D&D 5E Radically shrinking stat blocks

[Quickleaf]

Yes. Here is are a few quick photo of my session notes stat block section from my last session. I usually try to fit all stat blocks from one encounter on a two page spread though sometimes it takes up two two page spreads.

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Gotcha. I'm curious, is the "Proficiency Bonus" entry something you use when running monsters?

 

[mearls]

This looks cool! I've been thinking about developing two stat blocks. One for a monster book entry that has all the details, and an abstract one that just gives what you need to run a critter at the table.

I literally just ran a session (finished 11 minutes ago by my clock!) with some critters I designed. One NPC had +5 Dex, +0 everything else, and that was enough to make him feel distinct. The symmetrical design of TTRPGs (same stats and action economy for players and GMs) does us DMs no favors.

 

[Quickleaf]

@DinoInDisguise Interestingly, the Ancient Green Dragon (2024/25) has DEX save proficiency +8, and it's Initiative happens to be +8. I do understand the counterarguments from @Charlaquin and @Steampunkette in that having just one number is zooming out on the lens, so there's less tight control/alternate uses the GM has when there's more zoomed in granularity. So it's definitely getting into personal preference / design philosophy stuff.

I thought I'd put my money where my mouth is and look at that Ancient Green Dragon stats with an eye for how it might be made more manageable... I'll start with finished side-by-side comparison, then backtrack...

How did I get that? To start, I'm not questioning the foundational 5e design stuff – even if there are perfectly good reasons to do so. Rather, I'm coming at this through primarily a layout / information presentation / usability lens. A GM or designer could definitely INTENSIFY this "shrinking" by questioning game mechanics for sure... I just wanted experiment with what's possible within the constraints, so I'm bending but not breaking what's there...

Spoiler: Verbose and controversial explanation

For me, there's a couple things here that have been issues in terms of finding the info I need & mental strain/fatigue... it's easy to say "oh I can handle that monster no problem" when looking at it in isolation, but - at least for me - it's when placed in actual play where I'm tracking a bunch of other things that it becomes burdensome. Anyhow, some things I notice...

Lots to Track: It's not just HP, conditions, and spells... but also Legendary Resistances, Recharge, and # Reactions used. This isn't different from 2014 legendary monsters, but it is a lot for the GM to keep in mind. IME unless I'm really "on" that night, the more my mental energy goes into tracking this stuff, the less mental capacity I have for great narrative and the rest of the game. It's not a zero-sum game, but there IS an influence - at least for me.

"Dead Space" Traits: Do I really need a dictionary definition of Amphibious or could that be a tag added in [brackets] after the monster type or its swim speed? Similarly, Battle Ready feels like it should be in the Initiative line rather than pulled apart as a one-off trait that I'm not going to look at for the rest of the combat, yet still takes up space.

Legendary Resistance: I'm really not sure what the extra use in Lair is adding – assuming Lair Actions are still in the game, those are plenty of reason for a party to want to lure a dragon out of its lair / avoid it in its lair.

Multiattack: This could be greatly tightened up, along with Rend, for example...

Multiattack. Rend x3, and can replace one Rend with casting an at-will spell.

Rend (15 ft) +15 hit, 17 (2d8+8) piercing and 10 (3d6) poison.

Spellcasting. There's already good reason to provide mini-descriptions of spells in the stat block... though this is more for people using physical medium rather than DNDBeyond where you can have hyperlinks – so I get why WotC is not interested in "spelling out" spells (sorry pun). However, when including upcast spells in a monster's stats, that creates an extra bit of reading the GM needs to track down to determine number of targets. Fine for a GM who has no trouble remember that Charm Monster is 4th level, and upcast at 5th gives it two targets instead of 1... but... not every GM is going to be there even when running high level. For me it's a question of WHICH spells get brief descriptions – and my go-to there is spells which have immediate combat application... Charm Monster, Dissonant Whispers, and Cloudkill. The others are more narrative spells used outside of combat (usually). These descriptions would need to be super brief in the 1-3 lines range.

Poison Breath: It's interesting how we insist on writing out "saving throw" rather than the colloquial "save" in stat blocks... But even keeping that, I think this could be tightened...

Poison Breath (re 5-6): DC 22 Constitution saving throw, 90-foot cone. Failure: 77 (22d6) poison. Success: half damage.

Reactions: "Introduction" to legendary reactions language can be tightened to two lines, and I think the "Trigger:" doesn't really save words compared to "When" and in some cases adds words without adding clarity, e.g. "Trigger: Another creature..." vs. "When a creature..." Also I can see tightening each of these, for example there is tons of space wasted on "a creature the dragon can see" type language throughout the monster books, so here's an idea...

Charming Presence. When a creature ends its turn, the dragon casts Charm Monster on just that creature.

Since "a creature the dragon can see" is baked into Charm Monster, no need to repeat that here.

Corrosive Miasma: When the dragon uses Legendary Resistance or is hit with a ranged attack, it spews a virulent orb at a point it can see within 90 feet. The orb explodes in a 30-foot-radius sphere of gas; DC 21 Constitution save. Failure: 14 (4d6) poison and -2 AC until end of target’s next turn.

This is only 57 words compared to the 63 of the stat block above, but it isn't only a little more succinct, but it's also clarifying the narrative of what's happening. Clarifying that's it's a poison GAS also more readily cues the GM in that strong winds might disperse it or magic items making one immune to gases would apply. And it's doing that with fewer words.

Rend Retaliation: When the dragon takes damage, it makes a Rend attack.

Less words, same idea.

 

[Voadam]

For at the table I sometimes write up shorter stat blocks for myself starting with the core four stats for a bag of hit points (AC, hp, attack bonus, damage) then add in stuff as needed that makes them special. I will assign saves on the spot as needed.

When I had the group be ambushed by a catty wumpus (displacer beast) I think I wrote down:

AC 13, hp 85, +6, +6, 10d, disad to attack it, save for half = 0.

For full monster entries I like having the CR at the top. As a DM I am usually using the books/monster entries to either look up a specific monster or to find stuff of X power that seems right for the situation. Having CR buried half way into the stat block makes it harder to find stuff appropriate to throw at my 8th level group when flipping through a book.

Pathfinder 1e and 4e D&D were pretty good about having stuff in the statblocks in the order you would generally need it.

 

[Quickleaf]

For at the table I sometimes write up shorter stat blocks for myself starting with the core four stats for a bag of hit points (AC, hp, attack bonus, damage) then add in stuff as needed that makes them special. I will assign saves on the spot as needed.

When I had the group be ambushed by a catty wumpus (displacer beast) I think I wrote down:

AC 13, hp 85, +6, +6, 10d, disad to attack it, save for half = 0.

For monster entries I like having the CR at the top. As a DM I am usually using the books/monster entries to either look up a specific monster or to find stuff of X power that seems right for the situation. Having CR buried half way into the stat block makes it harder to find stuff appropriate to throw at my 8th level group when flipping through a book.

Yeah, shorthand is... well you can go crazy with that, and it's very personal. Your single-line is pretty minimal but I like that!

I've been playing around with a short/in-line text format for my own projects that looks like this (in current draft form)... still a bit heavy, though I deliberately used a spellcaster example because I wanted something more complex to test it...

 

[Quickleaf]

This looks cool! I've been thinking about developing two stat blocks. One for a monster book entry that has all the details, and an abstract one that just gives what you need to run a critter at the table.

I literally just ran a session (finished 11 minutes ago by my clock!) with some critters I designed. One NPC had +5 Dex, +0 everything else, and that was enough to make him feel distinct. The symmetrical design of TTRPGs (same stats and action economy for players and GMs) does us DMs no favors.

Nice! Putting it into practice!

I just started trying to integrate working iteratively between a bigger detailed writeup and an annotated writeup of the same monster – noticing where things in my long-form version just don't translate to the annotated version, and seeing how I can make it easier to translate. This has been really challenging when I've been writing high-level monsters which just seem to balloon in complexity in 5e (or it could be me).

Sort of the monster design equivalent of "Explain it like I'm 5"!

 

[Dumapic]

This looks cool! I've been thinking about developing two stat blocks. One for a monster book entry that has all the details, and an abstract one that just gives what you need to run a critter at the table.

I literally just ran a session (finished 11 minutes ago by my clock!) with some critters I designed. One NPC had +5 Dex, +0 everything else, and that was enough to make him feel distinct. The symmetrical design of TTRPGs (same stats and action economy for players and GMs) does us DMs no favors.

Agreed on both points. A monster book needs more details for planning, roleplaying, and brainstorming purposes. (I love the Level Up format for this!) But when I'm actually running a monster at the table, I've internalized most of the extraneous details and I just need the numbers and a few reminders (this monster has darkvision, is immune to fire, and has a cool aura attack).

But I've also started wondering about the usefulness of crunch in monsters. Will my players ever notice if a goblin has a +0 vs a +2 perception? The example above, where there's one group of saves, skills, etc. above average (+5 DEX) might be all I need.

 

[Steampunkette]

That? That I like.

Have the actual stat block and then a small "Shorthand Block"

And in the shorthand block, anything that isn't there (Immunities, Resistances, Vulnerabilities, Str Bonus of 0) just -isn't- included.

The skeleton's shorthand block would just be:

Skeleton M Undead CR 1/4 50xp
AC: 13 HP: 13 Speed: 30 DC: 12
Dex: +2 Con: +2 Int: -2 Wis: -1 Cha:-1
Vulnerable: Bludgeoning Immune: Poison, Poisoned, Fatigue
Senses: Darkvision 60ft, Passive 9
Language: No speech, understands what it knew in life
Attack: +5, 5 Pierce (1d6+2) (Ranged 80/320)

That's be super easy for when you've got a bunch of different monsters in one encounter... so long as they're all really simple enemies.

But that doesn't actually help for big tough dangerous difficult monsters that this system might try to streamline, does it?

Ancient Black Dragon G Dragon CR 23 50,000xp
AC: 22 HP: 367 Speed: 40/80f DC: 23
Str: +8 Dex: +2 Con: +7 Int: +3 Wis: +2 Cha: +4
Saves +7: Dex (9) Con (+14) Wis (+9) Cha (+11)
Immune: Acid
Senses: Darkvision 120ft, Blindsense 60ft, Passive 22
Language: Common, Draconic, +1
Ambusher: Stealth Adv Underwater, Free Grab on Bite from Hidden
Amphibious: Breathe Air/Water
Legendary Resistance: 3/day, AC -2
Ruthless: Crit, free Claw 1/round
Reach: 15ft
Multiattack: 2 claw 1 bite, or 2 claw Acid Spit
Claw: +15, 21 Slash (3d8+8)
Bite: +15, 30 Pierce (4d10+8)
Tail: +15, 21 Bludgeon (3d8+8) push 10ft, 20ft Reach
Acid Spit: 60ft, Dex Save Half, 22 Acid (4d10), 11 Acid ongoing (2d10) action ends
Acid Breath: 90x10ft line, Dex Save Half, 85 Acid (19d8), Blind on Fail.
Reaction: Hit by enemy in 10ft, Tail Attack
Legendary Actions: 3/Round
Darkness: 120ft range, 40ft sphere,1 minute magic
Roar: 120ft Range, Charisma Save, Frightened 1 minute
Wing Buffet: 15ft range Dex Save, Fail pushed 10ft knocked prone, free move 40ft fly

Does that make the dragon easier to run..? I dunno. I feel like there's clarity lost in the cutting of sentences down to a handful of keywords and dice values.

I imagine a newbie DM might find running that dragon pretty daunting without the fuller context of what the dragon's actually doing based on the sentence/paragraph structure.

 

[Sacrosanct]

That? That I like.

Have the actual stat block and then a small "Shorthand Block"

And in the shorthand block, anything that isn't there (Immunities, Resistances, Vulnerabilities, Str Bonus of 0) just -isn't- included.

The skeleton's shorthand block would just be:

Skeleton M Undead CR 1/4 50xp
AC: 13 HP: 13 Speed: 30 DC: 12
Dex: +2 Con: +2 Int: -2 Wis: -1 Cha:-1
Vulnerable: Bludgeoning Immune: Poison, Poisoned, Fatigue
Senses: Darkvision 60ft, Passive 9
Language: No speech, understands what it knew in life
Attack: +5, 5 Pierce (1d6+2) (Ranged 80/320)

That's be super easy for when you've got a bunch of different monsters in one encounter... so long as they're all really simple enemies.

Naturally I'm a fan of this, because you took my B&B stat blocks and made them even more succinct!

But that doesn't actually help for big tough dangerous difficult monsters that this system might try to streamline, does it?

Ancient Black Dragon G Dragon CR 23 50,000xp
AC: 22 HP: 367 Speed: 40/80f DC: 23
Str: +8 Dex: +2 Con: +7 Int: +3 Wis: +2 Cha: +4
Saves +7: Dex (9) Con (+14) Wis (+9) Cha (+11)
Immune: Acid
Senses: Darkvision 120ft, Blindsense 60ft, Passive 22
Language: Common, Draconic, +1
Ambusher: Stealth Adv Underwater, Free Grab on Bite from Hidden
Amphibious: Breathe Air/Water
Legendary Resistance: 3/day, AC -2
Ruthless: Crit, free Claw 1/round
Reach: 15ft
Multiattack: 2 claw 1 bite, or 2 claw Acid Spit
Claw: +15, 21 Slash (3d8+8)
Bite: +15, 30 Pierce (4d10+8)
Tail: +15, 21 Bludgeon (3d8+8) push 10ft, 20ft Reach
Acid Spit: 60ft, Dex Save Half, 22 Acid (4d10), 11 Acid ongoing (2d10) action ends
Acid Breath: 90x10ft line, Dex Save Half, 85 Acid (19d8), Blind on Fail.
Reaction: Hit by enemy in 10ft, Tail Attack
Legendary Actions: 3/Round
Darkness: 120ft range, 40ft sphere,1 minute magic
Roar: 120ft Range, Charisma Save, Frightened 1 minute
Wing Buffet: 15ft range Dex Save, Fail pushed 10ft knocked prone, free move 40ft fly

Does that make the dragon easier to run..? I dunno. I feel like there's clarity lost in the cutting of sentences down to a handful of keywords and dice values.

I imagine a newbie DM might find running that dragon pretty daunting without the fuller context of what the dragon's actually doing based on the sentence/paragraph structure.

I see your point. I think regardless, you're gonna have some real estate taken for big bad creatures. But the way you have the Actions is better, I think.

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

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What are PP and DV?