D&D 4E I may have had a 4e epiphany...

[Lizard]

One of the things bugging me about 4e is that the monster stat blocks, etc, make little sense from the perspective of modeling races and individuals who are members of those races -- the whole race/class/level paradigm which dominates 3e.

Today, reading through KOTS, it suddenly hit me.

4e is a point-based system like GURPS or Hero...without the points. At least as far as NPCs are concerned.

In Hero, I don't think, "I need a 5th level orc wizard". I think "I need an orc with some magic powers. Here's my pool of points. Let's see, give him this attack power, this for defense, raise his PD more 'cause he's an orc, give him some disads, there, done." The main thing is that he feels like an orc caster and has all the powers/abilities/skills an orc caster SHOULD have.

In 4e, I do much the same thing. "I need a controller...here's the basic orc trait...come up with a nifty power or two to make him memorable...give him +3 to armor, just 'cause...done."

Once it hit me that, basically, every monster/NPC in 4e is effectively built from scratch, not according to a structured system (other than role/level guidelines), my perspective changed dramatically.

Fascinating.

 

[Belorin]

Was it like lightning hitting your brain?

Bel

 

[Fallen Seraph]

Glad to see your coming more on board the 4e train, Lizard. I plan on doing much the same as you (when I need too).

It will be interesting to see what variations thanks to exception based design we will see.

 

[Ulthwithian]

First, Lizard, let me applaud you for your courage in stating something like this. You're a rather high-profile personage here, and this public airing of this switch in perception (as opposed to simply burying it in a thread somewhere) is very good to see from the standpoint of forum conduct, let alone anything about 4E.

On the whole monster thing, I'm not very much one to create whole new monsters. I do, however, like to innovate. Thus, I'll tinker with the mobs WotC gives us instead of creating them from scratch. I'll save my creation for my gameworld and adventures.

 

[Mostlyjoe]

Levels are just merely a pacing guideline for progression of the PCs. If you gave everything a cost value in points you could do much the same with them. However, NPC/monster points don't = PC points. For some very obvious reasons.

 

[Henry]

By Bane, I think he's GOT it!

That's pretty much it. I've always seen the 4e, and the 1e and Basic D&D as well, monster as having JUST enough stats to interact. If I need a fully statted up example of the race, I can do that, but 90% of the time, I don't, and don't want to have to do the work to do it -- hence, the 4e school of monster design.

 

[Saitou]

Was it like lightning hitting your brain?

Bel

That's an apostrophe!

Also, all of this has been all but said in the many months leading up to 4E. I imagine you are just a bit slow?

 

[Lizard]

On the whole monster thing, I'm not very much one to create whole new monsters.

See, I like creating *characters*. Most of my "monsters", other than Wandering Damage Table entries, are NPCs. This is why I like 3e; it erased the distinction, mechanically, between "monsters" and "characters" and made it possible to create much more interesting games than 1/2e did. 4e seemed to be returning to the 1e paradigm, as most of the sample monsters we've seen have been walking piles of combat stats, instead of (as in 3e) effectively races which could be customized via class levels.

But if you take it from the perspective of seeing the MM as "Big book of sample creatures", akin to, say, the "Enemies" books from Hero, it becomes a lot more interesting. The basic system for monster building is what matters; the MM entries are just things you can look at it to glean cool powers from or eyeball for balance.

 

[Lizard]

That's an apostrophe!

Also, all of this has been all but said in the many months leading up to 4E. I imagine you are just a bit slow?

A bit.

 

[Fallen Seraph]

But if you take it from the perspective of seeing the MM as "Big book of sample creatures", akin to, say, the "Enemies" books from Hero, it becomes a lot more interesting. The basic system for monster building is what matters; the MM entries are just things you can look at it to glean cool powers from or eyeball for balance.

Also with things like Templates, Magic Items, etc. and rules for taking PC powers and classes and adding them to Monsters being in the DMG it will be easier to do. Lay out the page in the MM of the monster your changing, take out DMG and just start writing No flipping back and forth.