Creature Rank vs SOD effects

[BobTheNob]

From the outset, Im going to say that this idea is a bit contraversial, but if there is a time for getting ideas out there and making mistakes, its early in the project, so here goes.

4e introduced enemy "types" (i.e. Minion/Normal/Elite/Solo). One of its inovations I think worked nicely.

Now, there has been discussions of such SOD effects and how to handle them. Many agree they are a nice edition to the game, others argue they are game killers in that with a single dice roll you can end an encounter the DM intended to be a little more epic.

Now, What if we bundled these concepts together a little and said that certain SOD style abilities (and I would like to clarify in this I would apply SOD to any ability which insta-unravels encounters. Hold person is a great example...they don't die, but they were as good as dead) only effected up to a certain type of opponent.

For instance, hold person(3rd edition style) does not effect solos. If you are targeting a single target, it can effect up to an elite, but if you try to effect multile enemies with it it can effect normal creatures at best.

Im not sure how I would class players in this. I was actually thinking feats, protection spells and equipment e.g. "Ring of Life Protection = vs Spells and effects which would kill you you are considered to be a Solo for the purposes of resolving that effect"

Just chucking it up on the board. What do people think?

 

[UngeheuerLich]

no thanks. The hp treshold is much more elegant. I want 5e not to have explicit solos.

Hold person actually usually does not work against solos. As humans shoould never be solos. Even in 4e.

Hold monster could not work against monsters of size huge or more. This would also rule out most solos.

 

[GreyICE]

Lord god, why don't you want 5e to explicitly tell the DM what role the monsters have in a fight? Do you actually want new DMs to suffer, make lousy games, and quit?

 

[tlantl]

Lord god, why don't you want 5e to explicitly tell the DM what role the monsters have in a fight? Do you actually want new DMs to suffer, make lousy games, and quit?

This is a little far fetched don't you think.

DMs have been able to figure out what monsters to use for over a third of a century. It's strange that all of a sudden we need our hands held by the developers of the game.

If DMs were to decide that they suck at the game so bad that they need to give it up then there really wouldn't be any reason for WotC to be trying to scrape together enough customers to salvage their IP since it would already be dead.



Back to the topic at hand.

Save or die effects used against a major encounter don't need to be game enders. I always roll my dice in private. There's no way I'm going to fail a die roll if it means ending the game early.

I fudge dice in both directions when ever I want to maintain the mood. If the group is heading for a meaningless defeat, or worse, there's nothing stopping me from missing on purpose a few times. We all suffer bad dice days, there's no need to have the fun grind to a halt because my monsters don't miss and no one in the party can hit.

For the record I don't like monster roles any more than I like player character roles.

I use what ever monsters I like without regard for their status as an opponent. Once I have the system sorted out I can run simple exploration adventures with little more than some random encounter sheets and some basic information about the residents of the area, which is found in my campaign folder.

Until recently monsters had hit dice, this was a spread of hit points which could range from a hand full to a whole lot. Used to be a time we rolled hit points. Was a time you could determine the difficulty of the opposition by looking at their hit dice and special attacks and defenses. You didn't need someone to tell you what the monster did or how to use it in combat, but some genius decided that the way D&D was designed and played for thirty odd years was wrong.

Now they're trying to fix it. Let's hope they get it right this time.

 

[JamesonCourage]

A little too defined by the metagame for me. I'd want to know why it doesn't effect them. If there's a reason, awesome. If it's "so they can take on a party by themselves (or with minions)", I'll want you to go a bit further and let me know in-game.

Is it just the property a unique creature has? Awesome, I can buy multiple creatures like that. Is it an ogre chief, when his ogre buddies can be affected by it? That's when I won't be satisfied with "so he can take on a party by himself (with his ogre minions)." Well, why isn't he able to be affected? Permanent blessing? Chosen by his god? Protective ring that shatters when taken off?

I don't care how it's explained, but I'd like something there. If the metagame advice is "don't let 'solo' creatures be affected by these things if you want to them to take a party on by themselves (or with minions), and here are a few ways you can accomplish that" I'd have no problem with it. Good advice, in my opinion. As always, play what you like

 

[steeldragons]

No thanks.

Put me down for not wanting to see..."CR" or "solos/minions/etc." The encounter is the encounter as makes sense for the scenario. If its too tough for you...RUN! Re-strategize, ambush, "come back a level or two later", something. But the idea that everything I meet is going to be within my "level appropriate difficulty rating" needs to go the way of the dodo. We can do that, and as tlantl says, the game was working fine up to a few years ago without it, for the most part, without being told so "by the book." It's not something, I feel, that needs to be carried over.

As to the SoD effects...Hold Person is kinda a bad example since, as you note, they don't die...nor are they "as good as dead." Saves are there to mechanically resolve whether a spell works on you or not (or partially). That's fine.

I, personally, do not use Save or DIE things in general or reflavor them to have some other detrimental effect besides automatic death. There are plenty of really nasty powerful spells and effects (Horrid Wilting or Harm, anyone?) that can be used without outright killing a PC. You might die after...you might be sorely incapacitated, but the things like "Power Word Kill (and such), one bad luck/die roll and you're gone", especially considering that a party is likely pretty darn powerful/has had the character for a while before encountering something like that, never struck me as fair...or necessarily flavorful...so I simply do not use them in my game.

If I was on the design team, I would suggest removing Save or DIE spells from the game entirely. But I don't think that's likely to happen.

...and the players know if they want to open that can of worms for themselves, it'll get used back on them, so we're all good without. Saying something like that with regards to SoD as advice in the DMG would be helpful, I think.

--SD

 

[Minigiant]

A HP threshold based on the caster would be fine. I am not fond of the Solo immunity approach. I used to be but not anymore.


"The target of Hold Person becomes paralyzed and freezes in place unless they make a successful Wisdom or Strength saving throw. It is aware and breathes normally but cannot take any actions, even speech. Each round on its turn, the subject may attempt a new saving throw to end the effect.

Hold Person can only effect a humaniod target that has hit points less than 5 times their caster's spell casting level level."

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I think you can actually get more mileage out of such a system if you make the "minion to solo" scale explicitly and only a metagaming concept, and then tie different optional mechanics to it, to suit playstyle. Options to change how SoD works on the scale would certainly be part of those options.

For convenience, let's say that they add another step after minion. On the scale, a creature can narratively be labeled as a minion, thug, standard, elite, or solo. (Though since this is explicitly a metagaming concept now, "solo" would probably need a new term.) So some group of kobold rabble you meet are labeled "minion" and their lizardman shaman leader might be elite or solo. What does that mean? It depends.

Some options:

1. The label is nothing but communication from the author to the reader about the presumed importance in the story. In your game, it means nothing mechanically. If the kobolds get lucky, they might survive. If the lizardman shaman fails a SoD on a surprise round, tough cookies. If you don't want that, it's up to you to keep the shaman protected (however you want to go about it--fiat, guards, etc.)
2. It's a slight change to saving throws, in an otherwise tight system where mods to saving throws are tough to get. It's not impossible for a solo to fail save or a minion to succeed, but it will be unlikely, and thus not tried much, and memorable when it works.
3. Action points are allowed in 4E style, but can be used more than once per encounter (though still only once per round). Minions get none, thugs get 1, standards get 3, elites get 5, and solos get 7. Solos can bring the hurt for most or all of the fight, but once someone wears down, they are limited.
4. Crits work differently depending on your status on the minion scale (in a system where hit points are otherwise kept relatively low). A minion may have more than 1 hit point, but crit one, and they die. On the other end, you need confirmation rolls to crit an elite or solo, but no one else.

There could be more. Then on the question of where PCs, fit on the scale, it also depends. You have similar options, such as explicitly making PCs favored by the system (perhaps inherently elite all the time) or nothing particularly special (stuck at standard all the time) or more complicated options where the state moves based on situaton, resources, spells, or even other explicit metagaming factors. Pick the ones that appeal to you and give results you like.

 

[Spatula]

I like it the general idea of giving important foes some sort of plot-armor. I'm also giving a big thumbs-up to the concept of elites or solos or minions. I was already doing something similar in my 3e games (giving "named" opponents max HP), but they still couldn't really keep up with the combined actions of 4-5 PCs.

 

[Grazzt]

I'm in for a "no thanks" on these.