The 4E Monster Manual: good...bad...ugly..

[JeffB]

4E fan here, but Voted "OK". The 4E MM IMO is the weakest of the 4E core books by a fairly large margin. I thnk 3/0/3.5 and the 2 Monstrous Manual have a significant edge.

There's alot of "silliness" from all of them that I won't ever use, but 4E seems to have a bit more of it- or rather, a greater percentage of it.

My biggest gripe is that the 4E MM lacks lower level threats (yes you can scale down, blah blah, but ready to run there's a dearth of lower level threats).

I think stylistically I prefer the 4E art, however the 3.x versions have better art from a technical standpoint-def more talent going on there-Overall, 3E gets the nod.

I'd have preferred more (but not neccessarily MUCH more) "ecology" info in the 4E MM as well.

2E Monstrous Manual, while not very good from an art standpoint (other than a few of the D'iterelli or whatever his name was pieces) was def most useful/best bang for the buck.

1E MM- still my fave- some of those illustrations to this day have not been equaled (of course there are some really bad ones). I def miss the 1E Troll, Bugbear (those shambling silent lanky looking things- the muscled brute of later editions is really blah, IMO) and old style Kobolds for example.

Overall 4E MM- seems thrown together at the last minute- it suffices, but is hardly a gem.

 

[Fallen Seraph]

I personally find it the best yet, but... That is more to do with the system then anything else. In that using the MM and how they have monsters divided up (I know later MM's had that as well, but nice to have this one continue it), and the XP budget, and roles and such just makes it sooo much easier to set-up encounters I find.

As for descriptions and look of monsters and such, it doesn't really matter much to me. Since, I refluff just about EVERYTHING.

 

[El Mahdi]

Overall, I voted OK. The minion concepts and different roles of monsters (artillery, etc) were really good, but overall the monster descriptions and writeups just feel to "cartoony" for me. Of all the core books, I'd rate the DMG 1st place, PHB 2nd place, and the MM 3rd place.

 

[JeffB]

One thing I should have added in favor of 4E- the different versions for common monsters- i.e. various types of Orcs, Goblins, Hobgoblins, Kobolds, and such. I find this extremely useful for me and a great addition as I tend to use the more common "goblinoids" as antagonists vs the more..errr...fantastical....type creatures (beholders, mind flayers, etc)

EDIT-and of course, FAR BETTER stat blocks. 3.x was a nightmare (for me).

 

[Shemeska]

Recycled artwork.

Poor/thin flavor text.

Removal of classic monsters for seemingly arbitrary reasons, or for reasons that were openly insulting to anyone who liked them and used them.

- Not the book for me.

 

[Spatula]

Errata, errata, errata. Too many monsters have had their numbers radically changed for this MM to be all that useful. In a just world, we would be able to get a new printing that incorporated the errata without having to pay $75 for it.

 

[garyh]

I really enjoy that they made the monsterous humanoids feel different in play. Orcs and hobgoblins are now differentiated by more than just the default weapon a level 1 warrior uses.

 

[Kunimatyu]

Recycled artwork.

Poor/thin flavor text.

Removal of classic monsters for seemingly arbitrary reasons, or for reasons that were openly insulting to anyone who liked them and used them.

- Not the book for me.

There's a yugoloth right in the book, and still he disses it.

Also, which "classic" monsters are you talking about? It seems like this MM is more of an all-star list than we've ever gotten before.

 

[Derulbaskul]

Recycled artwork. Poor/thin flavor text. Removal of classic monsters for seemingly arbitrary reasons, or for reasons that were openly insulting to anyone who liked them and used them. (snip)

This plus the errata means that my response to the book is less than favourable.

As for errata, I can understand that the editors lost the plot in the last couple of years of 3.5E because they were (ostensibly) working on 4E, but what's the excuse for the poor editing now?

 

[Victim]

I like the variant humanoids and such. Monsters of a given type have a mechanical feel within that type AND seem to have enough differences that fighting one type of orc is still a variation.

Plenty of monster abilities interact with other monsters or possible terrain features, so the monsters can oftern work as team like PCs hopefully do.

Stat blocks are generally pretty clear.

The organization is occasionally problematic. For example, the Tarrasque and Phane are under abominations; Bugbears are under G, etc. At least the index helps.

Not enough monsters.

On the other hand, non combatant information for monsters often feels incomplete or somewhat inconsistent. Many monsters could do with more than a few skills. Only a few monsters like Mind Flayers and Aboleth have combat effects that consistently apply outside of combat. It'd be nice to have more monster sort of rituals, or something. The descriptive text of monsters is usually so vague as to be a poor starting place for many DMs.

Naturally, the two above points work in direct opposition to each other.

I'm not exactly sure why some monster powers run on a per encounter basis, and others use the recharge system.