Monster Manual: What details?

[Nebulous]

People who complain about 4e MM should check out the Essentials Monster Vault, and Threats of Nentir Vale.

Great books, with mechanically solid and interesting monster designs, great artwork, and tons of interesting fluff, adventure hooks and other lore.

For example, the Manticore entry mentions that they shed their teeth like sharks; that the image of such teeth is sometimes used as a generic "Warning! This place's dangerous!" sign; that some people consider finding a manticore tooth an ill omen (no doubt because it suggests there are manticores around!) or a sign of bad luck, to the point that sometimes folks who find them don't mention their discovery lest they be shunned as unlucky... which doesn't help when the beasts attack!

Both of those books beat every 3e monster book with both hands tied behind their backs, and IMO are just as good as the (justly) famous 2e Monstrous Manual.

Damn it. I don't play 4e at all anymore but i keep hearing such good things about the Essentials monster books.

 

[Hassassin]

Fair enough. But in medieval fantasy wouldn't orcs, goblins, and kobolds be nearly as common as the boar, deer, and wolf? A D&D knight would be well trained in the manner of monsters he or she might encounter, before setting foot in their first dungeon.

Even the commoners would know a handful of beasties, passed down parent to child in the form of nursery rhymes, fireside tales. and lessons.

Everyone knows about fire-breathing dragons. It's when that dragon turns out to be a benign benefactor that things turn interesting.

I live in an area where they hunt at least elk and white-tailed deer, but if I saw one in the forest I wouldn't necessarily be able to tell which it is. Similarly, even if you knew orcs are greenish humanoids, would you be able to tell if you are looking at an orc or an ogre, or maybe something more exotic?

I handle this by asking no rolls for very common monsters (in the area the characters are from), and usually telling them the monster's type without a roll (so a dragon is a dragon).

 

[Aeolius]

I handle this by asking no rolls for very common monsters (in the area the characters are from), and usually telling them the monster's type without a roll (so a dragon is a dragon).

Works for me.

I remember when I first purchased the property where I now live. Before we built the house, I camped out one night, with my son. That night, we went for a walk in the woods.

Halfway down a trail, we heard the most blood-curdling screech. Coyote, perhaps? I did not know, so we high-tailed it back to the travel trailer. A quick bit of googling revealed that we had been frightened by a barred owl.

And knowing is half the battle.

A few weeks ago, six years after the house was finished, I went for a walk alone in the woods at night. Ten minutes away from the house, I heard the most blood-curdling scream not three minutes away from where I stood. Experience and research told me THIS was a coyote. I had previously heard them nearby.

So, I took out my bowie knife and walked cautiously back to the house.

 

[avin]

What about the 99.9% of all the other PCs that aren't in such a position? What about warriors that don't have such knowledgeable masters/trainers or perhaps PCs that have to learn this stuff from scratch? What if 1st level means just starting out rather than knowing 90% of the weirdest and strangest creatures out there? And more importantly, what about actual players and DMs who want a book that they can sit down and read to enjoy or get ideas from? The perfect Monster Manual needs to accomplish so many things.

My idea on this is the polar opposite to yours I think.

It depends on the game.

On a homebrew, where monsters live far away from civilization, is fair to assume most people don't know how they are or what they do.

In Forgotten Realms, geez, even children should know how to kill a Troll with fire.

People talk, at least about common creatures, which are defined campaign by campaign, world by world.

In a world a Grell could be so rare that just a few adventurers saw them.
In other world, Grells could infest caverns, ruins, deep forests... and then everybody would talk about them...

 

[Lurks-no-More]

Damn it. I don't play 4e at all anymore but i keep hearing such good things about the Essentials monster books.

They really are terrific. If the MM1 had been as good, I bet 4e would be a lot more popular.

 

[Klaus]

They really are terrific. If the MM1 had been as good, I bet 4e would be a lot more popular.

The free MM Updates are a good indicator of the quality of the two Monster Vaults:

Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game Official Home Page - Archive

 

[Glade Riven]

True. The Monster Vaults are pretty solid, and I would be happy for a similar 5e version.

 

[pauljathome]

Fair enough. But in medieval fantasy wouldn't orcs, goblins, and kobolds be nearly as common as the boar, deer, and wolf? A D&D knight would be well trained in the manner of monsters he or she might encounter, before setting foot in their first dungeon.

Even the commoners would know a handful of beasties, passed down parent to child in the form of nursery rhymes, fireside tales. and lessons.

Everyone knows about fire-breathing dragons. It's when that dragon turns out to be a benign benefactor that things turn interesting.

One thing to keep in mind is that information is INSANELY easier to come by in a literate society with the printing press than it would be in most D&D faux medieval societies. And the internet then hugely increased what we consider "normal" access to information.

So while I agree that the most common local monsters would be recognized and there would be folktales about many other monsters this should NOT translate into most people knowing most things about most of what they encounter.

While it is flawed I like the idea that you need in character knowledge skills to get in character information on monsters. What is needed are better guidelines for difficulty numbers and what is known. Oh, and more skill points for those poor fighters .

 

[steeldragons]

Fair enough. But in medieval fantasy wouldn't orcs, goblins, and kobolds be nearly as common as the boar, deer, and wolf? A D&D knight would be well trained in the manner of monsters he or she might encounter, before setting foot in their first dungeon.

Even the commoners would know a handful of beasties, passed down parent to child in the form of nursery rhymes, fireside tales. and lessons.

Everyone knows about fire-breathing dragons. It's when that dragon turns out to be a benign benefactor that things turn interesting.

I live in an area where they hunt at least elk and white-tailed deer, but if I saw one in the forest I wouldn't necessarily be able to tell which it is. Similarly, even if you knew orcs are greenish humanoids, would you be able to tell if you are looking at an orc or an ogre, or maybe something more exotic?

I handle this by asking no rolls for very common monsters (in the area the characters are from), and usually telling them the monster's type without a roll (so a dragon is a dragon).

One thing to keep in mind is that information is INSANELY easier to come by in a literate society with the printing press than it would be in most D&D faux medieval societies. And the internet then hugely increased what we consider "normal" access to information.

So while I agree that the most common local monsters would be recognized and there would be folktales about many other monsters this should NOT translate into most people knowing most things about most of what they encounter.

While it is flawed I like the idea that you need in character knowledge skills to get in character information on monsters. What is needed are better guidelines for difficulty numbers and what is known. Oh, and more skill points for those poor fighters .

Yeah, pretty much all of this is true.

Anyone going a'venturing is going to know an Orc or Goblin or (depending on where they're from) maybe hobgoblins, kobolds, bugbears too. Perhaps, if they are nearby, the difference between ogres and trolls.

More than that, it's a character by character kind of thing. The wizardess will recognize/be able to identify a pseudo-dragon (a.k.a. "a lap-drake" in my world) so commonly kept by mage-families in her magical homeland.

The druid knows, specifically, what a troll is and how to defeat them, various types of faye, maybe that the party needn't attack that stone giant or treant, they're "nice enough folks...most of the time."

The knight from the kingdom that just concluded a 20 year "war"/attempted invasion with "the Spider Queen", is likely going to know every possible thing there is to know about drow, driders, giant spiders, several types of demons, etc. etc.

Pretty much everyone knows (due to ghost stories or just plain local history) what most undead creatures are.

But at the same time, it took one group of mine quite some time before they realized that the townsfolk telling them about "the dragon" that was attacking caravans outside of town, really could mean any kind of giant reptilian creature.

"The Demons" that seemed to harangue farmers and kings, across the realms, were any number of curious beasts or magical creatures. Made it particularly nice/enjoyable for me when they encountered an actual demon. heh heh.

But yes, I do like to keep in mind that not every character will know what every creature is. And description is significantly more fun "this picture here"...unless, you know for sure, none of the players have seen it before. But it is sometimes most expedient. Regardless, I definitely want pix of just about everything (that isn't a normal real world animal).

And yeah, those Kenzer pages are pretty much exactly (maybe minus the half-page of narrative) the kinds of entries I'd like to see...but if it could work into 1 page...or closer to 1.5 pages instead of a full 2, would probably be better for the 5e MM.

 

[Mr. Patient]

You want to know how dishonest the monster is?

It's a famous misprint of "% Lair" found in the OD&D books. A lot of people didn't realize it was a misprint, and read it as exactly that.