D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

[AnotherGuy]

Read the game text. They explain their goals.

Apparently their goals and your opinion are the same on this.

 

[clearstream]

That's actually not true. You cannot choose to not kill something with a fireball (or any energy attack). You ALWAYS kill if you reduce anything to zero HP with an energy attack. The minion rules require you to ignore the specific - a PC can always choose to have the attack not kill - in order ot enforce a general rule. There's absolutely no reason that a PC MUST kill a minion when dealing damage.

Can you cite the RAW please? I can't recollect anything in core limiting knocking unconcisous by damage type, but there are a lot of rules in these texts and it's possible I played that incorrectly. I know some folk limit it to a melee attack (which is true of some versions of D&D IIRC) but the edition of 4e I have doesn't say that. Could it have been errata'd?

 

[Hussar]

Can you cite the RAW please? I can't recollect anything in core limiting knocking unconcisous by damage type, but there are a lot of rules in these texts and it's possible I played that incorrectly. I know some folk limit it to a melee attack (which is true of some versions of D&D IIRC) but the edition of 4e I have doesn't say that. Could it have been errata'd?

To be fair, I know it's true in 5e. I was more or less presuming that 5e simply carried forward the 4e rules. 3e had wonky rules for subdual, but, again, you couldn't do it with energy damage. 2e and earlier did not allow for non-lethal attacks in any form (other than against, strangely enough, dragons).

But, since every other edition that allows for some form of non-lethal damage does not allow energy attacks to be non-lethal, I would presume that 4e is the same.

Don't have my 4e books here, so, can't actually check chapter and verse.

The point being, you have no moral issues with fireball being designed to kill large numbers of humanoids (and everything else for that matter) never minding something like Cloudkill which has some seriously icky real world connotations. But, suddenly minions are a bridge too far?

 

[clearstream]

To be fair, I know it's true in 5e. I was more or less presuming that 5e simply carried forward the 4e rules. 3e had wonky rules for subdual, but, again, you couldn't do it with energy damage. 2e and earlier did not allow for non-lethal attacks in any form (other than against, strangely enough, dragons).

But, since every other edition that allows for some form of non-lethal damage does not allow energy attacks to be non-lethal, I would presume that 4e is the same.

Don't have my 4e books here, so, can't actually check chapter and verse.

I appreciate your forthrightness. I'll assume I have the mechanics right until someone can cite something to change that. It could be there is text outside of core. Errata or something in non-core PHBs or DMG.

The point being, you have no moral issues with fireball being designed to kill large numbers of humanoids (and everything else for that matter) never minding something like Cloudkill which has some seriously icky real world connotations. But, suddenly minions are a bridge too far?

Yes. Although I too see the ickiness of cloudkill I differentiate between diegetic powers that characters can use in different ways, and diegetical mechanics that structure the game reality. I appreciate that this is a sensitivity that others may not share, but then I think preferences rely upon sensitivities that aren't shared so it goes without saying that we should observe that of this one.

I think I will let this go at that, but would invite you to have the last word.

 

[Enrahim]

As @Enrahim draws attention to, aside from minions 4e can be played without slaughtering anyone. Not even with fireballs.


Another difference is that any amount of damage destroys a minion. Their function is to be slaughtered en masse.

Wait, what? Where is the "aside from minions" coming from? I didn't see any exceptions for them in the knock out rules?

 

[AlViking]

Wait, what? Where is the "aside from minions" coming from? I didn't see any exceptions for them in the knock out rules?

From the DMG "A minion is destroyed when it takes any amount of damage."

 

[Micah Sweet]

Why, in your opinion, was this seen as a good design (by the designers)?

Because they figured a lot of players want that?

 

[Enrahim]

From the DMG "A minion is destroyed when it takes any amount of damage."

Ah I somehow missed this reply.

That's an interesting thought, abeit it doesn't work under 4e RAW. "When you reduce a creature to 0 hit points or fewer, you can choose to knock it unconscious rather than kill it " but "A minion is destroyed when it takes any amount of damage."

I find it a very peculiar interpretation that "destroyed" here is supposed to be taken literary. The only monster type I can think of that traditionally has been referred to as being "destroyed" in the more literal sense are undead. I hence file this formulation under an unfortunate use of "flowerily" language, rather than actual rules content. (Wouldn't surprise me if it was written by someone that was making an unconscious slip into wargame terminology where units are "destroyed" upon defeat)

Edit - for reference this is what i consider to be the actual rules text for minions:
"HP 1; a missed attack never damages a minion."
This formulation is present both in monster manual, and monster vault - so I consider that the stable definition of a 4ed minion. Not the fluff in DMG 1.

 

[CellarHeroes]

From the DMG "A minion is destroyed when it takes any amount of damage."

Yikes! Using the word "destroyed" seems a little much in this case. Maybe something like "overcome" or "defeated" would've been better.

 

[AnotherGuy]

Because they figured a lot of players want that?

Well I think there are quite a few benefits with the minion concept but yeah not that this question was aimed at you but one of the benefits I feel that were gained were from the DMs perspective and how easier it made running combat. 4e was born on the ashes of a lot of 3x GM burnout. It may not have been the full story but for many of us that was the case and no matter what we thought about 4e, the encounter design was quite a relief after 3x.