D&D 5E D&D Beyond Confirms Monsters of the Multiverse's May Standalone Release

Monsters of the Multiverse comes out this month as part of a gift set along with Tasha's Cauldron of Everything and Xanathar's Guide to Everything. However, if you don't need those older books, D&D Beyond has confirmed that Monsters of the Multiverse will be available separately on May 17th.

DDB's entry refers to the digital release, but these are typically timed to match the hardcovers. You can preorder the digital version from DDB now.

The book compiles monsters from Volo's Guide to Monsters and Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes, and updates them to match WotC's current format; additionally it tweaks stats where needed to ensure monsters are worthy of their Challenge Rating, as some D&D monsters have been felt to be underpowered. In addition, it compiles over 30 races previously published in 5E D&D books, also updated to the current formats.

D&D 5E - Full List of Monsters in Mordenkainen Presents Monsters of the Multiverse

Mordenkainen Presents Monsters of the Multiverse contains revamped stat blocks for 260 monsters previously published in previous Dungeons & Dragons 5E books. The list was compiled by YouTuber Bob Worldbuilder based on some blurry screenshots originally shared by Nerd Immersion (see the video...

www.enworld.org

D&D 5E - A Compilation of all the Race Changes in Monsters of the Multiverse

Over on Reddit, user KingJackel went through the video leak which came out a few days ago and manually compiled a list of all the changes to races in the book. The changes are quite extensive, with only the fairy and harengon remaining unchanged. The book contains 33 races in total, compiled and...

www.enworld.org

Update! WotC has confirmed the standalone hardcover release date is May 17th.

 

[Morrus]

Always a chance they do the right thing.

So is the "right" thing:

1) Meeting their contractual obligations.
2) Breaching their contractual obligations.
3) Doing what half of the customers want.
4) Doing what the other half of their customers want.
5) Doing what you want.

 

[Inchoroi]

I'm super salty about that release date.

 

[darjr]

Someone somewhere posted the book wasn’t in discount on DnDBeyond, but it was for me. Doubly so since I’m a “all in” buyer from early on.

So it was discounted from my regular reduced price.

Edit to add: I was wrong.

 

[Mark Craddock]

Assuming this is when the hardcover releases, my guess is this is tied up with printing issues not some conspiracy to force early adopters to re-buy the other books.

I respectfully disagree. The slipcase was supposed to be the Holiday release. It bothers me and now I have to decide how to proceed. Since, I own everything on DnD Beyond I'll probably still buy it though and that means I'm rewarding them for what I view as crappy business tactics, which just means I'll willingly fall for it.

 

[Reynard]

I respectfully disagree. The slipcase was supposed to be the Holiday release. It bothers me and now I have to decide how to proceed. Since, I own everything on DnD Beyond I'll probably still buy it though and that means I'm rewarding them for what I view as crappy business tactics, which just means I'll willingly fall for it.

What was the original lead time between the holiday release gift set and the standalone book?

 

[Ruin Explorer]

The fact that they aren't answering suggests that they can't.

Them putting it on sale before they can answer this is outright dishonest.

So we have two scenarios here:

1) They know the answer, and haven't bothered to communicate it, but are acting in approximate good faith by starting non-refundable pre-orders (which, btw, are actually outright illegal in the EU, so if anyone takes them to court, they're in a lot of trouble). This is mildly dishonest but it's not very bad.

2) They don't know the answer, and the answer could be absolutely anything, in which case, they're being outright dishonest, and it's ethically and even morally unacceptable (and probably illegal in the EU, again, as noted) for them to be doing non-refundable pre-orders.

They're planning a dev update this week. If they haven't announced the plan, I suspect that's were you'll get to hear Joe Starr say 'Love to tell you but we can't. We'll get back to you.'

Then they shouldn't be selling it until then. This isn't complicated. It's dishonest to sell non-refundable pre-orders if you don't even know what you're selling. There's not really any grey area there. WotC may well be "hanging them out to dry", but that doesn't make them any less dishonest for starting to sell it.

Someone somewhere posted the book wasn’t in discount on DnDBeyond, but it was for me. Doubly so since I’m a “all in” buyer from early on.

So it was discounted from my regular reduced price.

It's not discounted for me, and I'm fully logged in and own both the books it updates on DNDBeyond. How much was yours discounted for owning both? (I never bought the "all in" discount because I don't use WotC adventures if I can avoid it).

It's hard to understand how they could discount it correctly if they genuinely don't know what's happening with it though.

 

[Reynard]

Don't pre-order anything. Know what you are buying.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I agree @Reynard. But normally with D&D and RPG books it's pretty trivial to know what you're buying, even from DNDBeyond. Here's it's bizarre.

Apparently the SRD isn't going to be updated, which is interesting (though this is from someone who interviewed the WotC devs, so could be wrong, we don't have it on video or anything), and would suggest these changes will be separate, so we will get 250 "new" monsters to junk up the already junky DDB search (which yes, is on DDB for sure) and 30 new races to junk up the race selection.

I presume the fact that they're opening preorders without saying is just further evidence that the current owners are solely in it to soak customers for as much as possible, even if it destroys DDB as a brand.

 

[Scribe]

5) Doing what you want.

Got it in 5!

 

[Weiley31]

Apparently the SRD isn't going to be updated,

Perhaps they are gonna wait all the way till 2024 to update it. That or murder the OGL.