# Forum > Gaming > Roleplaying Games > D&D 5e/Next >  Flee, Mortals! by Matt Colville

## SouthpawSoldier

Google didn't find any discussions of this book on the Playground and was wondering if others backed it and have had a chance to peruse playtest material. 

I'm really intrigued by what I've read, as it includes new mechanics for creatures; it's not just a bestiary. For example, Minion types die from any damage taken, but still have HP for factoring effects like Sleep. This lets PCs mow through swaths of foes in a cinematic style, but still makes groups a threat. There's Skirmishers, Scouts, Leaders, etc. Very reminiscent of positive aspects of 4e. 

There are also new rules for pets; not only ways to have new creatures as pets (like Mimics), but also rules for dealing with taming them, and maintaining control of them in combat; keeping them from going on a Rampage when they take too much damage, for example.

----------


## Sparky McDibben

> Google didn't find any discussions of this book on the Playground and was wondering if others backed it and have had a chance to peruse playtest material.


I looked at the goblins and decided not to back it. For me, the exceptions-based rules design of 5E makes homebrewing monsters easy enough. I've heard some folks say stuff like, "My players look forward to fighting goblins again!" to which I always want to ask, "How did you make goblins boring?"

If I need to make a goblin skirmisher, I give them a heavy crossbow, a spotter to give them advantage, and 1d4 vials of wyvern poison, then set them up where the gobbos think someone's coming through and let them take 20 on their Stealth check (given enough time). All this with the goblin shaman that binds curses? Naw, I'm good. 

And honestly, I think Colville's kind of fallen off over the last couple of years. _Kingdoms & Warfare_ wasn't nearly as useful as _Strongholds & Followers,_ and the Capitol campaign (that backers funded) has been on hiatus since the pandemic. I'm sad about it, but I don't think he's terribly well positioned to provide useful advice or products right now.

----------


## Sigreid

Not personally been a fan of Colville's philosophy of design.  In addition, I hate the 1hp mook mechanic.  Hate it as a DM.  Hate it more as a player.

----------


## Marcloure

> Not personally been a fan of Colville's philosophy of design.  In addition, I hate the 1hp mook mechanic.  Hate it as a DM.  Hate it more as a player.


You must hate 13th Age then, because his minion mechanics is basically the same as 13th Age's one XD

----------


## PhoenixPhyre

> You must hate 13th Age then, because his minion mechanics is basically the same as 13th Age's one XD


I used to find the concept of minions (and creatures with strong roles) interesting...and then I realized it's really just a symptom of bad system design. For the most part, actually sticking to bounded accuracy obviates the problem they solve entirely and allows way more flexibility in building monsters.

That fails if everyone is doing super mombo-wombo builds, especially stacking armor. But the fact that _that's_ possible is a sign of something going wrong, of bad design in the adventure (to allow lots of +X magic armor) or in the abilities/system to allow things to stack like that.

----------


## Marcloure

> I used to find the concept of minions (and creatures with strong roles) interesting...and then I realized it's really just a symptom of bad system design. For the most part, actually sticking to bounded accuracy obviates the problem they solve entirely and allows way more flexibility in building monsters.
> 
> That fails if everyone is doing super mombo-wombo builds, especially stacking armor. But the fact that _that's_ possible is a sign of something going wrong, of bad design in the adventure (to allow lots of +X magic armor) or in the abilities/system to allow things to stack like that.


I understand, but I don't agree. The issue with using low level creatures as minions is that even a 15th level fighter isn't guaranteed to kill a CR 1 creature in a single turn, much less a lot of them. Minions exist to fill the battlefield without making it too much of a slog, and also to make that cinematic feeling of carving your way through a bunch of cultists.

----------


## Sigreid

> You must hate 13th Age then, because his minion mechanics is basically the same as 13th Age's one XD


I've never played 13th age, but I've encountered the concept before.  To me, either it's unnecessary or it ruins the sense of danger and pride of victory.

----------


## PhoenixPhyre

> I understand, but I don't agree. The issue with using low level creatures as minions is that even a 15th level fighter isn't guaranteed to kill a CR 1 creature in a single turn, much less a lot of them. Minions exist to fill the battlefield without making it too much of a slog, and also to make that cinematic feeling of carving your way through a bunch of cultists.


Quibble: cultists aren't CR 1. They're CR 1/8, and you're almost certain to kill one in a single hit at any appreciable level.

The issue with minions is that they make things ultra gamey and shatter any setting consistency. It's number inflation-protection and guarantees that you get a nice treadmill feeling by just palette swapping monsters.

----------


## Marcloure

Just as a note, minions in both 13th Age and Flee, Mortals don't have 1 HP, they have something like 710 HP. The thing with them is that when you kill one of them, the remaining damage carries over to the next minion, so you get this cleaving effect where you kill 3 or 4 creatures with a single attack. Distance is usually irrelevant to this, so you can describe your attack as grabbing a creature and throwing them at another creature, causing so much terror that the other creatures flee, or however you can describe your action. It's meant for epic fantasy games, not for "grounded D&D", it is to feel like Sauron in the opening scene of The Fellowship of the Ring.

----------


## Unoriginal

> It's meant for epic fantasy games, not for "grounded D&D"


Beating up jobbers who are just here to fill space until they get smashed does not make for epic fantasy games, IMO. I prefer when the players' time isn't wasted pretending those opponents matter, when you could just keep the opponents that matter. 


Minions can work in some games, like if you're emulating Honk Kong action-comedy cinema where that kind of combat choreography is part of the genre, but I find them antithetical to D&D both in term of maths and in term of the feels and themes for the situation.




> it is to feel like Sauron in the opening scene of The Fellowship of the Ring.


Movie!Sauron wasn't pummeling worthless mooks, though, he was pummeling elite soldiers and heroes, as Jackson chose to portray him as an entity capable of one-hit-killing the greatest King of Men in one hit. 

But since a D&D PC has a consistant, calculated, power level, minion rules create tonal dissonance. The game maths says that X PC is Y strong, then you have them mow down enemies they by all logic shouldn't be able to. Even worse when the minions are a kind of enemy that won't be used as a minion later, ex: you have Ogre minions one fight and then three fights later you face the MM-style Ogres.



For OP's question, I don't know anything about this book, but I've never seen any work of Colville that was worth the effort of reading them/watching them/listening to them.

----------


## Veldrenor

I like the minion rules, especially because they include some basic rules for modifying other monsters into minion versions.  My party just finished going through the Final Enemy from Ghosts of Saltmarsh and swapping the basic sahuagin for sahuagin minions made the combats feel punchier.  I feel like there's probably a cutoff point for minions, though, based on the game's starting point.  Like, higher-CR minions such as Hill Giant Flunkies could be great in a campaign that starts at high level, but if the party has risen from level 1 and fought normal hill giants along the way it seems like minion versions will feel off.  Dunno, maybe I'll try it and find out otherwise.

I haven't had the chance to try out the stat blocks yet but I like monster roles in theory.  They seem like they'd make it quicker to build encounters since you know at a glance roughly what to use the monster for.

I like that a lot of in-stat-block magic abilities include an effective spell level.  My main irritation with Monsters of the Multiverse was that they simplified spellcaster enemies by giving them abilities that aren't spells and don't interact with anti-spell options.

I like that legendary resistances have a cost.  It always felt like legendary resistances introduced a weird tension into combat.  You don't want to use your big abilities because you know they won't stick, but if you don't use big abilities then you won't get the chance to make them stick.  So you have to find options that are scary enough that the boss wants to avoid them but tame enough that you'll have the real big guns ready once the resistances are gone.  But when legendary resistances cost the monster something, some of that tension is eased because it gives the players an actual choice.  It may be worth it to burn your big guns even if they'll fail, if it means knocking off some of the boss' AC, or granting advantage on saves against it's main offensive ability, or shutting down some of its powers for a turn.

----------


## Sparky McDibben

> It's meant for epic fantasy games, not for "grounded D&D", it is to feel like Sauron in the opening scene of The Fellowship of the Ring.


I call BS on this perspective - you can cleave the crap out of people in the most grounded D&D imaginable. See here for a pretty good rundown of cleaving through the editions: https://deltasdnd.blogspot.com/2021/...ough-ages.html 

So people have been cleaving literally since OD&D, which I would argue is the most grounded D&D imaginable. It's just that they didn't use these ridiculous minion rules. 




> I like that legendary resistances have a cost.


Yeah, they're only like three years late to the party on that one: https://goblinpunch.blogspot.com/2019/11/bosses.html

----------


## Veldrenor

> Yeah, they're only like three years late to the party on that one: https://goblinpunch.blogspot.com/2019/11/bosses.html


Cool, others have had that idea as well!  Sounds like a plus for costly legendary resistances (unless goblinpunch has a later blog to the effect of "we tried this, it doesn't work, don't do it").

----------


## Sparky McDibben

> Cool, others have had that idea as well!  Sounds like a plus for costly legendary resistances (unless goblinpunch has a later blog to the effect of "we tried this, it doesn't work, don't do it").


Nope, it works great! But this thread isn't about ablative saves, it's about Flee, Mortals! And my point wasn't that ablative saves are bad, it's that I don't need to buy a book that gives me tools I already have for free.

----------


## starwolf

I backed it and have enjoyed MCDMs take on the various creatures, giving them a theme and abilities based on that theme.
The retainer/companion stuff is a potential sidekick alternative.

----------


## SouthpawSoldier

Back from vacation. Reading comments, it really seems MCDM has a iffy rep, as an organization. Interesting to see the perspectives of folks who've been through older editions, as I started with 3.5/PF and went to 5e.

----------


## animorte

> Interesting to see the perspectives of folks who've been through older editions, as I started with 3.5/PF and went to 5e.


I share this exact perspective with all conversations.

----------


## Marcloure

> Back from vacation. Reading comments, it really seems MCDM has a iffy rep, as an organization. Interesting to see the perspectives of folks who've been through older editions, as I started with 3.5/PF and went to 5e.


This is the first place I see people disliking his books, or rather, his monster book. The other ones are more directed to certain playstyles, but even so I wouldn't say their reputation is "iffy".

----------


## Sigreid

> This is the first place I see people disliking his books, or rather, his monster book. The other ones are more directed to certain playstyles, but even so I wouldn't say their reputation is "iffy".


I'd say it's much less that they're iffy and more his style either jives with you or not.  There are plenty of quality products out there that just don't mesh with my vision or preferences.

----------


## KorvinStarmast

Matt's books aren't bad, but what they do for me at the moment is pile on another set of rules that in the main I don't need.  But for occasional musing and reading up on ideas that he's used, I don't mind them.
Will not be buying this one, I don't need more monsters.
I need to improve how I run the monsters I have now. Technique is, IMO, important.

----------


## Sparky McDibben

> I'd say it's much less that they're iffy and more his style either jives with you or not.  There are plenty of quality products out there that just don't mesh with my vision or preferences.





> Matt's books aren't bad, but what they do for me at the moment is pile on another set of rules that in the main I don't need.  But for occasional musing and reading up on ideas that he's used, I don't mind them.
> Will not be buying this one, I don't need more monsters.
> I need to improve how I run the monsters I have now. Technique is, IMO, important.


I think these are both good takes, and better explanations of how I feel than what I put down. Colville isn't iffy, my style and his have simply diverged dramatically over the last few years. That's what I mean when I say he's "fallen off." His advice is less useful to me now, but not devoid of utility.

----------


## Spriteless

I do like one gimmick monsters. With one as a framework I can change the numbers and description very easily. And I know his philosophy enough to know what I would have to change. It's the AAA make players feel like winners attitude. But even that dishonest habit is ameliorated by playing with people you can see, and wanting verisimilitude greater than video games.

Also, thanks for the link to dynamic boss monsters. That's food for thought.

----------


## Unoriginal

Colville once made a video on goblinoids where he declared he "doesn't think Bugbears are stealthy".

Given that anyone looking at their MM entry or even just at their statblocks can very much see that Bugbears are, in fact, stealthy, that shows how much trust one should put in his advice, and how much money one should invest to get those.

It's not an isolated incident, either. Another video of his had him talk about how a DM can use 4e monster abilities to make the monsters stand out... except the abilities he was talking about were found in several of 5e's monsters since the MM.

Now maybe it's because I stopped giving his work a chance after a while, but my experience is that I've never seen anything from Colville that wasn't obvious, better said by someone else first, only relevant to a very specific version of the game while being presented as an universalism, or flat out wrong.

----------


## Sigreid

> Colville once made a video on goblinoids where he declared he "doesn't think Bugbears are stealthy".
> 
> Given that anyone looking at their MM entry or even just at their statblocks can very much see that Bugbears are, in fact, stealthy, that shows how much trust one should put in his advice, and how much money one should invest to get those.
> 
> It's not an isolated incident, either. Another video of his had him talk about how a DM can use 4e monster abilities to make the monsters stand out... except the abilities he was talking about were found in several of 5e's monsters since the MM.
> 
> Now maybe it's because I stopped giving his work a chance after a while, but my experience is that I've never seen anything from Colville that wasn't obvious, better said by someone else first, only relevant to a very specific version of the game while being presented as an universalism, or flat out wrong.


Mostly only knowing him from some videos; my read on him is he's a style over substance guy.  Which isn't wrong, it's just a different sort of play than I want.

----------


## Spriteless

> Colville once made a video on goblinoids where he declared he "doesn't think Bugbears are stealthy".
> 
> Given that anyone looking at their MM entry or even just at their statblocks can very much see that Bugbears are, in fact, stealthy, that shows how much trust one should put in his advice, and how much money one should invest to get those.


Forget the monster manual, the bogey under the bed is stealthy. That's the whole point. Your parents won't find it but it is huge!

----------

