ghost

NOTE: The creatures previously featured here are now part of my Pay What You Want DMs Guild product Arachnids, Wraiths, & Zombies.

Despite its massive size, I think longtime D&D players have at least one creature they were disappointed to not see in the fifth edition Monster Manual. This is not a slam against Wizards of the Coast. I LOVE the new Monster Manual. It’s my favorite iteration of the book ever. That being said I think some people were sad to not see some of their favorites, be it old school like hound archons or newer beasts such as catastrophic dragons. Wizards couldn’t print a book with infinite pages and the stuff they left out makes a lot of sense. Plus, I guarantee we’re going to see more creatures in the future.

Drop Dread

I myself was surprised to find the dread wraith missing from the pages of the Monster Manual. I didn’t even notice the upgraded version of the wraith was left out until I sat down to make the blazing wraith as one of the Exploration Age monsters I’ve showcasing all this month on the blog. (Other entries include The Lingering Havoc, the gaping maw, the icebreaker shark, the mystauk, the morchia, and the sand kraken.) Anyway, I wanted to create a blazing version of the dread wraith, but I figured the original wraith also needed a little dread before I could do that. So I’ve created dread wraith in both classic and blazing flavors.

In fact I have already created a version of the blazing dread wraith, using the D&D Next final playtest packet. The packet had a dread wraith, which you can see below. That wraith helprf guide some of my thinking as I created one for fifth edition rules.

So without further adieu, check out the dread wraith and the blazing dread wraith.

So what do you think of the blazing wraith? Are you a fan? Which monster were you disappointed got cut from the Monster Manual? Should I write up catastrophic dragons for fifth edition? (Please say yes.)

Quick Poll

So we’re close to wrapping up monster October… which Exploration Age monster has been your favorite? Let me know in the poll below!

If you like what you’re reading, please check out my podcasts on The Tome Show, follow me on Twitter, tell your friends, share this blog post, and/or leave me a comment and let me know you think. Thanks!