Minions and Temporary HPs

Sabathius42 said:

My example is thus...

1. Its fairly easy to tell a minion from a normal bad guy through metagaming.

2. Minions are people too (in a simulationist/sandbox world) and have a life. Even that Lvl 27 Human Rabble minion goes home to visit his wife and kids now and then.

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There are level 27 human rabble minions, now?

Hussar said:

a lone 30th level minion?

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No such thing as a lone minion. If you come across minions, it will be, by definition, in a group of four or more.

Furthermore, your example is explicitly ruled out by the rules we've seen so far:

Minion Excerpt said:

When you use minions, you should use those of a level appropriate to the encounter you’re building. The concept of minions is to provide fun filler for encounters, not to provide a way for a 1st level character to gain 1,000+ XP for defeating a 23rd-level abyssal ghoul minion by rolling a natural 20. Minions are a rules abstraction, and one of the many tools a DM has to build exciting encounters.

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Here's the brain bender: The minion template is an encounter mechanic, not a monster mechanic. Examples of monsters with this mechanic applied are given in the MM so the DM can quickly build encounters using pre-fabricated minions, not because minions can be encountered solo 'in the wild'.

Minions drop in one hit because having a dozen or more guards who fall quickly to the heroes' attacks is a common trope of adventure fiction. The minion rules allow an encounter to include that trope, but outside of that encounter those rules break down. Minion rules are only meant to be used within the context of a larger, level-appropriate encounter.

Case in point: Humans can be minions. That doesn't mean that there are human lackeys walking around in the gameworld who live in fear of being attacked by a small dog. And just because they signed up to be a lackey doesn't mean they've suddenly dropped to one hit point, or even that they temporarily acquire the structural strength of a wet noodle whenever they're 'on the clock'.

So, if you come across such an NPC by themselves, then it would probably be a normal creature because the DM hasn't placed it into an encounter using the minion mechanic.

Lurker37 said:

No such thing as a lone minion. If you come across minions, it will be, by definition, in a group of four or more.

Furthermore, your example is explicitly ruled out by the rules we've seen so far:



Here's the brain bender: The minion template is an encounter mechanic, not a monster mechanic. Examples of monsters with this mechanic applied are given in the MM so the DM can quickly build encounters using pre-fabricated minions, not because minions can be encountered solo 'in the wild'.

Minions drop in one hit because having a dozen or more guards who fall quickly to the heroes' attacks is a common trope of adventure fiction. The minion rules allow an encounter to include that trope, but outside of that encounter those rules break down. Minion rules are only meant to be used within the context of a larger, level-appropriate encounter.

Case in point: Humans can be minions. That doesn't mean that there are human lackeys walking around in the gameworld who live in fear of being attacked by a small dog. And just because they signed up to be a lackey doesn't mean they've suddenly dropped to one hit point, or even that they temporarily acquire the structural strength of a wet noodle whenever they're 'on the clock'.

So, if you come across such an NPC by themselves, then it would probably be a normal creature because the DM hasn't placed it into an encounter using the minion mechanic.

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You might want to reread upthread. Not my example, my questioning of the example (done as a joke) upthread.

But, in any case, I agree with you 100%

Minions are good for using in bar fights too I think. Except for that really beefy guy. He's a Brute.

Lurker37 said:

Here's the brain bender: The minion template is an encounter mechanic, not a monster mechanic. Examples of monsters with this mechanic applied are given in the MM so the DM can quickly build encounters using pre-fabricated minions, not because minions can be encountered solo 'in the wild'.

Click to expand...

Bingo. I couldn't have said it better.

I think a lot of the confusion regarding minions is because people are thinking too simulationist about them.

-O