Review - Flee, Mortals!
MCDM, $70 Hardcover and PDF $40 PDF
Disclaimer
Before I start this review I did get this product for free but not as a review copy.
I backed the Kickstarter for the physical product and was very excited for it. My excitement turned to disillusion when the Lairs and Hordes stretch goal - "This is actually quite a bit of extra content, so it may be this turns into its own separate book you get along with your new monster book." turned out to be a separate book, but you had to pay for it and pay separately for shipping. At that point I cancelled my pledge because I didn't think I was getting what was promised, but I had already received the PDF.
I had a lot to say at the time but I'm not going to go over it, this is a review of the book, not a review of the Kickstarter process. If you choose to buy it now I have no reason to believe that MCDM won't deliver exactly what you pay for.
Introduction
So with that rather lengthy preamble out of the way how is the book?
That depends.
This review is going to end up feeling quite negative because I have a lot of things to nitpick, but up-front I want to make it clear that the monsters are good. The statblocks have clearly been put together with care, I know they have been extensively play tested and the ones I have used in my games have been fun for both me and the players. The book is also packed with really great art, it is rare to see art of this quantity and quality outside of a first-party monster book.
So why do I say it is going to be a negative review? Well largely because I don't think it really delivers on its potential.
The premise of the design is that lots of the monsters that exist for 5e are boring. While there are many monsters available lots of them come down to being a bag of hitpoints with two claws and a bite.
Their stated aim is: "We wanted to make a book with lore, stat blocks, and art so good that
you can replace your core rule book with ours … or at least use ours just as much."
Did they achieve it? Well let us have a deeper look.
What is in the book?
The introduction covers some new rules, such as the dazed condition, a description of creature roles that harks back to 4e with splitting creatures into roles such as brute, controller or solo. The largest part of this section is dedicated to more rules for some of MCDM's new ideas, companions (pet monsters), retainers and minions. There is also a section on Villain Actions which is MCDM's take on Legendary Actions.
The introduction finishes with something that I think is a fantastic idea and that I plan to write an article on soon, here it is called "Converting Ancestries" essentially a way to change a monster from one type to another by applying a template to it.
That covers the extra material at the start, it is followed by the main part of the book, split into three chapters.
First is the monsters, this covers the bulk of the statblocks and has some pretty darn good monsters, they take several traditional D&D monsters and break them out into multiple subtypes with some connecting mechanics to tie them together. So the section on Orcs has 8 different types of Orc tied together by theme and all having a special trait which nicely represents their toughness and aggression. There is also an action oriented Orc "boss", two creatures that are associated with Orcs (though not in traditional D&D lore, as far as I can see they are new MCDM derived creatures), an Orc Retainer and a Companion.
Second is Environments, it lists several adventuring environments players might encounter such as caves, enchanted forests and ruined keeps. It gives more templates for making environment adapted monsters, generic lair actions for the environments, a map, and a few monsters adapted for each environment.
The third is Villain parties which describes seven different parties that can be used as villains, in your campaigns. This is great stuff, there is something on each of their backgrounds, goals, methods and a description of each party member, the statblocks of course but also magic items and villain actions that are tied to the party. I haven't had cause to use one in a game yet but they look fantastic.
The final section is Psionic Powers, this seems to largely be an advertisement/expansion for their new Talent class.
Conclusions and Thoughts
In my opinion the good bits are very good.
Again, the monster stablocks are great, the Action Oriented Monsters, which is what MCDM calls monsters with legendary actions are fantastically flavourful and they have really worked to make the mechanics fit the story.
So what are the bad bits?
One potential problem is that in making monsters more interesting they have also made them more complicated. If you think 5e combat is too simple and want more complicated encounters with more monster abilities it is great, if you think combat is already too complicated or takes too long then this is not going to be for you.
Another problem is that there is a lot in here I'm just not interested in using, retainers and animal companions aren't something that fits my games whereas MCDM seems to love them. Of the 340 statblocks about 50 of them are companions or retainers that I will likely never use.
I'm not too interested in Minions either. This is another MCDM take on a 4e idea, weaker versions of a monster type that die in a single hit and allow characters to feel powerful by managing to cleave through several at a time. I like the idea, and I have used it. The best thing about it in my view is that you can make the fiction match the mechanics for things like attacking a Goblin village, there can be dozens of Goblins for the party to fight but only the chief and his bodyguard will be "real" monsters, the majority can be minions so you can have a big battle at low levels that doesn't take forever with the party heroically slaying dozens of foes. It is OK occasionally but unless you use minions in every battle it might mean you can slay dozens of Gnolls one day and struggle with a few Orcs the next. I think it is mostly just a gimmick that falls down a lot with more powerful minions, Fire Giants and Treants being felled in a single blow makes little sense to me. I would rather have had the idea presented with an example or two (they do cover extensively how to turn any creature into a minion version) than use up the space for another 40 statblocks.
This comes onto my biggest issue with the book, of the 340 statblocks there are 90 that I don't think are useful, that leaves 250. Which is respectable but is staring to be a small monster book. For comparison the 5e Monster Manual has just under 500, Kobold Press's Tome of Beasts has over 400.
The issue of the lack of monsters doesn't end there though. Because of the way the monsters are grouped there are 14 statblocks under Orcs and similar numbers for several of the other creature types such as Kobolds, Humans, Hobgoblins. These statblocks are of course useful and could make an Orc storyline really shine but going deep on the creatures they have means they have had to go shallow on the variety of creatures. This isn't all bad the standard Monster Manual had a lot of fat but they have made other choices that further reduce the utility.
The lore. MCDM have decided to go their own way on lore for this, if you play in their forthcoming setting or have your own then this is fine but as someone who mostly plays in published settings it is a problem for me. Their demon-tainted Hobgoblins who explode in fiendish ichor when they die are fine monsters, but they aren't the militaristic Goblinoids I'm used to, the kobolds are faux-Roman legionaries and the new creatures they have designed to accompany most monsters don't exist in current lore. This is fine if you are happy to change up your world or do the work to make the creatures fit better into an existing one but I'm not buying a monster book to give myself more work to do.
The other lore-related issue is that some of the remaining space is taken up by new creatures such as the Angulotls, who are cool but as anthropomorphic frogs with a vaguely South-American theme don't really fit existing settings. There is also a lot of space given over to science-fantasy monsters such as the the Voiceless Talkers, a Mind-Flayer equivalent and Time Raiders a Gith analogue from the Astral sea. This leaves me with another 20 or so interesting but not very useful statblocks.
Should you buy it?
Ultimately that is for you to decide, I have tried to give a fair assessment of the book emphasising both its good and bad points.
I have been quite picky when it comes to the bad points but this is a premium product with premium price-tag ($40 PDF, $70 physical) to match. While I can see where the money goes in the great art, the extensive playtesting and the high wages MCDM are known for ultimately I am buying a book that has to compete against all the others I could be buying.
If you love psionic powers, new lore, pets and retainers I think you will get a lot out of this and it is worth the money. If you just want new monsters to run in an existing setting I'm not sure it is.
I had a little regret when I started to see pictures of the book in people's hands after cancelling my order but now I've had a good look over it I'm glad I did. It is cool but it tries to do too much and suffers from it. It doesn't succeed on it's own terms as a replacement for the core monster book.
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