D&D (2024) D&D Monster Manual (2025)

[Chaosmancer]

Hmm, are scro related to nilbolgs?

Fey space orcs?

They are space orcs. As I understand the lore from the brief brush up I had with them, their big thing was being orcs that are intelligent.

double checking via google
Yep, pretty much just "what if orcs were smart and disciplined, like real people."

Scro loved combat. It is foundational to their disciplined society.[2][4] Despite this, scro were in no way stupid barbarians like many considered their groundling cousins. On the contrary they were highly intelligent and surprisingly articulate.[2] (Oftentimes, they began battles with eloquent insults toward their opponents, which sometimes gave them an advantage of surprise.[2][1]) While intensely aggressive at their cores, they kept tight reign over their emotions, hiding it under a cool exterior.[1]

The scro could see in darkness like other orcs.[4][1] Beyond that, their power came primarily from their training and physical strength, not from any magical or extraordinary powers.[2]

Unlike standard orcs, whose method of battle was often simply raw bloodthirstiness, the scro were practical and strategic in battle.[2][1] They could even be counted on to follow the rules of war held to by many civilized races, such as not harming messengers.[2]

[1] Joshua Cole (January 2006). “Races of Spelljammer”. In Erik Mona ed. Dragon #339 (Paizo Publishing, LLC), pp. 30–31.
[2]Scott Davis, Newton Ewell, John Terra (1991). Monstrous Compendium Spelljammer Appendix 2. Edited by Allen Varney. (TSR, Inc.). ISBN 1-56076-071-0.
[4] Curtis Scott (1992). The Complete Spacefarer's Handbook. Edited by Barbara G. Young. (TSR, Inc.), pp. 23–24. ISBN 1-56076-347-7.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I don't see that much difference between the changes from the Black Box to the Red Box and the changes to VGR except the latter got explained in an overly complicated metaplot story (the Grand Conjunction) and the latter didn't bother to explain. You still ended up with a different Ravenloft than you previously had, with the added benefit of knowing some dude killed Duke Gundar off camera.

I just can't get worked up about continuity any more. I find the new version the best Ravenloft to adventure in that has been released in years. I don't care that there is no canonical reason Azalin is gone, or Soth was there and left (Frankly, he should have never been there in the first place and I will die on that hill). I've had far more fun now than worrying about what some novel I never read says is Hiregaards origin is or isn't.

The explanation matters to me.

 

[Remathilis]

There have been significant retcons to the Eberron setting literally every time it has gotten an edition update. For your own sake, I’m glad you aren’t an Eberron fan, because there’s no way you’d be able to handle all of the retcons. If the destruction of the Core in Ravenloft made you hate modern 5e, the inclusion of Baator in 4e Eberron would have given you a heart attack.

When 4e first came out and changed the Dragonmarks from tied to a specific race to being something anyone can take (with incorrect species/mark combos being aberrant) I was aghast. I was very happy 5e changed it back. But looking back on it, I don't think its a bad an idea as I did. It made a lot of sense when those races were the 3e PHB races and needed something to spice them up when shapeshifters, living golems and werewolf-people on the menu. It doesn't make sense when the PHB only has five of those races and introduced five new ones. Further, there is nothing that requires any given mark to be tied to specific species except tradition.

If a future Eberron book opts for a 4e style feat dragonmark that anyone can take (and honestly feats are a brilliant way to do it now that origin feats can represent minor marks and regular feats greater marks) I don't think I'll be as upset as was in 2009. If they leave tied to specific species, I won't be angry either. The notion of magical marks denoting certain peoples to monopolize certain industries isn't inherently needed to be tied to species and I think it would make the Houses more interesting (Anyone can be a Turanni spy, for example).

As I said before, I'm too old and I've seen too many changes to concern myself with the details as long as it FEELS right...

 

[Remathilis]

The explanation matters to me.

And it doesn't to me.

I don't see where either of our desires are more important than the other.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I mean, people want to say how 2e respected 1e lore obviously ignores all the changes from 1e Manual of the Planes to 2e Planescape changes. The devil's daemons and demons to baatezu, yugiloths and tanar'ri, every plane getting renamed, the Lords of Hell getting new names (and new members), demon lords like Orcus being killed. A lot of that in reaction to the Satanic Panic.

They provided in-setting explanations for all of that, and nothing that happened before suddenly didn't happen. Whether or not one liked what they added is a separate issue.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Yeah, but that's the problem with most media where new stories get added; they always change something retroactively. I mean, Marvel or Star Wars or Doctor Who is always recontextualizing something in light of a new revelation, a new as of yet unheard of faction, an undiscovered location, etc. That's not even including the changes of side stories (did you hear about the time Luke has a yellow lightsaber?) or prequels (hey, Boba Fett knows who Obi-Wan was) do.

Yup, and generally explanations are provided.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I'm an old fan too and I wouldn't have cared. All it would have done for me and my game was produce unnecessary baggage that would have prevented me from easily coming up with my own interpretations.

I don't game in those settings, I appreciate them as stories and as game material to add to my homebrew as I see fit. So it didn't affect my play at all.

 

[Micah Sweet]

No, I don't understand how "Goblins are now Fey" is somehow a crime against Lore, while "The elemental plans are mixed together like a chunky soup, all elemental are now mixed beings, demons are born from the elemental planes and the Lord of The Nine is now a God" was to quote you "not a huge problem"

It seems like one of those things, which happened again back years ago at this point with the release of Monsters of the Multiverse, is much much less impactful.

I played and GMd a year of 4e and gave up on it. Their lore wasn't my D&D, so I tossed the whole thing on its ear and stuck with what I liked, assuming it would eventually pass.

And for the most part it did. When 5e started it felt like they were going back to the lore I remembered, or at least weren't contradicting it directly all that much (I still hate the 5e beholder origin). But instead they tore it to pieces and made a collage. Even 4e didn't do that; they just replaced everything at once, which ironically was easier to ignore.

 

[Remathilis]

Yup, and generally explanations are provided.

Not always.

There is sitll no excepted explanation why the 8th Doctor described himself as half-human in the TV movie that fits in cannon. Its a major plot point to the movie and it's utterly ignored after that. In fact, it's mocked in the 9th Doctor's finale. It really doesn't fit after they retconned the Doctor to being the Timeless Child and advised there are Doctor's prior to the First Doctor. That, of course, doesn't explain why the 15th Doctor is really the 17th (or later) Doctor. Or why the Richard Grant Shalka Doctor appeared in a montage of faces the Doctor has had (despite being a non-cannon 9th Doctor prior to the revival).

You know what the explanation they finally gave was? The Celestial Toymaker (a powerful Godlike being) "Made a Jigsaw of his timeline" and all canon before can be waved away as an Unreliable Narrators. What is the Doctor's continuity? Whatever you want it to be. They're all valid now. It all happened, but it didn't happen in any sort of chronological order to him or anyone else.

Seriously, Doctor Who continuity makes D&D continuity look like child's play.

 

[Micah Sweet]

There have been significant retcons to the Eberron setting literally every time it has gotten an edition update. For your own sake, I’m glad you aren’t an Eberron fan, because there’s no way you’d be able to handle all of the retcons. If the destruction of the Core in Ravenloft made you hate modern 5e, the inclusion of Baator in 4e Eberron would have given you a heart attack.

For an example, let’s take the Aasimar. Aasimar aren’t a major part of Eberron and were originally assumed to work as they did in the rest of yhe D&D Multiverse (being the child of an Angel and Human).

But then, still in 3E I believe, Keith Baker had a really cool idea on how to make Eberron’s Aasimar interesting and unique to the setting by merging them with the Yuan-Ti. The Shulassakar became Eberron’s Aasimar, they’re divine Yuan-Ti connected to the (mostly) extinct Couatls. They look like normal Yuan-Ti, but have feathers, psionic powers, and worship the Silver Flame. Some more powerful versions have Cleric magic and wings.

Then in 5e, Keith had another cool idea; tying Aasimar to different religions and planes of existence instead of specific divine ancestors. So now we have Aasimar that are the physical manifestations of the Silver Flame, Blood of Vol, the necrotic energies of Mabar, and so on. You can be a Seeker that believes so much in your own internal divinity that it awoke the divine spark in your soul and transformed you into a vampiric Aasimar.

(I don’t know if or how Aasimar were integrated in 4e. Did 4e Eberron have Daevas?)

In my Eberron, Angels and other divine entities are too otherworldly and aloof to have children with mortals, so I chose to implement both 5e’s Exploring Eberron Aasimar and the Shulassakar. Hell, I ignore the Shulassakar’s canon rivalry with the Yuan-Ti and make it so they are the only Yuan-To on Eberron.

This is the benefit of not caring about canon or retcons. I get to choose the lore for any given species in my version of the setting regardless of the edition. Shulassakar haven’t appeared in 5e yet, but I think they’re cool and still use them. I think base D&D Aasimar are bland and uninspiring, so I make my own versions for my own game, usually using the base mechanics. Aasimar in my setting are xenophobic isolationists that think they’re better than everyone else because of their divine blood and build their cities in the irradiated ruins of an ancient empire (partially based on Fallout’s ghouls).

Lore is meant to inspire games, not to be the sacred texts everyone has to use for their games. Canon is a curse that often prevents new, imaginative versions of older lore in the name of tradition.

I never said everyone has to use the lore in their games. Play what you want. My concern is about changing the story without explanation, because the story of D&D was something I was emotionally invested in, like Star Wars or Star Trek. They literally just ended it and said it doesn't matter anymore. That happened in the 5e era, not 4e.