Creating Minions?

[reezel]

So, I was thinking of making a Werewolf encounter and wanted to pad it heavily with some wolf minions. I went to the DMG trusty monster creation guidelines and scoured everywhere for rules on making minion and came up with nothing. So I come here to ask this question; does anyone know where the rules for creating minions can be found? If not, has anyone taken the time to come up with the formula or guidlines on thier own?

 

[greatn]

I'd just take the base creature you want(Wolves), use its movement and attack form, strip its encounter and utility powers, up its defenses and attack bonuses equal to the leader of the group(a werewolf in this case), subtract two from all defenses and attacks, reduce its hp to 1, and make damage equal to 4 + (x/5) where x is the level of the encounter.

Then add a descriptive adjective at the end: Wolf Lackey, Wolf Follower, Wolf Helper, etcetera.

 

[Family]

Badger?


---
Mal: "Yeah, well, just be careful. We cheated Badger out of good money to buy that frippery, and you're supposed to make me look respectable."
Kaylee: "Yessir, Captain Tight Pants."

 

[Surgoshan]

Then add a descriptive adjective at the end: Wolf Lackey, Wolf Follower, Wolf Helper, etcetera.

Gamma Wolf
Life's a bitch when you work for a werewolf.

 

[frankthedm]

This is a huge disappointment. While reverse engineering minions should not be that hard, i was hoping there would be minion conversion guidelines, like the Elite and Solo conversion systems.

 

[amnuxoll]

This is a huge disappointment. While reverse engineering minions should not be that hard, i was hoping there would be minion conversion guidelines, like the Elite and Solo conversion systems.

I also predict that minions will be were the killer DMs get the most play. I foresee encounters where abusing minions make the encounter more powerful than the numbers make it out to be (much like CR is abused today).

If there are no guidelines that makes it worse.

 

[Greatwyrm]

As far as I can gather, here's what's up.

Minions are just like regular creatures, except they're pretty much only supposed to be melee critters. (DMG 54-55)

Given that, I'd guess you probably use the monster design steps (DMG 184), but don't apply any of the modifiers in the table "Monster Statistics by Role". Then, just give them one hit point.

Those guidelines seem to get you fairly close. Then I guess you just compare it to existing ones to get the feel you're looking for in the way of special powers(see step 7, monster design steps).

Still, it does seem odd that's the only one you have to dig for when the rest of the monster types are pretty clearly laid out. In a way, it seems like the "basic" monster is the baseline and all the other types (e.g. lurker, soldier, Elite, etc.) are add-ons from there.

--edit-- I should note that this seems to get in the ballpark for some existing minions. Just a quick spot-check, not a detailed study.

 

[reezel]

Ok, I was wondering if it was just me that couldn't find this information. Well hopefully they put the rules up on the web at least. I will for now go with the suggestions put up by others here.