American Monsters (MM2 Review Part 7)

Are you noticing a theme with these titles? These titles have deep, philosophical and allegorical meanings. You will be quizzed on these titles. Anyway, welcome to another installment of Wyatt’s MM2 reviews.

[11:38pm] Fighter_Ysqueer: the elemental chaos has so much kung fu
[11:38pm] Fighter_Ysqueer: wyatt do you think you will have finished reviewing the MM2 before the MM3 comes out
[11:41pm] Magi_Wyatt: Yes
[11:42pm] Magi_Wyatt: when does the MM3 come out though

With that in mind, let’s begin! By skipping the Genasi.

The Ghost Legionnaire is the only Ghost in the Manual. It’s a really interesting monster in a way, because when many legionnaires are used together, damage to any legionnaire harms them on the whole. Players can also make History checks to gain advantages on the Legionnaires. They have two basic attacks, which, pardon the redundancy, are very basic, and a domination attack that grants surviving players a bonus to their History checks against the ghosts. Overall, this is a great monster, with a lot of flavor despite its very simple attacks.

Giants make an appearance in this manual, of course. First we have the Eldritch Giants, which are large, bald, purple people. The most interesting aspect of these giants is their ability to Consume Magic. This allows them to swallow conjurations and zones from the players, destroying them in order to give themselves a pretty significant buff – an extra three dice to attacks before the end of their next turn. The Eldritch Giants can also create their own Zone that buffs them up, dealing one dice more damage. These guys are sure to give the party’s magic controllers and leaders a headache. Their less tricky attacks do lots of damage to begin with.

Frost Giants are classic. The basic Frost Giant is perhaps too classic, just a straight beater with a stability power. The Frost Giant Iceshaper, meanwhile, is a very entertaining creature to add to a match. It can slide a player 3 squares as an at-will minor action once per round, immobilizes with one of its at-will attacks, can conjure a wall of ice, and can grant its allies resist 10 to all damage. This guy should set the standard for Controller leader monsters in the game. Just a few simple abilities can add a lot to the battle.

Meanwhile the Frost Titan just hilariously kicks people in the face as a minor action every round, knocking PCs on their asses.

Stone Giants make pretty excellent beaters and defenders. The basic giant and the Titan both have an ability to mark with their basic attack, and a power to make opportunity attacks when the marked targets move or shift. Their Stone Bones power allows them to resist damage as an interrupt, at-will, as long as they aren’t bloodied. The Stone Titan is a great example for how to make monsters versatile. It has close and ranged area attacks with a variety of detrimental conditions, and its basic attack can be brutal. The Stone Giant Runecarver, an Iceshaper equivalent, is a lot less interesting than its Frost cousin. All the Stone Giants have an Earthwalk ability listed for movement, but it is not written down anywhere.

WYATT IS SKIPPING SO MUCH CRAP HOW EVER WILL WE COPE

Next up, we’re skipping all the racial rehashes (gnoll, gnome and goblin) and jumping to the Golems. All the Golems you were missing from before are back, and striking action poses. Except for Paper Golems. But I don’t think anyone missed those.

Bone Golems are aptly described as conglomerates of bone that stab people with bones. I could have never figured any of this out without it being explicitly told to me. The Golem’s bone spurs can be used for an attack that damages and dazes two different targets at-will, if both are hit. It can also daze (save ends) in a blast of bones, and make attacks when bloodied and brought down to 0. With its damaging aura and ability to harm creatures which take opportunity attacks against it, the bone golem makes a pretty annoying creature to throw at a Defender.

Chain Golems are…conglomerates of chains that wrap people in chains. Well, at least it’s an honest description. Chain Golems are all about slowing and controlling movement. Their aura slows down enemies, and their basic attack pulls them closer. If attacked while bloodied, it can immediately make another attack. They can make a double attack, just like the bone golem, against different targets,  and grab opponents and slide them around with it freely. This seems like a golem that’s more interesting and easy to use effectively than the Bone golem.

The Clay Golem has the same features as the chain golem, with its berserk attack, double attack and basic attack, but its basic attack prevents creatures from regaining hit points unless they make a saving throw, and it can roll initiative twice using the higher result, as well as having a move action encounter power to barrel through enemies reducing their opportunity attack damage. Now this Golem can really put a hurt on parties. Healing is one of the most important aspects of the game, and the reason that PCs can stay tip-top throughout any conflict. The Clay Golem’s disruption of key figures in the party that require healing often (such as squishies, or defenders that are drawing a lot of attention) can put a serious dent on the player’s plans.

Iron Golems retain their poisonous breath, used prominently throughout the creature’s stat block. First it has a poisonous aura while bloodied that damages creatures. The golem also has not one but two different breath weapon abilities, one of which triggers when bloodied and then again when defeated. It can mark enemies until they save, double attack, and daze creatures that attempt to escape it while marked, at-will as interrupt. A powerful and varied creature. But not to be outdone, it also has a variation! The Juggernaut is basically the same as the Iron Golem but deals much more damage and has a larger size.

Next up is our old pal the Grey Render, now at the upper paragon tier. The most interesting thing about this guy is his Body Sweep, where a creature grabbed by its Claw attack is used as a weapon. It smashes the grabbed creature into another, pushing the second 4 squares, damaging it, and dealing half that much damage to the grabbed creature. Hilarious. I know I’d like to use this guy someday.

There’s a whole lot of half-eves and all of them seem to look vaguely Asian.

Hawks are present, adding some cute feathery fiends to the monster manual. The Blood Hawk is a level 1 critter that flies around scratching your face, while the Frost Hawk deals some nice extra damage against slowed creatures (1d6+5 + 3d6 cold) and has an at-will freezing blast that slows creatures until they save. I think if you pair a few of these Frost Hawks with a low level creature that slows, you can have a deadly encounter on your hands, as they Flyby Attack around for 4d6+5 every round!

Owl Swarm – look for it in MM3

We return to our regularly scheduled programming with Homunculus. The Stonefist Defender is a robot made of cans with a dwarf’s face, and he defends things with his Stonefist. The Arbalester is a very angry crossbow. His very leer can make your left thigh hurt mildly. Both of these creatures have a special rule that lets them guard an area, and is used by certain powers of theirs. Both are low level and fairly uninteresting, with the guarded area thing being a simple buff, and the rest being basic attacks.

If Human Gladiators are level 14 elite soldiers, and Human Dire Beast Hunters are level 9 artillery, both unaligned, both seemingly rather easy to get to work for money, why don’t they get more of these guys to clear up all those messy problems with goblins? I guess because the level 22 assassins are running a protection racket on the goblins or something, or the nobles are all level 23 and nuttier than a snickers factory.

The Hydras are all massive blobs of hit points and basic attacks. The Razor Hydra’s bite deals ongoing damage that stacks with itself, and it grows more heads, and it bites things a lot. A Heroslayer Hydra is even more boring than that as its basic attack does nothing but damage and its redeeming value is annoying Defenders. The Chaos Hydra, on the other hand, is actually amusing. It has two elemental bites, and when it gains new heads, each head has a new attack, which is rolled for randomly. It’s more complex than rolling the same attack over and over again, but do I even have to finish this sentence for you to understand?

Kenku are crow people who mimic voices and stab you, then loot your corpse. All Kenku can mimic sounds and voices, which is a form of bluffing you may be able to get creative with, and all the monster Kenku can Flock, getting a +3 bonus for Flanking instead of +2. Most of the Kenku are just a bunch of weapon attacks with a smattering of shifting, low-end status conditions, and combat advantage bonus damage. In short, not very exciting to read about.

Pretty much any D&D player who’s been at it for a bit knows what a Krenshar is. They’re basically hyenas with faces that peel back. Yeah, I don’t know either. Krenshar have the ability to give penalties to creatures saving throws against fear effects, because looking at that horrifying peeled-back hyena face would make anyone devolve into gibbering. All Krenshars have the ability to use “Unnerving Skull” which gives attack roll penalties in a burst, that can be ended with a saving throw. This is a fear effect. The Blood Slayer Krenshar’s trick is grabbing creatures and then using a Bite that requires no attack roll, it always hits. The basic Krenshar can roar to daze things. Krenshar are pretty silly, and we end on that note.

Next time, we’ll start off with…