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Message: <blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 6012842" data-attributes="member: 2067">So, this one frustrates me a bit.I like the intent of making them less a race and more of a unique creature. But there's a conflict here.There's a lot to be gained with making it a unique creature. It's closer to the myth, it's got interesting NPC potential, and it's an interesting worldbuilding, three-pillars-total element. But, if you're going to make it a unique creature, do that. Don't make it a curse or a blessing or a magical transformation, make it one creature in the world that is The Minotaur and let the DM define how it arises and what it is like in a way that reflects their games, not some WotC boilerplate. Rather than a stat block, you'd have a fully fleshed out NPC at the center of some semi-daemonic ancient Greece-esque cult who is a real, unique presence in your world, unique to your campaign and no others. It would be a whole THING you would drop into your games, and it would be uniquely yours, not some generic monster stat block in a book of monster stat blocks. That's neat. That's a potentially interesting new twist. But that's not this minotaur. This minotaur is some half-hearted almost-miquetoast bland vanilla generic "hur hur evil cultists hur hur mutation hur hur monster" also-ran of a creature. There's little to distinguish it from the dozens upon dozens of other demons and hellish armies in D&D (of which D&D ALREADY HAS A LOT, YOU GUYS). As a world element, this minotaur's story fails me. It's not interesting, it's not compelling, it's not unique, it's just "Oh. Another demon-mutant-thing. Now with horns for some reason. And called a minotaur, even though I've seen not ONE PERSON get intimate with a mechanical bull!" It's cool to go for the mythic resonance. But if you're going to go for the mythic resonance, go for it. Don't half-do it and call it a compromise. Of course, if you go for the mythic resonance, you have to admit that you're saying "buh-bye" to some D&D tradition on the thing. And not just Krynn minotaurs and yikaria. There is something unique about D&D's take on the minotaur, the Baphomet cult, and the existence of many of these creatures, as natural creatures in the world, and not necessarily special mutant demon babies (again, D&D has HUNDREDS of those -- that's not a unique back story, that's kind of a cop-out, like the "a wizard did it!" Owlbear explanation). If you make the minotaur a unique creature, you do lose that element, and that's an area where you want to tread lightly if you're 5e.Krynn's minotaurs and yikaria are actually very different creatures, and it does them a disservice to lump them in with the traditional D&D minotaur, let alone lumping them in with the Greek-style lone minotaur. It's good that they're kind of recognizing that. Not everything that looks like a bipedal bull needs to fall into the same silo. Personally, I think you can split this knot by recognizing that you're going to need different tools for different purposes. Yikaria are a good "villain race." That kind of monster has unique abilities and unique items and unique organizations and unique plans and potential diversity, but makes a pretty awkward PC, and needs some extra detail to make a good unique antagonist. Worthy of a complex MM entry. Krynn's minotaurs are a good "PC race." They make good PC's, and NPC's, but they're not the best at being horrible monsters. Worthy of a PC writeup. Greek-myth minotaurs make good antagonists. They are horrible and unique and special monstrosities that can anchor entire adventures. Worthy of a big MM writeup as a central unique monster.Either way, the article is missing what I think is a core element of the minotaur experience, be it traditional D&D monstrous minotaur or the minotaur of Greek myth, and that is this:The Minotaur is a piteous thing, while still being a horrible monster.To me, it always seemed that D&D minotaurs are created by particular people in some sort of ritual, as punishment for a crime. In Greek myth, the minotaur is the result of a cursed and taboo love. In both situations, they are put in man-made places, because it is people who made them. They are the unwitting offspring of others' meddling, the living, breathing, manifestation of the guilt of a curse, and that leads to them being an apt metaphor for secret deeds and hidden sins (especially of the wealthy and powerful -- those who could pay for the punishment).What they ain't is some generic demon-spawn thingy. Or a bucket to put every bovine monster in D&D into. FWIW, I'd probably keep them in the MM as being particular creations of a particular ritual done to particular individuals and put in particular places as punishment -- perhaps in some sort of divine ritual to Baphomet. Not unique, but not exactly naturally occurring. Then Krynn's Minotaurs can be different, and the yikaria (who aren't really even vaguely related, honestly) can be different. And if you want to make a more powerful/interesting/diverse one-off Minotaur antagonist, that's part of what the DM's villain-building guidelines and rules should be about. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /></blockquote>

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