It doesn't matter what D&D world you're playing in, the Devils and Demons in the D&D 2024 Monster Manual can make themselves at home anywhere

Fiends are the "most classic villains of the D&D multiverse." There have always been a ton of Fiends, ever since the very first Monster Manual. Whereas Aberrations are strange, gooey villains from the Outer Planes, Fiends are the burbling-inside-everyone villains of the Lower Planes—and sometimes even the inner self. But don't worry if your players have other priorities: evil turns on itself. So Fiends are fighting each other as often as they're fighting normies on the Prime Material plane.

Devils are Fiends. Demons are Fiends. And Yugoloths are a third group of Fiends they play both sides against each other. There are unaffiliated fiends like Succubi and Incubi but are super into doing evil things. 

The unifying theme is Evil. Whether they're Lawful, Chaotic, or Neutral in how they go about it, they're always going about their Evil. As long as the bad guys are winning, Fiends couldn't be happier. 

Fiends were already a big group in the old D&D 2014 Monster Manual. In the Dungeons & Dragons 2024 Monster Manual—that group is even bigger. Because like many creatures in the Monster Manual, some have migrated out, but even more have migrated in, especially from the Humanoid group. 

Creatures new to the Fiend category:

• Gnolls
• Sahuagin

Creature type (e.g. Humanoid, Fiend) not only has mechanical ramifications in the rules, but world-building ramifications as well. From a 10,000-foot view, it was getting hard to discern the differences between this jackal person and that wolf person, this sea creature and that sea creature. So creature type hopefully steers a Dungeon Master in the right direction as to how to discern between all these monsters. 

Take two types of sea creatures for example. Sahuagin and Kuo-Toa:

• Sahuagin are Fiends
• Kuo-Toa are Aberrations

That speaks to their origins in the multiverse, which also means they tend to feed different types of stories. 

What's the difference between Demons and Devils within the Fiend family, though?

• Devils are Lawful Evil. They want to wheel and deal for your soul and corrupt any semblance of order that exists.
• Demons are Chaotic Evil. They want to eat your face and/or just watch the world burn. 

There's more to it than that, but that might put you on the right track, just knowing those two things. If you want to get familiar with Devils and Demons, play the Descent Into Avernus adventure. Yes, some of those creatures play against type, even in the middle of the endless Blood War ravaging the Nine Hells. But if a Dungeon Master needs an enemy that the players don't have to think twice about destroying, Fiends are a great way to go. Even if your players need to destroy them with wit and wisdom rather than swords and sorcery. 

Because they originate from the Outer Planes—the Lower Planes to be exact—there's always room for a fiendish incursion, no matter what D&D world you're playing in. Greyhawk, Dragonlance, Forgotten Realms, Spelljammer, Planescape...you can have a Balor show up and Balrog your entire day. Setting-agnostic foes, such as fiends, are at home anywhere in the Multiverse. 

The 2024 Monster Manual gets wide release on February 18.