Monster Manual 2 and Elite/Solo design

[Elric]

WotC has changed their solo monster design with MM2. See D&D Alumni: Demogorgon.

In your own version of this challenge, you might play these two as originally presented, or you might reconfigure Orcus closer to the newer solo monster design tenets: give him 20% fewer hit points, -2 defenses, but also increase his damage output by 50% when bloodied.

From the previews, it looks like solos are becoming roughly 4x the offense and 4x the HP of normal monsters. It also looks like elites (as well as solos) do not have a bonus to defenses over normal monsters. The DMG's guidelines (page 184) give +2 to three defenses to elites/solos, and this seems to be widely followed in the MM. Can someone with MM2 confirm that solos/elites generally don't have higher defenses than normal monsters (of their level/role) in MM2?

If so, this is a major change: elites and solos no longer have a bonus to defenses, and solos have reduced HP at Paragon/Epic (and do more damage).

 

[Cheesepie]

It could also speak to iterative design, to put it in a slightly more positive outlook.

 

[Nifft]

It could also speak to iterative design, to put it in a slightly more positive outlook.

Yeah, this.

Improvement is good, and it ought not garner disapproval.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Regicide]

It could also speak to iterative design, to put it in a slightly more positive outlook.

We're a little passed the design stage. We're in beta testing!

This makes me think that 4.5E is much more likely to happen now however.

 

[Klaus]

We're a little passed the design stage. We're in beta testing!

This makes me think that 4.5E is much more likely to happen now however.

4.5? I don't think so.

More likely 4.1, 4.2, 4.3, with little tweaks and changes added as the PHs and DMGs are released (like the re-done Stealth in PH2).

 

[Elric]

So, to clarify, does anyone have MM2 and want to weigh in on whether elites have been changed to not have defense-bonuses over normal monsters?

 

[SlyFlourish]

It does indeed look like they're boosting damage and decreasing hps about 20% for solo monsters from my statistical sample of 1.

 

[pollochicken]

I read that the day after running a session and just thinking "Thank God!". The session from the night before ended with the party running into an appropriate leveled solo but the fight lasted much longer than it needed to because they never hit him!* The lower defense but higher damage output is something that I think will make my games run a little faster and be more fun.


*The problem was also probably in part due to me picking a solo creature shortly before the session without giving a lot of though to whether it was appropriate to the party. Well, that may have been the main problem, but its nice to blame something else.

 

[the Jester]

From glancing at a couple dragons, it looks like it.

Edit: Which I approve of.

 

[Stalker0]

I actually took a thorough look at the solos in MM2 because I was thinking of writing a post about this

Bottom line, its absolutely true.

Compare the hydras for example. The razor hydra has about 100 less hitpoints for its level than in standard 4e MM1 math. It also spots more damage that increases as the fight continues.

Also many solos now gets multiple turns per round which helps. There defenses are roughly -2 compared to MM1 math.

I haven't looked at elites much, but minions also got an upgrade at higher level.

You now have minions throwing out 12 and 15 damage on their attacks! Further, almost all high level minions have some kind of "aid their buddies" effect. Whether its an aura that gives -2 to defenses, giving temp hp to their buddies when they die, or making the party more vulnerable to something" the new goal of high level minions is "even when I'm not attacking, I'm doing something nasty".

Which I completely agree with.

I have not yet tested out any of the new MM2 creatures to see how effective the changes are, but I applaud the effort.

Bottom line guys, let's not beat up WOTC too much for actually listening to our complaints and altering how they design monsters to cater more to our desires. They have gathered the evidence, and have altered their designs based on it....and that is a beautiful thing for any game company to do.

While I do wish we could get some more errata to back track the changes into previous books, I don't mind that newer books push through better and better game design and that sometimes that requires me to convert some of the old stuff into the new model.

Last thing I'll say about this....in 3e if I was making a dragon I would spend 30 min to an hour picking feats and spells and magic items and special effects...so if it takes me 5 min to knock 20% of the HP off a red dragon, take off -2 to defenses, and then give them some extra damage...I can deal with that