I recently posted my newest PDF for sale on DMsGuild……Creatures of Ravenloft. In this post, I talk a bit about some decisions I made while updating stats to 5e.
First, on the statblocks. A few PDFs ago, I started changing up the statblocks. I condensed a few things (CR and XP are in the header), and I moved spells to spell actions. Recently Wizards of the Coast debuted similar changes to how spells will be presented in their NPC statblocks. Frankly, I like my version better. The WotC blocks don’t indicate things they’ve moved to actions are spells. In my PDFs, I’ve created spell actions as a type of action (in this PDF and future ones). These actions summarize what a spell does, indicates the level, and makes it clear they are spells. I think I could clean this up some, we’ll see in my next product.
Second, I added lore and combat tactics to each monster. This is based off the upcoming product coming from ENWorld Publishing, Level Up (currently on Kickstarter). This product looks great, and they’ve added lore and tactics and encounter groups and treasure (I think treasure). My current layout and font don’t give a ton of room to do those last two, but I may add them in in the future.
I think giving the DM some idea of NORMAL tactics is helpful (hopefully people realize these are recommendations, not strict rules). Also, it really makes things easier on the DM when PCs ask what they know about creatures if a product lays out some ideas in a table.
I used the disease format from fourth edition for the disease that Crimson Bones can give their victims. I always liked this way of using stages to have the disease get worse over time. It is especially effective in a horror based campaign…….
The last thing I did very differently than current WotC design is the way I handled the limbs and trunk of the Death’s Head Tree. I treated them very differently than how hydra are currently treated. You can (and should!) target the branches specifically, and the hit points are spread between the trunk and branches (that is, it isn’t one pool).
