Do creatures in your games take actions according to their mental stats?

[Savage Wombat]

My problem with dumb monster tactics was always with iron and stone golems. They're supposed to be scary, at least to some degree - having them fight like mindless "walk in straight line to nearest target" drones reduces the threat level. But then, I suck as a tactician anyway.

 

[howandwhy99]

My problem with dumb monster tactics was always with iron and stone golems. They're supposed to be scary, at least to some degree - having them fight like mindless "walk in straight line to nearest target" drones reduces the threat level. But then, I suck as a tactician anyway.

I've mentioned before that golems are not opponents you beat, at least not commonly at any rate, but ones you outsmart and avoid.

You can't destroy them with weapons, you can't turn them, you can't sneak attack them, you can't cast spells on them, you can't talk them out of attacking you. They are immune to everything... well, almost everything. They have very, very few weakness and those decline as you face harder golems. They are the shutdown kings of D&D monsters. the idea is to find another way.

Remember Nilbogs? The more you hurt them the more HP they get? It's sort of like that. Hack and Slash isn't the name of the game.

 

[pemerton]

I haven't personally accumulated vast amounts of knowledge about anything, let alone combative strategies and tactics. So I can't imbue my NPCs with those things. Best I can do is give them better stats and have them act at my maximal intelligence level

My own thought? The only way to do it is by modeling supra-genius characters post-hoc.

To [MENTION=1]Morrus[/MENTION] point, kinda hard to act in a way you can't have knowledge to act in a way, so
To [MENTION=11821]Obryn[/MENTION] point, can only do it in retrospect.

So to that point, I use either action points (4e parlance) ... For "Fools did you ever think I would not have foreseen such an obvious tactic" to just nullify an attack, or advantage (5e parlance) to make the success of attacks far less likely when appropriate.

I agree with all these. I want mechanics that will support the "supra-genius" trope for my geniuses, and the "thick as . . ." for my brutes. I like the interrupt idea for supra-geniuses as one mechanical solution. I've used that once or twice.

 

[NuSair]

I try to... creatures like orcs, goblins aren't usually very tactically sound, where as Drow are like Black Ops teams. Anytime the players come up with something against a super intelligent BBEG, if I consider it plausible, I act as if he had the answer for what devised.

I also try to keep in mind the differences between intelligence, wisdom and animal instinct.

 

[BronzeDragon]

I mean, what tactics do a supra- genius dragon use? Certainly not any I can think of!

I understand where you're coming from, but here is what I do (having also not been blessed with supra-genius intelligence):

The Dragon's intelligence can be interpreted as a sort of precognition ability. If the players can think of something, the Dragon has likely thought about it before them. Therefore, a Dragon will rarely be reactive.

So, if a player is describing his amazingly devious trap that will fool the Dragon, you, as a DM, start coming up with the justification for the Dragon not being fooled by it. Most of the time, players won't come up with incredibly bright things, so we have to assume the Dragon will be prepared. Maybe he has cast some spell in advance that allows him to ignore or largely bypass the player's idea.

Of course, if you particularly enjoy the idea that the player came up with, then it might be a good moment to downplay the Dragon's intelligence. Maybe he was tired that day...

 

[Grogg of the North]

I try to. But sometimes I'll favor the lore over stats. For instance, despite the undead flaming death being have high int and wisdom it's described as being single purposed in it's destruction. So sometimes I'll play things dumber than their stats say. I've also gone the other way as well, playing them smarter because of the lore.

 

[ImperatorK]

I use mental stats only as guidelines, aid in determining how to roleplay a creature. It's more about who a particular NPC or monster is, not how high is his Intelligence. In my games a group of dumb orcs could use advanced tactics simply because they're experienced veterans of many battles and a super-intelligent Wizard can act foolishly because he's just too arrogant and doesn't think he should even try (it's an old trope for a reason).

 

[delericho]

Basically, in games you run or play in, do creatures act according to how "they" would act and not necessarily how the DM would act?

As far as possible, I try to reflect the creatures' mental stats in the way they are portrayed. Wise creatures will use their resources well; foolish ones will not.

I mean, what tactics do a supra- genius dragon use? Certainly not any I can think of!

There's that problem, of course.

But there's also another problem with portraying the supra-genius BBEG: if you do portray such a character with all the intelligence that by rights they should have, the game is almost certainly not going to be much fun - that supra-genius villian will identify the PCs as a potential threat long before they become an actual threat, and will take steps to neutralise that threat, either by recruiting them into his own service or by the application of extreme force.

The specific case of the supra-genius dragon is an interesting one, because such creatures are frequently depicted as sleeping most of the time (with Smaug being the prime example of this). That being the case, it's not unreasonable that the creature might be caught unprepared and be forced to react to an intrusion. But even then, it's near-certain that the creature would have set up several layers of early-warning mechanisms before going to sleep, allowing it to make ready before that intrusion arrives. And, faced with an unknown but hostile force, it's very likely that an early tactic is retreat, so you can then assess the enemy forces and launch a devastating counter-attack.

 

[Minigiant]

I want to do it but it is hard to act using someone else's intelligences and dumb creatures become some much easier.

So I just rigged encounters according to mental stats. If they are smart and have time, they get more direct counters to the PCs stuff.

 

[Grogg of the North]

I mean, what tactics do a supra- genius dragon use? Certainly not any I can think of!

IIRC, in the Book of Challenges it has a small side bar about playing monsters that are smarter than you. It basically suggests that if the opponents mental abilities are sufficiently high that it has come up with a counter to whatever your players are planning and you should run with that.