Abreviated NPC Stat blocks: threat or menace?

[SteveC]

As you describe it, I think it's a step backward. IMO it's opening the door toward total DM's fiat and improvisation. I have been doing this sometimes, as a D&D DM: improvising evrything about the monster, and having the monster die when the characters have reasonably suffered. I much prefer when PCs and NPCs abide by the same rules.

I don't think it's quite that bad, but perhaps I didn't explain it with quite enough detail. Each monster would still have defined abilities, they would just exist in a highly specified format. A monster stat block would have about half a dozen stats in their statblock, like:

Attack (attack bonus), Defense (AC), Resistance (saves), Competence (skills), and Toughness (HP)

Each one of these would have a rating. Spycraft does this between 1 and 10, but there is no reason you couldn't extend it. Then, you pick the CR for the monster, and you get the stats you need out of it. You can also add relevent special abilities and feats to the mix as needed.

What this would do is make statting out encounters much faster, but also give a much more defined set of statistics for them. I don't think if you did it this way you would necessarily end up with more GM fiat, but you would no longer be able to reverse engineer everything backwards.

 

[Psychic Warrior]

Having slaved away for a few hours now upgrading some NPCs from the Age of Worms to face my PCs I can say that abbreviated (why is that word so long?) stats would have been a godsend. Most of the 3 NPC clerics I made up died in 2 rounds thanks to a Staff of Fire fireball and their crappy reflex saves (note all of them took Lightning Reflexes too). One got off 2 spells (one cure and a hold person) and another got off a cure then missle fire and a flame strike finished them off. I spent 2 hours on these 3 NPCs alone and felt I should have had at least one get away (he was too slow in his full plate).

I'll be using the NPC generation method linked by Henry from now on thanks.

 

[Psion]

The GM in my Spycraft game, who just co-GM'd a D&D campaign with me said "what a concept! Just think what could be done with this kind of a system and D&D. Prepping a complex encounter would take just a few minutes to complete!"

As I thought about that, I initially agreed with him, but as I thought about it some more, I thought this might be a huge step backwards. In earlier editions of D&D monsters followed their own rules and had their own special stat systems. One thing that 3E did was change it so that everyone has to live by the same rules, which has been an excellent change. It allows you to make any sort of monster as a real character, for one thing.

I don't think so.

Initially, I was on the same page as you. Time and again, I hear the body of "lamenters for the old days" fuss about the "good old days" (choke) when all you had was hp, damage, and THAC0 and away you go. Well, I have never been to eager to return to the days where most monsters were a bag of hit points with a sword. In fact, the Monster Manual (most particularly, the fact that it gave creatures full statistics) was what SOLD me on 3e. Prior to the publication of the MM, I had planned to just keep pressing forward with the old kitbash.

Here's where the rub lies: you are not REQUIRED to use the Spycraft 2.0 system for all NPCs. You can use the standard PC generation sequence. So, where I want the detail I can have it. But if I am going to spend a lot of time developing a mook that will go down after a shot or two, the spycraft system works perfectly. I can feel free to make my mooks bags of hit points (somehting of a misnomer, since mooks have no damage style points at all) with guns.

So, in short, I can have my cake and eat it too. I can have my detail where it is appropriate, and make villainous mooks with a few simple brush strokes where speed is more important than detail.

 

[jdrakeh]

Improvising, if the DM is experienced and good at his job, can be virtually transparent to the players.

Agreed, but I'd go so far as to say that if it's done well, improvisation can be completely transparent to players. This, of course, assumes that a given group of players is happy with encounters being described in terms of what characters see as opposed to having the DM actually recite stat blocks. For me, the latter approach is about as far from the generally accepted concept of roleplaying as one can get, but I know people who wouldn't have it any other way.

 

[Psion]

I don't like Spycraft 2's solution perfectly, but it's got the right idea: D&D needs a system for DMs which allow them to put in as much or as little detail into the NPCs as possible, and (here's the catch) STILL be compatible with the rules that the PCs are using.

Yeah, there is still a bit of a gulf there.

Back when I was still tinkering with FUDGE a lot, I was toying with the concept of "telescoping statistics".

The idea was that at a very basic level, faceless NPCs could be represented by 3 or 4 statistics (think BESM, but make two physical statistics, "physique" and "deftness") and that's all you needed. (I suppose that you could do like Klaus suggests and roll these all up in one level, like MR, BID). Under each of these categories are finer distinctions - physique can be rolled out into strength, edurance, and toughness. From there, you can roll these out into skills in a fashion similar to WEG SW or CORPS. That way, there were intermediate levels of detail available.

Of course, that's a long shot from d20, but that was the basic idea I was working with.

 

[Henry]

Back when I was still tinkering with FUDGE a lot, I was toying with the concept of "telescoping statistics".

That's EXACTLY the kind of design I'd be sure to use. If someone were able to develop this while still being compatible enough with D&D, I'd use it in a heartbeat. In terms of design, we're about 75% there, thanks to Spycraft, Iron Heroes, and laxy DM's like me But spellcasters still pose a problem, and the best workaround in my opinion would be a magic point system or Savage Heroes-style FX system for DMs to use in place of spell choice. But then, you get into REAL problems when players want to use spellcraft, or counter the spells, forcing more fiat.

 

[SteveC]

Yeah, there is still a bit of a gulf there.

Back when I was still tinkering with FUDGE a lot, I was toying with the concept of "telescoping statistics".

The idea was that at a very basic level, faceless NPCs could be represented by 3 or 4 statistics (think BESM, but make two physical statistics, "physique" and "deftness") and that's all you needed. (I suppose that you could do like Klaus suggests and roll these all up in one level, like MR, BID). Under each of these categories are finer distinctions - physique can be rolled out into strength, edurance, and toughness. From there, you can roll these out into skills in a fashion similar to WEG SW or CORPS. That way, there were intermediate levels of detail available.

Of course, that's a long shot from d20, but that was the basic idea I was working with.

You know, this is going pretty far afield from the original topic, but that has never stopped me before .

I did pretty much the same thing. My own system was built with the tree structure in mind, where you have roots and branches. At the highest level, you have just one stat, which would represent everything the character would do. You'd have a mook who would look like this:

hobgoblin warrior (+2)

...and whenever you would roll anything this character would be able to do, you'd just add +2 to your die roll (this was a roll and add to beat a TN system).

The next level had four attributes, Body, Reflexes, Mind and Presence at it. This was the basic level that characters were designed at. The point cost system was such that all of the branches would simply inherit points from their roots above them. The hobgoblin as a PC might look like this:

hobgoblin warrior (+2)
|
|-Body [+2] (+4)
|
|-Reflexes [+1] (+3)
|
|-Mind [0] (+2)
|
|-Presence [0] (+2)

...which meant that the character had increased their Body by 2 and Reflexes by 1 and the other values just stacked.

I finally had a third level where each of the attributes branched into two more "branch attribiutes" so you would have Strength and Health under Body, as an example.

The system worked quite well, actually. Someday, oh someday the world will see it...

 

[Psion]

SteveC - that's funny. I was going to use the way "folder trees" work in Windows as an example. Then you jot it down right there.

@ Henry & SteveC

You know, I haven't really been a big fan of True20, but it seems like you could mold it into this sort of telescoping scheme. What's more, do you remember that d20 monthly magazine that came out a while back (I forget the name). Someone actually had a scheme in there for parsing out the bonuses into finer levels from d20 that would work here as well.

The peices are there...