D&D (2024) Its till just me or is the 2024 MM heavily infused by more 4e influences?

[pawsplay]

What monster design from 2e? That was the entire point of 3e was that we actually finally got any sort of mechanics for designing monsters. In 2e, there simply were no rules for how a monster was designed. It was all just make stuff up.

In 2e, monsters had unified mechanics. All monsters of a given HD had the same attack matrix/Thac0, and saving throws follow a regularized theme. They had few special abilities, and these would be spelled out in small paragraph formats. 2e introduced the one monster, one page format, as well.
3e, by contrast, assigned monsters a bunch of feats, whether they wanted them or not, and gave monsters ability scores, which could vastly affect their capabilities, but weren't directly taken into account by the monster design rules. Insofar as they affected the creature's capabilities, they had to be reverse-engineered.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

If they had actually committed to it being a proper Asian dragon, with no wings at all, I wouldn't be complaining.

The problem is that they sutured together something that isn't either one, because it does have wings, they're just stumpy. Anatomically it's barely different from any of the other dragons other than the stumpy wings, it just chooses to curl up on itself in the air for no discernable reason. It doesn't have the kirin-style forked antlers of Asian dragons, and the face is quite clearly European in shape rather than the "camel"- or "cow"-like head of traditional Chinese or Japanese dragons.

Like...if this is meant to be a compromise between the two, it comes across a lot more like something that doesn't want to commit to being an Asian dragon but doesn't want to be an Easternized adaptation of a Western dragon either. Because the stumpy wings, lateral frills, and extreme noodle-ness are the only things that even vaguely hint at being non-Western here.

It has Antler like Horns, I think it’s face looks different to other Sragons too.

 

[Micah Sweet]

In 2e, monsters had unified mechanics. All monsters of a given HD had the same attack matrix/Thac0, and saving throws follow a regularized theme. They had few special abilities, and these would be spelled out in small paragraph formats. 2e introduced the one monster, one page format, as well.
3e, by contrast, assigned monsters a bunch of feats, whether they wanted them or not, and gave monsters ability scores, which could vastly affect their capabilities, but weren't directly taken into account by the monster design rules. Insofar as they affected the creature's capabilities, they had to be reverse-engineered.

2e's method (an extrapolation of 1e's method as much of 2e was) is my preferred, but I respected 3e's simulationist leanings very much.

 

[nevin]

Sure, except the rules rarely offer both equally.

thus the need for a DM. when the rules offer everything in a perfect mathmatical way we'll get boring AI games.

 

[mamba]

thus the need for a DM. when the rules offer everything in a perfect mathmatical way we'll get boring AI games.

that feels like a non sequitur, I also doubt AI would be able to accomplish that, that is not how LLMs work

 

[Micah Sweet]

thus the need for a DM. when the rules offer everything in a perfect mathmatical way we'll get boring AI games.

It doesn't have to be perfect, but it could be better, particularly if they wanted to support players with different tastes who all love D&D.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

As for the "separate Bite and Claw attacks" vs "Rend", I just...I don't get that criticism. I really don't. I cannot grasp why that matters. It would be like saying that because Monks just have "Flurry of Blows" without having specific punch/kick/elbow/knee/etc. attacks, Monks cannot be naturalistically understood. Of course they can! We're just simplifying the abstraction (since "bite" and "claw" were already abstracted anyway) in a way that saves a great deal of space.

I would argue that "Rend" works better for simulation purposes than "claw-claw-bite" does, as now* we can describe the dragon using more of their bodies than just those two when stuck in melee. Stomps. Tails. Wings. Claws. Bites. Headbashing (heck, a bunch have horns and yet, they've never that I've seen ever had a mechanical way of using them!).

I say "now" there, but I have always done that. Now I don't have to say, "yeah, I just smacked you with the dragon's elbow-spike, but I was mechanically using a "claw" attack for that". Nor do I have to expand the stat-block with tails and wing-slashes as separate attacks and make the block even *bigger than it already is.

I definitely like "rend".

And I agree entirely that complaining about rend is like complaining that the monk doesn't have "kick-punch-headbutt-elbow-knee".

 

[Corinnguard]

And I agree entirely that complaining about rend is like complaining that the monk doesn't have "kick-punch-headbutt-elbow-knee".

Isn't that another way of describing of how Flurry of Blows looks to an observer?

 

[Micah Sweet]

I would argue that "Rend" works better for simulation purposes than "claw-claw-bite" does, as now* we can describe the dragon using more of their bodies than just those two when stuck in melee. Stomps. Tails. Wings. Claws. Bites. Headbashing (heck, a bunch have horns and yet, they've never that I've seen ever had a mechanical way of using them!).

I say "now" there, but I have always done that. Now I don't have to say, "yeah, I just smacked you with the dragon's elbow-spike, but I was mechanically using a "claw" attack for that". Nor do I have to expand the stat-block with tails and wing-slashes as separate attacks and make the block even *bigger than it already is.

I definitely like "rend".

And I agree entirely that complaining about rend is like complaining that the monk doesn't have "kick-punch-headbutt-elbow-knee".

To me that just begs the question, "why don't monks have those things"?

 

[FitzTheRuke]

As a miniatures enthusiast I prefer dragons to have more or less the same appearance aside from color, that way I can paint any dragon figure as any color dragon and it will fit.

You can do that anyway. When you show up with a nicely painted dragon figure (of any color) no one is going to complain that it doesn't have the proper horns and frills of the D&D Art.