It crawls... It creeps... It eats you alive!
-The tagline for The Blob (1958)
Beware oozes! These fragments of the demon lord Juiblex are often overlooked by Dungeon Masters in favor of enemies that actually have limbs, but they’re arguably some of the most fearsome foes a group of low-level D&D adventurers can face. Why? Because unlike a normal monster that might be satisfied with killing a character, oozes are motivated by the undiscriminating desire to consume everything in their path!
Big blobs of death
Before we break down the four different oozes located in the Monster Manual, let’s outline a few key aspects of their behavior.
- Assimilation machines drawn to organic matter - The Monster Manual states that all oozes have blindsight within 60 feet and are drawn to movement and warmth. Aside from more sentient variants under the control of Juiblex, they have little sense of tactics or self-preservation. This means that oozes will not know to target the healer amongst a group of heroes - they’ll simply go where the nearest humanoid is as soon as they sense something within range, and they’ll push through whatever obstacles lie before them to reach that target.
- Shape-shifting, wall-climbing, and all-destroying - Three of the oozes in the Monster Manual possess the Amorphous ability, meaning they can move through tiny spaces as narrow as an inch wide. Two also have Spider Climb, and all oozes deal some degree of corrosive acid damage upon impact that can potentially wreck both characters and their items.
- Self-replicating amoebas - Inspiration for D&D’s oozes may have come from the 1958 sci-fi film The Blob - featuring a mass from outer space that runs rampant in a small American town - but these creatures are also reminiscent of the unicellular organisms known as amoebas, particularly with their ability to asexually reproduce. Two of the oozes in the Monster Manual can create smaller versions of themselves when subjected to certain damage types, and this ability can be a real headache as adventurers struggle to figure out what sort of damage actually caused the splitting.
An unyielding drive to feed combined with the ability to stick to surfaces, manipulate one’s form, destroy weapons and replicate. That’s a lot for just one monster genus. Now, let’s look at each ooze in detail.
Gray Ooze - Corrosion and camouflage, in one gooey package
Gray Oozes are the simplest oozes on the totem pole, and in many ways, they’re the foundation for all their disgusting cousins.
- They’ve got an Armor Class of 8, an average of 22 Hit Points, and a speed of 10 feet. This means they’re easy to attack, but their Corrode Metal ability will be a pain for characters relying on non-magical metal weapons. Their Pseudopod action, which is shared by all oozes, can also permanently damage metal armor upon repeated impact, and if you choose to use the Psychic Gray Ooze variant, they have a Psychic Crush ranged attack from afar.
- Unlike other oozes, the Gray Ooze has a +2 Stealth skill, which seems out of place until one notices its False Appearance trait, which renders the ooze indistinguishable from a wet rock or oil pool as long as it stays still.
- With this in mind, the best way to play Grey Oozes is to litter them along dungeon walls as silent, barely noticeable growths that can’t be seen unless players have high Passive Perception scores. Alternatively, you could rely on their Amorphous trait and stick them within the walls themselves - like living, hungry cement - and have them stay immobile until players get within 60 feet. Obviously, characters relying on non-metal weapons will shine at taking down Gray Oozes, as will magic users, but it’s important to note that these gooey creatures are resistant to acid, cold and fire damage, so anyone trying to use Ray of Frost is going to end up disappointed.
Ochre Jelly - Slinking along the ceiling, about to split into two...
Instead of harassing adventurers with corrosion, the mustard-looking Ochre Jelly focuses on mobility and replication, the other dangers within the ooze repertoire.
- Ochre Jellies have the same Armor Class and speed as Gray Oozes, but they boast an average of 45 Hit Points. They too are Amorphous with a Pseudopod action, but their version won’t harm weapons or armor - besides leaving them dripping in yellow goop, that is.
- The ability of Ochre Jellies to Spider Climb and Split makes up for this seeming deficiency. These globs can crawl upside down to get the drop on unsuspecting heroes, and any slashing or lighting damage administered to a Medium or larger jelly will cause it to split into two new jellies, as long as it has at least 10 Hit Points. These tinier oozes have half of their parents’ hit points and are one size smaller. Considering that Ochre Jellies are classified as Large creatures, that means that a wayward slash from a longsword is going to create two Medium jellies. And if those Medium jellies are slashed, you’ve got four Small jellies.
- The strategy here is to have Ochre Jellies emerge from holes and follow prey along walls and ceilings before launching out with Pseudopod attacks - potentially getting a surprise round on players, who might then need to contend with an annoying mess of additional jellies on their hands if they attack with the wrong damage type. Combine Gray Oozes on the floor with Ochre Jellies on the walls to create chaotic combat where players will be forced to deal with corrosion from one side and splitting slimes from the other.
Black Pudding - The fusion of the Gray Ooze and the Ochre Jelly
If the Gray Ooze and the Ochre Jelly are the grunts of the ooze hierarchy, the Black Pudding is what you’d get if you meshed the pair together in one revolting package.
- The Black Pudding actually has a lower Armor Class than its smaller cousins, but its average Hit Points of 85 and elevated speed of 20 feet make it hardier and faster. It’s completely immune to acid, cold, lightning, and slashing damage, and the latter two types will make it replicate just like an Ochre Jelly. Its Amorphous, Spider Climb, Pseudopod, and Split traits are a combo of the best of the Gray Ooze and the Ochre Jelly, so the tactics used to run those foes can work here as well.
- Black Puddings have a trait entitled Corrosive Form that’s slightly different from the Gray Ooze’s Corrode Metal. While the latter only affects weapons that hit the ooze, Corrosive Form does acid damage to both the weapon and the creature wielding it. The Monster Manual also states that any creature simply touching the pudding will suffer damage, which opens up possibilities for making a Black Pudding’s dwelling a place with uneven, treacherous terrain. One sloppy step could lead to a failed Dexterity Save - and the next thing you know, a hero’s fallen prone atop the pudding and is in for a world of hurt.
- The flavor text describing these sludge piles from hell states that they resemble little more than a blot of shadow. Play them as such, sticking them in murky corridors where characters without Darkvision or torches will be at a disadvantage. Imagine a party carefully maneuvering through the darkness, only to discover that the darkness is not only alive but slimy as heck and ready to devour every inch of them.
Gelatinous Cube - An engulfing killer, consuming all in its way
Finally, we reach the Gelatinous Cube, the most iconic ooze of all thanks to its unique size - an ode to D&D’s early days where dungeons were mapped out on grid paper and the sight of this giant block of Jello, taking up an entire space, was enough to send adventurers running for their lives!
- The Gelatinous Cube’s Armor Class is the lowest of the lot at 6, perhaps to emphasize that its immense size makes it easy to hit. Its average Hit Points of 84 and speed of 15 places it behind the Black Pudding, though it does have the most powerful Pseudopod attack of any of the oozes.
- The cube shines in other ways, though. First off, it’s transparent. Even when in plain sight, characters must succeed on a DC 15 Wisdom (Perception) check to spot it, which can lead to fun roleplay possibilities when the area in front of the heroes suddenly jiggles and becomes sentient. Secondly, the cube can enter other creatures’ spaces and use its Engulf action, which requires a DC 12 Dexterity saving throw. If the roll is successful, that creature can choose to be pushed 5 feet back or to the side of the cube. If they fail the roll, the cube will gobble them up instead, and an engulfed creature is restrained, can’t breathe, instantly takes 3d6 acid damage, and will take an additional 6d6 acid damage at the start of the cube’s turns - which can very easily permanently kill a character who goes unconscious and begins failing multiple Death Saving Throws. A conscious character can of course attempt an escape with a DC 12 Strength check, and other players can free trapped party members with the same check, though they’ll take 3d6 acid damage in the process. In the meantime, as the cube moves, anyone stuck within will be transported along with it.
- There’s a great scene in the Pixar movie Onward that shows the protagonists navigating a narrow, trap-lined corridor when a Gelatinous Cube suddenly drops from the ceiling, forcing them to throw caution to the wind or risk being engulfed. This is the perfect template for playing a Gelatinous Cube - treat it as a hazard instead of just an enemy, and toss it at your players in a claustrophobic environment that can potentially push them into other hazards. Are they willing to risk taking damage from that spike trap to avoid becoming one with the cube?! Speaking of risks, are there any brave souls in your party willing to pull that +1 magic weapon - obviously a remnant belonging to the cube’s last meal - out of this terrifying wad of ever-advancing goop?! It can be done if the dice are willing, and what a tale that would be!
Oozing into your D&D campaigns
Oozes are as versatile as their bodies are amorphous, and can easily be placed into any campaign. Here are a few ideas:
- An alchemist experimenting with illegal formulae ends up creating a Black Pudding that digests him and lurches out into the city to find further prey. Players have to hunt this unique brand of serial killer...and their task becomes all the more complicated as the pudding slowly multiplies thanks to frantic attacks from dumbfounded guards.
- Players are tasked with infiltrating the maze-like family crypt of a very eccentric mage who just happened to put a Gelatinous Cube in the hallways on cleanup duty. After all, oozes are technically unaligned creatures who could conceivably act as sentient vacuum cleaners, keeping corridors free from pesky vermin! And you best believe that this cube is going to lurch forward once it senses the warmth of tomb raiders…
- Oozes have been spotted in a garbage zone next to a large metropolis, feeding on the never-ending supply of organic refuse created by the city’s residents. As players venture forth to literally take out the trash, Gray Oozes and Ochre Jellies can wriggle out from tiny cracks in mountains of rubbish to make the party’s life miserable.
For an official campaign that features oozes-a-plenty, check out Out of the Abyss. There, players will delve into the Underdark, meet one of the sentient oozes connected with Juiblex, and perhaps even duel the demon lord himself.
Or if you’d rather create homebrew adventures that emphasize the terror of dealing with the creatures inspired by The Blob, take a look at Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft, which features rules for crafting horror settings and emphasizing suspenseful thrills in a game of D&D. Can you imagine a Domain of Dread that’s an apocalyptic wasteland, predominantly inhabited by Gelatinous Cubes and Black Puddings that have eaten nearly everything? The mind can only ooze with the possibilities!
Jeremy Blum (@PixelGrotto) is a journalist, gaming blogger, comic book aficionado, and fan of all forms of storytelling who rolled his first polyhedral dice while living in Hong Kong in 2017. Since then, he's never looked back and loves roleplaying games for the chance to tell the tales that have been swirling in his head since childhood.
More articles like this please.
That sounds awesome!
Thank you. Now that I've had some time to think on it, I'd change the introduction of the slime's minions to something much sooner. Instead of the party simply leaving to go find someone to help, it would make more sense for the slime to attack them with the creatures its already consumed.
This would allow a immediate, but hopefully low level, encounter right at the start.
Now by this point the slime should have already consumed most of the villagers, who in turn can be used to attack the party if the DM is feeling so inclined. But I personally feel like it would be a better start to instead use the local wildlife for the attack. Small rats can come scurrying towards them from the shadows, crows and ravens might dive at the party as they turn to flee. Maybe have a wolf or two racing ahead to try and cut off their retreat. All of which are trailing a thin line of acidic goo back towards the greater slime.
Each of these creature should deal a small amount of acid damage on top of their regular attacks. But if that sounds to overpowered maybe also consider cutting their health in half to compensate. For the first encounter the goal shouldn't be for the creatures to be any form of heavy hitters. Rather their purpose is to terrify the players and be a sign of the things to come.
I'll take a second here to make special mention of the birds. Though their ability to fly is completely unhindered, they should also still have a cord of acid behind them at all times. Which is something that could possibly entangle the players and begin to eat away at them if they don't flee fast enough.
But with a successful retreat from the area the party should be left alone for a time. Time that you can now use to help establish a sense of urgency to the matter. As the party continues to travel news should begin to reach the players of ever more terrible and numerous creatures advancing ahead of the slime. What begins as a pack of wolves dragging one man into the woods can then become a village on the outskirts of the forest going ominously silent. From this village the surrounding area suddenly see's far less problems with its local kobold or goblin nests, etc. The goal would be to use long stretches of eerie silence followed by the news of quick and brutal attacks only to be followed by even more silence to build tension and keep track of where the slime is moving.
By the time the party actually returns to properly deal with the slime it should have a far more vast list of creatures it can now throw at them. Exactly how vast though is dependent on how long the party stayed away. As I said in the first post, it should grow while they are away. But exactly how much it grew is dependent on how long they travelled.
Have the Wizard cast fly on his pet Gelatinous Cube to deal with these pesky adventurers.
Suddenly that Cube has a speed of 60 ft. 120 ft when moving then using it's engulf ability.
It was in the '88 remake.
yeah but if you look at the previous ones... "how to play devils like lawyers from hell"...that is literally what devils are. "how to play a sahuagin like a sea devil"... sea devils are another name in-universe for sahuagin... all of them are like that
it's about to be lit
lol, thanks this gives me whole new ideas for my players.
Oozes have always been something hard to make scary.
The cube would have a speed of 50.
This article is heavy on the recap of what is in the MM and light on the "how to run these monsters" part. Players can run away from the lower level oozes/slimes pretty easily if it doesn't drop on them from above (that's a bit cliché). I am sure creative DMs can find ways to situate oozes so that players are, if not forced to fight them, encouraged to. At least make running away something worth giving a second thought to.
Here are three for a gray ooze:
1) A gray ooze attacks players near the entrance to a long rope bridge. If they choose to run the bridge, roll an intelligence/passive perception check on the party lead to notice that the bridge is actually a cable (as in metal) bridge. If the check is failed, and the party makes a run for it, the ooze starts to eat away at the (metal) cables holding the bridge. Make the bridge long enough that there is a chance the party won't make it across without a medium difficulty Athletics check. At this point (no roll intelligence roll needed), it becomes clear that they better double-back, fight the ooze OR get off the bridge, ASAP.
2) Players encounter a gray ooze that drops down behind them in a room that has but one other exit, a stone stairwell 30' high. At the top of the stairs is a locked door. If players try to escape via the door, run a turn-by-turn contest of lock-picking (and possibly trap checking) as the ooze ascends the stairs, 10' a turn. The door is a trap: there is nothing but a stone wall behind it. Bonus detail: make the stairway a series of ledges 10' high each, so players have to use the climb maneuver several times to get to the (useless) door.
3) Party is in a long hall with two open pit traps ahead. The first one might be easy to leap, but the second one is a mere 5' past the first, meaning the second long jump will be with Disadvantage. I would *not* put spikes at the bottom, and I would make the pits only 10' deep. You want to encourage the players to fight the ooze, but not force them to.
"You touch a willing creature. The target gains a flying speed of 60 feet for the duration"
i have to agree
O_O
Oops. I thought it was 50.
I have had an idea for a gelatinous cube trap for a while. Essentially, at the end of a 60 or so foot long corridor is a strange contraption connected to a second room. When the players get close to it, a launches gelatinous cube is launched out of it at high speeds.
A great article! Lots of ideas here. Many thanks.
Did you know this song was co-written by Burt Bacharach?
I hate you. Lol
the latest encounter I have set up has the Party on their way to remove from a local swamp a Young Black Dragon who has started her first lair. To get to the island where her lair is they must cross a narrow rope & lattice bridge ... a Black Pudding is clinging to the underside of the bridge and comes up through the slats to grab onto the party as they try to cross.
jumping off the bridge into the corrupt and poisoned swamp below is a terrible idea
fighting a gelatinous corrosive entity in the middle of a rickety old bridge which is only wide enough for one person is an awful idea
letting a young black dragon know there are 5 tasty meat pies stuck on the nearby bridge is also a pretty bad prospect...
What will these intrepid young adventurers do?