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Message: <blockquote data-quote="kenjib" data-source="post: 492741" data-attributes="member: 530">Sometimes it's not the evil rampaging monsters that catch my attention, but the good and non-combatant neutral ones.  The evil ones are automatically set up in opposition to the PCs, although granted there is plenty of room for playing with these assumptions.However, the good and non-combatant neutral creatures can provide very interesting roles that evil monsters can't play as well.  For example, in the Monster Manual II there is the Corollax.  This bird really reminded me of the Clark Ashton Smith story "The Voyage of King Eurovan."<a href="http://www.eldritchdark.com/wri/short/voyageofkingeuvoran.html" target="_blank">http://www.eldritchdark.com/wri/short/voyageofkingeuvoran.html</a>The goal in this story is not to slay the beastie, and that's what makes it so interesting.  It's about obsession, myth, quest, pride, and adventure.  These things do not rely on an evil opponent, as the story is totally about the protagonist and his voyage of discovery (or ruin), not about his enemies.A creature like the Galeb Duhr has a lot of potential in that it can provide an entire society to become immersed in and interact with in interesting ways.  I think that creatures like this can create more complex situations than evil ones, since killing them should never be an attractive and easy solution or fallback plan like it is with anything deadly evil.We've got things like those mentioned above as well as treants, myconids, most of the fey, weirds, and others, but the emphasis of monster books is still weighted pretty heavily toward evil psychopaths and rampaging neutrals.  Do you think there should be more creatures not oriented toward combat?This actually extends to evil creatures not intended for combat as well.  Why aren't there evil creatures with immense power, but who simply can not at all stand up to a combat encounter?  The CR system seems to discourage this.Are monsters too combat oriented in design?  What would people think if a monster book came out filled entirely with creatures who try to avoid combat situations, but encourage interesting role play encounters instead?</blockquote>

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