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.

 

[Lidgar]

The last part is the best part - gear and treasure options for the corpses! Long has our party of murder hobos killed only to find there is no stuff to take…

 

[Micah Sweet]

I think they missed a trick by not giving the male Medusa a beard of snakes.

That would have been cool to see.

 

[dave2008]

As @Azzy already mentioned, gnolls were a playable race at least as far back as 2e, with an appearance in 1993's The Complete Book of Humanoids.

It was really @Hussar that was asking that question. So the answer is in 2e, 3e, and 4e gnolls have been playable. However, only in more obscure supplements it would seem.

 

[Micah Sweet]

It was really @Hussar that was asking that question. So the answer is in 2e, 3e, and 4e gnolls have been playable. However, only in more obscure supplements it would seem.

I never saw The Complete Book of Humanoids as any more obscure at the time than any other 2e non-core book.

 

[dave2008]

D&D was fairly consistent in its succubi not being temptresses, though (up until the end of 3E, at least). They weren't using the promise of sex as a lure to convince people to commit evil acts. Rather, they used sex as a weapon, literally able to kill with it (via negative levels). In that way, they made perfect sense as demons; their desire was simply to kill, and sex just happened to be their method of doing so.

To put it another way, they were femme fatales rather than temptresses.

I don't know, that 1e MM illustration was very seductive to young me!

 

[TiQuinn]

The male medusae (and they've been around since 1e) are mechanically different creatures with their own lore. Since this gender addition appears to be merely art-deep, they're not really the same creature (although the art's existence will likely ensure the maedar won't make a return any time soon).

The maedar's existence was merely a reversal of the ability to petrify to being able to depetrify, which I don't think is that mechanically unique, and there was never much of a lore explanation for that either (unless at some point some creative author decided to publish something in Dragon), other than perhaps a very simplistic "if medusae are female and maedars are male than clearly they would be opposites of each other in ability."

 

[dave2008]

I never saw The Complete Book of Humanoids as any more obscure at the time than any other 2e non-core book.

I think of all non core books are obscure. I never knew the above book existed when it was in print, nor most of the non-core books.

 

[Micah Sweet]

The maedar's existence was merely a reversal of people to able to petrify to being able to depetrify, which I don't think is that mechanically unique, and there was never much of a lore explanation for that either (unless at some point some creative author decided to publish something in Dragon), other than perhaps a very simplistic if medusae are female and maedars are male than clearly they would be opposites of each other in ability.

So you don't think much of the lore. That's fine, but its still there. I've read the 2e monster entries and it works just fine for me. To each their own.

 

[TiQuinn]

I think of all non core books are obscure. I never knew the above book existed when it was in print, nor most of the non-core books.

It was no more obscure than saying Xanathar's or Strixhaven is obscure in 5e. It was part of a very popular set of player's options in the 2e days published by TSR -- part of what they used to call the splatbooks.

 

[dave2008]

Then why add male hags at all?

Why not? I mean really, what are we getting upset about hear?