Grasslands and rolling hills may seem peaceful at first glance, but inDungeons & Dragons, these open landscapes hide their own share of dangers. The 2025 Monster Manual introduces new creatures and updates classic threats that thrive in these environments, from roaming predators and territorial beasts to supernatural entities lurking in the tall grass.
Whether your players are traveling between cities, hunting for a hidden ruin, or caught in a fierce storm, the right monsters can turn a quiet stretch of land into an unforgettable battlefield. Here are the best monsters from the 2025 Monster Manual to use in grasslands and hills.
8Wyvern
A Simpler Dragon
Traveling along the hillside can be as memorable or forgettable as you want it to be, but sometimes, you want it to be a bit of both. A simple encounter with goblins might get lost in the player’s memory as just another day, while fighting a fierce dragon might be too much for a simple traveling encounter.
Wyverns fill the niche of being fierce, dragon-like monsters without being an overwhelming creature. Their poisonous sting gives them enough of an edge to be an entertaining fight. At the same time, their lack of intelligence removes any chance for the encounter to complicate things beyond ‘big monster attacks party.’
7Cyclopes
A Divine Revamp
The 2025 Monster Manual changedhow a lot of monsters work, but in the case of the cyclopes, it also changed their lore, or lack thereof. Instead of mindless giants with poor depth perception, the most basic cyclops (the cyclops sentry) is now strong enough to knock anyone he hits prone, and their eyes can see into the future, giving them advantage on certain attack rolls.
Since cyclopes aren’t mindless monsters anymore, a new stat block for them appears in the 2025 Monster Manual that can work perfectly as a friendly NPC, the cyclops oracle. This creature has access to all sorts of useful spells for the party, like Locate Object and Legend Lore, as well as being able to improve the D20 tests of its allies as a reaction.
6Cockatrice Regent
One Angry Rooster
Many of the existing monsters from the 2014 Monster Manual had new members introduced in the 2025 version of the book, and the cockatrice regent is one of the better inclusions among them. While the smaller version only has the petrifying beak attack, this one has that and many other ways to be a nuisance to any party.
Other than attacking multiple times per turn (but only once with its beak, thankfully), the regent can use its fly speed to move around the battlefield without provoking opportunity attacks. What’s more, it also has a reaction where it can answer attacks with ranged magic, although exactly how it works during roleplay is for each Dungeon Master to decide.
5Roc
One Of The Earliest Gargantuan Monsters
Not all adventures are aboutfighting massive monsters, but they do add a level of bombastic awe to any tale being told. However, introducing a creature of gargantuan size tends to have repercussions on your overall stories, particularly how the many governments react to the presence of such a titan.
A roc is a great way to have a filler adventure about a massive creature without having to worry about how the NPCs react beyond wanting the creature gone. It can also be incredibly deadly when faced on its nest, all thanks to its swoop ability that can drop an adventurer plummeting to its demise.
4Centaurs
Protectors Of Nature
Few sights are as magical as a herd of centaurs galloping around verdant hills, and you can have such a moment without it needing to amount to much. Should the players want to interact with the migrating herd, they’ll likely find new friends among the nature-loving centaurs, but they shouldn’t provoke these equine druids.
This is because, in the 2025 Monster Manual, centaurs are fast and deadly, able to run across the battlefield while their enemies can do little more than watch. Both the centaur warden and trooper have these running abilities, one restraining their targets and the other knocking them prone.
3Hill Giant
Get The Trash Out
You can’t have a list of hill creatures without including the hill giant, the least friendly and most evil of all giant-kind. The 2025 Monster Manual made some changes to several low-level giant creatures, yet the hill giants were touched up the least; they are, after all, the standard version of how a low-level giant should be.
The biggest change in their arsenal is their ranged attack, Trash Lob. Before, they would throw a rock that dealt more damage than their clubs, which didn’t make much sense, so now they are throwing trash. Said trash deals less damage than their club, but it can poison opponents; just don’t ask where the trash came from.
2Bulette
The Land Shark
A bulette can be a great way to ambush players who think safety means no visible enemies, particularly when traversing the grasslands of Dungeons & Dragons. They might expect enemies to come from land or air, only for you to surprise them with an attack from the underground.
The 2025 Monster Manual added the bulette pup, a way for even lower-level characters to be surprised by these creatures. However, a pup often signals that a parent is nearby, so if a party of unprepared adventurers slays the pup, they better get ready to face the CR 5 progenitor.
1Gold And Copper Dragons
Quest Givers And Fun Lairs
Metallic dragons oftenguide adventurers through their quests, so they work better as social encounters rather than anything else. You can have the players meet a wyrmling of these dragons, trying to have adventures of its own and failing miserably.
Now, these dragons can impact the players without even meeting them, all thanks to how their lairs affect the surrounding areas. A gold dragon’s lair will have a mist that warns players of danger, while a copper dragon’s lair will have talking animals all around it, and force anyone that rolls a one in a D20 to burst out laughing.
