Illithid Nightmarish alien invaders from another time and place, illithid typically live in societies of their own kind, hidden away from the light of the sun. They feed on the brain matter of living creatures, preferably the grey cells of other sapient beings, to sustain themselves and fuel their strange and unnatural powers. Notorious as the "mind flayers" on dozens of worlds, the illithid are possessed of a desire to dominate and master all things around themselves, and they famously use their advanced mental powers to force other beings into thralldom. Still, members of illithid-kind can and do take up the adventuring life, from time to time, though almost always under rare and extraordinary circumstances. Leaving the collective networked intelligence of their own kind diminishes any illithids that brave the outside world, severely reducing the potency of most of their natural psychic powers. Most illithids encountered outside their citadels and outposts are either spies, renegades unwelcome in their communities, or have been banished for crimes even their alien moralities find unspeakable. Physical Description An illithid resembles a human in basic body structure, but taller and much more slender. Its skin is some cool color, such as pale green, mauve, or sky blue, and when it is well-fed, its body is coated in a thin film of mucus. Its skin is smooth and completely hairless, with a tall, sloping cranium, two roughly-humanoid eyes, and four long, coiling tendrils concealing an alien mouth evolved to open the skulls of other creatures and feed on their contents. History Illithid history is long and frightening, but most of it is of little relevance to any beings besides the illithids themselves. What is relevant is that, if their records are to be believed, the illithids are the descendants of temporal refugees, fleeing a mass slave revolt on the part of their various slave-races, including the grimlocks, the kuo-toa, and both subraces of the gith, in a time and place that have yet to exist. The most powerful cities of their kind ceaselessly plot ways to prevent the future they fled from coming to pass, but most are preoccupied with their own pursuits. Society Illithids live in vast, subterrainian cities full of thralls, often outnumbered ten-to-one or more by their mental slaves. Their culture reveres the Elder Brains, ancient, ageless beings they believe represent the collective personalities and identities of their kind. Illithids offer themselves up to its mass when they near the end of their lifespans, hoping to be absorbed into titantic intellect of the Brain. It is a closely guarded secret that the Elder Brains only consume the knowledge of their wards, with everything else being simply discarded and lost with the death of the body. Young illithids derive their personalities and emotional capacities from contact with strange crystals, containing the thought-impressions of previous illithids. This is the reason for the infamously cold and pitiless illithid temperament and personality: illithids normally do not feel any sort of positive emotion more powerful than a kind of sadistic, spiteful pleasure at the pain and submission of another creature. Thus, because the devices that teach young illithids cannot imprint on them the full spectrum of emotionality, they grow up to build another set of such flawed devices for the next generation. Illithids who have spent long periods of time among other races of beings, devoid of the company of other illithids, are often mind-wiped or otherwise mentally scanned when they return to the networked intelligence of their community, to purge the outside influences that may have colored their thoughts and made them more like the surface creatures. Illithids' alien nature makes them particularly resistant to magical forces and effects, and they regard the use of magic as aberrant and disdainful. All of their kind found studying arcane powers are shunned by their peers, and many are exiled from the community. Illithids consume the brain matter of living (or at least recently-living) creatures to sustain themselves with enzymes, hormones, and psychic energy. The brain of a large, intelligent predator like a wolf or bear provides enough sustenance for a full day, but the brain of a sapient humanoid is far tastier, and can bolster an illithid's metabolism for at least a week, depending on the quality of the brain in question. Some rogue illithids cultivate a special kind of moss that becomes sapient in large quantities, and which provides similar sustenance when eaten. Illithid Names Illithid do not have genders as other beings understand them, and reproduce via a process known as ceremorposis, which consists of producing "tadpoles" via parthenogenesis, then allowing them to consume the brains of other creatures, eventually mutating them into new illithids. They also use unique psychic impressions rather than names among themselves, but they do have transliterated Common equivalents to allow non-psionic creatures to address them. Sample Names: Altharid, Ilsenparint, Malinbossk, Qorik, Ullipsine, Xalliordell Illithid Traits Alien, frightening beings of great mental prowess and forceful personalities. Ability Score Increase. Your Intelligence score increases by 2, and your Charisma score increases by 1. Age. Illithids fully complete ceremorphosis after a week, and have become fully mature and complete in their education by age 1. Illithids live longer than humans, living up to 900 years unless slain by one of their countless enemies. Alignment. Illithids normally have a natural tendency towards hierarchy, discipline, and cruelty, and have an alignment of lawful evil . Some individuals find themselves developing more-individualistic personalities than their fellows early after ceremorphosis and have an alignment of neutral evil . A minority lack the characteristic sadism of their brethren while retaining their preoccupation with organization, and have an alignment of lawful neutral . Any illithid of any other alignment, usually the product of unusual circumstances such as mutation, magical alteration, extensive contact with unshackled non-illithid minds while cut off from the networked communal intelligence of their colonies, or intervention by otherworldly forces, is likely regarded by others of its kind as either a disgusting social deviant and pariah, or, at worst, as pollution to be cleansed. Many such illithids are either mentally wiped blank and re-educated or simply thrown out of their home communities if their natures are too open and offensive to their fellows' sensibilities. Size. Most illithids are at least as tall as tall humans, standing at least a few inches shy of six feet, but their bodies very slender and emaciated, weighing much less than an average being of their stature. Your size is Medium. Speed. Your base walking speed is 30 feet. Darkvision. You have darkvision up to a range of 60 ft. Lesser Magic Resistance. Whenever you are proficient in a saving throw against a magical spell or effect you gain advantage on it. Mind Blast. You may use your action to attack anything in front of you with a mind blast. When you use your mind blast, each creature in a 15 ft. cone must make an Intelligence saving throw equal to 8 + your Intelligence modifier + your proficiency bonus. A creature takes 2d6 Psychic damage on a failed save, and half as much damage on a successful save. This damage increases to 3d6 at 6th level, 4d6 at 11th level, and 5d6 at 16th level. After you use your mind blast, you can't use it again until you complete a short or long rest. Devour Brain. You can consume the brain of an incapacitated or recently deceased creature, which requires a full minute to open its skull and interface with its mind. You may use your action to attempt to wrap your tentacles around the head of an unconscious living creature or a living creature that died in the last few minutes, then use your alien jaw to open its skull and eat its brain matter. After doing so, you learn at least one piece of useful information the creature knew, and while you maintain Concentration, as though concentrating on a spell, you gain temporary proficiency with a weapon, skill, or set of tools the creature had proficiency with. If it was not dead, using this ability (obviously) kills the creature. Extract Brain. As an alternative to the Devour Brain trait above, you can use this trait which is more similar to the Extract Brain trait Ilithid NPCs have. On your turn, as an action, you can make a melee weapon attack (+7 to hit, reach 5 ft., ) against an incapacitated creature that has a roughly humanoid sized brain. On a successful hit the target takes 1d10 of piercing damage. If the damage reduces the creature to 0 HP, you kill the creature by extracting and consuming its brain. After you use this ability to consume a brain, you become full and can not use it again for 1d6+1 hours. The damage for this increases to 2d10 at level 4, 4d10 at level 8, 6d10 at level 12, 8d10 at level 16, and 10d10 at level 20. You might also learn some information the creature knew, at the DM's discretion. Aberrant Mind. Even those illithids who have undergone alignment shifts via magical means or mutations struggle to understand the thoughts of less-alien beings. You suffer disadvantage on all Wisdom (Insight) checks, even if you are proficient in them, and on any Charisma ability score tests in which you are not proficient. Languages. You can "speak," read, and write, Deep Speech and Undercommon, and can write Qualith, a language so unintuitive to most humanoid minds that only fellow illithids can decipher it without the use of magic by feeling it with their tentacles. Undercommon is a language of commerce among the subterranean races in the same way Common is among the surfacers.