D&D (2024) Why No Monster Creation Rules in D&D 2024?

not sure about the premise, but no, it does not take more complexity. It takes less openness about talking about the complexity / design / goals, or as you called it transparency

Less transparency is what makes things less transparent, it’s in the name ;)
When things are less transparent they are more complicated and difficult to use. So no I do not agree. The cost of less transparency is increased complexity. Because you lose transparency, you don’t know why something is being done, meaning you have to reverse engineer the results.

Reverse engineering is more complex than transparency at the outset.

But less transparency is what the fandom demanded, so this is what we get. A ten page system to create a monster that’s going to be used once at the table.

IOW a system that very few would bother using.
 

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It doesn't matter. you don't lose anything by having them there for the people that appreciate them. You do lose something by having them, then removing them.
No.

YOU lose something. Me? Not a thing. I gained pages of useful material in the DMG.

🤷
 

Who cares? Or more accurately, why should we care about that? The fact is, they have decided not to make the best game they can, so they're going to get criticized. Part of the penalty for that popularity that's so important to them.
I'm not asking you to care.

I'm explaining why things happen the way they happen.
 




It's kinda funny when you think about it.

For the past ten years, fans have been literally screaming for more lore in the game. It's a perennial topic. Heck, it's a drum that's been beaten by people in this thread endlessly, over and over again for years. Every month we'd see threads on "Why isn't WotC doing more lore for the game?" or various variations on that theme. It's been endless.

Y'know what I've never, ever seen on En World? A thread talking about how people want updated monster creation rules. I'm sure they exist. It's a big site, so, it's probably popped up here and there. But, let's play a little game. For every thread asking for new monster creation rules posted in the last ten years, I'll post three asking for more lore and we'll see who runs out first.

Frankly, AFAIC, unless people read threads like this one, they probably don't even know that there are monster creation rules in the DMG, never mind missing them when they're gone.

Fans of D&D are weird. Scream for something endlessly. Endlessly repeat the mantra that WOtC MUST MAKE MORE LORE. Get that lore. Get it in spades. Between the Greyhawk section and the Planes section in the DMG, we're talking a significant chunk of page count. Fans were heard. You wanted more lore. You got more lore.

Take the win.
 


Y'know what I've never, ever seen on En World? A thread talking about how people want updated monster creation rules. I'm sure they exist. It's a big site, so, it's probably popped up here and there. But, let's play a little game. For every thread asking for new monster creation rules posted in the last ten years, I'll post three asking for more lore and we'll see who runs out first
My theory is that In-depth monster creation rules is only desired for super unique boss monsters that would not interest anyone but each individual DM who wants to design their super unique boss and not TPK the party ZNOR be a push over.

The rules to create Amy's Zak the Destroyer Chaos Paladin, Bob's Blue Babbidaz the dual color dragon, and Charlie's Xyctar the Evil reverse lich would be different.

Whereas general rules to port over Tyranids or Darkspawn to 5e or writing up all the officers of an evil pirate crew would met with people saying "Reflavor and twist existing monsters".

Which is essentially the barrier. If WOTC prints enough good monsters, the need for monster creation rules decreases.

You only need monster creation rules for new and wacky monster ideas. And the crazier those monsters are, the more pages the monster creation rules have to be to build them.

So requests would seem selfish or asking for the improbable after a certain point.
 

AlphaStream published his video comparison of the 2024 MM stats vs 2014 DMG monster creation stats vs 2014 MM and Forge of Foes creation rules (complete with spreadsheets). It's an hour long video, but I encourage people to watch and make their own conclusions.

Regarding 2024 not including monster creation rules: I believe Chris Perkins addressed this during the DMG release timeframe in videos and interviews. TL'DR: best way to make a new monster is to reskin; new DMs don't need in-depth monster creation rules when they can get similar results with reskin; if people really want them they might release them in a future book, but not planning at this time.
 

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