Volo's Preview at Kotaku: Flinds, Yuan-Ti, & More

Kotaku has posted a new preview of Volo's Guide to Monsters. This one looks at gnolls, lizardfolk, flinds, and yuan-ti. Don't forget to check out all the previous previews of the upcoming 224-page monster book for D&D 5th Edition - the froghemoth, giants and orcs, mindflayers and beholders, fire giant dreadnoughts, giant lore, and the book's preface. Credit goes to EN World member Entsuropi for spotting this one!

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[Demetrios1453]

My guess is that Gnolls and Hiants don't have detailed lairs...

With six types of giants, I'm pretty sure they won't have lair maps either. And given that there are perfectly adequate lair maps in SKT for each type of giant, that makes sense.

 

[pukunui]

I'm hoping the "lairs" will include some settlements. I'd rather have an example yuan-ti town than an example temple, for instance.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

I'm hoping the "lairs" will include some settlements. I'd rather have an example yuan-ti town than an example temple, for instance.

From what I know they tend to live in their temples.

Wonder if we will get Yuan Ti Anathema in this book. The Pit Masters imply that we may. As Anathema are kept in pits by the Yuan Ti tasked with caring for them.

 

[Parmandur]

I'm hoping the "lairs" will include some settlements. I'd rather have an example yuan-ti town than an example temple, for instance.

We know from the podcast we all get a temple complex; but do Yuan-Ti even live anywhere else...?

 

[Parmandur]

With six types of giants, I'm pretty sure they won't have lair maps either. And given that there are perfectly adequate lair maps in SKT for each type of giant, that makes sense.

Yeah, a "generic" Giant settlement wouldn't be much use, and Perkins emphasized that Gnolls are pure wandering monsters, with no buildings or accommodations whatsoever.

 

[Demetrios1453]

From what I know they tend to live in their temples.

Wonder if we will get Yuan Ti Anathema in this book. The Pit Masters imply that we may. As Anathema are kept in pits by the Yuan Ti tasked with caring for them.

Anathemas were mentioned as being in the book, in one of the podcasts if I remember correctly.

 

[pukunui]

From what I know they tend to live in their temples.

We know from the podcast we all get a temple complex; but do Yuan-Ti even live anywhere else...?

I was picturing more of a "Dwellers of the Forbidden City" kind of setup than a single temple. Or an Aztec/Mayan style city where the temple is in the middle but there's lots of buildings around it where all the non-priests live.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

I was picturing more of a "Dwellers of the Forbidden City" kind of setup than a single temple. Or an Aztec/Mayan style city where the temple is in the middle but there's lots of buildings around it where all the non-priests live.

From what I saw of a Yuan-Ti complex in a novel that dealt heavily with them. (Venom in the Blood was what it was called if I remember correctly. Has Yuan-Ti Pureblood as the protagonist.) The Temple takes up most of the area, along with living quarters for the Yuan-Ti and an area for the young. Then they have the Anathema pit kept to an area a fair distance from were they actually live but close to the temple. Because while they respect the anathama and give it sacrifices they are terrified of it and if the Anathama gets out of the pit it will kill everything in it's path until the Yuan Ti can force it back into the pit. This is actully what happened to the Yuan Ti in that novel. The Anathema got out of it's pit before the story started and killed most of the clan in it's rampage before they got it back in the pit. The fact they continued to feed it and even started sacrifcing their own already small numbers to it shows just how messed up their culture is.

 

[Sacrosanct]

I LOVE the artwork of the gnolls. From what I can see of the previews so far, this may be my favorite 5e book. Even more than the MM.

 

[Chaosmancer]

I'll also throw in my hat saying Flinds are awesomely powerful. Best part is that "Aura of Bloodthirst" is a massive buff to the standard gnolls, meaning that when the party encounters the band everything is so much worse than they might expect. One or two Fangs, a dozen of so Gnolls and a Flind and you have an incredibly nasty encounter prepared.

Also loving the nightmare speaker being a Warlock, and if you wanted to make them even worse, you could give them the other GOO warlock abilities. Honestly though that "Invoke Nightmare" ability is crazy good against people with low Int saves. If they can keep it up it will do impressive damage with 2d10 psychic a round. Plus Eldritch blast with invocations.

Man, everything I see makes me want this book more, even when I already have a completely different culture and plan for Yuan-Ti.