Excerpt: Minions. Go forth mine minions! Bring havoc with your 1 hp [merged]

[Thasmodious]

The problem with letting misses kill minions is it makes encounters featuring minions no brainers. And its not hard to figure out if an encounter has minions. If you're facing a large group that greatly outnumbers your party, you are, in all likelihood, facing some minions. Then you just drop what ever AoE daily that does anything on a miss on as large a group as possible and wash part of the battlefield away.

 

[ForbidenMaster]

IMO if a miss would not normally kill a monster of comparable level it should not kill a minion.

 

[ForbidenMaster]

The problem with letting misses kill minions is it makes encounters featuring minions no brainers. And its not hard to figure out if an encounter has minions. If you're facing a large group that greatly outnumbers your party, you are, in all likelihood, facing some minions. Then you just drop what ever AoE daily that does anything on a miss on as large a group as possible and wash part of the battlefield away.

And then its like the minions never existed and you might as well have just given the PCs the XP instead of having the wizard waste a power.

 

[Blackeagle]

Perhaps there are fixes built into the dailies themselves- if single target dailies do other things on a miss than damage (or are reliable) while mass targeting dailies (such as fireball) could still reliably kill at least some minions, I think I'll be fine.

A single target daily is probably going to be a waste against a minion whether it hits or not. One target dailies are going to be best saved for solos or elites most of the time. If the DM is describing minions in a way that players confuse them for big baddies then it seems like more of a DM problem (or a stupid player problem) than a minion problem or power problem.

 

[Crashy75]

The problem with letting misses kill minions is it makes encounters featuring minions no brainers. And its not hard to figure out if an encounter has minions. If you're facing a large group that greatly outnumbers your party, you are, in all likelihood, facing some minions. Then you just drop what ever AoE daily that does anything on a miss on as large a group as possible and wash part of the battlefield away.

It does kinda have a fun cinematic feel to it, though:
"Leave them to me" *cracks his knuckles* <BOOM>

"Who's next?"

 

[ForbidenMaster]

These are good points. *sigh* Perhaps there are fixes built into the dailies themselves- if single target dailies do other things on a miss than damage (or are reliable) while mass targeting dailies (such as fireball) could still reliably kill at least some minions, I think I'll be fine.

Remember, just because a power misses, it doesnt mean that it cant kill a minion. There are 3 stages to an attack after the actual attack roll. Hit, Miss, and Effect. If the effect part of a power did damage, that is, the part of the power that occurs whether the power hits or misses, I would think that it would kill a minion.

 

[ncc4781]

If any attack that does damage kills a minion does that mean that a first level pc can kill a level 30 minion on a crit? ( i say on a crit because a level 1 should not be able to hit a level 20 any other way) I am not sure I like that but then as a DM i would never set that kind of situation up. To ez to kill the pc or give them waaaay too much xp.

Having said this, I really like minions and can't wait to throw them a group.

 

[Sojorn]

Remember, just because a power misses, it doesnt mean that it cant kill a minion. There are 3 stages to an attack after the actual attack roll. Hit, Miss, and Effect. If the effect part of a power did damage, that is, the part of the power that occurs whether the power hits or misses, I would think that it would kill a minion.

Indeed. Also remember that there are a fair number of feats and at-will powers that do some tiny amount of damage (usually an ability modifier) on a miss. It is more for these powers and feats than the dailies that minions do not take damage on misses.

If you want to just say "Ok, I don't care if it was a miss, that minion just took 50 damage, he's gone" you're perfectly justified to do so as a DM

 

[Rechan]

If any attack that does damage kills a minion does that mean that a first level pc can kill a level 30 minion on a crit? ( i say on a crit because a level 1 should not be able to hit a level 20 any other way) I am not sure I like that but then as a DM i would never set that kind of situation up. To ez to kill the pc or give them waaaay too much xp.

Having said this, I really like minions and can't wait to throw them a group.

From the article:

When you use minions, you should use those of a level appropriate to the encounter you’re building. The concept of minions is to provide fun filler for encounters, not to provide a way for a 1st level character to gain 1,000+ XP for defeating a 23rd-level abyssal ghoul minion by rolling a natural 20. Minions are a rules abstraction, and one of the many tools a DM has to build exciting encounters.

 

[Crashy75]

If any attack that does damage kills a minion does that mean that a first level pc can kill a level 30 minion on a crit? ( i say on a crit because a level 1 should not be able to hit a level 20 any other way) I am not sure I like that but then as a DM i would never set that kind of situation up. To ez to kill the pc or give them waaaay too much xp.

Having said this, I really like minions and can't wait to throw them a group.

This was addressed by the article. "Minions" are a metagame concept. There is no such thing as a level 30 minion to 1st level players.