Canonfire!

Fri Nov 14, 2014 10:35 am So do you roll Monster Lore or something?

So how do you handle situations where monsters require special handling to kill or injure them, for example trolls with fire or acid, Lycanthropes with silver, or Staking and otherwise dismembering vampires? In each of these cases, experienced players may know what is needed, but what is reasonable to expect the average character to know.

In each case, I'd assume that rangers with a favored enemy of the type would probably know, and Paladins and Clerics might know about undead, but is everyone else out of luck?

I posted this in the 5th edition forum, because that is what I plan on running Greyhawk with, but without regard to edition, have any of you found a good way of handling this possibly out of character knowledge that you've liked?

Fri Nov 14, 2014 3:41 pm

Though I enjoy giving new players a chance to learn about monster abilities via experience, I find that trying to tell experienced players not to metagame is difficult at best and nearly impossible for the player.

So, I just assume my experienced players know certain pieces of information and I play the monster more intelligently. After all, the monster knows its own weaknesses and will work to avoid them. A vampire or a rakshasa, for example, may have a scroll of Protection from Plants to prevent any adventurer from sticking an arrow (or blessed crossbow bolt) shaft through his heart; a lycanthrope may carry a potion of neutralize poison in case someone manages to trick them into eating a bowl full of stew seasoned with belladonna.

Additionally, it is easy for me to imagine that any adventurer who actually grew up in such a fantastic realm would have more information about the creatures of that world than we typically give them credit for. They would also have gained much knowledge simply from hanging around with other adventurer-types in their day-to-day activities. They may even have had adventuring parents that told them stories about the wide world and its denizens their entire lives. So, it is reasonable and much easier to simply allow for the possibility that the PC knows most anything the players knows.

SirXaris
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Sun Nov 16, 2014 3:53 pm

I use my judgement on whether to roll for lore. If I believe that some aspects of the monster would be common knowledge I share it freely. The rest certainly does require knowledge checks.
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