the challenge of "find an EX that matches dragon breath", I do not see a reason to entertain the idea that the search space is finite, when experience tells me it can be treated as infinite. And since it can, this is not "a process of elimination" - as I am tired of repeating, if we did do that, and remove every creature that doesn't fit every clue perfectly to the nth degree, we'd have no creatures anywhere in this thread.

The assumption that no perfect fit exists is a wild one, and frankly a contradiction of your position on an infinite pool of options. If we knew there are no perfect fits, then we could look forward, but as it stands anything in need of stretching is a second-order solution. And even if we want to rethink the interpretation of some of our criteria to avoid total elimination, that's still an elimination problem.

Also, the aforementioned comprehensive list actually exists. Here is my personal copy, since I can't track down the original right now. It's large enough to make a computer struggle. Try applying a few obvious filters (eliminating stuff after the release cutoff date, sizes smaller than medium, editions before 3.0, jungles and warm forest habitats and anything with a CR under a modest 10). Now, there could be some false assumptions to this filtering, but also plenty of duplicates, and that's 1.386 entries. Most of those can be rejected at a glance. This includes high-profile non-cannon stuff too, which you could filter out by canonicity. Raising the CR bar to 15 drops the contenders to 855, raising to 20, 483 (how big is the biggest monster manual?). Some of these pools are big-ish for an individual (even 1386 could be handled in an afternoon of determination with robust sources or knowledge), but we have more than one person here. For all intents and purposes, our option pool is very, very finite.

EDIT: Removing the 'warm forest' disqualifier, probably my weakest choice, this is 1420/875/494 for cr10/15/20, respectively

[Qwertystop]

I would generally say "if something comes up that the Protean can't explain without positing some Extraordinary ability that we haven't found, then the Protean becomes a less-good fit unless we find such a thing". Until then, though, I'm comfortable with it where it is. It could fit a lot of scenes that haven't happened but conceivably might! It could also not fit a lot of other such hypothetical events! We don't know where the line is between the two, but I don't like the idea of pushing a monster down because it might (or might not) fit something that we don't actually know the MitD needs to fit yet.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

I would generally say "if something comes up that the Protean can't explain without positing some Extraordinary ability that we haven't found, then the Protean becomes a less-good fit unless we find such a thing".

This. As evidenced by "Protean can only explain the escape with teleport" rather than, say, "protean explains the escape by positing the existence of a EX Wish ability".

Also, I've been trying to load this "complete" list of monsters for some time now and it is not getting anywhere. Can someone that can load it tell me if the following are listed:

• Flumph
• Xenocrysth
• Athasian Nightmare Beast
• Thor
• Carbosilicate Amorph

I'm attempting to quantify just how incomplete this "complete" list is for the purposes of this thread. That "it must be a D&D monster" is baked in is almost certainly a given (even though this thread does not restrict itself anywhere near as much), but I am wondering how else this restricts the effectively infinite search space to a fake finiteness.

Thanks,

Grey Wolf

[Xhosant]

Here's the original, with a potentially friendlier download link and some explanation of how, why and to what standards it was made, which partially answers your question.

The flumph and Nightmare Beast exist. Does a published statblock for Thor even exist? Is the Xenocryst even native d&d material? Are we even serious on the amorph?

In any case, this is "Echohawk's Complete D&D Monster Index". So if what lets you accept it is the qualification that this is a complete d&d monster list, not a complete every monster list...

All that said, there's nothing good to be said about the attitude with which you put down counter arguments. The infinity claim is factually erroneous, while a 'practically infinite' claim, even if it held sway to the nature of the problem (it doesn't) is hardly accurate. 10.000 entries is less than 30 man-hours to go through (and with over 10 active posters and 16 years of work, that's trivial - an evening's work). Not even close to impossible to process 'infinite'.

[Bilbo Baggins]

Maybe I'm missing something, but... if MitD is a protean, how many of the scenes we've seen so far *actually* require a lucky transformation for a specific monster ability? As far as I'm aware it's just the escape scene.

Sure, you can argue that the protean's shape-shifting could make it fit almost any potential scene, and if we had several scenes that can only be explained by certain specific shape-shifting I'd agree that it would weaken the case for the protean. But given what we have, that seems like a strawman. Most of the scenes fit with the protean because of protean-specific characteristics, not because of lucky transformations to acquire certain monster abilities

[Grey_Wolf_c]

The flumph and Nightmare Beast exist.

The Nightmare Beast is different from the Atahsian Nightmare Beast

Does a published statblock for Thor even exist?

Yes

Is the Xenocryst even native d&d material?

Irrelevant. It is a proposal.

Are we even serious on the amorph?

Yes.

In any case, this is "Echohawk's Complete D&D Monster Index". So if what lets you accept it is the qualification that this is a complete d&d monster list, not a complete every monster list...

And if this thread was limited to D&D monsters you might have a point. But it is not, and therefore you don't. The search space continues to be effectively infinite.

All that said, there's nothing good to be said about the attitude with which you put down counter arguments. The infinity claim is factually erroneous, while a 'practically infinite' claim, even if it held sway to the nature of the problem (it doesn't) is hardly accurate. 10.000 entries is less than 30 man-hours to go through (and with over 10 active posters and 16 years of work, that's trivial - an evening's work). Not even close to impossible to process 'infinite'.

This thread does not limit itself to D&D creatures. Therefore the claim that we are dealing with a limited set of creatures is false, as I told you from the start. Yes, there isn't in fact infinite possibilities, but the experience is that even after 10 years and hundreds of participants, there are still pockets of creatures that are new to this thread, such as the Xenocrysth, and I will not artificially limit the search space because this is not an exclusionary, eliminatory process, but a classification process. All it takes is one creature being proposed from outside that list, and I was able to come up with 5 just off the top of my head. Your approach might be useful for you, but it is not useful for this thread.

Grey Wolf

[Schroeswald]

I’ve seen suggestions about limiting our list based on being native to D&D, unfortunately I’ve both seen people insist that it absolutely has to be a D&D creature because it’s a D&D webcomic and also almost as many insist that if it was a D&D creature we’d have found it by now (or other better logic I forgot) therefore it can’t be a D&D creature.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

I’ve seen suggestions about limiting our list based on being native to D&D, unfortunately I’ve both seen people insist that it absolutely has to be a D&D creature because it’s a D&D webcomic and also almost as many insist that if it was a D&D creature we’d have found it by now (or other better logic I forgot) therefore it can’t be a D&D creature.

Indeed. This is one of those perennial topics that, whatever my personal opinion on them is, has to be overridden by my position as curator. There is no definitive answer to "is MitD a D&D monster?", and I cannot possibly stop people from suggesting creatures from outside, not just because it'd be literally against the rules of curatorship, but because the reality is that a lot of non-D&D creatures have been proposed over the years.

The best argument in favour of it, as far as I understand and believe, for what is worth, is that "~#100, OotS was a very D&D-centric comic, and Rich is unlikely to have picked a creature from outside D&D for his D&D comic"

The best argument against it, under the same conditions, is that "~#100, OotS was a very D&D-centric comic with a very D&D-centric readership, and Rich might have figured that it'd be a curve ball to import a character from outside to make the guessing game last".

As far as I can tell, it is undecidable.

GW

[Edreyn]

Sorry for posting my question in the middle of discussion, but we have only one thread for MitD. Probably somewhat late to ask, but I still do want to do it.

Page 1189

Can those two creatures that are hidden\invisible and we only "hear" them be related to MitD? I see similarity here, even it still gives no explanation of MitD or invisible creatures nature.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Can those two creatures that are hidden\invisible and we only "hear" them be related to MitD? I see similarity here, even it still gives no explanation of MitD or invisible creatures nature.

Any answers about those two at this point are pure speculation. I doubt it, myself, mostly on the basis I expect them to be Serini-related, but it is an opinion based on speech patterns & patterns, i.e. practically without base.

Grey Wolf

[b_jonas]

Also, the aforementioned comprehensive list actually exists. Here is my personal copy, since I can't track down the original right now.

Can someone that can load it tell me if the following are listed:

I downloaded it and opened the local copy on my spiffy new computer. I didn't try to open it in browser with Google Spreadsheets, because that's a terrible resource hog that makes even small tables hard to load. The list does look quite impressive. It has 34025 monster entries. A separate table lists its 4438 sources (801 magazine issues, 622 novels, 541 miniature products, 424 adventures, 262 webpages, etc), the first one of which predates D&D (Chainmail: Rules for Medieval Miniatures (1971)). Page numbers are listed besides the sources, to make it easy to find the entries within the sources. Someone must have spent a lot of time maintaining this list. The latest source is from 2011, but most sources are from 2009 the latest. Xenocrysth, Thor, Carbosilicate Amorph don't have entries. Here are the entries for the Flumph and Carbosiliate Amorph.

Spoiler: Extract from the big table

Show

From index

Rules	Canon	Setting	Release	Source	Page	URL	Entry	Monster	Size	Origin	Type	Keywords	Level	Role	XP	Subtypes	Class	Environment	CR	LA	Classify 1	Classify 2	Classify 3	Classify 4	Classify 5	Alternative names
AD&D2	A	Generic	1995.12	Monstrous Compendium Annual Volume Two	58		Monster	Flumph, Monastic	Tiny									Any dark			Flumph	Monastic
AD&D2	A	Generic	1995.12	Monstrous Compendium Annual Volume Two	58		Monster	Flumph, Common	Tiny									Any dark			Flumph
D&D3.5	N	Generic	2005.12	Tome of Horrors Revised	200		Monster	Flumph	Small		Aberration							Underground	1		Flumph
D&D3.5	B	Generic	2005.01	Dungeon #118	30		Monster	Flumph	Tiny		Aberration							Any temperate or underground	1	+2	Flumph
AD&D	A	Generic	1981.12	Fiend Folio	39		Monster	Flumph	Small												Flumph
AD&D2	B	Generic	1998.04	Dragon #246	76		Ecology	The Ecology of the Flumph													Flumph
D&D3	J	Generic	2002.11	Tome of Horrors	139		Monster	Flumph	Small		Aberration							Any underground	1		Flumph
D&D3	P	Generic	2001.07	Creature Catalogue		http://www.enworld.org/cc/converted/aberration/flumph.htm	Monster	Flumph	Small		Aberration							Any underground	2		Flumph
D&D3.5	O	Dark Sun	2008.01	Legends of Athas	111	http://www.athas.org/products/LoA/documents/36	Monster	Nightmare Beast, Athasian	Gargantuan		Magical Beast					Psionic			22		Nightmare Beast	Athasian

From sources table

Release	Source Title	Series	No.	Publisher	Product Code	Type of Product	Rules	Canon	Setting	Web page/notes
1995.12	Monstrous Compendium Annual Volume Two			TSR	2158	Softcover monster collection	AD&D2	A	Generic
2005.12	Tome of Horrors Revised			Necromancer Games	-	Hardcover monster collection	D&D3.5	N	Generic
2005.01	Dungeon #118			Paizo Publishing	-	Magazine	D&D3.5	B	Various
1981.12	Fiend Folio			TSR	2012	Hardcover monster collection	AD&D	A	Generic
1998.03	Dragon #245			TSR	-	Magazine	AD&D2	B	Various
1998.05	Dragon #247			TSR	-	Magazine	AD&D2	B	Various
2002.11	Tome of Horrors			Necromancer Games	WW08387	Hardcover monster collection	D&D3	J	Generic
1986.10	Creature Catalogue	AC	9	TSR	9173	Accessory	OD&D	A	(Mystara)
2008.12	Creature Catalogue			ENWorld	-	Web site	D&D3.5	P	Generic	http://www.enworld.org/cc
2008.01	Legends of Athas			Athas.org	-	Electronic accessory	D&D3.5	O	Dark Sun	http://www.athas.org/products/LoA/documents/36

Note: Dragon #246 is not in the sources table, so I copied the two adjacent issues. There's an additional table, not shown here, explaining the "Canon" column in the sources table.

Update:

10.000 entries is less than 30 man-hours to go through

6 seconds per finding clues in a monster entry in printed magazines of which you can't find copies on the internet? I don't think you're such a fast reader, so good luck. But reading isn't the only hard part, getting the sources is. (The table that Xhosant linked to has over 23000 entries from 2004-09 or earlier.) Also none of us are payed for our time searching the MitD, and the chance for balloons isn't enough payment.

Update:

Here's the original, with a potentially friendlier download link and some explanation of how, why and to what standards it was made, which partially answers your question. […] "Echohawk's Complete D&D Monster Index".

Thank you for the authoritive link.

[Xhosant]

The Nightmare Beast is different from the Atahsian Nightmare Beast

Yep, athasian nightmare beast. But also the regular one. It's listed as Nightmare Beast, Athasian though

And if this thread was limited to D&D monsters you might have a point. But it is not, and therefore you don't. The search space continues to be effectively infinite.

In that case, I stand corrected. In an unlimited search space, the options are close enough to infinite, while we can both agree that the D&D searchspace isn't and can be exhausted, right?
(Personally, I'll operate on the assumption that we're D&D exclusive due to my perception of odds and of fair play on Rob's part, but I'll take note that this isn't the policy).