How much do PCs know about monsters?

[Bystander]

Just curious...

1. How much info should a DM give the player about a monster he's just come face to face with?
ex: A newbie might not know that Trolls don't care for fire, or to run away from a beholder if he's only first level.

2. On the other hand, I have a few players who have basically memorized the monster manual... And while I appreciate that kind of enthusiasm and research, I'm worried that they may be metagaming too much. Should their first level characters know everything about every monster just like they do?

Do you limit how much the characters know at first? When they encounter a new creature, do you give them some information about what it can do to them, or how to beat it? Is there some sort of wisdom check or skill check you require before divulging such information?

 

[Mahali]

A good 'ol wilderness or Knowledge check for it.

Describe the monster, don't name it or show a picture of it. You might change some of the characteristics of the description too so they're less likely to know what it is if they shouldn't.

3ed assumes adventures know about legendary type monsters. Everyone knows a beholder, and dragon, and tarrasque when they run into one. They may not know all the details about it though.

 

[Hypersmurf]

Should their first level characters know everything about every monster just like they do?

Definitely not

They may have heard stories. They have quite possibly heard that trolls are all but impossible to kill without fire. But in a society without cameras and televisions, how certain is it that a fourth level character (for example) will know what a troll looks like?

They're tall and ugly. They eat people. If this is all the information they have, they'll have trouble distinguishing a troll from an ogre, a bugbear, or a gnoll.

If they've talked to someone who's actually seen both a troll and an ogre - or better yet fought them - they might get more detailed information.

But if the adventurers blithely encounter a troll for the first time, with no special preparation, and all suddenly reach for their alchemist's fire instead of their swords, the players are using information their characters have no right to.

So if you're planning on throwing a troll at them, and you want them to have a chance of survival, maybe have the bard in the last tavern sing a song about how Dudley Do-Right the Paladin hacked at the band of trolls for an hour before his buddy tried flaming oil. That way, when the thing gets up for the third time, the players have an excuse to remember the song and try the same thing.

It gets even worse if people meet a Rakshasa and start feverishly blessing crossbow bolts. How often does that piece of information get passed around the tavern? It's not the sort of thing characters should know without special research.

I would be inclined to let Rangers, in particular, know a little more about the weaknesses of their Favoured Enemies, however.

-Hyp.

-Hyp.

 

[Duncan Haldane]

I've thiought about this a lot, but still haven't come up with a satisfactory answer for myself.

I think it's quite unfortunate that in 3rd Ed the monsters are no longer listed with a frequency, because that makes rules about this much harder.

I think you need to consider monsters in different categories. For instance, a knowledge religion role is more appropriate to information about celestrial and infernal creatues. Natural creatures should come under a wilderness lore/knowledge nature role, and a knowledge arcana seems much more appropriate for a magical construct.

There might be other skills which are useful too.

You need to determine some base rankings. For instance, it requires a roll (say 10 or 15) on one of the above skills to recognise the monster. Then, depending on how much they succeed by, you might inform the player of extra details their character knows - eg, for each 3 points that you succeed the role by they would be informed of one more special ability/quality.

e.g., the party encounters a troll. The ranger makes a Wilderness Lore roll, and gets a 22. He needed a 10 to recognise, so you tell him the create name and four things
- It's a troll
- a troll regenerates
- a troll doesn't regenerate from fire
- a troll can reach further than a man
- if a troll grabs you with both hands he can tear you apart

Of course, if you bring this rule in, it's only appropriate for the first time a PC encounters that creature - so you might want them to note down details they are told and they discover when fighting it.

Also I think it's important that you make the roll secretly, because on a fail you may decide to give them false information.

Duncan

 

[Jairami]

Ah. This was a fun thread when I tried to run it. Here's is the system that my personal gaming group adopted. Monte's group uses a Knowledge (Monster) skill, though I haven't heard what system he uses. It was tossed around for a while for the PHB but was taken out for many good reasons.

The way we use it, it represents book knowledge or learned tales of monsters. Knowledge (Monster) being too broad and easy (who wouldn't try to put some ranks in it?), it was divided up. Very often no one will have any of these skills, but occasionally they come in handy. I had one wizard who specialized in studying various dangerous creatures and was diversified over all the fields. A successful check indicates knowledge of the base creature based upon your visual sighting of the creature or other clues (if the DM considers enough of them to be present). Any templates, advancement in HD, added class levels, or off shoots of the race are always unknown as they aren't in the books for every individual of every race. Of course on the brightside, this means you always roll against only the base CR of the creature.

Creatures your character has actually encountered and knows about first hand do not require checks (as the checks represent only book knowledge and hear-say).

We use CR because it allows the DM to keep back knowledge of the critter if he needs to, and because the difficulty of the check reflects the rarity of the creature (in general). And because it was simplest of course. Ack. Rambling on. Here's the system we use. Works great for us. Been using it for almost a year now.

Knowledge (arcana) - aberrations, constructs, dragons, ooze, shapechanger

Knowledge (history) - giants, humanoids, monstrous humanoids

Knowledge (nature) - animals, beasts, fey, magical beasts, plants, vermin

Knowledge (the planes) - elementals, outsiders

Knowledge (religion) - undead

Type of Knowledge.........DC
Common Knowledge..........5+CR
Basic Knowledge...........10+CR
Specific Knowledge........15+CR

Common Knowledge would usually include what the creature is, and what its usual reaction to people is.

Basic Knowledge would be a general physical description of a creature, its general level of intelligence, basic ecology, and general habitat.

Specific Knowledge would include strengths, weaknesses, and a detailed knowledge of about every trait of the most common example of the creature in question.

Ranks and successful knowledge checks in these skills represent information resulting from study, stories, and training. They do not include first hand experiences.

Also, in areas where creatures are more prevalent, specific traits of some creatures may be basic knowledge or even common knowledge. A border country constantly pushing back orcish hordes would know of the adverse affect of bright light on orcs. This trait would be common knowledge there. But to those in lands where orcs are a far off nuisance, only study would reveal this trait and it would be considered specific knowledge.

Side Note: We use Knowledge (Religion) for Undead as opposed to Knowledge (Undead) because a) Defenders of the Faith wasn't out yet and knowledge (undead) wasn't in print anywhere yet, b) because clerics have very few skill points to throw around, and c) because life and death, death and undeath are things we like clerics in our campaign to know about. It has worked out wonderfully so far. Especially against the Nightcrawler....

 

[SableWyvern]

I have found a very simple answer to player knowledge vs character knowledge in this respect.

At the start of every campaign, I tell my players that their characters "know" everything about monsters that they know as players.

This knowledge would be derived from tales, second, third, fourth etc... hand reports, study, whatever.

I then point out that the Monster Manual (or whatever equivalent book, depending on the system in use) is not being used rote in the campaign. Just because a "standard" vampire is destroyed by sunlight doesn't mean that is necessarily true in every campaign.

Frex, in my last major campaign, everyone pretty much knew that vampires were never out during the day - which was sort of very close to the truth. In actuality, for a vampire in that campaign, it was always night. They never saw the sun. If anyone touched a vampire, they too would not see the sun for the duration of the contact. Vampires themselves tended to stay indoors during daylight hours in order to maintain the facade.

In order for this techique to be effective, you don't need to make wholesale changes. Just a few glaring exceptions to the standard are enough to keep players from metagaming. Frex, when they find out that troll regeneration is hampered by cold instead of fire, that vampires can go out during the day and that drow become fair-skinned after a few days under the sun, they will know that while their folklore type knowledge is often useful, it is far from infallible, and excessive faith in their system-knowledge may end very painfully.

Once your players have come to understand that this is how your campaigns work, it is even possible to run a "canon" campaign, where every critter is as the published version. Your players will still be unwilling to metagame - because they don't know that their player knowledge, in this particualar campaign, is actually correct.

The one situation where this system won't work is where the campaign is set in a published world that the DM wishes to run "by the books". (I don't have any ideas for that situation, because I always run home-brew campaigns). In any other circumstance, I find that it actually adds to the depth of the campaign, giving folklore and myth a real effect that is incredibly easy to implement.

 

[Gaiden]

Simply have them roll a Knowledge[monster lore] check with the DC = to 10+CR (adjusted with circumstances bonuses/penalties by the DM). Have this one knowledge check be usable untrained and have synergy bonuses with appropriate skills - knowledge religion would give bonuses to checks made for celestials, knowledge nature would give bonuses to animals, etc.

As another option you could have other know checks replace the knowledge monster lore check - or you could even have them stack.

If they learn something from their knowledge check they can use that knowledge whenever they want. If they fail their check, make them wait until they gain a level or encounter the same creature (or a very similar creature) again - which ever occurs first. And if they fail their check, they cannot use the metagaming knowledge - btw, in campaigns I have played in, despite the frustration, it is most certainly possible to pretend like your character doesn't know the info.

Above all, leave it to DM discretion. And if the players can't do the roleplaying (for having their characters not know info) then start designing your own monsters or giving old ones templates.

Throw a half-fiend, deugar vampire at them (that's what I did) - it keeps them guessing - trust me. Or you might try a half-dragon (red) troll. (Just show them a picture of the troll, and say that it looks like it has a slightly brownish tint to it [green + red will give brown]). When fire doesn't work tell them not to use metagaming knowledge. You might also try shapeshifters. Make them look like one thing but in fact have completely different abilities. Get a halfmachine (template from most recent dragon) axiomatic shapeshifter. Make the shapeshifter appear as an orc. Lastly - you can always throw levels onto something. Give your kobold some sorcerer levels and have this kobold's cohorts from leadership have rogue levels. Or give the imp levels in cleric - this always throws off players.

 

[reapersaurus]

Should their first level characters know everything about every monster just like they do?

God NO.
Please, no.

Even if they're 10th level characters, they wouldn't know what the MM does.
The MM is a gamer's resource - NOT a PC's.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

I'd say there are two answers to your question.

1. It's highly campaign and background specific. For instance, in Greyhawk a character who grew up in the The Theocracy of the Pale next to the troll fens would probably know what a troll looked like and what their vulnerabilities are. He probably wouldn't know much about fire giants, merfolk, sea lions, or Kraken though. On the other hand, a character from Geoff would probably know a lot about giants.

2. I believe that the CRs of certain monsters assume that you have certain basic knowledge. Unless you let the party know that Holy water burns demons and undead, imps (regenerate everything except acid/holy water and blessed weapon damage) are pretty much invulnerable to a low level party.

3. Similarly, some information is very easy to infer from the descriptions of monsters and that should be considered character knowledge as soon as they encounter them. For example, it should be obvious that a Remhoraz, Fire Elemental, or Thoqqua will injure anyone or any weapon that strikes them (they're creatures whose very bodies glisten with the heat of a furnace). If a DM were to insist that characters actually see someone get crisped by striking these creatures before realizing that they damaged anything that touched them, it would make the appearance of a Remhoraz an instant death for at least one character.

4. Tome and Blood (p. 20) suggests that Knowledge Arcana might reveal the following information:
DC 10: Silver weapons hurt lycanthropes "common knowledge"
DC 15: Fiendish creatures have cold resistance "specialized knowledge"
DC 25: What spells affect a particular kind of golem "esoteric knowledge"
I think this could serve as a guide to determine what characters know.

 

[Mal Malenkirk]

You have to be reasonable.

Demanding that the characters spend several precious rounds hacking away at a troll without using fire/acid because you decided they shouldn't know about its weakness can lead to very frustrating fights and even more frustrating deaths.

The monsters in the MM are very generic. If the players/characters are familiar with them, it's OK. We can assume the PCs heard about it from a bard, from an adventuring uncle or simply from proximity.

If you want to surprise the players once in a while, use more exotic monsters that you designed yourself or that comes from D20 companies.