Must have book per edition

[Joshua Randall]

[nitpick]The Monstrous Compendium was "those horrible three-ring-binder thingies". Monstrous Manual was the hardback compendium that replaced the MC.[/nitpick]

D'oh!

Hey, you know what made my 2e Monstrous Manual especially cool? My sister bought it for me. One of the best birthday gifts I ever got. Who says siblings get you crappy gifts?

 

[Stormonu]

I'm not seeing enough love for 4th Edition's Monster Vault. That book is the model I hope all other monster books follow.

Of the limited 4E collection I have, I agree it's the best I've seen for 4E. Still, the 2E Monsterous Manual beats it hands down. I (and I suspect many others) hope it is the model that's used for 5E - with some tightening up, of course.

 

[MoonSong]

I can only speak for what I know

Basic: Rules Cyclopedia. This one book is full of quirks by itself. It's take on high scale medieval warfare is worth taking a look.
1e.- wouldn't know, haven't seen a single book on my life, if I'm to believe people would say the DMG.
2e.- The Complete Bard's Handbook. (lot's of usefull info on music and home of the Elven Minstrel to me the best version of the bard ever)
3.0 - The DMG. speciffically it's city building tables and some extra rules
3.5 - both Unearthed Arcana and Book of Vile Darkness
4e.- Dark Sun Campaign Setting
Essentials.- Heroes of Feywild

 

[delericho]

3.5 - both Unearthed Arcana and Book of Vile Darkness

Nitpick: BoVD predates 3.5e.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I'm seeing a lot of love for the 2e Monster book. Are we talking the hard bound or the ring binder? The ring binder was awful, IMHO, the hardbound I don't recall as well. Was the content that different?

 

[delericho]

I'm seeing a lot of love for the 2e Monster book. Are we talking the hard bound or the ring binder? The ring binder was awful, IMHO, the hardbound I don't recall as well. Was the content that different?

I believe people are talking about the hardbound book.

The binder was a decent idea, but was really badly executed. It had two major flaws: the pages kept ripping out of the binder, and even as soon as the very first expension it became impossible to organise the monsters alphabetically (thus negating the one advantage of having a binder in the first place).

But the actual monster content itself? That was basically fine, IMO.

The Monstrous Manual had essentially the same content as the binder (MC1 + MC2), but had full-colour art, and placed the monsters in the correct order. So it took all the good stuff, avoided the pitfalls, and so was an excellent product.

YMMV, of course.

 

[Drowbane]

I can't pick just one and I just know I am going to neglect excellent books from each edition. Ah well...

1e:
* Legends and Lore: for a kid who loved reading about ancient mythologies, this was an amazing find in my youth.
* Unearthed Arcana: so much good stuff. I used this all through 2e.

2e:
* Entire Settings of pure win: such as, but not limited to... Dark Sun, Jakandor, Planescape, and Ravenloft.
* Player's Option: These three books get a lot of flak, but they were the herald to 3e mechanics in a lot of ways.
* Complete Book of Fighters: gave melee some ooomph.
* Complete Book of Ninjas: was basically the 1e Oriental Adventures book for 2e without claiming to be a setting book.
* Complete Book of Psionicists: 2e Psi was wonky, but very fun to play.
* Complete Book of Elves: in retrospec, this race got too much love. But at the time, Bladesong and Bladesingers were all over my campaigns. 2e was the time for this elder race to shine.

3e
* Forgotten Realms CS: One of the best books from early 3e.
* Eberron CS: not my favorite setting, but it offers a lot of interesting new ideas. Such as playable constructs. Warforged are a personal favorite race of mine now. I also like the Karnathi, despite that kingdom having one of the worst kept secrets in 3e (King Kaius is a...!!!).
* Unearthed Arcana: gets mention for Gestalt alone. Great book overall.
* Expanded Psionics Handbook: a favorite "magic subsystem" of mine. Bruce Cordell did a great job here.
* Tome of Battle (A Book of 9 Swords): wait, what? Non-Casters can have nice things too? Sold!
* Fiendish Codex I & II: Very useful books for the DM (or player) who enjoys delving into the lower planes. WotC shortsightedly left out the most important Fiendish race, the Daemon... but nobody is perfect.
* Oriental Adventures: Iaijutsu Master. Nuf said?

4e
* no comment

Trailblazer (Bad Axe games take on 3.75)
* Trailblazer: I have only seen the one book, but they did a good job at analyzing the math of 3e and readjusting the "spine" to make things work a little better. If I had to choose a "3.75", it would be TB Mechanics + PF Fluff... + older Fluff (like Planescape and the Forgotten Realms).

Pathfinder
* Innersea Guidebook (or whatever its called): full of great fluff.

 

[Neonchameleon]

1e: DMG. Fascinating book with loads of useful tables. Runner up: Wilderness Companion.

2e: Planescape. Great and interesting setting. Runner up: Another setting book. There are so many good settings...
(IMO the Monstrous Manual is seriously overrated and generally has less fluff than any of the 4e equivalents other than what monsters have for dinner as standard).

3e: Eberron. Runner up: Book of 9 Swords.

4e: It's hard to pick. The DMG 2. Any of the monster manuals, especially including Monster Vault: Threats to the Nentir Vale (which is half setting book). Any of the setting books with the exception of the Realms.

 

[Zustiur]

I cast another vote for 2e MM. I don't have any other books that have been so helpful when running other editions.

 

[I'm A Banana]

I'm seeing a lot of love for the 2e Monster book. Are we talking the hard bound or the ring binder? The ring binder was awful, IMHO, the hardbound I don't recall as well. Was the content that different?

The Monstrous Manual was the hardcover book that compiled the binder materials.

The content wasn't that different (I think there may have been one or two monsters cut from the hardcover or something, and a chunk of fluff text for a lot of basic critters like badgers), but it's my opinion that the 2e MM's content is the best of any monster book in D&D. Nearly every paragraph was seeded with potential plot-hooks and encounter ideas. They provoked the DM to think about how this creature existed in the world. Even the statblock with fields like "activity cycle" and "habitat/terrain" and "No. Appearing" could inspire all sorts of encounter design.

I believe it's the 2e MM that sold me personally on D&D. A game that could so intimately tell me what a hippogriff was (and what kind of situations might cause it to confront adventurers) was something I wanted to play. I wanted to have adventures where the party encountered githzerai and aurumvoraxes. It seemed (and still seems) very full of potential.

The 2e MM also had something fairly unique going for it. Because it was a compilation of previous MCs, it included a fascinating array of exotic creatures relevant mainly for particular campaign settings. Seeing the Arcane (later Mercane) as space-faring magical item inventors from the '70's alongside beholders alongside zaratans alongside grippli alongside hags alongside genies along side "ogre magi"...there was a vast fantastic world in that book much bigger than the pseudoeurpean generic fantasy.

Personally, I think the focus on stat-blocks over "pointless notes on piercer ecology" after that diminished the utility of the MMs to me. Good stat blocks are essential and useful, but piles of numbers and keywords don't make me want to do anything. They're good tools, but lousy inspiration. And good tools are useless by themselves -- you need the inspiration to motivate you to make something with them. It's hard to make a bench without a good saw, but it's IMPOSSIBLE to make a bench without wanting to make a bench. I feel like I can go back to the 2e MM today and still run a thousand adventures from out of it, in any edition. I can't say the same about the 3e monster books or the 4e monster books I own, really. Or even the 1e monster books (though they're a bit better) or the OD&D monster descriptions (I never want a gnoll to be a gnome/troll hybrid again! ).

I think the 2e MM can be improved on, but I don't think that any book in any subsequent edition has done that. But I have controversial opinions.