Truly, setting-specific proper nouns belong in a setting guide, where it helps those who use the setting. These proper nouns do well to be absent from a monster book, where DMs who use other settings might use as a resource.
Reliance on proper nouns also reduces the value of the monster book for other settings. It makes little sense to pay money for setting content that the DM plans to ignore in the first place.
I disagree. Setting guides are not going to be seen by everyone. The MM is a chance to highlight the diversity of D&D worlds by presenting multiple settings. It helps encourage readers to seek out the more expanded setting material, while also keeping the MM from becoming a dry encyclopedic bestiary. And even though I don't use certain settings, the ideas presented from those settings can give me ideas that I can use in my own setting.
But oblique allusions to someone else somewhere else is useless for the DMs who need a description of a creature, in the first place.
Proper Nouns are distracting. The DM stops thinking about the scene and starts grappling with some random NPC in some random planar location somewhere else. The best case scenario is if this irrelevant NPC exists. Worse. These random NPCs and their random cosmological locations probably dont exist in other settings, so the description leaves the DM with no description at all.
Reliance on proper nouns also reduces the value of the monster book for other settings.
You seem to believe that the mini-paragraph posted in the article is the entire text for the jackalwere. That they will rely on only this information to convey the complete picture. Not that I know for sure, but I believe you will get what you're asking for on top of the Graz'zt connection. And I believe he alludes to that in the article.
Why pay money to rewrite everything?
Everything?
The monster book is a more cost-effective investment for other settings when its description focuses on the scene at hand - how do these monsters work well together? - and ignores proper nouns that may or may not exist in other settings.
A description of the creature - as opposed to the description of some random NPC - gives info that the DM can use to describe an encounter. Who cares if (insert powerful unique creature here) did it? The players looking at the scene will never know this. And even if they did, who cares? Proper nouns are useless and fail to give the DM the tools that the DM needs to describe an encounter.
In your opinion. If you are an encounter-based designer, sure. But world-builders would more likely appreciate these ideas ready at hand to incorporate these creatures into the big picture.
Why don’t the Jackalweres kill their Lamia masters? They can and would, since all of them are evil.
'Because Eeeeevil' is no better than 'Becasue Graz'zt.' I'd actually call it worse because if evil equated to all killin' all the time that would makle for a really silly morality.
What motivates the Lamia? The Lamia likes to use illusions to trick its prey, then attack it by surprise while its guard is down.
What you describe here is tactics, not motivation. This is important information on a encounter level, motivation helps the world-builder see the big picture of these creatures greater purpose in life.
So, buy a Setting Guide for origin stories. A Bestiary is something different.
And I think the point many are getting to is that this information need not be separate. I would rather they put the dry stats and such into a DDi-type environment for those who want to avoid "distractions."
I don’t use the Planescape Setting. So any origin or explanation that presupposes a Wheel of Outer Planes, or objectively existing gods (or archfey, or archdevils, or demon lords, or primordeals, or any other over-important NPC) cannot work as an origin in the settings that I use.
Yes, they can work. They work as inspiration for your own ideas. You may decide to use it with the names filed off or you may decide to trash it all, that is the nature of
anything written for a monster. Even the descriptive text you wish for can be entirely trashed if I don't like it for my version of the creature in my world. Why should *I* pay for stuff that *I* have to rewrite?
Your post suggests, ‘Because Grazzt’, is an explanation for why Lamia and Jackalwere work together. But it explains nothing. Grazzt could have had, Lamia and Blue Whale, or Lamia and Tulips, or Lamia and Salt Deposits. Why was it, Lamia and Jackalwere? What is it about this pairing that makes sense? The false answer, ‘Because Grazzt’, answers nothing. The description still needs a real reason WHY, HOW, do Lamia and Jackalwere work together?
Again, you assume that a short blurb in an online article is the be-all-end-all and that these questions won't be answered in the full description.
Saying, ‘Because Grazzt’, is equally informative as saying ‘Because cheese’.
No, because you can read about the outlooks of motivations of Graz'zt in his entry and see how his influence might spread to his servitors.
It's not about character knowledge, it's about a player feeling like they have an investment in the time they spent learning about these things, as a player. It sucks to be told that all these things you're excited about seeing and experiencing, and expect to experience given that the game says this is How D&D Is (tm), aren't going to happen.
It's even a greater joy, IMO, to see and experience these creatures in play. Why would you read all the spoilers? And, if someone read the entire Walking Dead graphic novel series, are most people
actually disappointed when the show diverges from the comic?
It's a hassle to have to be the bad guy as a DM and say, "Look, I want you to get excited for this OTHER story we're telling here, drop the old one." It's a sour note to start off a newbie on. It's showing up at an action movie and getting a romance. It might be fine, but that's not what anyone told you was going to happen.
Default lore gives unrealistic expectations to people just starting off in a way that example lore does not.
If it's a hassle then be up front with the new player. Tell them the MM is not applicable to your game before they play. Tell them you run 'romance' instead of 'action movie' before they play. Provide them with information about your world's monsters to get excited about (since you seem fine with them reading the MM anyway)
before they play.
I don't want to see the MM restricted by these hypothetical new players with DMs that hide the truth from them. I do agree with your later post that a diversity of settings should see print in the MM. It can give a good compare and contrast of how different your setting ideas can go.
The time investment as a player will be spent actually playing. The knowledge gained through that play will be applicable to the actual ongoing game. Anything the player wishes to read outside of that experience may or may not have any bearing on that ongoing game. A sour note to start a newbie off on is information overload.
Should the DM in this case make sure the player's time spent is properly rewarded by making sure the scenario is run as written? We wouldn't want the player to feel like reading modules was a waste of time after all.
