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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Manbearcat" data-source="post: 6325025" data-attributes="member: 6696971">How about in the same encounter?  Recently, the player in my PBP on here fought a giant, tentacled, sea monster riffed off the Darkmantle.  The PC and NPCs were on a boat.  The setup was thus:- A flatboat being attacked from below by the sea monster.- NPC daughter who was a Minion and had a trait to buff her defenses when adjacent to her father, an at-will to "get tiny" such that she makes herself a non-target, and an Encounter Move Action to squirm out of trouble.- NPC father who was a Standard Soldier who had several means to protect his daughter; at-will immediate interrupt to take an attack for her and then deal one in return, an Encounter power to give her temp HP and do AoE damage, an at-will mark attack with the long-oar he was using as a polearm.- The Sea Monster.  This creature was mechanically iterated as 4 parts.  1)  Minion tentacles that would grope, grab, and pull you into the water.  These were up at the beginning for a few rounds before the sea monster proper reared its head.  A foreshadowing.2)  Challenging Terrain around the boat which were the many unseen tentacles that would grasp and pull you down into the depths to be drown and devoured.3)  The Elite Sea Monster itself which had an aura and its own suite of attacks; a 'rock the boat attack" that knocked people into the water (refreshed on bloodied), its own tentacle attacks (that did damage and grabbed and pulled people into the water), and it could also "summon (mechanically)" several "summoned tentacles" (basically minions that, when killed, cause damage to the Elite itself) that it could channel attacks through as a Minor Action.I would assume that knowledge of the machinery of these make-believe things would be problematic for internal consistency and thus immersion for you (and for others)?  In play, these mechanical components all worked to enhance emotional investment, dramatic tension, and overall immersion for the player.  It was pretty awesome.  The little girl narrowly escaped death on several occasions as the PC and NPC worked to protect her while slaying the beast (and surviving themselves) and the NPC (father) was almost drowned in the effort.  It was a desperate, frightening battle in fighting the beast in its own element.  My guess is that, if I ran the fight 20 times, the girl (minion) would perish perhaps 8ish times (40ish % chance).  That is due to all of the various mechanical constructs at work (including PC and NPC tactical options).  The Minion rules (amongst others) were central to making this fight thematically and tactically deep.  Process simulation and symmetrical build components would never allow that % nor would it allow the kind of tactically rich choices made by the parties involved and the harrowing, narrow escapes.  The death rate of the little girl would have been extreme (19 out of 20 or more) regardless of the tactical decisions made by the involved parties.  Just the brunt force of the math and the lack of means to protect her would have dictated that.  That genre trope just couldn't become manifest, or at least not in any compelling way.</blockquote>

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