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.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I tend to be careful using etymology to determine gender. There are just so many examples of using the masculine to refer to both genders that it's difficult to determine if it's the inclusive (mankind) or exclusive (manosphere).

But in this case it is actually explicit. When these words were coined "man" indeed meant human and was gender-neutral, whereas male humans were weremen and female humans wifmen (origin of our current "woman" and "wife.") So werewolf is specifically man (as in male) wolf. Not that some ancient etymology that 99% people do not know should dictate how the words are used today, and there certainly have been female werewolves in popular culture for a good while and no one has insisted calling them "wifwolves." I just think the etymology is interesting, and indeed relates to why "man" is sometimes used to refer to humans in gender-neutral manner; that was what it originally exclusively meant.

 

[Echohawk]

That might have been me. I was up to at least 6, plus an additional binder for the index (which I made using MS Access). Alas, I got rid of it a few years ago and just kept the index.

How did you get up to six? All of the pages from the loose-leaf Monstrous Compendiums are only 11cm when stacked on top of each other (I just did this to check, stop laughing at me).

Mind you, if you were photocopying each side, that would double the total to 22cm. And then there are all of the additional sheets from many, many boxed sets and accessories and magazines, so that could easily add another 20cm. Okay, never mind, I've answered my own question.

While stacking my MC sheets, I also found an index I'd made. It appears to have been printed on a daisy wheel printer. Now I feel really old.

 

[Bae'zel]

yawn

Did this with medusa decades ago.

Medusas in the Hodgepocalypse are nerdy types that encompass gender options and come in full-color patterns of snakes.

One of my reoccurring villains is "The Copperhead Kid," an old west gunslinger Medusa (with an obvious Copperhead snake pattern), that Jesse James and John Wesley Hardin inspired, and he has become a favorite villain the pcs love to hate.

About a decade ago, I participated in an Inktober challenge. Can't remember the theme. Anyways, I did an illustration of a male Gorgon Medusa resembling Idris Elba (imagine those golden eyes from his time as an Asgardian in the MCU).

Got a few responses like "Hm a male medusa eh? I suppose that could work" or "I never thought of that!".

It's so ingrained that certain monsters are always male or female. It's like those people who are, like, "Dogs are boys, cats are girls". GROAN.

 

[Stormonu]

How did you get up to six? All of the pages from the loose-leaf Monstrous Compendiums are only 11cm when stacked on top of each other (I just did this to check, stop laughing at me).

Mind you, if you were photocopying each side, that would double the total to 22cm. And then there are all of the additional sheets from many, many boxed sets and accessories and magazines, so that could easily add another 20cm. Okay, never mind, I've answered my own question.

While stacking my MC sheets, I also found an index I'd made. It appears to have been printed on a daisy wheel printer. Now I feel really old.

Yeah, I did one creature per page, and the binders themselves were smaller (half the size, as I recall) to both reduce the stress on the pages and make them easier to flip through.

 

[SkidAce]

I’m a little taken aback by all the gnoll love. I don’t know if I’ve ever used them in a campaign.

Goblinoids are prevalent in half our campaign's continent, gnolls are in the other half.

 

[SkidAce]

You know what's cool about D&D? Or any fantasy RPG for that matter?

You can change the lore to suit your tastes.

Want Gnolls to be a "natural", non-demonic race? Want good Gnolls and happy Gnoll villages with cute Gnoll children who peacefully live alongside other folks from other species? You can do that.

I mean, look at D&D itself: the Forgotten Realms vs. Eberron vs. Ravenloft vs. Greyhawk vs. Dark Sun... all have slightly different takes, right?

Who the hell cares what WotC have declared as their official setting ideas on certain humanoids? Change it. Make your own settings where things are different. Or adapt the Forgotten Realms or Mystara to your own tastes.

Actually I think that WotC, and TSR for that matter, have always said "do what you will, make up your own $#!t".

I don't fully understand the debate here.

Yeah, I'm with you. But it seems there's a sizeable contingent that wants the lore to be shared all campaigns, giving a "common experience" if you will.

However, when we create campaigns or settings, what species are included and how are they different is one of the first things we consider.

 

[SkidAce]

Never read those. Did they have the cultural penetration of the Vampire Chronicles?

Not as well written. More meandering. Still popular with some folks.

 

[Voadam]

I mean, so did D&D. Male Medusae of been a thing since at least 2e and they also appeared in the 4e MM. In 3.5e they just say they look human (except for the snake hair of course) and make no distinction about the sex. So this is not a new thing.

In 2e male medusae were Maedar as shown in the first page of this thread.

In 3.5 the MM description is gender neutral as you mention with the picture being female so not contradictory with female only or both gendered. I am not sure if secondary sources provide for Maedar or straight male medusae or no males. I would not be surprised if there is a conversion of the maedar in some dragon magazine article or something similar.

In 4e male medusa were not maedar but also different from female medusae in powers and appearance. In 4e female medusae had a petrifying gaze and poisonous snake hair while male medusae had a poisonous blinding gaze and no snake hair.

From the 4e MM:

A MEDUSA IS A SCALY MONSTER WITH A HORRIFYING GAZE.
Females of the species use their gaze to turn other creatures to stone, and their lairs are filled with lifelike statues. Male medusas use their gaze to poison the minds and bodies of their victims before hacking them to pieces, and their lairs are painted with the blood of fallen prey.

 

[SkidAce]

I've decided to call male hags "Hags".

 

[Twiggly the Gnome]

There was one Golem created in Prague.

While the golem of Prague is the most famous, there are other examples, the first being recorded in the Talmud. Rava, a 4th century Babylonian Rabbi, was said to have created a man out of dust who could not speak.