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

[ForeverSlayer]

First, D&D 4E is the best selling system on the market, over its history.

You got some figures to back up your claim?

 

[GreyICE]

Oh yeah, and if I could have a second to just complain about something, you don't need the stat block to show how your monster interacts in a living, breathing world. You need it to show how he interacts in COMBAT. Here's a US Army Soldier, rough:

US Marine
STR - 14
DEX - 10
CON - 16
INT - 10
WIS - 8
CHA - 10

Assault Rifle - Fire a three round burst at the target, for massive damage
Frag Grenade - Area Blast 4
WE NEED AIR SUPPORT! - in 12 turns targeted area is hit with a hell of a lot of really nasty pieces of metal and exploding material. Duck.


Number of times these abilities are used in your average day-to-day life: ZERO. Seriously, "Frag Grenade" is not designed to be used in "Shopping Mall."

 

[GreyICE]

You got some figures to back up your claim?

It was number 1 for 2 years until knocked out by Pathfinder in sales stats, and is now number 2.

Meh, this is verging dangerously close to an edition war. Whatever. If you really think that New World of Darkness or FATE outsold 4E, welp.

 

[CasvalRemDeikun]

I don't mind the idea of a boss monster tag, since it is easily ignored, and actually helpful for people that don't ignore it. Basically, if they make a Boss Goblin, it tells me I -CAN- use said Goblin as a boss, but I can also use him later on as a powerful lackey of a bandit lord or something else. Don't get too hung up on terminology.

 

[ForeverSlayer]

It was number 1 for 2 years until knocked out by Pathfinder in sales stats, and is now number 2.

Meh, this is verging dangerously close to an edition war. Whatever. If you really think that New World of Darkness or FATE outsold 4E, welp.

Hey buddy, you are the one making the claim here. You should have known what you were starting. If you don't want to get into this then I suggest you stay away from comments like that.

 

[slobo777]

Monsters should be designed organically. Their abilities should make sense for how they function in a living breathing world, and their conception on paper should reflect a description of what they are in that world, biologically, psychologically, etc. Metagame considerations like how they will perform in combat with a "standard" group of PCs are secondary considerations at best.

How a monster performs in combat is not "metagame" in a game based around combat.

As a DM, I find 4E's monster designations very useful, and they allow me to build fun combat board games. I understand those games inside a story framework, but in 4E's world the encounter games come before monsters being "designed organically".

Wouldn't it be nice if 5E could provide both approaches though? You can always ignore something a about a monster that doesn't suit your style . . . (I do - generally I don't bother buying into game world fluff for a monster, up to and including appearance/behaviour etc)

 

[ForeverSlayer]

I don't mind the idea of a boss monster tag, since it is easily ignored, and actually helpful for people that don't ignore it. Basically, if they make a Boss Goblin, it tells me I -CAN- use said Goblin as a boss, but I can also use him later on as a powerful lackey of a bandit lord or something else. Don't get too hung up on terminology.

It's not just about the terminology, it's also about the mechanics and how they are used.

 

[CasvalRemDeikun]

It's not just about the terminology, it's also about the mechanics and how they are used.

So, without the terminology, a Boss Goblin is just a powerful Goblin that you -CAN- use. This is an insurmountable problem how? Or is this a case of "I HATE this as an option, therefore NO ONE can use it?"

Because if you are feeling forced to use said option, you should probably call the police on the person holding the gun to your head saying you must do so.

 

[Ahnehnois]

It is a necessary evil.

If the DM just uses stronger normal monsters, one of two things happen.

1) The monster has high level abilities that the party cannot deal with. This is the dragon breathing 30 fire damage on level 1s.

2) The increase of action economy of the outnumbering PCs easily defeat the monster via cumulative damage attacks or having a time to lock down.

The other outcome, of course, is that the PCs face a challenging and engaging battle, barely dodge the monster's powerful attacks, and use teamwork to bring it down. Or die trying.

But ignoring that for a second, I see no problem with the two outcomes described above.

Second, I don't really understand "your purposes."

My purposes are to create a story with setting, characters, and plot. Since we're talking about the characters (monstrous though they may be), I'll expand on that.

A monster is not purpose built. The point of an ogre is not to provide a group of level 2 PCs with standard ability arrays a challenging combat encounter. That is one reasonably common outcome, but I might also use that ogre as an aid to more powerful monsters, as an obstacle the PCs can negotiate with, as a source of information about other monsters, or (if a player plays one) as the protagonist of the story. It could also acquire templates or class levels and become something completely different. An ogre warlock fills a rather different role than the garden variety bruiser. The ogre entry in the monster manual needs to give me information to do all of those things equally well. Designing it around a one-minute combat with a party of a certain level is not conducive to designing it for this array of other diverse purposes.

Look at it another way. What if in addition to the PC classes, we added a set of descriptions about what their mandated roles are in the story? One class is a "protagonist" (let's say fighter), another is a "plucky sidekick" (rogue), another is "NPC quest giver" (wizard). Does that accurately describe one iconic use of the class? Sure. Does that make the game easier to play? No. It can only serve to limit creativity (and to insult people who'd rather play a wizard or rogue protagonist). As a DM, I am no less insulted when I read a monster entry that tells me what I am supposed to use that monster for. I can figure that out myself, thank you.

 

[Ahnehnois]

How a monster performs in combat is not "metagame" in a game based around combat.

If you include considerations like what level the PCs fighting it are or what kind of encounter the DM uses it in, then it becomes so. CR is no better in this respect, it's just easier to use when it's useful and easier to ignore when it's not.