2020 October Brewfest Finale!

2020 October Brewfest Finale!

This post compiles (cleaned up versions) of the statblocks I’ve posted throughout the fest. If you need the rules for Paragon Monsters or Units, view them (and these statblocks) at the homebrewery.

I hope you’ve all enjoyed this month’s content, even if things got a little messy at the end, and I appreciate all of your support!

Next saturday, I’ll be posting a compilation of homebrewery links to everything I’ve posted over the course of the brewfest, as well as updating my site with the content that stayed on tumblr throughout the festival.

Week 4: Festivals and Fear

Paragon Creature Preview

Some of you may remember a while back I mentioned a I was working on a “Sub-Legendary creature” I was referring to as Paragons. The idea is starting to take shape a little bit, though it may not look like much.

The idea here is that these creatures produce more interesting encounters than a normal creature by reacting to the things that the party does, but because these reactions have specific triggers, clever parties can deny them the opportunity to take extra actions.

In lieu of legendary resistance, we simply have the ‘Resist’ paragon reaction. This lets Paragon Creatures have some means of resisting the most debilitating effects, but they can’t simply say no in the way that legendary creatures can. There’s more tweaks coming to this idea for sure. You might notice the little blurb on ‘Force Actions’ near the bottom of the page. I’ll be playing with these later, but the general idea is to represent monsters with the backing of an army or force that is not taking direct part in the battle. I’m imagining Siege Weapons, Archer Volleys, or (on a wildly more specific note) a ship captain having his helmsman suddenly tilt the ship to unbalance boarders. There’s only one stat block for now, because this is more a dry run of an idea than anything. Tomorrow: The School of the (Ethereal) Border for Wizards.

DnD's 'Evolution' and Why We Probably Shouldn't Freak Out

So a new set of core rulebooks was announced recently. Due to drop in 2024 if I'm hearing right. Look, I don't have a ton to say on this front, but I see some folks getting a little worked up and I just want to address it. First of all, I frankly don't think this is going to be as big a deal as some folks think it is. I think what we'll see more than anything will be some coalescing of various errata and rules tweaks from Tasha's and Xanathar's. Basically, I think this is an organization effort, in line with what's happening with Mordenkainen Presents the Monsters of the Multiverse for monsters and player races. We might see some updating of core subclasses to be more in line with recent design philosophy. I don't think we're going to see any major overhauls of what already exists, given the desire for everything to be backwards compatable. So to those folks hoping to see a major paradigm shift in DnD 5e- I wouldn't hold my breath, but we can always hope. Those folks who are a little apprehensive of what this 'evolution' entails- I wouldn't worry too much. And you'll always have your old books (or PDFs, or wherever else you get your stats). And here's the thing- the only edition of DnD that matters is your edition. I can assure you that unless you're playing AL you are not playing the same game my group is, or even the same game your group will play if one of the players steps up to DM. There are still folks playing OD&D and AD&D (and having a ton of fun doing it)! Hacking the game has been in this community's DNA since day 1- Hell, Pathfinder 1e is pretty much just a very zealous hack of 3.5. If you want to see major changes, don't sit on your hands until they release '5.5' or whatever they call this 'evolution' when the dust settles, make tweaks and experiment. Find what works for you. Find your edition. All that said- I'm optimistic. In the best case, these tweaks all turn out to be for the better and we all have a great time. In the most likely case, we each love and hate a different mix of whatever they change, and we house rule as we always have. In the worst case scenario, we get a huge case study in what doesn't work and maybe plenty of inspiration to take to our tables based on what we actually wanted to see. This isn't an end-times adapt or survive scenario, folks. Don't fear the changing of the seasons. Let's just see what's out there, shall we?

2020 October Brewfest Finale!

This post compiles (cleaned up versions) of the statblocks I’ve posted throughout the fest. If you need the rules for Paragon Monsters or Units, view them (and these statblocks) at the homebrewery.

I hope you’ve all enjoyed this month’s content, even if things got a little messy at the end, and I appreciate all of your support!

Next saturday, I’ll be posting a compilation of homebrewery links to everything I’ve posted over the course of the brewfest, as well as updating my site with the content that stayed on tumblr throughout the festival.

Week 4: Festivals and Fear

Paragon Creature Preview

Some of you may remember a while back I mentioned a I was working on a “Sub-Legendary creature” I was referring to as Paragons. The idea is starting to take shape a little bit, though it may not look like much.

The idea here is that these creatures produce more interesting encounters than a normal creature by reacting to the things that the party does, but because these reactions have specific triggers, clever parties can deny them the opportunity to take extra actions.

In lieu of legendary resistance, we simply have the ‘Resist’ paragon reaction. This lets Paragon Creatures have some means of resisting the most debilitating effects, but they can’t simply say no in the way that legendary creatures can. There’s more tweaks coming to this idea for sure. You might notice the little blurb on ‘Force Actions’ near the bottom of the page. I’ll be playing with these later, but the general idea is to represent monsters with the backing of an army or force that is not taking direct part in the battle. I’m imagining Siege Weapons, Archer Volleys, or (on a wildly more specific note) a ship captain having his helmsman suddenly tilt the ship to unbalance boarders. There’s only one stat block for now, because this is more a dry run of an idea than anything. Tomorrow: The School of the (Ethereal) Border for Wizards.

Week 4: Festivals and Fear Paragon Creature Preview (With Approximately 200% more statblocks)
All right, all right, I’m cheating a little- I’m going to have to break schedule this week. The School of the Veil (formerly of the Border) isn’t quite working out for me just yet, so it’s being delayed. It might be better off as a sorcerous origin, but that’s for another time.
Today, I offer you Two Additional Paragon Monsters to ease any potential frustrations and keep up that breakneck Brewfest pace. This serves as a sort of proof of concept- that concept being that Paragons are both a quick and dirty alternative to Legendary monsters, and one which offers a slightly different experience. 
I knocked these two additional statblocks out in roughly 30 minutes, because I generally just expanded on the existing abilities of the monster. The Centaur took the most work because it lacks existing special actions, so I had to expand on its skirmishing themes.
I hope you Enjoy- our Final post for the October Brew Festival is going to be a compilation of monster statblocks, including several that have already gone up, but potentially many more.
Enjoy!

(Fixing a typo on my phone appears to have annihilated the formatting on this post- I’ll have to fix it when I get off work, sorry folks!)