DMG2 updated monster creation rules

[Mesh Hong]

I don't see anywhere in the encounter design section of the DMG anything even faintly resembling an encounter template made up of nothing but minions. It isn't a type of encounter that is advertised as being balanceable by the encounter design system.

This is true, and a good point.

The DMG does say:

"Sometimes you want monsters to come in droves and go down just as fast. A fight against thirty orcs is a grand cinematic battle. The players get to enjoy carving through the mob like a knife through butter, feeling confident and powerful."​

But it also says:​

"Minions are designed to serve as shock troops and cannon fodder for other monsters (standard, elite, or solo)."​

So the DMG certainly doesn't recommend using encounters made up of just minions.​

In your examples encounter 1 and 3 are throw-aways that exist for dramatic effect. They could be challenging or not of course depending on how big the "horde" is, but the XP system isn't going to balance them well. I wouldn't count on those encounters doing much and if I wanted them to have an impact I'd probably make them initial waves followed immediately by encounter 2 and 4.

Again you make a fine point.

The encounters are in a sense "throw aways", but I would argue that "dramatic effect" is a very important aspect of encounter design and overall encounter (or adventure) flow. Yes the horde encounters would be transitions between the main (and more meaty) encounters but they might still cause the PCs to expend resources if handled correctly, and would certainly add to atmosphere.

The MMII upgrade to minion damage, coupled with using more minions keeps minion encounters threatening and exciting. It also allows the players to feel like heroes by facing hordes of enemies swathing through them.

I do accept your point that RAW the encounters wouldn't work anywhere near as well though as I houserule the minions xp value and build my own minions. So your point stands as true.

 

[Dr_Ruminahui]

I ran a mostly minion encounter at 1st - the players attacked a goblin warcamp while all the soldiers were out hunting down a supply caravan. Basically, it was a goblin hexer and a whole bunch of goblin cutters.

It was a lot of fun, and certainly wasn't anymore "not balanceable" than an encounter with 2 solos.

Nor do I see a problem with the DM tweaking XP levels - if I throw the players into a situation where they are at a gross advantage to the monsters (for example, firing down into a pit at melee only monsters), I'll give less XP for the monsters. Likewise, if the monsters have a gross advantage (party attacking a bunch of fliers and artillery up a cliff), I'll increase their XP value. Now, if that situation comes up due to player ingenuity/stupidity, I'm less likely to adjust things, as I don't want to penalize players for being clever or reward them for being dumb.

IMHO, the XP adjustment for minions is simply that - a readjustment based on the realisation that against higher level parties, minions are simply less powerful.

One has to realise that the DM has a lot of discretion regarding XP. Some DM's don't give it out at all, and just level the party up when appropriate for the story. Tweaking the XP value of a minion (or any other monster) based on its threat to the party is certainly a valid activity.

 

[Elric]

My question is how much is almost? If 11th level minions are only worth a little more XP than 10th level ones I don't have a big problem with that. As people have noted, this is around the point where minions start being less effective.

I wouldn't be too worried that a 10th level party gets to face one or two more 11th level minions, it shouldn't cause too much of a problem.

Looking at the DMG, 11th level minions would be worth less XP than 10th level ones. 10th level minions would be worth 125 XP, and 11th level minions would be worth 120 XP instead of the current 150 XP.

Note that the problem I described applies in reverse if you end up using too few 10th level minions against an 11th level party.

 

[keterys]

Yeah, well, if you're making encounters that are ALL minions basically then you've diverged so far away from the envisaged encounter design parameters that all bets are off. It isn't that hard to devise ridiculous encounters that obviously won't work. I don't have to use minions or twiddle with any of the parameters of the system at all to do that. So what exactly whas your point?

Whoa, did you even read what I put? 12 minions is not an all minion encounter. Heck, it's not even necessarily a half minion encounter.

For a group of 4, I've run in the last few weeks the following encounters that featured that many minions:

1 Brute
1 Artillery
12 Minions

3 Soldiers
16 Minions (some avoidable)

1 Elite Brute
1 Elite Artillery
1 Skirmisher
1 Lurker
16 Minions (8 to start, 8 reinforcements, all able to be skill challenged away)

And those fights all went great. The 3 soldiers + 16 minions encounter is the one that was n+4 level in theory but n+1 in actuality, fwiw. Minions totally lie about how much xp they're worth.