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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Barastrondo" data-source="post: 5377069" data-attributes="member: 3820">I think a large part of what makes a "useless" monster is that for a while, the monster stat block was the only real interface that people were used to. Check out the cerebral parasites from the 1st edition Monster Manual sometime: they have a whole stat block, for formality's sake, but the only actual statistic that applies is "number appearing." They're basically a living disease, but because they're alive they were treated as a monster and given the stat block format. These days you'd use a variant on a disease rule, much like statting up green slime as a hazard rather than a monster.Things like the spanner and denzelian are likely the same way: these days we would probably stat them out using something other than the usual combat stat block for a "monster". A spanner would probably work better with a 4e trap stat block.To get back on topic, I'll admit I'm not really fond of D&D critters that don't look like they crawled out of somebody's myth cycle. This puts me in a weird place because I wind up being absolutely taken with things like nagpa and gnolls and wyverns, and rather unmoved by kruthiks and destrachans and even beholders. An immense part of a monster's utility, I believe, is whether the players have an interesting gut reaction to it or not. If they're trying to intellectually figure it out ("wait, it's an insectoid reptile? What is that even supposed to mean?"), it knocks a bit off the immersion.But I'll admit my standards are different.(Also, owlbears are completely awesome. I like the implications of a world where there are gryphons and chimeras and also new hybrid creatures; in a way, it further justifies the gryphons and such. They remind me of Baum's Kalidahs, which is also good stuff.)</blockquote>

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