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There is a kind of law of diminishing returns when it comes to monster books. You get the first one, and it's chock full of the most common critters you'll need to beat on your player characters until they cry mercy. Then you pick up a second, and it's maybe got a few more decent beasties, and a bunch of weird stuff people made up while they were drunk. Then you get a third, and now you're off the deep end, with monsters made of pure hallucinogenic dream stuff, with maybe two useful foes in the whole book, unless you count the three-headed demon horse made of spun candy.

So why on earth would you need a fourth Monster Manual? Can there possibly be redeeming features in the kind of supplement we've seen three times already, not counting dozens of times from third-party publishers and setting-specific books?

The answer is a resounding 'yes.' I'll be the first to tell you there are some goofy, nearly useless monsters in Monster Manual IV, but the book also contains a great selection of monsters that will make Dungeon Masters want to make new adventures, just to toss in some of these great enemies.

Contents

There are essentially four different facets of Monster Manual IV. The first is your random selection of new creatures – puzzlingly bizarre undead, disgusting oozes (what DM really needs an ooze made of pustulant flesh?), and conglomerations of cobbled-together monsters made from leftovers. These hardly make for a book that screams 'buy me,' unless you're the DM that likes to surprise your players with completely new and freakishly bizarre monsters.

The second angle of Monster Manual IV is stuff you've seen before, but with new angles. For instance, despite the fact that drow and githyanki are already in the original Monster Manual, they're here, too. Only this time each section has new spins on the old favorites, so the drow section doesn't just have base stats and some rules for scaling. Now it contains four specific drow types, scaled up and fully statted for immediate ass-kicking. The Lolth's Sting (a drow ninja), the dark sniper, the arcane guard and the drow priestess are all ready-made bad guys, fit to challenge parties that may think they know what to expect when they meet dark elves.

This second angle proves exceptionally useful. There are three githyanki archetypes, five new killer lizardfolk, and several more excellent additions to some very basic monster types, like ogres, orcs and gnolls.

The third angle Monster Manual IV takes is themes. There are three clockwork monsters, several new demons, and there are several new kinds of giant spiders. These themed groups of monsters can really help a DM who is looking to add something a little more interesting than the standard stable of monsters he is used to trotting out, without having to resort to golems made from discarded lawn clippings.

These themes are pretty cool. A clockwork steed has enormous potential, and I can only imagine the bizarre laboratory that would be kept clean by clockroaches. The various spider-types, like the inferno spider or the bloodsilk spider, can really punch up an arachnid invasion (and maybe give those new drow something to play with). And the avatars of elemental evil should give players a good long run for their money.

So there are those three great directions taken by Monster Manual IV – well, two great directions and one predictably random – but I've saved the best for last. More than 30 pages of the book are devoted to the coolest new monster sub-type to hit the D&D scene in recent memory – the Spawn of Tiamat.

As many D&D fans will remember, Tiamat is the evil queen of chromatic dragons. In her never-ending battle against Bahamut, the lord of the metallic dragons, Tiamat has taken to tainting dragon eggs to make particularly interesting dragon-like spawn. These colored dragonoids fall all along the power scale, come in several different colors, and have some amazing possibilities.

For instance, a bluespawn ambusher is a scaled blue beast the size of a wild boar, with horns crackling with electricity, that charges from ambush (thus the name). It may be a dumb beast, but the greenspawn sneak more than makes up for it. This green-scaled humanoid scout sneaks past sentries like a little dragonoid assassin. And the hits just keep on coming – from the redspawn arcaniss hurling fire spells to the whitespawn berserker whirling spiked chains, from the bluespawn godslayer chopping his way through every foe to the blackspawn stalker hiding in the trees like a bloated, scaled spider, the Spawn of Tiamat are an incredibly diverse group of really cool monsters.

This last facet of the book makes Monster Manual IV a must-have for nearly any DM. These spawn are so versatile, and there are so many possibilities, that a DM could make an entire campaign based around them. Players might just meet one or two throughout their adventures, but to really utilize these great new monsters, they should crop up regularly, and maybe even replace orcs or gnolls as standard foe fodder.

If Monster Manual IV only included these four aspects – random monsters, developed old favorites, themed monsters and the Spawn – it would be a really good buy. However, a few additions to the book just sort of kick it up a notch, like a full listing of the monsters by CR, breakdowns by type and subtype, and a glossary of monstrous terms. These are helpful and handy, and make the book easier to use.

One other nice addition is the small library of encounter areas and adventure maps. Lost tombs, cave dwellings, forest lairs, and more are all provided in full color, just waiting to be populated and raided by heroes.

Presentation

Monster Manual IV is even more attractive than the original. While the cover may not grab shelf surfers as well as the first one did, the monsters inside are awesome. There's a full-page painting of a gaggle of demons summoning Tiamat that could be blown up and framed. The illustrators have really outdone themselves on a lot of these critters, and the maps are (as probably expected) exceptional. All told, Monster Manual IV is fun to read, even if you're just looking at the pictures.

Observations

I was very surprised to find such a wealth of great content in a monster book, especially one with a title as inauspicious as 'Monster Manual IV.' I mean, what could I hope to find in a fourth book that escaped in the first three? But this book is so much more than a collection of weird monsters all thrown in one place, considerably more useful than any stewpot full of disparate beasties. Sure, you've still got your oddly disconcerting and ultimately silly undead, your extra-planar demon bugs, and your oozes made from blood that's on fire, but there is so much more. The themed groups, focused favorites, and most of all the Spawn of Tiamat make Monster Manual IV a fantastic addition to a creative DM's library.

Style: 5 – The illustrations in this book jump off the pages and make you want to read about the monsters.

Substance: 4 – With the massive cool factor of the Spawn of Tiamat, and the added bonuses of themed monsters and new takes on old favorites, I really wanted to give this book a five for substance. But too many pages are wasted on undead pus balloons and golems made of spare teeth.

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