Will we see more third party products to add depth to monsters outside combat?

[AncientSpirits]

The pit fiend can do any of these things if you, the DM, think that it would fit the concept and would be good for the game. Nobody has come down from on high and said "Yea, this is the Pit Fiend statblock, and ye shall only use those abilities I have set forth in it."

It's your campaign. Pit Fiends in your campaign can do whatever you want Pit Fiends in your campaign to be able to do.

Yes, Xyl, I'm aware of the fact that I can do this. Nor did I fear anything from "on high" as tired as that forum trope is. I REALLY do like that the new monsters are streamlined, because I'm sick of prepping hours to run a single encounter. That said, out-of-combat abilities:
a) Give the DM ideas
b) Help ensure the encounter sequence is balanced.
By balanced sequence, I mean, that I didn't give it so many nasty out-of-combat abilities (trap making, etc) that by the time the players get to fight it, it's no longer a fair encounter.

If the new MM is like the current one, in that creatures often have subtype-specific abilities, such as most devils can do rituals, then awesome. No problem! But WotC has only hinted at that, not spelled it out. I hope it really is the case.

 

[IceFractal]

And sometimes it's useful to know what a monster's "behind the scenes" abilties are, because players can and will drag those abilities out into the spotlight.

In 3E, there were tons of ways to do this, some of which, like Shapechange, no longer exist in 4E. But there's one way that's definitely still a factor - taking control of the monsters, whether directly through Dominate Monster, or indirectly through deals and threats. When the PCs gain control of a monster, they gain control of its abilities, and it suddenly becomes important to know exactly what those abilities are.

So you can't always assume "this is a monster ability and players will never have access to it". If monster X is known to build crystal structures with the power of their mind, and the PCs capture one, they're going to want it to build them a castle. Always having an excuse for why that can't happen is going to feel like railroading, and kill any sense of creativity the players bring to the table.

 

[AncientSpirits]

And sometimes it's useful to know what a monster's "behind the scenes" abilties are, because players can and will drag those abilities out into the spotlight.

IceFractal, this is a great point. I recall this coming up a fair amount in 1E adventures (it's funny to compare a 1E entry to a 3E entry). Since so little was spelled out, if the DM didn't want X, then he could say no X, but it felt arbitrary. I had a mass of problems when the players captured an Aludemon (I think, it's been 20+ years).

 

[WyzardWhately]

I think that "Me and my players want this information" is a sufficient justification to argue for including it, since we're laying out money for product.

 

[Daniel D. Fox]

This is a very important point. The rules exist for the most part to enable the players to interact with the world the Dungeon Master is presenting. There's zero point in having rules created simply to let the DM sit behind his screen and cackle with glee at the amazing and fantastic things his NPCs are doing to each other.

It's like watching a modern day cop movie that takes place against a backdrop of New York City. You, the audience, don't need to see what's happening three streets away to an Hispanic couple and their two kids calling the cops to report a missing dog. Sure, the NYPD is involved, but unless the hero (who is there to provide the audience with their focus) interacts in some way with this couple and their missing dog, that's just useless information.

Cheers,
Cam

Hmm, I completely disagree. Non-combat related abilities help me understand their place in society, flesh out their ecology and background. To me, the whole package is important.

 

[ThirdWizard]

It seems like such a publication would be aimed specifically at people who don't need it. That makes me wonder if it would be worth (in monetary amounts) publishing. Yes, there are people who would buy, but would there be enough people to buy it to justify production costs?

 

[Rykion]

I doubt we'll really need it. I suspect that the monster write-ups we have are just the basic MM stats. I would be very surprised if the MM or DMG didn't have clear rules for creating unique NPC creatures by adding to those basic stats. It could be as simple as a monster of level x and type y has x extra skills at max rank, x feats, and x rituals. They then could list common skills, feats, and rituals by monster type. This saves room in the stat block, makes monsters more unique than in 3E without adding class levels, and makes the vast majority of mook creatures much easier to run.

This way I can run a 5 orc encounter right off the stat block, and then spend 2 minutes creating the orc blacksmith that the characters are actually likely to interact with in a meaningful way.

 

[Xyl]

Yes, Xyl, I'm aware of the fact that I can do this. Nor did I fear anything from "on high" as tired as that forum trope is. I REALLY do like that the new monsters are streamlined, because I'm sick of prepping hours to run a single encounter. That said, out-of-combat abilities:
a) Give the DM ideas
b) Help ensure the encounter sequence is balanced.
By balanced sequence, I mean, that I didn't give it so many nasty out-of-combat abilities (trap making, etc) that by the time the players get to fight it, it's no longer a fair encounter.

I agree that those are good things, but I don't think giving the monsters specific out-of-combat abilities is the way to solve either.

Your a) doesn't require that the out-of-combat abilities have any sort of rules support. All it requires is a lot of information on the monster's ecology and society, and some suggestions about what abilities it might have. Even if someone gave you abilities with specific rules for how they worked, you'd usually find yourself either changing them to fit your campaign or looking for a different monster with abilities that work the way you really want. So suggestions to inspire the DM are better than hard rules on what the monster can and can't do. I definitely think there's room for third party books about monster ecology and society, but that's not what the OP is suggesting.

Your b) really has nothing to do with out of combat abilities. It has to do with adventure pacing. You have the same problem whether the party has to wade through a bunch of traps created by the monster, or a bunch of minions, or a bunch of totally unrelated monsters. What's needed here is general guidelines for what sort of encounter sequences are fair, not specific information on monsters. It's a very good bet that those guidelines will be in the DMG.