There's a trope in movies, games, and so on, where the first time a monster is introduced it's a terrifying threat, and eventually it decays into a mook to be mowed down by the dozens (see Monster Threat Expiration and Conservation Of Ninjutsu). To some degree this gets dealt with by the process of leveling up (according to Xanathar, a CR 2 is appropriate for an entire party at level 1, but you'd want 20 against a level 14 party), but it runs into the problem of complexity. Namely, if I'm using a single monster against a party, I want it to have complex mechanics (legendary actions, etc; the shortage of legendary monsters below CR 10 is something of a problem), but if I'm using twenty, no way do I want to track that much stuff for all of them (I'd be fine with "it gets one attack per round").
Has anyone come up with a means to scale the mechanical complexity of monsters, without necessarily actually changing their power level?
The complexity can come from a big monster mixed in that enhanced by the smaller ones.
For clarity: I don't mean having boss monsters and mooks. I mean having the same monster (or something similar enough to pass casual observation) that changes role over the course of the campaign. For example, the first time the PCs run into an ogre (at level 1) the DM may want to run it as a boss fight, and later on its a mook, but it really doesn't have adequate mechanics to make a fun boss fight -- it goes once per turn, probably oneshots anyone it hits, and then all the PCs pound on it.
The answer is simple just make a legendary or mythic one when you want it as a boss. There are loads of reasons to say they are more powerful. alternatively you can use a plot conceit for example giving them magic mind abilities that the players eventually grow to be immune to or whatever.
No. I don't want them to actually be weaker (or at least not dramatically weaker, though some reduction likely okay), I expect level gain to naturally reduce the relevance of monsters, I just want "boss-level complexity" vs "mook-level complexity" versions of the same creature.
No. I don't want them to actually be weaker (or at least not dramatically weaker, though some reduction likely okay), I expect level gain to naturally reduce the relevance of monsters, I just want "boss-level complexity" vs "mook-level complexity" versions of the same creature.
How can you switch from boss-level complexity to mook-level complexity (e.g. removing legendary actions) without making them weaker?
If you start with the "commander" idea, and then remove those commander abilities as the party get higher level, how is that any different compared to switching from boss to mook level of complexity?
Keith Amman recently posted an article on his blog about dragon tactics that outlines the types of lair actions that dragons typically use. In his article, he outlines the typical lair actions as Movement Restrictor, Debilitator, and Direct Damage. He also does a better job of detailing why a dragon would choose a particular lair action than I'm able to, given this medium.
I point out the article, not because you want to use dragons, but because there might be use in the article regarding lair actions and their use. Specifically movement restriction and debilitation. You may be able to construct lair or legendary actions that provide action complexity without adding to the overall amount of damage that is done, or the amount of damage that is received by the monster.
Abilities that allow the monster to move without provoking OAs, separation of a PC from the rest of the party, or debilitating conditions that end on a save or the begining of the monster's next turn start might be the a way to proceed.
There's also Matt Coleville's Action Oriented Monster, but that example specifically involves minions, which you said you didn't want. Mike"SlyFlourish"Shea also has an article regarding the improvisation of said Action Oriented Monster.
The conundrum in all of this is that you are asking to make the monster more complex, capable of doing more things, without increasing it's perceived power level. Anything that you do to either increase it's damage output, or reduce it's damage received, will inevitably change it's CR, which is a system to measure it's relative power. I might point out that Boss-Type monsters are supposed to be more powerful than their mundane "mook" counterparts. That's why the mooks do what the boss says. Boss is more powerful.
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“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad
How can you switch from boss-level complexity to mook-level complexity (e.g. removing legendary actions) without making them weaker?
By combining abilities. Move the legendary actions into a multiattack. Combine multiple elements of the multiattack into a single attack with the same total damage.
Have you considered the 4th Ed mechanic of Minions? The minion version of a monster can basically only take one hit and does a flat amount of damage. With that in mind, you can turn a CR2 monster into a mob of 20 monsters and be fine. If you are worried about a Wizard wiping the whole mob via an AOE, just have the monsters that save take no damage if they succeed on their save.
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"The mongoose blew out its candle and was asleep in bed before the room went dark." —Llanowar fable
What you're asking for is ultimately contradictory in nature, and impossible to achieve.
You want a monster - say the ogre you mentioned - to be a threat at level 1 but be mechanically complex. But you also want it to not scale, and be the same but also different at higher levels. Without changing the monster.
At low levels, you do not need mechanical complexity. An orc is a potentially deadly threat to a level 1 character. It doesn't need legendary actions, because the character it's fighting can go down to a single hit. Moreover, the players are either learning the game, or racing through the early levels if they're veterans. I have run creatures with legendary actions against a level 2 party, but they are a one-off. Legendary actions should be reserved for individual named enemies, not mooks. Mooks are not legendary, they just take actions. Even a balor is just one of many balors.
High CR boss monsters get all that complexity because the characters also have a huge array of skills to use. The boss needs a complex array of skills to be interesting.
What you're describing - "It was tough at level 1, but at level 12 we mow them down" is already completely achieved by using appropriate CR monsters.
What you're asking for is ultimately contradictory in nature, and impossible to achieve.
You want a monster - say the ogre you mentioned - to be a threat at level 1 but be mechanically complex. But you also want it to not scale, and be the same but also different at higher levels. Without changing the monster.
At low levels, you do not need mechanical complexity. An orc is a potentially deadly threat to a level 1 character. It doesn't need legendary actions, because the character it's fighting can go down to a single hit. Moreover, the players are either learning the game, or racing through the early levels if they're veterans. I have run creatures with legendary actions against a level 2 party, but they are a one-off. Legendary actions should be reserved for individual named enemies, not mooks. Mooks are not legendary, they just take actions. Even a balor is just one of many balors.
High CR boss monsters get all that complexity because the characters also have a huge array of skills to use. The boss needs a complex array of skills to be interesting.
First of all, I'm not opposed to having varying stat blocks, as long as there's a reasonably simple set of rules for doing it.
Secondly, interesting and challenging aren't the same thing, though it's rare to bother making a fight that isn't challenging interesting. The main thing that makes a fight more interesting is having it be dynamic and giving the PCs multiple things to think about. Legendary actions exist to make the fight more dynamic by breaking up the flow of PC actions.
Have you considered kind of abstracting monsters into monster groups? Like a group of four orcs that's just run as a large creature. Maybe consolidate their four attacks into two, borrow from swarm mechanics and halve their damage when bloodied, etc.
It's doable. Just balance things, use the situation. That is, split the standard attacks and actions of the creature up to something more complex, and then merge them back together when you want a group of them.
It helps if you don't run book-standard critters. It's a rare encounter where I haven't made some changes, added abilities, or just made stuff up.
Example for me is a giant flying zombie thing, super scary, like a skinned horse welded to bat wings, it's great. First time the players encountered it, it had landed on the roof of the inn, everyone could smell it and had a sudden rush of terror, and it straight up tore the head off the first poor drunken fool who went out to look. The fight was in the yard of a fortified waystation, and the thing was trying to get the gate open to say hi to the horde of zombies trying to get in.
So it was using throws and movement abilities trying to get to the gate, a paralysis tail, splitting its two attacks that each were very threatening to a level 3 party, and after they thought it had died it turned out it regenerated enough to get back up and try again. Cool fight, very dramatic.
They're level 6 now and have some sweet magic gear. They're going to fight a group of these things in a pass. One tail attack on a recharge, and I'm just combining their two attacks into one. That's it, no fancy stuff. The players know the trick with the regen and have enough fire to get around it, should be a fun warm up fight leading into a roleplay-heavy session. Same stats, same HP, same balance, but they're in a straight up fight and not trying for an I-win button, so the other stuff isn't relevant.
And my rough plan in a level or two is a set peice where they go into a nest of the things with demolition charges and just do a running battle of a couple at a time. I'll throw some of their more complex shenannigans back in where its cool. And finally they'll be back around level 10 as mounts for nastier dudes, where simple will be the way to go.
--
With a boss Ogre vs low levels, it might be forcing them to the edge of a cliff instead of just attacking. Give it some tools, like oil and fire. Make it smart enough to ambush the squishier DPS. Split its damage up so it can have a secondary "shield bash" type attack. Have it talk to them, shout, intimidate, threaten, offer bribes.
Normal orgres *could* do all of that, too, but when you've got 10 of them, they just ... don't. They choose the simple options.
As I said: split the standard attacks and actions of the creature up to something more complex, and then merge them back together when you want a group of them.
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There's a trope in movies, games, and so on, where the first time a monster is introduced it's a terrifying threat, and eventually it decays into a mook to be mowed down by the dozens (see Monster Threat Expiration and Conservation Of Ninjutsu). To some degree this gets dealt with by the process of leveling up (according to Xanathar, a CR 2 is appropriate for an entire party at level 1, but you'd want 20 against a level 14 party), but it runs into the problem of complexity. Namely, if I'm using a single monster against a party, I want it to have complex mechanics (legendary actions, etc; the shortage of legendary monsters below CR 10 is something of a problem), but if I'm using twenty, no way do I want to track that much stuff for all of them (I'd be fine with "it gets one attack per round").
Has anyone come up with a means to scale the mechanical complexity of monsters, without necessarily actually changing their power level?
Commanders and bosses
The complexity can come from a big monster mixed in that enhanced by the smaller ones.
Some examples:
Complex environments
The extra effects can come from an environment either in the form of terrain of lair actions.
Some examples:
Covens
I haven't tried it other than with hags but you could try something like a coven where in groups they get extra abilities/ actions which are shared.
For clarity: I don't mean having boss monsters and mooks. I mean having the same monster (or something similar enough to pass casual observation) that changes role over the course of the campaign. For example, the first time the PCs run into an ogre (at level 1) the DM may want to run it as a boss fight, and later on its a mook, but it really doesn't have adequate mechanics to make a fun boss fight -- it goes once per turn, probably oneshots anyone it hits, and then all the PCs pound on it.
Oh so you want them to decay over time?
The answer is simple just make a legendary or mythic one when you want it as a boss. There are loads of reasons to say they are more powerful. alternatively you can use a plot conceit for example giving them magic mind abilities that the players eventually grow to be immune to or whatever.
No. I don't want them to actually be weaker (or at least not dramatically weaker, though some reduction likely okay), I expect level gain to naturally reduce the relevance of monsters, I just want "boss-level complexity" vs "mook-level complexity" versions of the same creature.
How can you switch from boss-level complexity to mook-level complexity (e.g. removing legendary actions) without making them weaker?
If you start with the "commander" idea, and then remove those commander abilities as the party get higher level, how is that any different compared to switching from boss to mook level of complexity?
Keith Amman recently posted an article on his blog about dragon tactics that outlines the types of lair actions that dragons typically use. In his article, he outlines the typical lair actions as Movement Restrictor, Debilitator, and Direct Damage. He also does a better job of detailing why a dragon would choose a particular lair action than I'm able to, given this medium.
I point out the article, not because you want to use dragons, but because there might be use in the article regarding lair actions and their use. Specifically movement restriction and debilitation. You may be able to construct lair or legendary actions that provide action complexity without adding to the overall amount of damage that is done, or the amount of damage that is received by the monster.
Abilities that allow the monster to move without provoking OAs, separation of a PC from the rest of the party, or debilitating conditions that end on a save or the begining of the monster's next turn start might be the a way to proceed.
There's also Matt Coleville's Action Oriented Monster, but that example specifically involves minions, which you said you didn't want. Mike"SlyFlourish"Shea also has an article regarding the improvisation of said Action Oriented Monster.
The conundrum in all of this is that you are asking to make the monster more complex, capable of doing more things, without increasing it's perceived power level. Anything that you do to either increase it's damage output, or reduce it's damage received, will inevitably change it's CR, which is a system to measure it's relative power. I might point out that Boss-Type monsters are supposed to be more powerful than their mundane "mook" counterparts. That's why the mooks do what the boss says. Boss is more powerful.
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad
By combining abilities. Move the legendary actions into a multiattack. Combine multiple elements of the multiattack into a single attack with the same total damage.
Have you considered the 4th Ed mechanic of Minions? The minion version of a monster can basically only take one hit and does a flat amount of damage. With that in mind, you can turn a CR2 monster into a mob of 20 monsters and be fine. If you are worried about a Wizard wiping the whole mob via an AOE, just have the monsters that save take no damage if they succeed on their save.
What you're asking for is ultimately contradictory in nature, and impossible to achieve.
You want a monster - say the ogre you mentioned - to be a threat at level 1 but be mechanically complex. But you also want it to not scale, and be the same but also different at higher levels. Without changing the monster.
At low levels, you do not need mechanical complexity. An orc is a potentially deadly threat to a level 1 character. It doesn't need legendary actions, because the character it's fighting can go down to a single hit. Moreover, the players are either learning the game, or racing through the early levels if they're veterans. I have run creatures with legendary actions against a level 2 party, but they are a one-off. Legendary actions should be reserved for individual named enemies, not mooks. Mooks are not legendary, they just take actions. Even a balor is just one of many balors.
High CR boss monsters get all that complexity because the characters also have a huge array of skills to use. The boss needs a complex array of skills to be interesting.
What you're describing - "It was tough at level 1, but at level 12 we mow them down" is already completely achieved by using appropriate CR monsters.
First of all, I'm not opposed to having varying stat blocks, as long as there's a reasonably simple set of rules for doing it.
Secondly, interesting and challenging aren't the same thing, though it's rare to bother making a fight that isn't challenging interesting. The main thing that makes a fight more interesting is having it be dynamic and giving the PCs multiple things to think about. Legendary actions exist to make the fight more dynamic by breaking up the flow of PC actions.
Have you considered kind of abstracting monsters into monster groups? Like a group of four orcs that's just run as a large creature. Maybe consolidate their four attacks into two, borrow from swarm mechanics and halve their damage when bloodied, etc.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
It's doable. Just balance things, use the situation. That is, split the standard attacks and actions of the creature up to something more complex, and then merge them back together when you want a group of them.
It helps if you don't run book-standard critters. It's a rare encounter where I haven't made some changes, added abilities, or just made stuff up.
Example for me is a giant flying zombie thing, super scary, like a skinned horse welded to bat wings, it's great. First time the players encountered it, it had landed on the roof of the inn, everyone could smell it and had a sudden rush of terror, and it straight up tore the head off the first poor drunken fool who went out to look. The fight was in the yard of a fortified waystation, and the thing was trying to get the gate open to say hi to the horde of zombies trying to get in.
So it was using throws and movement abilities trying to get to the gate, a paralysis tail, splitting its two attacks that each were very threatening to a level 3 party, and after they thought it had died it turned out it regenerated enough to get back up and try again. Cool fight, very dramatic.
They're level 6 now and have some sweet magic gear. They're going to fight a group of these things in a pass. One tail attack on a recharge, and I'm just combining their two attacks into one. That's it, no fancy stuff. The players know the trick with the regen and have enough fire to get around it, should be a fun warm up fight leading into a roleplay-heavy session. Same stats, same HP, same balance, but they're in a straight up fight and not trying for an I-win button, so the other stuff isn't relevant.
And my rough plan in a level or two is a set peice where they go into a nest of the things with demolition charges and just do a running battle of a couple at a time. I'll throw some of their more complex shenannigans back in where its cool. And finally they'll be back around level 10 as mounts for nastier dudes, where simple will be the way to go.
--
With a boss Ogre vs low levels, it might be forcing them to the edge of a cliff instead of just attacking. Give it some tools, like oil and fire. Make it smart enough to ambush the squishier DPS. Split its damage up so it can have a secondary "shield bash" type attack. Have it talk to them, shout, intimidate, threaten, offer bribes.
Normal orgres *could* do all of that, too, but when you've got 10 of them, they just ... don't. They choose the simple options.
As I said: split the standard attacks and actions of the creature up to something more complex, and then merge them back together when you want a group of them.