Monster Manual by Mike Mearls

Monster Manual Reviews

• 
  DeadWeight

  Far too much to do with what a monster's stats are and how to kill them; relatively little concerning how they live.
• 
  Morbus Iff

  A little too light on fluff for me. Prefer fluff.
• 
  Randy Lander

  The Player's Handbook is the crucial book in D&D, but the Monster Manual is not far behind. And the 4th edition Monster Manual, while not a home run, is a pretty good evolution of the Monster Manuals I-V of D&D 3.5.
  
  I'll start with what I miss. The description of each monster that could be read to the players was handy, and while there was never a ton of information about the monsters, the 4th edition Monster Manual definitely stresses the tactical aspect of the new game. Each monster gets a tiny paragraph to describe it's basic purpose in the game. No information on their usual habitat, their history, etc. Tellingly, they each get a tiny paragraph of tactical advice instead.
  
  I'm also a touch annoyed that the Lore section, an outgrowth of the great Knowledge sections in the later 3.5 Monster Manuals, is not stronger. It's nice that the monsters all *have* that section, but it'd be nicer if it had some useful information for players that make their knowledge checks. As is, you make your knowledge check, and unless the GM ad-libs, you get a quick, fairly useless history of the monster, rather than any hint as to their abilities or weaknesses.
  
  So that's the complaints. But what works is so strong I'm compelled to more or less ignore them. The biggest change is re-packaging the monsters so that you don't have to create every single one as if it were a character. Dragons are now playable out of the book. Human bad guys don't require you to roll up characters. And every monster has different level versions of itself, and different tactics and powers. It makes it much easier for a DM to throw together an encounter on the fly, and more importantly, the different powers make all the monsters (even the ubiquitous orcs, kobolds and hobgoblins) interesting and more unique.
  
  Plus, as with all the Wizards stuff, it's packed with beautiful artwork, which is crucial to a good Monster Manual.
• 
  Mark Austin

  ★ - Most books with this rating I never finish and so don't make this list. This one I probably started speed-reading to get it over with.
  ★★ - Average. Wasn't terrible, but not a lot to recommend it. Probably skimmed parts of it.
  ★★★ - Decent. A few good ideas, well-written passages, interesting characters, or the like.
  ★★★★ - Good. This one had parts that inspired me, impressed me, made me laugh out loud, made me think - it got positive reactions and most of the rest of it was pretty decent too.
  ★★★★★ - Amazing. This is the best I've read of its genre, the ones I hold on to so I can re-read them and/or loan them out to people looking for a great book. The best of these change the way I look at the world and operate within it.
• 
  Greg

  This is the weakest of the new 4th edition core rule books. The main problem with it is the multiplication of just plain strange monsters at the expense of the old classic monsters from the old 1st edition. I can only assume that the changes were driven by the desire to increase sales for WOTC by spreading the monsters that people want across multiple volumes, and to increase the number of monsters to create figurines for.
• 
  Daniel

  An excellent initial tome of beasties for the D&D 4th Edition game. It very much is a Part 1 in the Monster Manual series, lacking some very basic creatures/animals, but it certainly provides enough fodder to throw at heroes of all levels.
• 
  Robert

  Looks like your pretty standard monster compendium. I am please with the manner in which they layout the abilities and explain how they can be used. Probably the best part in each entry is the Strategy section, just as it has been in previous versions.
• 
  Mario Molina

  Sleek artwork. Owlbears still.
• 
  Jon

  I like how they setup the monsters tactics and powers. I found some interesting ideas for my next encounters.
• 
  Abraham Ray

  good book of monsters for 4th ed dnd!