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5 years ago ::
Jun 02, 2008 - 6:15AM
#21
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Date Joined:
Jul 24, 2004
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He can.(If fireball is available at that level) Actually he can kill a bunch of them, as many little kobold minions as you can fit into the burst radius. :D
I was referring to non-minion kobolds.
I am still trying to get used to the concept of minion actually. I understand the rationale behind them, considering how popular this concept is on television and books (where you see the heroes literally mowing down the foot soldiers by the dozen with every swing of their swords).
For example, at 1st lv, a kobold skirmisher will have ~ 30hp, which means I need to use magic missile a few times to kill him, even at lv20. Yet at higher lvs, I can clear out an entire horde of say, legion devil minions with a single thunderwave. Yet no one would dispute that the devil is stronger than a kobold.
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5 years ago ::
Jun 02, 2008 - 6:33AM
#22
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For example, at 1st lv, a kobold skirmisher will have ~ 30hp, which means I need to use magic missile a few times to kill him, even at lv20. Yet at higher lvs, I can clear out an entire horde of say, legion devil minions with a single thunderwave. Yet no one would dispute that the devil is stronger than a kobold.
Bingo
This is not acceptable for me. There needs to be a level suggestion on the order of this: "If you are 10 or more levels higher than your opponent it is considered to have only 1 HP and gains the minion descriptor."
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5 years ago ::
Jun 02, 2008 - 6:42AM
#23
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For example, at 1st lv, a kobold skirmisher will have ~ 30hp, which means I need to use magic missile a few times to kill him, even at lv20. Yet at higher lvs, I can clear out an entire horde of say, legion devil minions with a single thunderwave. Yet no one would dispute that the devil is stronger than a kobold.
That Devil Minion has higher attack bonuses and Defenses than the Kobolds, meaning that they have to get lucky to hit him or avoid being hit by him. En masse, they can take him fairly easily (making lots of attack rolls), but one on one he's a serious threat.
He's "tougher" because he's harder to hit and has better powers. The fact that he's a minion just means that he's not going to stand back up after he takes the first hit.
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5 years ago ::
Jun 02, 2008 - 6:53AM
#24
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Date Joined:
Jul 24, 2004
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That Devil Minion has higher attack bonuses and Defenses than the Kobolds, meaning that they have to get lucky to hit him or avoid being hit by him. En masse, they can take him fairly easily (making lots of attack rolls), but one on one he's a serious threat.
He's "tougher" because he's harder to hit and has better powers. The fact that he's a minion just means that he's not going to stand back up after he takes the first hit.
But what is it about the minion which makes it so fragile? Assume both just stand there and voluntarily let you hit them. The kobold can still take 2-3 hits. The devil minion is kneeling over the moment you so much as sneeze on him.
Or to do away with the issue of defenses, lets use the fighter's cleave ability, which does not involve an attack roll, and thus makes AC irrelevant. The idea is still there - each legion devil is automatically falling to cleave's secondary attack, the 1st lv kobold isn't until the 4th or 5th hit.
It is said that the 1hp is supposed to be an abstraction, but surely suspension of belief can only go so far...
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5 years ago ::
Jun 02, 2008 - 7:08AM
#25
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But what is it about the minion which makes it so fragile? Assume both just stand there and voluntarily let you hit them. The kobold can still take 2-3 hits. The devil minion is kneeling over the moment you so much as sneeze on him.
Or to do away with the issue of defenses, lets use the fighter's cleave ability, which does not involve an attack roll, and thus makes AC irrelevant. The idea is still there - each legion devil is automatically falling to cleave's secondary attack, the 1st lv kobold isn't until the 4th or 5th hit.
It is said that the 1hp is supposed to be an abstraction, but surely suspension of belief can only go so far...oh wait... what? The System is used for abstract combat? What is the "abstract" you speak of? I'm highly confused.
Fix'd it for you.
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5 years ago ::
Jun 02, 2008 - 7:16AM
#26
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But what is it about the minion which makes it so fragile? Assume both just stand there and voluntarily let you hit them. The kobold can still take 2-3 hits. The devil minion is kneeling over the moment you so much as sneeze on him.
Or to do away with the issue of defenses, lets use the fighter's cleave ability, which does not involve an attack roll, and thus makes AC irrelevant. The idea is still there - each legion devil is automatically falling to cleave's secondary attack, the 1st lv kobold isn't until the 4th or 5th hit.
It is said that the 1hp is supposed to be an abstraction, but surely suspension of belief can only go so far...
It is a concept, players won't know the difference between minions and soldiers, so it makes resource management more crucial. Also if you ignore minions they can and will kill you.
I played KotSF at a local store, the guy playing a wizard decided to saunter up and whack it with his stick and couldn't hit the thing. He almost died because he didn't respect his local minion gang.
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5 years ago ::
Jun 02, 2008 - 7:17AM
#27
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Date Joined:
Jul 24, 2004
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Fix'd it for you.
I honestly wish to say that clarified things for me, but sadly, I am still as confused as before...
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5 years ago ::
Jun 02, 2008 - 7:27AM
#28
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Date Joined:
Apr 26, 2004
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to my understanding, if you're tough enough to be fighting demon minions, then you should definately be fighting kobold minions instead of actual kobolds. The way I understood how it works is once the party becomes too powerful for a certain monster, any encounters with them should be a minion from here on out, to represent how much more powerful than them you are at this point. As said previously, it is certainly an abstraction.
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5 years ago ::
Jun 02, 2008 - 7:45AM
#29
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Date Joined:
Oct 11, 2005
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Minions should be used whenever you need to express a large number of creatures that are a threat to the players. With a ratio of 4:1, it is quite easy to have a wave of 12 creatures with some appropriate back up to throw at the party.
This isn't even really about the party being higher level then the threat. It's all about being able to throw out scenes like the Anibus Warriors scene from The Mummy Returns, or throwing out hordes of Stormtroopers. Minions should be used whenever large numbers of things are called for in the script.
....
To the original Poster, we are back to ground one. Seriously. From everything told, we are looking at Blue Box, not even 2nd Edition worth of material. This is a good thing. I really think the people who played wizards in the previous editions will eventually see this. This game is going to open up adventure space like you wouldn't believe, that couldn't be done with the old game, because the designers quite simply messed up on some parts.
I'm not saying 3E is bad. I love the game... the way I run it. However, I understand it's weaknesses, and the overflow of the number of spells was the second worse problem in the game.
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5 years ago ::
Jun 02, 2008 - 8:00AM
#30
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- Forum Guide
- Survived Order 66
- Rules Lawyer from Hell
- Keeper of the F.A.Q.
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Better to be clean, concise, and have a few good options than tons of meaningless ones and not very interesting ones with a few gems.
QFT. Every high-level spellcasting PC I've ever seen would have 100+ spells in v3.5, with approximately 10 favorites that ever saw the light of day. 
4E hasn't changed as much (in this regard) as some people might think. 
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