How do you make NPCs out of PC classes?

[mattcolville]

I want to run an encounter between a bunch of people. Humans, who have PC classes, as the enemy.

My expectation was that I could just go into the Monster Builder and type "Hexblade" or "Rogue" and find a human NPC by that name with powers that are obvious analogues to their PC equivalents and all I'd have to do was level them down.

But indeed there are vanishingly few such examples and in every case it's a Name NPC. That seems weird to me, makes me think I'm missing something.

What's the expected behavior if a GM wants to give a PC a follower like a Dwrf Rogue or a Tiefling Warlock?

 

[ffy]

page 30 of DMG2, it has tips on creating a custom companion character, and using player classes for making companion characters.

 

[mattcolville]

page 30 of DMG2, it has tips on creating a custom companion character, and using player classes for making companion characters.

I'll check it out! Thanks!

 

[Lezta]

The rules in the DMG2 are more suited for making PC allies, as opposed to enemies.

The NPC rules in DMG1 on p186 are more suitable for your needs. They're expanded somewhere in DMG2 as well to include the PHB2 classes.

 

[Dungeoneer]

I want to run an encounter between a bunch of people. Humans, who have PC classes, as the enemy.

My expectation was that I could just go into the Monster Builder and type "Hexblade" or "Rogue" and find a human NPC by that name with powers that are obvious analogues to their PC equivalents and all I'd have to do was level them down.

But indeed there are vanishingly few such examples and in every case it's a Name NPC. That seems weird to me, makes me think I'm missing something.

What's the expected behavior if a GM wants to give a PC a follower like a Dwrf Rogue or a Tiefling Warlock?

While searching for 'rogue' in the Compendium won't necessarily get you what you want, there definitely are monsters that have analogs of PC powers. For instance, there are many Soldier-type monsters who mark. One of these would be a great starting point for creating an NPC defender. What is the defining characteristic of a rogue? Sneak attack damage. There are lots of monsters who deal extra damage with combat advantage. Start with one of those.

Basically, most PC classes have one or two defining characteristics to them. Just make sure that your NPCs have those characteristics as powers. A good way to search for such powers is the Monster Builder in Adventure Tools. Broken as it is, it should still give you a better search than the Compendium.

I'm not 100% clear if you want your NPCs to be enemies or allies. If allies, definitely look at the rules for companions in the DMG2.

 

[Dr_Ruminahui]

I've used the DMG method and its always seemed more work than its worth...

If you are going to search for a similar monster, rather than searching for a class, I would search for a mechanic. For example, if you want a rogue, search "combat advantage" then look at the skirmishers and lurkers that pop up. Likewise, if you want a fighter type, search "mark" and look at the various healers.

Doesn't work so well with controllers and leaders, who for monsters don't have any particular mechanic, but there tend to be less of those anyway, so just flipping through them should work.

Incidentally, for such key word searches, I find the compendium works better than monster builder - I just used it to build myself a minion, searching minion and combat advantage, and ultimately reskinned and tweeked the feral dog (I wanted something that used numbers to pull their target down, so I searched "combat advantage" and used the minion limitter).

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

I would suggest two methods. The first one is the easier, more flexible and probably all-round better. But YMMV.

Using the monster damage rules, go through the PH and pick out properly-flavored abilities for your monster. So if you wanted an NPC "cleric", go through the cleric's powers list (from at-wills to dailies) and pick out ones you want. Don't use the PH damage values though; use the values in the errata/DMG2/Monster Builder/whatever. However, the associated effects can often be used "as-is", though you sometimes (but not always) need to nerf effects for daily powers. (If the effect is something for the rest of the encounter, it's probably too powerful for a monster, but if the effect is "restrained (save ends)" it's probably useable.)

Feel free to take some class abilities as well. for a rogue, you would probably want to take combat advantage (easier than using sneak attack, although it's virtually the same thing). But for some rogue-like NPCs (eg a lurker) First Strike might suit the NPC very well.

Also feel free to mix-and-match with similar monster abilities, as suggested in above posts.

Alternatively, the DMG1 has two separate ways of creating NPCs that cling more closely to the PC rules. The first set of rules are for a template that turns a monster into an elite. The second creates a regular (non-elite, non-solo) "monster" with most of the class abilities. It would have dailities and limited magic items. Unfortunately, this section is a little confusing, so you would need to reorganize it yourself on index cards or something (that's what I did).

 

[Stoat]

Build 'em like monsters. Fighters and paladins become soldiers. Rogues are lurkers. Rangers are skirmishers. Wizards are artillery or controllers. Clerics are (Leaders). Use monster builder stats. Then give 'em two or three PC powers each, using monster builder damage.

Everything else is flavor text.

 

[renau1g]

Just avoid giving monsters healing powers like PC leader's have. Nothing contributes to grind more than beating the Solo or Elite Brute down to bloodied, just to have it use Healing Word to beef itself back up. You end up just hitting with at-wills and that can get quite boring.

 

[Dice4Hire]

I see it as mostly fluff, not much mechanics required. Maybe add a monster template to help out.