Monster Manuals, WTH?

[VariSami]

Hi.

Ok, here's an interesting phenomenon I have noticed: many if not most monsters are at their best against non-casters who are already at the bottom of the pecking order among characters. Yes, there are a great many monsters with Spell Resistance, sure. Even immunity to spells, as in the case of Golems. But Spell Resistance is relatively easily breached (it doesn't even affect all spells to begin with).

Let's go with a fresh example. In the latest dungeon we visited in a Tier 3-4 campaign which doesn't allow for full casters of any kind (We're also limited to the core books, PHBII, MIC, Complete Adventurer/Arcane/Warrior/Divine and Miniatures Handbook) the first thing that came across out party of a Dragon Shaman, Marshal, Spellthief and Marshal/Knight/Fighter (levels 5-6) was a Black Pudding. Oh, goody! Luckily my Marshal/Knight/Fighter immediately recognized it with Knowledge (dungeoneering) and assessed it as a threat with Sense Motive. So we escaped with our equipment intact and could later return (with an NPC Adept and my characters' equipment protected with Blueshine and Everbright qualities) and kill it - by slicing it up until it couldn't divide any longer and doing a few points of damage besides that(quess what the DM forgot to mention regarding the earlier Knowledge check?). The next thing we came across, like 50ft. into the dungeon... a pack of 3 Destrachans. They were behind a door though, and my aforementioned character happened to hear and identify them through the door. That way we could fight our way through a tribe of Derroes before the Destrachans rushed in through the walls.

Do you see a pattern? Even if your equipment is golden against acid and rust (Everbright/Blueshine), it can still be shattered. And what do non-casters do without their equipment? Nada but run. And that is only the beginning: regeneration, DR, damage immunities and close-quarter save-or-die attacks are legion. There are so many more ways to gimp non-casters than casters that every encounter we come across seems to be tailor-made to make our life miserable. (Then again, I wouldn't bet against that being intentional with a DM that used a group of 8 advanced Meenlocks with 6 extra HD the session before: more than the entry recommends; stronger than the entry would officially allow and all about save-or-die miserably attacks.)

To contribute something besides pathetic whining, here are a few thoughts and questions:

1. I actually liked how our DM resolved the encounter with the Black Pudding. He went with elementary logic and had it divide along the lines of 2xLarge/2xLarge/2xMedium instead of causing it to sprout identical, huge copies with each slash or stab. I believe this should be done more often with the monsters: logic before rules. And this comes from a diehard opponent of modifications to the rules (then again, I'd probably never use that accursed entry in the first place). Also, Meenlocks: why the hell do you only gain immunity to individual Meenlocks' horrifying screams each tie you save against them? You'll be trying to save against the attack 3-6 times per encounter which makes even those with good will saves bound to fail (not to mention that they also attack your Fort with paralyzing attacks in any case). There is no logic in this unless each Meenlock is a budding flower of unique individuality (hint: they're not). In my humble opinion, this applies to most cases of "you are immune to that particular X's Y for 24 hours".

2. In case of multiple opponents with identical abilities, probably having only one of them use it at the beginning of the encounter should suffice (from their point of view). Let's think about Destrachans: you could either have multiples shattering items to most definitely strip the party of everything. Or, you could identify with the Destrachans: even if their entry states that they begin combat with a shattering spree, one should suffice in most cases and the rest can focus on killing. Or Meenlocks: even if they can each scream each turn (and they did in our encounter with them), would they really? Maybe they would but 3+ Will saves against going comatose each time they close in on you is madness (see previous entry about immunity to effects).

3. I am in the opinion that low-magic campaigns are relatively common due to the brokenness of many casters. As such, there is bound to be a wealth of data regarding them available in here. What are your experiences? Which monster abilities should be avoided in such campaigns since they have been designed to be used against a party with at least 2 full casters (arcane and divine)?

Wow, this was an incoherent rant.

 

[Morrus]

Much of myth and legend has monsters with such binary fight-ending abilities unless you know the secret. It's always been part of myth that it's not enough to just be good at fighting monsters, you have to know how to defeat each one- either what its Achilles heel is, or how to protect against its special attack. Most of the time that isn't a function of experience/power on the part of the hero - it's purely a function of "If you know this piece of info, you live; if you don't, you die". Don't look at Medusa, stick a stake through Dracula's heart, and so on, to name the two most famous examples.

Should that be in an RPG? I dunno. It's nice, thematically -- but D&D has been slowly moving away from binary mechanics, save-or-dies, have-the-right-buff-spell-up-or-die, etc.

 

[delericho]

The balance point in 3.5e assumes a party of the 'big four' classes, and assuming very much unoptimised casters - that is, the Cleric is generally assumed to be a healbot, the Wizard a blaster, and neither has made extensive use of crafting for items. (This is less true in the later books... which can cause considerable problems with CRs, but that's another rant.)

That's either a feature, or it's a bug that's just not going to be fixed. Either way, your best approach is to note it and adapt your play accordingly. Either that, or play a different system of course.

 

[Empirate]

On the "you are immune to that particular X's Y for 24 hours" thing: It's probably there to prevent abuse. Clever players could just get ahold of one of the monsters they're bound to face a lot this day (by summoning/binding one, capturing one, charming/dominating one, diplomacy/blackmail/bribes, making a Simulacrum etc.), have it use its special attack a bunch of times until everybody's made their save once, then be immune to the best attack a whole species can muster for a full day of dungeon-delving.

Personally, I'm not sure whether this would even count as an 'abuse', but some DMs might be leery about such tactics. I'm quite certain the designers were thinking about this kind of thing when they came up with that particular clause.
Also note that in earlier editions, monsters' special abilities could be used over and over. Nice to have at least some damper put on this, isn't it?

 

[Nezkrul]

how about the banshee wailing every round until a single d20 roll spells death for your character... because the cleric didn't prep even 1 deathward spell that day for at least himself

 

[Empirate]

Yeah, well, it's a banshee. It has CR 17. Of course it will be able to kill a PC if you leave it alive for a few rounds and don't have adequate protection (i.e., immunity to death effects in some shape or form, in this case)! That's just how the game goes. If it happened to your group, I sympathize, but it's not as if even death-by-death-effect is such a big deal at the levels we're talking about, right?

 

[VariSami]

Regarding the abuse by players: That is probably true. Then again, it is intersting that thay offer 24h protection in the first place, now that I think about it. It's not due to easiness to track: you still need to keep in mind the time of day you fought it (which might be problematic in case you're underground, etc.). At least it's not any easier than, say, keeping track of 1 hour. If 1 hour against all such attacks was what a succesful save against certain save-or-die attacks entitled the characters to, they would probably not go through the trouble of summoning, capturing, etc. to gain that immunity.

The more I think about it, the worse off melee characters really are. Even most special movement speeds are against them unless they also have them. (Part of the reason my old Feral Mineral Warrior Half-Minotaur Goliath with a dip as Ape Totem Barbarian did so well, I suppose. Burrow and Climb do alleviate the problem.)

Since currently I am also running a campaign in which the party consists of a Barbarian, a (ranged) Ranger, a (sword-and-shield) Fighter and a Binder (there was a ban on full-casters due to the special nature of this game; there will be NPC healers, though), do you have any suggestions on what to avoid? Preferably the less obvious things I might miss otherwise.