MM4 Table of Contents up
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Garnfellow
Explorer
Nebulous said:
Looking at the samples, it looks like the WotC designers focused too much on building unique and specialized NPCs in Enemies and Allies. Ironically, those are exactly the sort of NPCs I don't want from a book like this -- I don't need a lot of half-dragon ranger/monks etc., and when I do want something like that I much prefer to hand-craft it myself for insertion in the campaign.
What I do want are lots of common NPCs that are tedious to mass-produce. Goblin archers, goblin scouts, hobgoblin commanders, orc footsoldiers, ogre brigands, kobold sorcerers, dwarf champions, and the like. I would love to be able to just cut and paste a statblock for stuff like that.
Owen K.C. Stephens
Adventurer
I -am- a contributing author to the MM IV, and I haven't seen anything but the raw files yet, so I actually can't say if I'm going to like the book or not. On the other hand, I'll get three free copies, so it's not like I have to worry about deciding if I want to buy it. And I hope most of you (that play D&D) are smart enough not to make such a decision until you see a copy and flip through it. Because doing anything else is either stupidity, or mean-spiritedness. Period. Form all the early opinions you want, but the final decision should wait until you SEE THE BOOK.
Now I had nothing whatsoever to do with the design, development, or art direction on the dragonspawn, so I do feel I can comment rationally and reasonably about them without being too biased. And here's the point I think most people have missed:
The intelligence of the design has nothing to do with one monster.
No one set of stats can show you why the dragonspawn are a good idea. They're not, individually, brilliant or new. What they are is an effort to have a flexible, interesting set of foes a DM can easily run, using elements the players have already seen and have some idea what to do with. In other words, their very simplicity and "uninnovative" nature is what makes them good monsters.
Most DMs don't have a lot of time to write up foes. Heck, in my experience -most- DMs aren't creative, thoughtful, or even all that smart. They're just typical people, trying to play a game. Oddly, the game insists they spend a lot of time doing math and plotting. Those are both jobs, and a lot of people don't like those jobs. The dragonspawn give them a set of options that don't require the DM to work that hard to have fun.
Most DMs are casual gamers at best. Most -gamers- are casual gamers. A lot of them if asked to write up a half-red-dragon-lizardman-sorcerer are going to go play WoW instead. And if they did write one up, they'd forget some important spell, or they'd have made dumb spell choices to begin with. And, likely, they would get the CR wrong, or not give it the right support monsters, or screw-up its treasure, or balk when a player asked what a Knowledge (arcana) check told him about the dragon-type monster in front of him. With the dragonspawn in the new format, none of that is a problem. They'll give you a threat just deep enough for a typical DM to run in a typical game against typical players.
Not interested? Fine the book isn't for you. Most books aren't. They're for run-of-the-mill gamers who just want to A: Kill something and B: Take its stuff.
There's a big danger if you get -too- innovative. You end up creating things that feel out of place, or don't have good support rules, or take the players so much by surprise they don't enjoy the game. YOU may not like the idea of creatures blending dragons and humanoids, but at least players understand their ecological niche well. You throw too many lucent worms, maulgoths, and ocularons at players and they feel like the world makes no sense. Heck, people on these boards have talked about how many different monsters you can stick in one game world. But most games have humanoids and dragons, meaning you can get dragonspawn somehow, and the players see that.
Personally, I may never use dragonspawn. But I sure as heck know DMs who are going dance in the street to see simple bad guys, with the rules for them all laid out, designed to work together. DMs who otherwise look down at the end of a game and say "dang, I never used it's breath weapon," or "shoot, when it was blinking it should have been doing sneak attack damage." If you aren't one of them just be aware they're out there, they outnumber you, as a whole they have more money than you, and they need help.
I wrote more monsters than showed up in the MM IV. I think some of the things that got cut were much, much better than some of the stuff that got in. But that's the way these things go. And of all the things that got in, I see what the dragonspawn got their place in the sun.
Now I had nothing whatsoever to do with the design, development, or art direction on the dragonspawn, so I do feel I can comment rationally and reasonably about them without being too biased. And here's the point I think most people have missed:
The intelligence of the design has nothing to do with one monster.
No one set of stats can show you why the dragonspawn are a good idea. They're not, individually, brilliant or new. What they are is an effort to have a flexible, interesting set of foes a DM can easily run, using elements the players have already seen and have some idea what to do with. In other words, their very simplicity and "uninnovative" nature is what makes them good monsters.
Most DMs don't have a lot of time to write up foes. Heck, in my experience -most- DMs aren't creative, thoughtful, or even all that smart. They're just typical people, trying to play a game. Oddly, the game insists they spend a lot of time doing math and plotting. Those are both jobs, and a lot of people don't like those jobs. The dragonspawn give them a set of options that don't require the DM to work that hard to have fun.
Most DMs are casual gamers at best. Most -gamers- are casual gamers. A lot of them if asked to write up a half-red-dragon-lizardman-sorcerer are going to go play WoW instead. And if they did write one up, they'd forget some important spell, or they'd have made dumb spell choices to begin with. And, likely, they would get the CR wrong, or not give it the right support monsters, or screw-up its treasure, or balk when a player asked what a Knowledge (arcana) check told him about the dragon-type monster in front of him. With the dragonspawn in the new format, none of that is a problem. They'll give you a threat just deep enough for a typical DM to run in a typical game against typical players.
Not interested? Fine the book isn't for you. Most books aren't. They're for run-of-the-mill gamers who just want to A: Kill something and B: Take its stuff.
There's a big danger if you get -too- innovative. You end up creating things that feel out of place, or don't have good support rules, or take the players so much by surprise they don't enjoy the game. YOU may not like the idea of creatures blending dragons and humanoids, but at least players understand their ecological niche well. You throw too many lucent worms, maulgoths, and ocularons at players and they feel like the world makes no sense. Heck, people on these boards have talked about how many different monsters you can stick in one game world. But most games have humanoids and dragons, meaning you can get dragonspawn somehow, and the players see that.
Personally, I may never use dragonspawn. But I sure as heck know DMs who are going dance in the street to see simple bad guys, with the rules for them all laid out, designed to work together. DMs who otherwise look down at the end of a game and say "dang, I never used it's breath weapon," or "shoot, when it was blinking it should have been doing sneak attack damage." If you aren't one of them just be aware they're out there, they outnumber you, as a whole they have more money than you, and they need help.
I wrote more monsters than showed up in the MM IV. I think some of the things that got cut were much, much better than some of the stuff that got in. But that's the way these things go. And of all the things that got in, I see what the dragonspawn got their place in the sun.
Nebulous
Legend
OStephens said:
Nice post, Owen.
Well, i'm buying the MM4 regardless. I loved the MM3, even with the errors that i don't really care about, because i am more or less a casual gamer and a +/- 1 missing here and there means zilch to me. I haven't seen the new book, but i am itching to run Red Hand of Doom, and i like the idea of having dragonspawn stats. And minis to boot. So yes, call it waste of my money, but marketing-wise i think it is really, really clever for WotC.
Mercule
Adventurer
OStephens said:
Point. I hearby withdraw my criticism of including statted critters. It won't move me to buy the book, but if it helps to gird the gaming field then the inclusion is a good thing.
I still don't think I'm going to like the Spawn, but I have come up with one situation where they'd make sense. They'd be excellent filler for a dungeon set on Argonessen (that's the dragon continent, right?) in Eberron. They definitely seem more the sort of thing that I'd expect to find localized, in a module appendix, rather than the implied generalization of a Monster Manual.
Man-thing
First Post
Kunimatyu said:
Okay, so now that we have a list for new miniatures for the plasticrack series, is there any chance we will see a list of Monsters that would appear in a 4th Monster Manual.
This things has way too many commons in it, I may have to wait for the Monster Manual V booster (Though at least there isn't to many dwarves or another iteration of Snig the Axe).
Psychic Warrior
First Post
ColonelHardisson said:
Truth. As posted by the Colonel. You always manage to say what I'm thinking is such a much more polite manner.
Bye Razz.
Psychic Warrior
First Post
Man-thing said:
I think there is a joke in here somewhere. Can't seem to find it though.....
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