D&D (2024) I have a Monster Manual. AMA!

[Azzy]

Giant Vulture is a monstrosity? I know they’ve changed some giant animals to celestials, but this one feels especially strange to me.

Have you seen the Giant Claw?

 

[GreatestHonor]

They are working very hard to keep big flyers off the wild shape and polymorph lists.

That tracks. Not something i would do, doesnt make sense to me for them to be anything other than beasts

It’s intelligent but also evil. So I guess they didn’t feel Celestial worked.

Ok, i dont have access to the statblock, but that makes sense.

View attachment 396580
Have you seen the Giant Claw?

Ok this picture alone kinda convinces me lol.

 

[Voadam]

Originally from @MonsterEnvy from this thread.

These table quotes help a bunch.

OK so Acolyte - Priest Acolyte, Cult Fanatic - Cultist Fanatic, Thug - Tough, Tribal Warrior - Warrior Infantry, Veteran - Warrior Veteran.

That covers the existing MM NPCs but still leaves the Volos and Mords to check on.

Seeing as these conversions are on the same chart as Duergar - Spy it raises the next question of how similar are these updates. Earlier it was said the Tough lost a thug's multiattack for pack tactics but was basically the same otherwise.

 

[Weiley31]

I think it stinks that, for example, some things are missing for Humanoids. Like, the Knight stat block is missing the Brave feature. Hmm, might have to look up some of the old stat blocks so I can re add anything that's not there now.

 

[pukunui]

It’s interesting to see what they’ve changed and what they haven’t. The cloaker still has its damage transfer trait but the rug of smothering does not. Meanwhile, the rug of smothering still causes its target to suffocate while the cloaker’s attach does not.

It’s also interesting that the chuul’s sense magic trait functions like detect magic without it actually casting the spell, while black dragons have to cast the fear spell instead of having a trait that functions like the fear spell.

Also, the cloaker can cast mirror image with no components (meaning it can’t be counterspelled) but black dragons and white dragons still have to use V and S components for their fear spells (meaning they can be counterspelled).

Also, why do only black dragons and white dragons get fear, and why is it a spell that can be counterspelled? What happened to the iconic dragon fear?

 

[mamba]

This feels like the wrong knob to turn on this. Instead of having to police every monster entry for the rest of the edition, maybe just fix those two abilities instead.

they tried, but it was shot down in the playtest, along with the other good ideas

I thought they added stat blocks to the PHB for this, just limit it to those.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

I think it stinks that, for example, some things are missing for Humanoids. Like, the Knight stat block is missing the Brave feature. Hmm, might have to look up some of the old stat blocks so I can re add anything that's not there now.

Well the new Knight is immune to Frightened.

 

[Weiley31]

Well the new Knight is immune to Frightened.

 

[GreatestHonor]

What does the lich’s new spellcasting look like? Curious since monsters dont use spell slots anymore.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

What does the lich’s new spellcasting look like? Curious since monsters dont use spell slots anymore.