Monsters and Armour...

[Redclaw]

But the idea is that the rules for PCs are different than the rules for monsters. If the intent is to make the enemies viable challenges for the PCs without giving the PCs insane amounts of treasure, accounting for every bit of the enemies' AC or attack bonus is going to be a nightmare. Honestly, I would just figure that the chainmail gives a +6 bonus to AC, and replacing it with scale mail would give a +7 bonus in its place. If you want the drow to have a better AC, give him one. 4E DM's supposedly don't have to justify every stat.

For example, look at the Elite and Solo Monsters section on pages 185-186 of the DMG, which instruct you to boost up to three defenses by +2, with no explanation of where those AC points are coming from. If you want a tougher monster, make a monster tougher.

I don't mean to sound rude in any way, but I think Archmage had it right. The difference between 3.x and 4E is that 3.x focused on using the rules to create challenging enemies, and 4E focuses on using challenging enemies to create the rules. It's more important to get the challenge right than get the rules right, because the game is about the challenges and the fun the characters have in overcoming them.

 

[Zurai]

Amusingly, it comes down to Law vs Chaos.

The "please give me rules that actually work" crowd is on the Law side.
The "just do whatever you want" crowd is on the Chaos side.

Which is The Correct Answer? Neither. (unless you want to be Chaotic Good or Lawful Evil, of course!)

 

[FourthBear]

Amusingly, it comes down to Law vs Chaos.

The "please give me rules that actually work" crowd is on the Law side.
The "just do whatever you want" crowd is on the Chaos side.

Which is The Correct Answer? Neither. (unless you want to be Chaotic Good or Lawful Evil, of course!)

It's simply different rules of Law. The Law that states that opponents stats should be appropriate to their role and level should have far, far higher importance than Laws of Consistent Armor Descriptions, IMO.

 

[Saeviomagy]

Amusingly, it comes down to Law vs Chaos.

The "please give me rules that actually work" crowd is on the Law side.
The "just do whatever you want" crowd is on the Chaos side.

Which is The Correct Answer? Neither. (unless you want to be Chaotic Good or Lawful Evil, of course!)

The end result of a system that is sufficiently complex resembles chaos.

The 3e system had enough points of complexity that the final result wasn't playable across it's range of results, and there wasn't really an easy way to predict what the playable range was.

4e simplifies that somewhat, by directly governing the results instead of the system that leads up to them.

At the point where you're confident about your DMing and the mechanics of the game to start rewriting monsters, it's reasonable to assume that you have a clue about what you're doing, and what results you want to achieve. If you find yourself feeling lost when it comes to changing monsters, then perhaps you simply shouldn't do it.

If you just want to change the armor a monster is wearing, just change the armor they're wearing and leave their stats alone.

 

[FourthBear]

I will note that there a couple of issues around monsters (really opponents) and armor that I imagine that most DMs will want to think about.

The first is armor and weapons as treasure. If you use opponents using armor and weapons frequently and the players, just as frequently, loot the bodies of all weapons and armor and insist of carrying as much of it around as they can carry, you might have an issue in regards to treasure totals. My solution would be to discuss this with the players and simply ask them to cut back on the vulture trade. If they decide that they consider all such items treasure, I would probably start counting it against their treasure totals. I mean, they consider it treasure, why shouldn't you?

The second is opponents of PC and PC-like races having similar attack bonuses and defenses to the PCs, without the use of magic items. PCs could wonder why they need magic items to get their stats up to the level of non-magic item using NPCs. There are a few possibilities I see:

1) Tell the players to just relax.
2) Opponents use magical items that are attuned only to themselves or gain special bonuses in the service of whatever powers they serve.
3) Get rid of the basic attack and defense related bonuses and simply give them to the players at the appropriate level.
4) All of the NPCs are explained as devoting themselves to basic stat enhancement of attack and defense, which results in them having fewer powers, skills, feats and narrower focus.

 

[Regicide]

If the intent is to make the enemies viable challenges for the PCs without giving the PCs insane amounts of treasure, accounting for every bit of the enemies' AC or attack bonus is going to be a nightmare.

Yes, this works perfectly. Player's LOVE getting screwed out of loot, just LOVE it.

Player1: "That drow had heavy armor and we found out he had an AC of 34, that must be some armor!"
Player2: "We check the armour to determine what the plus is on it! Happy days!"
DM: "It's mundane armour."
Player1: "No, it's not."
Player2: "I'm a bloody drow, I don't get innate +6 to AC, and there is no feat I can take that would give that to me, the armour is magic."
DM: "No, it really isn't."
Player 1: "Stop trying to screw us out of our rewards, you suck."

If the rules can't model a consistent world, the rules have failed.

 

[Brian Gibbons]

If it is, then couldn't I also just give this Drow say, Starleather and add its Dex bonus of +9 to its AC; making it 35? [the +4 of the leather is below the 10 as well.. but it is light armour).

In 4e, if you believe that increasing the AC of a creature to 35 is appropriate, you can do so, and choose to give any (or no) explanation as you choose.

The 3e paradigm is that as long as your methods follow the rules everything is balanced. You can choose to give a 10th level fighter no armor or full plate, and it's still a CR 10 creature. This, unfortunately, is much less true in practice than on paper.

The 4e paradigm is that the end result matters, not how you got there. If a creature is balanced with an AC of 24, then you should be wary of making its AC 14 or 34 instead, even if you can accomplish that by swapping out legal feats or equipment. You can make any changes you want (because, hey, you're the GM), but you need to take responsibility for your changes, as there is notpretense that changing combat statistics has no effect on balance.

Which paradigm is better for you depends on the type of game you run.

The 3e paradigm is useful in games with a player vs. GM mindset, where the idea is that the players try to create the most powerful PCs they can within the rules, and the GM attempts to kill them with encounters that are technically deemed by the rules to be an appropriate EL.

The 4e paradigm is useful in games with a more cooperative mindset, with the GM attempting to challenge the PCs with appropriate opponents to develop an enjoyable campaign for all involved.

 

[FourthBear]

If the rules can't model a consistent world, the rules have failed.

The problem in your example appears to be greedy, petulant players, rather than a poor ruleset. As noted above, if this is a concern and you do not wish to have every PC-like opponent to have at least three magical items, you will need to have a suitable answer to such questions. A very suitable answer is that the rules aren't there to play AC simulator, but to create an exciting encounter that emulates the fantasy action genre. If all at the table agree this is fine, they the rules have succeeded admirably.

If players and DM do not find this acceptable, I suggest that you follow one of the suggestions in my post above. Ask yourself, in your world, why *can* opponents have similar base stats to the PCs without magical weapons and armor? If your answer is that they can't, they you should be prepared to either eliminate the basic bonuses from the game and give them to the PCs as they level or be prepared to give every appropriate PC-like opponent at least three magical items to explain their stats. How to work this out with the treasure rewards system and greatly cheapening magical items through proliferation is a problem that all editions of D&D have had.

 

[Ximenes088]

Yes, this works perfectly. Player's LOVE getting screwed out of loot, just LOVE it.

Player1: "That drow had heavy armor and we found out he had an AC of 34, that must be some armor!"
Player2: "We check the armour to determine what the plus is on it! Happy days!"
DM: "It's mundane armour."
Player1: "No, it's not."
Player2: "I'm a bloody drow, I don't get innate +6 to AC, and there is no feat I can take that would give that to me, the armour is magic."
DM: "No, it really isn't."
Player 1: "Stop trying to screw us out of our rewards, you suck."

If the rules can't model a consistent world, the rules have failed.

Player1: "That wizard we killed was throwing fireballs. That means he's got at least thirty thousand gold worth of ruby showstones somewhere on him. I loot them!"
Player2: "Yeah, and I take his scrying mirror!"
DM: "What are you talking about? Wizards don't need rubies to throw fireballs and they don't use scrying mirrors."
Player1: "Hey, in the last edition of this game we played, wizards needed have rubies to throw fireballs. So make with the rubies."
Player2: "Stop trying to screw us out of last edition's rewards! You suck!"

Fourth edition has consistent guidelines for monsters. Fourth edition has consistent guidelines for characters. Fouth edition does not use the same guidelines for both monsters and characters, because monsters and characters are meant for different purposes in the game. Just as with original, first, second, and BECMI editions of D&D, monsters and NPCs often possess abilities and qualities which players cannot obtain without special DM permission. Third edition was an anomaly in this regard, which is why third edition PCs got used to carting out several Bags of Holding worth of magic items every time they walked out of a level 10+ adventure. It is well that they un-learn that habit.

 

[Saeviomagy]

Of course the problem with your example is that the monster has an AC that's 10 above where it should be (assuming that's all he's changed) with no good reason for it to be so.

Knowing that his players are like this, he would have been wise to think up SOMETHING to explain the phenomenon. Not to mention the fact that without other modifications, the encounter would have been thoroughly out of whack.

I believe the problem at the start of this thread is almost precisely the opposite - the DM is wondering what effect giving extra loot to monsters is going to have. I seriously doubt that most players will worry about this in the slightest.

Yes, this works perfectly. Player's LOVE getting screwed out of loot, just LOVE it.

Player1: "That drow had heavy armor and we found out he had an AC of 34, that must be some armor!"
Player2: "We check the armour to determine what the plus is on it! Happy days!"
DM: "It's mundane armour."
Player1: "No, it's not."
Player2: "I'm a bloody drow, I don't get innate +6 to AC, and there is no feat I can take that would give that to me, the armour is magic."
DM: "No, it really isn't."
Player 1: "Stop trying to screw us out of our rewards, you suck."

If the rules can't model a consistent world, the rules have failed.