Do you monster?

[Tuerny]

Re: Re: Re: Do you monster?

Experienced gamers come to expect certain things from certain races. Kobolds are supposed to be cannon fodder. IMLC I had a kobold civilization. They had hunting parties and such. The only one in the group that the party was scared of was their shaman (17th lvl adept) Things like this are okay. He was even a recuring NPC because the party kept going to visit him cause they liked the way I played him (voice changing microphones rock). However, since Kobolds make easier targets for other creatures then do humans and their chaotic nature stops them from building strong civilizations this was a one of a kind place. One thing that reall irks me as a player is when a CE race is played more like a TN race. I mean yes there are exceptions but as a general rule the race is CE and therefor their society is CE.

um, unless I am reading the Monster Manual wrong (or you have done something with house rules, which is perfectly understandable) kobolds are and always have been Lawful Evil

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

Do I monster? Only rarely, and for the reason that on the whole monsters are dull. What can PCs do with monsters? The only thing to do is to fight them.

Not at all! They can also run from them, hide from them, and get scared to death by them!

That aside, sometimes the trick is to find them, or to out-think them - some monsters can easily come up with intelligent plans on their own. And even if they don't, their behaviour can be so bizarre that the PCs can spend lots of time trying to figure out just what the hell is going on!

Monsters are dull? Only when you don't use them in the right way!

 

[Agback]

Re: Re: Do you monster?

Not at all! They can also run from them, hide from them, and get scared to death by them!

That aside, sometimes the trick is to find them, or to out-think them - some monsters can easily come up with intelligent plans on their own. And even if they don't, their behaviour can be so bizarre that the PCs can spend lots of time trying to figure out just what the hell is going on!

Monsters are dull? Only when you don't use them in the right way!

Okay, I shall be tediously explicit. NPCs can fill all the roles you suggest for monsters. And they can also fill roles that monsters can't, such as 'potential romantic interest' and 'possible father-in-law'.

Opponents with social roles just present a wider range of possible interactions for PCs than monsters squatting in their lairs can manage, or even monsters roaming the countryside. For everything monsters can do that NPCs can't, there are hundreds of things that NPCs can do that monsters can't. Best of all, there present some uncertainty as to whether they are real enemies or not.

Regards,


Agback

 

[Xarlen]

Wow. If you have NPCs who have townspeople pay them tributes in virgins or food or worship, NPCs who roam around forests, caves, mountains, eating farmers animals or running the local ecology, if you have NPCs who scare PCs by purely the sight of them (Note, not re-occuring villains), then man, I wanna meet some of your NPCs.

Considering how I have a werewolf and a half dragon in the party, 'Love Interest' and 'Father In Law' can work for monsters.

 

[Agback]

Wow. If you have NPCs who have townspeople pay them tributes in virgins or food or worship, NPCs who roam around forests, caves, mountains, eating farmers animals or running the local ecology, if you have NPCs who scare PCs by purely the sight of them (Note, not re-occuring villains), then man, I wanna meet some of your NPCs.

Okay. Because I've had PCs that did most of those things, especially running the ecology.

But note that in nearly all cases, these things that monsters do not create a wide range of ways for PCs to interact with them. They are just different excuses for PCs to engage inthe sam old same old.

Regards,


Agback

 

[Drawmack]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Do you monster?

um, unless I am reading the Monster Manual wrong (or you have done something with house rules, which is perfectly understandable) kobolds are and always have been Lawful Evil

typo on my part.

 

[drnuncheon]

Running an urban campaign as my primary game (see .sig), most of the opponents my players face are NPCs of one race or another - although undead has run a clos esecond. When the PCs actually ran into a "real monster" (a gibbering mouther) it was all the more 'WTF is that?!' than it would have been otherwise.

In my secondary (online) game, we're using published modules - right now it's Of Sound Mind - but all the monsters there are pretty much NPCs as well. Which brings me to Agback's comment:

Originally posted by Agback

on the whole monsters are dull. What can PCs do with monsters? The only thing to do is to fight them.

You are so wrong. Sorry, but there's no other way to say it. If the only thing to do with a monster is fight it, you're not using them right. Now granted, that might be true of some monsters - a purple worm perhaps - but far from all of them.

Where would Oedipus have been without matching wits with the Sphinx? What about Thor and Loki in Utgard-loki's hall?

The secret is in making your monsters into NPCs. Because once they have a name, a personality, goals - then you can actually interact with them. You can talk to them, trust them, mistrust them, ferret them out, trick them into revealing themselves, love them, hate them, buy from them, sell to them, win their trust, rescue their children, hire them, get jobs with them, infiltrate their organizations, bring social pressure to bear on them, and discover that they are right and the person you work for is in the wrong. And some monsters you can even dance with at the New Year's Ball, seduce, and wind up with children by.

Of course, if you do all that, then you won't be able to think of them as a 'monster' anymore...

Last but far from least:

Originally posted by Drawmack

Experienced gamers come to expect certain things from certain races.

That's precisely why you should give those races class levels. Shake 'em up a bit. Really, kobolds aren't any more 'cannon fodder' than humans, and to think of them as such is pretty much metagaming. Reducing an intelligent race to the status of walking targets simply because your players expect it is...limiting.

J

 

[Agback]

Of course, if you do all that, then you won't be able to think of them as a 'monster' anymore...

My point, I think.

Some of the NPCs in my campaign are dragons, some are undead, a few are shapeshifters. Quite a lot are celestial bodies, hills, mountains, valleys, bodies of water. But very few are monsters. They are almost all people.

Regards,


Agback

 

[Xarlen]

I thought the origional question was that if you use Monsters (I.e, non humanoid creatures). Just because the 'monster' has motives, personality, etc, that somehow dispels the 'monster' fact?

Me, I almost never just blatantly throw a monster at the party Unless it's either A) Working for/with a group (Grimlocks with a pet Basilisk), B) There for some reason I design (I used a Remorhaz to cause an avalanch so they would go a certain way), or C) and very rarely, it's just There. Once, PCs were investigating a place an NPC was hiring some younger adventurers to go; they wanted to ensure there was no doublecross. Well, I threw them a bone; some Ice Trolls, but who obviously had no corilation to the NPC.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

Re: Re: Re: Do you monster?

Opponents with social roles just present a wider range of possible interactions for PCs than monsters squatting in their lairs can manage, or even monsters roaming the countryside. For everything monsters can do that NPCs can't, there are hundreds of things that NPCs can do that monsters can't. Best of all, there present some uncertainty as to whether they are real enemies or not.

I still think that you are missing out on something. Storytellers throughout the ages have used monsters as metaphors, be it for human behaviour or forces of nature. They put monsters in their stories to make a point.

You can easily do the same.