Reviewing 5E D&D Monsters - Spelljammer - Boo's Astral Menagerie, Part 2

 

This is part two of our coverage of the fifth-edition Dungeons & Dragons: Spelljammer, specifically Boo's Astral Menagerie. I did a much more robust explanation of the Spelljammer setting/world-building in the first part, but essentially Spelljammer is "Dungeons & Dragons: IN SPACE!" with a rather cheeky and irreverent tone to the worldbuilding that's based primarily on the ham-and-cheese sci-fi-meets-fantasy tropes of old. 

Next up is going to be me covering "Monstrous Compendium, Vol. 1", a little bonus bestiary adapting some old Spelljammers. I'm still not sure how I'm going to handle the other Monstrous Compendiums, which are either setting-specific (Dragonlance) or very crossover-heavy. Like the MTG sourcebooks, I don't think I'm the most qualified to talk about those, but especially since I'm going to reach the MTG settings at one point in my MTG coverage anyway.

Anyway, in 2024 they did a bit of a 'refresh' for Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition with a brand new trio of Player's Handbook, Dungeon Master's Guide and most importantly the Monster Manual. They also did a compilation book of various monsters in 'Mordenkainen's Monsters of the Multiverse', which is mostly just creatures we've already covered in the two previous bestiary books. I'll take my time to go through those and if we have enough content for an article (beyond commenting on the changes, which I'm not the most qualified to guy to do).

• Click here for the previous part, where we cover the first half of this book. 
• Click here for the next part, Monstrous Compendium Vol. 1
• Click here for the index.

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Murder Comet

• Medium elemental; neutral evil; CR 5

Hahahaha, what the fuck. We start off with a hilarious entry this time around, with the Murder Comet. I can't find any older versions of the Murder Comet, so I'm going to assume it's original to 5th Edition... and I feel like the concept feels right at home with some of the "silly threats taken seriously" in the vein of such classics like the Cloaker or the Mimic. I like it! Murder Comets are screaming angry heads that zip around in space, made with a combination of an earth elemental, a fire elemental, and the spirit of their creator. 

See, the 'elemental fusion' is already a cool little way to adapt a comet as an enemy in a suitably "sci-fi fantasy" way. But adding that layer of some spellcasters seeing the Murder Comet as a way to escape death? You could be a lich, a vampire, a robot, or anything else, but you choose to be a screaming old-man head wreathed in cosmic fire, zipping around and slamming into spaceships? You know what, I can respect that. I sure don't understand it, but I can respect it. 

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Neh-Thalggu

• Large aberration; chaotic neutral; CR 4

Well, that sure is an update, isn't it? The Neh-Thalggu has shown up in all editions other than 4E, in various capacity, and are otherwise known as the 'Brain Collectors'. I find it interesting to see that some monsters are updated to be 'goofier' or 'campier', like the Megapede or the Braxat, while the Neh-Thalggu got a makeover that makes it look a lot more horrifying. The core idea of the design is still similar enough -- a central bulbous, tumour-like body with multiple eyes and a huge maw, with crab-like legs, and little tumours containing brains on the back, but the proportions and the choice of colours really does make the 5E Neh-Thalggu look a lot more horrifying. I like the choice of details, too -- with tiny little hand-like growths around the mouths, and the visible brains under the semi-transparent layer of viscera on the Neh-Thalggu's grub-like body. 

The Neh-Thalggu are creatures that arrive from the Far Realm to feed on brains, and has a strange little ritual where it scuttles and slices open the corpses of those it had slain to recover the brain and swallows it whole. The brains then appear on its back, like a little countdown timer. The Neh-Thalggu needs twelve brains specifically, before it starts creating a portal to return back to the Far Realm. This last little bit of behaviour is a cool, additional layer of unknowable mystery that Boo's Astral Menagerie just stops at, and in my opinion adds just a layer of spookiness for this aberration that the others do not. 

(Older editions actually explain the Neh-Thalggu's behaviour, which I will spoil after a long enough rambling opening sentence: all the Neh-Thalggu you see wandering around the Material Plane are juveniles, and they just need a specific number of brains to grow into adults. At which point they return to the plane they come from and turn into adults, where they occupy a position similar to dragons in their home realm.)

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Neogi

• Tiny/Small/Medium aberration; lawful evil; CR 3 (Hatchling Swarm), CR 3 (Pirate), CR 4 (Void Hunter)

Huh, they're still using the same 4th Edition art? Does someone in the 5E art department just really don't want to commission new art for the Neogi or something? Neogi showed up in Volo's Guide to Monsters in a setting-agnostic entry, and now that we're back to Spelljammer and... they're barely in it. We get to see their cool spider ship, but the lack of any kind of new artwork is rather strange. Weird! Anyway, Neogi are... weird spider-eel aliens that have an abhorrent slaver culture. 

The 5E bestiary describes three variants of the Neogi, with the first two ('Pirate' and 'Void Hunter') not really bringing much flavour that we haven't talked about before. The Hatchling Swarm is kind of interesting, I suppose, in that it brings back some old lore about Neogi reproduction. Basically once a Neogi is old enough, the rest of the Neogi inject the old guy with poison, which the others lay eggs on which serve as a little morbid incubator. Oh, and the little larvae fight each other for supremacy. Someone in the writing team was watching Animal Planet that week! It's like if you merged parasitoid wasps with their prey, I suppose. 

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Plasmoid

• Medium/medium/large ooze; any alignment; CR 3 (Warrior), CR 1/4 (Explorer), CR 4 (Boss)

Our final new playable race is the Plasmoid, which are ooze-people. Or amoeba-people, if you prefer. Yes! Yes, finally you can play as a slime! Joyous day. All the plasmoids are in various shades of blue, and they have a mass of nerves running around their body, so they're not quite slimes or oversized bacteria, but are creatures that just have a similar flavour. And all the artwork included with the Plasmoid enemies and player characters do consistently show the network of nerve clumps and clusters throughout the body. I like the descriptions of in the Astral Adventurer's Guide talking about how Plasmoids can create windpipes to simulate voices; they eat via osmosis; they still need oxygen (the book has all that 'air pocket' rules, after all) to survive; and they reproduce by a process that's basically a very loose adaptation of meiosis -- two Plasmoid parents merge and separate, and at some point one of the Plasmoids will divide and create a newborn that's a mixture of both parents

Now while all of the Plasmoid arts do have some kind of a humanoid shape, this is noted to just be the shape that Plasmoids take when they are around other humanoids to make them feel more comfortable; their 'natural' form is just, well, a blob of slime. In one of the cooler racial abilities, Plasmoids basically have the ability to create pseudopods and make extra arms or tendrils. That's so much cooler than just playing as 'space elf' or a monkey with weird wings, isn't it? 

Anyway, I like the Plasmoids a lot. I also like the description of the 'Plasmoid Boss', which seems like a cute riff on Jabba the Hutt -- apparently some older Plasmoids just balloon in size at some point, and this increased size allows it to boss around weaker creatures. 

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Psurlon

• Medium aberration; lawful evil; CR 2 (regular), CR 6 (Leader), CR 1 (Ringer)

Huh, okay, Psurlons now. See, these are the weird space-people I was expecting. Psurlons are weird giant worm-maggot people with really disturbing mouth-faces, six hooved legs and two hands. They mostly keep to their own worlds, but every century, as a species they would go and invade lesser worlds and indulge in a "Feast of Worlds" where they consume sentient life-forms. So it's like The Purge, only with more cannibalism and inherent racism. Psurlons are also able to utilize psionic abilities, like most space races, and are buddies with fellow xenophobic aliens the Mind Flayers. Who, by the way, I am surprised missed out on having an entry in this book.

Psurlons also share the same weird reproduction culture as the Neogi, though at least they wait for the older Psurlon to die first before laying their eggs and using the corpse as an incubator. The baby grubs still engage in a fight-for-the-fittest, though. Two of the more powerful Psurlon variants are the 'Psurlon Ringer', who can use magic to assume the form of a humanoid it just ate (despite being, y'know, a giant worm); and the 'Psurlon Leader' pictured here. Psurlons are led by special mutants who are born with the amazing quality of having two heads. Except that second head ends up on the Psurlon's butt, which makes for a very... undignified look, I must say.  

But I would like to point out how different Psurlons looked in previous editions. I have tended to shy away from doing this in most of my post-Monster-Manual reviews due to it being nitpicky most of the time, but the Psurlons really did change a lot over the years, and beyond the vagueness of being 'worm people', there's really not much in common, huh? The original Psurlon from 2E is an actual worm-headed man, with the head of a leech-y worm wearing robes with spiky hands. Not the most interesting worm-man, I must say, but it is 2E.

3rd Edition probably has my favourite Psurlon, where they actually went all-in on the 'earthworm' theme, giving the creature the wibbly-wobbly mess of an earthworm body who's trying to support itself with two chunky worm arms, focusing a bit more on their psionic powers. They also have fancy Hot Topic ringlets around their body. 

4th Edition Psurlons are originally humanoid aliens who blew up their entire culture due to an attempt to ascend to godhood, and their minds ended up taking root in worms and slugs and mutating them to... frankly quite threatening-looking spider-centaur monsters with a huge fanged mouth and giant Scyther-arms. I like the lore and the concept, and even the design, but I feel it feels a bit off compared to the slight goofiness and the more 'psionics' inspired other designs. 

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Reigar

• Medium celestial; chaotic neutral; CR 8

These are the Reigar, who made the Esthetic ship we see before. And... they're just weird Star Trek aliens whose skins are a bit weird. And I say that because the Reigar are supposed to have evolved from octopi, so all the Reigar in 5E have like, rippling primary colours or spots rippling across their skin like an octopus. Oh, and they also count as 'celestials' somehow, and some of them have a halo around them. The Reigar apparently exist only to wage war and make art, and sometimes both at the same time, becuase war can be artistic in their culture. Each Reigar also has a 'Talarith', which is a piece of jewelry that lets them create a golem-like copy of themselves.

Yeah, I don't know. I really do feel like these guys are boring. And they shouldn't be, really -- whether it's the "octopus-people" thing or the obsession with art and war, I feel like they could've done more in making the Reigar more memorable than Star Trek extras with weird clone-copy jewelry. As it is, their ships are more memorable than them. 

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Scavver

• Medium/large/huge/huge monstrosity; unaligned; CR 1/4 (Gray), CR 4 (Brown), CR 5 (Night), CR 11 (Void)

Space sharks, space sharks! Or more accurately, space cyclops sharks. Most Scavvers are actually scavengers, though, and like the Kindori and many of the wildlife in the Astral Sea, the Scavvers can just fly through space. The first two we see here, the Gray Scavver and the Brown Scavver, are mostly scavengers and aren't hostile unless provoked. I like the slight differences in their eyes, with the Gray having a cyclopean eye that juts forwards, and I like the extra pair of ventral fins that the Scavvers have compared to a real-life shark. They have a really cool 'deep sea fish' texturing going on here. 

The two bigger Scavver variants, the Night Scavver and the Void Scavver, are appropriately more threatening looking and mean-looking, with more unnatural ridges. The Night Scavver has its body covered with little pinpricks of light that act as camouflage in space. Which I'm not sure would actually work, but I also don't regularly fight off flying magic space sharks. Void Scavvers, meanwhile, are all edgy and stuff by being as jet-black as the night itself. It's got a creepy red glowing eye which allows it to cast a 'ray of fear' attack, and, to be fair, if you're on a ship, seeing a 20-feet-long spiky demon shark would scare you. 

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Solar Dragon

• Gargantuan/huge/large/medium dragon; neutral; CR 20/14/8/3

'Cause we had a moon dragon, of course we need a sun dragon. Yeah, kind of obvious... but the Solar Dragon is actually really a lot cooler than the Lunar Dragon, for the simple reason that it isn't the same four-legged winged lizard reskinned with some extra textures, no. As shown in the two pieces of 5th Edition artwork, the Solar Dragon actually has a completely different body structure, being a giant undulating eel with two massive arm-fin-wings, and a second pair of almost ephemeral wings that explode out behind it -- a bit more clearly seen in the wyrmling on the left. It's such a creative design, and regardless of whether this makes sense as a 'spacefaring adaptation', I believe it, y'know? It looks so much more memorable than just "oh, it's a dragon but it's glowing from the inside with the power of the sun". Pish-tosh, this is how you make your dragon variants be memorable. This is a badass design, and one that still is recognizably a dragon. 

Solar Dragons live in either the CORE OF A STAR (which doesn't make sense physically, but fuck it, it's cool) or, if the lair needs to be accessible to adventurers, in a rock near the star. Solar Dragons are highly territorial and tend to take parts of space as its hunting grounds. It breathes 'photonic breath', which has it unleash a miniature sun that explodes in a blinding radiant explosion. And interestingly -- and this is a property that its sibling, the Lunar Dragon, doesn't have -- the Solar Dragon has 'nebulous thoughts', giving it complete immunity from mind-reading. What are you hiding, Solar Dragons?

Our buddy Minsc and Boo is also riding a Solar Dragon on the cover of Boo's Astral Menagerie, and the main astral elf villains in the Light of Xaryxis campaign have items that summon Solar Dragons as the thing that makes their boss fight actually difficult. So yeah, this is the 'big boy' final villain of the 5E Spelljammer setting, and I approve!

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Space Clown

• Medium fiend; chaotic evil; CR 2

Yeaaaah, I'm... I'm not a big fan of this one. I know it's a reference to an old campy sci-fi B-movie, Killer Klowns from Outer Space, but... I'm just not a fan at all. They're fiends, and they come from "Clownspace", and all of the people in Clownspace was wrapped up in festivals of a god of revelry who got everyone high on a drug called 'Thrill Joy' from a 'bozo flower'. They eat humanoid flesh, they travel from world to world and set up creepy carnivals to attract prey, and they fight with ray guns. They have squeaky shoes and they explode like a balloon when they die, which... which I think goes a bit too far from being a cheeky reference to just trying to copy-paste a movie that frankly doesn't gel particularly well with even Spelljammer.

One thing I do like, though, is that Space Clowns also spread 'love and fear of clowns' to all corners of the multiverse. The idea of beings that spread a certain concept and thrive off them is cool to me, even if it's the concept of clowns. I just don't like this particular execution. 

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Space Eel

• Small beast; unaligned; CR 1/2

We need to fill up some of the bestiary with more space animals as we travel through the Astral Sea, and, well, the Astral Sea has space-faring versions of aquatic creatures. I think the bestiary gives us just enough for a couple of additional encounters without disproportionately filling up the entire tome with space aquatic creatures. The Space Eel are, well, space moray eels with extra fins and a lot of eyeballs. I like the colours and the art for this one. 

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Space Guppy

• Small beast; unaligned; CR 0

The art team really likes the space guppies, even if they are technically more space goldfishes... but I like their colourful bodies and their wide fins, and especially the weird triple-eye thing they have. Space Guppies are very docile, and are used by Chwinga Astronauts as mounts. That's adorable. 

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Giant Space Hamster

• Large beast; unaligned; CR 1/4 (Giant Space Hamster) 
• Tiny monstrosity; neutral good; CR 1/4 (Space Hamster)

The titular 'Boo' in this book's title is Boo the Miniature Giant Space Hamster (yes), of Baldur's Gate fame. The first entry here talks about the 'Giant Space Hamster', which are bear-sized friends that are... well, hamsters. They are mounts to most people in space, and I like the wacky description of gnomes apparently trying to build spelljamming ships with Giant Space Hamster wheels as engines. 

Meanwhile, the smaller, real-world-hamster-sized creatures, are 'Space Hamsters'... or more accurately, 'Miniature Giant Space Hamster', as Boo himself would remind you. Wizards apparently attempted to shrink the Giant Space Hamster down, which gives the tiny creatures telepathy and heightened intelligence. Which Boo totally is. This magical modification is why the tiny 'Space Hamsters' are considered as 'Monstrosities' while the Giant Space Hamster is a 'Beast'. Apparently most, if not all, hamsters in the Material Plane started off this way. See, that? That's the kind of a weird jokey thing I like. 

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Space Mollymawk

• Small beast; unaligned; CR 0

Not much to say here either. To fit with the spacefaring fantasy, we get a bunch of space seagulls, er, mollymawks. They're just a bit more creepier than their real-world counterparts, with some pterodactyl-like wing claws, a partially purple plumage and two pairs of eyes. 

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Space Swine

• Medium beast; unaligned; CR 1/4

PIGS THAT FLY! Hell yeah. The Space Swine are just winged pigs. Winged pigs! They are apparently bred by the Dohwar as mounts, beasts of burden, or trackers. The ones bred for war are outfitted with barding and are called 'Death Squealers'. That's funny. I like that. 

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Ssurran

• Medium monstrosity (lizardfolk); any alignment; CR 3 (Defiler), CR 1/2 (Poisoner)

The Ssurran have appeared in previous editions as huge, stocky Lizardfolk, mostly associated with the Dark Sun setting. 5E reimagines them as being space Lizardfolk with... really elongated features! Longer necks, an almost beak-like mouth, longer arms and claws... it's an interesting redesign, but the book itself doesn't really tell us much about what makes the Ssurran different compared to regular Lizardfolk other than that they're "in space". 

Older editions focus have a lot more setting-specific lore about how they are adapted to live in the desert, making them more muscular and ridged Lizardfolk... which regular Lizardfolk have already changed into anyway since 3rd and 4th edition, so I guess while some fans might be pissed off, at least the Ssurran actually feels a bit more unique visually.     

I do like the abilities of the 'Ssurran Defiler' variant, where it uses its psionic abilities to drain life from its surroundings, healing it while plants and small animals around it dies. That's just me appreciating a somewhat unique mechanical ability, though. 

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Starlight Apparition

• Medium celestial; neutral good; CR 5

This one feels more like a 'DM tool' more than anything. The Starlight Apparition is a 'space ghost', basically a glowing humanoid figure with shining eyes. Starlight Apparitions are "different from ghosts" because it's not haunting a place, but because it's trying to help someone else avoid an obstacle or complete a task. Which... just sounds like it's more or less the same thing as a regular ghost, just with less vengeance. Not the biggest fan of it, mostly because it feels like it already should've been a regular non-hostile ghost variant. 

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Thri-kreen

• Medium monstrosity; any alignment; CR 7 (Gladiator), CR 2 (Hunter), CR 5 (Mystic)

My boys the Thri-kreen get to be another one of the playable races, and I really enjoyed the playable version of them as described here. None of the lore is exactly new to me, just repackaged from older editions, but it's nice to see Thri-kreen getting some more exposure in 5th Edition. I like that they are able to still utilize the 'chameleon carapace' to blend in with the surroundings, and that they still physically can't communicate with their mandibles and must use telepathy to talk to other races. Which can be problematic sometimes! 

The Astral Menagerie gives three additional Thri-Kreen variations -- the Gladiator (very appropriate with all of the Dune and John Carter allusions), the Hunter and the Mystic. Psionics are back for these guys, and we don't even need a whole sourcebook for it!

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Vampirate

• Medium undead; lawful evil; CR 2 (regular), CR 6 (captain), CR 5 (mage)

What is it about vampires and pirates that makes people lump them together? This isn't even the first "Vampirate" (okay, pun game) I've seen, with the Magic: The Gathering setting of Ixalan featuring a lot of vampire pirates. But yeah, apparently this is what happens in space. Instead of little parrots, the Vampirates have pet Crawling Claws and Will-o-Wisps and, yeah, that's actually quite clever. Not specifically for a Vampirate, but for any undead pirate in general -- missing limbs are a staple in pirate fiction, and so are little animal mascots. Undead can do both!

I don't think there's much to talk about here that we haven't really covered in the coverages of D&D vampires in general. They're just space pirates on top of it. 

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Zodar

• Medium aberration; neutral; CR 16

And we're ending Spelljammer -- or at least the core Spelljammer book -- with the Zodar, who is a creepy floating suit of black armour. Another one that's really cool! I like the design, too, with the strange neckless head, the two cute glowing blue eyes, the huge shoulders and the fact that it's just floating around all the time. Under that armour is apparently "tightly knit muscle fibers", explaining its immense strength. Okay, so it's some kind of organic entity beneath it? The Zodars are the creations of some long-forgotten god, and they just hover in silence. Menacingly. They don't even register the living creatures around them. 

The thing is, each Zodar is programmed with a specific mission, and is relentless in pursuing that goal... and only three occasions in its lifetime is the Zodar allows to speak. A booming speech of 25 words (like the Sending spell) that everyone around the Zodar can understand regardless of message. These can be part of its mission, and certainly part of the Zodar involved in the Light of Xaryxis adventure. The Zodar also has the reality-warping "Wish" spell built into it, allowing it to alter the fabric of the universe as part of its mission... but it will disintegrate to dust when it's cast. 

Very spooky, and Boo's Astral Menagerie posits several more possible reasons that build up the Zodar's mystique -- maybe all Zodars are working together to achieve some master objective. Maybe the Zodars have lost that objective after their unknown ancient creator disappeared. Whatever the case, it's up to the needs of the story and the DM -- and whether he wants to clue you guys in -- and I like that in a mystery. 

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And with that, we're done with Boo's Astral Menagerie! D&D Beyond did release a short little 'Monstrous Compendium' for Spelljammer with a handful of extra monsters, and I enjoy the setting enough to talk about that. But after Spelljammer... I'm going to go and look at the 2024 core rulebooks as well as my original reviews of the Monster Manual to see what I can do with them. Just like the Magic: The Gathering reviews, I do think that my MTG monster reviews could do with a bit of a spit-shine, but whether that will take the form of brand-new articles, or if I rewrite and re-publish my old articles while incorporating the 2024 material (which would be a great excuse) remains to be seen.