Uploaded January 2025 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago

---

Welcome to Episode 223 of the Mastering Dungeons podcast!

Main topic: Monster Manual Previews!
Previews have begun for the 2025 MM! Shawn and Teos discuss the preview and just how hard it is to create monster books.

Contents
00:00 Monster Manual Previews
02:26 The Challenge of Monster Books
04:38 Describing Monsters in the World
10:50 New Art to Represent D&D
14:03 All Paths Lead to CR
22:46 What Changed and Monster Families
24:56 Monster Type Changes
29:57 Bloodied and Exhaustion
31:41 Biggest MM Ever?
33:01 The 2014 DMG is Bigger than 2024
34:19 Shout-Outs

Find our show notes and support our podcast and YouTube efforts:
patreon.com/MasteringDnD
Listen to us on your favorite podcast device:
MasteringDungeons.podbean.com
Chat with us online:
https://dice.camp/@MasteringDnD
https://bsky.app/profile/masteringdnd.bsky.social
twitter.com/MasteringDnD

Find Shawn:
twitter.com/shawnmerwin
ghostfiregaming.com
Find Teos:
alphastream.org
youtube.com/@AlphastreamRPG
https://dice.camp/@Alphastream

Mastering Dungeons is a weekly podcast, providing News and a Main segment. We separate these on YouTube for your viewing and listening pleasure.

Our intro and outro music is Metropolis Fanfare, provided royalty-free by Tabletop Audio (https://tabletopaudio.com) under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).