Someone asked (might've been you) what to do with racial bonuses and monster statblocks. The answer was, and is, that monster statblocks don't follow the rules player characters do. I don't see how you can miss that, since it is literally spelled out in the first sentence of the 3rd paragraph. And that same paragraph includes specifics as to how the Veteran breaks with player characters on rules. Like its two-weapon fighting and proficiency bonus.
And if you're interested in how I make NPCs, it's really not that complicated. I usually have an idea of what a character can do in combat, so I find a statblock to modify as needed. I've occasionally dabbled in using actual character sheets, but they tend to punch way above their weight so I rarely do, like a Gloom Stalker Ranger who made a party of 5 dread going out at night all on his own. He didn't even use feats, just basic and legal stats you'd expect from a lvl 10 dex Ranger. Good for very special NPCs though. And when the players drag an NPC into a fight I hadn't planned for, I tend to favor a simple statblock instead of dragging the game down by spending time modifying it, adding any special abilities I need on the fly. Race rarely factor into ot, beyond darkvision and any immunities, like Fey Ancestry, because monster statblocks don't follow the same rules as players.
And, just in general, I tend to increase HP by 25-50%, because I find the basic HP numbers to be too low for my particular players. Even more if we're more than 4 at the table. They defeated a 200 HP Githyanki Gish and two 75 HP Githyanki Warriors in 4 rounds once. But I should've expected as much when we had 2 wizards, a GWM barbarian, a blood hunter sharpshooter and an artificer.
Don't you just hate it when people with dumb opinions have nice avatars?
