Anatomy of Failed Design: 3E NPC/Monster creation

[RandomCasualty2]

Why a system?

Yeah, the PCs need something to fight. But in the first place, why have a monster creation system? You could just make up numbers and arbitrary abilities for your monster and just write those down? It's certainly faster. Having a system means you have more rules to learn and you have to reference those rules to make enemies, and it slows down the game to some degree. So why bother making your game more complex than it has to be?

The real answer is that we want a method to help us design adversaries (and by extension, encounters) that won't kill our players. In combat heavy games like D&D, this is essential. We want our encounters to be dramatic and close, but not deadly. And to achieve that delicate balance, it's important that the PC's adversaries, be they medusa archer or elven ranger, are adequately balanced.


I didn't come here to watch you do your taxes: Speed is everything
Okay, so we want a way to measure a given adversaries power. But what else does such a system need?

Well first of all, it needs to be fast. If you can't use it fast enough, it just isn't useful. One of the big advantages of tabletop gaming is that it's freeform. And as DMs we all know how rapidly PCs can derail what we expect is a simple plot. And that's fine... plots get derailed, it's a fact of life. Your game should actively work to accommodate that fact.

If you want decide to punch the lord in the face and what the DM thought was a social encounter now turns into a combat encounter. What happens then. Maybe your DM didn't even plan on you doing this, and has no idea what the stats of the lord and his guards actually are. Well it's time to write up some monsters.

So he needs to create these characters midsession. But we better not hold up the game, so your system needs to be fast. There's no question about it. If you want a game where people can think outside the box, you better be able to draw up stuff outside the box without having to delay the game.

Monsters and NPCs need to fit their flavor
This is an RPG, so if you're generating a dragon, it better breathe fire. And if you're generating an enchanter, it should have abilities that people would expect an enchanter to have. Your system needs to be able to do that. Whether it's freeform in that it expects you to just choose thematically appropriate abilities or whether you actually assign it some kind of enchanter class or type, that's important.

Monsters should be easily playable
The DM's job is a complicated one. While a PC has a luxury of running a single mini on a board, the DM is controlling possibly 20 or more creatures at once. That means that those monsters need to be manageable. DMs don't want to track little small +1 conditional bonuses and that bullshit to determine if a kobold hits. Nor do they want to have to keep track of a ton of minor buffs or any of that bullshit.

Whenever possible, keep it simple, because as referee, the DM has a lot of things to do.

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The Analysis
Now that we know what makes an adversary creation system, lets go and analyze the 3E version.

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How strong is a level 10 giant?
Okay... so everything uses classes. Even monsters use monster classes like humanoid, giant, undead, etc. And those classes have hit dice and base attack bonus, and all that crap. And you think... well okay, a 10 hit dice (or level 10) giant is equivalent to a level 10 PC.

Well no. Because a level 10 giant doesn't really get anything that you care about. It's a weaker chassis than the warrior NPC class that oddly enough fights as well as a cleric. Why? Fuck if I know. Outsiders on the other hand are made of awesome.

And here's where things start to go to shit. To make up for this power discrepancy, somebody got the great idea of just stacking on hit dice. So now hit dice is virtually meaningless compared to PC level, and we need a new category to determine how tough a monster is. And thus, Challenge Rating was born.

Of course, there's no real obvious correlation between CR and Hit dice. Some monsters have CR less than half their hit dice. Others have them about equal. But remember, CR is the thing we actually care about. The #1 use of the monster creation system is to generate challenging, but not deadly encounters. So that CR is what we care about. That's the magic number.

But guess what? CR is determined arbitrarily. Literally nothing in the entire fucking system helps you figure out the CR of the monster you just made. It's just a cruel joke. The system does pretty much everything else, except rate a monster's CR.

But sure, you're saying... monster classes must do something. They determine base attack bonus. Well yeah, they do, but BaB isn't the only way to calculate a monster's attack bonus. In fact, the other half comes from ability scores. And guess what. That shit is entirely arbitrary. And the moment you add an arbitrary value, the whole fucking thing is fucked. If your system is X+Y, if Y is some value you pulled out of your ass, it doesn't matter what X happens to be, because Y can always fuck it up and the system can't account for what Y might be, because it's totally fucking random.

And there's an arbitrary value for every single fucking stat you care about. Attack bonus adds strength, Fort save adds con, will save adds wisdom, AC adds natural armor. Yup... every fucking stat that matters in game is now arbitrary.

Surely monster abilities must come from some table or something? Nope... entirely arbitrary.

But... but.... Their DCs are supposed to be determined by the hit dice! And you say... wow, maybe the hit dice actually means something. Nope... you add an arbitrary ability score to it. Once again, totally pointless. Might as well just pick a number out of your ass. That's where a giant's strength comes from.

So take a moment to realize that you're doing all this work, and you're getting zero return on it. Okay great.



Tax Code: Fill it out in triplicate!
Well okay, so it's not very accurate at determining CR... but I'm sure that it's at least fast. Right? Fuck no.

It's slow as shit. Because remember those monster levels that didn't do anything to help you determine CR? Well it turns out that they determine a bunch of substats, like a monster's base saves and BaB. Which you then have to add with the monsters ability scores, those arbitrary values which destroy any semblance of having a meaningful system.

And you think, well okay... maybe all this number crunching is worth it. I mean maybe those final numbers you just calculated can get you a CR, right? Wrong fuckers. CR is the one value you don't calculate. That's determined by eyeball.

Oh but it gets better... it's not just enough that you have to do all that math, but now you have to make your monsters like they were PCs by giving them feats.

Why, I don't fucking know, because you could have just assigned abilities arbitrarily that do the exact same thing, but each monster has to get 1 feat per 3 hit dice it has, you know, just like the players get. I guess there's some monster's rights union out there enforcing these trivial factors. I mean if you're going to hand out monster abilities arbitrarily, why not just hand out feat abilities arbitrarily. The numbers are arbitrary, the medusa's petrifying gaze is arbitrary, why bother wasting your time even opening the players handbook and picking out feats.

At this point, you're not creating something more balanced, you're just wasting the DM's time. It's kinda like trying to keep flies off shit because the flies might get the shit dirty.

NPCs are PCs: Because the DM clearly has no life
Ok so monster creation doesn't work... at all.

But now you're saying... NPCs are different! They use PC classes. They aren't shitty like those awful monster classes. Their CR = their level. Only due to the system requiring a huge amount of rules mastery, the CRs of PC classes are way out there. Your 1st level wizard might be a TPK in a can if he took color spray, or he might be a laughable joke if he took magic missile. Writing wizard 1 doesn't necessarily equal CR 1.

PCs take a fucking long time to make in 3.5. You don't just write up a random fighter and expect him to compete with stuff of his CR. You better be prepared to dumpster dive your ass off for the best feats, magical gear and prestige classes. Even making a wizard or cleric isn't exactly trivial. You've got a bunch of buffs to worry about, and have to keep long lists of your spells tracked. And don't forget, you better shop around for those magical items. Creating a competitive PC is a lot of work.

And in their wisdom, the designers of 3E decided, hell yeah, the DM can do that for every single fucking NPC in the game!

And this is where things really go to crazy town. Writing up a monster is a pain in the ass, and it makes you jump through a bunch of hoops that you don't even need to, but when you get to NPCs, it actually expects you to set a significant amount of your life on fire to make them. Yeah, every mid to high level NPC you write has to go to the magic shop and equip himself with his own gear. And he needs feats and he has to do every little trick PCs do to compete.



Magic item shopping: We're all out of lube
Well, guess what. PCs have magic items, so NPCs have to as well. It's only fair, right?

Only what happens if every NPC has as much treasure as every PC. The PC can kill an NPC of his level and literally double his wealth. Well that's a huge balance problem. We really can't have that. So we give NPCs less wealth. But wait... now don't they have a CR discrepancy. If the PC fighter gets all this awesome gear and the NPC can't afford it, then being a PC fighter is way better, right?

Well the designers have their solution: Consumable items. Yeah. Just hand them potions and crap. That way they can drink their way to power and the money is gone. Can't afford a +2 sword, oil of greater magic weapon! Sound good?

Well guess what, DM? You just got it stuck up your ass, again. This means you're going to have a ton of extra shit to keep track of in combat. Your NPC now has a potion of bulls strength that he can drink, and oil of GMW he can put on his sword and an oil of magic vestment he can pour on his armor. And you have to track him both buffed and unbuffed (in case, you know, he doesn't get a chance to drink it.) And you also have to worry about whether he drank it. And if all your NPC warriors have potions of fly, bull's strength and so on, you've got a lot of bullshit to keep track of.

Oh and... um... you also have to buy the NPCs gear with virtual gold too. So better make sure those potions aren't too expensive! But hey, that whole storyline you wanted to do can wait, you have math and shopping to do!

NPCs are PCs: Or are they?
Well, it doesn't build challenging encounters, it's slower than a sedated turtle... does it at least build reasonable story characters?

Well the answer here is "sort of". While it's true that NPCs do the same things PCs do, they don't really play the same way.

When was the last time you saw an NPC fight through 4 encounters in a day and conserve his spells? Probably never. Lets face it, NPCs exist only to kick your PCs asses; that's the one big encounter they're going to have and their moment in the spotlight. They can damn well blow their entire wad trying to win that battle, and really there's no reason they wouldn't.

Now is the time the PC spellcasters are probably standing up saying, "Wait, that's not fair! I have to conserve my spells!"

And they're right. That's not fair. That's in fact, horribly unfair. By treating NPCs like PCs, you're giving NPCs an edge because they can ignore resource conservation. So the NPC wizard gets all the spell slots the PC wizard does... only he doesn't have to ration them, and can just go nova.

Think you're playing the same game... well, you're not.

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What's the alternative?

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Well before we worry about better systems, lets just assume that we tried it without having any fucking system at all. Lets just pull numbers out of thin air. If you want NPCs to have an item, you don't buy it, you just give it to them. If you want them to have an ability, you give it to them. Similar to what Shadowrun does.

Encounter Difficulty: Winner - Draw. In terms of determining a challenge rating, pulling numbers of your ass and eyeballing things is bad at determining challenge rating. But then, the 3E system relied entirely on eyeballing to figure out CR anyway.

Speed: Winner - No system. Pulling numbers out of your ass may not be accurate, but it is incredibly fast, and requires zero tax code. It's also completely modular, meaning that you invent stats as they're created. You don't need to know any particular adversaries' specific skills until you need that skill, because there are minimal substats. 3E's system is left in the dust.

Story consistency: Winner - Draw. While pulling crap out of your ass may seem like the NPCs don't feel real, you're going to pull out numbers that make sense, and you in fact don't have to worry about a system creating stuff that doesn't make sense, because you can create exactly what you want. So yeah, nothing really lost here. The ability to make things consistent is just up to the person making the NPC or monster.

Ease of Play: Winner - No system. Since you're not constrained to making things like PCs, you can just hand out whatever modifiers you want and not worry about small conditional bonuses, or have to use tricks like have NPCs use consumable items to save on money.

So that's it. Literally the 3E system is worse than not having a system at all. In all of our important criteria, the best it did was achieve a tie half the time, and it lost in the other two. To make matters worse, it lost really horribly in the speed category.

And this is comparing it to having no system at all!

To put it another way... consider this analogy. If you want to get to the store to buy something, you could always walk. You have that option by default. Ideally you'd like a bike or even a car to make your trip easier. The 3E system is like a broken car that you decide to push to the store. It's harder than just walking and has no benefits. It's just added dead weight that you're pushing around.

Lets lay this horseshit system to rest once and for all. It fucking sucks. And you shouldn't be apologizing for it. This system has no redeeming qualities, and if you like it, you should feel ashamed.

It is without a doubt, the worst part of the entire edition.

[NativeJovian]

I don't think some of these problems are solvable. The encounter difficulty balancing, in particular, strikes me as impossible to ever really "fix". You can do better than 3E does, certainly, but in the end it's always going to come down to the fact that your party is different than everyone else's party, so assumptions made from some "default" are going to be wrong, and horribly wrong in some cases.

A simple example: a magic-heavy party is going to get its collective ass kicked by a golem, due to the fact that most golems are immune to most magic. Even if a CR 11 stone golem is a good challenge for the "average" level 11 party (and let's assume that that's true, just for the sake of argument), a level 11 party of arcane full-casters is going to have a hell of a lot more trouble with one than a level 11 party of beefy melee types, simply due to the nature of the beast. There's no possible way for a system to take this into account -- nor do we really want it to, given that if it was possible it would involve lots of math with questionable basis in reality (imagine trying to quantify things like the general magic ability or durability or sneakiness of the party as a whole). This is, quite honestly, why the game is played with a DM -- so they can make this sort of judgment call, and decide that a stone golem is better used as a boss fight for their magic-heavy party at level 15, rather than a random battle at level 11.

The speed issue is easier to fix, but there are a few different ways to go about it. The easiest would be to simply have a stable of monster entries to use as-is and that's it. Need to use something? Just look it up and run it. Fast and easy. Problem is that it doesn't allow any sort of customization -- and if you want to throw a two-headed cave troll sorcerer at your party, you really should be able to, even if there's no "two-headed cave troll sorcerer" entry in the monster manual. One way of handling that would be through templates -- you take the "cave troll" entry and apply the "two-headed" and "sorcerer" templates to it (or in a more extreme case, start with "troll" and add "cave dweller" to it as well). That's usually pretty simple to do -- templates just stack on top of premade monsters, so it's mostly just adding abilities on ("two-headed creatures cannot be flanked") or replacing stuff with other stuff ("cave dwelling creatures lose the ability to see, but gain blindsense in its place").

The problem is that that's still not very customizable, and it may be difficult to implement things like the "sorcerer" template without just flat-out giving the thing levels of sorcerer, which blows the "fast and easy" aspect straight out of the water.

In the end, it might simply be best to provide all of these options -- you have your basic monsters, you have your stick-on templates for instant variety, and you have your complex-but-fully-customizable from-scratch monster generation rules. You can't have one ruleset that does everything for everyone when you have conflicting goals like speed of use and depth of customization, so the best you can do in that situation is provide for both and let the users decide which they want in any given situation.

[RandomCasualty2]

I don't think some of these problems are solvable. The encounter difficulty balancing, in particular, strikes me as impossible to ever really "fix". You can do better than 3E does, certainly, but in the end it's always going to come down to the fact that your party is different than everyone else's party, so assumptions made from some "default" are going to be wrong, and horribly wrong in some cases.

A simple example: a magic-heavy party is going to get its collective ass kicked by a golem, due to the fact that most golems are immune to most magic.

Not really. No. Mages do fine against golems due to the fact that while you can't fireball one, you can totally hide behind an illusory wall of stone, or just go invisible and walk past it. Even the epic golems have no way to deal with something as simple as invisibility.

But lets ignore that for the moment and get to the broader issue.

Yeah, we're never going to get a challenge system that's going to be spot on accurate, just like we're never going to have perfectly balanced PC classes. But that's not really a reason to just write the whole thing off and not bother to try at all.

The speed issue is easier to fix, but there are a few different ways to go about it. The easiest would be to simply have a stable of monster entries to use as-is and that's it. Need to use something? Just look it up and run it.

Problem is that then you're not thinking outside the box. You're literally limited to whatever happens to be in your stable. For NPCs, that's downright crippling.

Because remember, if you're handing enemies abiltiy scores, before you can even think of turning your hobgoblin into a mage, you need to find a smart hobgoblin. Otherwise you have to restructure ability scores, which basically means everything gets changed around and you're recalculating a monster from scratch. Not to mention you probably invalidate the arbitrary CR that it had before, rendering the creature useless.

Fast and easy. Problem is that it doesn't allow any sort of customization -- and if you want to throw a two-headed cave troll sorcerer at your party, you really should be able to, even if there's no "two-headed cave troll sorcerer" entry in the monster manual. One way of handling that would be through templates -- you take the "cave troll" entry and apply the "two-headed" and "sorcerer" templates to it (or in a more extreme case, start with "troll" and add "cave dweller" to it as well).

Templates don't work well, because they're inflexible and very specific. For instance, we could make a template "sorcerer" or "Warrior" to add but that's going to add a fixed increase to CR. And this is generally contrary to the design you're going to use to build an encounter.

Remember, it all starts with the PCs. I say... look okay, my PCs are level 12, and I want to have this spellcasting troll hag. So I now want a troll that's say CR 13. But the regular troll is only CR 5 and the sorcerer template only adds +3 CR to it. Now what?

Now it seems we're going to need a book of monsters and a book of templates, and it's still going to run into problems because we're going to need to restructure ability scores and crap to make the templates work. Otherwise you end up wtih the troll wizard with 6 int.

I just don't think the complex system + modification paradigm is the way to go. When you have too many substats, you're just going to have things that are too complex to modify. We shouldn't ever have this idea that we need piles and piles of sample pregens to get anywhere.

I think the way to go really has to be just having the design system be quick in itself. Throwing something together should be fast and easy. 4E really had the right idea, but it didn't make it detailed enough.

You should always start with CR first, or level or whatever you want to call it.

I'm creating a level X monster or NPC. That's where we start. I think the 4E concept of having a monster role or type is a good one. Based on that, you get some numbers for your creature. No substats like strength, dex or con, just final numbers. Attack bonus, saves, hit points, etc.

You should have a simple algorithm to modify these stats. You can for instance subtract up to 3 from any stat and add up to 3 to any other, but the amount you subtract must equal to the amount you add.

Then you add special abilities based on a chart (also arranged by level). Each monster type gets abilities by whatever type it is. Brute monsters would only have a small amount of abilities, since their basic attack chassis is so good. Weaker chassis types, like spellcaster monsters, would get several abilities, better than what's available to the brute. There may also be a "gimmick" monster type which gets a single very powerful ability, which is used for stuff like basilisks or medusas.

You may also have some traits, which are sorta like abilities, but used more to represent what a monster can do well. These are things like "strong" or "charismatic", and give a monster skills as well as the ability to bash down doors and the like.

So your monster may look like:

Hill Giant
Type: Brute
Special abilities: Stunning smash, rock tossing
Traits: Strength (x2), Huge, Clumsy, Stupid

Basilisk
Type: Gimmick Monster
Special Abilities: Petrifying Gaze, bite attack
Traits: Can't use equipment, darkvision.

[Cynic]

The well used put things together mechanic only works for experienced DMS.but that is a thought that goes without saying and I'm sure you've only used it as the easiest analogy.

One method I had originally thought of in relation to the 3e system was to really just remove the unnecessary stats for monster creation.

Hmm -- strong brute - throw away that int and assume it's intelligent enough to survive two curses maybe.

magus - fuck that strength.

it might come in handy when people want to use it in grapple or for those curses. but still then it's not necessary. at that moment just drop in a 10.

traits - you have covered.

and the rest is easy.

[PhoneLobster]

Hill Giant
Type: Brute
Special abilities: Stunning smash, rock tossing
Traits: Strength (x2), Huge, Clumsy, Stupid

Basilisk
Type: Gimmick Monster
Special Abilities: Petrifying Gaze, bite attack
Traits: Can't use equipment, darkvision.

Now you know I disagree with you on this topic.

But despite that, at least cosmetically this is a lot like what monster descriptions should or could look like.

Still it does bring up two of the reasons why you are talking out of your ass on this.

1) Pregenerated Characters and Tables
You consistently screamed that this was unacceptable/not allowed or simply refused to admit it might be an existing tool for systems of 3E levels of complexity.

But really if your monster build examples aren't a short list of references to much larger sets of information from pregenerated tables and lists then I don't know what the hell you think they are.

2) NPCs are 60% or more of your game
The complexity of your game is defined by it's content.

NPCs are the majority of the content.

If the short list of abilities you provided for monster examples there aren't references for more complex content then you have just defined the complexity level of your game.

And it's somewhat simpler than Descent. Which though fun is just a simple board game.

[erik]

Given that I had very few monster/challenge problems over years of play with many DMs and players, as compares to bigger problems trying to challenge parties since same leveled characters were playing at entirely different levels... I would disagree with the claim that monsters/npc creation are the worst part of the game. Shitty fighters/monks/etc were the worst part of the game for my experience.

I do enjoy that your arguments here completely contradict the b.s. you had been spewing as of late bout npcs though, RC. If you are going to bitch that npcs nova and are unfair then mayhaps we have seen the end of the tired old rant that npcs are weak and you must spend forever to min max then so they are a challenge, yea?

For that matter how again are pcs and npcs different? Do you think that is your players squared off against equivalent characters except with better equipment, spells/feats, and outnumbering you at least 4 to 1 that your players would not go nova themselves?

If you just take monsters and npc tables then your arguments neatly crumble. It is when you alter monsters or npcs unintelligently (and that includes overthinking npcs for hours) that things get awful.

There are real problems with 3e challenges but your perspective is so thoroughly entrenched in contradictions and crazytown that I cannot take this thread seriously.

[IGTN]

NPCs can both nova and take too long to optimize to get to any effectiveness, since NPC is a wide category that includes both Fighters and Sorcerers.

[erik]

I will not deny there are problems and I readily admit (and already complained!) that noncasters are not in the same league as casters. But if you make the claim that npcs are too strong then you look like a retard when you also claim you must spend hours making them stronger. Obviously there must be a viable middle which is being overlooked.

[IGTN]

Fighters take hours to make competent.

Psions and Sorcerers just cast everything and nova.

Wizards take hours to make them compliant with the rules unless you do something like pick spells at random (not actually a bad idea for NPC wizards), and then just cast everything, making them the worst of both worlds.

[MGuy]

I would think that before we start thinking about pregens and monster generators at all that the classes should have some kind of balance. I don't think that the CRs can be accurately generated if the balance of the classes isn't approached. So before you work on monster generation I think there is quite a large amount of work you need to put into other things like the balance of classes, races (racial LA), wealth/level (magic items), etc then make an approach with the hard numbers attained from the new balance to the monsters. If you want to base the classes on the challenges that monsters present on the other hand then you'd need to lay out what kind of challenges PCs should face at each level cause the current CR system has quite a few bugs that need to be ironed out.

[K]

Yes, 3e uses a very complicated system of character and monster generation which is deeply flawed and only gives the most general benchmarks of power.

1e, 2e and 4e all have a quick and easy method to make the same NPCs and monsters. This method is "make crap up randomly" and this method gives no benchmarks at all.

What's your point? There's a lot of page space spent devoted to explaining obvious truths.

[Draco_Argentum]

Yes, 3e uses a very complicated system of character and monster generation which is deeply flawed and only gives the most general benchmarks of power.

3e really gives no benchmark at all. The numbers and abilities a monster gets are "make crap up randomly".

[Red_Rob]

1e, 2e and 4e all have a quick and easy method to make the same NPCs and monsters. This method is "make crap up randomly" and this method gives no benchmarks at all.

I would just like to point out that the 2nd Ed. DM's guide did have a section detailing a system for generating the XP value for any given creature from the stats you had given it, which whilst not really the same as a CR, was the closest 2nd Ed. had as a guide to the power level of monsters. So it wasn't "no benchmarks at all" it was make up crap randomly and then assign a value based on the result, which seems a quicker and easier way than the convoluted 3rd Ed. system.

Although i must say, it was highly inaccurate. Even with my 2nd Ed. fanboy hat on i can't pretend it was very well balanced. But it was quick and easy to use and gave a rough approximation, so maybe it isn't totally useless as an example of how it can be done.

[technophile]

I would just like to point out that the 2nd Ed. DM's guide did have a section detailing a system for generating the XP value for any given creature from the stats you had given it, which whilst not really the same as a CR, was the closest 2nd Ed. had as a guide to the power level of monsters. So it wasn't "no benchmarks at all" it was make up crap randomly and then assign a value based on the result, which seems a quicker and easier way than the convoluted 3rd Ed. system.

Unless your goal is to come up with a level-appropriate challenge for your players, in which case the 2e system rapidly devolves to "make up random stats, realize XP value is way too high, change something, recalculate, notice XP value is still too high, lather, rinse, repeat". (Which I guess if each step was fast enough might be reasonable, for small numbers of iterations.)

I think the idea of the 3e CR system was that you want to start with the "end result" (I want a creature that will challenge, but not TPK, my 8th-level party) and work backwards to the stats and abilities.

Which, granted, is a much harder problem than going the other way, given how many different ways there are to build NPCs and monsters.

[Spaghetti Western]

Yes, 3e uses a very complicated system of character and monster generation which is deeply flawed and only gives the most general benchmarks of power.

3e really gives no benchmark at all. The numbers and abilities a monster gets are "make crap up randomly".

It's not random . something with a CR of 30 is going to be more powerful than a CR of 3. However it is not precise. So it is really is a general benchmark of power

[PoliteNewb]

Unless your goal is to come up with a level-appropriate challenge for your players, in which case the 2e system rapidly devolves to "make up random stats, realize XP value is way too high, change something, recalculate, notice XP value is still too high, lather, rinse, repeat". (Which I guess if each step was fast enough might be reasonable, for small numbers of iterations.)

But in 2E, "CR" was really tied fairly closely to HD...HD were used as the base, and special abilities gave "effective HD" for increasing the power level/XP value. (and aside from fringe cases, like ogre magi, drow, and some devils and shit, most times HD were your major indicator of power level/CR).

So if you wanted a monster of a specific power level, you started with HD. And then essentially "sold" HD for special abilities...extra attacks, better AC, SLA's, whatever. You could totally work it backwards if you wanted.

Also remember there were a lot fewer stats to work with on a 2E critter to futz everything up...they basically had AC, HD, movement, attack forms, and special abilities/defenses. No feats, no ability scores, etc. It was a good bit more "bare bones", which made it easier to swap things around.

It's not random . something with a CR of 30 is going to be more powerful than a CR of 3. However it is not precise. So it is really is a general benchmark of power

2E gave the exact same vague benchmark...it was just based on HD, not CR. Again, it was not precise, but it worked roughly as advertised.

[Murtak]

What I would like to see is a list of abilities and modifiers appropriate for each CR. Ideally in a sortable format, with tags like "mind-affecting" or "movement". Then when I want to whip up a CR 10 golem I look at some tables, pick an AC that is considered high for that CR, a touch AC that is terrible, some random combat abilities appropriate for CR 10, some powerful defenses and if I want to be thorough I work out his ability modifiers from those stats.

Sure its a compromise and you can't build exact PC copies which such a system, but it should work fine to build random monsters and NPCs.

Thoughts?

[MGuy]

Sounds like it might also help with LAs.

[Murtak]

Or for designing new classes ... or artifacts ... the more I think about the more useful it sounds. So what about starting on it? I suggest this format:

Dominate (15)
Mind-affecting, Cohort

Lets you dominate a target creature (as per dominate creature). Default duration is measured in rounds.

+ Longer duration, Multiple targets
- Restricted Targets, Only one dominate effect at a time, Longer cast time

[Draco_Argentum]

It's not random . something with a CR of 30 is going to be more powerful than a CR of 3. However it is not precise. So it is really is a general benchmark of power

So you can point me to the page that calculates CR then?

CR was the most arbitrary part of 3e monsters, there was no process for generating that at all.

[Murtak]

Read what you just quoted. Are you really arguing that the chances of defeating a random CR 20 monster are the same as the chances of defeating a random CR 1 monster are? Because that is what random means. I'm sure we all agree that the CRs by the book are not precise and that it involves a lot of guesswork to assign CRs to newly created monsters. But to literally argue that the CR means nothing at all is moronic.

[violence in the media]

What I would like to see is a list of abilities and modifiers appropriate for each CR. Ideally in a sortable format, with tags like "mind-affecting" or "movement". Then when I want to whip up a CR 10 golem I look at some tables, pick an AC that is considered high for that CR, a touch AC that is terrible, some random combat abilities appropriate for CR 10, some powerful defenses and if I want to be thorough I work out his ability modifiers from those stats.

Sure its a compromise and you can't build exact PC copies which such a system, but it should work fine to build random monsters and NPCs.

Thoughts?

I'd worry that monster creation would become too random. As in there's no consistency. Using your AC example, would all Large Golems with equivalent Dexterity have the same touch AC? Why or why not? If you want to make a monster "tougher", should you give it Damage Reduction, Armor Class, or Hit Points? Maybe Fast Healing? All of the above?

Of course, you can write your creations down and refer back to them if the party encounters another one, though there has been argument against that sort of thing. So, how do you make sure the party feels like they can get a pretty good handle on what monsters can do and that they're not constantly at the mercy of random ability aggregations?

Things like that are one of the reasons that Yak Men (IIRC?) annoyed me. They're big buffalo/minotaur-looking motherfuckers that have some strange affinity for magical staves and a bizarre ability to crawl inside your body and puppet you around. Like some sort of magic jar effect that their body comes along on. Where did that come from? I mean, besides Al-Qadim?

[Starmaker]

I'm sure we all agree that the CRs by the book are not precise and that it involves a lot of guesswork to assign CRs to newly created monsters.

Precise CRs are impossible.
How does one go about determining CR in the most direct way? By comparing the monster in question with PCs built to go 50-50 with other monsters of a particular CR. That's two degrees of separation, plus the number of options for PCs increases, which leads to power creep (according to the second law of thermodynamics).
Precise CRs do not exist, but it doesn't matter, because the circumstantial margin of swinginess (encountering various parties in various environments) is wider.

[Murtak]

I'd worry that monster creation would become too random. As in there's no consistency. Using your AC example, would all Large Golems with equivalent Dexterity have the same touch AC? Why or why not? If you want to make a monster "tougher", should you give it Damage Reduction, Armor Class, or Hit Points? Maybe Fast Healing? All of the above?

Of course, you can write your creations down and refer back to them if the party encounters another one, though there has been argument against that sort of thing. So, how do you make sure the party feels like they can get a pretty good handle on what monsters can do and that they're not constantly at the mercy of random ability aggregations?

Presumably you have some sort of monster in mind already. The lists are just guidelines to help you pick stats and abilities. In my example you decide you want some sort of metal man, so you pick an AC from a range that is considered high for its CR. If you want a flesh golem you would probably pick a low or medium AC. Then you decide you want your golem to have some sort of firebreathing ability - you look at the list, see that a CR 10 golem is probably fine with a 10d6 cone every round, or a 15d6 cone every 1d4 rounds and that it's DC should probably be around 20 to 25.

It is not intended to be a random list to roll on, though I guess you could do just that for some monster whose flavor text is "spawned from primal chaos".

[NativeJovian]

I was thinking about this, and it seems to me that instead of balancing monsters by the sort of party that could take them down, wouldn't it make more sense to balance them in comparison to an individual character?

Balancing by party is difficult/impossible because you have to make assumptions about what the "average" party is. The standard would probably be a four-man party that includes a melee type, a healy type, a blasty type, and a roguish type. But how often do you actually run into that party? It's a useless rubric because it makes invalid assumptions. The group I play with is fairly large, so we frequently have 6-8 character parties. Well, now CR is useless to us. Wonderful.

But if monsters were balanced in reference to characters, wouldn't that make things easier? If you knew "this monster is roughly equivalent to a level 7 character", then that's useful information regardless of the size and composition of your party. This assumes that you have balanced classes (ie every PC is roughly equal in power regardless of what their class is), which may not be the case right now, but is certainly something that can be done eventually. You would need some guidelines as to what makes a good challenge -- is one "level 10" monster a good match for a party of five level 7 characters? How about eight "level 5" monsters? You'd need some playtesting to determine the formulas there, but if you've done it right you should be able to figure something out.

This would also have the happy side effect of getting rid of stupid shit like LA and racial HD for generating ECL. If a level 10 monster is equivalent to a level 10 character, then you should be able to just USE a level 10 monster in place of a level 10 character without having to worry about balance issues. Adding class levels on top of that might be tricky (a level 10 monster with 1 level of wizard, so they can cast Ray of Frost and Magic Missile, isn't equivalent to a level 11 monster), but it's certainly better than the current system.