Monster Builder….Booooooooo

this is a fictional re-enactment of me trying to give WoTC my money

What’s that saying? “Knee me in the groin once shame on you, knee me in the groin twice shame on me”. Well shame on me indeed. This all started a couple of weeks ago when I received an e-mail from Wizards notifying me that in 2 weeks time the new online monster builder would be officially launched, which was followed by me prancing around my living room, flapping my hands, and squealing multiple “OMG’s” as if the captain of the football team had just asked me to the summer sock hop. I have been patiently waiting for this thing to drop for a while.  This a big deal for me as a DM, because I pretty much try and stick to using monsters with the newer design principles, most of which are not in the older offline monster builder, thus regulating me to altering, leveling, re-skinning by hand and needing to sort through multiple books.

I even prepared myself mentally after the fiasco of the online character builder with helpful soothing coping thoughts such as “it’s not the end of the world if it isn’t perfect, nothing is ever perfect and expecting perfection is setting yourself up for disappointment”, “having something is better than nothing”, “this isn’t personal, they can’t possibly be doing this just to spite you, they don’t even know you” etc….

So as the 22^nd approached I eagerly awaited the opportunity to pimp a run of the mill Minotaur Charger from the Monster Vault into an Elite badass mofo with a new “skewering” power to surprise the smug and to big for his britches charge-happy Scout in my online game. On the day of the release, after a couple of deep, centering breaths I nervously loaded up the program. It didn’t falter or freeze up and was surprisingly quick. The layout is similar to the character builder and I was easily able to bring up the Minotaur Charger stat block complete with picture (which was pretty cool). I then excitedly clicked the “customize” tab and…..well I don’t really no how to describe it, but there was just nothing. I am not talking like full of bugs freezing and crashing, just nothing, no functions. There was just the stat block, you couldn’t change or customize anything. There was a slide bar that changed the level but it didn’t’ correctly level the monster. So essentially this thing wasn’t really a monster builder per say, but was really more of a monster viewer, which for the record it was awesome at.  

To be clear this is part of the e-mail Wizards sent out:

 “On March 22, Wizards of the Coast will begin rolling out the new web-based Adventure Tools for D&D Insider, starting with the launch of the brand new D&D Monster Builder. Creating new monsters, customizing existing ones and building your adventures will be easier than ever before. On launch day, just log in to your D&D Insider account, click on the Adventure Tools button and give the new Monster Builder a try

I have to say that I honestly never saw this coming, well played Wizards well played indeed. I can’t for the life of me figure out why they did this. It’s like they want people to be angry or frustrated with them. There was no reason to do this, just release it when it is ready to go. After what happened with the online character builder I was content with them taking as much time as they needed on the monster builder so I wouldn’t want to, you know, put my fist through my computer screen….well fingers crossed on the release of the virtual table, because there is no way they can go 3 for 3 right?

Read Full Post »

No More Paper Tigers

…..after several months of working your way up through his minions, foiling his dastardly plots and machinations, you kick down the doors of the long forgotten temple to badness and trade soliloquies with the BBEG. He threatens you with an eternity of suffering as he ignites his rod of doom; you question his sexual orientation and mock his flamboyant wardrobe. He levels his massive rod at you and a pulsating beam of pure vileness erupts from its tip striking you right in the bread basket….”okay you take 8 damage”, “really? Dude that doesn’t even blow through my temps, are you sure he hit me with that rod thingy and not his limp cock? I’m just saying”…….

It became readily apparent after playing 4^th edition for a while that something was slightly off with the threat level of the monsters. It seemed that Wizards hadn’t calculated something quite right, I am not sure what it was, but needless to say they have been on continuous quality improvement mode since the editions’ release, utilizing their sort of free-form development style that has become the hallmark of D&D these days and can be seen in successive monster manuals and creature books.  I disagree with Wizards assertion that this was more of an issue with paragon and epic tier monsters, as I have struggled with challenging my players from the get go. I was finding that I needed a level + 3-4 encounter to create significant threat, and this is with my minimally optimized group, I am not even talking about my group of filthy uber optimizers that I run an online game with (I’ll save my thoughts on character optimizing for another post) as even a level +3 encounter can sometimes be like having them square off against my grandmother.

The fixes to this problem have come in the way of the July rules errata with an updated monster damage table, Monster Manual 3, Dark Sun Creature Catalogue, and Monster Vault. For a DM, I can’t recommend these products enough as they are proving, at least for me, a well needed recalibration.  You can actually use a solo monster as originally intended. I won’t use monsters anymore that don’t come from these sources or haven’t had their damage upped per the July errata. I am not some dick DM trying to win D&D by ball kicking my players at every chance, but I really feel the game is boring if there is no challenge or threat, and I also find it can be difficult to tell a story if your players feel like they can pown everyone in the universe.

I will give you an example from my online game were I ran them threw H1 Keep of the Shadowfell, a sort of before and after deal. “Kalarel” the BBEG of the adventure is a level 8 elite controller, he has 2 main attacks his melee does 2d6+5 (+ongoing 5) and his ranged does 1d6+5 (weakened), the encounter is filled out by some minion skeletons, Wight, and the “thing in the portal”. If I run this encounter as is, I guarantee the war priest doesn’t even need to bust out a healing word. When I ran the encounter the Wight got nuked before it acted in the first round. That really left me good ole Kalarel and the “thing in the portal”. When I updated the damage on Kalarel he looked a little more imposing with his melee attack doing 2d8+2 (+5 ongoing) and his ranged going off at 2d8+7 (weakened).  The result was a modern day throw down, with one player dead and another making death saves while being dragged toward an eternity of torment in the Shadowfell when Kalaral was finally struck down.

I would say the only real drag about Wizards having to recalibrate the monsters in 4^th edition is that it makes it a lot more work if you want to run previous adventure material, but well worth it and for me pretty much mandatory.

Read Full Post »

Killer Instinct

So there I was staring down the barrel at a total party kill. I had one player already shed his mortal coil and was frolikicing in the waves of the Astral Sea; two others were making death saves with a few strikes against them, and a lone fighter with one reaming Hit Point was going toe to toe with the Kobald Wyrmpriest. It was the Wyrmpriest’s turn to act, I said “he lunges at you with his dagger, while cursing your family lineage” and let the d20 drop from my hand watching it spin to a stop on the 20….. “does a 14 hit your AC?” I already knew the answer. The rest of the fight was a blur as the fighter cut down the Kobald with the aid of the ranger who miraculously rolled a 20 on his death save allowing him to basically resurrect himself.

If this was my home game where I roll the dice without a screen, this wouldn’t have been an issue as it would have been a complete bloodbath, but this was my online game where I find it easier to just roll the dice instead of creating macros for maptools. So I had the option to fudge the dice, and when push came to shove I did. The question is why did I do it? This has required some introspection on my part. I don’t’ think it was to prevent hurt feelings or upset by the players, as we were having a really good time laughing and joking, no one was getting bent out of shape about what was happening. I think when it came down to it I just didn’t have it in me, but I don’t think it was a fear of being a Killer DM or being uncomfortable with my unconscious aggression and blood lust . I think I just didn’t want to have to deal with the ramifications of the tpk, like creating new characters, re-starting the story or the having to hand-wave everything, this just seemed easier. It did make for an a epic tale as I know the ranger felt like he was full of awesome when he rose from the dead and put an arrow through the Kobald’s eye. In hindsight, if I had to do it again or if the opportunity presents itself in the future, I think I would just let the hammer fall, unless it really turns out that underneath it all I am just a big softy…god what’s next finding out I like romantic comedies.

On a side note, I am running H1 Keep on the Shadowfell for the online campaign. I have substituted some of the monsters with their updated Monster Vault counter-parts, which I think contributed to the lethality of the encounter, and we haven’t even gotten to the infamous “Iron Tooth” encounter yet. I have to say that the Monster Vault is way awesome and is one of the best things that Wizards has out in a while

Read Full Post »