Monster Manual IV - Good, Bad, or Indiferent?

[Thanee]

I haven't even seen the book yet, alas.

You will like it. A lot.

Bye
Thanee - hasn't seen the book either

 

[Mercule]

I don't hate it (contrary to impressions I may have made), but I definitely don't consider it a good buy. Two stars out of five.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

I don't like the Monster Manual IV but I think it's very useful.

When I think of a Monster Manual, I want new or updated monsters.

I don't want monsters from prevous books with classes (non core especially) that aren't going to follow the logical extensions (like no psionic gith) and I don't want maps.

Now those things in and of themselves are very useful.

I just don't want them in my Monster Manual.

Pretty much my take as well - it would have been better called Encounter Manual (or something along those lines), in which case it could boast about having 'X New Monsters for your D&D game!' I don't think people would mind having new monsters in a book of encounters nearly as much as having encounters in a Monster Manual. Sometimes it is better to have peanut butter on your chocolate than chocolate in your peanut butter....

The Auld Grump

 

[ThirdWizard]

Since I don't think I've participated in any of the other threads, I'll add my comment.

I do not use the same classed monster twice. Now, I might use multiple troll fighters or ettin barbarians or what have you, but they're going to be different opponents. I customize them each time, and I liberally use PrCs when I make monster NPCs. Thus, at best, each classed monster in the MMIV, in my game, would be used once, which makes too much wasted space for me to want it in the least.

On the other hand, one of my group members just bought Fiend Folio. I know, I know, I'm behind. But, between Fiend Folio and the Abyssal Codex I just got my hands on, the MMIV is a waste of trees.

 

[Shemeska]

I can't say the book is bad, not really, it's just very uninspired. If I was just starting out, and I'd never DM'd before, the book would have more use, but I can't justify paying money for a book where a bunch of 'new' monsters are in prior books, just with some hitdice or class levels slapped onto them. That takes a few minutes to do, and I don't have to pay for a new book to do it for me.

The art is spectacular, which has been a 3.5 trend with slim exception. Kudos to the artists.

But on top of my prior criticism the book has some pretty shallow, nearly cheesy, flavor text in places plus at least to me it's somewhat obvious that whoever wrote the ecology details on several monsters didn't do a very good job of researching said monsters before trying to write about them (the 'loths and the githyanki could have used some additional homework).

Overall, I give the book a 4.5/10

 

[Pants]

It's average. Above the MMII in quality, barely below the Fiend Folio and MMIII.

The Good: The new monsters are all pretty cool, aside from one or two. Avatars of Elemental Evil, defacers, balhannoths, bloodfire oozes, corruptures, tomb spiders, web mummies, and vitreous drinkers are probably the coolest.

The classed up humanoids will most likely see some use, unlike 99% of the monsters I own, think are cool, but I never use.

The new layout is kinda nice, with the expanded ecology and societal info. The knowledge checks are great.

The art is awesome.

The Bad: The classed humanoids probably belong in a different book. Since most of the new monsters are al pretty cool, it kinda makes me feel gipped that there could've been more, but instead we got these gnolls...

The new layout can be really useless. There's only so many times that I've read 'this creature does not exist in a natural ecology and contributes nothing' blah blah blah, only stretched out to fill a full paragraph.

There are way too many Spawn of Tiamat. Way too many. Even if some of them are kinda cool, there's still way too many.

No creatures from older editions. There's still truckloads of monsters left over that are just begging to be converted.

The froghemoth wasn't in it.

 

[atom crash]

I don't like the Monster Manual IV but I think it's very useful.

When I think of a Monster Manual, I want new or updated monsters.

I don't want monsters from prevous books with classes (non core especially) that aren't going to follow the logical extensions (like no psionic gith) and I don't want maps.

Now those things in and of themselves are very useful.

I just don't want them in my Monster Manual.

I agree to an extent: a Monster Manual probably should be chock full of new monsters. However, that's not what I want. What I want is a book of existing monsters with class levels (possibly grouped around a central theme or environment), maps and ready-to-run encounters. Give me that, call it whatever you like. I don't need another book chock full of monsters when I won't ever be able to use all the monsters I currently have.

I can't say the book is bad, not really, it's just very uninspired. If I was just starting out, and I'd never DM'd before, the book would have more use, but I can't justify paying money for a book where a bunch of 'new' monsters are in prior books, just with some hitdice or class levels slapped onto them. That takes a few minutes to do, and I don't have to pay for a new book to do it for me.

I flipped through a copy of the book yesterday and passed on it. I got a copy of the Fiendish Codex and 3 boosters of minis instead. I didn't see a single new monster in the book that I'd want to use. I wanted to get it for the monsters with levels and maps, but I couldn't justify spending the money for the book when half of it is full of new monsters I don't want and won't use.

Like many other DMs I own a metric ton of monster books, but I've only ever used a few monsters out of any book other than the Monster Manual. I was actually excited about maybe 10 entries in the MMIII (ambush drake, battlebriar, boneclaw, death blossom swarm, flind!, ibixian, kenku!, redcap, sussurus, thorn -- and many of these are 3.5 updates of older edition material). And despite my initial excitement about the Fiend Folio, I've only ever used a handful of creatures from that book (dark creeper and dark stalker, iron cobra, shadar-kai, spriggan, yellow musk zombie).

The name "Monster Manual" has traditionally been used with books containing a glut of new monsters (or monsters updated from an older edition sourcebook to the current edition of the game), so I can see how a book that deviates from that pattern might disappoint some people who expect a book full of new monsters.

But in all honesty I'm flabbergasted that so many players and DMs might still feel like there's a need for another book full of new monsters. Don't we have enough already? I certainly do. I get the coolness factor of new monsters, though, and I like seeing updated monsters as much as the next guy. But as much as I might like to see an update of the froghemoth, I'd never actually use it.

Edit: Ok, so maybe "flabbergasted" is too strong a word; merely "surprised" is more like it. But "flabbergasted" is such a great word, no?

 

[Mercule]

I agree to an extent: a Monster Manual probably should be chock full of new monsters. However, that's not what I want. What I want is a book of existing monsters with class levels (possibly grouped around a central theme or environment), maps and ready-to-run encounters. Give me that, call it whatever you like. I don't need another book chock full of monsters when I won't ever be able to use all the monsters I currently have.

I can't disagree that such a book would be nice. Problem is, what sort of classed beasties should be in it?

For example, I hate drow with an undying passion, dislike yuan-ti, and am lukewarm toward gnolls and gith; but goblinoids, undead, fiends, and orcs are cornerstones of my campaign setting. I also have a lot of human and elan psionic adversaries. Needless to say, the specific breakdown of classed critters in MM4 was pretty well worthless to me, as a whole. Anyone who does find them useful would probably be disappointed with any such book that'd tickle me.

 

[JoeGKushner]

But in all honesty I'm flabbergasted that so many players and DMs might still feel like there's a need for another book full of new monsters. Don't we have enough already? I certainly do. I get the coolness factor of new monsters, though, and I like seeing updated monsters as much as the next guy. But as much as I might like to see an update of the froghemoth, I'd never actually use it.

Edit: Ok, so maybe "flabbergasted" is too strong a word; merely "surprised" is more like it. But "flabbergasted" is such a great word, no?

No. We don't have enough monsters.

The old Creature Catalogs from Dragon had dozens of beasts that haven't seen the light of day. this doesn't include the numerous old Dragon's Bestiary.

If WoTC announced that they were doing a Monster Compendium and including monsters from all editions and each book would be 224+ pages at $39.95 a crack, I'd be there.

 

[Ripzerai]

(the 'loths and the githyanki could have used some additional homework).

I believe this book contains the first 3.x mention of Zerthimon, however. He seems to have been intentionally left out all of Bruce Cordell's descriptions of the gith.

As for the book, I am indifferent to it, so indifferent that I will not bother to rate it, let alone buy it. The class/race combinations seem fairly interesting choices, and I can see using them more than once. Something like a drow ninja seems enough of a category of monster that it's appropriate for an MM. Of the new monsters, only a handful pique my interest to any great extent. I rather like the spiderdragon, the evil elemental avatars, the fey, the clockwork modron-fixer, the goblinwolves, the angelfiend assassins, the shapeshifting body manipulators, the demons and the 'loths. But not enough to buy the book. I would like the defacer better if it were the debaser, just because of the Pixies. I think the Debaser would be a pretty good monster.