avin
First Post
Whitespace <> empty space or free space.
/agreed
White spaces help vision to focus on the righ elements of pages...
...but there are some pages on MM where I seriously doubt this was their intention.
Oooooh Monster Descriptions...
- Thread starter Scribble
- Start date
/agreed
White spaces help vision to focus on the righ elements of pages...
...but there are some pages on MM where I seriously doubt this was their intention.
Keefe the Thief
Hero
With all these "x was not in he MM thread - nnnooo!" thread since 4e came out i wonder: will i need a player to act as a porter for my 5e MM? I can already see the commercials: "10 variants of Frost Giants you never knew existed! Statblocks will tell you what Bugbears feel when killing peasants!" 
Nebulous
Legend
With all these "x was not in he MM thread - nnnooo!" thread since 4e came out i wonder: will i need a player to act as a porter for my 5e MM? I can already see the commercials: "10 variants of Frost Giants you never knew existed! Statblocks will tell you what Bugbears feel when killing peasants!"
Heh, heh. Yeah, WotC will snap back the opposite direction and try to counterbalance their "mistake" in 4e:
"We got your Snowflake Giant, your Frostbeard Giant, your Sleetfist giant, and your Coldfoot giant, all right here in one book for the low low cost of $19.99!"
LostSoul
Adventurer
I just picked the first monster in the book. Let's look at the next entry:
Abominations are living weapons that were created during the ancient cosmic war between the gods and the primordials. Some of these creations were enormous, others small. Some were singular beings of terrific power, while others were legion. A few abominations stand apart as failed of incomplete divine experiments that have either been locked away or forgotten.
Devious and battle-hungry hunters, astral stalkers savour challenge and renown. Many of them serve as assassins and bounty hunters, and an astral stalker might pursue its quarry simply to test its mettle against a worthy foe.
[blah blah blah, tactics]
Although created as instruments of the gods in their war against the primordials, astral stalkers survive still. They're now a race unto themselves, inhabiting the Astral Sea. Astral stalkers gather in small tribes, and leadership of a tribe falls to the astral stalker with the best hunting trophies.
Astral stalkers often hunt in pairs of small groups if they seek particularly elusive game. They have also been known to sell their services to other beings.
Devious and battle-hungry hunters, astral stalkers savour challenge and renown. Many of them serve as assassins and bounty hunters, and an astral stalker might pursue its quarry simply to test its mettle against a worthy foe.
[blah blah blah, tactics]
Although created as instruments of the gods in their war against the primordials, astral stalkers survive still. They're now a race unto themselves, inhabiting the Astral Sea. Astral stalkers gather in small tribes, and leadership of a tribe falls to the astral stalker with the best hunting trophies.
Astral stalkers often hunt in pairs of small groups if they seek particularly elusive game. They have also been known to sell their services to other beings.
Huh, pretty cool.
Scribble
First Post
Yeah but I wonder if some of it had to do with not wanting monsters to spill over onto another monster's page(s)?
Like if you wanted to put the create golem ritual in the book, but can't fit it on the golem pages... do you have an entirely seperate page devoted to that ritual and nothing else?
THAT seems like a waste... Seems more appropriate to just trim out the golem ritual (which probably less would use then wouldn't) and use that page for another monster.
Baz King
Explorer
When I started out with 4e I really wanted a little help with monster descriptions. I never upgraded my MM form 3 to 3.5 but often wished I had because of the neat 'what the characters see' fluff. To be honest, with some monsters I was at a loss with what their powers were meant to represent. Simple stuff like Kobolds Shifty power. What does it look like?
But then the confusion faded and was replaced by a feeling of liberation. I realised it was my game and it could be whatever it wanted. Now some of my kobolds were blue. Why not? I saw that Hobgoblins had a Phalanx Soldier power. 2 minutes thought and I had about as much fluff as any MM could give me but these were my justifications.
And then I remembered. My imagination got stirred by D&D 30 years ago because I didn't understand it all. 4e feels like coming home.
But then the confusion faded and was replaced by a feeling of liberation. I realised it was my game and it could be whatever it wanted. Now some of my kobolds were blue. Why not? I saw that Hobgoblins had a Phalanx Soldier power. 2 minutes thought and I had about as much fluff as any MM could give me but these were my justifications.
And then I remembered. My imagination got stirred by D&D 30 years ago because I didn't understand it all. 4e feels like coming home.
King Nate
First Post
They could have just put the rituals all on one or two pages at the back of the book. I hear they put rituals in the back of other 4e books. This would allow them to add another vampire/lich creature as well.
Amadeus Windfall
First Post
This, I don't personally get. It looks like the kobold moving - what is there to describe?
avin
First Post
The first paragraph is the generic description for aberrations, so it's unfair include it as the monster itself. Now let's check 3.5 Astral Stalker:
This creature looks like a muscular humanoid with thick black-green skin. Its deminic visage is remniscent of a sekeletl human with a prominent jaw, Its hands end in a large, wickedly sharp claws.
Astral Stalkers roam the multiverse looking for the ultimate quarry. They live for the thrill of the huntm and they measure their personal worth and status in their community by the number and power of the creatures that they successfully hunted.
These able hunters prefer to stalk intelligent foes, and the pleasure they gain from hunting these creatures for sport makes them evil by the standards of any race. However, astral stalkers adhere to a short list of tenets that they refer to as the Rules of the Hunt: Once its quarry has knowingly eluded an astral stalker, it will never again hunt that creature; if hired to hunt a creature, the stalker will not hunt its employer for at least one year; and no astral stalker will ever hunt aother atrsal stalker.
Astral stalkers fin that their prey provides better sport if it knows it is being hunted, so they often warn their quarry in some roundabout fashion before beginning the hunt.
An astral stalker typically stands 6 feet tall and weigh 275 pounds.
Astral stalkers speak Common and Infernal.
Astral Stalkers roam the multiverse looking for the ultimate quarry. They live for the thrill of the huntm and they measure their personal worth and status in their community by the number and power of the creatures that they successfully hunted.
These able hunters prefer to stalk intelligent foes, and the pleasure they gain from hunting these creatures for sport makes them evil by the standards of any race. However, astral stalkers adhere to a short list of tenets that they refer to as the Rules of the Hunt: Once its quarry has knowingly eluded an astral stalker, it will never again hunt that creature; if hired to hunt a creature, the stalker will not hunt its employer for at least one year; and no astral stalker will ever hunt aother atrsal stalker.
Astral stalkers fin that their prey provides better sport if it knows it is being hunted, so they often warn their quarry in some roundabout fashion before beginning the hunt.
An astral stalker typically stands 6 feet tall and weigh 275 pounds.
Astral stalkers speak Common and Infernal.
Better described, better written in my opinion.
I don't know if we can copy & paste sections of the books here but compare Eidolon (MM4E pg 101) to Rogue Eidolon (MMII3E pg 180). Still think 4E has a better description?
Most 4E descriptions are just bad, looking like some recipes or some newspaper's economic section.
As I said before, there is exceptions. Astral Stalker's not one of them, unless they fit better to what you want.
Last edited:
Mustrum_Ridcully
Legend
Shifty seems a simple case, but I agree, for some powers I'd like some fluff text. But I wouldn't want it in the stat block, because it just takes too much space. An extra area where the monsters powers are described would be nice, but then, I would probably be able to buy a Monster Manual of twice the size and price. I don't know about the rest of the target audience.
Similar Threads
