2E grognards and mirrors

[Orion]

EDIT: wrong thread, sorry.

This one's not quite polished, but I think there's the germ fo a good idea here...


Bugbear
Fighter
Rogue
Feats: Sneak of Shadows, Novice Power, Adept Power, Initiate Power, Acrobatics Training, Distracting Shield, Shield Push

Priority: STR, DEX, WIS, CON

Riposte Strike
Tide of Iron

Cloud of Steel
Come and Get It
Bait and Switch
Passing Attack

Victorious Surge
Clever Riposte
Villain's Menace

Stalwart Guard
Ignoble Escape
Boundless Endurance

Possessions: Dagger, Scale, Heavy Shield

Notes: The typical Fighter build punishes enemies for not attacking them, and has defenses that make attackign them a waste of time. This Fighter punishes enemies for attacking... or not attacking him. His at-will shtick is to use Riposte strike. If this hits, the enemy is essentially screwed. Attacking anyone *else* leads to an attack at +2 that will probably push them out of attack range, while attacking him leads to... another attack. For the big fights, he can layer on clever riposte to increase the punishment.

Apart from that trick, he's just a fighter with inexplicably sucky dps (though the shot of sneak attack does help). But hey, he's got a ranged attack.

[RandomCasualty2]

Monsters are fucked, and uninteresting, fluff wise.

While I can see the rest of the points you, K and some of the others are making, I don't agree with the idea of uninteresting monsters.

I actually found the monsters in 4E pretty interesting. I like the design and how they tried to give everything some interesting abilities.

I mean 3.5 monsters were dull as fucking rocks. A melee brute in 3.5 did nothing interesting at all. It either did full attacks and pummeled, or it had improved grab and grappled you. That's it. There were so many creatures that just played out exactly the same.

In 4E, it seems creatures have lots of tactical abilities, and that's good. Even something as simple as the goblin tactics or kobold shifty abilities make them more interesting foes. Further, 4E actually has some monsters that fight like rogues, which is also cool, because 3.5 had none of that.

Now granted some of the high level monsters are rushed and uninteresting, but it's pretty clear that the system can create some entertaining battles which are also fairly simple to run too. And that's a good thing.

[The 13 Wise Buttlords]

In 4E, it seems creatures have lots of tactical abilities, and that's good. Even something as simple as the goblin tactics or kobold shifty abilities make them more interesting foes. Further, 4E actually has some monsters that fight like rogues, which is also cool, because 3.5 had none of that.

You know what, though? That just pisses me off even more about 4E.

Why the fuck are monsters more interesting and better at their jobs than PCs?

Take the damn Sorrowsworn Reaper. Over the course of a day, it practically makes a better striker than any non-optimized build. It's not even a boss monster, just a regular ol' leader.

I think a lot of the blame rests upon the incredibly lame ability per day/encounter system, where you can't even use the same manuever twice in one combat. But that still doesn't change the fact that, say, the ability to fly and have Aura of Fear up already gives it two abilities that are better than anything a rogue will get.

What the FUCK, man?

[Maxus]

I think a lot of the blame rests upon the incredibly lame ability per day/encounter system, where you can't even use the same manuever twice in one combat. But that still doesn't change the fact that, say, the ability to fly and have Aura of Fear up already gives it two abilities that are better than anything a rogue will get.

What the FUCK, man?

When I saw that you could only use an encounter/daily maneuver once per combat, I immediately thought about making that two or three times an encounter/day.

[Voss]

RC, read the bit you quote again. You missed the last word entirely.

The monsters exist in a dead void. They appear for encounter, and thats all. Goblins don't break out into Labyrinth-style musical numbers, plot to murder people or anything else. They just wait for people to kill them.

In 4E, it seems creatures have lots of tactical abilities, and that's good. Even something as simple as the goblin tactics or kobold shifty abilities make them more interesting foes. Further, 4E actually has some monsters that fight like rogues, which is also cool, because 3.5 had none of that.

Now granted some of the high level monsters are rushed and uninteresting, but it's pretty clear that the system can create some entertaining battles which are also fairly simple to run too. And that's a good thing

It is. For the first encounter or two. And then their abilities are just a fucking annoyance, and completely predictable. Every kobold fight is going to be an exercise in annoyance unless you've built your characters to encounter it, and its going to be exactly the same thing every time. After two fights with kobolds, I never want to see them again. Goblins shake it up a little, then its a slightly different more of the same.


And really, some? Some? The high level monsters are all even more boring than goblins and kobolds. At least there is some variety between the shield, priest, slinger, archer, and stabber kobolds. The giant piles of hit points that stab or zap you are always giant piles of hit points that stab or zap you.

[RandomCasualty2]

RC, read the bit you quote again. You missed the last word entirely.

The monsters exist in a dead void. They appear for encounter, and thats all. Goblins don't break out into Labyrinth-style musical numbers, plot to murder people or anything else. They just wait for people to kill them.

I'm not sure why the monster manual should even cover that stuff. What goblins do outside of combat is something for a world book to cover. Seriously, I mean sometimes orcs are ravaging marauders, other times they're just brutish humanoids accepted into society on Eberron. Mind flayers may have some elaborate underdark empire, orf they may be isolated monsters you run into in dark tunnels sometimes.

And I'm okay with that. The DM fills in his own flavor text. That's actually kind of good.

It is. For the first encounter or two. And then their abilities are just a fucking annoyance, and completely predictable. Every kobold fight is going to be an exercise in annoyance unless you've built your characters to encounter it, and its going to be exactly the same thing every time. After two fights with kobolds, I never want to see them again. Goblins shake it up a little, then its a slightly different more of the same.

Yeah, admittedly every monster gets boring if you overuse it. I don't think any system can really fix that.

And really, some? Some? The high level monsters are all even more boring than goblins and kobolds. At least there is some variety between the shield, priest, slinger, archer, and stabber kobolds. The giant piles of hit points that stab or zap you are always giant piles of hit points that stab or zap you.

Yeah, I mean lots of the high level crap just doesn't have any variety at all, or is composed of pure bullshit. Did you ever check out the Yuan-Ti groups. They're fucking nuts, considering everyone of them can stun you, often with at will or recharge abilities. Fighting 4-6 of them would be a nightmare for the party.

[Voss]

The problem with overusing monsters is this: they fundamentally didn't make combat interesting. So they compensate by giving every monster a fucking gimmick. Once you've seen that gimmick a couple times, it isn't interesting anymore, nor are gimmicks based off or similar to that gimmick.

If combat is actually interesting in the first place, you don't need to overuse gimmicks to try to fool people into thinking its good.



As to the fluff angle, hell yeah it should. I can throw random numbers together myself, particularly with the stupid chart of Fucked Up Math.
But most of the monsters in the MM that are even vaguely interesting are the ones that I know the legacy material (either myth, legend or old D&D material). For shit I don't know, (which is about 25% of the book, actually more with the shit thats randomly changed for no reason) I don't know what the fuck the point of the monster is. What the hell is a phane? Its a gassy cat-centaur thing that has several levels of arbitrarium vs. damage, and is apparently EBIL, yet can't one-shot a first level human guard. Where does it fit in the world? Is it an evil mastermind that has minions to compensate for the fact that it sucks so bad? Or is it somebody's bitch and gets sent out in large scale suicide missions to annoy people?
I have no idea. I wouldn't want to ever use this monster because it isn't interesting and it doesn't have a fucking hook. Its just a stupid looking phantom fungi type of thing that I don't care about at all. No purpose, no point, just a pile of hit points that you kill while grinding your way to level 30.

That sucks ass. And thats what the 4e MM gives me.

I can do fluff too. But its useful for everyone to have some common ground. Sure, I can pull whatever out of my own head and have whatever monsters running around. But if everyone at the table actually has the same expectation and (common) knowledge about the game world, its probably going to be a better game. Constantly surprising people with weird ass shit is going to make them feel disconnected.

[RandomCasualty2]

The problem with overusing monsters is this: they fundamentally didn't make combat interesting. So they compensate by giving every monster a fucking gimmick. Once you've seen that gimmick a couple times, it isn't interesting anymore, nor are gimmicks based off or similar to that gimmick.

If combat is actually interesting in the first place, you don't need to overuse gimmicks to try to fool people into thinking its good.

Eh, I disagree. Any combat is going to get boring if people keep busting out the same tricks and tactics over and over again. The more you see something, the more monotonous it gets and the more bored people become.

That's one reason that in a level based system you fight monsters of gradually increasing difficulty, that change all the time, because fighting the same thing is pretty boring.

I can do fluff too. But its useful for everyone to have some common ground. Sure, I can pull whatever out of my own head and have whatever monsters running around. But if everyone at the table actually has the same expectation and (common) knowledge about the game world, its probably going to be a better game. Constantly surprising people with weird ass shit is going to make them feel disconnected.

Well, if you're running a game world people know, then people are going to have some common expectation that you've got to follow.

People expect that lizard men and orcs are brutal savages in Forgotten Realms. In Eberron you'd probably try to negotiate with them. In ravenloft, Lycanthropes are pretty much evil as hell, and out to kill you, but that's not always true in every world. I'm not saying that common expectation isn't good, but that's by world, not by monster.

In my worlds Thri-kreen are just intelligent insects that attack you, but in Dark Sun, they're accepted as a race and do other stuff. Your expectations of a race should be based on the world (and thus included in the campaign setting), not included in a generic monster manual. Seriously, I don't really want their flavor in a core book.

[SphereOfFeetMan]

While I can see the rest of the points you, K and some of the others are making, I don't agree with the idea of uninteresting monsters.
...
I'm not sure why the monster manual should even cover that stuff. What goblins do outside of combat is something for a world book to cover. Seriously, I mean sometimes orcs are ravaging marauders, other times they're just brutish humanoids accepted into society on Eberron.
...
Your expectations of a race should be based on the world (and thus included in the campaign setting), not included in a generic monster manual. Seriously, I don't really want their flavor in a core book.

In a nutshell, your defense of 4e's lack of interesting monsters (Rp/fluff-wise) is that the Rp stuff shouldn't be in the Monster Manual, but in different campaign books. How does this defense handle the fact that the Rp stuff won't be in the campaign books for the vast majority of monsters?

[K]

Well, if you're running a game world people know, then people are going to have some common expectation that you've got to follow.

People expect that lizard men and orcs are brutal savages in Forgotten Realms. In Eberron you'd probably try to negotiate with them. In ravenloft, Lycanthropes are pretty much evil as hell, and out to kill you, but that's not always true in every world. I'm not saying that common expectation isn't good, but that's by world, not by monster.

In my worlds Thri-kreen are just intelligent insects that attack you, but in Dark Sun, they're accepted as a race and do other stuff. Your expectations of a race should be based on the world (and thus included in the campaign setting), not included in a generic monster manual. Seriously, I don't really want their flavor in a core book.

I think you can do both.

I mean, the default DnD campaign accepts that there are multiple worlds where things are different on many levels. One of the things that the later MMs did well was tell you how certain monsters fit into the setting of certain worlds.

I mean, you really can talk about how rakshasa in Eberron are the prime demon race, but in other settings they tend to be loners.

I think it would really fire people's imaginations to see three or four takes on a race.

[Voss]

The problem with overusing monsters is this: they fundamentally didn't make combat interesting. So they compensate by giving every monster a fucking gimmick. Once you've seen that gimmick a couple times, it isn't interesting anymore, nor are gimmicks based off or similar to that gimmick.

If combat is actually interesting in the first place, you don't need to overuse gimmicks to try to fool people into thinking its good.

Eh, I disagree. Any combat is going to get boring if people keep busting out the same tricks and tactics over and over again. The more you see something, the more monotonous it gets and the more bored people become.

And thats why 4e is bad. No one has any option but to bust out the same tricks over and over and over. Previously, people had more options. Other games, people have more options, and there was really the possibility for monsters that weren't solved by 'I hit it in the face 10 times'.

Your argument seems to come down to '4e isn't that bad because there are other things that suck'. That isn't an argument for 4e. Its a statement that lumps 4e in the discard pile of 'things that suck'... where it belongs.

[Ravengm]

Granted, 3e and 4e both have things that need to be changed. However, it's always easier to tone down cheese than to make crap up. 3e is salvageable becuase the DM can essentially take an eraser to spell and ability descriptions, make a couple editing marks, and be done with it.

4e? Not so much. I don't want to rewrite 400 powers from scratch. It'd work, but I wouldn't have the patience.

[Maxus]

So, to borrow easily-at-hand examples...

Elves--

-The world's primary spellcasters, and very proud of their history of magic, and spend a lot of their time in studies, as a race.

-Very carefree folk who live in the woods. Lots of woodcraft and so on.

-Arrogant ethnocentric xenophobic bastards, but skilled warriors when they can be convinced to fight.

-the world's oldest culture/race.