Minionizing Monsters: Death Attacks for Everybody!

[OnlineDM]

I'll note that when I first started playing D&D about two years ago, I had seen a DM make minions in a published module into two-hit minions, which I thought was a great idea. I ran my minions that way for a few months, until I read an article by Chris Perkins in which he extolled the virtues of hordes of monsters on the table.

The only problem I was having with minions is that using 4 minions as the equivalent of one regular monster is not a realistic threat. Depending on your party, you'll want 6-8 typical minions in order to represent the same threat as a typical monster of the same level. And let's face it - it's way more fun to face down 15 shambling skeletons than 8.

Rather than upping the hits to kill a minion, just add another minion!

 

[GreyICE]

Swarm rules in 3.5 work exactly this way. As long as the four squares are contiguous, do whatever you want with them.

And if the zombies are spread out in a 4x1 and there's one target close to the left side and one target close to the right the zombies won't split apart to go after the closest targets? Because... uh... they're mindless shambling monsters looking for brains...

I'm sorry, generalizing tons of weak enemies as a "swarm" feels like a hack fix. I'd prefer to save swarms for something cool, like a swarm of rats or insects, or that cool hobgoblin phalanx.

Plus it still leaves open the possibility of a Rogue sneak attacking or a fighter power attacking to kill an entire swarm in one blow (half damage or no), and it just doesn't get much more "anime" than a fighter slicing down 20 enemies with a single swing of his sword.

 

[Savage Wombat]

Well, saying a 600 lb. ogre has 1 hp because the DM doesn't want to track his damage strikes me the same way. Both are rules abstractions created to fit a game, not simulationary at all.

I think the proposed system has a lot of merit for reducing the need to use either kind of kludge.

 

[pemerton]

Swarms for creatures small and larger is just... wrong, IMO. Minion is a far interesting idea, because any monster has his own actions.

Like I said, I like minions. But I like swarms too.

When I ran the gnoll part of Thunderspire Labyrinth, I wrote up a Large hyena swarm to add in to the combat. Because of the shape of the corridors in that module, the issues about swarm shapes didn't come up. But it did produce some cool stuff - like the fighter jumping clean over the top of it (soaking the oppy) in order to get to the gnolls on the other side. A comparably threatening group of minions wouldn't have allowed for that - becuase of the 5' square spacing rules, they would fill up too much space to be jumped over.

So while I fully agree that swarms aren't always the solution we need for large groups of weak foes, I'm curious why you think that they're wrong per se.

I'm sorry, generalizing tons of weak enemies as a "swarm" feels like a hack fix. I'd prefer to save swarms for something cool, like a swarm of rats or insects, or that cool hobgoblin phalanx.

Plus it still leaves open the possibility of a Rogue sneak attacking or a fighter power attacking to kill an entire swarm in one blow (half damage or no), and it just doesn't get much more "anime" than a fighter slicing down 20 enemies with a single swing of his sword.

Thanks for the kind words about my phalanx.

Your "anime" example reminds me of something else about the phalanx encounter. The Questing Knight gets a close burst weapon attack called "Strength of Ten". I've always found it a little quirky, but when the paladin used Strength of Ten to singlehandedly push back the onrushing hobgoblin phalanx, it was a pretty cool image of this one guy standing there, holding back the hordes with nothing but his sword and shield!

 

[Hussar]

Meh, the game is abstract enough to realize that one round does not equal one swing of a weapon. If you only swing your weapon every six seconds, you're character is REALLY slow.

So, if the fighter whacks the swarm in one round, describe it as a great sweep that sends bodies flying. Or several strikes, or whatever. A little imagination goes a long way.

 

[pemerton]

if the fighter whacks the swarm in one round, describe it as a great sweep that sends bodies flying. Or several strikes, or whatever. A little imagination goes a long way.

I'm thinking Asterisk and Obelisk vs the legions of Rome.