Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 4498283" data-attributes="member: 2067">One way to gauge 1e feel is a la Necromancer to pick up the Tome of Horrors, and pick up the 3e MM, and compare how they are distinct.I've said before that I think the Tome of Horrors is a better monster manual in many ways than the 3e MM. Some of the things that make it that way, for me, are...#1: Monsters that feel like fairy tales and village legends, or that cull from other fantasy staples. The great thing about this style of monsters is that they already have great "traction." It doesn't take a whole lot of thought to figure out how to use a cult of giant frog-worshiping evil, any more than it takes to figure out how to use a cult of Orcus, really.#2: The 3e MM lacked any "named boss monsters" except the Terrasque. The ToH had demon princes and lords (and minor sidekicks of those), clockwork empires, bloated frog deities, and other things that helped to define entire campaigns. 4e does a little better in this (they have Orcus, after all), but the 3e ToH was better.#3: Exotic abilities. Not everything fit snugly into the 3e mold, and the ToH wasn't afraid to let it be exotic. Alcohol dissolving monster slime? A critter's predilection for a certain kind of berry? Go for it. This helps monster lore skills to be very fun to use, because you won't be able to predict everything just by the rules, and it makes NPCs who have met the monster more interesting.#4: "One Page Per Monster" layout. It's so easy and intuitive, and if one goblin ain't enough for one page, they'll give you three. You know exactly where to point your eyes for the stat block, exactly where to  point your eyes for the picture, and exactly where to point your eyes to see what they can do in combat. WotC won't break stat boxes (which is good) but the 4e MM is a scattershot of monster wobbliness.  These all seem to be throwbacks to earlier editions. When D&D was very "melting pot" and included whatever fantasy or legend you bothered to stat up. When you were fighting the big bads from the same campaign as the designers. When "gotcha" abilities were very popular (but with the annoyance of those abilities removed). When monsters went in campaign binders instead of in books. I love them all. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />I can't speak for the rest of it, but that, in a monster book, absolutely appeals to me. I've never really played 1e, so I don't know from 1e "feel," but I like what happens at Necro, no matter what feel it's supposed to be. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f60e.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":cool:" title="Cool    :cool:"  data-smilie="6"data-shortname=":cool:" /></blockquote>

Verification