Why did the mind flayers did not conquered the world?

[sleeper]

Since they seem to have high tech technology and all that

[sleeper]

this is so freaking annoying

[WitchWarrior1]

That is part of the mystery, because they lost all that tech after the Githyanki have been beating them into submission for centuries. So the fact they have somehow managed to recover or rebuild some of their ancient tech, and somehow very quickly, along with ties to the cult is going to be interesting to find out.

[Foolswalkin]

Illithid, IIRC, were tiptoeing around the drow and trying not to piss them off. They aren’t even the scariest thing in the underdark, much less the D&D multiverse.

[sleeper]

Originally posted by Foolswalkin:

Illithid, IIRC, were tiptoeing around the drow and trying not to piss them off. They aren’t even the scariest thing in the underdark, much less the D&D multiverse.

the drow are lucky the duergar are lazy or else they would have been wiped out. You should see their their empire and numbers. Their capital has like 200k duergar and they have lots of other cities not to mention most duergar do not live in cities.

[cl656]

Because any civilization reliant on slaves becomes stagnant. There was a time Sparta could have conquered Greece and even created a large empire, but between always being at war,
their xenophobia, lack of flexibility in regards to recruitment,and spending a great deal of manpower suppressing their slave population that outnumbered them,they became stagnant, and eventually backwater city state that is now only known because of the 300 movie based on a comic book

Mindflayers are over reliant on other races, particularly their slaves, like Sparta was. then one race of slaves rebelled, found out they were stronger than their masters, and destroyed them.

.

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

It seems at one point their Empire spanned the multiverse.

[Deemer]

You seem to be under the assumption that advanced technology is some absolute thing that automatically always stands above other power. advanced technology is just one form of "power", its not unbeatable by other things. It can still lose to magic, it can lose to powerful beings, it can lose to numbers(zerg vs protoss anyone).
most important though, is that no matter how advanced your tech is, as long as you are no longer able to PRODUCE said technology anymore, you are going to lose thru attrition eventually, even more so if you cant propogate fast enough to match your enemies. if you cant repair or recreate things as they are taken out one by one over time it doesnt matter

[Raï 𓆣]

Originally posted by cl656:

Because any civilization reliant on slaves becomes stagnant. There was a time Sparta could have conquered Greece and even created a large empire, but between always being at war,
their xenophobia, lack of flexibility in regards to recruitment,and spending a great deal of manpower suppressing their slave population that outnumbered them,they became stagnant, and eventually backwater city state that is now only known because of the 300 movie based on a comic book

Mindflayers are over reliant on other races, particularly their slaves, like Sparta was. then one race of slaves rebelled, found out they were stronger than their masters, and destroyed them.

Interesting take.

[Wraith]

Originally posted by Pan Darius Loveless:

It seems at one point their Empire spanned the multiverse.

and then got taken down by their slave the gith in less then a year.

Yah they definitely didn't have time to to save much technology

and because you don't age in the astral plane there probably still gith that been around since the collapse of the mindflayers

[sleeper]

Originally posted by Mad Scientist:

You seem to be under the assumption that advanced technology is some absolute thing that stands above other power. advanced technology is just one form of "power". Technology can lose to magic, it can lose to powerful beings, it can lose to numbers(zerg vs protoss anyone).
most important though, is that no matter how advanced your tech is, as long as you are no longer able to PRODUCE said technology anymore, you are going to lose thru attrition eventually, even more so if you cant propogate fast enough to match your enemies. if you cant repair or recreate things as they are taken out one by one over time it doesnt.

Its because I am thinking how things happend in our world when slightly more military advanced nation conquered others 10 or 20 times their size in population.

[Pinhead Larry]

The mind flayers are a one trick pony, they rely entirely on psychic mind control. They actually DID rule an entire universe at one point, and used the predecessors to the githyanki/zeri as slave fodder.

The problem is one of those ancient gith became resistant/immune to the mind control and quickly developed a method to teach others how to resist, and the Mindflayers didn't really have any way to respond to that, especially since most of their tech was organic and the gith developed more durable metal based technology and magics that shredded everything the Mind Flayers had.

[Deemer]

Originally posted by sleeper:

Originally posted by Mad Scientist:

You seem to be under the assumption that advanced technology is some absolute thing that stands above other power. advanced technology is just one form of "power". Technology can lose to magic, it can lose to powerful beings, it can lose to numbers(zerg vs protoss anyone).
most important though, is that no matter how advanced your tech is, as long as you are no longer able to PRODUCE said technology anymore, you are going to lose thru attrition eventually, even more so if you cant propogate fast enough to match your enemies. if you cant repair or recreate things as they are taken out one by one over time it doesnt.

Its because I am thinking how things happend in our world when slightly more military advanced nation conquered others 10 or 20 times their size in population.

see, thats your problem, You cant quantify things things in DnD the same way as the real world. of course technology drives power in real world, there are no such things like magic or dragons. there are significantly more variables at work in fantasy than reality for such a line of thought.

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

Originally posted by Wraith:

Originally posted by Pan Darius Loveless:

It seems at one point their Empire spanned the multiverse.

and then got taken down by their slave the gith in less then a year.

Yah they definitely didn't have time to to save much technology

and because you don't age in the astral plane there probably still gith that been around since the collapse of the mindflayers

In less than a year? Where's that from?

[larhtas]

Originally posted by Mad Scientist:

Originally posted by sleeper:

Its because I am thinking how things happend in our world when slightly more military advanced nation conquered others 10 or 20 times their size in population.

see, thats your problem, You cant quantify things things in DnD the same way as the real world. of course technology drives power in real world, there are no such things like magic or dragons. there are significantly more variables at work in fantasy than reality for such a line of thought.

I like to add to that: that there is literally actual living gods among the realms.
In this world, magic is clearly more powerful than technology.
The illithid have leads in the past because of their natural magic ability to control minds.

[Morgian]

From the older lore in the days of AD&D the mindflayers ruled once an interstellar empire. Their dominion fell when their githyanki slaves developed defensive psionic powers and overthrew them. It is unknown what happened to them as a race, except that they are only found in underground places now, where the elder brains rule them.

The githyanki did not do well, either. They immediately fell out after their victory and two subraces developed, the githyanki and the githzerai.
In the "Monstrous Arcana: The Illithiad" handbook did the authors expand the background of the mindflayers. There was their biology, outlook, habitat, deities, psionic powers, and how their society works and the role of the elder brains.

The mindflayers began their career as an entry in the monster manual, but they became quite popular, even if they were rare in official adventures. Besides one encounter in Descent into the Depths of the Earth I can only remember the three module series devoted to them.