Do you like modrons?

[Charwoman Gene]

I don't like that modrons aren't Tetrahedron, Cube, Octahedron, dodecahedron, icosahedron. It bothers me mathematically.

 

[Piratecat]

I have a deep and abiding love for modrons. For a plot reason I killed them all off simultaneously in my old campaign (and pinned the blame on the PCs), and I'm still missing the little polyhedral fellas.

 

[TwinBahamut]

I voted that they are silly/bad, but they are not irredeemable. However, they do have two severe strikes against them.

Flaw 1: They were created as part of the awful Great Wheel alignment symmetry scheme. As such, they are stuck as being compared to being like Angels or Demons, but don't live up to that comparison in the least.

Flaw 2: They are impossible to take seriously. A large part of this is the art portrayals and the decision to make them both dice-shaped and anthropomorphic. There is no way to take something that looks like that seriously.

If Modrons were broken away from the "avatar of law" concept a little bit and given a more complex role in the world, then they would be more interesting. For example, casting them as elemental beings of crystal that try to forge ordered structures within the Elemental Chaos would break down the flawed symmetry and let them establish their own niche a bit better. I say crystal because I can't help but imagine that they would be much more cool if they were elaborate crystalline structures of both incredibly detail and perfect spherical symmetry, beautiful but completely alien to anything that has legs or eyes.

Basically, Modrons would be great if they were re-imagined as thoroughly as many other D&D creatures were in the transition to 4E. I don't like a lot of those monster revisions, but for some creatures in similar situations to the Modrons it worked very well.

Edit: To clarify, I would prefer it if Modrons looked like big crystalline structures, with complexity starting with something like this, and ending up in things more like these (and yes, I am aware that the latter link is referring to 4-dimensional polygons).

 

[Shemeska]

I voted that they are silly/bad, but they are not irredeemable. However, they do have two severe strikes against them.

Flaw 1: They were created as part of the awful Great Wheel alignment symmetry scheme. As such, they are stuck as being compared to being like Angels or Demons, but don't live up to that comparison in the least.

I really don't understand the claim that pretty much any pre-4e outsider that wasn't modeled upon (or just usurped the name of) something from mythology only existed because of symmetry (this isn't saying that you made that claim, but it's a general observation that I've seen the claim tossed around rather often). You can have cool races that fit distinct concepts without being there just to fill out a spot in a spreadsheet.

Flaw 2: They are impossible to take seriously. A large part of this is the art portrayals and the decision to make them both dice-shaped and anthropomorphic. There is no way to take something that looks like that seriously.

Not all of them are even dice shaped. In fact the most common modrons, the monodrones, are spherical. They're no sillier than beholders, and frankly they're a lot more alien and difficult for PCs to understand because of their generally limited sphere of awareness within and outside of their own hierarchy. The image of a hundred thousand lower caste modrons marching through a town on the outlands with little or no comprehension of the act except that they were ordered to do so by say, a secundus, is cold and scary, and the secundus would understand the why of it all, and be capable of perfectly rationalizing it with zero empathy or malice, just cold, mathematical perfection.

 

[Merlin the Tuna]

Not all of them are even dice shaped. In fact the most common modrons, the monodrones, are spherical. They're no sillier than beholders...

No sillier than the Disco Ball of Death, you say?

Well, I'm sold.

 

[airwalkrr]

Modrons.

Love 'em.

'Nuff said.

 

[jdrakeh]

I intensely dislike them. They're like the Ghoulies or Critters of the films bearing the same names. They're all monsters, but they're so goofy-looking and goofy-acting that they don't present a credible threat — even though they've all killed lots of people. They're that silly.

 

[firesnakearies]

Heck yeah, modrons rock.

Anyone who doesn't like them, go play Planescape: Torment (which is, in all seriousness and without any hyperbole at all, totally the BEST computer roleplaying game ever made) and then tell me you don't.

Nordom is amazingly cool and entertaining. Voiced (brilliantly!) by none other than Dan Castellaneta, best known as Homer Simpson.



(Talking to the reformed succubus priestess in the party)

Nordom: Attention, Fall-From-Grace. I wish to address your body.

Fall-From-Grace: I beg your pardon?

Nordom: Your body. Your form. Your reason for selecting it. Why?

Fall-From-Grace: Why..? I suppose I find it comforting. Besides, I rather like the wings.

Nordom: It would be more practical for you to assume the form of a modron. It is 13.27% more efficient; give or take +5.2%.

Fall-From-Grace: (gently flirting) Why, Nordom... are you trying to court me?

Nordom: It was not my intention to initiate legal action against you.

 

[TwinBahamut]

I really don't understand the claim that pretty much any pre-4e outsider that wasn't modeled upon (or just usurped the name of) something from mythology only existed because of symmetry (this isn't saying that you made that claim, but it's a general observation that I've seen the claim tossed around rather often). You can have cool races that fit distinct concepts without being there just to fill out a spot in a spreadsheet.

It is not that modrons are not interesting because of the symmetry (like them or hate them, they are weird enough to be interesting and I find them entertaining as much as I wish they were something different), it is that they simply don't fit in their position. They are a round peg in a square hole.

Angels and demons play an undeniable part of culture, and have for millenia. They fit into well-understood, recognizable roles. Even descriptions of them as the "inhabitants of heaven" and the "inhabitants of hell" don't go anywhere far enough to really cover the full extent of their place in the world. Modrons simply don't have that, and thus, when they inevitably get put forward as being equals to angels or demons and fulfilling the same role, then the comparison is unfavorable.

Besides, they are there to fill out symmetry. In all its absurd foolishness, the Great Wheel needs to have Lawful outsiders to manage the Lawful people who drift to the Lawful plane of Mechanus. The entire situation, based upon an unnecessary lawful-alignment extension of the afterlife (an afterlife built upon the idea that evil people go to hell because that is how the evil gods want to reward their service, rather than because they are being punished for their evil ways) is so far removed from anything the player can relate to that it is simply silly.

I really wouldn't mind it if the Modrons were just described as being inhabitants of some outer plane, like countless other planat creatures are, but their roles as "outsiders of perfect law" just doesn't work well. They don't even really interact with mortals on behalf of the forces of law like angels and devils do...

Not all of them are even dice shaped. In fact the most common modrons, the monodrones, are spherical.

That is mostly irrelevent, really. Well, except for the part that, in my opinion, a perfect sphere should be one of the highest forms a creatuer of pure mathematical order should aspire to, not the lowest...

They're no sillier than beholders, and frankly they're a lot more alien and difficult for PCs to understand because of their generally limited sphere of awareness within and outside of their own hierarchy.

Beholders are very silly. Also, the fact that Modrons are hard to relate to is a strike against them, not something in their favor.

The image of a hundred thousand lower caste modrons marching through a town on the outlands with little or no comprehension of the act except that they were ordered to do so by say, a secundus, is cold and scary, and the secundus would understand the why of it all, and be capable of perfectly rationalizing it with zero empathy or malice, just cold, mathematical perfection.

It is not cold and scary in the least. It wanders entirely between normal (for an organized army of beings) and silly (especially the whole random marching for no explicable purpose thing). Also, I really see little real expression of "mathematical perfection" anywhere in the Modron race as they have been previously described. Actually, I am struggling to understand what the term "mathematical perfection" is really supposed to mean... Math is anything but perfect, and this becomes clearer and clearer the further you go in its study.

 

[avin]

They're all monsters.

They are a race. Humans are a race. Elves and dwarves too.