Another awesome scenario made feasible by minions

[Scribble]

It will also play nicely into the whole: Grab a fool and take his uniform so we'z can sneak into the castle schtik.

 

[LostInTheMists]

Personally, when I think of minions, I think of The Tick vs. a rooftop full of ninjas.

 

[shilsen]

The same reason that switching from THAC0 and descending AC to Attack Bonus and ascending AC was.

The concept is ludicrously simple. It's still a frikkin' good idea to implement.

Yup, yup, and yup. There are lots of things I did with 3e/3.5e which required me to be very creative and mess with the rules as written. Just like I had house-ruled Thac0 and AC to ascending numbers in my 2e games. But a ruleset which already does that for me is one I can seriously get behind.

 

[Amphimir Míriel]

Personally, when I think of minions, I think of The Tick vs. a rooftop full of ninjas.

Actually, when I think of minions, I think of the Law of Conservation of Ninjitsu (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ConservationOfNinjitsu)

Im happy to be able to provide my players with this kind of scenario... predictable, but fun

 

[Cirex]

This makes me think of the "28 Days Later"-style zombie infestation campaign that a guy over on the WotC boards recounted in his famous "Lessons From DMing with my GF" thread. He had the PCs meet in a tavern, as you do, and then started the zombie attack. The PCs were holed up in the upper floor of the tavern for weeks, iirc, before they were able to make a break for it and slowly went from building to building until they made it to an abandoned but still well-stocked armory and then from building to building until they made it to some abandoned temple where they spent the winter holed up in safety, etc etc. Was very cool and it's something I've been wanting to try myself. The fact that 4e has a variety of zombies, some of which are 1hp minions, will make this sort of adventure much more doable as well. I also like how zombies go down on a critical hit.

I tried running Zombigeddon myself. However, it was with an unexperienced party and it became tedious. I may try it again with 4e and with my friends, maybe it works better, but I will be doing it in a big castle or something else. Mapping an entire city was too exhausting.

 

[F5]

I think what has people excited is somethign that minions actually seem to be a result of.

I think in 4e they've (finally) realized that monsters shouldn't just have monsterness determining their power. They should have race/class just like the PCs.

Agreeing with this, but with one nit-pick: they've recognized that the class/race needs of the monsters are DIFFERENT than that of the PCs, in order to make the game run easier. 3.X had the race/class for monsters thing, but it was the exact same class structure as the PCs had, which caused extra headaches.

Admitting it makes my simulationist-brain cry out in pain, but this is one of the things I suspect will really work with 4e. So you get Elven Rangers fighting Orcish Striker Minions...if it all plays well, I can live with that.

 

[Irda Ranger]

Sure, you could do minions in 3e, probably by using a template. But can you really build a template that fits all monsters equally?

The "Minion Template" is "Set HP to 1; Set AC high enough PC's need to roll a 10 or better to hit; Set BAB high enough it can hit the PC on a 10 or better." You can apply this Template to any monster in 3E.

There are lots of things I did with 3e/3.5e which required me to be very creative and mess with the rules as written. Just like I had house-ruled Thac0 and AC to ascending numbers in my 2e games. But a ruleset which already does that for me is one I can seriously get behind.

I guess. It just seems like some people are excited that they "can do" something now when they could always do it (and quite easily). The only difference is it's a standard feature now rather than a really simple after-market add-on.

The parts of 4E I'm excited about are the things that the devs have done which are really, really hard. I can tell you the single chart I am looking forward to the most: the one which spells out the BAB, Defenses, HP and Dmg for every possible monster, organized by Level and Role. There's no way I could design that chart myself, or write up 60+ fun and balanced powers for each class in the game. Minions are easy; that is hard.

 

[Lurker37]

Personally, when I think of minions, I think of The Tick vs. a rooftop full of ninjas.

You can throw chimneys in 4E?

SOLD!!

 

[Celebrim]

The "Minion Template" is "Set HP to 1; Set AC high enough PC's need to roll a 10 or better to hit; Set BAB high enough it can hit the PC on a 10 or better." You can apply this Template to any monster in 3E.

Yes. Although, I think based on some of the conversation around zombie minions, that it seems clear that you can't even gaurantee the 'minion template' fits all 4e monsters equally.

 

[pukunui]

I tried running Zombigeddon myself. However, it was with an unexperienced party and it became tedious. I may try it again with 4e and with my friends, maybe it works better, but I will be doing it in a big castle or something else. Mapping an entire city was too exhausting.

Yeah. I'm not sure I'd want to do an entire city. Possibly just a small village. It would still be possible to do the "holed up in the inn" type thing and it would be easier for them to make a break for it. Perhaps it's a village that happens to be situated near an old battlefield or something ...