D&D House Rules: Stealing Villain Actions from Matt Colville
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- Опубликовано: 19 авг 2024
- D&D House Rules: Stealing Villain Actions from Matt Colville
Nerdarchy does a video response to Matt Colville and his Action Oriented Monsters | Running the Game #84 video. It's a great set of house rules for DMs to introduce into their games.
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Video Response to Matt Colville Action Oriented Monsters | Running the Game #84 - ruclips.net/video/y_zl8WWaSyI/видео.html
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I tried both "nordarchy" and "nerdarchy" and neither worked.
@@xoxlyss I will look into it asap.
Nerdarchist Dave
@@xoxlyss it's nordarchy20. My apologies.
Nerdarchy thank you!
When I watched Matt's video I immediately started modding monsters in that vein. It's really fun, and I thought it pairs nicely with icrpg's monster AI. It's really cool that you made this video, it's obviously different compared to your "normal" videos.
We felt inspired.
Nerdarchist Dave
Same here man. I took notes on that Colevile vid like it was gonna make me money lol. Loved the fresh perspective from the NA. Good stuff guys
@@mactireliath2356 Ditto - I was immediately looking at more monsters and pondering villainous actions.
Bobby Fuesz yup
Nerdarchy more please
You can become a Matt given enough time, dedication, and time. They have had decades to practice their craft, and expecting to copy their likeness in only a couple years is indeed a foolish thought.
But I still feel it should be possible to do it in less time since we have the benefit of their tutelage. While they had to learn on their own.
Ohhh...it's Dungeon Mattster! That's why Matt's are so good.
I need a name change.
Everyone should check out Matt’s Kickstarter, Kingdoms and Warfare if they haven’t already.
He’s coming out with a lot of cool content!
I shamelessly admit that I troll Nerdarchy, Matt Colville, Seth Skorkowsky and others for ideas, and then put my own spin on them for my games. Matt's action-oriented monster design is probably the first thing I've used directly as presented.
I'm glad to see I'm not the only one. I kinda felt cheap until I watched this video - Thanks!
We believe in stealing ideas from everywhere. One of the reasons we do what we do is in hopes it'll help you and others with your games.
Nerdarchist Dave
"Sometimes, the simplest method is the best method." Exactly why I play 5e now instead of 3.5.
Gosh I remember how the 3.5 npc generators would make a weak villain but buff them by giving them MANY magic items that I would forget to use and would, inevitably, be very, very bad if the PCs got ahold of them.
@@sparkusclark6176 I'm not sure I'm familiar with these generators of which you speak.
At least the math for stats works past level 12 in 3.5. Skills were better too.
@@kyleward3914 online resources. You could enter the CR and race you needed and it would come up with a printable npc
Problem I have with 5e is all you need to win everything is a raging Barbarian with the biggest weapon he can carry and a spellcaster who can cast dispel magic.
I love you guys because you do vids like these, saying "You don't have to be a Matt," but not hopping on the put down train and instead teaching people, "Try these techniques they use." Really distills the sometimes-dense content down for people. :)
Now I REALLY want to DM! I love world building but hated trying to put together adventures. This changes everything. Thank you!
Each GM does it very differently.
Different systems also require different planning.
I really like Blades in the Dark for not having to prepare a lot.
But Scion 2e is my love when it comes to this. The players make up 'deeds' that they want to happen and then the GM uses those deeds to create an adventure and storyarcs.
Absolutely loving the production values and hard work you've put into your channel these days!
Thank you. We appreciate it when folks notice. It's always been our goal to improve and be the best nerds we can be.
Nerdarchist Dave
Ted's basement looks alot like heaven to me lol
That thumbnail is looking clean! Thats some professional presentation.
I saw the video when it dropped and I think it's a really amazing and refreshing spin to give it to an NPC that the party would never expect.
I tried this design in the last 2 games I DMed. Combat became more smooth, easier to run and very interesting!
I watched Matt's video a few months ago and since I have all the Monster Manual monsters in a OneNote file, I was able to make a table for villain actions so that I can cut and paste it into the OneNote entry and begin thinking about what actions to give those monsters that I'm planning to use in upcoming encounters. I have also recently purchased the monster tactics book "The Monsters Know What Their Doing" and have learned that I didn't really look at monster stats to figure out what their specific tactics were in combat. It will be interesting now to use villain actions and tactics together to challenge my players. I will state that my players requested better monster tactics and combat scenarios, so it's not my fault completely if bringing these things together happens to go wrong :-)
For doing monster-casters, it's usually a good idea to pick 3 main spells, 2-3 reactions or bonus action spells, and 2 'oh shit' spells, and what levels they would be cast at. It's very rare for a caster to live too long, but you want enough variety that they can act and react without a huge spell list, it's a good way to not do too much work. Smart villains will almost always have a 'get out of trouble' action for after the 3rd turn. This can be as simple as pulling a 'brave Sir Robin', or some form of magical escape.
A lich may, for instance, employ a contingency-force cage for any living creature that gets within 10ft (anti-bum rush), hold person, cloudkill, disintegrate, plus counterspell and absorb elements, and a teleport spell to bug out if the fight takes any longer than 3 turns. That's it. No further deliberation needed on making a whole character sheet. Throw on hp, armor class, and all the work goes into things like villain/lair actions such as bringing in piles of ghasts, magically dropping the room temp down to sub-zero, and finally sealing the chamber so they can't escape a ghastly/icy death even if the lich runs. If you're a smart DM, the phylactery will also have a contingency teleport (also 'living creatures within 10ft') to teleport it to a safe location, making the lich a recurring villain.
Matt has entered the comments
Sequential actions are really fun! I was a huge fan of Kingdom Deaths almost "AI" and found using a narrative sequence based off the bosses TURN 1.
If Turn 1 I roll a 4, then it does the sequence of turns that I assigned to 4. Had it rolled a 3, the sequence would have been in a different order or perhaps completely different.
It's a little bit more prep but tbh, it's really fun because it gives a new life to the monster/boss it otherwise might not have had. It also speeds up the bosses turns making it feel a bit more intense.
Audio is waay better than last i visited this RUclips. Now i can listen to you guys.
Watched and loved the Matt Colville video as well. Just ran an "Ankheg Elite" that I stole straight from the video in my session this weekend. It went VERY well, and the players loved the "WTF is this thing?!?" factor.
I actually ran a combat with this exact rule on Friday and it was the most fun combat we've had all campaign! I found a stat block online for a Fey dragon creature called a Butterfly Dragon to give my Fey pact Warlock something cool, but the creature was super fun to run because it was really narratively interesting and engaging! Also, I gave it 300 hit points and it almost died before it could exit initiative and talk to them, so lesson learned
I'm going to be using the Goblin Boss in my game. In fact, I'm going to run the adventure that Matt outlined in his first Running the Game 👍
100k youtube Button looking great in the background :D
I had a one shot planned for some players the very day I saw Matt’s video. I immediately was inspired to add some actions to my monsters and it was a huge hit with the party! As someone who has players who generally dislike combat, these actions made all the difference.
I have watched matts video and it helped me so much I am glad you made this video to spread the word on this great Gm tip. After DM'ing for the last 3 years this tip alone has revitalized my inspiration to make and run encounters.
ted saying “attune to that notification bell” still makes me giddy on the inside
Excited that you guys are excited....I loved action oriented monsters as well
Having basically encouraged a "Semi-RP" version of combat in general, it's long been a practice at our Table to construct most "Important" Combatants (boss-monsters, chieftans, leadership caste or just overtly important enemies) such that there's a sort of "checkpoint list" of things that are done at various specific points or phases of the Combat.
It depends on the intended "end result" and purpose of the encounter, but it's not far from what Matt was talking about. AND the simplest is a "Hit Point Check-point list"... basically a bullet-point of shifting goals and actions, based on how well/badly the "boss monster" is dealing with the combat at the time...
At some twenty or thirty HP down... signal to allies for reinforcements (due in three rounds or less but NOT instantly there)
Maybe at fifty HP down... Diabolical AoE retribution...
Somewhere in the last twenty or so HP left... some huge distracting action (take out supports that hold the roof overhead, for instance)... To create an opportunity for escape...
Things like that shift the tides of battle even temporarily.
AND for what it's worth, NOT every combat has to be important or memorable. Part of what makes a legendary fight so Epic is that we (Players) go through the motions of repeatedly bashing enemies, hunting down relatively mundane risks and threats and squashing the kobolds... It's not always a glamorous routine, but the repetitive nature of it is part of the deal...
On the other side of the screen, repetitive sorts of "stock encounters" can also pull the Party together, and as they work better and better, refining their places and timing with each other, you (GM) gets a better view of what they're really capable of accomplishing... This is invaluable information when it comes to really taking risks and "cutting close to the bone" as it were. You're only going to know what sort of Players (and PC's) you have when the figurative chips are down IF you actually get them into positions where the chips are down.
SO taking that kind of insight with you and creating these epic "Important Battles" is what makes the effort worth it. They'll talk about it like it's the only thing they've done in a year... even after countless onslaughts of "Stat-block monsters" coming in waves upon waves. ;o)
gnarth d'arkanen I really like the idea of staging actions around hit point milestones. I think phases of combat per Matt Coleville and hit points represent critical inflection points.
My favorite published adventures always laid out a monster strategy (use these buffs in this order if prepared, so these things with this magic and allies, and if the end is near for the monster and/or its allies, do this).
This action-oriented monster essentially does this in a more interesting and simpler manner!
@@jkhart It's worth pointing out that we're essentially beating around the same bush with a slightly different stick... I think.
Whether you key the list of goals/actions to specific HP milestones, or you find another useful measure to make a combat "epic" or "memorable"doesn't matter so much... as long as you allow just enough of "the same old song and dance" kinds of encounters to let the "truly great ones" stand out.
I like RP'ing combat with a cavalier approach to letting the Player suggest a particular action... and then figure out how to dice it up into manageable rolls and consequences... That alone has served me fairly well in keeping the Players coming for more (abuses)... lolz. ;o)
Thanks guy's, glad someone had a discussion on Matt's video.
I've used a similar system for a while: i add riders to various attacks that make sense.
For example: a giant just wacked you like a golf ball, make me a strength save (DC15) or be knocked 15ft back and go prone. Oh, you failed? Whats that? You hit your ally? She can roll the same save, if she succeeds neither of you go prone, but if she fails you both go prone and take 1d6 bludgeoning dmg.
Or
The dragon used its firebreath! Everything in this location is now aflame for 1d4 rounds and anyone starting their turn there takes 1d6 fire damage and takes 1 fire damage for every 5ft they move in this area.
I generally do a fair amount of forced movement stuff, as this makes the fight more dynamic than 3 characters standing in the same spot swinging at each other for 5 rounds. I also really encourage alternate attacks and improvised actions (think fluffernutter)
I did the same, but more extreme. I made all giants attacks aoe, so they target one enemy, but the attack damages a radius around. This way a typical giant attack would be rolled vs an Ac, but all of those in a line between the target, or in a radius around the target must make a save (this includes the target should the giant miss), the DC is Str+prof+8 for each giant type, and failing the save results in half the damage of the attack, while success means taking none. I also gave the giants a wide attack, so it's a 15 foot cube so they can swing and hit a bunch of gather small folk.
In addition, I created a "knock back" rule: Any creature two sizes larger than one it hits with a melee attack automatically triggers a "knockback" as part of their attack, target creature saves (usually strength vs a dc of the str score of the creature), if succeeds is only shoved 5 feet back, if fails is thrown as far as larger creature's strength score, taking falling damage should it hit anything (including the ground), this can be halved if a dex save is made (would allow a dex acrobatics if player wanted to spend reaction instead) succeeding at this save also means you're not prone. I've found it makes fighting bigger enemies really effective, and brings giants up to where I felt they should be in the threat department.
Nice touch with the breath attacks, will have to include that.
Thanks for relaying these ideas - very interesting. I really like the idea of having the boss creature that has actions involving ordering the minions around - b/c I think this actually opens up opportunities for certain party members/classes who might not be as involved in a combat encounter. I.e. a character that can cast some form of silence spell or laughing etc - something that impedes the verbal command ability of the boss for a limited amount of time. This is something that will likely result in a memorable encounter: "thank goodness you got him with that silence spell (whichever exact spell it happens to be) to stop him from reinforcing that turn, or else we might have been overwhelmed" or something along those lines. It allows the DM the ability to truly draw all the players into actively participating in this combat - which keeps people from losing interest while making them feel like they genuinely have a stake in what is taking place. And perhaps these players would normally cast this silence spell or hideous laughter during combat, but in this case it has a much greater effect than it normally does - not just weakening the target creature, but impeding the entire enemy group by interrupting their command and control functions. So again, this character who might normally play a minor role in combat, this time instead gets the chance to save the day perhaps with a well timed spell intervention. Nice video with a very helpful theme/focus.
I just had a very successful hag boss fight using his idea, where the villainous action each round was a new weird 1-use magic item (a floating teapot that tries to hit PCs in the head, a wooden straw she stabs into a PC's neck to suck HP and heal herself, a cloud of biting flies in a jar, a hand mirror that creates a lifelinked duplicate of herself, a flying set of steel teeth with bat wings that flies from the room to alert her ally to start killing hostages)
It made for a really wild and unique fight that had my players tactically engaged and taking crazy risks. It was the happiest I've been running combat in 5e.
I'm glad you made this video, because I just need to share my (bad) experience with my group.
I decided to run the last encounter of my campaign using these advices from Matt. The moment the drow priestess ordered her minions to attack out of her turn, they gave me a really cold stare. Later, when she used a healing spell (again, out of her turn), they started mumbling that I was cheating (and no, it was not the first time I used "legendary" actions). Then, when she sacrificed one of the soldiers to summon a demon, they started telling me that giving enemies so many cool actions was unfair and that I didn't know how to DM properly.
I just wanted an epic and challenging combat (something I think I achieved) but the fact that half of them regarded it as a scam left me quite disappointed.
Heard you were talking about Matt Coville again so I thought I would stop by and drop a like. Great vid!
I think Lair/Legendary Actions and the advantage/disadvantage systems were the best things to come out of 5e. Villain actions are a natural progression of that, and fit in nicely on their own, or in conjunction with the various "monster-ai" systems out there.
I've been doing things like this too. It makes combat so much more exciting.
I used a modified version of the Ankhegs from MC's video for my level 4 party. I made them weaker than his, obviously, but it still really spiced up the fight. I think it made it really dynamic. Love the concept so much I backed the Flee Mortals! KS and will make sure I have an Action Oriented Monster for any important fight
I watch Matt Colville’s game and his campaign diary. In his campaign a group of high level NPCs are shadowing the PCs and at some times entering into combat with them. Colville was using villainous actions as a means of reducing the complexity for him running these NPCs with tons of spells, actions and special abilities. As he said, it’s hard enough for one PC to run one mid or high level PC and as DM in his campaign he had to run a handful of high level NPCs which were as sophisticated as PCs. He gave all the NPCs a couple “boss level” special actions instead of all their abilities which made it easier to DM.
Then he put out a video for a couple monsters (goblin and ankheg) which Nerdarchy are talking about as a means of throwing a curve to your players and balancing out combat. Not really the reason why Matt cane up with the concept in the first place.
I think this is important for people saying it makes the combat run longer, rewrites the rule book or is too ambitious - the original intent was to make combat simpler and faster.
Colville rambles too much. He puts me to sleep.
I thought Matt's video was really inspiring. I love the simplicity above all of giving monsters bonus actions and reactions. It's given me great ideas like a monster that can absorb some of the damage from an energy attack and refocus it into an immediate reaction of its own. So you hit it with a fire spell and it takes half damage but uses the other half to do a petrifying gaze. That's got to be memorable!
M&M the two Matts that taught me how to DM.
Mutants and Mattsterminds.
@@natanoj16 You sir just made my day :P
@@natanoj16 my mind went there are as well.
Nerdarchist Dave
I had already watched it. I like the concept and will probably try it.
I've been using something similar for many years. With matt's video I basically fine-tuned that. Recently in Forge of Fury as example. the Ogre leader is modified to an orog that also has similar Villanous Actions as the goblin boss example. The young black dragon chases the party for 2-3 days down the mountain pass. As the group made their way back down to Blasingdell. Bullying and harassing them to get the loot of its hoard back. Attacking at the most inopportune times and nightly ambushes. Making sure the party didn't get full rests and was building up exhaustion points. During that journey they stumbled on the Ankheg, which I had copied straight from matt's example. As that creature had dug underground and was close to death... a modified Bulette appeared. Ate the Ankheg and was now hunting the PC's. When the group came above ground all beaten and in fight with the Bulette... the dragon appeared with some breath attacks as well. Exhausted and after a final fight in the woods at the bottom of the mountain ranges they fought off the young black dragon for the last time.
So, there is the guardian of a crypt, the PC need to get into, because they need a holy relic stored within.
He was a paladin and wears full armor, now a deathless (LG undead, returned into his body by it's own volition; immune to turning).
Has 3 abilities. On round 1, he animates some statues around the room, gives the PCs something else to concentrate on.
On round 2 he goes in to the most wounded one and SMITES (he can keep going for that until most of the statues are broken, or when he is at low HP).
On round 3 he cast Scatter on the party, attacking those who made the save.
Has 2 reactions, 1st is when he is approached, his magical shield (+1) can project a cone of blinding light in a 15'' cone (CON save CD 14). 2nd, he uses healing hands on himself when he loses more than half HP, heals himself half HP.
All he wants are the PC not entering the holy site, that is the very reason he stands there. Can be talked with and reasoned with, if the PCs justify their needs (he will detect the aura of the speaker, so put a Good person to talk). Otherwise, when not animated, seems a skeleton with some magic equip on him. (+1 sword, deals +1D4 radiant damage)
Keep in mind that Matt Colville comes from a video game design background. He's definitely applying some of those design principles here and it works. He obviously knows how to keep players actively engaged.
I haven't yet implemented the specific villain / monster actions that he talks about but I have an opportunity coming up. One of my gaming groups is getting to the second level of The Forge of Fury soon. I think I'll leave the troglodytes as they are, but the encounter with the roper at the beginning of the third level would be a perfect chance to try this out.
a spell caster could perhaps forfeit his next turn to read/look up a spell in the PHB etc. that could ease things a little. or the GM could rule that the spell cast forfeit his next turn, due to “looking up” a spell...
Instead of interrupting a player's turn, I prefer to give multiple turns in the Initiative to the monster. Of course, I limit his main action and movement to only one of those Initiative turn, but it can do many great things in between the players' turns!
Saw the video when it dropped. I have used it once already by customizing a villain in the style of a shadow monk. But instead of going through all of the stuff of a monk I just grabbed some signature abilities. Added a few legendary actions, reactions and bonus actions to make him interesting and a few so he would be able to create or close distance to the desired targets. The villain actions could be worked a bit more like the timing stuff to tell a narrative but I think it went well for a first go. Players really enjoyed the fight and talked positively about it for awhile after.
I am interested in doing this, but I'm not the best at balance. It would be cool it you guys did a video with your examples showing how you thought to do it.
I stole this idea from Matt, and it went over great! I was able to build appropriate challenges for my players in the climax of their campaign, and since the abilities were tailored to my monsters it made it very easy to remember to actually use them. I liked Matt's advice, "you don't need to know what it says, you just need to know how it works."
I've been using villainous actions for awhile now without calling it that, because I thought most monsters were boring as written so I just started making up abilities for them. The players loved it, but I found whenever I slacked off and went back to using monsters "as written" the battles seemed that much more boring. So, ya, be prepared to work in these special encounters every session or two because after you start, the bar has been raised and you can't take it back!
Creating a villains stats regardless of use helps to solidify the villain in your mind at the very least
This ted looks EXACTLY like a stereotypical dnd nerd thats old and i realy respect it.
I did watch the video and already applied it! Unfortunately the game I was running was a one shot and by the time we got to the boss it was getting late so I scrapped the villainous actions for sake of time. I didn't wanna drag this out into a two session game since this was supposed to just be a break in between campaigns
I used the Action Oriented design idea for my Halloween session! I created Shia LeBeouf (from the Rob Cantor song Actual Cannibal Shia LeBeouf). First round he could get down on all fours and sprint (double move and make some attacks). Second turn he interrupted the Fighter’s movement by revealing they had stepped on a beartrap. Third round he was finally defeated.
Wait! He wasn’t dead! Shia surprise!
The whole thing was fun and the relatively simplified nature of this boss monster let him take on 5 PCs and make them feel challenged while keeping the encounter under 40 mins.
I have used this to create a possessed tree (akin to the old Gulthias Tree) and used the villainous actions to make it spawn blights, destroy them, make them explode and heal from their deaths. My players will long remember this encounter :)
When they finally destroyed it, and it left some black, charred pieces of wood they even dispelled magic/remove curse it just to make sure it was dead :D (They could have crafed some items from it, like a staff of withering)
Spell Slots for monsters have always been something I never bothered with
I just choose some spells that makes sense in a combat situation, sometimes spells that aren't listed on the monster, that they can just cast
I have enough stuff to keep track of in combat and Spell Slots just adds a whole stack of unnecessary book keeping
Of course I do set limits on how many times some spells can be casted so I don't Fireball every turn since that would not be fair
Started doing this and it makes combat SO MUCH smoother. I'm used to combat scenarios taking upwards of an hour. Now with these tips I've cut that time down drastically, kept players engaged and personalized my villains, absolutely amazing.
Dave: "...encounters aren't always climatic." ;)
This mispronunciation put me onto a train of thought regarding the Monty Python & the Holy Grail animation sequence about the bizarrely changing seasons. Now I want to run a scenario where encounters are Climatic - sudden Winter! Winter then changes to Spring, but Spring then skips Summer and proceeds directly into Autumn.
Sigh the burden of the stupid. It's hard being me 🥺
Nerdarchist Dave
Do not forget the swordmaster; Matt Easton of ScholaGladiatora. A HEMA instructor and master.
The Talespinner (.eu)* system has a Legendary Creature mechanic built into its Creature Creation rules. Part of a Legendary Creature are the creature's special Event abilities. LC have more wound boxes so that they can't be rushed down as easily, but every 10 damage they takes, something special happens _immediately._ Damage AoE, fatigue restoration, spawning trash mobs... That sort of thing.
*Talespinner: A Roleplaying Game is free, so there's no investment in visiting. Yes, this is a shameless self-promo. ;)
Once I started watching Matt Colville I started playing 5e
Why don't you guys do gameplay videos anymore (other than the RPG Crate ones which are awesome)? I really miss them...
A combination of reasons ranging from RUclips algorithms to production issues. We do appreciate the fact that you enjoyed them.
Nerdarchist Dave
I second this. I've really enjoyed all the live plays that I've seen.
Isn't it jus like monster Moves from PbtA / Dungeon World mechanisms?
I don't think I've seen Mat Colville's video on villainous actions, but I have watched his video on Alignments a few times. And he brings up a good point in the early portion of the video, D&D is basically the only RPG with an alignment system.
Honestly, I think alignment is mostly an unnecessary component to the game, especially considering a very small handful of things in the game require alignment of some kind, most of the spells and abilities present for players to make use of don't really require any alignment in some way. I see alignment as the foundation for a character's sense of morality, which feeds in nicely to personality aspects that you can get with backgrounds. But I feel that as the game continues to get its upgrades, Alignment will get more and more unnecessary, possibly to the point it won't even be on default character sheets and an optional playset.
I like to joke that D&D will keep going with new editions until the complete collapse of civilization all over the world, and even then the final edition will be played for who knows how long until things get to a point where someone does a revival of the game with updated information. Personally, I think D&D will make it to edition 68 or 69 before that happens, I wonder what the game will be like when we get to that point. There was a comic in the back of an old Dragon magazine where they had a Wizard duel with spells and spell rules from "the 6th edition" and it was pretty amusing, of course, this was all back during the 3.5 era. It might be a few years before we get the 6th edition, considering we've only been on 5e for just a small number of years now.
I don't need a name change, it's my initials, JDM, see.
So if I have an reoccurring bad guy, like a cat folk army is tracking them down I have 3 to 6 cat folk charecters that I level with my pcs. If it is charecter that I will play once I give hp ac attack and damage a few spells and a few open spell slots.
I hope something like this BTW, not a new concept makes it into the Neardarchy Encounters book
For some reason, I agree with Ted's opening statements.
so are you saying if I change my name from dave to mat il be a better dm
I understand you might have bias in your answer
Might be fun as like a stage name thing. Hmm, what is the female version of this, Mattea?
That thumbnail tho
Coleville is such a wonderful nut!
I saw that video too
I like the idea
The last two videos I’ve seen from you guys are about Colville’s ideas. Guess I’ll just go watch him. Lol
You must of caught the live chat last night. Or looking at some old videos. It's been awhile, but Ted really loved the villainous actions. Matt has some good stuff.
Nerdarchist Dave
Yeah he does a great job. I was only messing with you guys. Love you stuff!
Straight plagiarized Matt last week after I first saw the video.
I loved idea instantly.
I started in 3.5 and felt like monsters were lacking a certain, something in 5e....
Worked out great at my table. All 3 pc's in the game I run either have a fire breathe weapon or fire catrip. So I saddled the Goblin on a Wolfspider. And had the goblin lair (a watch tower they took over) interior covered in webbing.
Had the players discussing out of frustration in the end if they should retreat and light the place up, forgoing all loot and magical items. Or continue to stick it out.
Ive Dm'd for these 3 before and we are close friends. This time they insisted on making 2 gold bloodline drow with psionic abilities and a Centaur druid, who wanted a giant frog animal companion. The combo was kinda op on sess#0.
Matt's concept with some of my own flair provided the flair needed to keep the risk and wonder interesting. No more same ol'ect they already either fought b4 with another character, or whos stat block they googled lol.
My DM and one of my fellow players is also named Matt.
Cool stuff. I did like this episode by Matt Coleville. Making bosses dynamic should always be a goal to keep in mind.
However remember: Patreon sucks.
Matt Click!
I found Matt Colville's video far too ambitious for a typical DM and are tailored to groups that love a giant 4+ hour fight. That said, even for more casual games giving a monster (doesn't even have to be a boss creature) one special ability/action that is environment dependent can add at lot to the game, both in terms of making the combat feel harder or more tactical and making a memorable moment.
For instance I had one-shot where the main villain was a hag so I gave her a totem pole that once during the combat if she touched the totem pole she could cast an extra AOE spell on the whole party, or in another I had some crocodiles that could make mini-tidal waves instead of their tail attack as long as they were in water. I've just finished a battle in a bell tower where the villain can ring the bell to cause a toll-the-dead like effect on everyone close to it. Next is going to be a bird-like creature guarding a portal to the Abyss that can call for minions or do special wing/flight maneuvers that mimic Thunderwave or Gust of Wind.
I disagree. See my op. Colville is trying to greatly reduce the time and burden on mid to high level PC/NPC combats. It’s more ambitious to run these types of combats RAW with too many spells and special abilities and actions to prep and run during combat.
Yeah I think you misunderstand the point of his method. It's the complete opposite of what you're saying.
The players aren't used to anything: a 5E player unlike, you and I, barley has 100 total hours of gameplay. A 5E player would be left in tears playing an 80s version of this game, use this to improve your players!
Aren't these "Villain Actions" just Lair Actions renamed and not tied to a lair? Is there something I am missing or ignorant of that differentiates them?
Lair actions run on points like legendary actions. Villain actions are tied to rounds - first round this happens, next round this happens.
Yes and no.
A lair is, in practice, just another enemy on the field that shares it's health with the owner of the lair - it has it's own initiative and list of things it can do. Another way to look at a lair is that it's a boss' legendary action with some minor conditions attached.
Regardless of how you view it, at the end of the day it's just an extra source of CC or damage - a nuisance - the party needs to deal with.
The idea of "Villain Actions" that Colville suggests provide something of a short story to the specific combat encounter. Taking his own example of the goblin boss:
1) The first few rounds are about ordering his minions around the battlefield into a position they would be the most effective in - like a boss/leader/general normally would - move out of their turn.
2) Then, when all the minions are positioned so that they would have the most effectiveness, the boss orders them to "kill" - make an attack out of their turn.
3) Finally, if the enemies (PCs) are still standing after the "general's best maneuver", he retreats (or tries to).
This non-solo boss encouter provides a dinamic situation, where due to said boss' presence the rest of the enemies become stronger and behave more like an actual group with a leader and not just a few extra punching bags that are in the way.
Due their apparent intention, I think a better name for these "Villain Actions" would be "Progressive Actions" or something like that.
@@tomm35 Ok, hadn't heard it explained like that. Based on all the info I saw it basically seemed like giving a boss an additional set of lair actions (they function similarly as they go not on the monster's actual turn and must be used in a rotation) in addition to also having legendary actions. Not saying there's anything wrong with that but everyone is saying it's such a great idea and I didn't get why.
I saw the original video and based on that all I could think was "yeah, cool. But they already have that in the game lol."
@@nickthompson6466 Well, that's my personal take on the idea.
All of those videos are intended to inspire and not regulate - so that's just what I got from it.
How would you set that up with roll20? The monster get 2 iniative rolls?
No idea. I haven't really used Roll20.
Nerdarchist Dave
Villain Actions are GOING to be in 6e. Mark my words.
that was always the problem of 5e, matt is not the first to actually do this kind of thing. ever since 5e came out, we all thought that monsters not having bonus actions and the full set of actions like players were making the villains much less impressive. thats why most of us started using legendary actions to make the monsters more memorable. as legendary actions were designed for that reason. now have 1 of abilities called villains actions is something he did and i think its cool for semi-boss encounters. but not for big boss encounters. sorry but legendary actions seems much more inclined toward villain bosses. villain actions to me seems like a small fix for memorable combat that do not involve big bbeg !
2:12 to get to the meat
the title of this video tho :D
MY New name is Matt
News views and homebrews lol