Let's talk about minions...

[steenan]

I haven't played 4e, so I can't share any experiences about how the minions work in real play. On the other hand, I am familiar with similar concept in other games and find it interesting from a theoretical point of view.

What causes people to reject the idea of minions is seeing game mechanics as in-character reality, game world's "laws of physics". It is strongly simulationist POV, which I, personally, prefer - but it's not the only possible approach.
In this model, most of mechanical values aren't measurable in game worls (creatures don't know their HPs or attacks), but they represent real qualities. If I have more HPs than you, I am more tough and it is an objective fact. Game mechanics is an abstraction and simplification, but it is close enough to how the world works to lead to similar decisions as character's own knowledge.
The simulationist model also demands the same rules for all - the world has to be consistent in itself, NPCs handled in the same way as PCs, all possibilities used to their logical bounds. That's what 3.x tried to do and failed.
Minions definitely have no place here. The creature either is powerful, tough and dangerous, or may be killed with a mage's punch - it does not depend on if it fights with the PCs and what level they are.

On the other hand, they fit perfectly in a narrativist game. When we agree that the rules don't reflect setting's reality, but rather what happens in a movie or a novel, they work as they should. We don't care how resistant a creature is, the only important thing being that it is dangerous at the beginning of a campaign, but may be killed in one blow by an experienced hero. It is not realistic, it is not "logical" - but it is cinematic. And if one plays a game designed to be like an action movie, that's how it should work. That's what 4e does - based on my second-hand knowledge - very good.
The narrativist POV only demands the world to exist where and when the PCs interact with it. It doesn't need any continuity of creature mechanics - numbers only reflect what it can do in a given encounter. There is also no need for rules for any off-screen activity. Of course, monsters have their own lives, they don't exist only to attack heroes, but the system only needs to describe the direct interaction.
This play style brings its own dangers. As the game mechanics represents style and convention rather than how the world works, decisions based on it differ much from how the characters would act. It creates a rift between immersion and achievement, with in-character decisions being "not optimal" and metagame ones not fitting the designed cinematic style. That is the weakest point of all game systems geared for the narrativist play, probably including D&D 4e. But it's a topic for a different discussion.

 

[Hypersmurf]

Thanks to minions, my players always lead combat with (enlarged) dragonborn breath and burning hands, which pretty much clears out all minions instantly. It makes them pretty much pointless, except to give the wizard a sense of usefulness (which she doesn't really have without minions, because she's otherwise mostly useless outside of dailies).

A couple of suggestions:

1. Spread the minions out. Let the wizard clear some out with the burning hands, and feel good... but she can't get them all at once, and the fighter gets to do some minion cleavage as well.

2. Send minions in waves. The dragonborn gets rid of the minions with his breath weapon, and laughs at the BBEG... and then in round 3, the reinforcements show up.

-Hyp.

 

[CapnZapp]

cangrejoide hit it in 1 as far as I'm concerned.

A legion devil against a party of 5th level character is not a minion, he's a monstrous...probably unbeatable encounter.

How many hit points does that devil have, then?

 

[Engilbrand]

The answer to "What doesn't he understand?"
In my view, bringing up questions like "What if two minions are fighting?" as more than a goofy question shows a lack of understanding. There have been a number of posts by other people in here with similar ideas to this. In my book, they don't get it.
For those of you who say, "The world exists outside of the PCs and everything is exactly as powerful as it would be against the PCs.":
How do you play the game? At all? You would have to run your own mock combats for EVERYTHING that happens in the world. Do you roll Stealth checks for thieves to get away from the guards before the PCs ever show up? Or do you handwave it? The little quote about this is "If an NPC climbs a tree, and a PC isn't around, does he make a Climb check?" Of course not. It gets handwaved. "Why did this happen? How did this work?" It did because it needed to.
Minions are the same. HP are much more abstract than some people seem to understand. You can say, "I don't like having my PCs able to 1-hit something." That's fine. You don't like a part of the game. But don't add, "Because it doesn't make sense."

 

[Engilbrand]

In regards to the Legion Devil:
You probably wouldn't be using him. If you really wanted to, though, you'd have to look in the DMG and do a couple of quick alterations to his abilities.
If it's not meant to be used as a normal creature, you have to make some changes.

 

[cangrejoide]

How many hit points does that devil have, then?

Well that question has different answers depending on your GM style:

1) IF he is a level 15 skirmisher he would have 8+con+(8*level) hit points. (pag 184 DMG)

2) He doesn't have hit points, a level 15 demon vs a level 5th party is a plot device.

3) As many as he wants!!!! Am I right?? XD

 

[UngainlyTitan]

When I first read about them, I was a fan of minions. I got their relativistic nature, and it seemed to make sense. But they haven't worked out so well in practice. Thanks to minions, my players always lead combat with (enlarged) dragonborn breath and burning hands, which pretty much clears out all minions instantly. It makes them pretty much pointless, except to give the wizard a sense of usefulness (which she doesn't really have without minions, because she's otherwise mostly useless outside of dailies).

I also find the difference between regular creatures and minions too significant, so much so that it's jarring. One goblin is an absolute tank, taking four or five hits (or more), while the guy next to him drops in one. It all gets a little too metagamey.

There is no need to use them all the time, use them for the sentries that need to be taken out silently with one shot and in combat mix them in with stronger monsters and as reinforcements.

 

[Charwoman Gene]

I still fail to see what is more realistic about humanoids taking multiple sword stabs to kill than humanoids that despite adequate training and skill at killing, are not particularly good at not dying.

 

[wedgeski]

As for the 1 hp, I understand the abstraction, and I understand the goal, but I don't like the execution. Its just part and parcel with the whole "black box" design philosophy, and it leads to all the odd situations that others have mentioned. Hp should mean something whether the characters are in the room or not, or they mean nothing.

In which case, I guess not giving minions any hp, and just declaring them "one-hit kills" would actually make more sense to me. But I still can't wrap my head around a wizard with a dagger killing a demon with one hit.

That IS how they are described in the rules!

A minion is destroyed when it takes any amount of damage. Damage from an attack or from a source that doesn’t require an attack roll (such as the paladin’s divine challenge or the fighter’s cleave) destroys a minion. If a minion is missed by an attack that normally deals damage on a miss, however, it takes no damage.

This whole '1 hit point' thing is an improper characterization of those rules, mixing two completely incompatible abstractions in such a way as to create fodder for those who don't like the idea of minions. To my knowledge, the rules *never say* minions have 1 hit point. If they do, they need a good spanking.

Edit: Argh! Spank the monster stat blocks! I've just realised they do give minions 1 HP.

 

[Crosswind]

One thing I have found particularly useful is to not say when something is a minion. The first few 4E sessions I ran, my players weren't even aware that minions existed. When minions died, their death was explained by the narration.

PC - Does a 17 hit?
Me - Yep, roll damage.
PC - 9 damage
Me - Nice swing - you catch the goblin square in the chest, and he crumples against the wall.

The PC doesn't know that this guy dies automatically in one hit. I never called him a minion. Next combat, there's no guarantee that there will even be any minions. Granted, from my descriptions, sometimes PCs can figure out that certain characters are more likely to be minions...but they don't know a priori.

I think that hiding the core mechanic of 1-hit = dead with narration really makes this particular mechanic make more sense.

-Cross