Maxperson
Morkus from Orkus
I disagree. If the DM is changing 1 monster out of 8, metagaming is very much incentivized because it's still far superior to have advantage in 7 fights than it is to maybe have bad luck in the 8th.I don't really know what your goal is here with talking about referencing a book during play. The fact is, if the DM changes even one monster, you can't be sure if any other monsters have been changed, which disincentivizes the very thing you say you don't like. In that environment, it becomes more optimal to verify your assumptions before acting on them. That doesn't mean players won't "metagame," but in effect it makes it an unreliable tactic and, in my experience, players prefer tactics with more reliability than not.
If you aren't changing most of the monsters, it's still superior to have an advantage in most of the fights.