The Gith Are Now Aberrations in Dungeons & Dragons

The githyanki and githzerai are officially reclassified as aberrations in Dungeons & Dragons. In a video released today about the 2025 Monster Manual, D&D designers Jeremy Crawford and F. Wesley Schneider confirmed that the two classic D&D species are now being classified as aberrations. The reasoning given - the two gith species have been so transformed by living in the Astral Plane and Limbo, they've moved beyond being humanoids. Schneider also pointed out that the illithid's role in manipulating the gith also contributed to their new classification.

The video notes that this isn't technically a new change - the Planescape book released in 2023 had several githzerai statblocks that had aberration classifications.

The gith join a growing number of previously playable species that have new classifications. The goblin, kobolds, and kenku have also had their creature classifications changed in the 2025 Monster Manual. While players can currently use the 2014 rules for making characters of those species, it will be interesting to see how these reclassifications affect the character-building rules regarding these species when they are eventually updated for 2024 rules.

 

[MGibster]

Lots of psionics stuff in 2e and 3e, and O don't recall it being indelibly connected with mind flayers, aboleths, and beholders.

As they say in all the Fallout games, "D&D. D&D never changes." Oh, wait. D&D changes a lot. Admittedly I was never particular attached to psionics believing they never did a good job incorporating it into any version of D&D.

Backward compatibility applies mainly to their published adventures. When pressed they have admitted this. In many other ways it is IMO far more than a revision.

I didn't think WotC was being truthful when they touted backward compatibility. It's like when Obiwan told Luke that Vader killed his father. From a certain point of view? Nah, Obiwan was straight up gaslighting Luke.

 

[Parmandur]

As they say in all the Fallout games, "D&D. D&D never changes." Oh, wait. D&D changes a lot. Admittedly I was never particular attached to psionics believing they never did a good job incorporating it into any version of D&D.


I didn't think WotC was being truthful when they touted backward compatibility. It's like when Obiwan told Luke that Vader killed his father. From a certain point of view? Nah, Obiwan was straight up gaslighting Luke.

In what way have they been untruthful...? You can still mix and match old and new material. They said it would be compatible, not identical.

 

[MGibster]

In what way have they been untruthful...? You can still mix and match old and new material. They said it would be compatible, not identical.

AD&D 2nd edition and 3.0 were compatible too by that standard. It's so compatible the new Greyhawk organized play campaign is only using 2024 rules. That tells me it's not easy to mix and match old and new material.

 

[Parmandur]

AD&D 2nd edition and 3.0 were compatible too by that standard. It's so compatible the new Greyhawk organized play campaign is only using 2024 rules. That tells me it's not easy to mix and match old and new material.

....huh??

You can use 2014 and 2024 Monsters in the same game, or mix Classes from before and after, or use older Advebtures using just the new books.

That's what backwards compatibility is: it works together.

 

[abirdcall]

I like it.

It is in keeping with how they're paying more attention to the creature types.

I like the general trend to tie psionics thematically to the far realm. I actually highly dislike psionics in D&D but as something that comes from outside the multiverse it works for me. It's weird and the far realm should be weird.

Making these former humanoid sapient species different creature types helps open creativity of personalizing monsters of these different types. We already have characters like Xanathar and some mind flayers in BG3. Not talking about mechanics here, but just framing. It pushes me to make mind flayers and beholders and elementals etc. have distinct personalities rather than just typical behaviours.

 

[dave2008]

AD&D 2nd edition and 3.0 were compatible too by that standard. It's so compatible the new Greyhawk organized play campaign is only using 2024 rules. That tells me it's not easy to mix and match old and new material.

But it is easy to mix and match. We did it with the playtest and continued when the 2024 rules (keep our mix of 2014 & 2024 characters and even keeping some of the playtest rules that didn't make it to 2024). However, for an organized play I am sure it is easier still (and clearer) to limit to one rule set. If you have questions about compatibility, just try it. It quite simply works.

 

[AlViking]

In what way have they been untruthful...? You can still mix and match old and new material. They said it would be compatible, not identical.

If there hadn't been any changes there would have been no reason for a new version. Meanwhile these changes both make sense to me and will also only impact our game as much as we want it to. There have certainly been bigger changes in the past.

 

[InkTide]

I generally like these changes. I also think dragonborn, elves, tieflings, and aasimar should be dragons, fey, fiends, and celestials, respectively. Goliaths should probably be giants, too.

However, I really don't like the half-baked implementation of things surrounding the changes, especially the spells that care about creature type.

For example, how the wording of Banishment works now - Dispel Evil and Good mentions a "home plane" (I much prefer the "home plane" wording, because it allows some flexibility with defining a home plane so you can't, for example, cast Nystul's Magic Aura on someone naming "Aberration" and then banish them to the Far Realms), but Banishment in 2024 specifically banishes based on type.

Meaning you can Nystul's Magic Aura someone into an Aberration and then Banishment them into the Far Realms. You can also Banishment a Githyanki, who was almost certainly born and grew up on the Prime Material Plane (in Forgotten Realms, they live near the moon), to the Far Realms.

Nystul's new "willing creature" clause (which makes the only real utility it had in the 2014 version worthless, very in keeping with the sometimes bizarre spell wording changes in the new PHB) is rendered moot with a simple persuasion check and/or Charm Person, which shouldn't be difficult since it's a harmless illusion that also grants immunity to stuff like Hold Person or Charm Person being cast on them (but won't dispel either).

Another casualty of this that people aren't really talking about that is that necromancy (the actual kind, not the "deal some necrotic damage and/or debuff" kind) gets continually worse with each of these changes. Raisable corpses are fewer and further between. Not even Nystul's Magic Aura fixes this (it never did, in fact), since corpses are objects, and you can only change creature types of a creature.

Of course, all of this is a consequence of certain spells being worded in a way that was either not considered (it really feels like they just didn't realize what Banishment can actually do without the "home plane" wording, which it used to have) or were balanced for a distribution of types that increasingly no longer exists (e.g. spells that raise undead, except Danse Macabre, which forgot the restriction and can thus turn ooze remains into skeletons - back to the "not considered" thing from earlier).

 

[Gradine]

My dude, what do you think midichlorians are?

The powerhouse of the cell… IN SPACE!!!

Wait, is Aya Brea a Jedi?

 

[Vincent55]

Nope.

2014 is looking better every day.

I am telling you I have invested in others like Shadowdark and old-school Essentials, as D&D appears to be going down a rabbit hole more and more.