D&D 5E Tome of Beasts 5E

[JacktheRabbit]

I know I am late to the game. Just got back into DnD last fall and after being a player for 7 months I am taking over as DM.

That being said I just picked up the Tome of Beasts 5E. Overall I must say I love the book. I could use a few less CR20 plus threats, I know they look cool and are cool to read, but how many do you end up using really.

My main point of thread is to ask people how things are going using the monsters in the book. As I am going through them I am finding that I an unsure on the accuracy of the CR rating for many of the foes.

An Iron Ghoul is CR5 and has 143hp, an AC of 16 and at just using its glaive can make three attacks per round with a +7 to attack. Played with any intelligence this IG is going to shread 4 5th level characters.

An even more extreme example is the Leshy. Decent melee attack, stealth benefits, innate spellcasting, 84hp and an 14AC all wrapped up as a CR1.

Am I thinking of things wrong here or did the book miss on some CR ratings?

Hoping to see some opinions here.

 

[hejtmane]

Depends on your campaigns i have level 18 players now so i have used quite a few in my last several sessions

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[Croesus]

I've used several creatures from the book and those CRs were close enough that there were no serious issues. That said, there are a number of entries where the CRs are way off. If in doubt, compare to same CR creatures from the MM.

 

[Jester David]

I love the high CR threats in the Tome of Beasts. There's so few in the Monster Manual, not enough to really do a full 1-20 campaign.

 

[dave2008]

An Iron Ghoul is CR5 and has 143hp, an AC of 16 and at just using its glaive can make three attacks per round with a +7 to attack. Played with any intelligence this IG is going to shread 4 5th level characters.

Well, I just checked and per the DMG the Iron Ghoul from ToB should have:

Defensive CR: 6
Attack CR: 9
Total CR: 7.5

So, yes that is OP compared to the MM. These things a really easy to check, I am surprised the got it so far off.

EDIT: It was point out to me that the calculation above was based on a typo for the glaive damage (20 vs 9). With the correct damage it should be:

Defensive CR: 6
Attack CR: 5
Total CR: 5.5

This should probably be at least rounded to CR 6 because of the ghouls condition and poison immunities. So not so bad after all - if you notice the glaive damage is a typo!

 

[Azzy]

Well, I just checked and per the DMG the Iron Ghoul from ToB should have:

Defensive CR: 6
Attack CR: 9
Total CR: 7.5

So, yes that is OP compared to the MM. These things a really easy to check, I am surprised the got it so far off.

I could be wrong, but I believe that ToB came out before the DMG (and D&D Basic Rules) and the CR guidelines.

 

[Ristamar]

I could be wrong, but I believe that ToB came out before the DMG (and D&D Basic Rules) and the CR guidelines.

November 2016 according to Amazon.

 

[dave2008]

I could be wrong, but I believe that ToB came out before the DMG (and D&D Basic Rules) and the CR guidelines.

Even more reason to be suspect of their CR values then

 

[Zardnaar]

The occasiobal critter is a bit off. A common complaint though is that the MM critters are to easy.

 

[hastur_nz]

Yes, a lot of their CR levels are off, compared to MM. However, the MM values don't really align well with the DMG guidelines either, and a lot of monsters in MM do not warrant their CR level, especially at higher levels. IMO, the ToB CR levels are probably more 'correct' than the MM ones, on average, but you'll need to use your DM-mojo to judge it for your table (which you'll need to do with MM monsters at some point as your PC's level up, anyway).