4e Prepping as we speak: Two Quick Questions

[Armoury99]

Greetings 4e Sages in the playground!

I'm away from all my books at present and trying to do all the "mental math" for the next game for my next game in my head. I got two quick questions... Help me out, will ya?

1. Is there a class-template for adding some Bardic goodness to monsters? I'm happy to look at a homebrew if there's nothing official.

2. As it happens, the monster I'm looking to "bard up" is a Solo. Now I'm positive I've seen a note or a rule or something about adding templates to a Solo, but can't for the life of me remember what or where it is... any ideas?

Thanks in advance - 'cos I know you guys (and gals) are life savers at this sort of thing :smallsmile:

[HMS Invincible]

2 templates turn a standard monster into a solo.
Adding one template to an elite monster upgrades it into a solo.

Not sure what adding a template to a solo does though, other than upping the challenge rating by some number.

[Mando Knight]

The bard template will be officially released in the DMG 2. If you have the first DMG, I'd take the Cleric or Warlord template and use it as a guide to creating the Bard one.

Now, making a "Super-Solo" is something that I'm curious about, too. The Draconomicon has a Warlock Dragon, essentially adding a template to a Solo. However, I haven't taken the time to reverse-engineer WotC's method of creating the monster. What I would do in the mean time is to remove a power from the original monster's statblock and replace it with a similar power from the template.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

The bard template will be officially released in the DMG 2. If you have the first DMG, I'd take the Cleric or Warlord template and use it as a guide to creating the Bard one.

Well, making a bardy monster is just like making a bard NPC, so take the templates in the first DMG, and compare from there.

[Shadow_Elf]

I'm not sure, but I think Gralamin made some PH2 Class Monster Templates over on the homebrew forums maybe... a month ago? They'll be there somewhere, I think.

On the subject of templating a solo... I will probably try and make a mechanic for this one day (or WotC will beat me to the chase), but off the top of my head, I'd say make a brand-new Elite monster with the same sort of flavour as the existing solo and then throw on the bardic template.

[Mando Knight]

I'm hoping that WotC will release official rules for making Super-Solos/Templated Solos in the DMG 2.

[hamishspence]

my best guess is- add a few levels, add the powers from the elite NPC upgrade, but not the hit points, saves, action points.

[shadzar]

I'm hoping that WotC will release official rules for making Super-Solos/Templated Solos in the DMG 2.

There already is in a way for super-solos if you are using the weakned monster rules for quicker combat....I think it may work like this?

For all other monsters you cut them in half to speed up combat, but do not for your super solo. Since this will likely only cause the battle to drag out, just up the attack a little for the monster or its damage to the highest within range.

Like when you adjust monsters for harder fights. Do that and leave it all the same without cutting it in half for a tougher/longer fight.

Unless I misunderstand the idea of super-solo?

For the bard bit....4th edition is designed around monsters having a single purpose as to their function in combat. Making one for combat with flavor for the world seems left out for now.

I would say the best you could do would be flavor it as a bard and use any PC available bard powers for the monster and maybe swap out its own powers for them. :smallconfused:

The problem then lies in how monsters use powers vs PCs, and that some monsters are supposed to have stronger than normal powers, so you may need to adjust the baridc like powers for this monster to accommodate what kind of power a monster should have vs what is granted as the PC power due to number of times it can be used, and how it is used.

I can only picture the PCs facing Tom Bambadil in this situation and having a hard time really figuring out which monster and how to make it a bard for the PCs to fight.

Is there a specific monster you are wanting to make a bard? Or just monsters in general?