The Mind Flayer has been around since the beginning of Dungeons & Dragons, and many know the Mind Flayer to be a part of the Illithids, a race of super-intelligent aberrations who believe themselves to be the dominant species of the multiverse. They consume brains, they have tentacles, and they create thralls of lesser species, one would be forgiven if you referred to them as the spawn of the Great Old Ones like Cthulhu. In fact, Gary Gygax created the Mind Flayers and was inspired by the cover artwork for the book The Burrowers Beneath by Brian Lumley. The book series is about fighting against the Great Old Ones and their worshipers, so it makes plenty of sense for why the Mind Flayers resemble those Lovecraftian horrors.

OD&D - Mind Flayer

No. Appearing: 1-4

Armor Class: 5

Move: 12”

Hit Dice: 8 + 3

% in Lair: 50%

No. of Attacks: 4 tentacles

Damage/Attack: special (plus special)

Treasure: F

The Mindflayer makes its first appearance in The Strategic Review #1 (Spring 1975), a short-lived magazine that was the precursor to Dragon Magazine. The Mind Flayer is the first monster created for the magazine and is described as super-intelligent, but not only are they intelligent, their brains are so powerful that they can attack the minds of others with their Mind Blast ability. For most people of average intelligence, this is going to stun you or make you fall asleep, for those that aren’t very intelligent, it could kill you immediately while the most intelligent may have their minds destroyed as if they were suffering from the effects of a feeblemind spell.

Standing as tall as the average human, these creatures could never be mistaken for one. Above its mouth, the Mind Flayer has four tentacles that are its primary method of attack that have the ability to penetrate through your head and eat your brain. While the article does not describe how the tentacle “penetrates”, we can only imagine that it is a lot like how the ancient Egyptians would remove brains by pulling it out through the nose with a metal stick. Of course, there are major differences, like with the Egyptians it’s a dead body and with a Mind Flayer you are still alive and probably screaming.

The Mind Flayer makes it into an official publication in 1976 with the release of the Eldritch Wizardry supplement. This supplement contains a whole slew of new rules for Dungeons & Dragons including class information for the druid, demons and devils, and a new magic system known as psionics. Unfortunately, psionics is a huge mess to get into, but just know that the Mind Flayer is a very powerful psion and will ruin everyone’s day if you stumble across one of them, let alone up to four of them at a single time.

AD&D - Mind Flayer