Should monsters behave sensibly in tabletop role-playing games?
By that I meant it doesn't have to be silly. It doesn't have to be “brain fever.” It can make sense the way a good fantasy novel makes sense. There's a big divide here with two schools of thought.
The first is characterized by a statement by Robert McKee, who was talking about novels:
The second is dominated by the “Rule of Cool”: “if it's cool, use it." This can consequently to sometimes strange or nonsensical results, but that's part of the fun.
In other words, make the monster more than a stage prop/spear carrier in the adventure. Continuing:
Those of us playing Dungeons & Dragons in the early days started with the “anti-pattern” because that's how Gary Gygax taught us, but some of us decided (McKee-like) that this didn't make sense. So we wanted to make sure the monsters didn't just show up and fight for no reason. Automatically fighting is likely to put the monster in the Dead Book - not good for survivability of the species.
Conversely, when the player characters want to fight “for experience points” that is a “game thing,” not a reality thing. Another excuse for fighting monsters is “for treasure” but so many monsters are (in reality) unlikely to have significant treasure. (Treasure-grubbing is a big part of video games, where “monsters” are even less likely to be sensible than in tabletop.)
Isn't the party mission oriented? Don't they have a mission in mind that they want to achieve, and so they should only fight when it's necessary and unavoidable? Yet so often we see monsters that are willing to fight in almost any circumstance and player characters who are willing to fight in almost any circumstance.
You can consider the ecological place of the monster in its residence, shouldn’t that make sense? Why do they live here, where do they get their food, what about waste disposal and ventilation?
I've occasionally populated a dungeon-like place by having monsters wander in and find their niche, which might include kicking someone else out. I don’t quite fight out the fights, but I take relative combat strength into account. It's an interesting exercise for me, and after an adventure I run more “monsters” in so that the dungeon isn't exactly like the players left it, which is what would happen in reality unless the player characters came back very soon.
If it does come to combat, the monster should use tactics, whether instinctual or intelligent. Think about the monster charge (“human” wave). While suicidal desperation by monsters instead of sensible monster behavior helps the players, when the monsters make sense, the player characters can act more rationally as well. There is a series of books by Keith Ammann which are from an online column called The Monsters Know What They're Doing that may provide help here.
This approach is simply that monsters do what makes sense for the game, not for what should make sense in a fantasy world. This suits the instant generation of dungeon crawl methods, at least in part because there's simply no time to explain where monsters came from since what happens next is new to both the players and the game master. Or to put it another way, when you're generating a dungeon on the fly, why the monster decided to live there is not of primary importance. The "Rule of Cool" allows creatures to show up without a lot of prework and is more narratively flexible, even if it doesn't always make sense.
There's also the possibility of the randomness shaping the world itself. That is, if a kobold shows up in a dungeon with a bear as a pet/guardian, we can now assume all kobolds do. Instead of coming up with a logical framework for how kobolds work, the game plays this out in real time -- similar to how player characters were once blank slate 1st-level characters and in later editions of Dungeons & Dragons now come complete with backgrounds (we discuss this in "Which Came First, The Character or Their Backstory?").
Your Turn: Do the monsters act sensibly when you GM? Do you care about sensible monster behavior?
The Sensible Thing to Do?
Should monsters behave sensibly (and you might substitute “realistically” if you don’t balk at that term in a fantasy context) in role-playing games? People are all over the map about this, from a clear “Yes” to a clear “No” and everywhere in between. My answer is "yes", and I’ll quote myself from 40 odd years ago (White Dwarf magazine) to illustrate:By that I meant it doesn't have to be silly. It doesn't have to be “brain fever.” It can make sense the way a good fantasy novel makes sense. There's a big divide here with two schools of thought.
The first is characterized by a statement by Robert McKee, who was talking about novels:
The second is dominated by the “Rule of Cool”: “if it's cool, use it." This can consequently to sometimes strange or nonsensical results, but that's part of the fun.
Make Sense!
We've discussed how monsters might make sense in my Monster Workshop series of articles, in two parts, where we tried to make monsters make sense. Sbszine summed up the philosophy as:In other words, make the monster more than a stage prop/spear carrier in the adventure. Continuing:
Those of us playing Dungeons & Dragons in the early days started with the “anti-pattern” because that's how Gary Gygax taught us, but some of us decided (McKee-like) that this didn't make sense. So we wanted to make sure the monsters didn't just show up and fight for no reason. Automatically fighting is likely to put the monster in the Dead Book - not good for survivability of the species.
Conversely, when the player characters want to fight “for experience points” that is a “game thing,” not a reality thing. Another excuse for fighting monsters is “for treasure” but so many monsters are (in reality) unlikely to have significant treasure. (Treasure-grubbing is a big part of video games, where “monsters” are even less likely to be sensible than in tabletop.)
Isn't the party mission oriented? Don't they have a mission in mind that they want to achieve, and so they should only fight when it's necessary and unavoidable? Yet so often we see monsters that are willing to fight in almost any circumstance and player characters who are willing to fight in almost any circumstance.
You can consider the ecological place of the monster in its residence, shouldn’t that make sense? Why do they live here, where do they get their food, what about waste disposal and ventilation?
I've occasionally populated a dungeon-like place by having monsters wander in and find their niche, which might include kicking someone else out. I don’t quite fight out the fights, but I take relative combat strength into account. It's an interesting exercise for me, and after an adventure I run more “monsters” in so that the dungeon isn't exactly like the players left it, which is what would happen in reality unless the player characters came back very soon.
If it does come to combat, the monster should use tactics, whether instinctual or intelligent. Think about the monster charge (“human” wave). While suicidal desperation by monsters instead of sensible monster behavior helps the players, when the monsters make sense, the player characters can act more rationally as well. There is a series of books by Keith Ammann which are from an online column called The Monsters Know What They're Doing that may provide help here.
Cool Monsters
The counterpoint to “sensible” is what’s convenient. It’s easier for a GM to control monsters who aren’t sensible. Sensible is also not flashy. Talking a “monster” into doing what you want isn’t typically thought to be heroic. Furthermore, sensible monsters can be more difficult to overcome if players are too passive. I discussed Active and Passive Players, in two parts.This approach is simply that monsters do what makes sense for the game, not for what should make sense in a fantasy world. This suits the instant generation of dungeon crawl methods, at least in part because there's simply no time to explain where monsters came from since what happens next is new to both the players and the game master. Or to put it another way, when you're generating a dungeon on the fly, why the monster decided to live there is not of primary importance. The "Rule of Cool" allows creatures to show up without a lot of prework and is more narratively flexible, even if it doesn't always make sense.
There's also the possibility of the randomness shaping the world itself. That is, if a kobold shows up in a dungeon with a bear as a pet/guardian, we can now assume all kobolds do. Instead of coming up with a logical framework for how kobolds work, the game plays this out in real time -- similar to how player characters were once blank slate 1st-level characters and in later editions of Dungeons & Dragons now come complete with backgrounds (we discuss this in "Which Came First, The Character or Their Backstory?").
Does it Matter?
How you feel about your monsters "making sense" likely pivots on how much time you have to put into the game, how much your players care about logic in a fantasy universe, and the group's overall playstyle. But whatever style you choose, it's worth considering before you start a campaign. Ask yourself, “does this make sense? Do I want it to?” and you may be doing your players a favor.Your Turn: Do the monsters act sensibly when you GM? Do you care about sensible monster behavior?
This is a GREAT article! It reminds me that I am running my monsters correctly.
