So, yeah, it me -- Hi!

Ok, so, a lot of folks (and I include myself among them) want some monster creation rules. Not always because folks hate WotC and so they can do nothing right, but sometimes so they can do things like create a Stat Block for a Fext or maybe have a set up where Lycanthropes are immune to anything but silver weapons, or whatever.

Essentially, you want them or you want to be able to shift a monster that exists, or whatever.  Now, there are no official rules for it -- the guidance is "re-skin', so we are left with an issue where something has to kinda match what already exists. W are not likely to get one, so obviously I am asking for something from a 3rd party perspective. Also, assume this would be for free.

So, as the title suggests, what would you want to see in a monster creation system?

How important is it that it follow the same CR system?

Is CR even important to you?

Would it need to account for everything monsters can do?

What matters to you in this kind of thing?

All I would really want is an updated viewpoint on what statistics should be considered when calculating CR, particularly the components Offensive and Defensive CR. They've said that they revised every creature so that it punches in line with its challenge rating now, which means they have some kind of internal guidance they used to make those calculations (e.g. how much more DPR should a CR 5 creature do/take than a CR 2 one) and sharing that with us would be ideal.

The guidance they have now boil down to "find a creature that's close enough to what you want and then make small alterations" which is functional, but doesn't give us particular insight on how they came up with those creature statistics in the first place.

Quote from PsyrenXY >>

All I would really want is an updated viewpoint on what statistics should be considered when calculating CR, particularly the components Offensive and Defensive CR. They've said that they revised every creature so that it punches in line with its challenge rating now, which means they have some kind of internal guidance they used to make those calculations (e.g. how much more DPR should a CR 5 creature do/take than a CR 2 one) and sharing that with us would be ideal.

The guidance they have now boil down to "find a creature that's close enough to what you want and then make small alterations" which is functional, but doesn't give us particular insight on how they came up with those creature statistics in the first place.

 Agreed!

All I would be looking for is how to calculate the CR correctly.

For the monsters that I have created, even prior to the 2024/2025 books dropping was already in the "find something similar, and make changes" type of process, so all I would need would be the CR calculations.

That is just me though :)

I agree with Psyren mostly. Getting the general idea of the 5.0 DMG's table for CR-building would be useful.

To me it is important it follows or at least similar ballparks the CR system. And I do find use in CR because that's the first estimate of how strong a monster is. If I'm planning a fight for a party I might think "Ok, I want a CR 6 monster here." So getting to that range first is good.

While I think it's impractical to get everything a monster can do, it is useful to at least get analogues/guidelines by using a lot of the official stuff. I've certainly found the examples there helpful when trying to think of something not exactly there but that has a similarity.

One thing I would really like is a guide to how to handle spellcasting. Fireball is easy enough to calculate in CR. But something like hypnotic pattern or counterspell or fear gets tricky.