The last of the 2024 expansions of the core 5E D&D rule books, the Monster Manual, is set to arrive in February. So right on time, Wizards is starting to drop information about what it contains, including a press preview, where we were able to ask some questions. Interestingly, though, this was the first Wizards product preview that began with a presentation about “the business of D&D” by Jessalyn Zillow, VP of D&D Franchise and Products. While part of me wanted to get right to new book, Zillow’s short presentation had some interesting tidbits.
The Interesting Tidbits
The part of most interest to fans is the news that new subclasses will be introduced to the Baldur’s Gate 3 videogame in 2025. Zillow did not provide a date for when to expect that.
One of the metrics they’re tracking to determine how well the new core books are doing is to compare it to the initial sales of the 2014 core books for 5E. Zillow said that the English-language, analog version (ie., physical books) of the 2024 Players Handbook reached the same sales numbers that the 2014 PHB did in three years across all languages.
That makes sense since 5E really took off with the advent of actual play videos that made it easier to see how D&D is played. Critical Role season 1 debuted in 2015 with a 5E campaign and it was joined by a host of other AP video streams. AP games had begun years before with podcasts and convention games watched by spectators, like Acquisitions, Inc., but video versions greatly expanded the audience and brought new people to D&D.
Zillow also credits other things like Stranger Things, D&D movie Honor Among Thieves, the videogame Baldur’s Gate 3, and more as having grown the audience for D&D in general and 5E in particular. Zillow said that that Wizards estimates that D&D has 85+ million global fans. D&D Beyond now has more than 19 million registered users and that’s in addition to people who play D&D in a completely analog fashion, play on a different VTT, or play via Discord or Zoom.
In regard to how the new core rule books fit into 5E, Zillow said, “You’re not losing all of the years that you’ve spent in putting into your campaigns and your play groups. We’re just providing new enhancements and really exciting new ways for you to play. And it’s going to be a springboard for all of the exciting stuff that we are going to be doing in the future.”
With that, Zillow turned the presentation over to the co-leads for the new Monster Manual, with the discussion moderated by D&D Community Manager LaTia Jacquise. Jeremy Crawford is well known to D&D fans and is game director for D&D. Wes Schneider is principle game designer for D&D and has been the lead for a number of prior books.
What’s In the Book?
Crawford and Schneider began with an overview of the new MM, starting with the fact that it’s the biggest one ever, featuring more than 500 creatures. That includes 85 new monsters such as the primeval owlbear, the blob of annihilation, the vampire nightbringer, and the haunting reverent.
“We took a look at the 2014 Monster Manual and we’re like, folks have been clamoring for so much. We’ve got so many more ideas. We know so much more about this game and how we want to develop it, how we can improve the gameplay experience. Let’s make it even bigger. So one of the biggest goals for this new Monster Manual is just… more. More of what everybody wants out of their monsters and their threats for their D&D games,” said Schneider.
“So, to that end,” Schneider continued, “You’re going to see over 85 new monsters throughout this book. This is going to be new critters. This is going to be things you’ve never seen before. But then this is also going to be incredible takes on some of your favorite monsters, givine you more versatility, more game play, more opportunities to use them. You’ll even see in this note here, if you love owlbears, guess what? We’ve got you more owlbears, so now these guys aren’t just going to be something that you throw at lower-level parties. You can use them through more of your campaign with creatures like the primeval owlbear, these owlbears that inhabit the Feywild.”
“What this also means is that we’re going to be giving you more monsters for every tier of playy. Something that the 2014 Monster Manual has somewhat of a dearth of is just great threats for high-level play. That’s not going to be a problem with the 2025 Monster Manual. You’re going to see more high-level threats – big monsters, creatures for ending campaigns, for epic-tier play, and we’ve got a few of those to show off for you here,” added Schneider.
It was clear from Schneider and Crawford’s comments that the D&D team has been paying attention to fan feedback, not just from the recent playtests but also going back to comments made about what was missing from the 2014 MM. That feedback was then filtered the goal of making it easier for DMs to run adventures of any level and have the game be more fun and satisfying for players.
“We’ve reviewed all of the rules, fan feedback, ways that players and DMs interface with the monsters and done a ton to make sure that your game-play experience is as smooth, as elegant, as player friendly, and as easy to use at the table as it absolutely can be. So everything’s been reconsidered. Everything’s been adjusted to make it easier and ultimately more fun to use,” said Schneider.
One thing demonstrated by the sample pages provided is that each entry gets a little byline of sorts, answering what it is. For the gargoyle that is “a sculpted sentinel hidden in plain sight.” It’s just a little touch before the narrative information that gets to the core of the creature. They also simplify things by noting the treasure or treasure type within each creature’s entry, along with its habitat.
Narrative information is provided but they emphasize that they don’t want to lock DMs into thinking there is only way to run or present a monster. “We want to make these springboards for your own adventures,” said Schneider. To that end, a lot of entries have a little random table of ideas for inspiration, such as what might be in a gelatinous cube.
The stat block has also been tweaked to be more DM friendly, making it easier to look up ability modifiers and giving the traits section its own heading. Iniative has both a static number and a modier, so if a DM wants to roll, they can, but if they’re in a hurry, they can just use the number. The new MM is also going to have “day one digital integration” with D&D Beyond so “you’ll be able to just plot them right into your encounters and go,” added Jacquise.
Monster Manual Overview
The book starts off with what they described as an expanded “How to Use a Monster” section right up front. With the growth of D&D has come an influx of new DMs, especially since those that got started after watching AP videos might not have access to an established DM. Wizards has heard over and over of new groups that formed from a shared curiosit about D&D, with one person volunteering to DM. So when the D&D talks about creating a smoother experience and making things easier for the DM, it’s not just making life easier for experienced DMs, though that’s one repeated goal. It’s also about teaching new DMs how to create and run adventures. The 2024 Dungeon Master’s Guide put a lot of thought and effort into teaching new DMs and helping to speed up game prep for established DMs. This MM is following in that path by helping DMs of all experience levels get the most out of their monsters and provide lots of inspiration for new campaigns.
“We’ve spent a lot of time in this introduction explaining, ‘Here’s what a stat block is,’ ‘Here’s now you use it,’ ‘Here’s how it makes sense,’ really trying to guide you into what can, at first glance, be a little bit of, ‘oh, I’ve got this whole block of numbers. What do I do with this?’ We spent time really easing you into understanding that, explaining what everything means, and then giving DMs a little more guidance than before of how we think these monsters are best used and how you can get the most threat and action out of every one of these monsters,” said Schneider.
That first chapter works hand in hand with material in the 2024 DMG. So information on adjusting monsters and encounter building is in the DMG because that’s the purview of the DM. “How to Use a Monster” is more of you’ve got these stat blocks and this entire book of monsters. Here’s what you’re going to be seeing and how to use it.
Monsters, Monsters, Monsters
“After that short introduction, you’ve got over 300 pages of just monsters, monsters, monsters from the aarakocra all the way down to zombies. Everything that you’ve come to expect from D&D Monster Manuals, plus a lot more,” said Schneider.
As previously noted, some of the creatures are new and some are well established, but they also reached back to older Monster Manuals.
“The creatures that people have been enjoying for the last decade have returned, either in their old form or in a brand-new form, sometimes with new names. And then we also have many new stat blocks, some of which have certainly been inspired by creatures that appeared in earlier editions, like when we look at making the new azer variants, for instance, also some of the new takes on the giants. Also, when we revisited the dragons, it’s not just that we have brought back older monsters. We’ve also brought back elements from existing monsters,” said Crawford.
“For example, high CR dragons now cast spells, which before was an optional element in our dragons, but now is built into the dragons themselves, and that has been a fun part of D&D’s storytelling about dragons for decades,” added Crawford.
The new book has a lot of creature variations but while some variants get their own individual stat blocks, others done. For example, the animal lord has one stat block with the different possibilities for the various types of animal lords built into the stat block. Entries for NPCs/professions are also expanded. Unlike 2014, where all of those stat blocks were in an appendix, now entries for things like guards, druids, etc. are placed in the main book, alphabetically.
“So in the ‘C’ section, you will find the cultist section, and in there you will find the updates of the cultists from the cultists from the 2014 Monster Manual and then a lot more. So in addition to your base tier cultists and now the cultist fanatic and a cultist hero fanatic. Then you’ve also got a number of cultists that swear themselves to some of the other powers of the D&D multiverse… and each one of them has different abilities to help convey that in a way that isn’t just spooky guy with a sacrificial dagger,” said Schneider. The artwork (above) provided during the press preview showed an aberrant cultists and elemental cultist.
“This is another example of how we have provided more options for DMs when building adventures, building worlds,” added Crawford. “You can go through this massive collection of potential friends and foes as a dungeon master, and really, our hope is, find even more inspiration than before for building your worlds, building your stories. And eve here, looking at this piece of art, I think many of us dungeon masters could suddenly come up with, wow, I might create an entire campaign based on a war between an aberrant cult and an elemental cult, and see how the player characters get swept into it,” said Crawford.
The NPCs throughout the book are not all just updates from 2014. More NPC categories have been added, one of which is a set of pirate NPCs. These include base level pirates, pirate captains, pirate admirals, etc. Because the pirate set provides multiple CRs, a DM can introduce pirate threats for low-level characters all the way to the crew of pirate navy. The pirate section even has an side on pirate flags and how to random generate one.
Some returning creatures have new companions. In the case of the bullete, that includes the bullete pup. Crawford called it, “the scariest pup you will ever go up against.”
Crawford also said that a recurring theme in the book is giving full stat blocks to variants that previously only got a brief mention or a paragraph suggesting to a DM how they could tweak a creature, such as a mind flayer, into a mind flayer arcanist. In 2014, the poltergeist was a suggested variant for ghosts. Now it has its own stat block, too. It’s all about presenting new and expanded options to DMs.
The merfolk have been joined by the merfolk wavebender, a new type of merfolk. “Again, making it so that DMs who’ve bene playing 5E for the last 10 years have a whole bunch more toys to play with even when they are returning to creatures that perhaps they have used many times.”
“So then after we get through over 300 pages of monsters we’ve got a couple of appendices here. The first one is just all of your animals, things that we expect live on almost every world of the multiverse. This is going to be, you know, normal critters from like cats and crocodiles and elements like that but then moving onto supernatural creatures like giant apes, giant eagles, those sorts of things,” said Schneider.
Monsters from A to Z
Another change from the 2014 MM is how monsters are listed in the book itself. Instead of listing monsters alphabetically by group/family, the upcoming book is purely alphabetical, which was the case for some prior Monster Manuals.
“That is something that we felt was worth bringing back in the Monster Manual for whole game,” said Crawford. With the emphasis on making things easier for both experienced and new DMs, it’s a reasonable decision. This way you flip directly to “G” for gelatinous cube instead of knowing or remembering to look under “O” for ooze.
If you do prefer to look up monsters by family group, Appendix B is the solution. “The second appendix… is just a massive collection of monster lists to help you really make sure that you’re getting the monsters that you need for your encounters. So this is going to be presenting things like all of the monsters in the book by their habitats, all of the monsters by their creature types, by the groups or families that they’re a part of, so like all of the devils are on a list here, all of the demons are in the list here so on and so forth. And then monsters by challenge rating. You will also, of course, at the beginning of the entire book, we didn’t mention it here, but there is a table of contents that includes an index of stat blocks where everything’s just listed alphabetically,” said Schneider.
Epic Adventure Requires Epic Monsters
One of the constant complaints the 2014 MM received was that it didn’t have enough options for high-level characters and epic-tier play. That has been addressed in 2024 (well, 2025). “You’re going to find new monsters that represent the apex of their creature type. In the 2014 Monster Manual, we had ancient dragons for dragons. We had the tarrasque for monstrosities, and we had a few other epic monsters for some of the other creature types. But, as we were building this new bestiary, we looked at some of the creature types that were lacking an apex threat. Basically friends and foes for the tarrasque,” said Crawford.
“The apex threat that we created for the elemental creature type is the elemental cataclysm, and you will see in the game mechanics for this wandering catastrophe that this creature has a random element to play where different environmental disasters occur while you are fighting it. Each of the the new epic threats that you’re going to face in this monster have some special schtick in how they function in play, and how they all feature an updated approach to legendary actions,” explained Crawford.
“In the past, DMs had to look at the costs of how much does each legendary action cost to use in each round of play. The DM no longer has to do that. The DM simply knows this monster has a certain number of legendary actions to use each round, and then pick from the list. Now, a few of those options can be used only once per round, but the selection process is going to be easier, and we have also ensured that no matter which combination of legendary actions you select for one of these terrors, this creature is going to stay on its challenge rating and be terrifying for your player characters whatever way you decide to have it use its new stunning abilities,” said Crawford.
That’s course correcting an issue in the 2014 MM. DMs have long complained that some of the challenge ratings in that book seemed high compared to what the creature did, but over the years, the D&D team explained it was an issue of how they described the monsters’ abilities, causing them to often be run by the DM in a less than optimal fashion.
An example of how some of this was revised is through the adult and ancient dragon entries. In the 2014 MM, spellcasting was an option but now it’s built in. Further, they have revised and streamlined lair actions that make them more dangerous while also making it easier for DMs to remember everything a venerable dragon can do.
“We have, to make the DM’s life easier in play, taken the best of those lair actions and moved them into the stat block itself… [so] when you’re behind the screen, running the game, you no longer have to go looking someplace else to find out what the creature’s lair actions are. They are right there for in the stat block,” said Crawford.
When reconsidering the dragon entries, they also looked for ways to differentiate the various dragon types. For example, in the past, all dragons caused fear, especially chromatic dragons, through frightening presence. In looking for a way in which each type of dragon can control a battlefield, some still get frightening presence, but, for example, gold dragons don’t bother to frighten you. They just banish those who dare to try to fight them. The idea is that this adds an element of surprise, even for groups who have been playing for years.
A lot of thought went into the metallic dragon entries. After all, this type of dragon is good aligned, but that doesn’t necessarily preclude fighting them. Schneider added that they might also be allies, and that they wanted provide a inspriation for “a multitude of ways to use them.”
“We upgraded elements in every single one of the dragons, so you’re going to find not only some of the new mechanics that I talked about before, but then also returning mechanics that have been refinded. One of the big examples for the metallic dragons is it used to be that they had two different ways their breath weapon could function and both ways were on the same recharge. That’s not true anymore. The metallic dragons, they’re damaging breath weapon is still on a recharge but often their non-damaging option is not. So again, talk about a surprise if you are allied with one of these dragons or fighting against it when you think, oh, they used their breath weapon, ‘OK, now they can’t use it for a little while longer, oh my gosh, they’re doing something else the very next round’,” said Crawford.
Some of the other epic-level creatures introduced are the blob of annihilation from the ooze family and the haunted revenant for undead, which can take the form of a haunted hause.
Schneider described the blob of annihilation as “this just massive blob, this tidal wave of ooze that can sweep over whole cities, but it’s not just that it’s gross and sticky. It’s that these things are actually inside of them have the skull of a dead god that’s floating inside and when they encompass you, they can actually pull you into a different plane, which even has the potential where you kill the thing and you don’t have everybody out of the thing, they might be sucked away to the astral sea.”
“So even the timing of when you defeat this monster will be very critical because you might destroy it and think, yay we won! Oh no, three members of our party were inside it when we destroyed it, and now they’re gone. Again, one of those examples of how each of these epic threats has surprising new mechanics for players to face when they come up against one of them,” added Crawford.
As for the haunting revenant, Schneider said, “if you’re familiar with the 2014 Monster Manual, revenants have traditionally been corpses that are just particularly hard to put down. They have a mission. They’re out for revenge and if you defeat them before they get that revenge, they’re going to come back. So we’ve created an entire new family of revenants that still include the classic corpses revenant, but then we’ve also taken that to a few additional levels where we have another revenant where it’s not just animating a corpose, but it’s a spirit that’s animating an entire group of creatures, or, in this case, haunting an entire location. So with the haunting revenant here, you’ve got the spirit that is trying to get its vengeance through animating an entire structure and potentially consuming you.”
And the apex level creatures come in a variety of forms. “Here you can see a direct example of… monsters from past editions returning to the game. We have the animal lord, which appeared in first edition D&D and has, now, decades later, graduated to the Monster Manual,” said Crawford.
“The animal lords are, even though they might look just nice and friendly here, these are another one of our real high level apex new threats in the book. Like the animal lords clock in at CR20 because these are not just animal-headed characters. These are manifestations and really demigods of whole different types of animals that might live on the plains someplace like the Beast Lands or something like that. So when you encounter them, you’re not just encountering a fox person or a cat person or whatever have you, but you’re encountering pretty much the demigod of wolfkind or lynx kind or any number of animals. In fact, included with this creature are a number of tables to just help inspire you or even randomly generate what type of different animal you might come up with because as part of these creatures, you get a different suite of abilities, depending upon whether they’re more of a forager-type animal or a hunter-type animal or a sage-type animal,” said Schneider.
“With the Azer, you see an example of how we have taken some monsters that were in the 2014 Monster Manual, and in the new Monster Manual, given them some friends. So in the 2014 Monster Manual, we had just a single azer. Here, now, we provide two different types, the new one being the azer pyromancer. And so you will see in many different places throughout the book, in the past maybe had a lone creature. Now there are multiple types to make it so that the dungeon master has more options for creating rich encounters that involve these families of creatures,” said Crawford.
But never fear, tarrasque fans. Even though these apex additions provide the tarrasque with friends and foes, the tarrasque itself is still the highest CR creature, making it the ultimate apex preddator in the book.
Crawford also promises that the new tarrasque is the most terrifying ever in the history of D&D. Wheras in the past, some parties could take one by fight it at long range, this leveled up version can blast buildings at distance and block teleportation.
Monsters in Action
Another distinction for the 2025 Monster Manual is a change in the type of art that accompanies each creature. The 2014 MM used what Schneider referred to as the “glamour shot” where you saw only the monster against a white backdrop. For this book, the monsters are all shown in action.
“Something that people can see in all of these pieces of art is we’re seeing the monsters in context,” said Crawford. Schneider expanded on that, saying, “”We’ve really highlighted context… You’re seeing them where they live, and in many cases, doing what they do. So for the azer pyromancer here, you’re seeing it actually casting its flaming spells.”
Another example of that is in the adult brass dragon artwork shown during the presentation. It’s set in the desert, which is its favored environment, with the brass dragon blasting mummies to clear them out of its territory.
The context-providing and action-oriented art approach brings something else to the forthcoming MM – inspiration. Over and over again, both Crawford and Schneider talked about they wanted this book to provide ideas for DMs to use as encounter and campaign seeds. Players caught within a war between an adult or ancient brass dragon and an army of mummies is just one possibility from the brass dragon artwork.
The downside, as Schneider noted, to showing creatures in context is that it’s sometimes gross with gross monsters doing gross things. That’s the case with the art for the otygugh. He also added that it shows horror in D&D isn’t limited to Gothic castles.
And in some cases the art reinforces the fact that D&D has its own flavor. A good example of that is the skeleton artwork. It doesn’t just show human skeletons. It also has various D&D species among the dead, such as a tiefling skeleton. The book also brings back the minotaur skeleton and the warhorse skeleton. A new type, the flaming skeleton that has an unholy fire it can channel.
Schneider also promised that the zombie art in the final book will also show a “very D&D version of a zombie apocalypse.”
The Thorny Question of Alignment
One of the questions I asked was about which approach the new book was taking to alignment for sentient species. The 2014 MM, like prior Monster Manuals, just gave a static alignment even for sentient species. That became a point of debate because even if a culture was a moral monolith, D&D lore and fiction are filled with exceptions. The most famous example one is Drizzt Do’Urden, who is chaotic good even though the entry for drow was traditionally lawful evil.
Some of the books after 2014, such as Mordenkainen Presents Monsters of the Multiverse, addressed this by citing “any alignment” in some cases, such as for the stat blocks for professions and playable sentient species. In other cases the word “typically” was added in front of the alignment. For the new MM, Crawford
“In the new Monster Manual, alignments appear just on their own and so if a creature is archetypically neutral good, it says simply, ‘neutral good,’ and the reason why we’ve done it this is the way alignment is described both in the Player’s Handbook and in the Monster Manual’s introduction is we are very clear that this is purely a suggestion. We tell you in the introduction of the Monster Manual that every alignment you see in this book is a suggestion, and DM, if it makes sense for your campaign or for an individual, change it. And given that framing and given the space constraints, we realize we could drop the word ‘typically’,” explained Crawford.
“Now, for many of our humanoid creatures,” Crawford continued, “…it actually does still have a suggested alignment but it’s one that you almost never saw in 2014 – neutral – because in the old days, neutral really just meant ‘whatever’ and so we’ve really embraced that,a nd we give you guidance in the new Monster Manual that when you see ‘neutral’ that is especially an invitation for you as the dungeon master to decide, well, do I want to push this individual creature toward one of the other alignments when I think about how to role play it or am I fine to sort of keeping the creature in a sort of morally neutral place?” explained Crawford.
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