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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Zaruthustran" data-source="post: 3848396" data-attributes="member: 1457">Was never a fan of templates; way too much fussing around, too much math. The bit from the last zombie article (stating that a gnoll zombie and an orc zombie are the same monster) suggests that 4E is designed to be adjustable on the fly. They're designing in such a way to make it easy for DMs to "wing it". That's a good thing. Rather than spend 30 minutes accurately adjusting abilities and re-calculating modifiers for your orc (zombie template), you can just yank out the regular zombie stats, maybe add an extra point of damage (for the base orc's strength) and AC (the orc zombie is still wearing armor) and away you go.I really get the impression that's the way they're doing customization: instead of creating a specific template that gives +4 to Str and forcing you to do the math to derive damage, to hit, skills, and so on, I suspect they'll just say "to make something fill the Big Brute role, add +2 to all of its attacks and damage. Then add 1 to [4e's equivalent to CR]." It's a subtle distinction, but better for DM's because you can explain that +2 to attacks and damage as coming from bigger muscles, better training, precision targeting, or whatever you want. In other words, sounds like they're focused on the result (tougher monster), rather than bothering with the process (adding to Str, which results in a tougher monster). Hooray!</blockquote>