Juvenile Monsters

[doktorstick]

No, I'm not talking about those players that try to use Bucket-o-Snails (TM) for the WWA + GC, but rather the younger monstrosities that ooze across the landscape of Your World.

The Monster Manual has rules for increasing the HD of creatures through their advancement chart. It also states that the monsters listed are the weakest versions of that monster. That being said, however, would you find it reasonable to de-advance a monster to make it the juvenile version? In this case, I would reduce the size by one and the HD by 1/4 to 1/2 as appropriate. For example, a medium creature would become small. Its statistics would be the inverse of what it would gain when going from small to medium: Str -4, Dex +2, Con -2, Natural Armor same, AC/Attack +1.

Is this reasonable? Any gotchas? (I'm haven't mucked with Advancement and don't understand the implications, fully.)

Cheers,
/ds

 

[Crothian]

I see nothing wrong with it and it is something that needs to covered by the rules.

 

[dcollins]

Yes, that's what I've had to do for a number of juvenile monsters.

There are specific guidelines given for young giants on MM p. 100 which approximately, but not perfectly, follows the advancement rules in reverse.