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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5970845" data-attributes="member: 42582">It's a 1st level goblin lurker, in the 4e MM. I may have the name wrong - I'm going from memory - but I know the monster is there, because I used a couple of them in the first 4e goblin encounter that I ran.There are two things here that I'm really not feeling the force of.First, I don't understand what it means to say that "giant" is a class. Which is not to say that I don't understand the mechanics of the 3E monster build rules. I do. But I don't understand what you think is at stake in the role/class distinction."Class", originally, meant something like (i) the adventuring vocation that a PC has adopted, and (ii) the role that the player will work within - mechanically, thematically, etc - in playing the game. Now from early in the game NPCs had classes, even though (ii) didn't apply to them. But (i) still did - "class" corresponded to an NPCs vocation.But when we say that giant is a class, we're not talking about anyone's vocation. As far as I can see, it is just a device for building monsters. In that respect, I don't see how it is any different from Brute, other than specifying slightly different mechancial conequences for each level taken.This takes me to the second thing.On the one hand, you seem to agree that these are just mechanical constructs. On the other hand, you seem to be complaining that there is no "vanilla" ogre that you can include in the game for the PCs to encounter - which seems to mean that you envisage the BASE ogre is more than just a mechanical construct, but as a mechanical representation of something in the gameworld. I'm not sure what, though - I suggested it might be the typical ogre, but I think you disagreed with that. But I don't see the problem with using any of the Ogre Savage, Thug or Bludgeoneer as a typical ogre.And why does one ogre have better reflexes than another? Presumably the same reason some humans have better reflexes than others - it is quicker, lighter, better trained, etc. And why more hp? It's bigger, tougher, luckier, etc. It's not that hard to come up with a story to tell, I don't think. (Give your ogre another few giant levels and its reflexes will go up, as will its hp - why? Because it's a bigger giant? - that works for hp but doesn't make much sense for reflex, does it? Anyway, whatever story you would tell to explain that, you can tell the same story for your higher reflex 4e ogre.)Let's suppose you decide to use the Ogre Savage as the typical ogre. And now you decide you want to make a rock-throwing ogre. So you start with the savage. You add on a "thrown rock" at will ranged attack, and maybe a "hurricane of stones" encounter AoE attack. Now you've got a brute that is slighly more effective than the typical brute, because it can attack from range without closing/charging. So it's level (let's call this level A) is no longer an accurate indication of the mechanical challenge that it poses. What should you do? Well, you could work out what level it would have to be to be an artillery monster with that many hit points (let's call this level B) - but if you move it to that level, you'll find that your attack bonuses, damage and defences are all too low - that is, the level B will still fail to be an accurate indication of the mechanical challenge that it poses.4e is designed on the assumption that, at that point, you'll pick a level somewhere between A and B, drop the hit points a bit and raise the defences (which, mathematically, should be more-or-less a wash for PCs of around that level), raise its attack bonus and damage a bit (so that it will pose an appropriate mechanical challenge to PCs of that level), and generally massage things until you get numbers that fit within the parameters for an artillery of that level. What's the rationale for this? To build monsters that are predicatable and reliable in the mechanical challenge that they pose. If that rationale is of no interest to you, then presumalby the 4e approach to monster building won't interest you either. (Which isn't to say that the 3E approach should be of interest instead. I'm still not quite sure what rationale it serves.)Another way to do your brute-into-artillery would be to make it an elite skirmisher, with both a melee and a ranged attack. Up its hit points a bit more, mabye make its AoE at will also to help it with the action economy. Again, the rationale for tweaking the numbers is to buile a monster that is predictable and reliable in the mechanical challenge that it poses.To reiterate - if you want to build monsters that are both brutish and can throw rocks, but don't particularly care to ensure that they are predictable and reliable in the mechanical challenge that they pose, then I don't think 4e's role system has much to offer you. Just give the monster the numbers that best fit your conception of it and go to town! (This is how Burning Wheel does it, and I think largely how classic D&D did it, except for attack bonuses which were dependent on HD.)</blockquote>

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