D&D 5E D&D Studio Blog - Sage Advice - Creature Evolutions

There's a new D&D Studio Blog - Jeremy's posted about "Creature Evolutions": Creature Evolutions | Dungeons & Dragons

Some quick takeaways:

• Some creatures that were formerly humanoids will, going forward, be monstrosities, fey, or something else. ("Humanoid" is reserved for creatures with similar "moral and cultural range" to humans.)
• Alignment got put in a "time out".
• They've started using class tags so that DMs know that a particular NPC can attune to magic items limited to a particular class.
• Bonus actions get their own section in the stat block now.
• They've merged the Innate Spellcasting and Spellcasting traits and have gotten rid of spell slots.

Also some stuff we've already guessed based on the stat blocks and playable races in Wild Beyond the Witchlight.

There's also some Sage Advice on "rabbit hops" for harengon PCs.

 

[Dire Bare]

This Even if you don't use the "overly complicated tables", it provides a useful point of reference for both players and DMs.

Eh. I've found age descriptors more useful than numbers. Is the elf NPC young, middle-aged, venerable, ancient? That does more for me than saying the elf NPC is 1,000 years old. I might decide that's how old they are, but I've never found the age range stats provided so far useful in any meaningful way either.

 

[ad_hoc]

Each edition after 3rd just has been less and less D&D. Now Alignment is gone. Anothe sacred cow slaughtered. Creatures having completely different origins again. What's next? Dragons are brutish beasts? Vampires sparkle in sunlight? Spells are now as simplistic as "Fire, Fira, and Firaga"?

God I freaking hate WotC for making this game popular and twisting the game around in ways where it hasn't evolved at all, it's just being metamorphosized into something grotesque.

Well, guess it's partially my fault. Wish I found a way to get as rich as Bezos, cause I'd buy up D&D and fix everything for sure.

D&D had been dying since the 90s.

5e brought it back to life. Without it there would be no new D&D.

 

[Hussar]

But you should elimate the root of the problem, not the symptoms.

But, I thought the problem was that monsters with spell lists are too difficult to use at the table and far too much of a PITA for a DM to prepare?

So, this does eliminate the root of the problem. That it potentially nerfs Counterspell is a bonus, but, not really part of the problem.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

D&D had been dying since the 90s.

5e brought it back to life. Without it there would be no new D&D.

Puzzlingly, some people would rather that D&D died than become popular.

Those people are wrong and gatekeeping, but they exist.

 

[NaturalZero]

Puzzlingly, some people would rather that D&D died than become popular.

Those people are wrong and gatekeeping, but they exist.

"It's not DnD anymore," is always a funny lamentation. I remember getting into running the game with 3e and people complaining that it wasn't DnD because they completely overhauled saving throws, racial class limits, spell casting times, creature types, et al. Every time they change anything, someone is going to come out of the woodwork to tell us that the game is destroyed, or ruined, or dead, or whatever other contrived bit of nonsense.

 

[Tonguez]

D&D had been dying since the 90s.

5e brought it back to life. Without it there would be no new D&D.

I dont think it was 5e that brought it back though, if anything it just got lucky that the Brand recognition helped the new edition catch a new generation of social media natives who didnt have the old hang ups of ‘geek’ being pejorative. I think it was the creatives (actors and influences) of that new fangled world wide webs that made it popular not some magical quality of 5e

 

[Oofta]

I dont think it was 5e that brought it back though, if anything it just got lucky that the Brand recognition helped the new edition catch a new generation of social media natives who didnt have the old hang ups of ‘geek’ being pejorative. I think it was the creatives (actors and influences) of that new fangled world wide webs that made it popular not some magical quality of 5e

Huh. Last I checked, the internet existed during 4E an after the first year or so, sales of 4E steadily dropped.

Maybe the streams are popular because the game is entertaining and relatively streamlined? I know, I know. Crazy talk!

 

[Micah Sweet]

This Even if you don't use the "overly complicated tables", it provides a useful point of reference for both players and DMs.

We appear to have abandoned points of reference lately.

 

[pukunui]

Eh. I've found age descriptors more useful than numbers. Is the elf NPC young, middle-aged, venerable, ancient? That does more for me than saying the elf NPC is 1,000 years old. I might decide that's how old they are, but I've never found the age range stats provided so far useful in any meaningful way either.

Yes, and in my experience, no one wants to have an elf PC have to wait until they're 100 years old before they can be considered adult enough to go out adventuring. All my players who choose to play elves always give them a sub-100 age and I just roll with it. Elves look like adults from when they're 18+ and it's just a cultural thing that they're not "declared" an adult until they're 100, so meh. If you want to play a 25-year-old elf who's off adventuring, that's fine.

I think it would make the game easier to say all playable races reach adulthood at more or less the same age. It's just that some live longer (or shorter) in general than a typical human.

 

[Tonguez]

Huh. Last I checked, the internet existed during 4E an after the first year or so, sales of 4E steadily dropped.

Maybe the streams are popular because the game is entertaining and relatively streamlined? I know, I know. Crazy talk!

Ad-hoc mentioned DnD dying since the 90’s, 4e only came out in 2010
If anything I credit 3e with bringing DnD back to life and 4e being a glitch>

The concept of DnD being streamed to an audience also become a thing in 2010, which I contend was a happy interface between the game branding and the zeitgeist