I know too much about how good the monsters COULD be if done well and right
This very sentence kinda shows you are either dont want to see, or dont understand what he was trying to say tho. :-/
You keep talking as if DnD rules were the only way to make things right ... but that is just not so. :-/
Those books only offer one of possible ways, and litteraly anything other is just as "corect" ... its even said in those books, right there on first page.
Ugh
For the love of all that is good and holy!
Ragnarok. I LOVE it when people create new monsters and enemies and think outside the box. Shoot! The Phase Spider Matriarch is one of my favorites. I have NO problem with her except that they call her a phase spider. And, you know what? Again, I have no problem with spiders teleporting and spitting. Yay! New types of nasty spiders. Call them something besides phase spiders.
And I encourage Larian. Create MORE new monsters and enemies. I love that they've made each goblin unique and special. Every goblin has a name and personality. That's immersive. That's awesome. That's great. They're not all cookie-cutter goblins. LOVE it!
Now that that's said, let's get to the rest of it.
The game IS D&D. It IS Forgotten Realms. If I'm playing Pathfinder, and the elves are aliens from another planet, that's great. If I'm playing BG3 and the elves are aliens from another planet, there's something weird and wrong with that. I'm not playing a game with elf lore that says they are aliens, so even if they look like elves, don't say they are elves. You can call them Bistary Elves because they come from the planet Bistary and they look like elves so people assumed they were. You can all them Cha Cha Elves because they come from the Plane of Dance and look like elves. But don't tell me they are Moon Elves but they have absolutely no Moon Elf abilities and stats and so forth.
This is what I'm getting at. Imps that don't sting, turn invisible, fly into the air to avoid melee attacks, and have no resistances are not imps. They're imp-looking creatures, but they aren't imps. Call them Stumpy Tailless Avernian Imps, or whatever, I don't care, but don't just leave them as imps as if they are supposed to have all of the above mentioned abilities. Same with intellect devourers. Don't call them intellect devourers. A good name has already been developed for baby intellect devourers. Call them Ustilagors and it makes more sense and D&D fans who play the game will know they aren't supposed to have all the stats and abilities of a typical intellect devourer.
And again, my main points are that Larian took legit monsters and nerfed them to the point of creating TRASH MOBS. WHY??????? Why take a monster that can fly, turn invisible, has resistance to standard weapons, can sting the crap out of a level 1 character and 1-Hit KO them, and turn them into a petty thug trash mob grunt with wings that can only hover and not actually fly? THAT is my issue. It makes no sense. Use a lemure or any number of other devils people have created over the years. Don't take something that exists and rip its guts out and leave it a shell of what it should be - but then give it the same name.
It's like saying, "You're fighting a bird," but then you describe the creature as running up to you instead of flying, it bites you instead of pecks, it barks, and it tries to thrash you. Are you really fighting a bird or a dog?
