D&D 4E 4e Monster Manual excerpt

[AZRogue]

So an immobilized (or otherwise utterly lacking in available movement), charmed guy can interpose himself between an immobilized succubus and an angry person on the opposite side of her. Yay! Lets not get into what happens if the succubus gets enlarged, or what happens if people want to interpose themselves without the benefit of charm... Note that wanting to take a hit for someone else comes up a lot in DnD.

If they don't have a power active or an ability for it, then I don't think they can. Unless it's an option in the Combat chapter of the PHB, which it might be considering how many creatures use some variant of the ability.

 

[Xyl]

The succubus would be way too powerful if her charm ability did more than what is written. Imagine that she manages to get off her charm on the party fighter, and in addition to what's written he is compelled to stand next to her. Now there is no way to kill the succubus until the fighter is knocked out! Any attacks on her will hit him instead, and the ability doesn't even allow a saving throw. That is much too powerful for a non-elite monster.

Even without any added effects, though, the ability is pretty good. If the players concentrate elsewhere, she can use her dominate attack to wreck havoc. If they try to kill her instead, she dominates her charmed victim and uses him to defend herself.

Of course, needing to make two attack rolls to set up the kiss is kind of weak. If only she could somehow kiss one of the PCs before they realize that she's an enemy...

 

[Bishmon]

Ethereal Jaunt, Teleport, Detect Thoughts: These have pretty much been subsumed into skills. Now the monsters don't need thes things as much, as they can sneak about, use bluff and insight to read people and convince them of things, and more! They're far more capable, since they don't need magic to do things these things anymore.

You made a lot of good points, but this is a stretch. There's no skills for Ethereal Jaunt, Teleport, or Detect Thoughts. And no, Insight doesn't replace Detect Thoughts, no more than Sense Motive did.

Anyway, I don't mind the monsters. I'm just much more eager for the Wednesday and Friday updates.

 

[Dausuul]

Put some effort into conveying what's happening and suggest that the victim reacts accordingly. If the succubus makes you fall in love with her, mention that, and suggest that the victim should treat her as a lover (so killing her pet nightmare is inappropriate, and so is running away to avoid taking attacks intended for her). If she's so beautiful that you can't stand the thought of anything harming her even though you know she's a dangerous fiend, mention that (so killing her nightmare is perfectly reasonable, and so is running away).

Powers that are just mechanics to be described as the players see fit are fine for something like the malebranche's trident attack, but when it's mental influence, especially imperfect mental influence, some sort of flavour text that gives an idea of how your mind is influenced really helps.

Agreed. I would describe it as "You feel a sudden, powerful impulse to protect her. You know she's evil, but you can't bring yourself to harm her, and if you're close enough to protect her physically, you can't resist the instinct to do so."

(Parenthetically in before any absurd "if you're charmed you're willing to risk yourself" psychological explanations. Players control what their characters try.)

How about, "The succubus is an expert at using you as a meat shield?"

Or just let the PCs interpose themselves. It might require a special feat for either the defender or the defendee, at least to have it work as well as it does for the succubus, but I doubt it would actually be a problem. Heck, when I was in college playing 2E (gridless, of course), we did that sort of thing all the time--the party fighter would announce his intention to "get between" the monster and the wizard, and it was generally understood this meant the monster had to beat the fighter before it could get to the wizard.

So an immobilized (or otherwise utterly lacking in available movement), charmed guy can interpose himself between an immobilized succubus and an angry person on the opposite side of her. Yay!

Yeah, just like in 3E you can still walk around and do stuff when you're dead, or have your hit points stabilized by shoving your head in a bucket of water.

These are corner cases. The rules cannot cover every eventuality. That's what DMs are for.

 

[sckeener]

Ethereal Jaunt, Teleport, Detect Thoughts: These have pretty much been subsumed into skills. Now the monsters don't need thes things as much, as they can sneak about, use bluff and insight to read people and convince them of things, and more! They're far more capable, since they don't need magic to do things these things anymore.

Immunities: Immunities are mostly gone from the game itself.

Tongues: Check out the language Supernal for this.

Detect Good: Out out out. As a bonus, Detect Evil being out of the game means the succubus can move about more freely!

Hope that helps!

It helps, but how are teleport (plane shift in previous editions) and Ethereal Jaunt now skills? Or are they totally gone since crossing planes is difficult?

Re Supernal> does that include telepathy?

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Summoning: Handled by rituals. Remember, it's hard for devils to make it into the World, so summoning is pretty much out. If they want to bring other devils in, they'll have to go through those things mentioned in the article.

Ethereal Jaunt, Teleport, Detect Thoughts: These have pretty much been subsumed into skills. Now the monsters don't need thes things as much, as they can sneak about, use bluff and insight to read people and convince them of things, and more! They're far more capable, since they don't need magic to do things these things anymore.

Charm: Yeah, they have that.

Spell Resistance: This has been subsumed. Spells no longer auto-hit, which was one of the main reasons for SR in 3e. When power word kill is cast on a pit fiend, there needs to be some kind of defense. Luckily, this is no more.

Immunities: Immunities are mostly gone from the game itself.

Tongues: Check out the language Supernal for this.

Detect Good: Out out out. As a bonus, Detect Evil being out of the game means the succubus can move about more freely!

Hope that helps!

I agree, looking at the list, I thought she didn't really lose something to make her work as the seducer she is supposed to be. She has Bluff, Diplomacy and Insight and thus doesn't need to care about running out of spell-like abilities.
I think the only "flavor" losses are losing teleport (I like the image of disappearing devils. But she has fly and change self for that,I suppose) and her summoning (which means she needs her allies around. Not that the 3E Summoning was really that great implemented, but the idea behind it was certainly interesting.)

 

[DandD]

Of course, needing to make two attack rolls to set up the kiss is kind of weak. If only she could somehow kiss one of the PCs before they realize that she's an enemy...

I doubt you will need to make an attack roll outside of combat for the kiss, if the victim agrees to be kissed.

 

[Jack99]

Did they? In that case, I hope the tag has some description to it that will give us a bit more "play" with the ability. Thanks man.

I must admit that I can't find the damn quote. Could only dig out a post where FourthBear mentions that he thinks he saw it - somewhere. Sorry.

Maybe someone else can dig out what started the whole keyword thing?

 

[ThirdWizard]

It helps, but how are teleport (plane shift in previous editions) and Ethereal Jaunt now skills? Or are they totally gone since crossing planes is difficult?

Re Supernal> does that include telepathy?

They are probably partially gone because crossing planar boundaries is going to be handled different, however, when you look at those abilities they are basically "escape" abilities. So they can be replaced with more mundane ways to sneak about for the most part as well as some clever planning on the monsters' parts. I don't think that its necessary to have a get out of jail free on every demon just because people want their BBEGs to have a way to do it. It's overkill, its wasteful, and it cheapens the whole thing as well as frustrates players.

No, those are out for very good reason.

 

[SeRiAlExPeRiMeNtS]

the new pitfiend image is working now: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/images/excerpt_4EMM_pitfiend.jpg