2025 Monster Manual to Introduce Male Versions of Hags, Medusas, and Dryads

The upcoming Monster Manual will feature artwork depicting some creatures like hags and medusas in both genders, a first for Dungeons & Dragons. In the "Everything You Need to Know" video for the upcoming Monster Manual, designers Jeremy Crawford and Wesley Schneider revealed that the new book would feature artwork portraying both male and female versions of creatures like hags, dryads, satyrs, and medusas. While there was a male medusa named Marlos Urnrayle in Princes of the Apocalypse (who had a portrait in the book) and players could make satyr PCs of either gender, this marks the first time that D&D has explicitly shown off several of these creatures as being of both male and female within a rulebook. There is no mechanical difference between male creatures and female creatures, so this is solely a change in how some monsters are presented.

In other news that actually does impact D&D mechanics, goblins are now classified as fey creatures (similar to how hobgoblins were portrayed as fey creatures in Monsters of the Multiverse) and gnolls are now classified as fiends.

Additionally, monster statblocks include potential treasure and gear options, so that DMs can reward loot when a player character inevitably searches the dead body of a creature.

The new Monster Manual will be released on February 18th, 2025.

 

[dave2008]

A snake body ? Honestly I have never heard this one. Where does it come from?

Not sure this is the origin, but:

1981 Clash of the Titans:

2010 remake of Clash of the Titans:

Magic the Gathering:

Theros:

just to name a few. A quick internet search can show you it is quite common:

EDIT: Decided to do a bird bodied gorgon search and still got some snake bodies. Notice all the bird bodies are mostly either ancient depictions or old art.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I think Ray Harryhausen has a Medusa with a snake body as well.

 

[SlyFlourish]

See the new Empyrean below.

• 10% increase in HP
• big jump in initiative
• 1 additional use of Legendary Resistance
• BPS resistance (not just to nonmagical weapons - all attacks)
• 68% increase in DPR (209 to 124)

By the old DMG calculator it would be CR 25 instead of 23 (and that doesn't include any impact for the BPS resistance, with that it might be closer to CR 26 under the old calulator)

View attachment 391576

FOF has it at a CR 23 AC/DC 23 HP 375 Atk/Prof +15 DPR 186 Atks 5 × 1d6 + 34

This one is CR23, AC 22, HP 346, +15 / +17 to hit, and about 175 dpr (maybe more if that stun bypass comes into effect)

That's pretty close to me. I certainly wouldn't change a book over it.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

I still can't see how goblins can be fey but elves are humanoids. I mean, I'm okay with the goblin-fey connection, I really am. I just think they shouldn't be more fey than elves. So if you want them to be fey, make elves fey too.

I think everyone should agree with me or you're just wrong. I mean...we can argue about some things, but this is just the way it is.

 

[Dire Bare]

I mean, without sentience, can you even be evil?

I get many don't agree, but this is an escape for my tables, and we like having unequivocally evil foes.

I'm probably using sentient wrong . . . I should be using sapient instead. Thanks @Charlaquin

@Zaukrie Huh?

Of course, to be evil you have to be sapient. Or to be good. The problem is having any sapient race as "always-evil" like orcs, goblins, and drow have been traditionally. Where WotC has stepped wrong (IMO) is thinking, "Well, if we change gnolls to demons, it's okay that they are always-evil and players can slaughter them without a second thought."

Do you need a race/species of always-evil people in order to have unequivocally evil foes in your game? My players fight evil foes all the time, but their foes evilness is not based on their race/species, we've moved past that . . .

At least, with mortal races. We still have always-evil fiends and undead . . . or always-evil-with-the-rare-exception. But even with the more supernatural creatures, this trope is problematic.

 

[Dire Bare]

I suspect the "answer" is to create a new race of hyena people, unfortunately.

Nah.

While some of us love the 5E change to gnolls, some of us hate it, some of us don't care . . . everything WotC does ultimately are suggestions for our own games. I'm not saying WotC's choices don't matter . . . they do . . . but the answer to a design choice you don't like is pretty easy, design your own version for your own game!

So, we don't need WotC to design a new hyena or dog-headed PC species . . . we just need to create our own versions of the gnoll and then . . . maybe . . . share it out with the community, perhaps on the DM's Guild.

That's a fun idea for a DM's Guild product . . . a splat on True Gnolls, presenting them in a similar light as modern orcs. With a chapter on the Graakhalia gnolls from the Mystara campaign!

And . . . WotC definitely NEEDS to give us a PC species for the Lupin! The best dog-people from classic D&D!!! Such good boys! (and girls)

 

[JEB]

WotC definitely NEEDS to give us a PC species for the Lupin! The best dog-people from classic D&D!!! Such good boys! (and girls)

It's very surprising to me that the Lupin (or any dog-folk) have yet to appear in 5e.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

"True Gnolls" is giving me Vampire: The Masquerade flashbacks.

Hey, keep the leather jackets and katanas away from those gnolls!

 

[Dire Bare]

While I don't agree with you*, I will point out that making them fiends doesn't require them to always be Evil.

*I agree that people will bring their views of an animal to an anthropomorphized version of that animal; however, I don't think that is a good reason to make that creature a particular "type."

Fantasy literature at large and even D&D literature specifically has had fiends who are more complicated than "Evil". The best example I can remember off hand is Lorcan, a cambion who acts as a warlock patron to Farideh, a tiefling warlock from the Brimstone Angels novel series. He's evil, but a pretty fleshed out and complicated character.

Which brings the problematic aspects of always-evil species to the more supernatural set like fiends and undead.

But . . . in current D&D lore, while any creature can have any alignment the DM wants, fiends are always-evil (with-rare-exceptions). Gnolls are designed to be unequivocally evil creatures, not just fiends but corruptions of nature. KILL THEM ALL WITH FIRE. Not my cuppa tea these days.

 

[Dire Bare]

As far as I know, animals cannot be offended. So a demonic depiction of a hyena is pretty much guaranteed to pass the sniff test by even the most open minded sensitivity reader.

Huh?

IRL hyenas can't be offended, true. IRL orcs also can't be offended, for different reasons. The trope remains problematic.