Comments and dislikes of lore and other changes in the 4th ed MM.

[Silverblade The Ench]

most of 4th ed, I love, but a few bacsktory/lore changes bug me in the Monster Manual.
I do enjoy the lore check additions, neat touch in MM! But I personally want a LOT more fluff on some critters,especially if there's wasted "white space" on the page.
The changes I don't like or get:

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DRIDER.
driders have always been failed outcasts of drow society...they failed the Test of Lolth, bee that way since Fiend Folio, iirc.
So why are they now...favoured of Lolth??
I know the Queen of Spiders has evolved into a more powerful god in 3rd ed, but...why the change?
it was good to have driders as outcasts, added yet another dimension of ickiness ot drow Lolth punished weak folk,and had driders asenemies, which also kept drow on their toes and gave them border guards.

Up to the WOTC designers I know, but, changing established lore, without justifying it = seems bad, IMHO. Removing the Great Wheel was explained and justified, even if I'm not totally for it.

I'd suggest if they wish to stick to this lore change, they add a bit of lore such as "the recent ascension of Lolth saw the outcast driders being welcomed as blessed creatures of the Queen"
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ABOLETH LASHER.
Why have a melee only aboleth? totally out of character for the species, rather have some nasty thing like a Glyph Caster instead. Aboleths are not melee brutes...unless they are failed mutants
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BEHEMOTH
why rename dinosaurs, to behemoths? It's very confusing and not needed. I used dinosaurs in my homebrew campaign in two distinct continents and types of beasts. Players liked them. It seems ot much of a "PC for D&D" change :/
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BEHOLDER
why use that Eye of the Beholder Aura, it just seems like an additional rule we don't need, why not just give EYE RAYS another 2 attacks??
is it to deal with "mass wave attacks" or some such?
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STORM GIANT
why are storm giants now evil?!? they've always been Chaotic good. I liked that.
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LAMIA
are now some kind of beetle swarm, eh?? always been nasty desert dwelling illusion/charm using villains. I don't see where the beetle thing had to come form. it always seemed they'd seduce, debauch mortals, amongst their ploys, but now...eh?!
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LIZARDFOLK
why don't they worship gods? that's a tad silly in settings where the gods literally exist! lizardfolk SHOULD have druidic-type priests (ie nature clerics). the "survival of the species" angle of Semuneya worship of lizardmen always seemed very cool to me.
Adding in lizardkings once more i like! But you'd need ot add what demon lord is behind influencing them, sigh, forgot off hand who it was...Demogorgon?
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MARUT
uh, removing the Great Wheel and the cosmic philosophy of good vs evil chaos vs law kind of trips up here, badly, IMHO.
Marut are now peculiar mercanries. But why they really fight is not explained.
Keeping them as enforcers of Universal Laws in 3.5, was sweet, I don't like this change.
More back story is needed behind them, they just seem "neutral mercenaries for neutral powerful folk in places of fiends", metagaming of a sort.
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MALE MEDUSA
just, ugh...lol. Maedar made more sense.

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OGRE
I actually liked the bestial/animalistic ogre look of 3rd ed, gave them a real unique D&D appearance, that's been lost. At first I wasn't keen on the 3rd ed ogre change appearance but I grew ot love it. made them seem less like "failed giants", and more like a seperate, unique creature.
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OTYGH
now they are dumber and can't be bargained with...that's a loss. it was nice RPing with the icky things, sigh. Please increase their intelligence in an errata, to 5 or 6, so folk can RP with them?
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I do love the way monsters have been changed, make smy job as a Dm much easier and fun again, thank you!
over all, the MM is extremely good.
Just these things I have problems with.

 

[Kwalish Kid]

DRIDER.

To me, the change to driders seemed obvious. It just makes more sense to have driders as a monster that can be paired with drow to give the entire encounter a better arachnid feel.

I'd suggest if they wish to stick to this lore change, they add a bit of lore such as "the recent ascension of Lolth saw the outcast driders being welcomed as blessed creatures of the Queen"

But this does absolutely nothing for DMs who are not running a campaign with this backstory. If the DMs are using the history of drider as enemy of Drow, then they don't have to change this. The histories of the monsters in the 4E MM seem to be written for the aid creation of monster groups. If you have other goals, substituting other histories is too easy. Especially if you have a lot of old gaming material that lays out that history.

BEHOLDER
why use that Eye of the Beholder Aura, it just seems like an additional rule we don't need, why not just give EYE RAYS another 2 attacks??

Because auras are used with a number of different monsters. You will probably get used to the ways auras work and so will your players. I suspect that you will have fun with them as the players struggle to keep out of the monsters' auras.

STORM GIANT
why are storm giants now evil?!? they've always been Chaotic good. I liked that.

Then change it.

LAMIA
are now some kind of beetle swarm, eh?? always been nasty desert dwelling illusion/charm using villains. I don't see where the beetle thing had to come form. it always seemed they'd seduce, debauch mortals, amongst their ploys, but now...eh?!

I think they can still play that role. They've moved the name of a vaguely defined mythological creature from one thing that barely resembles it to another thing that barely resembles it, essentially.

LIZARDFOLK
why don't they worship gods? that's a tad silly in settings where the gods literally exist! lizardfolk SHOULD have druidic-type priests (ie nature clerics). the "survival of the species" angle of Semuneya worship of lizardmen always seemed very cool to me.

Then use it!

Adding in lizardkings once more i like! But you'd need ot add what demon lord is behind influencing them, sigh, forgot off hand who it was...Demogorgon?

Again, you are referencing game material that you have that not everyone has. There is nothing that binds anyone to the text written in the 4E MM or any other source.

OTYGH
now they are dumber and can't be bargained with...that's a loss. it was nice RPing with the icky things, sigh. Please increase their intelligence in an errata, to 5 or 6, so folk can RP with them?

I think you may be confusing Otyugh with Neo-Otyugh, their more intelligent counterparts.

I urge you to continue to use the histories (and alignments) from your older products.

 

[s.j. bagley]

i'm fine with most of the changes, although i do wish that we had a descriptive paragraph to go along with the picture.

 

[Wormwood]

So why are they now...favoured of Lolth??

And now more likely to be encountered when assaulting Drow cities, I'd imagine. Upgrade

BEHEMOTH
why rename dinosaurs, to behemoths?

Because nothing evokes "pulp/action fantasy world" like scientific binomial nomenclature. Upgrade.

STORM GIANT
why are storm giants now evil?!? they've always been Chaotic good. I liked that.

I'm not a huge fan of monsters that won't see play in a normal game.

 

[Inyssius]

STORM GIANT
why are storm giants now evil?!?

Because they--along with all the other giants--were created to serve the Primordials, the foes of the gods at the beginning of time. Specifically, they were created to kill and oppress their divine-made counterparts, the smaller humanoids (elves, humans, dwarves, et cetera). I'm not really a fan of making the primordials "The Evil Ones" and the gods "The Good Ones", but that may be the trend you're seeing here.

(That said, being committed to ruining the humanoids, fighting the gods, and (if the primordials had their way) destroying everything in an endless cycle of destruction and recreation--seems like it might put them generally in the Enemy camp.)

I do think they should be the noblest of the giants, however. Point taken.

 

[I'm A Banana]

"Just change it!" misses the point that this is basically calling out WotC for being lamer than they could have been, and decrying that we now will have official products based on the new versions, rather than the old versions.

There are plenty more examples than you are calling out, but still...

DRIDER
Yes, agreed. They could always be found alongside drow, but this created a certain favor in the goddess for the dark elves specifically, and I enjoyed having the RP ability to turn evil against evil and to play these creatures as pathetic and lonesome, despite their fearsome appearance.

Driders were always with drow, in drow cities, but as bestial rejects, not as upgrades.

ABOLETH LASHER
I like that they had this. Not every member of the race needs to be a psychic mastermind.

BEHEMOTH
I enjoy the name change, actually. Its less real-world-sciencey.

BEHOLDER
I disagree with you again, I think the aura is a nice way to simplify all those attack rolls.

STORM GIANT
I agree, but only a little. They fit better with the mythos of the current setting, and they're more likely to be adversaries, so I don't mind in this specific case that they were made evil.

LAMIA
While the new lamia is cool, it does seem largely pointless, and we need our lion-centaurs back!

LIZARDMEN
I agree, their druidic society was very, very cool, and deserved to be kept.

MARUT
100% agree, 110% even. Enforcers of universal law was AWESOME. Mercenaries is "Oh, they're like every other humanoid in existence, weeee!" Bad WotC. No cookie.

MALE MEDUSA
I've got no problem with 'em. I think its a little idiotic they felt the need to include them, but they're fine.

OGRE
I'm a bit on the fence, here. The new ogres are classic big dumb guys, and we need that niche filled since hill giants became earth-elemental critters. The predatory savagery can come back, I think, in specific ogre variants. So I'm okay with it, but the predatory vibe was cool, still.

OTYUGH
I kind of agree. This is the "everything is meant to be killed in 5-10 rounds" philosophy at work, though. Bargaining is for the weak!

 

[IanB]

The beholder aura functions the way it does because the beholder is a solo monster. Solo monsters generally have to have things they do on other people's turns, in order to make them more interesting and challenging to fight.

 

[Klaus]

Re: Drider: I never knew why Lolth would take the failures of the drow race and make them more like herself (if anything, she should be turning the failures into regular elves, to be tortured and killed by drow). Making Driders the favoured of the goddess makes more sense.

 

[Silverblade The Ench]

IanB,
after thinking about it a bit, I can kind of see the advantage in having an Aura, sort of like, oh a free AoO effect on any bugger who gets close
K, I can go with that one, touche'!


Kamikaze Midget,
DRIDERS
aye, exactly! it was nice to have beasties who hated the drow even more than the PCs, lol.

ABOLETH LASHER
hm, maybe the WOTC folks added them so you have a melee template as well as leader/controller, to work from? I can see it, but it really doesn't fit the aboleth way of life...unless, as said, you say they are mutants, hehe.

LIZARDMEN
aye I really really liked them as NPCs! since I played Spelljammer too, it's important for the Spelljammer storyline (Lizardmen shamans take their races eggs near suns to hatch, becoming more intelligent, with no shaman...no spelljaming!!)

I liek them as a race who've chosen to remain primitive, they are happy that way, they'd just like Humans to leave 'em alone and to improve in their own way.

Very nice lizardman NPC storyline in Neverwinter Nights2 by the way

MARUT
yeah I dig there's Some Things Out There (tm) that you DON'T mess with or they mess back, big time! Rules beyond just godly Good and Evil. Love that stuff.
Ever seen Dr WHo? Think the White and the Black Guardian.


Kwalish Kid,
Otyughs in 3.4 and before had 5 intelligence, now they've got 1 in 4th ed!! No WAY. With 5 they were dumb but you knew you could often bribe 'em with food.
As Kamikaze says, it smacks of "if it moves, KILL IT!" mentality lol

Inyssius,
aye I know the backstory, but doesn't mean they have ot be evil, does it?

Wormwood,
easy, PCs annoy creatures left right and centre...lol, and alignments are only a rough guide, except for some specific things like Planar monsters

 

[pawsplay]

Re: Drider: I never knew why Lolth would take the failures of the drow race and make them more like herself (if anything, she should be turning the failures into regular elves, to be tortured and killed by drow). Making Driders the favoured of the goddess makes more sense.

I think the idea is to show they failed her as being higher beings and transformed them into something that manifested their solitary, bestial nature. Also, Lolth and the drow were cursed. Lolth passing on her accursed appearance is kind of a way of expressing her dissastisfaction with that drow's service. Also, Lolth likes to test her followers; the driders were up and coming drow that didn't quite make the grade, and hence are perfect for keeping everyone else on their toes. Also, Lolth is (was?) a demon queen, and just because she claims to be the patron of the drow does not mean she actually has their best interests at heart. It suit her to simply punish those who don't measure up by making them hideous. Also, spiders are servile creatures in Drow society, used as pets and guards; being transformed into one would be a humiliation.

I don't like the idea of them adding "more spider" to the encounter. The MORE COWBELL approach to RPG stuff is usually a bad idea. In general, the more thematic you make something, the less cool it is. Complexity is interesting. "Let's add more spider" to something that is already spidery is not likely to really add anything. Also, if they're favored of Lolth, it raises the question, why isn't drow society ruled by driders?

Probably the only improvement I could think of would be if they came up with some backstory as to how the driders had managed to start reproducing, creating less powerful versions called "driderkin" or something. Perhaps to drive the point home, driderkin might throwback to their elven ancestors and have a pale complexion. Just a brainstorm.

But mainly, drider should be accursed monsters living outside Drow society.