Let's Play Pokemon Legends Z-A, Part 44: The Dark Nightmare of Lumiose City

After the Heatran mission, we get a short discussion with the rest of Team MZ. Ansha and Lida suffered from the same nightmare dreams of a voice telling them to go away, and Korrina speculates that this is because Hyperspace is merging with Lumiose, affecting everyone's dreams. Korrina briefly has the mad idea of just letting Hyperspace Lumiose swallow up regular Lumiose just to find Ansha's legendary Pokemon, but the rest of the team shut her 'joke' down. 

Corbeau summons us to the Rust Syndicate office, but going into the office instead teleports the entire Team MZ into Hypesrpace Lumiose. Hoopa didn't even open the portal or anything. Rather randomly (and in a far better comedic timing than the mainline story) Jacinthe has infiltrated the group and asks what's going on. Apparently, everyone important was teleported to Hyperspace Lumiose. The game lets me run around a bit to look for where Corbeau has landed, with the clue of 'a place surrounded by walls', but every named NPC is scattered around this large map. I didn't bother to go around to talk to absolutely everybody, but we've got the usual suspects and even the more passive NPCs like Mable and Emma, and even the named Infinite Z-A contestants like Zach, Yvon and Xavi. 

We find Corbeau, Vinnie and Phillippe in the arena where the Mega Starmie fight happened, and we get a lot of discussion about how this is basically the result of the hyperspace distortion getting worse. Not only are Pokemon coming from Hyperspace to the real world, but people are being dragged from the real Lumiose into Hyperspace. Potential world-ending threat, oh no!

And just like that, very abruptly, we're teleported back to Corbeau's office. Rather hilariously, Corbeau ends up standing on his own desk, something that the game doesn't acknowledge but I do find funny. After a lot of recap about what's going on and the potential threat (this bit, by the way, was very repetitive) Corbeau shares that they discovered that Hyperspace Lumiose is being maintained by just a single Pokemon... but one that was exposed from sheer undiluted mega power when Ange went on its rampage. This is going to lead to a massive Rogue Mega Evolution. 

Ansha briefly gets a moment where she laments potentially losing the chance to catch the 'fine legendary Pokemon' that she has been after, but brushes it off very quickly, since her dream isn't worth the sufefring of everyone else in Lumiose. Corbeau praises her maturity, but also notes that even if we solve the Rogue Mega Evolution, pockets of Hyperspace will still remain for quite a while (i.e. as long as we play the game). 

The solution to reach the massive portal is to make an even better donut to power up Hoopa, and apparently this leads my character to suggest that we nede to feed Mega Evolution power to the donut. This will unlock Mega Evolution -- or power equivalent to Mega Evolution -- on Hoopa. I... yeah. Okay. Everyone likes it, and Corbeau, with a super-serious zoom-in to his face, declares that this is Operation Mega Donut. Okay. Fine. 

Unfortunately, this leads to like a massive 40K or something grind for points. It took me a while to get it, because I keep running out of berries and having to dive to low-level rifts to get more berries. Sigh. 

Anyway, skipping through all the grinding, Corbeau arrives in Hotel Z, takes a look at the adorable donut stand, and asks Ansha if she is interested in a little financial backing "to turn your solo stand into a global donut empire". Lida is a bit angry, but Corbeau defensively says that he has a nose for business opportunities. Phillippe notes that it's a bit hard for others to know when Corbeau is joking, to which Corbeau replies... "who says I am?"

Apparently, the research they did is that I need to make a donut with 310 points in sweet and sour, 100 spicy, and 40 bitter and fresh. Oh, and I have to put in some plot device Rust Syndicate spice called Epice Noire. It's all just so random and shoehorned in just so that we have another long collection quest to do. I was fortunate enough to have the berries at this point to make the epic donut called Bad Dreams Cruller, or whatever, but it is just a bit silly that neither works with the dreams theme of Darkrai, nor the more sci-fi bent of Hyperspace distortions. This is compounded with the fact that... well, these nonsense requirements is just a way to force people to grind even more after a bout of grinding, yeah? Wow, this DLC is horrible with the grinding. 

Anyway, we gather in front of Prism Tower and we get a rather generic (even by Pokemon standards) roll call about being ready to save people and stuff. Corbeau and Phillippe take over the duty of gathering everyone around Prism Tower, and there's a bit where holo-Jacinthe starts appearing and nosing her business into everyone and being her whiny self about not being allowed to lead the mission, but Corbeau quickly gives her an answer she's satisfied with by saying something about letting a trainer of her caliber being freed from managing logistics. 

There are some short bits of dialogue as the characters gather -- Gwynn hanging out with Canari and Tarragon, causing Ivor to run around yelling for her; Jacinthe bothering Grisham and Griselle; a short bit of Jacinthe praising Lebanne; Naveen and Taunie arguing about curry. Oh, and Emma actually shows up for this finale, having missed the main story one. 

Korrina, Taunie, Ansha and myself stand on the top of Prism Tower, perched on the edge... it's quite dangerous, particularly with the kid, no? And Operation Mega Donut begins, and... man, it's a bit silly to have everyone just tap their Key Stones and have the light of the power of friendship fly up to the donut, yeah? At least have them mega evolve their partner Pokemon? It's not going to be something new, but at least it would make more sense with the 'power of mega evolution' and everything. Sigh. Anyway, the power flows to the donut, which Hoopa eats. She flies up and briefly the image of Hoopa Unbound appears behind her, and she stabilizies the gigantic rift, allowing us to go through...

The location that we end up in is an island. Specifically, New Moon Island from Generation IV, where the Darkrai event would take place in the few regions that had the Wi-Fi event happen. The environment is honestly nothing special, even if it is a novelty in this game. 

Korrina stops us halfway through and finally deduces that the Pokemon we're facing is Darkrai. Which is, again, very anticlimactic considering that most experienced audiences would already know; while newer ones wouldn't have any idea what Darkrai is. No foreshadowing whatsoever, and if you're going to not really explain and name-drop it, might as well as just have Darkrai's actual physical appearance be the introduction. 

After explainins Darkrai's powers, Korrina gets a bit angry at this perversion of Mega Evolution, which is supposed to be a wondrous thing that's the ultimate bond between a partnership... but it's tormenting poor Darkrai now. 

However, halfway towards the boss arena is a familliar figure... it's AZ and Floette. Or rather, an echo of AZ and Floette, which Taunie quickly points out. It's 'just a dream, but then life is a dream'. This echo of AZ ends up basically allowing Taunie and Korrina to say goodbye to AZ in a way, which is a bit of a cheap way to do it... but this sequence with AZ and the music behind it was way more emotional than anything in the entirety of this DLC, so I'm going to let the contrived coincidence slide. Taunie is quite upset that AZ has passed away without giving her the chance to say goodbye while thyey were dealing with the tower. 

AZ thanks Taunie and Korrina, and praises them both for their growths. Taunie is a lot more emotional, but Korrina's a lot more... well, she takes it a lot better. AZ notes that he had wished to welcome Korrina properly to Lumiose, but life has a way of laughing at all the best-laid plans in the world. This ghostly AZ finally ends his little meeting by thanking me. Our time together, short as it is, was precious. "After wandering in the dark for as long as I have, your words are almost blindingly bright". AZ then gives us some words of encouragement, before he disappears. Taunie urges us to go. 

And we enter a grotto, with the circular image of the real Lumiose City hanging overhead like a full moon. 

As Darkrai's voices continue to speak, we get a cutsecne! We see the 'moon' in the background, we get some blurring and Darkrai is standing there. Yes, standing. Darkrai's got feet, most famously shown in his feature movie, but it really does look quite creeepy being long, extended and looking like someone stretched a shadow from the ground. Darkrai retracts his legs and flies in front of the camera, eyes glowing, and we get the Darkrai boss fight!

Darkrai is at level 200, but the Epice Noire donut actually sets my party to almost be around that level so this is a point where the game is actually properly optimized for a fair fight and I don't have to wonder if I fed Hoopa the right size donut or not. I brought in a team somewhat equipped to fight Darkrai... okay, it's mostly just Hawlucha, Meganium, Diancie and maybe Mewtwo that I'm relying on. But I find it hilarious that for the most part of this initial battle, I relied on a mega-evolved luchador bird to suplex this nightmare ghost.

Darkrai's special attacks are his signature Dark Void, which puts me to sleep and I don't know if this is unique to the raid battle, but it also damages my boys continually while they are drowsy. 

The fight against regular Darkrai is, to be frank, not the hardest. But then he flies up and mega evolves, and... what is this? Mega Darkrai is just a big blob. It first appears as a big oval with tentacle hands, a tentacle 'tail', and a mass of trailing tentacles on its rear side. Its front side has bright pink markings resembling an eyeball. What the hell? ... and then the eyeball markings blorp together like a creepy flower and Darkrai's regular head, albeit with stringier hair, pops out like a flower or something. Okay? 

Not much I can say about this raid battle. Dark Void is still threatening, but the most annoying attack is Future Fight, which rains down psychic meteors around a location. Oh, and it summons clones a couple of times. At this point it's just doging, spamming plus moves, and just whittling Mega Darkrai's health down until it gives up the ghost (heh) and I catch him in a Dusk Ball. Success! 

Taunie, Korrina and Corbeau all congratulate me on a job well done, and with that we return to the real Lumiose, having dispersed the massive hyperspace hole. Korrina speculates that Darkrai was hiding on top of Prism Tower to avoid everyone else in the city, since the tower was closed off for redevelopment. But this also made Darkrai right there to be exposed to Ange's mega energy when it went supernova, causing Darkrai's powers to go wild. They then conclude that Darkrai was just out of control and not actively malicious, something that I think all previous dialogue have already made quite clear... but okay. 

There's then discussion about Ansha's goal, which we'll follow up with next. Ansha then reiterates how happy she is to be part of Team MZ, we do a group fist bump, and credits roll. The credits features a lot more secnes that are just reused from the gameplay, but it ends with a childish drwaing of Team MZ (with me being drawn with the default starter green jacket), Ansha and Hoopa in front of Prism Tower. 

After credits roll, there's a bit where Team MZ gathers in the sofas, discussing Ansha's request again and formalizing Ansha's requests. They then lampshade the fact that Corbeau will call, and we walk up to his office before he has the opportunity to call us. Corbeau tells us that they detected strong radiation in two locations, a distinctive pair of brightly hued hyperspace distortions... called the Ruby Distortion and Sapphire Distortion. Of... of course.

Learning of Ansha's quest for Rayquaza, Corbeau then recalls his mentor, a gentleman from Kanto that is a boss of an organization. Giovanni? Corbeau is a student of Giovanni? No wonder he's got style. Corbeau learned about Johto and Hoenn legendaries from Giovanni, and Lida helps to collaborate some of the Hoenn backstories. It's a nice (if random) revelation that Lida is from Hoenn, and we get a retelling of the Groudon/Kyogre fight, and how they were calmed down by Rayquaza... I think anyone reading these Pokemon let's play blogs would be familiar with the plot of the Generation III games, right? 

Anyway, I would be excited if Corbeau didn't jump straight into telling me that I need to get ready for another grind. Why. Why can't this just be a regular side-quest, why??? 

As you probably can tell, I do enjoy, for the most part, the story of Mega Dimensions as much as I do think Ansha is a bit of a flat character. But damn, the padding via grinding is driving me insane. 

Random Notes:

• The game is really ambiguous and flip-floppy whether the NPCs we meet in Hyperspace are really people from the real world dragged into Lumiose, or if they are copies created in Hyperspace. Some quests (like the Naveen-vs-Canari one) implies the latter; this main quests implies everyone we meet in that sequence are the real people; the hyperspace battle zones are definitely 'fake' people... but some of the sidequests are a bit ambiguous. 
  
• Zach, Le Eternel Z: "Wow! I managed to reach a place that's not on the map! I must be an amazing driver!"
• Mable: "If I knew that this place was safe, I'd love to do some research... but I do value my own life." Gee, thanks, Mable, for that vote of confidence on the safety of these interdimensional planes. 
• Grisham: "I suppose we'd better prepare, too." Griselle: "We ARE prepared!" Griselle just has an expression that screams 'I'm done' when Jacinthe pulls off her nonsense antics, and, sister, same.
• Ansha's childish crayon drawings does bypass the need to make two versions of the drawing for male protag/Taunie and female protag/Urbain. Everyone looks like a stick figure! 
• Corbeau and Lida seem to confirm that at least for Rayquaza, there's only THE Rayquaza, the one from the Hoenn region. Nice, we're going back to at least some legendaries being special and only existing as a singular species throughout the various games. 

One Piece 1177 Review: Did I Miss A Chapter

One Piece, Chapter 1177: Fury

Mmm, not the biggest fan of this one, I'm afraid. On paper, the events that happened here should be hype and cool and all, but I just wasn't feeling it -- it really felt like there was a chapter, or at least half a chapter, that was missing. And that does fairly ruin the moment, I would say, that would otherwise be an Elbaf arc showstopper. 

Yes, sure, 'the anime will fix it'... but I'm not reviewing the anime here, just the chapter. 

The first half of the chapter is a nice continuation of the previous chapter (and I still have the same opinions about the Dorry/Brogy Domi Reversi-reversal plot twist) but with Zoro and the four allied giants going on full-ham. There is something nicely cool at seeing a barrage of moves like Gungir, Ikoku and Zoro even gets a particularly nasty 'slice a head like a pie' attack called Red Ogre: Mega Rage. Some nice little moments like Colon and the other young giant children being excited at seeing the Giant Warriors fight and everything. 

On the opposite end, Kashi is being menaced by a couple more evil giants, and he's unable to bring himself to fight them. Gaban is apparently still weakened, so it is left to little Tony Tony Chopper to handle it...  and Chopper goes to Monster Point and slaps one of the giants. It isn't even a powerful slap -- neither the art nor the giant seems to be particularly indicating that it's super strong, and it's not even a named attack from Chopper. I don't think it's part of the Othello/Reversi game either, since Chopper is clumped together with Kashi and Gaban. But the slap seems to exorcise a little demon-imp spirit out of the giant, and he gets spun around the Domi Reversi thing. 

It's a bit weird, and I am a bit curious about this, but not as much as I would've sacrificed other scenes over it. 

Jinbe, Franky and Sanji have cut up Killingham into different bits -- reminding me of how they dealt with Buggy in the East Blue (and the live-action) -- and we get some boasting from the Straw Hats about how they are a Yonko crew now. Killingham, in his sorry state, keeps ranting about how they shouldn't underestimate the God's Knights while Franky doesn't seem to be terribly impressed by these fools. Which is a sentiment that I personally do have as well. 

Luffy and Loki show up, and Luffy gets all excited about his new big dragon pal... and Nami goes ballistic and angry at Luffy for causing so much devastation in his wake. We get a hilarious scene of Ragnir patting Luffy with a ._. facial expression in his Gear Fifth form, before Luffy and Loki start yelling at each other over this. It's a bit silly, although we do get Loki unleashing a lightning blast at Luffy which Luffy just tanks no problem. 

But then we cut away to Branch 8. This is where Brook was fighting Gunko. And I don't mind off-screening that fight, as much as I love Brook. We saw the connective tissue and buildup. We saw Brook clashing against Imu-Gunko, and there's enough hints here to build up a potential backstory reveal later on. It doesn't have to be in Elbaf. So the Brook stuff, I don't mind. 

The problem is that USOPP is there. He's somehow, between 1176 and 1177, teleported across branches, and fought Imu-Gunko enough to be wounded. What? Excuse me? I actually re-read the last five chapters just to see if I'm missing something, if I missed Usopp going "I'm worried, let me go and look where Brook is" or "I'm going off to do something" or whatever. No. Usopp is just there commenting and yelling with the rest of Nami's group. I really wouldn't have complained if we had one or two lines of Usopp realizing something was wrong. With or without Haki, with or without a huge 'Usopp mans up when fighting Chu in East Blue' moment. No. Just some connective tissue. 

And that's even something you could've done in this chapter, too. Take out one of the random panels of evil giants and replace it with Usopp arriving on the Imu/Brook fight. 

But no. Usopp is just on the ground. And he finally gives his speech about the warrior's pride of Elbaf, about the humiliation that Imu has done on it, about how she should've used proper warriors to fight warriors, about how Imu should have fought them head-on. Imu manhandles Brook with some Jedi powers, and then also causes Usopp's skull-bomb grass to explode point-blank front of him. The two of them are taken out. And I'm going to rush through this a bit, but Luffy and Loki arrive in the last two-page spread and Luffy gets angry at seeing his two teammates brutalized as such. 

And... I don't really like this. On paper, Usopp's speech is good. Usopp's speech is great. But there's just no buildup. He was fanboying without much substance before this, in every single one of his scenes. To have the leap of off-screen going through all the emotions to get to this point in time? We don't even need like a full chapter of angsty crying. Even a couple of panels showing Usopp arriving, realizing what it means for the giants to be conquered by someone like Imu, and running into combat would've been much more palatable than what we got here. Instead, we get yet another two-page spread with Loki when the sheer scale isn't really that necessary to display. 

Comparing this to some of Usopp's best moments -- when he realizes that he should stand up and not rely on lies when fighting Chu. His fight with Luffy in Water Seven. Him going through lots of excuses before apologizing at the end of Water Seven. When he mans up and tries to fight Sugar even without memories of his friends. Even Stampede, a usually-panned movie, has a much, much better buildup for Usopp being this dude with plant bullets fighting against Haki-monster Bullet, being manhandled by Bullet, but proving that he's useful after all. 

This doesn't have that buildup. Usopp did nothing in this arc before this but be the peanuts gallery, and it really rang hollow as a result. I really feel like we're missing just a couple of scenes. Maybe Usopp talking with one of the giant children. Maybe Usopp talking to Saul. To Dorry and Brogy. A discussion about warrior's pride. Even a repeat of him knowing he's helpless and weak against someone like Imu (or even the God's Knights) but still manning up and fighting alongside them would have been something. I wasn't the most invested in the 'Usopp becomes a True Warrior of the Sea in Elbaf' storyline, but I felt like it was sorely mishandled here. 

Yeah. I don't know... I really don't care about the Domi Reversi mystery at this point in time now. I guess we're going to a Luffy/Loki/Imu fight which is kind of cool, but it really does feel like we're just barreling to another not-so-satisfying conclusion again.

Random Notes:

• A bunch of the background Giant Warriors get given names like DDT, Rhodes and a bunch of other wrestling-move names. Neat. 
• While we've seen most of the other giant named attacks, Stansen shows off a new move called Drunken Hammer. His hammer is a barrel of ale!
• Dorry also gets stabbed through his arm in this chapter. I think Oda's just trying to give the two giants symmetrical wounds so they are on equal footing, but there's such a thing as too much symmetry. 

Reviewing 5E D&D Monsters - 5E Adventure Modules, Pt 1

A lot of my older 5th Edition 'adventure module review' has been quite... messy. And with me recently re-mastering and rewriting much of my 5E D&D content, I have also decided to do the same treatment to the adventures. Some of the statblocks of the monsters introduced in these adventures do make it into more bestiary-oriented sourcebooks (like the 'Guard Drake' entry, for example), but a lot of them involve NPCs, named final villains, or very setting-specific characters like members of a cult specific to that adventure or setting. And when I did these reviews the first time around, I tried to go through everything. Including trying to give a synopsis of the modules, which is a bit foolish considering the nature of D&D adventures. 

That got exhausting really quickly, and I end up rambling just to pad out content and be exhaustive. At some point I ended up dreading doing the adventure modules, or trying to go through the logistics of trying to figure out how many monsters are contained within each adventure and how many would fit in an article. 

And in this revision? I decided to go through a couple of rules to make this process more enjoyable for me as a writer, and hopefully for you guys reading the ramblings I do about fictional fantasy monsters. I'll only talk about monsters I have something to talk about (no animals, no NPCs, no slightly-modified variant), I won't cover any named villains (no Tiamat, no Strahd, no Imix, no Demogorgon...) and I won't necessarily be going in proper chronological order of release.

To that end, I've picked the format of listing the origin adventure of the monster beneath the chunk of monster details I like to talk about. I think this is a nice compromise to give context to these monsters, without me having to spend entire paragraphs summarizing adventures that I might not be particularly interested in.

Anyway, this current batch combines almost all of the adventure modules from 2014 to 2018, with the exception of Tomb of Annihilation. For those that care, I originally reviewed these entries in the blog in two and a half articles (with the Waterdeep books originally mashed with the Eberron sourcebook). 

• Click here for the previous part.
• Click here for the next part.
• Click here for the index.

[Tyranny of Dragons, The Rise of Tiamat, Lost Mine of Phandelver, Princes of the Apocalypse, Out of the Abyss originally reviewed in July 2020; Curse of Strahd, Storm King's Thunder, Tales from the Yawning Portal originally reviewed in September 2020; Waterdeep: Dragon Heist, Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage originally reviewed in December 2020; Revised in April 2026]

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Ambush Drake

• Medium Dragon; Unaligned; CR 1/2
  
• Debut: Hoard of the Dragon Queen / Tyranny of Dragons (2014)

The first two adventure modules are the two-parter of Hoard of the Dragon Queen and Tyranny of Dragons, and being the first-ever 5th Edition adventure meant that they had the entire Monster Manual to draw from and create monsters out of. Which makes sense, monsters from the bestiaries become more notable as they get bigger roles in stories. But in those adventures, we also get a bunch of unique statblocks. Two of them are Drakes -- the Guard Drake and the Ambush Drake. The Guard Drake would graduate to a bigger bestiary in Volo's Guide to Monsters, leaving its cousin the Ambush Drake behind. 

Presumably, the two Drakes have a similar origin story since the Ambush Drake visually resembles the Guard Drake, only using a Green Dragon's features instead of a Blue Dragon. Four-legged, wingless and more bestial, and with the context that they are utilized by the Dragon Cult of Tiamat, they are also likely to be created by the same ritual that made the Guard Drakes. 

The Ambush Drake is a much weaker version of the Guard Drake, but has bonuses to the damage dealt if it manages to surprise its prey in, you guessed it, the ambush. They also have the 'pack tactics' ability that is normally assigned to weaker pack hunters like wolves.

Drakes in Dungeons & Dragons were perhaps the most prolific in 3rd and 4th Edition, with the monster manual and bestiary teams really going ham in creating as many variations of these lesser non-sentient dragons as possible, with the Drakes often also taking the ecological niche of creatures like dinosaurs in their respective settings. While I appreciate the effect, having so many lesser dragons does cheapen the oomph when an actual dragon shows up, something that 5th Edition seems to take to heart as they scale back the non-true dragons by quite a bit.

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Ixitxachitl

• Small Aberration; Chaotic Evil; CR 1/4 (regular)
  
• Medium Aberration; Chaotic Evil; CR 4 (Vampiric Ixitxachitl)
• Debut: Out of the Abyss (2015)

And with that, we jump straight into the next two-parter adventure module, Princes of the Apocalypse and Out of the Abyss. They involved elemental planes, elemental cults and Underdark shenanigans, and some of the monsters here like the Derro would be represented in Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes. But not the lxitxachitl! (Pronounced ick-zit-zah-chit-ul). The lxitxachitl is a little weirdo that debuted all the way in the 1st Edition's Monster Manual, and that does really highlight just how some monsters from that book become staples in the genre like the Gelatinous Cube or Beholder... while others like the lxitxachitl make me go 'really? It debuted in the first book?'

lxitxachitl, or Demon Rays, are aberrations that resemble monstrous manta rays. Older editions just drew a regular manta ray with mean evil eyes, with 3rd Edition giving us a nice, tropical-themed lxitxachitl. 4E and 5E went for all sharp, jagged edges, a pair of mandible-like protrusions, and a shark-like mouth. It does look a fair bit more demonic, particularly with all the textures. The text for the 5E version still describes it as having little 'claws' at the end of their fins, although the 5E artwork moves them to be on either side of the mouth. It really is a nice piece of monster artwork, and I do think that the main reason the lxitxachitl isn't represented more is that they kind of fight over the Cloaker over the design space of being a manta ray monster. 

lxitxachitl make use of their similarities to common manta rays to fool other humanoids, hiding the fact that they are actually cunning and highly intelligent. They inhabit bodies of water both freshwater and salt. They hollow out coral reefs and aquatic rocks to create labyrinthine dens, stripping an area bare of resources before moving on. They often come into conflict with other aquatic creatures, and have a culture surrounding survival. Most lxitxachitl are actually classified as 'small', being noted to be the size of a hand, which isn't what you'd expect from looking at that artwork. 3E's artwork actually has one of these baby lxitxachitls latching on to its parent rather adorably. 

Elder lxitxachitl will gain the power of regeneration and the ability to drain life from others, which is represented by the 'Vampiric lxitxachitl' stat block, giving them just those two abilities. From how the lore is represented, though, they're not actually vampires, they just have vampire-esque abilities. Yet others revere the demon prince Demogorgon, and act as lxitxachitl Clerics able to channel clerical spells. 

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Mongrelfolk

• Medium Humanoid; Any Alignment; CR 1/4
  
• Debut: Curse of Strahd (2016)

We then go from those adventures to perhaps one of the most famous 5th Edition modules, the gothic horror story revolving around a vampire lord, Curse of Strahd. Highly beloved by the fandom, Curse of Strahd also comes with a bestiary detailing several of the beings that reside in Barovia, and some variations of existing creatures like Animated Objects and Blights (with the Tree Blight graduating to the 2024 Monster Manual). 

One of the creatures introduced to 5E in Curse of Strahd is the Mongrelfolk, whose concept isn't the most immediately clear from their more modern art. I think the Mongrelfolk's original 2E artwork with its more cartoonish colouring demonstrates this the best, showcasing that the Mongrelfolk are a patchwork creature that have features taken from many different humanoids and beasts. They are a nice shout-out to classic sci-fi horror book The Island of Doctor Moreau.

Mongrelfolk are humanoids who underwent horrific, magical transformations, being patched together with features of various beasts. The artwork for 5E only shows an individual with a dog-ish face and a single duck leg, but the prose goes into detail on how any combination of features could be possible, specifically detailing the 1E artwork in the process ('body shape of a dwarf, a head that combines cat and lizard, one arm ending in a crab pincer, one leg with a horse hoof). 

The 5E statblock gives us a little table of features that the DM can roll for the Mongrelfolk, although I feel they are far more interesting by combining two or three features. Darkvision or keen hearing alone isn't particularly interesting on their own, after all. The Mongrelfolk all also have the ability to mimic sounds, because despite their misshapen vocal cords, they are very much able to mimic the noises of animals and humanoids, at least enough to draw enemies into a trap. 

It is noted that Mongrelfolk unfortunately face a lot of prejudice from other humanoids, and often find themselves abused, shunned or even enslaved. This leads the Mongrelfolk to be skittish and suspicious of regular humanoids, hiding in ruins and the fringes of civilization. The individuals that interact with the greater world often hide their more monstrous parts under cloaks or plant-based accessories, to masquerade as more regular, more acceptable humanoids. 

There are also rules about Mongrelfolk offspring, where those that are turned into a Mongrelfolk could be returned to their original form; while Mongrelfolk that reproduce with regular humanoids will create a 'true' Mongrelfolk that can't be 'undone' since they are born that way. But honestly, from the way they have been described, it really does seem like the Mongrelfolk would be happy to keep to themselves! Leave the nice patchwork people alone, it's not their fault that you think they are monstrous! I haven't read through all of Curse of Strahd, but the story does portray the Mongrelfolk as sympathetic, tragic victims of the villains. 

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Phantom Warrior

• Medium Undead; Any Alignment; CR 3
  
• Debut: Curse of Strahd (2016)

"Phantom" as a common name for a D&D undead never really stuck around, despite the many Specters, Wraiths, Ghosts, Geists, Banshees and many other incorporeal undead that have shown up in the franchise's history. The only 'Phantom' I've really been able to find that properly fits the original meaning of the term is from 2E's Monstrous Manual, where the Phantom is characterized as an echo left behind after a particularly strong death trauma, being more of an echo or an image instead of a properly independent undead. In 5E terms, the Phantom would be a less-malicious Spectre bound to a single location and repeating either the dead person's death throes, or trying to communicate some unfinished business. 

Curse of Strahd's Phantom Warrior is the remnant of a knight who died performing his sworn duty, and still remains after death. Unlike Ghosts, Phantom Warriors are not bound to complete some unresolved goal, lingering willingly out of loyalty and duty. Notably, Phantom Warriors can 'choose to end its undead existence at any time', and usually they will do so out of understanding that their duties are completed. 

Phantom Warriors are noted to be able to remember their alignment, their personality, and how they die, but no more than a couple of weeks, upon which everything becomes hazy. In combat, they fight like how they were while alive, but with an additional forcefield that protects them from physical attacks, as well as the ability to phase through objects. 

There is honestly a fair amount of overlap between the 5E Phantom and many of the other 5th Edition 'ghostly' undead, and they are essentially less-angry versions of the more popular 'Sword Wraith' monster introduced in Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes. I do like the idea of a ghost that stays behind out of duty and its own desire, but I also feel like there's perhaps a bit too heavy of a glut of ghostly enemies to make the Phantom actually stand out.  

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Wereraven

• Medium Humanoid (Shapechanger); Lawful Good; CR 2
  
• Debut: Curse of Strahd (2016)

The Wereraven is another type of lycanthrope introduced in Curse of Strahd, debuting in the original 2E Monstrous Manual and proving so popular in 5th Edition that the Wereraven statblock has reappeared in Candlekeep Mysteries and Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft, receiving pretty cool artwork. One artwork shows a more raggedy wereraven, with beady eyes and a hunched-over pose as they collect trinkets, while the other Wereraven is dressed in nicer robes with a crossbow, and a more heroic build in general. Ever since 2E, Wereravens were always characterized as being more heroic and well-put-together than most other lycanthropes. 

Of course the gothic-horror inspired adventure will have lycanthropes, and a segment of Curse of Strahd does deal with Werewolves, but ravens are equally gothic! Hence, Wereravens. The Wereravens introduced in Curse of Strahd are part of a secret society called the Keepers of the Feather, and their characterization is just that -- Wereravens are highly cautious, trust one another, but distrust everyone else. In the land of Barovia, it's probably just good survival instincts. They tend to blend into society and obey the law, keeping out of everyone's sights. 

Instead of a 'murder' of crows, Wereravens call their little groups 'Kindnesses', and tend to utilize regular ravens and hide among them. Like real ravens, they collect shiny trinkets and baubles. Unlike real ravens, they give them away to charity. There really is a sense of the Wereraven society being a more good-aligned parallel with their fellow raven-inspired humanoid race, the Kenku, being a group of secret society philanthropists instead of a crime syndicate.

Not much to say here that I haven't really spoken of in the Lycanthropes, other than appreciating the art of cool raven-people. I like my ravens. 

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Tressym

• Tiny Monstrosity; Any Alignment; CR 0
  
• Debut: Storm King's Thunder (2016)

Give a player and excuse to access a cute and unique familiar, and I guarantee you, just like a Pokemon player, they will pounce on it. Our next book is Storm King's Thunder, featuring a giant-themed adventure and 5th Edition's inordinate love towards giantkin. A bunch of new statblocks for random animals are in this book, but most relevant and popular is the little mascot, the Tressym. 

A Tressym is just a cat with wings. That's it. That's the simplicity of it. It's a cute kitty with wings, except that they are inordinately smart for a cat, and have the additional ability to detect invisibility and sense poison. A good kitty! I'm not a cat person myself, but I must admit that a Tressym familiar would be adorable, and I've played in a campaign with a player that had one of these. It's just so much more interesting and immersive to have a slightly weirder D&D creature!

Rather cutely, Tressym peacefully ignore other flying creatures that aren't malicious like faerie dragons or bats, and even while hunting for food they explicitly steer clear of 'nestlings' and eggs. So they're like, ethical hunters. Tressym are particularly vicious towards evil flying monsters like stirges and manticores. I am sorry, little Tressym, Manticores are the size of dire lions and you are just a cute little adorable widdle kitty tat. Although I suppose that behaviour tracks with real-world cats, I suppose. 

Tressyms usually mate with others of their kind, but like real cats, don't mate for life. They can also mate with normal cats, but only one out of ten children will have wings. Lastly, an adorable detail is that Tressyms have a long memory... but not necessarily the context to understand what it's seeing. It might see its wizard be hurt by a wand that shoots lightning, and will try and protect the silly human by all wooden sticks. I am sorry, that is adorable.

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Yakfolk

• Large Monstrosity; Neutral Evil; CR 3 (Warrior), 4 (Priest)
  
• Debut: Storm King's Thunder (2016)

Huh. Debuting all the way back in Al-Qadim are the Yakfolk, or Yikaria ('the Lucky Chosen') in their own language. The Yakfolk are essentially civilized minotaurs, wearing clothes and dressing in a quasi-Tibetan-coded garb. Hiding in secluded mountain settlements and desert oases, they definitely do have that vibe going on about them. But where you think that the Yakfolk sounds like a peaceful species name, they are actually a people that thrives on slavery. Yep, one of these. 

Other civilizations treat the Yakfolk as a race of 'bogeyman', but in this case their reputation is actually warranted. In their idyllic, paradise-like remote hideouts, the Yakfolk practice an outwardly enlightened and peaceful culture... but are actually evil overlords. It is quite interesting of a societal kind of 'gotcha', because when outsiders stumble into one of their hidden locations, the Yakfolk will foster the image of a secret utopia, actually playing on the tropes and the kindly and grumpy face of the yak  to get their new victims to lower their guards. Once they do, the Yakfolk will disarm and enslave them. That's mean! I would find it funnier if the Yakfolk isn't so heavily coded based on a real-life culture!

When they are not pretending to be nice to get new slaves, Yakfolk have an intense drive for learning. Anything they can't gain or use, they will destroy. And what do they learn? Why, powerful dark knowledge to corrupt and dominate others, of course. Yakfolk culture is a malignant theocracy in service to a nameless deity called the Forgotten God, and at least in this campaign, the Yakfolk do sacrifices based on the four elements -- immolation, live burial, drowning or throwing the victim off a mountain to represent fire, earth, water and air respectively. A neat bit of culture (and a nod to older editions) is that Yakfolk used to be able to command the Dao after some cosmic deal, but that sentence has apparently expired due to the timeskip between 3E and 4E.

What about abilities, then? The Yakfolk aren't just powerful yak-people. The book gives us statblocks for the Yakfolk Warrior and the Yakfolk Priest, the latter having a mass of cleric spells, but all Yakfolk also unexpectedly have an ability to 'magically crawl under another creature's skin, control its body, and suppress its mind'. That is not something I had expected, nor remembered, on top of everything else, but that's just such a unexpected ability for a species of bovine-people to have. The fact that this is described to be so gruesome with this cow-man crawling under its victim's skin and hijacking the mind is... there's just something so wrong about that. You'd expect something alien-looking like the Mind Flayers to screw with your mind, you don't exactly expect something like the Yakfolk to pull off a Wendigo-style possession!

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Crag Cat

• Large Monstrosity; Unaligned; CR 1
• Debut: Storm King's Thunder (2016)

The Crag Cat very nearly did not make it into this review series, and frankly only made it in by virtue of being classified as a monstrosity and not being a regular animal. The Crag Cat looks like just a larger version of a white lion, but actually adapts its coat depending on the weather -- being white in snowy seasons, and gray to blend with rocks otherwise. Their cry resembles a human scream, and prefers to hunt humans to the exclusion of all else.

Their stat blocks also offer a couple of surprising abilities, having a 'Spell Turning' effect that causes any spell that targets it specifically to have the potential of being reflected back on the caster. It also has the strange ability of nondetection, something that many powerful figures in D&D would probably love -- complete immunity from divination and magical scrying. This second bit is a quite bizarrely powerful feature to give to a random carnivorous feline that probably won't come up too much, but it does make this random kitty cat feel a bit more special. 

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Dread Warrior

• Medium Undead; Neutral Evil; CR 1
  
• Debut: Tales from the Yawning Portal (2017)

Next up is Tales from the Yawning Portal, an anthology and remakes of some classic D&D modules from older editions. Many of the monsters introduced in this anthology are actually released afterwards as part of Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes, which includes the Deathlock and the Choker. But one variation of undead is the Dread Warrior, a type of special undead servant utilized by the Red Wizards. Dread Warriors are simple undead minions with weapon attacks and a bit more 'undead fortitude' similar to zombies. But the unique thing about them is that Dread Warriors are linked to their respective Red Wizard to be utilized as an equivalent to a familiar. Via a psychic link, a Red Wizard can view the world via the Dread Warrior, and even pilot it to do certain actions. 

That is about it that makes the Dread Warrior different from another low-level undead like a zombie or a skeleton, but the slight flexibility does allow a bit of twist to what seemed to be a 'regular' undead corpse. I can see why the Dread Warrior did not make the jump to a proper bestiary book, however. 

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Kelpie

• Medium Plant; Neutral Evil; CR 4
  
• Debut: Tales from the Yawning Portal (2017)

In Scottish legend, the Kelpie is a shapeshifting water spirit that lures people to their death by drowning, often times appearing in the form of a horse, or sometimes as a human. I am quite surprised that D&D hasn't actually done a proper adaptation of this mythological Kelpie. Instead, the Kelpie throughout D&D's history has been a weird little monster that initially debuted in 1st Edition's Fiend Folio, which even this 5th Edition Kelpie still draws inspiration from. 

See, the Kelpie in Dungeons & Dragons isn't a magical horse, or a fey, or even an evil spirit. No. Thanks to the 'kelp' pun, the Kelpie is... a shape-shifting seaweed. That is actually a clever little twist! The 'horse' and the 'beautiful female' (playing off of Sirens, another mythological creature I'm surprised isn't more prominent in D&D) forms are just like, forms that the Kelpie takes to attract its prey. 

The Kelpie in 5E is a very faithful adaptation of its original Fiend Folio appearance, having the shapeshifting ability as well as the 'drowning hypnosis' ability. Once a target is charmed by the Kelpie's humanoid or equine form, they will be dragged by the Kelpie underwater, and attempt to breathe... and drown. At which point the sentient seaweed will consume their prey. 

I get not adapting statblocks like the Dread Warrior or Phantom into a bestiary due to a lot of overlap. But are you seriously telling me that the shapeshifting plant that charms people into riding it isn't weird or interesting enough to get a proper new art and a longer lore than the paragraph we had? Come on. 

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Nereid

• Medium Fey; Any Chaotic Alignment; CR 2
  
• Debut: Tales from the Yawning Portal (2017)

There have been various terms used for aquatic fey in various mythologies that got adapted into Dungeons & Dragons. Nymphs, Nereids, Naiads... they all kind of blend together and are all pretty fey women that live underwater. In its first appearance in 2E, the Nereid debuted as a 'Water-kin' Elemental, being classified alongside the Water Weird as a type of specialized elemental lifeform similar to the Salamanders or Galeb Duhrs. They then end up being re-interpreted as aquatic fey in 3E. 

5E's Nereids are simple, just noted as being fey creatures that can shape their environments, and they bear an otherworldly beauty regardless of which gender they appear in. Surprisingly, despite the transformation from Elemental to Fey, 5E's Nereid still retains a lot of the features that the Nereid in 2E's Monstrous Manual. This includes the ability to control water, be invisible in water and be surrounded by marine animals, yes, but Nereids also have the unexpected ability to spit poison. This is actually interpreted as acid damage, which... yes, it makes sense that a being with mastery over water can summon acid, too, but it's just such a fun and unexpected ability for a traditionally elegant being like the Nereid to do. I'm all for it!

An aspect of the 2E Nereid that surprisingly makes it to the 5E Nereid is the 'Mantle Dependance'. All Nereids come with a mantle of silky cloth that the Nereid's spirit is bound to. The mantle can't be harmed while the Nereid still wears it, but if it is stolen or separated, and then destroyed, the Nereid will be poisoned and die. The scarf essentially works similar to the tree that a Dryad is bound to, which is honestly an aspect that really screams 'fey' more than 'elemental' to me. 

It's just such a shame that so much of the Nereid's fun lore isn't really properly laid out, and you need to really go through each ability to piece together the Nereid. I am honestly surprised that none of the sourcebooks, and not even the Witchlight Feywild adventure, has taken the time to give us a properly-statted out block for a water fey. 

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Sea Lion

• Large Monstrosity; Unaligned; CR 5
  
• Debut: Tales from the Yawning Portal (2017)

Sometimes known as the Sea Cat in older editions to avoid confusion with the real-world mammal known as the Sea Lion, this weird creature has shown up all the way from the 1st Edition's Monster Manual. The Sea Lion is a strange creature that is shaped like a mermaid, with the lower body of a fish, but the claws and head of a lion instead of a man. This creature resembles Singapore's Merlion, which is a name that I really wished this creature was called instead just to not have the confusion with real-world pinnipeds. 

There really isn't much about the Sea Lion beyond them being a weird 'fusion' creature, with their stat block only containing generic beast melee attacks and some aquatic features. I took a peek into their previous entries in older bestiaries, and there really isn't much about them other than them behaving like lions (hunting in a pride, being fierce predators) and being able to be domesticated, just a bit harder. 

The design team likes the Sea Lion enough to reprint them in a bunch of other aquatic adventure books, like Ghosts of Saltmarsh and Locathah Rising, but never really bothered to give a proper creature writeup to come with the block. A bit of a shame, that. 

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Lava Child

• Medium Humanoid; Neutral; CR 3
  
• Debut: Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage (2018)

We jump a bit ahead for a pair of adventures set in the massive city of Waterdeep -- Dragon Heist and Dungeon of the Mad Mage. The first book didn't really give us any new monsters, but the second one does, and we're starting off with the Lava Children, which are... weird. The Lava Children debuted all the way back in 1E's Fiend Folio, everyone's favourite book of the strangest things to have graced D&D's history. Lava Children are created from the union of the elements of Earth and Fire, creating... large, adult-sized beings that always perpetually look like children. Which is... most certainly a weird creature design concept. 

Despite acting and looking like children, a Lava Child that has reached maturity... will lay eggs, procreating without mating. These hatch into more Lava Children, and it is noted that all Lava Children look physically similar. Okay? They... they like meat the most, but can also feed on anything that's not made of metal or stone.

They are classified as humanoids instead of elementals, despite their name. They do, however, have the ability to pass through metal. The Lava Children are mostly nonviolent, content to reside in their little volcano lairs and worship the gods of the elements that create them. However, when they decide to be territorial, many adventurers have been fooled by their big, child-like smile... even as they decide to tear smaller intruders limb from limb. 

I don't know. The Lava Children are probably one of my least favourite monsters because of the strange hodgepodge of features and themes. They're not even actually creepy or disturbing or funny, they're just... they just got me tilting my head and go 'why'. There is a bunch of random themes here that I don't feel is properly portrayed. Kudos to the 5E artwork for giving this thing a really demented expression. Just look into those eyes. They look more horrifying than most demon artwork out there. 

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Living Spells

• Small Construct; Chaotic Evil; CR 8 (Blade of Disaster)
• Medium Construct; Unaligned; CR 0 (Unseen Servant), 0 (Demiplane), 1 (Burning Hands)
  
• Large Construct; Unaligned; CR 4 (Bigby's Hand) 5 (Lightning Bolt), 7 (Cloudkill)
• Debut: Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage (2018)

Debuting in 3rd Edition are the creatures called 'Living Spells', which as their name implies, are spells that somehow caused certain spells to take sentience. They are classified as 'constructs', and are essentially the very same spell that so many spellcasters use... except their energies just continue indefinitely. This happens in areas where powerful unnatural forces or huge clashes of magic just cause spells to continue to happen independently as they subsist on the ambient magical energy in the land. 

Several Living Spells have appeared throughout 5th Edition. Dungeon of the Mad Mage gave us the Living Unseen Servant; Eberron: Rising from the Last War gave us Living Burning Hands, Living Lightning Bolt and Living Cloudkill. Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden gave us Living Demiplane, Living Blade of Disaster and Living Bigby's Hand. 

I will spare really much of the details of these spells. Most of them are self-explaining. Living Burning Hands and Bigby's Hands are giant magical hands, one of them being on fire and the other being larger and more solid. Living Cloudkill (a.k.a. the coolest spell name ever) is just a roiling cloud of death-fog going around this area of magical flux. The Eberron sourcebook gives a template to take any spell, look for a corresponding template of the similar spell level, and swap the 'spell mimicry' to match whatever spell you want to adapt into a Living Spell. 

I don't think I've ever really appreciated how much spells really matter to the players who play them until I played spellcaster PC's myself with a slower level grind, and the anticipation to reach each successive milestone and getting to pour through tables to pick spells is just really fun. Each spell gets a bit of a 'character' of their own, so to speak, and to see them manifested as roiling sentient magical effects is certainly interesting, even if I don't have much to really say about the topic beyond that. 

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Scaladar

• Huge Construct; Unaligned; CR 8
  
• Debut: Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage (2018)

The Scaladar is a giant robotic scorpion robot associated with the Waterdeep setting, having been around since 2nd Edition. When I first went through the Waterdeep books, I actually thought the Scaladar was the name of a specific 'boss' enemy, but it turns out that there are a bunch of these Scaladars running around, enough that all Scaladars have a 'Scaladar Link' ability that lets them know if there are more Scaladars around. They can shoot lightning bolts from their stingers, and if they are themselves attacked with a lightning spell, they can absorb it and empower their next lightning strike. 

The creator of the Scaladar created artifacts called Trobriand's Rings, and anyone who wears one such ring becomes immune to being attacked by Scaladars and must obey their commands. It's a control ring! Interestingly, if two people holding different rings say contradictory commands, the Scaladar short-circuits and becomes inert for an hour. 

It sure is a giant metal scorpion! It's inherently cool, but there's really not a whole ton to say about it. A lot of the stuff with the control ring and lightning blast are pretty basic 'mecha' enemy stuff. 

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Werebat

• Medium Humanoid (Shapechanger, Goblinoid); Neutral Evil; CR 2
  
• Debut: Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage (2018)

And to end this article, the last entry from Waterdeep is going to be the Werebat. Which is... a lycanthrope that turns into a bat! The body layout is similar to DC comics' Man-Bat, with a humanoid body and head; large bat wings instead of hands, and clawed feet. The Werebat curse is noted to be particularly rare even among other lycanthropes, and the curse appear to be more common among goblins. In fact, the artwork shows one of 5E's orange-skinned goblins. Look at that goofy grin on his face. That Werebat is very happy to be included. 

Interestingly, despite not really being vampires, the Werebats still need to feed on blood to survive. They need to feed on one pint of fresh blood every day, or suffer exhaustion that can't be alleviated by mere rest. It's a bit less debilitating, I suppose, when you realize that Werebats can shrink down to the size of actual vampire bats and go around feeding on wildlife just like actual vampire bats. 

This causes them to be shunned even by their goblin kin, and the Werebats end up being exiled. The prose notes how they are forced to adopt nocturnal hunting habits and move into caves... but goblins already do that. The Werebats also gain the ability to echolocate, as well as sunlight sensitivity, both of which make sense for a part-bat lycanthrope. I don't really have much else to say about Werebats... I feel like they at least tried a bit to make the Werebat curse a bit more different with the vampiric feeding necessities, but this is probably a huge reason why they cut down a lot on random lycanthrope variations. There really is ultimately not much to really say that can't be put into a template of 'hey, pick whatever animal you want your characters to turn into'.