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Am I the only one who doesn't like the arbitrary "boss monster" tag?

Nothing. The concept is completely separate from those possibilities. That's kind of the problem. Even combat mechanics like hit points are meaningful in some noncombat situation.

If "fighter" really did refer to a character who only fought, it would be a problem. But it doesn't, so it's not a problem. If "big badass fighter" and "wimpy support fighter" were possible character class/theme combos, it would be a problem. They aren't, so it isn't. And finally, if "big badass ogre" and "wimpy support ogre" were possibilities that would be a problem. And is, according to this thread.

I'm having trouble following this post.

If solo really did indicate a monster that could only appear by itself, and only in a combat context, that would be a problem. Sure, I can agree with that.

But it doesn't. In my games I've had plenty of solo enemies who were ultimately engaged by means other than combat. Does that mean solo tags aren't a problem, as you would see it, in my games?

I really can't follow the second part of the post. Could you please clarify?
 

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A confusing piece of terminology. "Gamist" does not mean "the extent to which something is a game". It refers to a tactical style of play with a competitive tone directed towards goal outcomes, characterized by system mastery and adversarial relationships between the people at the table.
I believe many people toss 'buzz' words at concepts they dislike, like rice at a wedding. Since there are many play styles, tactical being one, it seems like thinly veiled edition bashing. All play styles MUST be considered & included.
D&D is always a game in the broad sense of the word: it's an activity you do for fun. Playing house is a game. The gamist terminology describes (and people are objecting to) the attempt to make D&D into a competitive game (which D&D has some elements of, but which certain rules can push the game towards or away).
But we are discussing the way the game is played. I object to the idea of telling Two small children they are 'playing house' wrong, because they are NOT playing the way someone else did 30 years ago.
The boss label is gamist because it suggests that the PCs are "supposed" to fight that monster by itself, and defeat it after a relatively difficult battle. It ignores all other outcomes that could happen (i.e. retreat, negotiation, anything other than a straight up battle), emphasizing the main competitive segment of the game (combat). Some call that "gamist"; I think "reductionist" describes it better.
That all depends, a dragon fights typical alone, If I tag that as a Boss fight, it doesn't change anything does it. Giving something a label doesn't intrinsically change that thing.

Every since early editions, we had baby dragons, young, sub-adult, adult, old, ancient dragons. Rather than at low levels fight 1 baby dragon, at l2 2 baby dragons etc. To me fighting 12 baby dragon (at higher levels) makes no sense.

Rather that have 40 goblin fight, maybe I want a goblin chief & 20 goblins, of a Goblin King & 4 Goblin Sargents. Does calling the goblin chief an elite & the King a solo change the way we play (fight)? I think it does not.
 

Since there are many play styles, tactical being one, it seems like thinly veiled edition bashing.
Not at all. The terminology almost certainly predates whatever edition you are referring to. It also describes a perfectly valid style of play, and incidentally one that is very well supported by the kind of monster creation rules I advocate. And, as I said, the "gamist" term doesn't quite hit the mark for me, but I can see what the people who've used it were getting at.

But we are discussing the way the game is played. I object to the idea of telling Two small children they are 'playing house' wrong, because they are NOT playing the way someone else did 30 years ago.
Well that's out of left field. Again, I have no stake in things that happened before I was born. I do, however, dislike rules that unbalance D&D's delicate balance between competitive and noncompetitive playstyles and effectively exclude people from the game because they do not fit the mold. Monster roles are an example of this kind of mechanic.

That all depends, a dragon fights typical alone, If I tag that as a Boss fight, it doesn't change anything does it. Giving something a label doesn't intrinsically change that thing.
No, it doesn't. I could label many of my battles as boss fights, based on the stats I gave the monsters, the context in which the battle occurred, and how the battle played out. Again, I just don't want it in a monster manual entry. It's fine for a session review. Big difference.

Does calling the goblin chief an elite & the King a solo change the way we play (fight)?
No. Does designing a creature solely to be balanced as a solo encounter and then calling it a goblin chief change the way we play? Yes.
 

Well that's out of left field. Again, I have no stake in things that happened before I was born. I do, however, dislike rules that unbalance D&D's delicate balance between competitive and noncompetitive playstyles and effectively exclude people from the game because they do not fit the mold. Monster roles are an example of this kind of mechanic.

Huh?

You admit that slapping the Solo tag onto something in no way affects whether or not a given encounter will be resolved with combat or non-combat. Yet, here you're saying that slapping the solo tag on something means that it will unbalance the delicate balance between combat and non-combat?

Isn't that like saying adding 4 levels of barbarian to an orc to make an orc chief (3e style) or using an ogre's stats (pre-3e style) or adding the solo tag (4e style) makes ANY difference in how the encounter plays out.

At no point is the Orc Chief going to be a standard 1st level warrior straight out of the monster manual. There is absolutely no difference in play as to whether this will be a combat or non-combat encounter.

The difference is in the recognition of action economy, which is a 4e innovation. Simply jacking up the orc to a ogre worked reasonably well in AD&D because the monsters were generally so weak. An ogre only did a couple of points more in damage on average than an orc (d8 vs d10) and its AC was only a couple of points different. Add in some flunkies (which were effectively minions in most cases anyway - they died in one hit) and you were good to go.

I remember in 2e setting up an encounter with an Ancient Red dragon, the biggest thing in the monster manual, buckets and buckets of hit points, only to watch the 10th level party obliterate it in a couple of rounds. 2e characters were EXTREMELY good at dealing damage.

3e made things a bit more difficult because it massively added to the workload of the DM. Instead of simply flipping to a different monster, you were supposed to build the new monster like a PC, a process that was neither simple nor fast. And, the problem was, because the monster damage progressions scaled so sharply, jacking up the monster a few levels turned the game into rocket tag. By and large, the best encounters in 3e involved 2-5 monsters. Single monster encounters were often lackluster. I remember the party finally meeting the Tarrasque, smoking it in 2 rounds without a single loss of hit points. Two or three heal spells is all the fight cost. :yawn:

It took 4e's recognition of the action economy to finally make single monster encounters into something that didn't turn into balloon popping contests. Note, they didn't get it right at first, as evidenced by the first Monster Manual. When people talk about 4e solo's, they're talking about what came a few Monster Manuals later (MM3?) and the changes that came with that.

One of the biggest innovations in 4e was breaking out of the standard initiative model which had been relatively unchanged since OD&D - you rolled your init, and you could ONLY act on your init. Breaking out of that, which is what makes solos work, is a fantastic idea.
 

The idea is that badass monsters are what they are because of what the monster substantively is (i.e. a dragon vs a kobold),

D&D Players: placing personal, arbitrary limits on the fantasy fighting prowess of imaginary monsters since the invention of the d20.

choices the DM makes,

"Hmm, I think I'll use this elite bugbear instead of this standard bugbear!" is a choice the DM makes. I'm not sure why that choice doesn't count in your eyes.

and what plays out at the table.

Monsters designed to be badass tend to be more badass at the table. Does that surprise you in any way?

Putting a keyword "badass" on a monster does not make it so,

No, but altering that monster's mechanical abilities so that it qualifies for that keyword tends to.

Did you think that we were just talking about adding a word to a stat block and being done with it?

or help a designer or a DM make it so.

When that keyword comes with clear, simple, step-by-step rules for making it so, then yes, it does.

At best, it's wasted space.

How in the world is a keyword that tells the DM, "Hey, we designed this monster to be as much of a challenge for the party as two normal monsters put together, and accordingly it's worth double the experience and has some nifty abilities to boot!" useless?

At worst, it's a metagame distraction.

DMing is a metagame distraction. When your explicit job is to handle all things metagame, how can you possibly find it a "distraction" when a new metagame element is introduced to make the DM's job easier, and one that the players are never witness to except through the lens of their PCs?
 

Well, there's a non-sequitur. I also like adventure and story. That's why I don't need encounter-based balance, because encounters balanced around a mechanical standard are neither adventurous nor a particularly interesting story. The story comes out of a diverse set of possible outcomes, not "the creature fights for 2-6 rounds before being killed". "Predictable" and "adventure" are words that don't go together well. And if anything, I think most players appreciate the continuity of knowing that monsters are subject to the same rules they are (and I don't know of any "boss" PCs).
You play 3.x, yes? High level caster PCs seem pretty "boss" to me. ;)

As for the rest, you're putting a lot of faith into your anecdotal experiences, and it sounds like you haven't actually asked many players if they enjoy your style. Maybe your group loves [or at least tolerates] the threat of random death that results from you not bothering to match their power level with the opposition's, but chances are you've driven potential/new players away with this very practice. You can't please everyone, and you're not D&D's authority on what's fun and what isn't.

Predictability on the DM's side of the screen and adventure absolutely go hand in hand for many of us, and the combination absolutely does NOT prohibit a diverse set of possible outcomes. That diversity simply becomes a result of DM intent, rather than "I don't need no stinkin' CR!"

If this still doesn't make sense to you, that's cool with me. Personally I'd be happy to see a 5e with no boss labels, and no monster levels or CR; it'd save me the temptation to buy a game that I'll almost certainly find disappointing.
 


DMing is a metagame distraction. When your explicit job is to handle all things metagame, how can you possibly find it a "distraction" when a new metagame element is introduced to make the DM's job easier, and one that the players are never witness to except through the lens of their PCs?


LOL, yeah.

Just this past weekend I was wondering, as I subtracted HP from the monster that was getting summarily whacked, how can I get rid of this "metagame distraction"? Just a few minutes later as I counted down initiative, the monster "attacked" and I had to roll dice to hit the character's armor class that darn "metagame distraction" just kept creeping right in there.

Funny that at that point I wasn't really bothered that the description for the monster said "Elite". All those other "metagame distractions" just kept bothering me.



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you're putting a lot of faith into your anecdotal experiences
In the absence of any published data on these topics, I tend to do that, yes.

it sounds like you haven't actually asked many players if they enjoy your style.
Don't know where you got that. My style was built out of asking my (in the early days, double-digit) player pool what they wanted, both in person and in a variety of online venues between games. It probably reflects their tastes more than mine.

Maybe your group loves [or at least tolerates] the threat of random death that results from you not bothering to match their power level with the opposition's, but chances are you've driven potential/new players away with this very practice.
You don't even have anecdotal evidence to base that on. And it's rather needlessly insulting. And false. And irrelevant.

You can't please everyone
...and wouldn't presume to try.

you're not D&D's authority on what's fun and what isn't.
Of course not. Did someone say I was? Are you? Is there a point to this?

Predictability on the DM's side of the screen and adventure absolutely go hand in hand for many of us
How many? A half dozen ENWorlders? The current (diminishing) 4e DM base?

If this still doesn't make sense to you, that's cool with me. Personally I'd be happy to see a 5e with no boss labels, and no monster levels or CR; it'd save me the temptation to buy a game that I'll almost certainly find disappointing.
I'm also okay with that outcome. As long as enough people like it. You can't please everyone.
 

I want every creature to have it's normal everyday statblock along with it's history, culture, and any other relevant information.

Then I want to be able to make that creature into what ever I want just by adding a class, background, feat etc...

I don't want a certain creature to be built and presented in the MM as just a "boss" creature.

That doesn't really do anything except make DMs have to spend more time devoted to mechanical drudge-work, rather than on developing their adventure. Monsters in Monster Manuals are carefully selected to be relevant to a wide audience of game groups. The idea is that by presenting monsters that are essentially "plug-and-play", you're taking some of the burden off the DM, thereby improving the quality of his game, and lowering the bar of transition from player to DM, which is vital to the hobby's growth.
 

Into the Woods

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