The WOW method to monsters? Would you hate it?

[Soel]

I know that there is an "internal consistency" that many feel needs to be maintained. But really does it? The logic can be applied on the other end of the spectrum, why do all the high level monsters hide out until the PCs are ready to take them. If you think about it, if you want realism characters/monsters wouldn't know what "level" they are. A group of 10th level adventrues while talented isn't going to know "gee we' re 10th level we shoud be able to wipe that whole Orc tribe". If it was "real" they would use caution not march into the middle of the camp and start swinging.

Thank you!

I am surprised to see so many posters here disregarding this aspect of the game.

You must think more abstractly about the characters and the monsters, along the same lines used to represent hit points in the game.

 

[S'mon]

What I was thinking is for example is that if the party is 10th level the warriors of the Orc tribe might be 8th level warriors.

I do agree actually that you can use different level demographics in your campaign than D&D default without breaking a world's suspension-of-disbelief. Eg maybe the common, untrained beggar-goblins of the Misty Mountains are 1st level warriors, while the Goblin King's Hobgoblin Guard are 4th level, Saruman's Uruk Hai soldiers are 6th level and the Black Oroks of Mordor are 8th level. Then likewise you can have untrained human bandits 1st level, Bree watchmen 3rd level, the Riders of Rohan 5th level and the Royal Guard of Gondor 8th level. Just don't have the Misty Mountain goblins be 1st when PCs are 1st, 5th when they're 5th, 12th when they're 12th...

 

[Elephant]

What's "WoW"?

World of Warcrack, a MMORPG by Blizzard.

Officially, Warcraft, but hey, Evercrack

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

I know that there is an "internal consistency" that many feel needs to be maintained. But really does it? The logic can be applied on the other end of the spectrum, why do all the high level monsters hide out until the PCs are ready to take them.

They aren't hiding, they are somewhere else eating some NPCs in places the PCs will hopefully have the good sense to stay away from.

Apart from this, it's a simple convention of adventures in general - the opposition will be tough, but there is almost always some way to beat it. Just look at all those Hollywood movies - you will rarely see movies where someone goes against strong foes and actually gets defeated and killed in the process! Yes, it is unrealistic. But hey, we are playing D&D here, so a little suspension of disbelief in this area is warranted (and if you don't like it, go play Call of Cthulhu or WFRP where the PCs won't get such lucky breaks).

And simply increasing all NPC levels (as opposed to the Main Bad Guys) with the PCs is a cop-out. It destroys the idea that the PCs are something "special". Once they reach mid- to high levels, they are supposed to be more capable than just about anyone else out there, so throwing just hordes of 12 level gnolls of them cheapens their accomplishments.

 

[S'mon]

And simply increasing all NPC levels (as opposed to the Main Bad Guys) with the PCs is a cop-out. It destroys the idea that the PCs are something "special". Once they reach mid- to high levels, they are supposed to be more capable than just about anyone else out there, so throwing just hordes of 12 level gnolls of them cheapens their accomplishments.

I agree, although "Merry is now so tough/high level, he can take on a Black Orok of Mordor single-handed!" I think works ok; ie it's ok to have groups of high-level orcs & gnolls as long as they're an integral part of the setting, not just levelled in response to the PCs levelling. 12th level is really OTT though - look at what a 12th level Cleric or Wizard can do, in 1e those guys would be in the Abyss killing Lolth...

 

[Evilhalfling]

My fave tribe of gnolls had a charriot culture, revolving around heros each accompanied by servants. They would train constantly and fight against each other, but rarely to the death. Defeated heros were randsomed back. So when the 7-8th level party hit the gnolls territory they were met by sucessive teams of charrioteers until they finally killed the biggest local hero and won uncontested passage.
walah groups of high level gnolls, lots of internal conistancy. It was a lot more fun than facing 50 normal gnolls, 2 lieutants that were mere speed bumps and a challenging leader.

However I am yoinking the 'favored of the diety' a small band of humanoids given levels they didn't earn and near mythic reputation among the tribes.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

I agree, although "Merry is now so tough/high level, he can take on a Black Orok of Mordor single-handed!" I think works ok; ie it's ok to have groups of high-level orcs & gnolls as long as they're an integral part of the setting, not just levelled in response to the PCs levelling.

Exactly. Having all gnolls the PCs encounter suddenly be high level is lame.

The proper way to do it is: "Holy &%$§! There is this elite band of gnolls who have been ravaging the neighboring country... and now they are done there, and they are coming over here!"

Tough variants of ordinary humanoids should have a reputation that preceeds them long before the PCs encounter them. Or if the PCs suddenly do encounter ultra-tough gnolls without prior warning, it should be a major plot point in the ongoing campaign ("Whoa! Who were these guys, where are they coming from, and are there more where they came from?"), one that the PCs should be compelled to explore, and one that the DM must be willing to elaborate.

By the time they reach mid to high levels, the PCs are larger-than-life heroes. So any enemies of the Common Races must likewise be larger-than-life villains - beings who have a similarly big reputation as the PCs, just in the reverse way...

 

[Dinkeldog]

One of the problems that having tribes of high-level humanoids causes, though, is that it can overwhelm your campaign's economy.

It works well in the computer game because when you kill the monster, you don't get all of its equipment. For a role-playing game, players expect to get the equipment off the monster pretty much intact. And then World of Warcraft puts comically trivial coinage on any given encounter (as NWN did). There has to be a similar acceptance for the tabletop game for it to work. However, in WoW, your combats last in the range of seconds to a couple minutes (for druids and paladins). In D&D, our combats last in the range of tens of minutes to an hour or so or even longer. But it makes the power-inflation for D&D much quicker, when compared by number of fights involved.

 

[WayneLigon]

I've been hooked on WoW espically since out group decided to take a break away from RPGs until the summer was over. I've been thinking about the monsters and how they are protrayed in WoW vs. D&D.

I don't really mind it with regard to some monsters, especially with 3E. As people above have said, you can just add class levels to certain special monsters. Whole tribes of them, though, that would break my suspension of disbelief. The thing that wholly would is that in WoW, normal creatures like tigers and such also advance in levels. Wolves are lvl 1-10 creatures (as far as I've seen). Mountain lions weigh in at 25-35th level. I can sit on the western Naze and watch seven or eight lvl 35 mountain lions prowl back and forth on this small mesa. Nice as an obstacle in a computer game. Silly if you presented it to me in a tabletop RPG.

 

[satori01]

It is curious to me that people find a tribe Gnolls with an average level of 12 to be incongurous with the world around them.

Many DMs have groups or organizations with that level range made up by PC races, why not a tough and hardy band of Gnolls rulling a forrest or a mountain pass.