MM II Identity Parade

[Dire Bare]

Also, the new Drakes sound awfully similar to some of Eberron's dinosaurs. Are the "drakes" the new name for dinosaurs, as opposed to the old "behemoth"?

I don't have MM2 yet, but it seems to me that "dinosaurs" have been split up so far into "behemoths" and "drakes". The large herbivores, like brontosauruses, are behemoths. The predators, mostly raptor types, are filed under drakes. Although more traditional "lesser" dragons still seem to be drakes also.

That only leaves pterosaurs without a home yet, I think. If we keep the categories broad.

 

[Jack99]

Jack has also made a few epic monsters.

Are you claiming that my wife and daughter are epic level?

 

[Intense_Interest]

Are you claiming that my wife and daughter are epic level?

Wait, are you implying that you "made" your wife? That's a claim that Eric's grandma would find appalling!

 

[Dice4Hire]

Hey Dice4Hire, what's your impression of the metallic dragons? Are any quite as nasty as the elder adamantine dragon that WotC previewed?

They seem to be about as nasty. A variety of effects, including the ability to make saves against specific conditions at the beginning of the round in addition to the end. They could make player's lives harder.

It is odd to see "Gold dragons that have selfish and evil tendencies...." in the writeup.

Selfish? Sure, that is a dragon.

Evil in a gold dragon ????????

 

[Dice4Hire]

How does the depth of the demogorgon write up compare to that of Orcus in the MMI and Yeenoghu in the early 4e dragon write up?

It seems the same as in MMI for Orcus. Dunno on the Dragon writeup, I don't read dragon.

 

[Derren]

Evil in a gold dragon ????????

In 4Es world there must be a reason to fight it. Otherwise the monster would be useless. Can't waste space with unnecessary good creatures, can't they?

 

[Hellzon]

In 4Es world there must be a reason to fight it. Otherwise the monster would be useless. Can't waste space with unnecessary good creatures, can't they?

Image removed by admin. Feel free to ignore someone's posts if you don't want to read them, but please don't insult them. ~ PCat

 

[Dire Bare]

In 4Es world there must be a reason to fight it. Otherwise the monster would be useless. Can't waste space with unnecessary good creatures, can't they?

You say that like it's a bad thing. If my PCs aren't going to kick its ass at some point, why do I need stats for it?

Plus, this is a very open change from older editions. Earlier, gold dragons pretty much had to be good unless they were some kind of freaky rogue or insane creature. Now the "standard" gold dragon is a lot like your standard "person", not good or evil, just doing its own thing . . . with inclinations towards being nice. But don't piss it off.

If you just can't stomach the thought of neutral and evil metallics, how hard is it to simply change the alignment in your campaign . . .

 

[Derren]

You say that like it's a bad thing. If my PCs aren't going to kick its ass at some point, why do I need stats for it?

Because you can do other things with it than "kick its ass".

Now the "standard" gold dragon is a lot like your standard "person", not good or evil, just doing its own thing . . . with inclinations towards being nice. But don't piss it off.

Except that this wasn't the reason for making metallics evil. No "grand fluff plan" to make D&D more interesting. If it would then the chromatics would be unaligned too. No, its just that in 4E everything which moves must be killable. Having something that moves and is good doesn't fit that. And so they break another tradition just to have more creatures to kill.

If they had higher reasons for it then I would have no problem with it. Its just this focus on "making things killable" and "if its not for fighting its not needed" that irks me.

And if you also want something more tangible, every time WotC breaks with a tradition they invalidate older edition fluff, be it fluff from monster books or fluff from campaign setting. Again, if they had good reasons for it, it would be ok. But their reasons is, imo, far from good. I would even say its rather bad.

Besides, why must every creature think and behave like a human? (Unless the creature is completely evil and can be killed on sight. Thats also perfectly acceptable. But having something inherently nice and compassionate? Thats a big no).

 

[gizmo33]

It is odd to see "Gold dragons that have selfish and evil tendencies...." in the writeup.

Agreed. The record graphic was funny but I don't really see how it addresses the issue. For one: the chromatic dragons have an evil alignment. Secondly: gold dragons in the past had a more unearthly nature to them - dwelling with Bahamut behind the east wind and so forth. Otherworldly creatures, like cacklefiend hyenas, get evil alignments.

If there *was* a dragon that should have an alignment, I would think it would be gold. They could have just saved some space by not writing a throw-away line that (AFAICT) has nothing to do within anything interesting. A DM is perfectly capable of taking any good creature and changing the alignment to evil, I would think no permission from WotC needs to be stated in any particular monster's stat block.