D&D 5E Are solo monsters weaker in 5e?

[Beleriphon]

I still think that legendary creatures are meant to present a challenge to a group of characters. The Adult and Ancient dragons are good examples. They have actions they can take outside of their own turns, and can make multiple attacks on their turns. I mean the Adult Red Dragon can multi attack, and more importantly move between each attack, take three actions out of turn, and has lair effects that trigger on initiative count 20. That means in each full round of combat is it can make up to seven attacks, which is roughly comparable to a group of four PCs at that level. Never mind the lair effects give the DM an excuse to include other fire monsters.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

In my experience, yes, legendary creatures, especially with lair actions, are definitely challenges for level-matched group. The last time I used one (a green dragon), we were inches away from a TPK.

That being said, I’ve found that singular monsters otherwise do tend to present less of a challenge, especially if we’re talking a plain flat battlefield. I first noticed it in 4e, when any single monster encounter had to be way above challenge rating to present any challenge at all.

I still think that legendary creatures are meant to present a challenge to a group of characters. The Adult and Ancient dragons are good examples. They have actions they can take outside of their own turns, and can make multiple attacks on their turns. I mean the Adult Red Dragon can multi attack, and more importantly move between each attack, take three actions out of turn, and has lair effects that trigger on initiative count 20.

 

[Beleriphon]

In my experience, yes, legendary creatures, especially with lair actions, are definitely challenges for level-matched group. The last time I used one (a green dragon), we were inches away from a TPK.

That being said, I’ve found that singular monsters otherwise do tend to present less of a challenge, especially if we’re talking a plain flat battlefield. I first noticed it in 4e, when any single monster encounter had to be way above challenge rating to present any challenge at all.

Fair enough, but I don't think a single ogre is really supposed to present a challenge to a level appropriate party. I mean it only gets one attack per round and it can just get pounded into mush in a few rounds. Monsters without multiple attacks, or out of turn actions require at least some kind of group use. The single ogre should probably be an ogre and at least one other creature (maybe a pet dire wolf?) to make a more interesting challenge. Ogres are dangerous to commoners because the can splatter normal people in one blow.

Giants are similar, they're really designed to be used with other creatures as a hunting party kind of group. So a frost giant should probably have a few winter wolves, fire giants work great with hell hounds. Even hill giants need a few other beasties to present a challenge to most groups.

 

[Mistwell]

A true solo creature breaks the in-game restrictions on creatures for purposes of a better game

Which Legendary creatures do.

Most importantly, it gets to act several times to balance the action economy

Which legendary creatures do.

I suspect maybe you forgot how the Legendary creatures work? It's understandable, as in my opinion there are not enough of them by far, and so it would be rare that you'd have an occasion to play with those rules.

I still think that legendary creatures are meant to present a challenge to a group of characters. The Adult and Ancient dragons are good examples. They have actions they can take outside of their own turns, and can make multiple attacks on their turns. I mean the Adult Red Dragon can multi attack, and more importantly move between each attack, take three actions out of turn, and has lair effects that trigger on initiative count 20. That means in each full round of combat is it can make up to seven attacks, which is roughly comparable to a group of four PCs at that level. Never mind the lair effects give the DM an excuse to include other fire monsters.

Exactly as Beleriphon says. Legendary creatures, like the one in his example, have actions they take outside their own turns, which "breaks the in-game restrictions" and "gets to act several times to balance the action economy". That is precisely what they do.

 

[Jeff Carlsen]

I think it was a mistake to use the term Challenge Rating, when that's not really what it represents. It's more of a Threat Rating. The number doesn't mean it will be a challenge to a party of a given level, but that it presents a credible risk of character death or other permanent damage.

For a solo monster, the real problem is the action economy. A party has a lot more actions than a single monster. Legendary Monsters get bonus actions to combat that, and it helps. Another possibility is to build a monster as if it were a group, giving it multiple turns. You could even give it separate hit point pools and actions for each of it's turns (as if it were multiple different monsters). When it loses enough hit points to kill one of it's modules, it loses that turn and those actions. Plenty of creative possibilities there.

 

[yakuba]

One thing to remember is that the Legendary template can be applied to any NPC or monster. This is helpful if you want a strong solo challenge for, say, a 5th level party.

 

[Tony Vargas]

4E had it right with using XP values and designing for an encounter, not a challenge rating. You cannot sum up the myriad of variables in any given encounter in a single number.

To be fair, 4e did assign monsters a level, it just didn't call it CR. But, combined with secondary role, it served a similar purpose. Level told you what monsters were appropriate for the party (from level -1 or 2 to level +4 or 5) to face, secondary-role told you in what numbers (4:1 to 6:1 for minions, 1:1 for standards, 1:2 for elites, and 1:5 for solos).

CR looks like level, but works a bit more like secondary-role, but is ultimately pretty murky by comparison. In the case of 3e vs 5e, the for every 2 CR lower, double the number appearing, guide may not have worked quite (nearly? at all?) as well as the 5e multiplier, but at least it was easy to remember.

Well, upon thinking about stories, myths, etc, There are 'lots' of stories about single 'boss monster' fights in the end, as they mentioned. I guess what I was thinking about was D&D and AD&D 1e/2e adventure modules....But that's all I can think of at the moment. Maybe there's more. I'm not including ones where the 'boss monster' is very likely to summon or otherwise 'have minions available'. I guess I'll have to concede there there are more adventures with "boss monsters" in them than I had originally though.

Or just "Number Appearing: 1." Any solitary monster is either solo-worthy, or not much worthy of being a monster, at all (and there were certainly some of both in classic D&D).

So there is still no real "solo" monster category in 5e, from what I can see.

Legendary seems pretty close. But, in theory, any but the very weakest lone monster fit the exp budget & difficulty encounter guidelines for parties of some level. In 5e, all monsters are meant to 'solo,' 'elite,' 'standard,' and 'minion,' to parties of a given relative level. That was one of the promises of Bounded Accuracy.

 

[CapnZapp]

I was going to break this down, but, eh. Lets just say that I pretty much disagree with you on every line you wrote here and move on.

Sure thing. I'm cool.

 

[CapnZapp]

I still think that legendary creatures are meant to present a challenge to a group of characters. The Adult and Ancient dragons are good examples. They have actions they can take outside of their own turns, and can make multiple attacks on their turns. I mean the Adult Red Dragon can multi attack, and more importantly move between each attack, take three actions out of turn, and has lair effects that trigger on initiative count 20. That means in each full round of combat is it can make up to seven attacks, which is roughly comparable to a group of four PCs at that level. Never mind the lair effects give the DM an excuse to include other fire monsters.

Sure they can.

If you throw the CR guidelines out the window, and pitch a monster 10 or more CR than the party level at them.

Meaning, the fact you CAN challenge a party with a single creature is more due to the inherent power rise from levels, than any deliberate "solofication" of a random MM entry.

 

[CapnZapp]

Which Legendary creatures do.



Which legendary creatures do.

I suspect maybe you forgot how the Legendary creatures work? It's understandable, as in my opinion there are not enough of them by far, and so it would be rare that you'd have an occasion to play with those rules.



Exactly as Beleriphon says. Legendary creatures, like the one in his example, have actions they take outside their own turns, which "breaks the in-game restrictions" and "gets to act several times to balance the action economy". That is precisely what they do.

No my dear Mistwell, insulting my intelligence by suggesting I perhaps forgot all I'm talking about is something you get called out on.