Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Rocket your D&D 5E and Level Up: Advanced 5E games into space! Alpha Star Magazine Is Launching... Right Now!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="JEB" data-source="post: 8209419" data-attributes="member: 10148">Except the MM drow do match PHB drow in every other way (or at least every other way we can actually see clearly demonstrated in a NPC stat block).As to your specific points:1) Having extra abilities above the baseline doesn't mean there wasn't an expected baseline.2) So this is weird. I completely thought that was how CR worked for all NPCs as well, but it doesn't actually say that for the drow in my copy, only for dragonborn and tiefling. I don't see that fixed in errata either.But let's suppose that is the case (because it makes sense). CR 1/4 is supposed to be functionally equivalent to a level 1 PC, but so are CR 1/2 and CR 1; the whole "CR = level" mechanic is for design convenience and shouldn't be taken as more than a guideline. (In fact, it breaks down quickly if you do; a CR 2 creature is much more powerful than a level 2 character.) Besides, a CR 1/4 creature can have abilities of a higher class level, if that's balanced out by not having other things a level 1 PC has. (The MM drow don't have PC class features, for example.) In fact, when reverse-engineering monsters per the DMG guidelines, it often seems to be the case that CR X is more like "CR X+5 in offense and CR X-5 in defense".Which is a long way to say, the CR thing doesn't really refute every other indicator about PC vs. NPC racial traits at the beginning of 5E, which is that they were intended to be treated the same.(Incidentally, I really wish at some point they'd given us an official PC level-to-CR equivalency. You can reverse-engineer it from NPC statblocks or encounter-building budgets, and many have done this, but it would make monster design that much easier if they had.)Of course a DM can do whatever they want when designing a NPC or a species. They're not bound by Wizards of the Coast's expectations.But if you were abiding by Wizards' 2014 guidelines - to add PC racial traits to a NPC to reflect the PC race - they've now created a contradiction. You're supposed to give NPCs traits that, per the 2020 guidance, they may not actually have. Officially, you don't know that all changelings can change appearance - that might only be something PCs have.You can, of course, ignore the 2020 proclamation and stick with 2014's approach, but per Wizards, you're now doing it wrong. Alternatively, you can abide by said proclamation; but unless they also provided other official NPC builds for that character race at some point (i.e. tabaxi, goliath, grung, etc.), which you can modify to create your own NPCs, officially you have to venture into homebrew territory.</blockquote>

Verification