D&D 5E D&D Studio Blog - Sage Advice - Creature Evolutions

There's a new D&D Studio Blog - Jeremy's posted about "Creature Evolutions": Creature Evolutions | Dungeons & Dragons

Some quick takeaways:

• Some creatures that were formerly humanoids will, going forward, be monstrosities, fey, or something else. ("Humanoid" is reserved for creatures with similar "moral and cultural range" to humans.)
• Alignment got put in a "time out".
• They've started using class tags so that DMs know that a particular NPC can attune to magic items limited to a particular class.
• Bonus actions get their own section in the stat block now.
• They've merged the Innate Spellcasting and Spellcasting traits and have gotten rid of spell slots.

Also some stuff we've already guessed based on the stat blocks and playable races in Wild Beyond the Witchlight.

There's also some Sage Advice on "rabbit hops" for harengon PCs.

 

[Hussar]

Which doesn't really impact my home game,

See this, this right here is at the heart of the changes.

For homebrewers, nothing actually changes. They are still going to ignore what the game says and do their own thing anyway. But, these changes also mean that those who aren't particularly homebrewers now have to spend a tiny bit of time actually thinking about the repercussions of the baseline because they need to establish a baseline that is acceptable for that group.

That's the benefit here. Every group now establishes it's own baseline. Is it ok to indiscriminately slaughter something? Well, the game and WotC isn't going to answer that for you. Maybe yes it's perfectly fine at this table, but, at that table, no it isn't. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with either table. They are playing the way they want to play. Groovy.

The game isn't losing anything. It's becoming more about making the game acceptable for your table, rather than dictating from on high that this or that is okay or not okay.

 

[Charlaquin]

You might as well say that (…) dwarves don't wear beards

Who needs a beard when you’ve got chest hair?

 

[teitan]

The more I hear about the Anniversary Edition, and I am usually not this type, the more I think it's going to be a loud fart in church during Mass.

 

[teitan]

As of Volo's, they are Medium, Humanoid (Gnoll), CE. Not sure if that is the most recent printing?

I stand corrected. Must have been Twitter where Crawford said they were now Fiendish.

 

[SkidAce]

Sooooo . . . . what exactly did those overly complicated random age, height, and weight tables actually bring to the game? At every table I've ever played at, we've never used them, never even looked at them. The vast majority of PC races already are pretty close to human in height and weight, and age for the classic fantasy races hasn't been consistent over the decades.

This is not a change I'll miss, or likely even notice much really.

See though, its relative....

At almost every table I've played at, we rolled on them after generating basic stats. We will notice it immediately.

Anecdotal evidence is anecdotal though...different stokes, etc.

Game on!

 

[Scribe]

I stand corrected. Must have been Twitter where Crawford said they were now Fiendish.

Maybe, I've had to selectively ignore things that piss me off so its possible they had an update and I just didnt see it.

That said, a quick search on google is not showing any update to Gnoll either, so it could still be a Humanoid (but it certainly will not remain one if it doesnt get turned into a PC race soon) for now.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

But, I thought the problem was that monsters with spell lists are too difficult to use at the table and far too much of a PITA for a DM to prepare?

So, this does eliminate the root of the problem. That it potentially nerfs Counterspell is a bonus, but, not really part of the problem.

A twisted way to look at it.

Two independent problems.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

More good changes to help push the racist, homophobic and misogynistic people further from the game. And the louder someone protests all the changes done with 5E, the more likely they are one of those people and to be avoided.

 

[pukunui]

I stand corrected. Must have been Twitter where Crawford said they were now Fiendish.

Yes, it's possible that Jeremy said something about making gnolls fiends at some point. I don't think we've had any gnoll stats since he said that, though, so everything official still lists them as humanoids.

 

[Hussar]

A twisted way to look at it.

Two independent problems.

Twisted? I'm not quite sure what you mean.

The point was that we were simplifying how the monsters can be used. This makes it easier for DM's to both prep and play the game. That's a good thing. Having fifteen different spells is pointless when combat never lasts that long. Additionally, the game, as I said, already has a tradition of non-spell "spells" for monsters. The idea that NPC's must be built the same way as PC's is ludicrous. As to "How come that NPC can do that?" Well, the out of game answer is easy and the in-game answer is, "Well, he learned it somehow. Do you want to spend several downtime periods, months of research taken away from adventuring while you find out how he did an extra d6 on his attack?"

Like I said before, if you've used monsters from outside of WotC, this has been pretty standard since the very beginning. This isn't new at all.