Volo's Guide to Monsters (Dungeons & Dragons)

This is a great addition to 5th Edition Dungeons and Dragons. The cutesy banter between Volo and Elminster is kept to a minimum, leaving some really great, meaty content. While I just received my print copy today, I've been using the online version through Roll20 for two weeks. My review is based on two weeks of experience with the content, plus sitting with the physical book today. What exactly are you getting in this book? - Nearly 90 pages of in depth monster lore, focusing on Beholders, Giants, Gnolls, Goblinoids, Hags, Kobolds, Mind Flayers, Orcs, and Yuan-ti. This is very in depth work, with multiple pages providing variants, tables, lairs (including maps), historical background, and even some of the psychology of the creatures that can really help you flesh out these types of creatures in your games. - 7 new Player Character races, including Aasimar, Firbolg, Goliath, Kenku, Lizardfolk, Tabaxi, and Triton. These are a nice edition, and I especially like how the details for these new races includes tips on how to role-play as these slightly more unique creature types. Overall, these new races feel like they can breathe a lot of new life into campaigns for players who might be starting to get tired of the standard set from the Player's Handbook. - 6 new Monstrous Player Character races, which feature groups that were represented in the first 90 pages. These are more limited/specialized builds that a DM would really need to weigh before including in a game, but absolutely could provide some fantastic adventures for the right group of players. The 6 Monstrous races represented are Bugbear, Goblin, Hobgoblin, Kobold, Orc, and Yuan-ti Pureblood. - An expanded Bestiary.The next 99 pages of the book are dedicated to new monsters for your games. There are an excellent variety of new creatures, including some favorites that didn't make the original Monster Manual. Personally, I was glad to see a nice balance between creature types, and that these new creatures help round out some of the groups, such as Fey. It also is nice to see a book like this deepen the bench; this section of the book provides an especially large amount of new monsters of the type covered in the first 90 pages (Beholders, Giants, Gnolls, Goblinoids, Hags, Kobolds, Mind Flayers, Orcs, and Yuan-ti). A full 10 pages of this is also used to create new NPC stats, which is a great boon to be able to build encounters that stretch across a wider CR level in more civilized locations. - The book wraps up with 4 pages of Appendixes which provide a quick reference no matter how you are looking for a creature: you can find them by CR level, by Creature Type, or by the typical environment that you would find the monster in. All in all, the content is incredibly useful for any dungeon master who wants more content. The new monsters alone are worth the price of admission. The new character races are also an excellent new addition, although their uniqueness may make them more useful for some groups over others; that said, options are always nice to have. The first 90 pages of lore will be most useful to DM's who are planning on using the types of creatures listed in their campaigns. Especially if you are using those creature types, I highly recommend this as an addition to your collection, as the amount of material provided on these creatures is sure to spark your imagination and spin new adventures for your table.

This is a supplement for the core 5E books, providing lore within the frame narrative that Loremaster Volothamp Geddarm is the one who collected it and made it available to the reader. The Literary Agent Hypothesis is fun when it is done well, and it is done well here. Volo's comments provide extra insight, humor and a greater degree of immersion into the lore itself. The lore is for certain monsters, such as mind flayers and orcs. It also has a list of new races for players but that is by far the shortest section. Third it has more monster-manual style monster entries, and finally an appendix for NPC humanoids with class levels, such as an abjuration wizard or an arch-druid, or some other non-class NPCs like apprentice wizard. So this is definitely something that is more useful to the Dungeon Master than the players, but players can also benefit (and not in a meta-gaming way either). For those that want to play a paladin but don't like the "honor and justice" mold then Tritons provide an excellent template. They are typically lawful good but in a good-is-not-nice sort of way and gain racial bonuses to their STR, CON and CHA (+1 each) in addition to useful abilities, which set them apart from the paladins of other humanoid races. Additionally, the communication methods and non-combat skills of the kenku sound like they would be fun to role-play. The curiosity of the tabaxi as well; there's a random table to simulate their mercurial curiosity. For DMs, this is an extremely useful aid. The first chapter provides lore on cultures, history, social structure etc. for monsters, which can help with role-playing them, devising encounters that can lead into future events, and what their lairs can look like. Each section has maps, many of which are a full page, detailing a typical lair. As a DM myself, these sections have already proven useful for me. I used the section on goblins to describe a war camp that was the centerpiece of a prior campaign, and the section on hags to devise and plan a future campaign. The artwork looks great too. The focus monsters get several pictures showing them in action, like this one of an orc hunting party chasing down an elf, who is trying to hide, or a dissection of a mind flayer (Volov's own work, maybe? Or some researcher he interviewed?) Each monster and player race has their own depiction (warning: the spider-themed ones are creepy). Trickster Eric Novels gives "Volvo's Guide to Monsters" an A+

This guide has a lot of good stuff for the DM and a few new things for players. It seems to focus on 3 things: Monster Lore including lairs and new variants, new Monsters, and new playable character races. The Monster Lore covers a lot of interesting background lore for DMs on some of the iconic monsters in the game. The section gets into what motivates some of these monsters including societal backgrounds. There are also stat blocks on variants and lair maps. All of this is very nice and helpful if you are trying to flesh out a custom campaign. There's quite a few pages of new monsters (sorry didn't count) including stat blocks and brief descriptions. New monsters with stats are always welcome to a DM especially when we've gone through the Monster Manual and are running out of new monsters to keep players engaged. It seems like a lot of Fiends to me but that's not really a complaint. There are a few other monster types as well including NPC and beast stat blocks. The new playable character races are all very interesting and many have already been introduced in previous 5E publications. The intent of these new races is that they are very rare races as they all bring unique abilities. As such you probably don't want to have to build a campaign around an entire party of these races without proper planning. Potential issues may arise if you have a session for character creation prior to a campaign and you throw this book on the table. One player sees all the cool new player races then the rest see what he/she is doing and want a cool new player race too. So be prepared for that potential can-of-worms as it could throw a few monkey wrenches into your already prepared campaign. This isn't to say that it won't all turn out OK but it is definitely something to consider.

I'd just like to clarify before I begin my review that I'm not jumping the gun by reviewing the first day of non-game store release. I purchased the alternate cover version from my local game store Nov 4th, and have used that version extensively since. Now, I really have to get this out there: this. book. is. AMAZING. It has some amazing creatures that I thought were horribly left out by official D&D sources this edition (the expansion of fiends itself is worth the buy to me). The new player races are awesome, and with my limited playtesting since FLGS release, all seem mostly balanced (my party had some issues with some vague wording here and there but that's probably mostly due to their goal to drive me thoroughly crazy). Like, 10+ new (significant, not variations of already released variables) races added is a pretty big deal. The lore bits and flavor are both top-notch, though I personally found the interactions between Elminster and Volo to be a tad - I don't know, childish? Cringey? For the most part, though, it wasn't an issue, and usually the information conveyed by the interactions is important (different takes on the creature you can have fitted for your campaign). I should also note that my friend and fellow DM had no problem with the dialogue. The lair information is great, but I really wish there was more. The binding seems a bit sturdier than the previous WotC publications, but I only received the non-FLGS copy this morning. You can rest assured that I will update my review as soon as a page falls out, or if I note an issue with the printing itself. The layout of the book is great. It's nice to have the list by CR at the back of the book - a feature missing from the Monster Manual. Overall, my nit picks don't really matter when one considers the quality of the book. It's honestly a must-buy for any 5th edition enthusiast. If you're new to the hobby, however, you might want to wait a bit before buying.

I'm a DM who has been playing since the late 80's. So I'm always looking for products that make my life easier. Functionally, this book gives you more options for monsters. Now in my group I often just build my own from scratch. I'll build monsters and encounters to challenge my players and avoid the cookie-cutter templates. My group has experienced players and former DM's, so they'll recall original builds easily and they'll play their characters with more "knowledge" than their character might actually have. Volo's guide has the monsters "out of the box," but then has sub-sections after each monster that show variations you can add in the game to make them different, more challenging, but also stay within the spirit of the monster's original design. For example in the beholder section, they have alternative eye socket powers. So previous knowledge from another game won't aid the players when they encounter your re-skinned creations. If you have someone at your table who is a rules lawyer, and they take issue with things that aren't in the books (you're cheating!), this will help you create variations that you can point to and say "actually this can exist." It also just gives more ideas and culture for the monsters. This includes behavior, biological functions and culture which all really help build verisimilitude. So if your group likes a lot of realism and detail, Volo's guide has done the work. The book is very detailed, and is written from the perspective of Volo, a traveling wizard from the Forgotten Realms setting who has a very high opinion of himself and is prone to conflation. Thankfully, there are annotations from Elminster (also from Forgotten Realms) that help either confirm, or in some cases, completely refute what Volo is saying. This makes it for a more amusing read. This guide was necessary for D&D. Some of the monsters in the book are as old as the game (over forty years) and the community takes them for granted. It's nice to see a product that freshens up the old, brings some new and ultimately helps give a DM tools to create a more immersive experience.

This book is a nice expansion to the 5e core books. It offers 7 new races for Player Characters to play. There is a chapter on monster lore that works with the monster manual. And there are over 85 pages with creatures with stat blocks. And a few other nice items for DM's. Worth a purchase to expand the game.

Volo’s Guide to Monsters Review I bought this book back in May and have been using it as supplement to the weekly games that I dungeon master for. I have rated this book on durability, ease of use, value added to the game, and cost. This book is a great supplement for the dungeon master who wants to add depth to some of the common villains the heroes will face off against. In addition, it also expands the DM’s choice of unique monsters to spice up the game. This book is also an excellent choice for players to pick up if they want to expand their race choices. Durability First off, the actual look and feel to the book is up to the Wizards of the Coast standards. The hardcover should come undamaged and without any additional stickers on it. The book is weighty but it is still easy to handle and flip through. Value added The body of the book is split into three sections. The first of which deals with groups opposing the players. Beholders, orcs, and gnolls are a few of the villains this section helps you make more interesting. Beyond just adding flavor, the book contains tables that make this creation easy and fun to use. The second section of the book introduces new playable races for the players to use. These races offer more interesting choices for the players. Roleplaying loving player will find a lot to love here playing by affording them the opportunity to play outlandish characters. Be warned that power gamers are likely to find imbalances and exploit them. So, you should expect to trim some race abilities down. Included in this section are stats for playing races that are typically the fodder for the party, such as orcs or kobolds. These races are great picks if the party wants to be villainous. The final section is an expansion on the monster manual. This includes more variations on some of the monsters included in the first section as well as completely new creatures. In this section, there are also whole new sets of monsters that can be used to create new and fun interactions. Several creatures have been brought back from the grayhawk era of D&D. Price In terms of price, I got this on sale for about $35 dollars and it is well worth it for that price. I would recommend waiting for it to be on sale as the sticker price of $50 is a bit pricy and sales are often.

Volo's Guide To Monsters is now, without a doubt, my new favorite 5E book. Part 1 contains a LOT of in-depth information about some of D&D's most notable adversaries: Beholders, Giants, Mind Flayers, and others. The second part contains new racial options for players; IIRC, some of these were presented in other books, but it is nice to have them collected in one place. The rest of the book has a bestiary of new creatures, great and small, as well as some "plug and play" NPCs. For the DM, this book is a treasure trove; I tend to buy 5E books for inspiration, and don't really play pre-generated campaigns, and VGtM is helping me take the campaign I'm running in some exciting new directions (at least, for me). Also, I'm all about giving players more options, so the new player races are also extremely interesting to me. I don't know how much I'll use the pre-gen NPCs, but they're handy to have, just in case. One of my favorite things about the book is the chief conceit of its design. Peppered throughout the book are comments of Volothamp Geddarm (the "Volo" of the title) and the archmage Elminster Aumar. These little side notes add a lot to the flavor of the book, and help the reader immerse him/herself in the world. EDIT: Another thing I like about this book that I just discovered is that the index of the book has monsters sorted by challenge rating and sorted by location. So, if you're hunting for creatures in, say, the Underdark, it's extremely easy to find them in the book. Nice addition!

Don't think too much, just click, and buy!

This book is a great mix - half full of lore to hang story hooks on, half full of stats and rules to build gameplay on. If you're looking for a way to make some traditional D&D monsters fresh and new, pick it up.

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it is what it says it is

El libro esta genial, muy bien explicado y amplía gratamente lo presentado en los libros base de la 5a Edición.