Dungeons & Dragons will be completing its trio of 2024 rules revisions—a little confusingly—on Feburary 18, 2025. Its third source book, the Monster Manual, comes on the heels of both the Player's Handbook and the Dungeon Master's Guide.
I recently got to sit down last week, with a bestiary of other outlets, for a preview of what would be inside—and, honestly?
As far as a tome of stat blocks goes, it ain't half-bad. Obviously, as revealed by game director Jeremy Crawford and principal game designer Wesley Schneider earlier this month, the Tarrasque is getting some «fighting buddies».
The amount of high-CR BBEGs here is, in truth, honestly kind of impressive—with promises to add a bunch of «apex threats» like the Elemental Cataclysm, a multi-headed beast with varyingly-flavoured maws of doom doing their best Tiamat impression.
Other big bads included the Animal Lords, CR20 demigods with different abilities based on your flavour of furry, as well as a Haunted House Revenant.