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Message: <blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 6115973" data-attributes="member: 2067">So, I like the environment listing, because it helps me when I'm setting up an area for exploration. Say I want to plunk a jungle down, then I can look at the MM, and say, "Oh, here's a list of things that live in a jungle that the PC's might encounter, awesome."It helps me create situations in play, and serves as fuel for the plot-generation fire. I generally like the monster types, but I think "monstrosity" might be a little vague. People are going to have the same reaction to "monstrosties" as they do to 90% of the other things on that list. No one hears a fiend or a dragon is living nearby and goes "Oh, well, at least it's not a monstrosity, I guess I have nothing to worry about." It's not useful to have a vague catch-all for "Screw it, I don't know what it is."I'll also go on record as really disliking 4e's arbitrary clinical insanity of monster types. It hard-coded the fiction to the creature way too tightly. "Oh, see, demons are elementals like fire people, but devils are immortals like angels, and golems and undead are basically the same thing, and eladrin are immortals but like magic panthers and pixies." Which also brings me to the eyebrow-raising bit from the article about how eladrin are Fey and not Celestial which....I think I like, but I'm instantly suspicious of. Part of the appeal of the eladrin to me (pre 4e fashion model blink elf) was this view of the fey and the celestial as somehow linked, that there was something divine and Muir-esque about the untamed wilderness. I don't want eladrin to loose that association with the essence of Good. I think they can do that as Fey, too (and I like how that makes Fey a more dynamic category), but it's not cool if they're just blink elves again.I'm not initially enamored of his idea for treasure. It seems to combine awkwardly stilted and meaningless jargon-y redefinition with "generic treasure" that doesn't catch me.What I like about treasure info in a monster is stuff like "The blood of a basilisk can be used to make a stone to flesh potion" or "Campestri are delicious and are considered quite the delicacy to certain groups of less-than-morally-upstanding humanoids." or "Roc eggs can sell for 500 gp." Stuff that makes the monster stand out, that gives the treasure some relationship to the beast, and that gives me more idea seeds for what to do to reward the party for handling this potentially deadly hazard. Treasure types are old-school, but screw generic treasure tables. Give each monster it's own little random treasure table with custom rewards. Use it or don't, but it's there for ideas and funtimes! This also reminds me of the distinction between "Wandering" and "In-Lair," which is useful from an exploration-style gameplay perspective for more than just treasure. So I'm a little stymied to respond to two of the poll questions. "Monstrosity" doesn't make sense, but I wouldn't make them beasts or magical beasts (which are also vague terms). And I can already tell where the lammasu would live (CELESTIAL, DUH). I think the type is getting too hung up on body type. Worgs (and winter wolves!) aren't civilization-building humanoids, but they are people, all the same: they have language, they make alliances, they consider good and evil (and mostly side with evil). I don't like treasure parcels (UGH!), I don't want "treasure per level guidelines" (DOUBLE UGH), and I'd personally like it to be more than "up to the DM" (BORING AND UGH), but arbitrary terms like "rich chest" (lol, bewbs) and "poor sack" (lol, scrote) don't communicate very clearly, either, and if they just serve as code-words for back-end dice rolling, why bugger about with it? I prefer a creature-specific treasure table.</blockquote>

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