D&D 5E Zooming In On Monsters of the Multiverse [UPDATED!]

Earlier, WotC announced Mordenkainen Presents Monsters of the Multiverse, a new D&D compilation of monster material from previous products updated to a new format. These screen grabs are as good as I could get them. They're not terribly clear, but you can make more out than in the original images.

The screenshots show the original entry in Volo's Guide to Monsters next to the new entry in Mordenkainen Presents Monsters of the Multiverse.

"The Future of D&D" (New Core Books in 2024!)

The online D&D Celebration event, which has been running all weekend, comes to a close with The Future of D&D, a panel featuring WotC's Ray Winninger, Liz Schuh, Chris Perkins, and Jeremy Crawford, hosted by Elle Osili-Wood. D&D is exploring the multiverse Revisiting classic settings. 1st of...

www.enworld.org

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UPDATE -- a cleaned up version of the War Priest has appeared on imgur.

 

[Frozen_Heart]

I hope to see the planetouched PC races, not only genasies and paragenasies but the mechanatrix from Fiend Folio.

My surprised is I wouldn't imagine they were going to use again the name of Modeerkainen in the title.

Any space for the Vodoni empire as an easter egg about the return of Spelljammer?

I'm desperately hoping that the genasi get a revamp to bring them in line with aasimar/tiefling.

 

[Aldarc]

While I would like to see a lot more "alignment Any" applied to monsters, I would not also not mind to see more broad-stroke alignments used as well (e.g., "typically Chaotic alignments") rather than simply "typically Chaotic Evil."

 

[Waller]

Looks like they're doing a lot of the same stuff that Level Up is doing. Spells as actions, revised math, extra tables of info. So with this in January for the non MM monsters, and Level Up doing it for all the MM monsters next month, I'm going to be set!

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

I miss the genasi subraces, not only the classic four, but the para-genasies, the Athasians and the Abyssals.

I see a great potential for the mechanatrix, and I imagine the high-elves/eladrin from 4th Ed like 3.5 "celadrin" (elves with eladrin ancestors).

I suspects Hasbro wants to "open space" to later to add possible intercompany crossovers.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

Looks like they're doing a lot of the same stuff that Level Up is doing. Spells as actions, revised math, extra tables of info. So with this in January for the non MM monsters, and Level Up doing it for all the MM monsters next month, I'm going to be set!

Except Level Up keeps the normal spell slot economy; they just include an abbreviated action listing for the combat spells that are simple enough that you don't have to look them up. There's nothing objectionable about that.

I know you weren't really addressing this, but it's the way they are doing stuff like giving them spells that don't exist (sorcerer's bolt for d12s of force damage? why can't I have that!), letting them have their unnecessarily renamed buffed fireballs on a recharge, and limiting all the spells that don't have an action to 1/day that makes some of us unhappy, because now it's something completely different from what a PC can do.

Are they trying to become 4e to Level Up's Pathfinder?* Because that's exactly what might happen if they go down that road. Hopefully those couple of years give them enough time to get good feedback (like they did with alignment apparently, though I don't remember it being in any survey I took) but I'm not feeling as optimistic as I have been for most of the edition. It's happened in every D&D edition since OD&D (before my time, but from what I can tell). Part way through the edition they start experimenting and changing things up and lose a lot of goodwill and interest from people who liked what they found in the initial core rules of the edition and kind of expected the game to, you know, still be the same game for at least the rest of the edition.

*For those of you old enough to remember--you're a grognard now regardless of which game you favored. Welcome to the club.

 

[grimslade]

This info is a mixed bag for me. I like the return to 4e monster layout. Having combat spells as actions, spelled out in the stat block, is a nice thing for running the game, especially as a newer player who may not have exposure to all the spells. I dislike renaming actions away from the spell name. Cacophony is very thematic for the bard, but its effect is the same as Shatter. A PC bard may be inspired by a fight against this NPC bard to add Cacophony to his repertoire only to not find it in a player facing book.
I also do not like the shift away from creature type organization of the monsters. Glaberzu is a single named Type III Demon, not the whole range dagnabbit! I imagine this alternate organization is another way to add value to the book that is a collated reprint of monsters. It would be greatly ameliorated if the old groupings and new, were added in a nindex.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I hae mixed feelings about the restructuring of spellcasting npcs.
One one hand, I do not like it, because the rules diverge from pc rules. Especially not having rules for dispell magic or counterspell against spelllike abilities is a bit problematic. I would have hoped that such abilities would get something like (3rd level spell or even better just "fireball" ) in their discription.
On the other hand, enemy spellcasters are always in a weird situation: when they are encountered, they usually have all their spells available and usually the just cast the same spell over and over again.
With their most powerful spells changed to recharge abilities and utility spells at 1/day, they should feel a lot better (less repetitive) in a fight.

My solution already was just giving npcs pc class levels if I wanted them to feel more like actual characters.

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

Isn't this the way 4E set up its monsters?

Yes and no. 4e provided a few options in the stat block, but it did not include a list of utility spells. This is the best of both IMO.

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

I sure hope so. The DMG's current monster creation guideline doesn't match up with CR at all.

My DM, who posts a lot of custom monsters on these forums, says otherwise and that the difference is mostly people not applying the full DMG guidelines

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

Except Level Up keeps the normal spell slot economy; they just include an abbreviated action listing for the combat spells that are simple enough that you don't have to look them up. There's nothing objectionable about that.

I know you weren't really addressing this, but it's the way they are doing stuff like giving them spells that don't exist (sorcerer's bolt for d12s of force damage? why can't I have that!), letting them have their unnecessarily renamed buffed fireballs on a recharge, and limiting all the spells that don't have an action to 1/day that makes some of us unhappy, because now it's something completely different from what a PC can do.

Are they trying to become 4e to Level Up's Pathfinder?* Because that's exactly what might happen if they go down that road. Hopefully those couple of years give them enough time to get good feedback (like they did with alignment apparently, though I don't remember it being in any survey I took) but I'm not feeling as optimistic as I have been for most of the edition. It's happened in every D&D edition since OD&D (before my time, but from what I can tell). Part way through the edition they start experimenting and changing things up and lose a lot of goodwill and interest from people who liked what they found in the initial core rules of the edition and kind of expected the game to, you know, still be the same game for at least the rest of the edition.

*For those of you old enough to remember--you're a grognard now regardless of which game you favored. Welcome to the club.

Hardly, I’m really excited about LevelUp, but it currently has about 5000 people signed up, that is 1/10000 of the 5e player base.
Also, I lot of people have been asking for this type of change.