Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Greenfaun" data-source="post: 4054651" data-attributes="member: 55366">It's actually a little more complicated than that there aren't NPC classes. There are new monster roles that are practically classes, but those deal strictly with combat roles. Classes for non-combat NPC's haven't been talked about, and some people have said that DM's will have more freedom to just make NPCs instead of having to use classes to give them the stats they want. First, the "NPC classes" that we have seen in the Previews apply to ALL monsters, not just intelligent/humanoid foes. The city guards might be "Level 3 Soldiers" but the necromancer's sword-swinging skeletons would be too, just with the undead descriptor instead of human traits. The monster classes we've seen so far are BruteSoldierAmbusherSkirmisherArtilleryMastermindthough some of those might be descriptions rather than actual mechanical monster roles, it's a little hard to tell from the writing of some of the Design and Development columns and playtest reports. This combines with the different power categories as well, which are:MinionStandardEliteSoloFor instance, it looks like for any particular level, you're supposed to fight monsters the same level as you, but your party of 4 level 5 PCs might fight 8 level 5 minions, 4 level 5 standard monsters, 2 level 5 Elite monsters, or 1 level 5 solo monster, and each of those would be a level 5 encounter. See how that  goes? There's a lot we still don't know, like how PC classes fit in on the power categories above. I'm personally also wondering whether monsters will be locked to one sort of class/role/thingy, or if it would be possible to have, say, skirmisher wolves and brute wolves. Another thing we don't know much about yet is how they're handling non-combat sorts of issues. Will there still be silly things like having to give an NPC courtier 7 levels of aristocrat so he can have ten ranks of diplomacy, or can you just make a human with ten ranks of diplomacy because it fits the story? I'm very curious about what they decided. On a related note, apparently wizards will have some of their "utility" spells in the form of rituals, the things specifically mentioned were teleportation and item creation IIRC. It's possible that there will be NPC mages who can do these utility rituals but not combat magic, but I'm just speculating, and I have no idea whether there will be an NPC class for it or if DM's can just say "the local mage's guild can enchant your weapons if you have enough gold." Personally, I'm hoping for the latter.</blockquote>

Verification