I think my favorite part of Aboleth lore is that the origin and empire of fellow Aberrations the Illithids are a complete blank spot in their flawless memory, having apparently just appeared at one point with their society already established and functioning. It's two tiny pieces of monster history interacting that I really like, since nearly every creature ever has had an ancient globe-spanning empire that almost never talk about the others. It's also such a weird situation that it's easy food for thought as to why that's the case, with Volo supposing that the Illithids must somehow be from the future, but it could easily be a matter of Mind Flayers somehow having been capable of wiping a part of the Aboleths' collective memory.
@@The_Archlich they are canonically from the future. their future empire was brought down by someone called the adversary an illithid that completely retained the mind of the person it grew from. so in a last bid to survive the illithids traveled back to near the beginning of time. some lore hints this may have happened many times. also the timeline they and the aboleths came from was cut off, there are events that cause changes to the forgotten realms/dnd multiverse retroactively, cutting off the previous timeline and making time lost creatures like aboleths and illithids. the event that created the gods which caused the overthrow of the aboleths was one of these events.
@@LordCrate-du8zm well, they're from a different future but also yes. the illithids are kinda supposed to win eventually and get overthrown by a new adversary.
My personal headcanon is that the Ilithid ARE the Aboleth, in a future where they went through a radical change in order to restore their long gone empire and succeeded in that, but later on came back to the past to avoid it's collapse. Basically, the Aboleth see an alternate future of themselves pop into existence. What I say isn't too far out considering both of their ties to the Brain and how eerily similar the Aboleth and Ilithid tadpoles look
I’m into the Lovecraft idea where the encounter starts with weird stuff happening in a fishing town and the party has to investigate a cult devoted to the aboleth
Your idea for the Elder Aboleth sort of reminds me of issue 131 of Dragon Magazine, where there's an article that makes the base aboleth into a "common" aboleth, adding multiple stronger (and nobler) types of aboleth until they reach the Grand Aboleth, a massive, 70-foot long monstrosity with psionic powers equal to a 25th level character, with all the other kinds of aboleth at its beck and call.
I could imagine these Aboleths being one of the pillars of a campaign wide evil army bent on bringing down the world's empires. They would constitute the naval force, and would be incredibly potent. Just one elder and a few younger Aboliths is all it would take to massively disrupt seafaring trade and naval deployments. Totally "4 great generals of the evil armada" material.
@@eatingtheleaf4659 Well, I hadn't put that much thought into the rest. But I feel like there are a lot of land dwelling monsters that could be used. You could also have the ground portion of the army be the human branch. Honestly, I haven't started playing DnD yet, I was just watching videos for research. So I'm unaware of a lot of what this world has to offer, lol.
@@ClashBluelight a cool thing about D&D is that there is no set world. If you're thinking of running a campaign of your own, maybe look into world-building :)
>Be me, aboleth >Pesky human kingdom has set up an overseas colony near my lair >Raiding parties and adventurers constantly harrassing the local monsters and bullywug tribes >Fuck these guys, who do they think they are coming to my territory and killing my slave stock >Organise an attack on the colony, use telepathy to transmit the battle plan to every tribal chief and apex predator I have enthralled over the past century >Humans confused as fuck, they can't fathom how a bunch of animalistic beasts and disparate toad people are able to coordinate their attacks so intricately >They're starting to get overwhelmed now, desperately they send a message back home for supplies and reinforcements >Watch the supply ships approach the harbour >Not today shitheads >Hypnotise the captains and crew into thinking they already dropped off the goods >Make sure I can see the horror on the settlers' faces as they watch the ships turn around and go home >mfw the ship captains tell the king that the settlers had repelled my minions and they didn't need the help after all >mfw the frontier town's church is close enough to the sea that its within my telepathy range >mfw I convince the town to become my thralls willingly by posing as their God Just another day in the life
A small lore info about Aboleths is that they created Chuuls to be servants and guards for them. Every selfrespecting aboleth should have at least a few of these robot-like crustatians. Also Chuuls grow in power and size with age, so an elder aboleth should probably have some big boy defenders.
My players still talk about the psychic catfish they fought. It was 90% atmosphere. By the time the players actually fought this thing they were already shaking at the table.
Fun Fact: in guildaria, my dnd world, bahamut and tiamat call the aboleth "dragons of the deep places", basically they see them as dragons of the far realm, and are enemies to Gem dragons.
One thing ive done before with my aboleths in a campaign was that they have a dial-up hive mind. My take was that all aboleths are fragments of the One Big Boi who once ruled over aboleth society, and these are essentially the cells that he was made from. They could, while resting, commune with any other aboleths resting in the same body of water. Made for an incredibly fun campaign where my players essentially declared the aboleth holy palace as the One Piece and got all the worlds pirates looking for it.
Aboleths have always been a favorite of mine. I like to lean more into the psionic nature, making them use talents that are forgotten by more modern forms of magic. More of a malevolent alien vibe with them, but from the deep sea rather than space. And you're dead on with the base aboleth being an example of a young one with the deeper ones being way scarier. As for why it's messing with land-bound creatures, I also like to let the players realize that the region was underwater hundreds of thousands of years ago and it's after forgotten aboleth artifacts that are now on land.
Aboleths are so cool I just finished a arc of my campaign with one as a boss and I always made sure whenever it talked to the party it would talk down to them saying how long it’s been alive and how they were not even a concept when it was alive had my players intimidated
Man, I love your content so much. Not only is it actually informative but also hilarious. The only negative of watching your videos is that I'm pretty sure my players will at some point murder me in my sleep.
An Aboleth could probably provide the fucked up knowledge that gets someone a great old one pact or they could use their mind reading, instant recognition of someone’s greatest desires, to coerce them into a fiendish pact
this is like binging with babish but dnd. its great, plus this is well timed as im planning on an aboleth being an optional boss in a campaign i'm running.
5:18 vicarious position. Wrong word, but honestly, making the rogue spend a day in a fishes shoes really do be a messed vicarious relationship. I felt that one though, I always slip up on words when gming my players ride me for it.
I would imagine many classes in D&D would be interested in working with an Aboleth. The amount of magical secrets that one would know would surely be of interest to a Wizard or Warlock. They are unforgetting, and would know history forgotten to all but the Aboleth. Unlike Illithid, who consume brain matter to feed off of their brain power, Aboleth's are more concerned with information, so I can imagine them to be both cunning and willing to work with landwalking adventurers should it benefit them.
Thank you Archie, you have came at just the right time as I'm running a level 10 campaign focused on pirate characters so an abolith will be a perfect fight against them. I used your elder brain guide to wonderful effects on my party causing quite the horror of trying to survive the beginning maze of their layer with many passages to drop scampering brains and grimlocks and the like slaughtering half their crew and at several points downing several players
...I swear, this man makes The Best builds for any encounter. Honestly, I could really use one to spruce up my Hags. None of the videos on UA-cam are helping, and BG3 has everyone already used to Green Hags, so I'm aiming for a Night Hag when I get the chance. If you've got nothing lined up, I'd be hyped to see what you'd do with... Well, any and all hags, but I'm hoping for a Night one.
Love aboleths and I can’t wait to use one. I have a whole arc built up in my notes where a town was founded due to the abundance of fishing, and they began worshipping “old whalebone”, who is this odd whale that was seen a few times throughout the towns history and is considered divine and good. Of course in actuality the whale is a young aboleth that lives in the underwater caves beneath the town and is attended to by kuo toa slaves. The aboleth uses the kuo toa as a means to gather power, as it becomes more god-like the more they believe it to be a god. This pseudo-divinity is what allows the clergy to actually gain levels of cleric or warlock, and is bolstered by the worship of the townsfolk as well. I even made a character backstory for a fathomless warlock, in which the priests take the young acolyte down to meet their god and it attempts to enslave him as well. The whole town of course is a means to an end, and old whalebone will eventually try to take them all back home with it as slaves. Signs of things going wrong includes: their “god” tells you it can grant your desires very directly if you pray in town. Some townsfolk become rather quiet and subdued after the party’s absence. The priests of the church warn you not to wander the cliffs at night for fear of drowning. The children spread rumours about the fish men in the caves. The children stop spreading rumours about the fish men in the caves. Etc.
Your video has inspired me. I have an upcoming Hexcrawl that I'm planning. The premise is that it's a brand new world, the races are still young and primitive, and the players will eventually become the first Gods in that setting. After this video, I'm gonna make sure there's plenty of Aboleth fuckery going on. I'll give my players the actual experience of being the Gods that the Aboleths seek to topple. Thanks!
Add tunnels/ pools of water throughout to make your players really hate the aboleth that sinks into its role as a harasser. You could also give them the option of taking care of them beforehand, and with a few water breathing potions perhaps those tunnels could be traversable
A great addition to the line of boss monster videos. You’re great at making monsters feel like the powerful, intelligent, infamous creatures they should be. It’s also incredibly helpful to have a place to refer back to for tactics on these things. Do you have any plans for what to cover next?
A nice thing that has been quite effective was using the aboleth projections with lair action to bait high level spells from the party, i kept them guessing the whole fight which aboleth was the true one and made the cleric banish an illusion *evil laughter*
I am but a humble skeleton in the vast undead ranks of "Our boy Archie", Great video, now I'm thinking up a huge underwater society where Sirens are just pawns of an Abolith trying to recruit sailors that follow their voices.
Love all of these videos so far. I would love to see Hags (Alone and in Covens.) as well as Beholders but let's be honest any topic is bound to be a banger.
I love it. Young Aboleth makes much more sense for their lore. I'm looking forward to running this in the coastal area of my world. Thank you. Second time requesting the spellcaster variants of Vampires or Dragons. Suggestion: go absolutely hardcore and use Greatwyrms with the spellcaster variant.
Love the tactics - I would almost feel bad as the PCs have to leave behind one of their own... Love the Elder Aboleth it just feels right for the lore that they have.
If you feel THAT bad, you can always fudge up enough enslave charges to make the player fail, then have the escapees mount a rescue mission if they have the guts to go back.
Bold of arch lich to be the second DM coaching youtuber Ive deemed worthy of subscribing to, to only have 5 videos uploaded. (Jk these are all very high quailty and effort and you probably have a life, love ur stuff)
Honestly to me the biggest appeal of aboleths is how old they are and that in itself being an explanation for their relative weakness, they are archaic entitled entities wistfully longing for an age long past them, clinging to memories of dominance and lost power as their bodies and minds have slowly decayed over the years.
I personally run my aboleth more as a schemer, using it's telepathy to know what the players want and use that to too make them unwitting thralls of sorts (make their goals align with it's)
in my current campaign i currently have an Aboleth that is slowly enslaving a major town causing several cults to pop up and bring new victims to the Aboleth. currently the Aboleth is attempting to gain control of the leaders of the town which if it succeeds it would make life a nightmare for my players. this video came at the perfect time to help me flesh out the boss fight. thank you.
Found this video after the game where encounter the aboleth, he was abducting a peoples from the town to mine out a treasure, but with anger issues so he ate a too stupid slaves
Always liked creatures that have such an utterly alien mindset that even if they wanted to, they could no more explain themselves to you than you could explain yourself to an insect.
So true Archie
Homie strikes again
You return
"haha, my aboleth can breathe air and water"
> pumps 3 million gallons of oil from the surface into Aboleth chamber
No, oil floats on water
Use mercury
I like the dark way you think@@scifidino5022
America, fuck yeah! 🦅🦅🦅
@@scifidino5022this just in, illusionists wizards ability to create something from nothing suddenly greatest threat to all aboleths everywhere
A lich, a elder brain, and a aboleth walk into a bar
The lich shatters
A lich, an elder brain, and an aboleth walk into a tavern.
Then they TPK the party as they meet there in session one.
A deathknight walks out
And the death knight is, once again, forgotten
@@CrazyLikeUhFoxthey are the party, it's now an evil creature campaign
I think my favorite part of Aboleth lore is that the origin and empire of fellow Aberrations the Illithids are a complete blank spot in their flawless memory, having apparently just appeared at one point with their society already established and functioning. It's two tiny pieces of monster history interacting that I really like, since nearly every creature ever has had an ancient globe-spanning empire that almost never talk about the others. It's also such a weird situation that it's easy food for thought as to why that's the case, with Volo supposing that the Illithids must somehow be from the future, but it could easily be a matter of Mind Flayers somehow having been capable of wiping a part of the Aboleths' collective memory.
I love the implication that illithids may be from the future.
@@The_Archlich they are canonically from the future. their future empire was brought down by someone called the adversary an illithid that completely retained the mind of the person it grew from. so in a last bid to survive the illithids traveled back to near the beginning of time. some lore hints this may have happened many times. also the timeline they and the aboleths came from was cut off, there are events that cause changes to the forgotten realms/dnd multiverse retroactively, cutting off the previous timeline and making time lost creatures like aboleths and illithids. the event that created the gods which caused the overthrow of the aboleths was one of these events.
If they're from the future, does that mean we all worship giant brains and become squid people?
@@LordCrate-du8zm well, they're from a different future but also yes. the illithids are kinda supposed to win eventually and get overthrown by a new adversary.
My personal headcanon is that the Ilithid ARE the Aboleth, in a future where they went through a radical change in order to restore their long gone empire and succeeded in that, but later on came back to the past to avoid it's collapse.
Basically, the Aboleth see an alternate future of themselves pop into existence.
What I say isn't too far out considering both of their ties to the Brain and how eerily similar the Aboleth and Ilithid tadpoles look
This has quickly become one of my favorite dnd channels
Thank you. I'm glad you enjoy my work!
@@The_Archlich No thank you man. Love your video style, keep it up! I'm sure it will only become better in the future!
Took 90 seconds for me to join you in that sentiment
I’m into the Lovecraft idea where the encounter starts with weird stuff happening in a fishing town and the party has to investigate a cult devoted to the aboleth
babe wake up, archlich came out of his cave again get the dice
Your idea for the Elder Aboleth sort of reminds me of issue 131 of Dragon Magazine, where there's an article that makes the base aboleth into a "common" aboleth, adding multiple stronger (and nobler) types of aboleth until they reach the Grand Aboleth, a massive, 70-foot long monstrosity with psionic powers equal to a 25th level character, with all the other kinds of aboleth at its beck and call.
😮 I'll just add looking up that article & converting those stats into 5e to my endless homebrew to-do list
Lovecraftian horror
Thank you Archie for hiring aboleths to the Evil Defense
- Video came out five minutes ago
- comment 1 day ago
What sorcery is this!?
Sorry, Wild Magic messed up my Time Stop during my Math exam. Ended up reversing time for the local area instead.@@breadstick4458
@@breadstick4458 Patreon Early Access.
I could imagine these Aboleths being one of the pillars of a campaign wide evil army bent on bringing down the world's empires. They would constitute the naval force, and would be incredibly potent. Just one elder and a few younger Aboliths is all it would take to massively disrupt seafaring trade and naval deployments. Totally "4 great generals of the evil armada" material.
With 18 Int they have the mind, and quite frankly should have some spellcasting.
Oooh yeah, I like that idea! Does this evil army have ground and air branches? What creatures would be the generals of those?
@@eatingtheleaf4659 Well, I hadn't put that much thought into the rest. But I feel like there are a lot of land dwelling monsters that could be used. You could also have the ground portion of the army be the human branch. Honestly, I haven't started playing DnD yet, I was just watching videos for research. So I'm unaware of a lot of what this world has to offer, lol.
@@ClashBluelight a cool thing about D&D is that there is no set world. If you're thinking of running a campaign of your own, maybe look into world-building :)
>Be me, aboleth
>Pesky human kingdom has set up an overseas colony near my lair
>Raiding parties and adventurers constantly harrassing the local monsters and bullywug tribes
>Fuck these guys, who do they think they are coming to my territory and killing my slave stock
>Organise an attack on the colony, use telepathy to transmit the battle plan to every tribal chief and apex predator I have enthralled over the past century
>Humans confused as fuck, they can't fathom how a bunch of animalistic beasts and disparate toad people are able to coordinate their attacks so intricately
>They're starting to get overwhelmed now, desperately they send a message back home for supplies and reinforcements
>Watch the supply ships approach the harbour
>Not today shitheads
>Hypnotise the captains and crew into thinking they already dropped off the goods
>Make sure I can see the horror on the settlers' faces as they watch the ships turn around and go home
>mfw the ship captains tell the king that the settlers had repelled my minions and they didn't need the help after all
>mfw the frontier town's church is close enough to the sea that its within my telepathy range
>mfw I convince the town to become my thralls willingly by posing as their God
Just another day in the life
A small lore info about Aboleths is that they created Chuuls to be servants and guards for them. Every selfrespecting aboleth should have at least a few of these robot-like crustatians. Also Chuuls grow in power and size with age, so an elder aboleth should probably have some big boy defenders.
My players still talk about the psychic catfish they fought. It was 90% atmosphere. By the time the players actually fought this thing they were already shaking at the table.
Fun Fact: in guildaria, my dnd world, bahamut and tiamat call the aboleth "dragons of the deep places", basically they see them as dragons of the far realm, and are enemies to Gem dragons.
I would love to see a video like this on hags
That elder aboleth is straight up criminal! Good work, Archie
It’s time for evil eels
There’s always been time for evil eels
eveels
One thing ive done before with my aboleths in a campaign was that they have a dial-up hive mind. My take was that all aboleths are fragments of the One Big Boi who once ruled over aboleth society, and these are essentially the cells that he was made from. They could, while resting, commune with any other aboleths resting in the same body of water. Made for an incredibly fun campaign where my players essentially declared the aboleth holy palace as the One Piece and got all the worlds pirates looking for it.
Your channel came out of nowhere for me and instantly gave me a dozen campaign ideas for each of the monsters you’ve covered
Thank you. I'm glad people are finding and enjoying my work!
Bro has evolved from an Archlich to a YT god, the views on that first video are through the roof.
Aboleths have always been a favorite of mine. I like to lean more into the psionic nature, making them use talents that are forgotten by more modern forms of magic. More of a malevolent alien vibe with them, but from the deep sea rather than space. And you're dead on with the base aboleth being an example of a young one with the deeper ones being way scarier. As for why it's messing with land-bound creatures, I also like to let the players realize that the region was underwater hundreds of thousands of years ago and it's after forgotten aboleth artifacts that are now on land.
oh this makes the patron of one of my old characters SO much cooler. ty for this, hopefully someday i’ll get to run an aboleth boss for my players
I'd love to see the Beholder get this treatment.
Aboleths are so cool I just finished a arc of my campaign with one as a boss and I always made sure whenever it talked to the party it would talk down to them saying how long it’s been alive and how they were not even a concept when it was alive had my players intimidated
I found thus channel a few hours ago and You are already my favourite spooky scary skeleton.
Geat work I would love to see more
KACHOW! It's me, H.P., back at it again with the FISH PEOPLE!!!
MY GUY ARCHIE- ABOLETH ELDER BRAIN WITH UCHUULON SERVANTS!
Man, I love your content so much. Not only is it actually informative but also hilarious. The only negative of watching your videos is that I'm pretty sure my players will at some point murder me in my sleep.
Oh don't worry. They'll surprise you and win more than they lose in my experience!
Aboleth: American Gangster
New Archlich video dropped, time to rewatch the previous ones
I’m definitely going to use this next time I run a Aboleth and I’m definitely going to use a southern accent
After watching all of these I'm feeling like I need the Vampire Lord/Vampire like a Chad for my campaign, these are great!
Bruh I just went back to your channel yesterday and was sad there wasn't anything new and now here this is.
An Aboleth could probably provide the fucked up knowledge that gets someone a great old one pact or they could use their mind reading, instant recognition of someone’s greatest desires, to coerce them into a fiendish pact
One of my favorite new series on youtube
He hath returned
this is like binging with babish but dnd. its great, plus this is well timed as im planning on an aboleth being an optional boss in a campaign i'm running.
This is the DnD content I've been searching for.
Boy am I glad the UA-cam recommendations introduced me to you. You are something special, O Dark One.
Upload more videos, i can't get enough of them 😔
To the point ive rewatched the lich one multiple times
i would lo a "how to run hags" video personally
Osrs intro music? Thats a like.
you are literally the best dnd youtuber, you just make the game sound/seem so much more fun with your additions
this would be a good way to steal a party member without killing them, just cast the water breathing on one and chase the party away
0:19 you know the internet has ruined you beyond repair when the first thing you see are sad Brendan Fraser eyes.
Great video! Cant wait to see what's next.
Thanks!
5:18 vicarious position. Wrong word, but honestly, making the rogue spend a day in a fishes shoes really do be a messed vicarious relationship. I felt that one though, I always slip up on words when gming my players ride me for it.
You got me. Don't tell the elf.
My lord Archie, thy insights on the creatures of this realm and beyond is astonishing. I hope to catch your next lesson soon.
I would imagine many classes in D&D would be interested in working with an Aboleth. The amount of magical secrets that one would know would surely be of interest to a Wizard or Warlock. They are unforgetting, and would know history forgotten to all but the Aboleth. Unlike Illithid, who consume brain matter to feed off of their brain power, Aboleth's are more concerned with information, so I can imagine them to be both cunning and willing to work with landwalking adventurers should it benefit them.
I'm dming a game right now, and I made my Warlock's patron an Aboleth. It's been pretty cool so far. The new stat block is PERFECT for them!
Thank you Archie, you have came at just the right time as I'm running a level 10 campaign focused on pirate characters so an abolith will be a perfect fight against them.
I used your elder brain guide to wonderful effects on my party causing quite the horror of trying to survive the beginning maze of their layer with many passages to drop scampering brains and grimlocks and the like slaughtering half their crew and at several points downing several players
Glad my material is helpful!
An aboleth is my main villain right now so I appreciate any perspectives that can fill out gaps in goals and methods. Great video!
@@coomtheslayer sick name
@The_Archlich thanks Archie, yours too
...I swear, this man makes The Best builds for any encounter. Honestly, I could really use one to spruce up my Hags. None of the videos on UA-cam are helping, and BG3 has everyone already used to Green Hags, so I'm aiming for a Night Hag when I get the chance. If you've got nothing lined up, I'd be hyped to see what you'd do with... Well, any and all hags, but I'm hoping for a Night one.
hell yeah, Aboleths were always my favorites among the big 3 aberrations
2:43 We live in a Socieleth
Love aboleths and I can’t wait to use one. I have a whole arc built up in my notes where a town was founded due to the abundance of fishing, and they began worshipping “old whalebone”, who is this odd whale that was seen a few times throughout the towns history and is considered divine and good. Of course in actuality the whale is a young aboleth that lives in the underwater caves beneath the town and is attended to by kuo toa slaves.
The aboleth uses the kuo toa as a means to gather power, as it becomes more god-like the more they believe it to be a god. This pseudo-divinity is what allows the clergy to actually gain levels of cleric or warlock, and is bolstered by the worship of the townsfolk as well. I even made a character backstory for a fathomless warlock, in which the priests take the young acolyte down to meet their god and it attempts to enslave him as well.
The whole town of course is a means to an end, and old whalebone will eventually try to take them all back home with it as slaves. Signs of things going wrong includes: their “god” tells you it can grant your desires very directly if you pray in town. Some townsfolk become rather quiet and subdued after the party’s absence. The priests of the church warn you not to wander the cliffs at night for fear of drowning. The children spread rumours about the fish men in the caves. The children stop spreading rumours about the fish men in the caves. Etc.
fucken beauty. I've been looking for something to put into my lake side undercity
Your video has inspired me.
I have an upcoming Hexcrawl that I'm planning. The premise is that it's a brand new world, the races are still young and primitive, and the players will eventually become the first Gods in that setting.
After this video, I'm gonna make sure there's plenty of Aboleth fuckery going on. I'll give my players the actual experience of being the Gods that the Aboleths seek to topple.
Thanks!
That sounds cool if they make it to the late game!
In a year I will produce a mega dungeon using all of the villains catalogued by archlich to create the greatest player meatgrinder of all time.
The Giga Dungeon of Hell
@@The_Archlich AND SO IT IS NAMED, THE CONTRACT IS SEALED
@@thebiggestcheeseong you could make it into a dungeon crawler or like the etrian odyssey games with different themed floors and bosses if possible
@@dominikreinhart3457 not a bad suggestion
Add tunnels/ pools of water throughout to make your players really hate the aboleth that sinks into its role as a harasser. You could also give them the option of taking care of them beforehand, and with a few water breathing potions perhaps those tunnels could be traversable
Hells yeah.
This feels like a lot more of a niche enemy (who wants to really fight underwater) but still really cool. Always love when you upload.
A great addition to the line of boss monster videos. You’re great at making monsters feel like the powerful, intelligent, infamous creatures they should be. It’s also incredibly helpful to have a place to refer back to for tactics on these things. Do you have any plans for what to cover next?
I'm going to put it up to a vote for my members/patrons. Not sure what it will be yet.
@@The_Archlich fair enough. Well, whatever it ends up being, I’m looking forward to it
Remember, aboleths don't kill themselves.
Thank you archie, been thinking how i would run aboleths for a while and I will definitely use this
Happy to help!
A nice thing that has been quite effective was using the aboleth projections with lair action to bait high level spells from the party, i kept them guessing the whole fight which aboleth was the true one and made the cleric banish an illusion *evil laughter*
I am but a humble skeleton in the vast undead ranks of "Our boy Archie",
Great video, now I'm thinking up a huge underwater society where Sirens are just pawns of an Abolith trying to recruit sailors that follow their voices.
Thank you. I'm glad you're finding use from my work!
Love all of these videos so far. I would love to see Hags (Alone and in Covens.) as well as Beholders but let's be honest any topic is bound to be a banger.
Hope you liked the hags video
@@The_Archlich Defenitly!
Excellent wisdom, Mr. Archlich, sir.
My party is heading to the Elemental Plane of Butter next session, so this will be very useful 🙏
Post more. Love your delivery.
This is my favorite D&D channel lol, you're funny, charismatic, and your ideas genuinely sound cool.
Thank you, I'm glad you enjoy my work!
@@The_Archlich ah you’re welcome my dude.
I love it. Young Aboleth makes much more sense for their lore. I'm looking forward to running this in the coastal area of my world. Thank you.
Second time requesting the spellcaster variants of Vampires or Dragons. Suggestion: go absolutely hardcore and use Greatwyrms with the spellcaster variant.
I needed more aboleth info, thanks! My party just turned evil and their patron is an aboleth.
NEW ARCHLICH POST LETS GOOO
Sounds good 👍
Woohoo! Another video! Keep up the great work, I'm loving these!
thumbnail had me tweakin 💀
Fantastic stuff, I've never been a D&D sort of guy but your videos are great
An asbolute chad. You deserve WAY more views.
babe wake up new archlich video just dropped
glorious! please continue
Love the tactics - I would almost feel bad as the PCs have to leave behind one of their own... Love the Elder Aboleth it just feels right for the lore that they have.
If you feel THAT bad, you can always fudge up enough enslave charges to make the player fail, then have the escapees mount a rescue mission if they have the guts to go back.
Spicy thumbnail = spicy like
Bold of arch lich to be the second DM coaching youtuber Ive deemed worthy of subscribing to, to only have 5 videos uploaded. (Jk these are all very high quailty and effort and you probably have a life, love ur stuff)
Thank you. I'm glad you find use from my work!
Underrated channel ngl. Looking forward to future videos.
its precarious bro
I don't even do DND but these vids are quality compelling content....and the community is highly intelligent & funny as heyall! Well done Archie!
Always a welcome sight on my recommended
love your videos evil overlord
Yeeeah baby, this is what I've been waiting for!
Been waiting for this! glad you’re starting to post again.
D&d always puts me in a vicarious position.
I'm never going to financially recover from this...
great video, man! lots of good ideas
Glad you enjoyed!
Honestly to me the biggest appeal of aboleths is how old they are and that in itself being an explanation for their relative weakness, they are archaic entitled entities wistfully longing for an age long past them, clinging to memories of dominance and lost power as their bodies and minds have slowly decayed over the years.
I personally run my aboleth more as a schemer, using it's telepathy to know what the players want and use that to too make them unwitting thralls of sorts (make their goals align with it's)
I like this, but the only problem is that it can only do the desires thing if it can see them, and it's not that good at hiding.
Thats why I let it see through the eyes of it's thralls, get more of a collector's from mass effect vibe going on with them@@The_Archlich
You are the king of boss fights!
in my current campaign i currently have an Aboleth that is slowly enslaving a major town causing several cults to pop up and bring new victims to the Aboleth. currently the Aboleth is attempting to gain control of the leaders of the town which if it succeeds it would make life a nightmare for my players. this video came at the perfect time to help me flesh out the boss fight. thank you.
Don't forget to also check out the 3.5 book "Lords of Madness" for variants, new magics, etc to consider converting
Found this video after the game where encounter the aboleth, he was abducting a peoples from the town to mine out a treasure, but with anger issues so he ate a too stupid slaves
Like the 10 seconds to let us settle at the start.
Lol when I was editing, and I threw in Sea Shanty, I immediately saw that I wanted to start the video on the drop.
im in love with your channel thank you!
Always liked creatures that have such an utterly alien mindset that even if they wanted to, they could no more explain themselves to you than you could explain yourself to an insect.