Custom Monsters and Races: Chris Perkins says yes you can!

[Greg K]

This is exactly what I'm hoping for as well.

I agree with Lizard. I want the AC breakdown and for the reason he mentioned and thought 3.x got it right. I think it will be a shame if 4e does away with it.

 

[Doug McCrae]

I agree with Lizard. I want the AC breakdown and for the reason he mentioned and thought 3.x got it right. I think it will be a shame if 4e does away with it.

Maybe there's scope for a 3rd party product to '3rdify' 4e, giving the breakdowns for AC and such.

 

[Dragonblade]

See, I like playing "dress up" with monsters.

I'd rather start with a gnoll, natural AC 15, and see "Bashers should have AC 19-21", and decide "OK, we'll give him +5 from a Chain Shirt +1" or "OK, he's going to drink a Potion of Stoneskin just before the fight" or some other means to "up" him to 20 in a way which is mechanically consistent and which can be adjusted. Dispel magic to undo the stone skin, a rust spell or a rending attack to destroy the shirt, etc. 4e is supposed to give people all sorts of k3w1 p0w3rz, it would be a shame if none of them are debuffing/equipment damaging.

I just can't deal with the whole "This gnoll has a higher AC than his archer friend because he went to Basher School at Gnoll College."

See, this is exactly why I got burned out on 3.5. It seems really cool to be able to account for every little bonus and know exactly what the effect is on AC if the PCs do X, but in practice it just killed the enjoyment of the game for me.

I just want the monster to have a set AC. Whether it wears armor or not, should just be fluff. If the PCs in 4e do get some sort of "armor piercing" ability, I'll just give the appropriate penalty to the monsters AC. But I don't want to have to account for each little contributing bonus anymore.

 

[Dragonblade]

I agree with Lizard. I want the AC breakdown and for the reason he mentioned and thought 3.x got it right. I think it will be a shame if 4e does away with it.

Flat-footed, Touch, Dodge, Natural, Enhancing, Armor, Deflection, Luck, etc. on ad nauseum.....

No thanks. I just can't take it anymore. I hope 4e jettisons all this.

 

[med stud]

Hopefully creation goes faster this time round. I created one monster using all the rules for creating monsters, then I just put new looks on existing monsters. Three headed, fire breathing hound of Hell? Take a chimera, add two more breath weapons, describe it differently to the players and voila! Instant monster

If it goes faster to create monsters this time round I might make some creations all of my own

 

[Fallen Seraph]

It would be really nice for me if they do make it easier.

I am really hoping they give some level-based examples of different Types and Origins. Then the tools to build upon them.

I want this, since my world is heavily affected by the Far Realm, so I want to be able to create aberrated-dogs (key element of one part of my game), and various abberated-plants, animals, etc. Hell a aberrated-dragon be awesome as well.

 

[Rechan]

Flat-footed

I think this has been gotten rid of.

From what we can tell, it looks like there's something called Combat Advantage. And this combat advantage is a flat plus to attack, and situations like surprise give Combat Advantage.

 

[Dragonblade]

I think this has been gotten rid of.

From what we can tell, it looks like there's something called Combat Advantage. And this combat advantage is a flat plus to attack, and situations like surprise give Combat Advantage.

Oh, I know. I follow all 4e news religiously! I was just making a point about the overwhelming number of bonuses and types of AC that constantly had to be accounted for in 3.5.