A great new change is coming for the next edition of the Dungeons and Dragons Monster Manual in 2025. Treasure is now split into categories, and each monster will have its own favorite types of shiny swag. This will be a great help for making encounters feel more naturalistic, as the Manual will assign each monster the kinds of items they are most likely to collect.
Under the new version of the DnD rules, 5e magic items are split into four categories: Arcana, Implements, Armaments, and Relics. It’s not exactly clear exactly what all of these are, but in a recent video, Wizards of the Coast designers tease that Clerics and Druids are going to want Relics, whereas martial DnD classes will want to look out for armaments, which are obviously going to be your standard magic swords and armor.
In the magic items video, designer James Wyatt explains that the four categories also affect the generic loot given out in treasure hoards. For instance, for a DnD monster that likes Arcana, the bulk of the monetary value is more likely to be represented by gems. But for a monster that’s wild about relics, it’s more likely to be represented by works of art and marble statues with the arms knocked off.
This is a big change from how treasure is handled in the Dungeon Master’s Guide right now, where loot is simply organized according to a monsters’ CR. Big monsters had big piles of gold and more powerful magic items, whereas little monsters had only a few copper or silver pieces to their name.
But if you’ve used these tables, you’ll know there was nothing to distinguish one monster’s treasure pile from another’s. In fact, previously, the DM’s Guide advised that if a monster had no interest in treasure, the party could gain the exact same reward as if it did, just from the incidental treasure left on the bodies of its victims. This was fair, but felt slightly weird.
Of course, while it’s a welcome change for the 2024 DMG, this is nothing revolutionary. The very first, 1979 edition of the Monster Manual had a category for treasure type, with different tables you could consult, and this approach has filtered down through various editions, and been used by numerous other tabletop RPGs. But it is something DnD 5e hasn’t done before, so I’m personally pleased to see it.
The updated Monster Manual doesn’t arrive until mid-February, 2025. Before that, we have the Dungeon Master’s Guide, which comes out on November 12. Stay tuned for our Dungeon Master’s Guide review to see what we think of all the changes. We can also fill you in on new features like DnD Bastions.
Source: Wargamer
