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.

 

[MGibster]

I’m with you there. They never really stood out to me in any particular way and I’m not a furry or anything so I don’t find them particularly interesting as animal people either.

Ditto. I don't hate gnolls, but they fill the same niche as orcs, so what use did I have for them in most campaign settings? In the next scenario for my campaign, I decided to have two warring orc factions with one wanting to ally itself with Greyhawk and the other wanting to continue with business as usual. Some gnolls have moved into the area and want both orc groups to toe the line, but the one still wants to ally with Greyhawk, so the PCs are going to have to do something to make sure that happens. Otherwise there's going to be an annoying threat not too far to the west of the city.

One of the pack lords sent to get the orcs in line is @Charlaquin, who also has some bard levels. Naturally she sings Ke$ha songs to inspire her cackle to deviant heights and cause fear among her enemies. (And just so we're clear, Charlaquin is a lovely lady who probably wouldn't crack open my bones to sup upon the marrow.)

Whenever you tell me that I'm pretty/
That's when the hunger really hits me/
Your little heart goes pitter patter/
I want your liver on a platter/

It's been a while since I sang to my D&D players. Last time I tried engaging in a rap battle but they ended up throwing hands instead of lyrics.

I think just about any intelligent creature in D&D can be fun if you just try to think of something creative to do with them. One of the things I really liked about Baludr's Gate 3 is how much personality goblins and others had. Even the ogres had some personality.

 

[Yaarel]

The Norwegian word for "hag" is the cognate heks. It can be masculine or feminine, and refers to a male witch or a female witch. Its etymology is complex, borrowing from German Hexe directly as well as indirectly via Danish. Originally it refers to a kind of troll, a forest nature being (compare hulder). But the German witch concept is often diabolical. So Norwegian heks can connote an ugly witch who has a pact with the devil, but oppositely he or she might instead be a "righteous witch".

It is normal to have a "male hag".

Like the English word hag, the heks can be human or nonhuman, and can be good or evil.

 

[Faolyn]

I'm the minority there, since I found them to just be orcs with hyena heads. Nothing unique or special that wasn't already happening with goblins, orcs, hobgoblins, bugbears, lizardfolk, etc. Which is why I really groked to the "mutated demonic hyenamen" idea. An orc would kill you. A hobgoblin enslaves you. But a gnoll would kill, eat, and desecrate your corpse, and if you're lucky, in that order.

Heh. I do agree that orcs and gnolls are similar. Which is why I'd pick gnolls over orcs.

(It should be noted that my response to seeing pics of snarling hyenas with blood all over their faces is usually a nod of appreciation at the badassery.)

I mean, while I'm not fond of "always evil" races, I don't mind one that's a fiend (or construct or undead or something like that). I just would reskin them as something other than hyenas.

 

[Chaosmancer]

I'm the minority there, since I found them to just be orcs with hyena heads. Nothing unique or special that wasn't already happening with goblins, orcs, hobgoblins, bugbears, lizardfolk, etc. Which is why I really groked to the "mutated demonic hyenamen" idea. An orc would kill you. A hobgoblin enslaves you. But a gnoll would kill, eat, and desecrate your corpse, and if you're lucky, in that order.

EDIT: I should not I don't run them as having a real civilization, they don't raise young (new gnolls come from hyenas, or rarely humans, eating demon-tainted meat), and are barely more sapient than the hyenas that spawned them. They are more akin to a natural disaster, a plague of locusts, than to a humanoid. It absolutely doesn't bother me to make them fiends and treat them as always Evil, especially when so many other humanoids can be nuanced beings now.

I think a lot of this comes done to the media you are thinking of. I don't think gnolls in DnD have ever had much done that was interesting with them (Znir pact non-withstanding).

When I think of good gnoll characters, I think of webcomics, I think of the excellent merchant and families from Wandering Inn, I think of the Werehyena's and Bouda from Kate Daniels. I think this is why I am mostly fine with the DnD gnolls being fiends, it was a direction I had taken them occassionally myself, and all the media with better gnoll characters was non-DnD media.

I have the same thoughts about Goblins largely. The best goblins in fantasy are not in DnD.

 

[Faolyn]

Barmaids follow similar rules to inkeeps. If they’re not portly, you can’t trust them.

I think that when it comes to barmaids, the correct term is "zaftig."

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I honestly feel I say this a lot but... gnolls are interesting in Eberron. Where pretty much every monster race is interesting. And now gnolls are 100% incompatible with decades of Eberron lore, because Eberron had gnolls overcoming their savage natures and becoming productive members of society under the assumption they were humanoids, rather than fields.

Wait. You can't just have an eberron variant for gnolls anymore?

 

[Faolyn]

I think a lot of this comes done to the media you are thinking of. I don't think gnolls in DnD have ever had much done that was interesting with them (Znir pact non-withstanding).

There was an issue of a Dragon Mag--I'm too lazy to look it up right now, but definitely in the early-mid 2e era--that had gnolls and some sort of goblin riding leucrotta while invading some elves or something. I've always adored that image.

But yeah, there hasn't been much in D&D to make them cool. I think those of us who really like them either do so because of our own ideas or because it's a furry thing.

 

[JEB]

Wait. You can't just have an eberron variant for gnolls anymore?

I admit to being curious how this will be handled in the inevitable (and likely near-term) 2024-version Eberron update. Though I suspect they just won't address it.

 

[JEB]

To be honest, they should go back to ORIGINAL lore where they are a cross between gnomes and trolls.

In seriousness, the OG gnome-troll hybrid gnolls are one of my favorite weird lost bits of OD&D lore, and wish there'd been some elaboration before AD&D overwrote them. (My other favorite lost tidbit are gnomes and kobolds being implied in Blackmoor to have underwater civilizations...)

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Mod Note:

Here we go again…

And

Do you actually believe that, or are you just being snarky so you call out supposed hypocracy?

Today’s Offense du jour seems to be making things personal. It’s going viral!

People, if you have a problem with a poster, report them and/or disengage from them.

In addition, those of you who seem to be butting heads every time you encounter certain other posters in a thread should probably practice the fine art of using your ignore lists.