Minion fun! What do you plan to do with them?

[Kzach]

I think one of my favourite rules from the preview has to be the minion rules. Actually, truth be told, they annoy me, but mainly because it's such an incredibly simple concept and yet I never thought of it.

Make creatures of roughly the same level as the PC's, but killable with one hit. Perfect!

24 Zombie Rotters are a standard encounter for 6 level 1 PCs. You don’t HAVE to run minion fights that large, but man are they a good time. They make your PCs feel highly effective as they drop zombie after zombie beneath their feet, but also prove tactically challenging as they have to fight off swarms with completely different tactics. It also lets you have a little fun by replacing several of the minions with a regular fighter type of the same monster. Why are there only 13 zombies this time? Because one of them is a level 3 nasty. Guess which one it is before it eats your cleric.

Mu hahahahahahaa!

I'm a bit of a zombie fan. Not sure why. I think I've watched the new Dawn of the Dead about a dozen times and 28 Days Later about half as much. And, of course, Army of Darkness three times (it's a special occasion movie that requires copious amounts of alcohol and good company ).

Anyway, point is, I've always wanted to run a Zombie Apocalypse game or at the very least, a zombie plague adventure. And sure, there were some decent systems out there and I quite liked YotZ, but at the end of the day, there was something missing in all of them.

Minions!

I've just gotta add running capability to these suckers and whammo! The end of the PC's will have begun!

When there is no more room in Hell, the dead shall walk the earth.

After that, I'll begin setting up the eventual confrontation with... the Kobold Hordes!

Kzach = evil.

What juicy campaign ideas are going to have swarms of hordes attacking your PC's?

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I see dozens of Kobolds or Goblins swarming the heroes...
But Zombies work, too. Undeads are always great for this kind of stuff...

But I wonder if my players will also be overrun by Troll Hordes?

 

[Fallen Seraph]

A couple ideas I had are:

The party manages to defeat a Charnel Hound (essentially a giant undead hound made of human corpses). It falls apart around them, the bodies slamming down into the ground; as the party begins to pick their way through the corpses, one grabs their ankle and raise. All the bodies have come to life as undead! Undead minions to be precise and their in the middle of them.

and

The party is in a deep dungeon, the floor is pocketed by circular grates, what appears to be debris floats below it in the dark water. As the party gets nearer they notice it isn't debris but hideous, cannibalistic merfolk waiting for a feast.

The party must now watch out as they cross the floor, as the grates appear rusted and collapse at any second sending them splashing down into the waiting arms of the merfolk.

 

[fafhrd]

They're the perfect things to have pour forth from a planar rift, be it infernal, far realm or other.

 

[Nytmare]

I'm a bit of a zombie fan. Not sure why. I think I've watched the new Dawn of the Dead about a dozen times and 28 Days Later about half as much. And, of course, Army of Darkness three times (it's a special occasion movie that requires copious amounts of alcohol and good company ).

Kids today! Back when I was a zombie fan we knew how to watch good zombie movies. Come back when you've learned how to appreciate Dead Alive or any of the real Romero films.

Army of Darkness three whole times? Sheesh. Just to get your membership card you used to have to recite the entirety of the Evil Dead trilogy, including the credits. Backwards. While doing Michael Jackson's "Thriller."

 

[mach1.9pants]

Any of you seen Shrek 3? When he is dreaming and babies are pouring into his hut through the window in a wave.
Just think of that with goblins and a dungeon door......and my PCs at the receiving end.

A more boring example would be the goblins in Moria in LotR, but I prefer the Shrek analogy!

 

[Fallen Seraph]

I personally for a more humorous minion scene want to have the players travelling through a valley and they notice a land-slide with various boulders crashing down towards them.

They duck for cover, as they realize the boulders have suicidal kobolds strapped to them swinging spears when they pass by the PCs

 

[Spinachcat]

I'm a bit of a zombie fan.

Hunt down a book called Zombie Movie Encyclopedia.

With the minions concept, I want to do the cover of C&C - sending a half dozen wyverns coming after a party on horseback. Somehow I want to integrate SpyCraft chase rules as well.

BTW, I can vouch for the minion rules working very well. They are a staple in the RPG called Waste World from back in the 90s. It allowed PCs to blow away hordes of mutants with rocket launchers and then boss fight the BBEG.

 

[frankthedm]

Minions are so I can use my minis. ALL my minis...

Minions are also a great way to impress onto players that critical fumbles and allies granting cover are GOOD things.

 

[Edheldur]

I think one of my favourite rules from the preview has to be the minion rules.

Question: where did you see those minion rules?