Ye Olde Inn

Has anyone worked out the %age strengths of each of the monster types in combat? I'm thinking of writing an event/rule booklet that would reflect the personalities of the different monster types. For instance - undead are brainless so will attack the nearest player, goblins are bright enough to run away when outnumbered but maybe would go find allies to stage an ambush. That kind of thing. But central to this is an analysis of just how tough each monster type is singly and in bands against each of the the heroes and different combinations of heroes.

I normally play Undead the same as you said, as attacking the closest hero any even potentially other monsters. When I was playing Castle of Mystery with a group, a hero teleported into a room with greenskins, but on his next turn he fled. An Orc chased after him, teleporting to a room with undead... The undead attacks and killed the Orc.

The problem with getting a retreating Goblin to flee and find other monsters to help implies that he can open doors. As each progressing room adds more and more monsters onto the board the heroes can potentially become bombarded... But I will use the monsters more strategically if they have mind points. If the heroes don't have a ranged weapon I might hold the monsters back, instead of blocking up a doorway. The heroes need to progress, the monsters don't always have to run to them.

However I'm not sure if I completely understand the rest of your inquiry... There's always strength in numbers, so multiple monsters are more powerful than 1. Singly an Ogre or Polar Warbear are probably the toughest, but a group of 3 or 4 Orcs might be able to take them out. Greenskins are more likely to work in groups.

I've come up with a points system for heroes and monsters, but this was more so to accurately group them into Arena Mode... Probably not what you're talking about.

However when I attended Dungeons of Hope, I was given a list for special abilities that can be imposed upon monsters. I'm not sure if this is the case. If so, I'll check my E mail for a copy of it.

An interesting idea BenjiHQ. Something like a monster playbook. I have played other dungeon crawlers with preset instructions for monster actions printed on the monsters stat cards.

Is your goal to eliminate the need a human to take the role of Zargon and all humans participating could play as heroes?
An addition to gameplay "flavor?"
Or are you trying to figure out how to move and use your monsters more effectively to challenge your players?

To increase challenge two simple tactics for Zargon that work until heroes buy crossbows:
1) Trick heroes into dungeon traps when cowardly goblins "run away"
2) Force heroes to break formation. Wallydubbs mention this tactic in his reply. Once my kids learned to use doors as chokepoints for heroes to gang up on monsters I occassionally held back monsters in defensive positions rather than rushing the barbarian with six defense dice blocking the doorway.

I think the main obstacle is how to prevent a standoff where the heroes wont leave the door to engage and not marching monsters into the grinder just to keep the game moving. In quest 8 if I recall correctly 5 heroes were holing up at the door, part of this was due to one player being new and learning, but despite there being weak enemies they would not enter the room further. After 3 turns where they would not leave the door (I don't recall if they had much for range options) I had two of the enemies move to the side of the room- quite unusual behavior. On the next turn when they still wanted to keep stalling by meta gaming I had those enemies raise an alarm- causing a ruckus from the nearby room with the closed door. That was finally enough to light a fire under them that walking in and starting a fight but dallying too much carried consequences. It gave the impression that there were going to be more monsters flooding the room (and no indicator if they were strong or not) soon so they needed to get these ones out of the way. I continued with that impression- having the door sound like it was being bashed or other loud noises that I don't quite recall.

I ended up repositioning some of the monsters in the next room to better give the impression that they were prepared for them or were going to bust into the room by having the strongest right at the door. For the rest of the dungeon I tweaked the encounters by adding an additional weak monster or 2 or by strengthening something in the room. This was in part to support the raised alarm, but also so that the 5th player would have more chances to do stuff. That combined with some of their own choices and how the dice rolled made for probably the most engaging experience so far. They had some intense fights working against numbers or trying to rush down the biggest threat, and the boss battle worked out similarly due to the dice making a very intense combat that got pretty close to downing some players. I don't recall if they had to save themselves with potions or not, but they were in a more vulnerable spot then they had been in a while.

In regard to monster specific behavior- I think there is good merit in it. It gives a bit more personality to the monsters than just their stats. Using homebrew abilities or other things to distinguish them also works depending on your play group and style. I'll be looking to add some of those myself to change up the challenge of normal enemies a little closer to the end of the GS quests. Playing into the mindless undead bit with having them attack the closest living thing is an easy way to liven things up after players are comfortable with the basics and changes up the threat assessment if the abomination favors attacking magic users or something. For undead specificly, I've had them not activate once seen (as if they are not yet aware of the players if they are too far away down a long hall for example) or shamble aimlessly back and forth. I think to make greenskins work as a smarter unit that can position to trick characters into traps and such, you need to establish there could be consequences if they try to leave them alone to lure them into door combat instead of engaging. Maybe monsters using the doors is usually prevented, but you could start adding wandering monsters coming to a call for help- you just need to make it clear that the call for help is happening - they should be prodded into action at that point even if nothing shows up or you do a die roll. Mixing in some ranged units would probably help with this too, but I'm not ready to add them to the general roster until either they are out of the game system (probably into content that uses them), or stuff starts feeling too samey.

It's useful to adhere to the written quest for the most part but be ready to make adjustments one way or the other as needed. I haven't run into a situation where they have had an impulse to retreat- but modifying a started quest a bit so it isnt predictable probably helps a lot with the feeling of the game having some limited response to you- its the whole reason a player controls the monsters instead of a flow chart afterall.

BenjiHQ wrote:Has anyone worked out the %age strengths of each of the monster types in combat? I'm thinking of writing an event/rule booklet that would reflect the personalities of the different monster types. For instance - undead are brainless so will attack the nearest player, goblins are bright enough to run away when outnumbered but maybe would go find allies to stage an ambush. That kind of thing. But central to this is an analysis of just how tough each monster type is singly and in bands against each of the the heroes and different combinations of heroes.

The goblins being able to get help might be a bit too overpowered. Actually it might be better to say the board isn't big enough for monsters to really retreat and open doors without it getting very out of hand, very quickly. When Evil Wizards want to give monsters 'powers' to balance out things a bit, keep players from camping the door, etc. The standard I always see used is to give the goblins the ability to 'split move' (move > attack > then continue move). The other standard one I always see is to give skeletons the ability to attack diagonally. Sometimes I see lists that give every monster a 'power' like this. But often times each list will be different. But giving Goblins the ability to split move, and giving skeletons the ability to attack diagonally is very standard, and repeats in a lot of these lists.

Though I'm not sure if that's helpful to what you are asking.

wallydubbs wrote:I normally play Undead the same as you said, as attacking the closest hero any even potentially other monsters. When I was playing Castle of Mystery with a group, a hero teleported into a room with greenskins, but on his next turn he fled. An Orc chased after him, teleporting to a room with undead... The undead attacks and killed the Orc.

There is actually a massive tradition that supports this behavior in undead. The standard 'old school' view of undead in older Dungeons and Dragons is that the undead resent the living for still possessing life, which they themselves no longer possess. Therefore it makes perfect sense that the undead would kill orcs and goblins just as readily as the heroes. Though I'd point out it's not because they are stupid, but because they are compelled to destroy all living things. I once toyed with the rule that this would only not be the case if a powerful sorcerer or gargoyle was on the board. As it would make sense the undead have been forced to submit to their command. Only they would be able to keep the legions of the dead under their control and prevent them from destroying all the living in sight. But if that sorcerer or gargoyle is felled, all bets are off.

wallydubbs wrote:I've come up with a points system for heroes and monsters, but this was more so to accurately group them into Arena Mode... Probably not what you're talking about.

I'd actually be interested in this because I'm working on a point system for monsters also, although for different reasons, and I'm just kinda curious to know how another approached it.

Evil Frog Wizard wrote:

wallydubbs wrote:I normally play Undead the same as you said, as attacking the closest hero any even potentially other monsters. When I was playing Castle of Mystery with a group, a hero teleported into a room with greenskins, but on his next turn he fled. An Orc chased after him, teleporting to a room with undead... The undead attacks and killed the Orc.

There is actually a massive tradition that supports this behavior in undead. The standard 'old school' view of undead in older Dungeons and Dragons is that the undead resent the living for still possessing life, which they themselves no longer possess. Therefore it makes perfect sense that the undead would kill orcs and goblins just as readily as the heroes. Though I'd point out it's not because they are stupid, but because they are compelled to destroy all living things. I once toyed with the rule that this would only not be the case if a powerful sorcerer or gargoyle was on the board. As it would make sense the undead have been forced to submit to their command. Only they would be able to keep the legions of the dead under their control and prevent them from destroying all the living in sight. But if that sorcerer or gargoyle is felled, all bets are off.

wallydubbs wrote:I've come up with a points system for heroes and monsters, but this was more so to accurately group them into Arena Mode... Probably not what you're talking about.

I'd actually be interested in this because I'm working on a point system for monsters also, although for different reasons, and I'm just kinda curious to know how another approached it.

Yes, of course, unless there's a Necromancer guiding the Undead they'd have no strategic component to them.

My points system is just simple math: 1pt for every body point, 1pt for every attack dice, half a point for every mind point, half a point for every spell in their arsenal; if the hero or monster can cast a spell more than once (Dragon's Ball of Flame, or Bard's Inspirational Tale, etc.) it won't be worth more than 1pt. Hero defense dice is worth 1pt, but monster defense is worth half since there's half a chance of getting a as opposed to . Having a diagonal attack opens up twice as many spaces to attack, so another half point there, ranged attacks are also worth half a point. Special abilities like Clever Tactician is worth half a point; undead spell immunity (Fear, Sleep, etc.) is worth half a point, but monsters like the Witch Lord or Guardian of Grin's Crag with complete spell immunity is worth a whole point. Monsters with 0-5 movement get 0 points; 6-8 movement is worth half a point and 9+ movement is worth 1 point.
By this metric a Goblin is worth the same as a Skeleton and Zombie (5pts). Orcs are 6.5pts, Mummies 7.5, Abomination 8.5, Dread Warrior 11pts, Gargoyle 12pts. A boss like the Witch Lord would factor around 20pts. If I remember correctly the highest ranking monster was with the Ogre Lord or Bloomrot Scion at 22pts.
Of course, this isn't perfect and requires a bit of math. But a Goblin Archer with 5.5pts can beat the Ogre Lord by dancing around the arena with 10 movement and the Ogre Lord with only 4 movement will never get close enough to get an attack on the Goblin Archer so long as he's careful.

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