Minions and fixed damage

[AtomicPope]

No, they're not. That's why they have level-appropriate attacks and defenses. They go down in one hit, but they're not ignorable.

Yes they are (supposed to suck). They're 1/4 the equivalent of the appropriate level monster. Teh suck.

 

[hong]

Yes they are (supposed to suck). They're 1/4 the equivalent of the appropriate level monster. Teh suck.

No, they are not teh suck. They have level-appropriate attacks and defenses, and so are not completely trivial. They go down in one hit, but they're not ignorable.

 

[glass]

Wonder if you could split the difference and say roll once for damage... Like if minions could do a possible 1d8 damage, then roll 1d8 and all of the minions that round do the result of that damage...

That would be swingy.

Rolling damage for each one, not so much. More swingy than flat damage, obviously, but less damage than rolling damage for normal monsters (of which there would be fewer).


glass.

 

[DonAdam]

True but minions are supposed to Suck

No, they're not. That's why they have level-appropriate attacks and defenses. They go down in one hit, but they're not ignorable.

Yes they are (supposed to suck). They're 1/4 the equivalent of the appropriate level monster. Teh suck.

No, they are not teh suck. They have level-appropriate attacks and defenses, and so are not completely trivial. They go down in one hit, but they're not ignorable.

Rabbit Season!

 

[eleran]

This smacks of the same exceedingly poor logic (not yours ZH, but the overarching logic you're explaining) that made some monsters arbitrarily immune to crits in 3e. Simply put, if you want game-world balance and believability, crits (and many other things) have to work both ways equally. A minion can be critted against, and there's no good reason it can't give a crit right back...and if a PC gets unlucky and eats a few crits from some minions, tough. It's the price you might pay for wading in to a sea of red shirts.

Lanefan

Except your overlooking the fact that in practice, a minion can't be critted against because it doesnt achieve anything. Why bother maxing the damage when the min damage will kill it?

 

[eleran]

Then what's the point?

It's a role-playing game, last I checked, and without a believeable stage (the world) it's hard to play a role.

Lanefan

It's hard for YOU to play a role. Don't paint us all with the same weak imagination brush. This is just a symptom opf thinking too hard about fantasy.

 

[Amakar]

I like it

Well, I think both speed an balance are a factor.

Look at the Pit Fiend:

An encounter with the Pit Fiend can consist of: 1 Pit Fiend, 2 Bone Devils, 4 Legion Devils (the others advanced to match the Pit Fiend.)

Now the Pit Fiend can quickly summon 8 more 21st level Minions....

We now have a fight with 5 PC vs 15 Devils. That's going to be one Hell of a fight (pun intended)

Running that fight might be daunting.. in 3e if you could balance that fight by CR and make it fair.. it would be insane to run.

15 Monsters, 15 hit point totals, 15 potential victims to track status ailments from high level PCs cool tricks and spells, 15 attack rolls and 15 damage dice. Imagine 15 ongoing damage effects and saving throws for 15 creatures. Bookkeeping from hell.

1 hour later.. round 2.

4e turns it down to 3 things to keep track of, and 12 minis to just yank off the board when you're done with them.

Also, due to the sheet volume of Minions, one or more will almost certainly crit. Frankly, I'd just round up the 1/2 point (instead of down) when averaging minions damage and call it even.

Too swingy if the minions get crits and if thye had crit based abilities.. what's the stop a DM from throwing the full 20 minions at you. They will get at least 30 attacks, probably a lot more. Crits are luck when it a 1 in 20 shot. If you roll 30 attacks and a few are crits.. yawn.

 

[LEHaskell]

Well, I think both speed an balance are a factor.

Look at the Pit Fiend:

An encounter with the Pit Fiend can consist of: 1 Pit Fiend, 2 Bone Devils, 4 Legion Devils (the others advanced to match the Pit Fiend.)

Now the Pit Fiend can quickly summon 8 more 21st level Minions....

Too swingy if the minions get crits and if thye had crit based abilities.. what's the stop a DM from throwing the full 20 minions at you. They will get at least 30 attacks, probably a lot more. Crits are luck when it a 1 in 20 shot. If you roll 30 attacks and a few are crits.. yawn.

Hey in your example, the minions WILL get a chance to crit -- when the Pit Fiend uses Irresistible Command to hurl them at the PC's like grenades!

 

[Aenghus]

Minions in an encounter allow the DM to make a lot more attacks, potentially with bonuses from any enemy leaders present. At 4 minions instead of 1 normal monster, with reasonable attack values, allowing minions to crit would be potentially too swingy. In the even they were allowed to crit it is unlikely but possible to get multiple minion crits in a turn, and they could potentially do a lot more damage than the equivalent standard monster.

As it is there is enough potential swing factor in the multiple minion attacks as it is. It is unlikely but possible that most or all of the minions hit in one turn. Individual damage amounts might be low, but they add up quick.

Also it slows things down and makes work for the DM. Since minions are a book-keeping convenience for the DM mostly, having fixed damage makes sense.

It is possible to roll for damage, of course, it would be a minor delay. This would primarily make sense if the DM was trying to conceal the minion status of some monsters. I don't see this necessary for most minions - the minion status of the average minion should generally be apparent eg kobolds, goblins, orcs, generic guards.

 

[Tervin]

I really like the concept of minions, and will probably use them as written most of the time. But, I do like to be able to sometimes hide the minion status from the players. For example have an encounter with 8 minions, 2 standard opponents and 1 elite against my 6 players, where it is not in any way obvious who is the bigger or smaller threat.

In those cases I will simply roll damage for the minions, making sure to get an average that is not higher than what the set damage would have been. Having "maths teacher" as part of my resume, I feel quite safe in that this has very little risk of backfiring in an encounter.

Rolling the damage at the same time as the attacks makes sure that it won't take too much time. By colour coding which attack die goes with which damage die I can still roll several attacks at once.