D&D 5E One-Stop Stat Blocks for D&D 5th Edition

[Frylock]

Added appendix showing all changes I made to stat blocks. Added a table of contents. Corrected several typographical errors due to copy-and-paste errors, including (among other things) missing powers, extraneous powers, and incorrect to-hit and damage expressions.

 

[bmcdaniel]

This is fabulous. I always prepare index cards with statblocks before a session with shorthand of spells and spell like abilities (I have no idea how people play without doing so... Do you really pause a game until you flip to the PHB spell description?). So this will be very useful for me, especially once you put it in Word format.

If I could make one suggestion, it would be to start every stat block on a new page. That way a DM can print out just the stat blocks needed (of course easily done individually once the Word doc is posted).

For those who have suggestions or critiques, I challenge you to also release some useful gaming aids back to the community, whether it be new monsters, classes, spells, DM screen, modules, battlemaps, etc. I've done some in the past but I should put more of my own homemade materials in shape to be more widely used. I'm about to create a dozen different orcs for an upcoming campaign and I'll pledge to put them online, and in Frylocks fabulous format.

 

[Frylock]

This is fabulous. I always prepare index cards with statblocks before a session with shorthand of spells and spell like abilities (I have no idea how people play without doing so... Do you really pause a game until you flip to the PHB spell description?). So this will be very useful for me, especially once you put it in Word format.

If I could make one suggestion, it would be to start every stat block on a new page. That way a DM can print out just the stat blocks needed (of course easily done individually once the Word doc is posted).

For those who have suggestions or critiques, I challenge you to also release some useful gaming aids back to the community, whether it be new monsters, classes, spells, DM screen, modules, battlemaps, etc. I've done some in the past but I should put more of my own homemade materials in shape to be more widely used. I'm about to create a dozen different orcs for an upcoming campaign and I'll pledge to put them online, and in Frylocks fabulous format.

Thanks for your comments. In answer to your first question, my experience has been that DMs simply cast the spells they know, which means every spell that's cast is sleep, fireball, or hold person. This greatly reduces the versatility, and therefore challenge, of the monster in question.

As for starting every stat block on a new page, I just uploaded that to the site.

Also, you should tweet [MENTION=81765]MonkeyKing[/MENTION] and KoboldPress to tell them you want their new bestiary to use this format. This should be the way to go for these stat blocks in the future.

NOTE: I've deleted the older files in my media library, but Wordpress doesn't truly delete them, so the PDF name has changed. If you want to bookmark the bestiary, bookmark the blog page, then click the link.

Send me your email in a PM. I'll email you something that will make it easier to create those Orc stat blocks.

 

[Jester David]

15 years of practice, which includes copyright law. If they send a C&D, I'll just give them my address for service of process. But they won't do that.

Considering you have a lot of non-OGL monsters that are product identity (kuo-toa, mind flayer, yuan-to, and yugoloth) I imagine it'll be an easy case for them...

 

[Frylock]

Considering you have a lot of non-OGL monsters that are product identity (kuo-toa, mind flayer, yuan-to, and yugoloth) I imagine it'll be an easy case for them...

No, it'd be a loser, which is why they won't sue. And there are enough people at WotC that know me that the attorneys there will be told not to screw with me. I could explain this, but every time I try to explain copyright law on ENWorld, the cognitive dissonance kicks in, and people refuse to listen. There's absolutely no risk that I'd ever lose that lawsuit, and I promise you, I'm happy to fight it.

But I'm sick of trying to explain why to people that don't listen, so feel free to continue to self-censor yourself. I won't.

EDIT: For the record, I've encountered no such narrow-mindedness from you in particular, Jester. I'm simply stating that enough people are unwilling to accept that they don't know American copyright law that I'm unwilling to allow myself to be drawn into a debate on the subject. I've been practicing too long to subject myself to that.

EDIT: Okay, nothing is absolute, but I'd probably win 9-0 before the Supreme Court if it came to that.

 

[Celtavian]

Considering you have a lot of non-OGL monsters that are product identity (kuo-toa, mind flayer, yuan-to, and yugoloth) I imagine it'll be an easy case for them...

http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl108.html

No, he's not in much danger. Stat blocks and names are not copyrightable. If he were using WotC histories with the names or imagery, he would be in trouble. Printing rules absent descriptive text like 3d10 acid damage is not copyrightable. Even writing Solar or Mindflayer absent any explanation as to what the creature is or any of its history I don't believe is copyrightable either. It's once he makes it obvious with images and monster explanations that it is a D&D mind flayer he could get hammered.

It's a fine line. I'm sure he knows the line well being a lawyer dealing with this subject matter.

 

[Frylock]

Very good, Celtavian. But don't expect it to impress anyone here. You're just going to be arguing in circles.

 

[S'mon]

http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl108.html

No, he's not in much danger. Stat blocks and names are not copyrightable.

Well the WoTC stat block format might be copyrightable - but he's not using their stat block format.

 

[darjr]

Very good, Celtavian. But don't expect it to impress anyone here. You're just going to be arguing in circles.

Hey, watch the broad brush there! Seems needlessly unfair and condescending considering that some of these folks agree with you.

 

[Li Shenron]

I've modified the 5th edition D&D stat blocks so that a DM doesn't have to have so many hard-cover books open at once. As with 4th edition stat blocks, everything you need to run a creature is at your fingertips. Of course, this results in stat blocks that, in extreme cases, are 4 pages long, but only a minority of them are larger than a page. Moreover, most Monster Manual stat blocks weren't recreated because they already fit my definition of "one-stop."

I hope you can use these. Happy gaming!

https://gsllc.wordpress.com/2015/06...sh-luddite_vic-erik_nowak-gopcyclist-dnd-rpg/

Are you more safe from C&D if you only include monsters and abilities which are already publicly available in Basic D&D documents?