The first edition AD&D Monster Manual was published in 1977. While it has a few forgettable entries, it's mostly wall-to-wall iconic D&D monsters: dragons, devils and demons, giants, the classic humanoids, the classic undead, and on and on.
The Fiend Folio came out in 1981. Most of its entries have been justifiably forgotten, but it codified enduring monsters like the kuo-toa, slaadi, githyanki and githzerai. (Oh, and the flumph. Huzzah.)
The Monster Manual II came out in 1983. It contributed a large number of monsters which have stood the test of time, including aboleths, myconids, duergar, modrons, devas, yuan-ti and the Tarrasque. Like the Fiend Folio, many of its entries had previously been published elsewhere.
And then ... nothing?
I was looking through my old books the other day, and thinking about the ongoing fifth edition release, and I suddenly realized that every single monster that I think of as being iconic to D&D appeared in one of those three books. The only clear exception that I could come up with is the dracolich, which according to Wikipedia showed up in 1986 in an Ed Greenwood article in Dragon magazine. Any other potential exceptions have big metaphorical asterixes beside them - such as the tiefling (1994) and warforged (2004), which I'd consider iconic, but which were introduced as PC races.
Even looking at the list in the last of James Wyatt's Wandering Monsters columns, the only post-1983 entries are Chuul, Shield Guardian, Tiefling and Foulspawn. With the exception of the Tiefling, I wouldn't really consider any of those to be iconic.
I'm not surprised that the majority of iconic monsters come from that era. Most of them are taken from myth and legend, and by 1983 they had nine years of creative work by tons of people to choose from. But it does suprise me that in the thirty-one years since then, the exploding fields of tabletop and computer fantasy RPGs, and fantasy literature, have barely contributed anything new to the list.
So what do you guys think? Obviously it's incredibly subjective whether a monster is iconic or not, but what have I missed? What great twenty-first century monsters am I forgetting or wrongly failing to grant iconic status?
Drop Bear from D20 modern?
Setting specific stuff, like Daelkyr from Eberron.
But, honestly, there aren't new iconic monsters because monsters are variations and manifestations of our common collective fears. It's too well-tread. Which is why stuff that departs fe that - fiend folio etx - gets forgotten.
The thing to do is examine a fear, anthropomorphize it, and make it terrifying or horrifying in presentation. Do the work, and create something iconic. Or be satisfied with thousands of years of refinement & variation on "monster that eats humans."
Well, I think the issue is fairly simple.
Most of the early monsters were taken from myth and legend. Any the European mythology was more or less tapped out fairly quickly. And, to be frank, a lot of the Asian mythological monsters were either sort of lame (rakasha, vanara, kappa, tengu, naga... they are all just.. well... furries) or were described phenominally powerful and unique. And they have all been done sooner or later anyhow.
Then after the original D&D tapped out the mythology, they had to fill the void with something. Honestly, the big monster crazes of the 50s-60s and the 80s served them sort of well. A lot of the weird monsters they came up with... they.... didn't exactly come up with. They used weird monsters plastic models being sold to kids as "dinosaurs" or "prehistoric creatures" or such. I mean, their level of creativity kind of boils down to if they had ahold of some godzilla/ultraman/super sentai toys and thought they were the size of bears and then, having never seen the original production (technically, it never existed) asked themselves what weird things those monsters might do. And those became iconic monsters.
But, okay.. could that be done now? Hmm... maybe. Of course, now it seems all ideas of monster designs are either just boring combinations of things or are turned out by companies as highly recognizeable and strongly marketed, branded and copyrighted goods. So.... yeah... while someone could try to turn Pokemon into monsters for D&D or something... I think one would just end up in legal trouble for their efforts.
Putting that aside, the other pressure has been that well.... they has been strong resistance against creativity in general when it comes to D&D. And its not totally understandable. People who play the game are familiar with certain monsters and demand them first and foremost-- anything else is a niche at best. And when new ideas are turned out, for the most part they have very little appeal. And, that's not surprising, having gone through those early monster manuals there were a lot of crappy ideas in them as well. WAAAAAAAY too many humanoid races that I don't think ever would have existed beyond a single encounter or a village somewhere...
And, then there is the change in direction. While the concepts for monsters might have been strong in those early days, the way they worked was unbearably boring.
For instance... you could have an orc. In the old days that meant the orc had exactly 1d8 hit points, swung an axe for 1d8 damage and they were all identical with damn near identical equipment and identical armor... unless you had enough to warrant a chief or king in which case they might have a few more d8 of hit points.
That's how they all worked-- only difference between kobolds and goblins and orcs and hobgoblins and lizardmen and gnolls was that they increased in hit points in that order from the weakest to the strongest and as you leveled you'd fight one after the other and after you passed a level, the weakest would just outright vanish from the world.
But now? Now Orcs are seen more as an active part of the world. Now you can have 4 different versions of orcs that fight in 4 different ways and meld together as a fully functional battle unit. And one could well fight against Orcs at every single level of the game.
Or, another example....
If I was given the task of "create a dinosaur race"-- well, I am going to look at what the most advanced dinosaurs looked like and jump off from there. They have long, flexible necks, hunched over bodies, hands that have 3 fingers and a thumb as well as feet with three forward facing toes and a backwards facing toe and they can grasp things with their feet as well as they can their hands, they would have feathers for hair and probably not just on their head, but dow their necks and on their arms and legs as well. They would have long tails and look a bit like raptors, but look clearly more intelligent with larger brains.
But they go and design a dinosaur people?
Well, they just go and stick the heads of the 4 most well known dinosaur people haphazardly onto human bodies with tails and depending on which head was stuck on the body, that determines which of the 4 base classes the ENTIRE SUBRACE of that dinosaur people are.
Darksun is a veritable cornucopia of new monsters, and Darksun didn't come out until 91. Almost all the creatures in darksun are unique, or strange takes on stock fantasy creatures. I think what drives monster creation these days isn't so much generic monsters, as setting specific things. That said we have had a serious setting draught with WotC, usually they focus exclusively on FR and Ebberon, Darksun got a bit of love in 4th, but other than that we have seen the setting faucet turned off with just a steady drip of FR leaking through.
D&D did have a vew unique creatures early on that have become iconic like the rust monster, bulette and owlbear.
These 3 where actualy based on cheap toys form a prehistoric animal pack containint 14 figures ( and totaly not historivly accurate)
They had the models first then just made up stats for them.
Maybe would be fun to start looking the cheap toys on offer now to find something that can become a D&D Monster.
Or to make up some stats for other creatures from the set that haven't been used.
D&D has lots of new monsters.. but to become popular and iconic it takes time.
New iconic monsters? the dragoborn, half-dragons and the shadar-kais.
tehsquirrely wrote:
Hmmm, all I can think of is the Giant Space Hamster. That was, er, late 80s/early 90s?
1eejit wrote:
Hebitsuikaza wrote:
edwin_su wrote:
I liked the Boneclaw, which I think first appeared in 3e. The Dave Allsop illusration was awesome, and the idea of a large undead who's claws twitch and lengthen to 10 feet before quickly contracting is really cool. Another great one was the Atropal, which 4e changed a lot, but it still was a great and creepy undead horror.
Also, 4e created the Banderhobb. Great monster, IMO.
Darksun does indeed have some awesome monsters, but, yeah...They aren't 'iconic' Euro-centric D&D fantasy beasts.
Of course, no one can forget that D&D dragons are iconic as well. The original 5 chromatics and 5 metallics are quite unique, and their depictions have become standardized with 3e and 4e.
D&D still has the best fantasy/TTRPG monsters. Even if there aren't too many 'new' ones. Fact is, humans already made up pretty much every cool creepy monster over the past several thousand years. There's not much more to do in that area, really. I hope the 5e MM (and inevitable MM 2) keep adding classics, some more 'multi-cultural' creatures ( ie: Africa, pre-columbian America, and south east Asia are FULL of bizzarre creatures that haven't been seen all over RPGs yet), and a few new ones, like 4e's invention: the Banderhobb. VIdeo games also manage to make up outstandingly beautiful new monsters. Look at any Final Fantasy game, for example.
I do not really consider Tieflings, Dragonborn, Shadar Kai as iconic. Some races are iconic to settings (DB Nerath, Tieflings Planescape, Halkf Giants DS) but not really iconic to D&D as a whole. I would go as far to say if a monster/race/class was not in 1st ed it has not been around long enough to be considered iconic.
Luis_Carlos wrote:
I completely agree with you. Completely. I think the problem lies with the gaming community who have become cynical and argumentative--see any forum on this site. What you and I think is cool will look uncool to someone else becasue the eyes are in the wrong place or it has too many arms or it's abilities make it too weak/strong, thus sparking the inevitable debate. And so begins the reasons why and why not the new proposed monster is cool/not cool. On rare occasions there will be a monster or two that will satisfy most of the community but that will be a a rare occasion indeed. Look at how much debate there is on the current artwork. Some despise it and some love it. New monsters will fare no better I fear but I agree that we are overdue for some new cool monsters that in 15-20 years will be considered iconic.
When did bebiliths come out? 2e?
Yeah I think those first three AD&D monster books were def the high water mark, and its mostly been a bunch of rehashing and reinventing since then.
Even though they came out in 1st edition, the Dragonlance draconians are kind of iconic and I don't think they appeared in any of the monster manuals.
pauln6 wrote:
pauln6 wrote:
For me it seems thet they have done pretty well with introducing new humanoid racesover the editions.
But when it comes to monsterous creatures there aren't that many that realy stood out.
seti wrote:
Things like the inevitables, from manual of the planes (1987) are iconic, but certainly not as iconic as the beholder, rust monster, or owlbear.
I think your correct in saying that the 'monsters' from more recent times that seem iconic are player character races. Perhaps the reason is that those initial iconic monsters defined something of what the game was. Monsters that came later were always in addition to that original batch. Official player character races (defined in PHBs) were very slow to change, and so the newer races introduced in the last 15 years have been able to define the game like some of those first monsters, and so have become more iconic. Also, since the races of a world define who constitutes that worlds *people*, they would seem more iconic.
Interestingly, the Pathfinder game, since it is not able to use many of the iconic D&D races such as beholders, or mindflayers, has ended up creating a vast number of creatures that have become semi-iconic, such as the Lovecraftan monsters and gremlins.
Warforged and Dragonborn have certainly gained quite a bit of traction since their introduction in 3E.
To players BXCMI D&D, rakastas, living statues, manscorpoans, blackballs, thouls, nuckalavee and nightshades are pretty iconic. They're among some of the creatures that I whish had been ported over to AD&D when I switched over (they eventually did with Mystara MC codex, but that was waaaay late into 2e). I'd love to see all these and more in 5e.
edwin_su wrote:
I so want a set of those. 
I always liked the feyir / fheyir. From 2e and the 3.0 MM2
I think the problem is that people make two types of monsters for Monster Manuals: updates of classic 1e foes and new monsters. Every designer wants to make a new classic, but no one updates monsters from the previous edition.
There are likely some great 2e and 3e beasts just begging for an update.
Pathfinder has been exploring all sorts of monsters from literatures and world mythology. Shingamai, Lovecraftian monsters, creatures from the writings of Lewis Carrol (flavors of bandersnatch, jubjub birds, etc.), gremlins, etc.. The only reason these monsters are less than iconic is that there are now so many monsters that any given one is lost in the weight of information overload.
That may be the case with all new D&D monsters. As the number of monsters increase, the impact that any given one can have becomes more limited.
And yet there are monsters in the original monster manual that didn't become iconic. Shedu. Su-monsters. Leucrotta. Kirins. Heck, Sphinxes, while mythological icons, are not really iconic to D&D. Likewise Lepricauns. Bugbears are a good example of a monsters that is not iconic, at least when comparred to gnolls, goblins, orcs, trolls, hobgoblins, lizardmen, or troglodytes. The hapless bugbear is still present, but it is an afterthought. If 5e accidentally forgot to include bugbears, it would be sad for the big, quiet, fuzzy goblinoids, but the game would still be D&D. Not so if you left out, say, lizard folk. If you left out lizard folk, people would be like, !??!@(@!!? No lizard folk?!?! They were TSR's logo dammit!
Ixachachitl.
I have no idea what book they were in first or when they were printed, I just like spelling it.
On-topic: I think you're right. The newer monster manuals have focused more on inventing awesome specific creatures, instead of awesome kinds of creatures. (Like, for example, that monster that's a moon from 4E's MM3 whose name I cannot remember at the moment). I actually can't think of a monster from 3E or 4E that was outright new in the way the owlbear or the beholder were new to me when I first read the 2E MM; even those monsters that I had not read D&D stats for before were monsters from mythology that I had heard of before.
We need some new monsters that are actually new. Like tyrannosaurs in F-14's.
Hm. Tapping into the fears of people, eh?
Let me give this a go... I'm using the stat block format from the playtest, since I don't have the Starter Set and thus don't really have the current stat blocks.
Slender
Medium Monstrosity
Armor Class: 17
Hit Points: 110 (10d8+60)
Speed: 30 ft., climb 30 ft., see Unseen Movement
Senses: Blindsight 30 ft., low light vision
Str: 22 (+6) Dex: 24 (+7) Con: 22 (+6)
Int: 14 (+2) Wis: 18 (+4) Cha: 20 (+5)
Alignment: Neutral Evil
Languages: Common. Can understand, and be understood by, any child.
Traits:
Proficiencies. Slenders are proficient in Stealth (+11), Perception (+8), and Insight (+9).
Hide in Shadows. A Slender can hide even if only lightly obscured.
Unseen Movement. If a Slender is not seen by any other creature, it can, as a move, teleport up to 100 feet. It must be able to see its destination, but does not need line of effect for this movement. The destination must be a location where the Slender would be allowed to hide. When the Slender teleports in this way, it brings along any creature it has grabbed.
Attacks:
Multiattack. The Slender makes two attacks, in any combination of Snatch and Tentacle attacks.
Snatch. +10 to hit (reach 5 feet, one creature of Medium size or smaller). Hit: 2d6+6 bludgeoning damage, and the creature is grabbed. The Slender may immediately attempt to hide, using the creature as cover.
Tentacle. +10 to hit (reach 15 feet, one creature). Hit: 3d4+6 bludgeoning damage, and the creature is pulled 10 feet toward the Slender.
I'm not sure what level or XP value to apply here, and the creature's thrown together. Anyone want to poke it?
Avocat wrote:
DLfan wrote:
ankiyavon wrote:
TiaNadiezja wrote:
bawylie wrote:
TiaNadiezja wrote:
Leugren wrote:
This is still the most iconic thing I've seen in a long time.
TiaNadiezja wrote:
The brainstealer dragon could be a iconic monster...
The warforged from Eberron are iconic, because we can use different creatures from different settins for our own worlds.
The thoon cult and the zerns from the last MM could be a iconic monster in the future.
Warforged, to me, were the icon of 3.5 to me - but Ebberon was my favorite setting, and my DM loved warfoged (not in a force them into every game and sesion way, more like a self-identify with them kind of way) to the point that we joked that she was ForgedKin (joke on Warforged and OtherKin).
I love warforged, even though I never DMed or played in Eberron. The concept is awesome; as are their 3.5/4e racial crunch.
Sorry the pic is so small, but...Here's the warforged rap group.
That's MC Gearbox, Hamma Yo Face, and Skinny Piston. They're like the Wu Tang of Eberron.
Sharktipede
Not sure where it originates, but would love to see it make the list as a new D&D iconic.
seti wrote:
seti wrote:
The Algoid (1st Ed Fiend Folio) is iconic for me, one of my first encounters back in the day.
Also, the Grell is a bit iconic, the big splash page, again, in the 1st Ed Fiend Folio.
I have converted many monsters to 5th Ed in the last year, my first ones to convert were the alignment exemplar monsters (Archons, Eladrins, Guardinals, Modrons, Slaadi, Rilmani, Devils, Demons, Daemons/Yugoloths), I can't wait to get my hands on the MM and DMG, so I can do some final editing.
I will be converting the algoid (it really is an interesting concept for a monster).
Oh, oh, Catoblepas is very iconic (that picture alone) to me (I converted that bad boy).
(awesome beats.)
MC Gear Box: (Baritone) Ah got mad steel; keepin' it real,
- It's gonna get sureal; if ya'll don't feel.
- My people; by my honor I seal.
(interrupt)
Hammer Yo Face: (Tenor) Distruction is my game; Sh*t has no name,
- Muthaf**kers play it all the same.
- The Sharn 'thorities ain't got no game.
(again, interrupt)
Skinny Piston: (Tremelo) Rage unchain'd; we do feel pain,
- Forced were we, to fight on the plain,
- hard as it was; we kept it sane.
- Died in the rain, there was nothing to gain.
( more awesome beats.)
All as a Chorus:
- Clink, Clank...we know the game
- F**k; it's always the same
- Clink, Clank...F**k all this shame
- Warforged will not be tamed
- Clink, Clank... we got no name
- Warforged; you can't explain...
Anyway, LMAO....more lyrics....better lyrics...please.
Nobody’s mentioned pegatuars yet..
Elves are cool. Winged elves are cooler. Winged centaur elves are even cooler-er.
Wish I knew how to post pics.
Artifact wrote:
Don't forget twiglings.
Twig blights were from 3e, and made it into both 4e and now the Starter Set of 5e.
Why? Well, a small plant creature works, and the idea of a violent shrub is fun.
But the real reason? Minis.
Despite being a rare solitary creature in 3e, twig blight had a common mini. And it was easily the most common in the set, being small with simple paint. They offset the cost of other minis so were super common; anyone who bought more than a couple packs ended up with several if the little critters.
So the creature became a minion in 4e, so people could use the 4-8 twig blights they had. And they've stuck around since.
The only new iconics have been dragonborn, warforged, and tieflings really. It is a bit tragic all told, though to be fair Kenku and Kobolds have changed significantly since 2nd edition; 3rd/4th edition Kobolds have almost no resemblance to the previous incarnation.
So there have been a handful of new iconic creatures.
Luis_Carlos wrote:
The_Jester wrote:
What monster personifies our current fear of invasion and lack of privacy?
Staccat0 wrote:
leo9sign wrote:
While I don't think there haven't been any new iconic monsters since 1983 (Tieflings to name one), I do agree that they have been few and far inbetween. I honestly think it reflect a fundamental shift in the gaming and DND subculture that happened during the 1980s that was overlooked at the time. 1983 is just before the DND fad hit it's highest peak which would last until about 1990 or so (more or less)....yet it was then that gaming groups and gaming culture (at least TTRPG culture) became more insular, less open, and less accepting of new people and frankly ideas [at least DND did....game design flowered during the 1990s but it did so in the realm of computer games and third party RPGs]. Let's be frank. DND as a game basically ossified from about 1985 until 1999 and the dawn of 3e [with a notable but badly failed experiment with the Player's Options late in 2e]. I realize that seems harsh, but it's really accurate: If you took a character sheet or even a campaign from say 1980 and then forwarded in time and tried to use it in a 1995 ADnD 2e campaign, you could with only very minor (and often just cosmetic) changes. What's more a 1995 DM could look at the 1980 sheet and recognize it for what it was and easily translate it over. Now go just ten years forward after that, and none of that is true.
Sorry about being longwinded, but I really do think the reason we haven't seen a lot of iconic monsters since 1983 is because that's when the overall DND culture changed [a bit after but it's a decent ballpark] and IMO not for the better.
-Polaris
Brimleydower wrote:
TiaNadiezja wrote:
It has a pretty powerful ability called Catch With Pants Down
What about the "Flying spegehetti monster"? I mean the flumph.
It's a great observation. There have been plenty of new monsters in D&D over the years but they just haven't become iconic. The other problem is that with each new edition the deisgners are playing catch-up for several years. They usually spend most of their time on conversios or npc creation.
I also think that past editions have explored just about everything already. I mean just look at all the monsters in 2e. http://www.lomion.de/cmm/_index.php
Orzel wrote:
dmgorgon wrote:
TiaNadiezja wrote:
edwin_su wrote:
alienux wrote:
Looked through the Monsterous Manual for monsters not from 1e that were okay and found:
Argos (from Spelljammer)
Broken One (Ravenloft)
Crawling Claw (Forgotten Realms)
Deepspawn
Eyewing
Feyr
Gargantua aka the kaijin (from Kara Tur)
Gremlin
Hatori
Wereraven
Manscorpion
Crimson Death (the mist)
Vampiric mist
Neogi
I'll have to skim my 3e books sometime.
Dunno if 4e added many new iconic monsters to the pool, but it did add a large array of more flavorful/interesting versions of classics through the various named versions (e.g. Poisonscale Needler vs Lizardman). 1e+ may give one handy archetypes but I find the 4e versions more fun/interesting to play with.
zgrose wrote:
I feel like D&D writers unjustly leave the cornucopia of monsters found in other cultures untapped simply because they aren't familiar with said cultures. Broadening horizons broadens creativity! In Japan alone, there's an invisible wall monster that can move and extend itself nigh infinitely (nurikabe); an undead whale god accompanied by strange birds, fish, and even islands (bakekujira); and foxes so old they become sorcerous, can shapeshift, and cast spells (the most tails they have are 9, like 1 for each level of spell they can cast!). Really, there are some surreal Native American monsters too, like giant heads that roll or fly around eating people, but I could go on and on...
Existing D&D monsters like the raggamoffyn/executioner's hood/sheet phantom, vargouille, and flameskull may be based off the ittan momen, a type of Malaysian vampire (there are many, varied kinds), and onibi, respectively. Kenku is obviously based off the wizard-warrior-ascetic tengu.
Some monsters operate in ways not easily measured in D&D rules: Medieval European scipods and push-me-pull-mes, and the Japanese shirime and rokurokubi, but giant snails made it in, so they're worth a try! Other curiosities, like plants that birth animals or grow fruit that looks human, that could be in D&D as NPCs or magical ingredients, rather than combatants, but even Alraune, a similar being, has been made into a typical combat monster in many video games.
Some monsters' obscurity to D&D puzzles me. Cat-o-Nine Tails, a monster that splits into 9 separate creatures and rejoins, or Guardian Familiar, which comes back larger and scarier each time it died (for its 9 lives) have neat mechanics behind them (like many 1e monsters, actually) and not entirely uniconic forms. And why aren't (Greek) hundred-armed giants and (Medieval European) blemmyes well-known in D&D?
Dreamstryder wrote: