mook!

[Jeph]

You all know what a mook is: a henchment whos only purpose in life is to be beaten up the PCs, preferably in an interesting way. Or at least, that's the purpose that they serve in RPGs. This is my Mook Construction Kit.

Mooks are either level 1, 2, or 3. Level 1 mooks should be faced off against characters of level 1 through 5. Level 2 mooks are for characters of level 6 through 10. You get the picture.

Their abilities are allways 10. Period.

Their base attack bonus and base save bonusses are equal to their level minus 1, times 5. Their Ac is equal to 10 plus their (level minus 1) x 5. Think of some reason why their AC is at this level, it's not important.

They deal 5 damage times their level per successful attack. Period. They'll never actually hit anyway, so this isn't really important.

They don't have HP. (treat their HD as being their level squared for spell effects, etc.). Instead, whenever they take damage, refer to the below chart:

Dame Taken . . . Effect
lv. x 2 or less . . . . . . . None. They're fine.
lv. x2 to lv. x5. . . . . . . Unconcious for 5 rounds.
more than lv x5 . . . . . dead.

Ther you go. NIce, clean mooks. They can be whatever the heck you want--guys with guns for d20M, orc warriors for standard DnD, stupid zombies for even more DnD. Just apply the Undead, Vermin, or what have you special abilities, which won't really matter anyway. No record keeping required. Just tell 'em the number of mooks, and watch the carnage.

Ah, nevermind. Just play Feng Shui.

 

[Sagan Darkside]

Salutations,

As my players know too well, I love zombies.

When the pc's involved are high level, I will often just say if they hit they kill. It keeps book keeping down- and allows me to throw a lot at them.

SD

 

[jonrog1]

I use mooks, but off the Burning Shaolin definition. Only hit on a 19 or 20, do d6 damage that can explode like an action die, only have 6 HP. AC is light armor (whatever system) +1 ...

... but don't underestimate them. Their sheer numbers allow them to occasionally hit, and at low levels they do need to be dealt with, and at higher levels they're a tactical nuisance. THe feeling of joy, though, when your PC slices through a swath of them -- it makes them so happy.

 

[Drawmack]

4 20th level characters against (literally) a city of ogre zombies. That was a bitch - it was also a battle that lasted 2.5 game sessions.

 

[Hawkeye]

I did a similar thing in a LARP. I was trying to evoke the feeling that you get out of old style Kung Fu movies in which the Hero(es) is/are surrounded by a large number of bad guys and then the PCs begin to mow them down with little to no effort. They had low HPs and Armor to the PCs and if the PCs managed to knock them down (knockdowns are part of our system) the NPCs were out regardless of their current HP status. I called my NPCs GOONS.

Hawkeye