Coming in May: Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes! [UPDATED!]

So they just gave the title and showed the cover mock-ups; no specific info till Monday?

 

[The Big BZ]

What is the source that says 150 new monsters? The product description says only "dozens" of new monsters, which sounds to me a lot less than 150.

Jeremy Crawford on one of the Twitch shows

 

[darjr]

130 not 150. Almost half the book.

 

[Herosmith14]

Yeah, I don’t know what this is like, but it’s not 4e.

Which, to be clear, I don’t consider a bad thing. Or a good thing. If we could all just stop judging 5e by how much or little it resembles 4e and just judge each edition on its own merits, that would be lovely.

Dear Mr Charlaquin,

We are the internet, and we have some news for you...

In all seriousness, I get the complaint, but it just human nature to judge by comparison. Really the way I think I've avoided it because I got into DND with 5e and know absolutely nothing about past editions.

 

[Demetrios1453]

130 not 150. Almost half the book.

And technically that's pages of monsters, not the number of monsters itself, although the ratio of monsters to pages does tend to fall close to the 1 : 1 ratio. But if we end up with lots of monsters requiring multiple pages (such as Archdevils and Demon Lords), the overall number might end up below that..

 

[Parmandur]

What is the source that says 150 new monsters? The product description says only "dozens" of new monsters, which sounds to me a lot less than 150.

Crawford said "130+ pages of monsters" on the latest Dragon Talk.

 

[GarrettKP]

130 not 150. Almost half the book.

Pretty sure he said 130 PAGES of monsters, not 130 MONSTERS. Which could mean a little more or a little less than 130. Remember the Dukes of Hell probably take 2 pages each, and they may reprint the Demon Lords which also take 2 or 3 pages each. Also, the "Elder Elemental" beings they mentioned could take multiple pages. So I would not bank on 130 Monsters.

 

[darjr]

I did to at first. But Kate was talking about illustrations for the monsters and that each of them got at least one, 100 of them, then he said more, 130 monsters.

 

[darjr]

I’m out of my mind. Just listened to the podcast, she was talking about art pieces, 100 or more, then he said more because there are 130 pages of monsters.

So no idea of exact monster count but 130 pages of monsters. But this was was before they were done and weren’t going to send it to the printer till the next week, so who knows for sure.

 

[Swift Nimblefoot]

Yeah, I don’t know what this is like, but it’s not 4e.

Which, to be clear, I don’t consider a bad thing. Or a good thing. If we could all just stop judging 5e by how much or little it resembles 4e and just judge each edition on its own merits, that would be lovely.

The Shadar-Kai (who are basically, pasty goth humans, aka BORING) , and the Shadowfell as a concept itself were from 4E, and neither was something I liked... nor the idea that elves/eladrin are from the Feywild (basically the faery legend First World that Pathfinder also uses). This blurb mentioning that elves were shapeshifters once leans heavily towards that origin again, and I frankly always felt that D&D does not need a separate faery world plane.

 

[gyor]

The Shadar-Kai (who are basically, pasty goth humans, aka BORING) , and the Shadowfell as a concept itself were from 4E, and neither was something I liked... nor the idea that elves/eladrin are from the Feywild (basically the faery legend First World that Pathfinder also uses). This blurb mentioning that elves were shapeshifters once leans heavily towards that origin again, and I frankly always felt that D&D does not need a separate faery world plane.

Shadar Kai were more the BDSM race then Goth race, they really liked and needed pain, and had no problem dishing it out, I think the Drow were more the Goth race or the Vryloki.