Am I the only one who finds the design of monster stat blocks to be somewhat counterintuitive, especially for complex monsters with numerous special abilities/attributes?
As a DM with ADHD, I often find the blocks as written to be hard to decipher in the heat of battle. Therefore, as part of my prep, I usually "re-design" the stat blocks for any monsters I'm likely to use by grouping/dividing defensive attributes (ie. things I need to reference on players' turns like HP/AC/vulnerabilities/immunities and certain special features) from offensive attributes (ie. things I need to reference on a monster's turn like movement speed, actions and certain special abilities). It's extremely helpful for me... but it's a hell of a lot of extra work just to help the game run smoothly. It's kinda the only way I can keep from routinely screwing up/forgetting/inconsistently enforcing a monster's abilities...
Just curious to know if anyone else has this struggle and or any creative solutions they use?
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
DM - Classic Adventures Reborn
Rylan - L1 Human Paladin - Barty's "Princes of the Apocalypse"
Most resources I’ve seen are similar to what you’re already doing by simplifying the statblock with only the important stuff.
one thing you could consider would be to use average damage so skip rolling at working out stats, just use the average damage
something I’ve never tried butwhich might help is the RPG sweet spot results (not sure if they have a proper name). So in general once you add proficiently 15-20 on a dice will almost always hit, 11-14 might hit and less than 10 will usually miss. So remembering these brackets as a guide you might be able to skip using stats or having to look stuff up?
usually I prep any combat i think might happen ahead of time to save time during the game. I tend to ignore the base stats and only write, health, AC and Attack modifiers. If I need a saving through I’ll look it up but in general you know if something is good with a stat and can usually judge it. As above it’s only really the rolls in the mid range that could go either way, above 15 will almost always save, below 10;is likely a fail
There have been multiple redesigns from different editions. For me, the main problem with the 5e format is that the (unnamed) section between CR/PB and the start of the actions can contain... anything.
Agreed! That's one of my biggest frustrations as well.
Sometimes those entries are 90% flavor... Sometime's they contain long descriptions of interesting abilities that have no role in active combat... and sometimes they contain crucial mechanical buffs for combat that really shouldn't be overlooked by a DM.... and it's often hard to parse the difference at a glance during combat because all three types of content look like the same, identically formatted paragraph of text.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
DM - Classic Adventures Reborn
Rylan - L1 Human Paladin - Barty's "Princes of the Apocalypse"
To be fair, "complex monsters with numerous special abilities/attributes" is kind of against the primary goal of 5e to streamline things, so it's not a surprise that the stat blocks aren't optimized for those outliers. Monsters are supposed to have one or two gimmicks that telegraph their flavor and that's it. Large climactic bosses are an exception, but they're basically supposed to be a whole encounter wrapped in one stat block.
I don't know. I like things broken up by action and I think there are plenty of abilities that don't clearly fit into categories like "offensive" or "defensive." Start prescribing what each section has to contain and you limit what a stat block can contain. I'd rather have a more flexible design.
Maybe you're just doing too much in an encounter. You shouldn't be running three types of enemies all with multiple special abilities. Use an encounter to highlight a particular enemy type and throw in some simpler mooks if you need more bodies. Doing this also helps you get to know the highlighted monster pretty well so that in later encounters you can potentially use them in more complicated situations.
The way the statblocks are currently being designed are that all the stats are at the beginning for quick reference, Actions and Bonus Actions (stuff the monster can actually “do” on its turns) have their own sections, Reactions (things the monster can actually “do” on other creatures’ turns) have their own section, and everything else goes into the “special traits” section (that unnamed section in between the stats and the Actions).
Honestly, the monsters don't even need to be that complex for me to come up with problems... And again, some of this might be due to my own neurodivergence making it particularly challenging for me to parse visual information on the fly.
The meddlesome issue I came up against recently had to do with a CR 2 monster, an Azer, surrounded by throwaway cultists. Not a particularly complicated foe but one with multiple features I needed to keep an eye on at the same time.
For whatever reason. the Azer's "Heated Weapons." Ability (When the azer hits with a metal melee weapon, it deals an extra 3 (1d6) fire damage) was grouped in the (unnamed) section rather than the attack... which is literally the only time the ability would come into play LOL
Meanwhile, the Illumination ability is wedged between the two.... which feel like a rather arbitrary place to have that information.
Just using this as one example, but I feel like it's something I keep encountering when I run a game. I dunno. It's not the biggest deal in the world. Just a little gripe that I was wondering if anyone else had experience with.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
DM - Classic Adventures Reborn
Rylan - L1 Human Paladin - Barty's "Princes of the Apocalypse"
For whatever reason. the Azer's "Heated Weapons." Ability (When the azer hits with a metal melee weapon, it deals an extra 3 (1d6) fire damage) was grouped in the (unnamed) section rather than the attack... which is literally the only time the ability would come into play LOL
The heated weapons feature doesn't actually do anything unless you're customizing monsters, because it's already included in its Warhammer action. I would probably put it in a section like
Customization Notes: if the Azer uses a metal melee weapon other than the ones already listed in its stat block, that weapon deals an extra 3 (1d6) fire damage.
I think the useful classification for the non-action abilities are "when do you use it". Some categories I can think of:
Defenses: use these when attacked or required to make a save.
Reduced to 0: mythics, creatures that don't die at zero, etc.
Start/End of Monster Turn: things like regeneration.
Start/End of Enemy Turn: things like auras.
Start/End of Ally Turn: pretty rare. Things like healing auras.
Attack Enhancements: things like Pounce. TBH, these should just be actions.
Attack Enhancements you mean stuff like Charge, or Trample? In the newest statblocks they are under Actions, rolled into the attack.
For all the rest they have nowhere to go other than that generic field, and there they are just organized alphabetically for ease of reference. The way they see it, if they broke that section down further, it would be too busy and cluttered for most people to appreciate. Heck, they were reticent to add the Bonus Action section for fear of cluttering things up. And they list those traits alphabetically so one doesn’t have to search all over looking for the right cluster of traits to find the right one and then look for the right trait, alphabetically just worked smoother. Plus, the vast majority of monsters don’t really have more than 1 or 2 special traits, so it would look all random and hodgepodgey most of the time, and completely disorganized. This way, it’s just always in alphabetical order all the time so it’s easy to remember because we all learned the alphabet when we were babies/little kids. Simpler. That’s what WotC goes for.
Right, but the alphabetic reference is only helpful if you already know the name of the feature you're looking for... So, it's useful if you're already familiar with the monster and its abilities... not so much if you're not.
But, again, to each their own. I'm sure plenty of folks find the current orientation to be simpler. I personally find it to be counter-intuitive. I'll just keep re-crafting stat blocks in a way that works best for me. I was just hoping someone with similar issues had a workable solution they used.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
DM - Classic Adventures Reborn
Rylan - L1 Human Paladin - Barty's "Princes of the Apocalypse"
For all the rest they have nowhere to go other than that generic field, and there they are just organized alphabetically for ease of reference. The way they see it, if they broke that section down further, it would be too busy and cluttered for most people to appreciate.
The secret is: only include elements that are actually used. Let's look at a sample of a monster stat block that's horribly overcluttered: the vampire. Consider this revised stat block -- it has the same set of abilities as the standard vampire, just with some changes to order and wording
Vampire
Medium Undead (Shapechanger), Lawful Evil
Ability Scores and Checks
Str 18 (+4), Dex 18 (+4), Con 18 (+4), Int 17 (+3), Wis 15 (+2), Cha 18 (+4)
Skills: Perception +7, Stealth +9
Defenses
Armor Class: 16 (Natural), Hit Points 144
Damage Resistances: Necrotic; Bludgeoning, Piercing, and Slashing from nonmagical attacks.
Saves: Str +4, Dex +9, Con +4, Int +3, Wis +7, Cha +9.
Legendary Resistance: 3/day. If the vampire fails a saving throw, it can choose to succeed instead.
Misty Escape: (this trait is stupidly complicated, not going to try to rewrite it here)
Movement
Restrictions: The vampire can’t enter a residence without an invitation from one of the occupants.
Speed 30', Climb 30'
Spider Climb: The vampire can climb difficult surfaces, including upside down on ceilings, without needing to make an ability check.
Start of Turn
If the vampire is in running water, it takes 20 acid damage.
If the vampire is in sunlight, it takes 20 radiant damage.
If neither of the above is true and the vampire has at least 1 hp, it regenerates by 20 hp. This does not apply if the vampire has taken radiant damage since the start of its last turn.
The vampire's legendary reactions are restored to 3.
End of Enemy Turn
If the vampire has sufficient remaining legendary actions, it may take one, choosing from the actions listed below.
Actions
Shapechange(Bat): If the vampire is not in sunlight or running water, it can turn into a tiny Bat. Its movement becomes Speed 5' (Fly 30'), and it cannot use its unarmed strike ability or any other abilities that require hands (DMs discretion).
Shapechange(Mist): If the vampire is not in sunlight or running water, it can turn into a medium cloud of mist. Its movement becomes Fly 20' (Hover), its physical resistances become immunity, it has advantage on Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution saves, and it is unaffected by any barrier that gas can pass through. However, it cannot speak or use any actions other than Shapechange.
Shapechange(Vampire): the vampire returns to its normal form.
(other actions unchanged).
(legendary actions unchanged, other than the fact that their restoration and use have been moved to the blocks above).
It’s just an alternative way of organizing things. Neither one is can satisfy everyone because I can almost guarantee that would feel just as off as the current statblocks do for other people.
For all the rest they have nowhere to go other than that generic field, and there they are just organized alphabetically for ease of reference. The way they see it, if they broke that section down further, it would be too busy and cluttered for most people to appreciate.
The secret is: only include elements that are actually used. Let's look at a sample of a monster stat block that's horribly overcluttered: the vampire. Consider this revised stat block -- it has the same set of abilities as the standard vampire, just with some changes to order and wording
Vampire
Medium Undead (Shapechanger), Lawful Evil
Ability Scores and Checks
Str 18 (+4), Dex 18 (+4), Con 18 (+4), Int 17 (+3), Wis 15 (+2), Cha 18 (+4)
Skills: Perception +7, Stealth +9
Defenses
Armor Class: 16 (Natural), Hit Points 144
Damage Resistances: Necrotic; Bludgeoning, Piercing, and Slashing from nonmagical attacks.
Saves: Str +4, Dex +9, Con +4, Int +3, Wis +7, Cha +9.
Legendary Resistance: 3/day. If the vampire fails a saving throw, it can choose to succeed instead.
Misty Escape: (this trait is stupidly complicated, not going to try to rewrite it here)
Movement
Restrictions: The vampire can’t enter a residence without an invitation from one of the occupants.
Speed 30', Climb 30'
Spider Climb: The vampire can climb difficult surfaces, including upside down on ceilings, without needing to make an ability check.
Start of Turn
If the vampire is in running water, it takes 20 acid damage.
If the vampire is in sunlight, it takes 20 radiant damage.
If neither of the above is true and the vampire has at least 1 hp, it regenerates by 20 hp. This does not apply if the vampire has taken radiant damage since the start of its last turn.
The vampire's legendary reactions are restored to 3.
End of Enemy Turn
If the vampire has sufficient remaining legendary actions, it may take one, choosing from the actions listed below.
Actions
Shapechange(Bat): If the vampire is not in sunlight or running water, it can turn into a tiny Bat. Its movement becomes Speed 5' (Fly 30'), and it cannot use its unarmed strike ability or any other abilities that require hands (DMs discretion).
Shapechange(Mist): If the vampire is not in sunlight or running water, it can turn into a medium cloud of mist. Its movement becomes Fly 20' (Hover), its physical resistances become immunity, it has advantage on Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution saves, and it is unaffected by any barrier that gas can pass through. However, it cannot speak or use any actions other than Shapechange.
Shapechange(Vampire): the vampire returns to its normal form.
(other actions unchanged).
(legendary actions unchanged, other than the fact that their restoration and use have been moved to the blocks above).
Meh. I mean the vampire being overcluttered isn't really going to be fixed by rearranging the block. The block is just too big. For smaller blocks, I don't think there's much benefit to this sort of change IMO.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Am I the only one who finds the design of monster stat blocks to be somewhat counterintuitive, especially for complex monsters with numerous special abilities/attributes?
As a DM with ADHD, I often find the blocks as written to be hard to decipher in the heat of battle. Therefore, as part of my prep, I usually "re-design" the stat blocks for any monsters I'm likely to use by grouping/dividing defensive attributes (ie. things I need to reference on players' turns like HP/AC/vulnerabilities/immunities and certain special features) from offensive attributes (ie. things I need to reference on a monster's turn like movement speed, actions and certain special abilities). It's extremely helpful for me... but it's a hell of a lot of extra work just to help the game run smoothly. It's kinda the only way I can keep from routinely screwing up/forgetting/inconsistently enforcing a monster's abilities...
Just curious to know if anyone else has this struggle and or any creative solutions they use?
DM - Classic Adventures Reborn
Rylan - L1 Human Paladin - Barty's "Princes of the Apocalypse"
Most resources I’ve seen are similar to what you’re already doing by simplifying the statblock with only the important stuff.
one thing you could consider would be to use average damage so skip rolling at working out stats, just use the average damage
something I’ve never tried butwhich might help is the RPG sweet spot results (not sure if they have a proper name). So in general once you add proficiently 15-20 on a dice will almost always hit, 11-14 might hit and less than 10 will usually miss. So remembering these brackets as a guide you might be able to skip using stats or having to look stuff up?
usually I prep any combat i think might happen ahead of time to save time during the game. I tend to ignore the base stats and only write, health, AC and Attack modifiers. If I need a saving through I’ll look it up but in general you know if something is good with a stat and can usually judge it. As above it’s only really the rolls in the mid range that could go either way, above 15 will almost always save, below 10;is likely a fail
There have been multiple redesigns from different editions. For me, the main problem with the 5e format is that the (unnamed) section between CR/PB and the start of the actions can contain... anything.
Agreed! That's one of my biggest frustrations as well.
Sometimes those entries are 90% flavor... Sometime's they contain long descriptions of interesting abilities that have no role in active combat... and sometimes they contain crucial mechanical buffs for combat that really shouldn't be overlooked by a DM.... and it's often hard to parse the difference at a glance during combat because all three types of content look like the same, identically formatted paragraph of text.
DM - Classic Adventures Reborn
Rylan - L1 Human Paladin - Barty's "Princes of the Apocalypse"
To be fair, "complex monsters with numerous special abilities/attributes" is kind of against the primary goal of 5e to streamline things, so it's not a surprise that the stat blocks aren't optimized for those outliers. Monsters are supposed to have one or two gimmicks that telegraph their flavor and that's it. Large climactic bosses are an exception, but they're basically supposed to be a whole encounter wrapped in one stat block.
I don't know. I like things broken up by action and I think there are plenty of abilities that don't clearly fit into categories like "offensive" or "defensive." Start prescribing what each section has to contain and you limit what a stat block can contain. I'd rather have a more flexible design.
Maybe you're just doing too much in an encounter. You shouldn't be running three types of enemies all with multiple special abilities. Use an encounter to highlight a particular enemy type and throw in some simpler mooks if you need more bodies. Doing this also helps you get to know the highlighted monster pretty well so that in later encounters you can potentially use them in more complicated situations.
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
The way the statblocks are currently being designed are that all the stats are at the beginning for quick reference, Actions and Bonus Actions (stuff the monster can actually “do” on its turns) have their own sections, Reactions (things the monster can actually “do” on other creatures’ turns) have their own section, and everything else goes into the “special traits” section (that unnamed section in between the stats and the Actions).
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
I think the useful classification for the non-action abilities are "when do you use it". Some categories I can think of:
Honestly, the monsters don't even need to be that complex for me to come up with problems... And again, some of this might be due to my own neurodivergence making it particularly challenging for me to parse visual information on the fly.
The meddlesome issue I came up against recently had to do with a CR 2 monster, an Azer, surrounded by throwaway cultists. Not a particularly complicated foe but one with multiple features I needed to keep an eye on at the same time.
For whatever reason. the Azer's "Heated Weapons." Ability (When the azer hits with a metal melee weapon, it deals an extra 3 (1d6) fire damage) was grouped in the (unnamed) section rather than the attack... which is literally the only time the ability would come into play LOL
Meanwhile, the Illumination ability is wedged between the two.... which feel like a rather arbitrary place to have that information.
Just using this as one example, but I feel like it's something I keep encountering when I run a game. I dunno. It's not the biggest deal in the world. Just a little gripe that I was wondering if anyone else had experience with.
DM - Classic Adventures Reborn
Rylan - L1 Human Paladin - Barty's "Princes of the Apocalypse"
The heated weapons feature doesn't actually do anything unless you're customizing monsters, because it's already included in its Warhammer action. I would probably put it in a section like
Customization Notes: if the Azer uses a metal melee weapon other than the ones already listed in its stat block, that weapon deals an extra 3 (1d6) fire damage.
Oh, man... I didn't even notice that distinction... All very confusing. And, yeah, the subsection you describe would make things so much clearer.
DM - Classic Adventures Reborn
Rylan - L1 Human Paladin - Barty's "Princes of the Apocalypse"
Attack Enhancements you mean stuff like Charge, or Trample? In the newest statblocks they are under Actions, rolled into the attack.
For all the rest they have nowhere to go other than that generic field, and there they are just organized alphabetically for ease of reference. The way they see it, if they broke that section down further, it would be too busy and cluttered for most people to appreciate. Heck, they were reticent to add the Bonus Action section for fear of cluttering things up. And they list those traits alphabetically so one doesn’t have to search all over looking for the right cluster of traits to find the right one and then look for the right trait, alphabetically just worked smoother. Plus, the vast majority of monsters don’t really have more than 1 or 2 special traits, so it would look all random and hodgepodgey most of the time, and completely disorganized. This way, it’s just always in alphabetical order all the time so it’s easy to remember because we all learned the alphabet when we were babies/little kids. Simpler. That’s what WotC goes for.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
Right, but the alphabetic reference is only helpful if you already know the name of the feature you're looking for... So, it's useful if you're already familiar with the monster and its abilities... not so much if you're not.
But, again, to each their own. I'm sure plenty of folks find the current orientation to be simpler. I personally find it to be counter-intuitive. I'll just keep re-crafting stat blocks in a way that works best for me. I was just hoping someone with similar issues had a workable solution they used.
DM - Classic Adventures Reborn
Rylan - L1 Human Paladin - Barty's "Princes of the Apocalypse"
The secret is: only include elements that are actually used. Let's look at a sample of a monster stat block that's horribly overcluttered: the vampire. Consider this revised stat block -- it has the same set of abilities as the standard vampire, just with some changes to order and wording
Vampire
Medium Undead (Shapechanger), Lawful Evil
Ability Scores and Checks
Defenses
Movement
Start of Turn
End of Enemy Turn
Actions
Oh that’s lovely…
DM - Classic Adventures Reborn
Rylan - L1 Human Paladin - Barty's "Princes of the Apocalypse"
It’s just an alternative way of organizing things. Neither one is can satisfy everyone because I can almost guarantee that would feel just as off as the current statblocks do for other people.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
Meh. I mean the vampire being overcluttered isn't really going to be fixed by rearranging the block. The block is just too big. For smaller blocks, I don't think there's much benefit to this sort of change IMO.