Taking 20 Podcast - Ep 229 - Wandering Monsters

Episode Date: June 23, 2024

Wandering monsters have been around since the very earliest days of D&D.  Their usage has waxed and waned through the years as the editions have come out but they still could have a strong purpose in your game as long as you use them correctly.   #dnd #5e #pf2e #dmtips #gmtips #WanderingMonsters   Resources: Wandering Monsters Suck:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNgn3rxLPP0

This week on the Taking20 Podcast. Wandering Monsters encourage a party to take action, and frankly, more risks during the adventuring day. Long rests were harder to come by in the old days, and it encouraged the party to press on to accomplish their mission. Thank you for listening to the Taking20 Podcast, episode 229, discussing wandering monsters in your game. I want to thank this week's sponsor, Straws.

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If you're willing and able, please consider a small donation to the podcast. Every dollar helps. And if you've given already, thank you so much for doing so. If everything continues at the rate that it's been going for the past few weeks, then sometime just after this episode releases, this little bitty podcast will hit 50,000 downloads over the life of the podcast. That's incredible. Especially given where we started with, I think I had 86 downloads for the first month when I released five episodes and now we're averaging that many downloads

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But either way, thank you so much for listening, and here's hoping we have many many more episodes together and great conversations. As always, if there's a topic that you'd like to hear, please let me know. and great conversations. As always, if there's a topic that you'd like to hear, please let me know, feedback at taking20podcast.com or direct message me on social media. Since wandering monsters are a bit of an antiquated concept and aren't used much anymore, let's start with the basics.

What are wandering monsters? Wandering monsters are creatures that the adventuring party can encounter unexpectedly when they're exploring the dungeon. These creatures are on the move from place to place or room to room and aren't just standing there waiting for the PCs to come in and flat murder them. What does a wandering monster encounter look like? Well, the PCs have finished looting the partially destroyed dining room and they open the door to reenter the hallway and they're surprised to see a swarm of corpse beetles all over the cobalt they killed on the way in. Sensing more meat and a living meal the swarm rushes at the party. I need everybody to roll initiative please. The swarm of carrion-eating

beetles just happened to find a recently deceased corpse and were mid meal when the party re-entered the hallway and interrupted that meal. The hallway is not the swarm's home, they just happened to be there when the PCs showed up. That is a wandering monster type encounter. Wandering monsters as a concept are very old, and been around since the earliest versions of Dungeons and Dragons. Out of my own curiosity, I went digging through old materials that I had and the oldest wandering monster table I can find is from 1974's original Dungeons and Dragons book number 3, The Underworld and Wilderness Adventures written by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson. They presented the reader not with a list of monsters that could just show up randomly, but a level of encounter as well.

For example, if the party is level 1, then most likely they would have a level of encounter as well. For example, if the party is level one, then most likely they would have a level one encounter, but these early tables allowed for encounters far above your level. And as the party gained levels, sometimes they would have encounters below their level. First level party, rolls the dice, two carrion crawlers around the corner,

and you see them immediately. Boom, time for some combat. Keep in mind that these early versions of D&D were focused around combat. If I remember correctly there weren't even skills for things like diplomacy and intimidation, it was just like a charisma check. 99% of the time an encounter was pointy end of the sword goes into the other guy and then let's look through their pockets for loose change. By the way there's a great video I used as inspiration for this episode called Wandering Monsters Suck by a YouTube channel called Daddy Rolled a One, which I love the name.

It goes way more in-depth into wandering monsters and I'm going to put a link if you're watching this on YouTube and I would encourage you to give that video a watch as well. You may be asking, why even have wandering monsters? What's the purpose of wandering monsters? More wandering monsters in a game meant more combat. Since the original game was largely built around combat, more combat equals more things to do, equals probably a better game.

Another reason for wandering monsters was that they were a tool to make an adventure harder, more dangerous. Areas that the party cleared didn't stay cleared forever, so there's no guarantee of a place where the party could retreat to completely free of monsters bent on eating the PC's faces off. Having wandering monsters ratcheted up the danger of all of the adventures. Plus, if the party were having too easy of a time in a dungeon, you could throw in a patrol of goblins and now the party has a fight they weren't expecting.

Or the party was light on loot, in your opinion, and the party could randomly encounter some undead wearing nice clothes and carrying some gold, silver, or old school term here, Electrum Pieces. Yeah, at least one listener probably just thought, oh fuck, I forgot about Electrum Pieces. I know, probably for a good reason they were hardly ever used. Wandering Monsters also encouraged the party to stay active, not just rest for the day after the warlock blows through his three spells and nope, I'm done, the cleric's out of healing, we're not going anywhere else.

Both the doors were staying here. And by the way, as a side note, I am so thankful that Pathfinder 2e has non-magical healing built into the game system. It doesn't have the spontaneous ability for clerics to trade out spells for cure spells like D&D 3.0 and 3.5 where you prepared instances of spells but could trade any of them out for a cure equivalent if needed. Nope. My cleric in my high level adventure had four healing spells for the day and the first fight was an absolute, to use a phrase I haven't used in a while,

knockdown drag out fight. For our more educated listeners it was a Donnybrook, a rumble, a scuffle, a free-for-all, a bloody scrap, and our party got caught fighting a war on two fronts, which is never good, ask Germany. We all took a ton of damage and that required a ton of mid-fight healing. Geez, sorry, my episodes sometimes wander a bit, like monsters. Okay, sorry, wandering monsters encourage a party to take action, and frankly, more risks during the adventuring day. Long rests were harder to come by in the old days and it encouraged the party to press on

to accomplish their mission. In short, Wandering Monsters reduced the feeling of, we got this and we know what to expect, and it changes it to, we better keep moving or we're gonna get overrun. These older games tended to be more of resource management games as well. You're tracking ammunition, food, water, hit points, spell slots, per day abilities, and so forth.

Every single combat was a myriad of decisions of do I use this consumable, whether it's a potion, a scroll, a spell, an ability, a magical arrow, or what have you, now? Or do I save it because I might really need it later? And as an aside I'm convinced my tabletop RPG playing around this time has contributed to my hoarder mentality in video games. I have a horrible habit of setting up these massive storage rooms just in case I need it and you can't see me doing air quotes around that phrase but I just did. Minecraft, Terraria, Foundry, Factorio, and RPGs like Baldur's Gate 3 and Fallout and Skyrim and too many others to name.

I'll set up this massive storage area just in case I want out I might I might need this but I never use 99% of it. Oh look I have 65 Dwemer plates I hauled out of the earth and stuck in a chest in my bedroom. Yeah carry these burdens Lydia, you pissy bitch. Anyway, that's the why of Wandering Monsters. They were designed to keep the adventure moving, add more combats, make the PCs make more resource management decisions, and offer more opportunities for the DM to reward PCs with treasure. But like I said, Wandering Monsters are a bit… passe in the modern game. They seem to have gone the way of the dodo at a lot of gaming tables and in a lot of

adventures. If you look at most modern published adventures, there aren't even Wandering Monster tables listed. Gone are the days where you rolled a D12 or a D6 to see if a monster showed up and then rolled on the listed table to see what came sniffing around the party. I think some of these old tables are why wandering monsters got a bad reputation, by the way. In one older adventure where the party treks across a forest as level 4 adventurers, one of the random encounters was a green dragon.

Okay, sure, do green dragons live in forests? Depending on your game system? Possibly. But as a DM DM does it make sense to have a level 13 encounter for a bunch of level 4 PCs generally no unless you're really really trying to kill them okay the dragon squares off with you at the other side of the glade everyone roll initiative oh darn the dragon goes first 18d6 poison breath weapon and 120 foot cone.

Give me some saves. Oh, really? Dead, dead, dead and what was that? Dead, right. Wanna start the adventure over again? All of this because you rolled a green dragon wandering monster on the table. Those tables in a lot of ways made little to no sense.

Where the hell did the 2D10 Undead come from? Why would the Green Dragon attack these adventurers, there were obviously no threat to them. Those tables resulted in weird random encounters. Here's 2D4 Bandits in the middle of the Underdark. Okay. Why the hell are these here? It made it no easier when an adventurer had two to three maps, each one meant to be explored at a different level.

The author or the DM had to make separate tables for each level. Could they take the time and research exactly what's on the level and include only entities based only on the creatures that were present? Sure, and some of us did. But some also looked at the Monster Manual, found six challenge rating 3 encounters, and called the table done. The table contained creatures from the swamp, the arctic, underground, elemental plane of water, while the adventure took place in a forest.

That made for, frankly, crappy wandering monsters, unless the monsters were all really, really lost. As the game matured, so did the concept of wandering monsters, and there were a number of improvements made. Suddenly, and I noticed this about second edition timeframe, random encounters started appearing that weren't always combat. Sure, that was the most common, but especially by the time we hit the 3.0 wandering monster tables came to be known as encounter tables and included things like non-combatant NPCs, new or changed obstacles like low-hanging vines,

or weather events like a flash thunderstorm or a blizzard. D&D 3.0 and later game systems really started expanding what the game could be with more role-playing opportunities and storytelling, so the concept of wandering monsters grew with it, but since 4.0, I've seen encounter tables wane and a lot of the adventures don't even include them anymore. The reasons are varied but part of it is this I think that we DMs have gotten smarter more realistic and more capable behind the screen. Okay I'm not one to blow smoke up someone's tuchus and I'm definitely not one to toot my own horn but look at the resources available to DMs now and for the past 10 years compared

to what came before. There are more let's plays out there, more examples of great DMs, more how-to videos, and more resources in general. That makes including these tables almost unnecessary in most adventures at this point. Okay, Jeremy, so the encounter tables are gone. We shouldn't use wandering monsters or surprise encounters, right? Not so fast my friend. I want to give you some good reasons why you should use wandering monsters and encounters occasionally in your game. Number one, as I alluded to earlier, it ratchets up tension and danger.

In most places the adventurers will be, they are, with apologies to Robert Heinlein, strangers in a strange land. They shouldn't get comfortable inside a drow city, a troll cave system, or the swamps of Ninnicrit. They are invaders to put it very bluntly, and the things that live there, especially the intelligent things, should see them as a potential threat. Or potential lunch, depending on the creature. One of my favorite encounters to design and use is the scouting or hunting party from the nearby encampment. They're attempting to find out more about the troglodytes on level 2 of the caverns and are sneaking around the edge when they see a group of four troglodyte scouts. Three of them block the tunnel and draw weapons while one makes a dash for the encampment to warn the others. Now, besides a straightforward combat,

the PCs have to worry about the runner. If they make it back to the encampment, the entire group will be on alert. The PCs can prevent it, but they gotta catch the runner first. That one encounter changes the entire mood from, we can take our time and search every nook and cranny to we gotta catch that runner and now. Another one to use is the powerful monster somewhere off in the distance. They see a dragon flying close to its lair but it's a couple miles away or they hear the rumble of something big off in the distance removing around. That changes the mood at the table to we gotta move and we gotta move now. No more lollygagging taking their time tip

toeing through the tulips. They aren't in Kansas anymore and they need to start acting like it. Another reason for wandering monsters is realism. Creatures on earth leave their home for an infinite number of reasons. Off the top of my head they could be looking for food or water, finishing chores like carrying away trash or moving stuff to storage. They could be on patrol, they could be doing something entertaining like gambling or laughing or graffiti or art, or maybe even running from something more dangerous than they are. They could be doing anything really and maybe they're just getting some exercise. I like to stretch my legs a few

times a day when I'm at work. Maybe I'm the wandering monster in that case. Don't do that by the way. I'm a level zero encounter at best and I really don't react well to getting stabbed or bludgeoned over the head. I will drop like a sack of potatoes. Sorry. Wandering monsters make the dungeon feel alive, non-static, like a living ecosystem. It adds a touch of verisimilitude to your game world, and it makes it feel like things don't just go into stasis when the PCs aren't around. These monsters or these creatures have shit to do and they work on it all the time whether

the PCs are there or not. My last reason for including wandering monsters is this. Adding wandering monsters or random encounters allows GMs to adjust the challenge of an area. I've danced around this at this point, and you've probably figured it out by now, but to say it directly, if the PCs are having a particularly easy time of it, a wandering monster can ramp up the difficulty and make it harder to get a long rest and keep the game moving. Now, when it comes to using wandering monsters, I have a few tips.

One, if your adventure includes a wandering monster table like the Days of Yor and says the DMs should roll a D12 every 4 hours and on a 1 or two there's an encounter, the dice ain't the boss of you. If you want an encounter, have one. If you don't want an encounter, don't have one. It's your table and you should know whether now is a good time for a monster encounter or not. Tip number two. If you have wandering monsters, generally draw them from the collection of creatures that are already in the area. You can either subtract from the creatures that

were already there somewhere in a room and make a few wander or just add them to the game if it needs to be a little tougher. Instead of encountering six bugbears in room A4, now it's four because the party beat two wandering bugbears already. Tip number three. Wandering monsters are usually doing something while they're wandering. The safest answer is patrolling, looking for danger, looking for food. But they could be doing anything you want them to do. They're escaping from being a slave or running away from home as it were. They could be rehearsing show tunes. It doesn't matter. After all, not all who wander are lost. And tip number four. As the party clears the entire level of creatures, it might make sense for fewer creatures to come wandering by. After all, how can the bandits be scouting if all 27

of them are dead six rooms over? Could there be some stragglers or whatever? Sure, but generally I make wandering encounters more rare the fewer things that are wandering around. but generally I make wandering encounters more rare the fewer things that are wandering around. Wandering monsters have waxed and waned through the years and have come and gone as the additions have done the same. While they are slightly out of vogue at the moment, I think wandering monsters can fulfill an important purpose in your game. Use them to reinforce the danger, use them as often or as rarely as you think is appropriate for the area the PCs are in, give them a reason for being there, and I'd bet that you and your players would have fun doing it. Hey, we have a website. I still haven't had time to update it, but you can still listen to old episodes.

Check out more details about the podcast. Come on by www.taking20podcast.com Tune in next week when I'm going to talk about how DMing is a lot like theater. There's different things going on in front of the screen versus behind it. And before I go, I want to thank this week's sponsor, Straws. I brought my favorite straw to the zoo, but I was immediately kicked out. I just hope the camel's backs will be okay. This has been episode 229, all about wandering monsters. My name is Jeremy Shelley, and I backs will be okay.