D&D 5E (2014) Radically shrinking stat blocks

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

Naturally I'm a fan of this, because you took my B&B stat blocks and made them even more succinct!

View attachment 378367


I see your point. I think regardless, you're gonna have some real estate taken for big bad creatures. But the way you have the Actions is better, I think.

View attachment 378368

That dragon is compact, but really hard to read unfortunately.

 

[Tonguez]

What are PP and DV?

Passive Perception, Dark Vision

 

[Steampunkette]

What are PP and DV?

Passive Perception and Darkvision.

Oop. That'll teach me not to refresh a page.

 

[Quickleaf]

But that doesn't actually help for big tough dangerous difficult monsters that this system might try to streamline, does it?

Ancient Black Dragon G Dragon CR 23 50,000xp
AC: 22 HP: 367 Speed: 40/80f DC: 23
Str: +8 Dex: +2 Con: +7 Int: +3 Wis: +2 Cha: +4
Saves +7: Dex (9) Con (+14) Wis (+9) Cha (+11)
Immune: Acid
Senses: Darkvision 120ft, Blindsense 60ft, Passive 22
Language: Common, Draconic, +1
Ambusher: Stealth Adv Underwater, Free Grab on Bite from Hidden
Amphibious: Breathe Air/Water
Legendary Resistance: 3/day, AC -2
Ruthless: Crit, free Claw 1/round
Reach: 15ft
Multiattack: 2 claw 1 bite, or 2 claw Acid Spit
Claw: +15, 21 Slash (3d8+8)
Bite: +15, 30 Pierce (4d10+8)
Tail: +15, 21 Bludgeon (3d8+8) push 10ft, 20ft Reach
Acid Spit: 60ft, Dex Save Half, 22 Acid (4d10), 11 Acid ongoing (2d10) action ends
Acid Breath: 90x10ft line, Dex Save Half, 85 Acid (19d8), Blind on Fail.
Reaction: Hit by enemy in 10ft, Tail Attack
Legendary Actions: 3/Round
Darkness: 120ft range, 40ft sphere,1 minute magic
Roar: 120ft Range, Charisma Save, Frightened 1 minute
Wing Buffet: 15ft range Dex Save, Fail pushed 10ft knocked prone, free move 40ft fly

Does that make the dragon easier to run..? I dunno. I feel like there's clarity lost in the cutting of sentences down to a handful of keywords and dice values.

I imagine a newbie DM might find running that dragon pretty daunting without the fuller context of what the dragon's actually doing based on the sentence/paragraph structure.

That's a college try for sure! Two things are working against the annotated short-form of this monster.

First, I think A5E in particular - where that stat block comes from - has a more complex design (compared to 2014 5e) that makes shrinking stat blocks more difficult. Ambusher, Ruthless, and Acid Spite are examples of this increased complexity. I think the design gestalt of A5E works against this kind of extreme condensing.

Second, legendary monsters are always going to be lengthier; even in short-form by at least 4-5 lines.

If we imagine complexity as a dial, with this sort of complex monster we can turn it up to a 3/4 page stat block (iirc that's what the A5E ancient dragons take up) or down to a small paragraph. However at both extremes, there are downsides. Too condensed and there's information / clarity loss. Too lengthy and it's hard to keep track of it all.

Anyhow, I'll take a stab at a short-form / in-line text / AD&D stat style version of this A5E Ancient Black Dragon...

Ancient Black Dragon. LE Gargantuan;
Senses 22 (blindsight 60 ft, darkvision 120 ft); Stealth +9 (advantage in water); Lang Common, Draconic; AC 22; HP 367; Spd 40 ft, fly 80 ft, swim 40 ft (amphibious);
Saves S +8, D +9, C +14, I +3, W +9, Ch +11; Defenses Acid resistance, Legendary resistance (3/day); Multiattack (x1 bite or acid spit, x2 claw) x1 Bite +15 (15 ft) 4d10+8 piercing and 2d8 acid (grapple if target can’t see dragon), x1 Acid Spit (60 ft, DC 22 Dex, 4d10 acid and 2d10 ongoing/half), x2 Claw +15 (10 ft) 3d8+8 slashing;
Special Attacks Acid Breath (re5-6, 90 ft x 10 ft line, DC 22 Dex, 19d8 acid/half), Reaction Tail (when creature within 10 ft hits dragon; tail +15 3d8+8 bludgeoning and push 10 ft), Ruthless (1/round after critical hit make claw attack);
Spells spell save DC 19
3/day fog cloud, pass without trace, legend lore, speak with dead
1/day create undead, insect plague
Legendary Actions (3)
• Darkness (40 ft sphere magic darkness w/in 120 ft)
• Roar (120 ft burst, DC 19 Cha, frightened, repeat save)
• Wing Burst (15 ft burst, DC 22 Dex, push 10 ft and prone, then dragon flys 40 feet)
CR 23 (50,000 XP)

 

[el-remmen]

Gotcha. I'm curious, is the "Proficiency Bonus" entry something you use when running monsters?

You know, not yet. But I only recently started including it. I could do without it but despite not thinking monster/pc symmetry is a requirement, I still like having all the info I might need to figure something out on the fly.

I do agree with @mearls that ideally two kinds of stat blocks should be the aim. A full bestiary one and then a truncated one for in-line use for adventures (with a page reference to where the full version can be read).

 

[Dumapic]

Ancient Black Dragon. LE Gargantuan;
Senses 22 (blindsight 60 ft, darkvision 120 ft); Stealth +9 (advantage in water); Lang Common, Draconic; AC 22; HP 367; Spd 40 ft, fly 80 ft, swim 40 ft (amphibious);
Saves S +8, D +9, C +14, I +3, W +9, Ch +11; Defenses Acid resistance, Legendary resistance (3/day); Multiattack (x1 bite or acid spit, x2 claw) x1 Bite +15 (15 ft) 4d10+8 piercing and 2d8 acid (grapple if target can’t see dragon), x1 Acid Spit (60 ft, DC 22 Dex, 4d10 acid and 2d10 ongoing/half), x2 Claw +15 (10 ft) 3d8+8 slashing;
Special Attacks Acid Breath (re5-6, 90 ft x 10 ft line, DC 22 Dex, 19d8 acid/half), Reaction Tail (when creature within 10 ft hits dragon; tail +15 3d8+8 bludgeoning and push 10 ft), Ruthless (1/round after critical hit make claw attack);
Spells spell save DC 19
3/day fog cloud, pass without trace, legend lore, speak with dead
1/day create undead, insect plague
Legendary Actions (3)
• Darkness (40 ft sphere magic darkness w/in 120 ft)
• Roar (120 ft burst, DC 19 Cha, frightened, repeat save)
• Wing Burst (15 ft burst, DC 22 Dex, push 10 ft and prone, then dragon flys 40 feet)
CR 23 (50,000 XP)

This may be digging too much into "Monster design" instead of shrinking stat blocks, but do some of these attacks need to have different stats? Would players notice if Bite, Claw, Tail, and Acid Spit were all the same (except for damage type)? Then you could just interchange all of them in the Multiattack.

Something like:
Multiattack x3, Bite (pierce), Claw (slash), Tail (bludgeoning), Acid Spit (60ft acid) +15, 4d8 + 2d8 ongoing acid

Not perfect, but in the spirit of making monsters easier to grok and run, maybe helpful?

 

[Tonguez]

That's a college try for sure! Two things are working against the annotated short-form of this monster.

First, I think A5E in particular - where that stat block comes from - has a more complex design (compared to 2014 5e) that makes shrinking stat blocks more difficult. Ambusher, Ruthless, and Acid Spite are examples of this increased complexity. I think the design gestalt of A5E works against this kind of extreme condensing.

Second, legendary monsters are always going to be lengthier; even in short-form by at least 4-5 lines.

If we imagine complexity as a dial, with this sort of complex monster we can turn it up to a 3/4 page stat block (iirc that's what the A5E ancient dragons take up) or down to a small paragraph. However at both extremes, there are downsides. Too condensed and there's information / clarity loss. Too lengthy and it's hard to keep track of it all.

Anyhow, I'll take a stab at a short-form / in-line text / AD&D stat style version of this A5E Ancient Black Dragon...

View attachment 378377

Ancient Black Dragon. LE Gargantuan;
Senses 22 (blindsight 60 ft, darkvision 120 ft); Stealth +9 (advantage in water); Lang Common, Draconic; AC 22; HP 367; Spd 40 ft, fly 80 ft, swim 40 ft (amphibious);
Saves S +8, D +9, C +14, I +3, W +9, Ch +11; Defenses Acid resistance, Legendary resistance (3/day); Multiattack (x1 bite or acid spit, x2 claw) x1 Bite +15 (15 ft) 4d10+8 piercing and 2d8 acid (grapple if target can’t see dragon), x1 Acid Spit (60 ft, DC 22 Dex, 4d10 acid and 2d10 ongoing/half), x2 Claw +15 (10 ft) 3d8+8 slashing;
Special Attacks Acid Breath (re5-6, 90 ft x 10 ft line, DC 22 Dex, 19d8 acid/half), Reaction Tail (when creature within 10 ft hits dragon; tail +15 3d8+8 bludgeoning and push 10 ft), Ruthless (1/round after critical hit make claw attack);
Spells spell save DC 19
3/day fog cloud, pass without trace, legend lore, speak with dead
1/day create undead, insect plague
Legendary Actions (3)
• Darkness (40 ft sphere magic darkness w/in 120 ft)
• Roar (120 ft burst, DC 19 Cha, frightened, repeat save)
• Wing Burst (15 ft burst, DC 22 Dex, push 10 ft and prone, then dragon flys 40 feet)
CR 23 (50,000 XP)

Did a quick block up using my template and got

It may not be accurate but I think its easy enough to read.
I decided Malevolent Stalker was a nice narrative in put since it already says its a dragon and I really like Role tying to Ambusher and Fear Aura as the two have great synergy - a dragon surging out of the water to grab your companion should be terrifying and trigger a 'morale' check.
I like Regional Effects and Lair Actions, so included them too

 

[Sacrosanct]

That dragon is compact, but really hard to read unfortunately.

Sure. Steampunkette has a much better use of selective bolding that helps in that regard a ton.

 

[Sacrosanct]

I do agree with @mearls that ideally two kinds of stat blocks should be the aim. A full bestiary one and then a truncated one for in-line use for adventures (with a page reference to where the full version can be read).

I will forever be a fan of how early D&D did just that.

Full stat block in the MM:

And how they typically appear in-line for adventures:

That's how I design my books, and yes, it's a hill I will die on For example, taken from the adventure section of Twilight Fables:

 

[Steampunkette]

Sure. Steampunkette has a much better use of selective bolding that helps in that regard a ton.

D'awww, thank you! It's the mild dyslexia. I got -real- good at bolding text blocks because otherwise I just can't read them.