How do you guys Equip NPCs

[jguy]

I am curious on how you guys purchase equipment for NPCs, whether they are mooks, Big Bads, or Elites.

I very much believe in consumables, especially for my mooks/cannon fodder. Potions of Enlarge Person/Reduce Person can greatly change the battlefield, the various animal potions are much on more effective then the item boosters. Potions of Bulls Strength are cheaper and give a bigger bonus then a Gauntlets of Ogre Strength. This also means that if a fight is happening and the mooks hear, they can spend a round or two drinking potions and join in, making them much more deadly then they usually are.


This give the added benefit of allowing me to control how much gold my party gets and award them for creative tactics. Getting a drop on the enemies mean not only is the fight easier, but they have a bunch of valuable potions to either sell or drink for later.

I also prefer masterwork weapons over +1 weaponry. That extra point of damage is never worth the 2000+ gold, especially if equipping them with multiple weapons like with TWF. This is gives the people with DR/Magic a little extra oomph since it is useless if everyone has a magic weapon. Also lets me spend the money on better gear.

Big Bads I build like characters with Character level wealth (sometimes more if they have access to a fiefdom or something). I edge towards survival than pure killing power. Having a nuke is all well and good but pointless if the BBEG is killed before he pushes the button. Vests of Resistance are usually the first thing I get, then Stat boosting and armor.

For any extra wealth, I like to give them gems instead of straight gold. Easier to carry and makes more sense to have a single gem worth 500g on you than haling around the actual 500g

[Techsmart]

I usually do similar. Mooks might have some consumables, but nothing extraordinary. Bosses and other humanoid enemies often carry the weapons/armor that I intend players to use themselves (not always, but it makes more sense to me for the more powerful weapons be in the hands of the person that owned them).

[hydroplatypus]

I just generally ignore rules on NPC wealth, and give them whatever seems logical for them to have. For instance, random mook #3 is not likely to have much on him besides whatever equipment makes sense. For example a random thug hired to rob the adventurers will likely have a club/greatclub/other simple weapon and studded leather armor, while a seasoned mercenary will have full plate, potions etc.

[TheCountAlucard]

Depends on the system; did you intend for this to be a D&D 3.5e discussion? :smallconfused:

[ImperatorK]

Richly.
(That 10 letters minimum is annoying)


did you intend for this to be a D&D 3.5e discussion?
I would assume this to be the case. I already reported this thread.

[TheCountAlucard]

That 10 letters minimum is annoyingThat's why a number of us resort to white text.

[ImperatorK]

That's why a number of us resort to white text.
Good idea.

[jguy]

Yeah, this should be on the 3.5 board, I didn't realize I wasn't in it.

I use the NPC wealth table as a helpful guide. I go up and down depending on the situation. A random thug would be a warrior 1 or so, so yeah, not a lot of gold there. A seasoned mercenary would be more close to a Fighter 4 and thus could afford the full plate and still have some left over.

[RandomNPC]

Minions/guys knowing they're going into a fight:
Weapon, possible 2nd, ranged weapon.
Armor
If high level, a scattered amount of magic items, a stat boost here, armor buff there. Potions and scrolls consumed quickly for maximum benefit, and the "Ha! you can't loot this off me!" factor.
All non-mission gear left in the care of family or friends in case of worst case scenario.

Big Bad Guys crew:
Full gear as if building a character. Some things are left at home or handed to minions if it makes sense, and they often have a small pile of coins on them for when they need to pay someone off.

Big Bad
Built like a PC, usually with starting cash a level over actual level, buy as much gear as possible for "Daily use" then if it makes sense (Evil ruler collecting tax and whatnot) make a separate treasury style setup.

[ILM]

As if they were PCs.

[WildPyre]

Sometimes I like to stick neat little nicknacks in people's pockets to boot. Maybe Hired Thug #4 had a lucky marble he kept with him, or Bandit #2 carried a pair of dice. I also have a book titled "The Mother of All Treasure Tables" that's just awesome for handing out flavor loot that my players often keep rather than sell.

[Alleran]

I just generally ignore rules on NPC wealth, and give them whatever seems logical for them to have. For instance, random mook #3 is not likely to have much on him besides whatever equipment makes sense. For example a random thug hired to rob the adventurers will likely have a club/greatclub/other simple weapon and studded leather armor, while a seasoned mercenary will have full plate, potions etc.
Very much this. I tend to ignore the guidelines on NPC wealth. If I could figure out how to do it without throwing balance to the wolves, I'd probably wind up drastically reducing the number of magic items the players can find.

[Serpentine]

I'm really bad at this, specifically the just grabbing the basics and making do. If there's a lot of choice, I always feel like I have to go through everything there is to find exactly the right stuff. For instance, I've just spent numerous hours equipping the next middling BEG... (he's gonna get a lot of ioun stones and metamagic rods)

[big teej]

I am curious on how you guys purchase equipment for NPCs, whether they are mooks, Big Bads, or Elites.



I'm going to use orcs as examples this time around..

mooks:
whenever possible I rip mooks straight from the monster manual. for instance, I recently ran a party through a goblin warren, I used basic gobbos and orcs. the only change I made was giving the occaisional goblin a shortbow.

elites:
I create "brute" and/or "elite" enemies, typically with class levels, and assign them an arbitrary amount of equipment that pushes them to the threat level I desire.
for instance, the Orc Brutes in the warren, all wore battle plate and carried + 1 greatswords.

BBEGs:
anything meant to be a recurring baddie or a major "boss" type creature is designed through the exact same method as the players.
roll stats, pick out class levels, full WBL the whole 9 yards.
in this example,
Orkamungus, was given a + 3 Vile, Wounding Greataxe. + 1? battle plate, and had levels in Orc Paragon and fighter.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

For consumables, they're not expecting their fight with the PCs to be their final stand, so if they only have one of every potion they may be hesitant to use it. I'll always give opponents three potions of any buffs they'll be using, plus at least twice as many cure potions as they would use. It's extremely stingy for an opponent to drink up all the treasure just before they engage the PCs, so this gives them a useful reward that can be handy for a tough fight or sold to finance better gear.

[NecroRick]

For consumables, they're not expecting their fight with the PCs to be their final stand, so if they only have one of every potion they may be hesitant to use it. I'll always give opponents three potions of any buffs they'll be using, plus at least twice as many cure potions as they would use. It's extremely stingy for an opponent to drink up all the treasure just before they engage the PCs, so this gives them a useful reward that can be handy for a tough fight or sold to finance better gear.

I've seen potions of invisibility used by casters to great effect. This stops the fighter-types from just wading in and obliterating them. Otherwise it makes sense to target enemy spell-casters first. And if they know that you know this, then it is perfectly logical that they would spend 300gp of their allotment of thousands to save their own bacon.

Personally, I've given up on the D&D economy a long time ago, it's just so colossally broken, but NPC WBL is notably egregious. Basically if you take out a couple of similar level NPCs, then you just doubled your suggested WBL as a PC. Woohoo. Party time. I think that is why one of the earlier poster recommended consumables.

Also, if they can't loot consumables from NPCs, players will almost never buy them themselves. Just look at the horror and disdain the suggestion that buying a wand of cure moderate (or serious) wounds would get here. Level 1 consumables are one sixth of the price of level 2 consumables, which are two and a half times cheaper than the level 3 consumables. The price just goes ballistic.

[Bhaakon]

I'm big on jewelry. I figure that it's got the same weight advantage as jewels, and the additional benefit of getting to show everyone how rich and poweful you are (which a lot of villains are in to). Plus it's highly recognizable, so the PCs can reasonably get hunted down by a vengeful relative who happened to recognize her dear uncle's treasured pinky ring in the local pawn shop display case.

As for the rest: definitely consumables. Magic ammunition in particular (relatively inexpensive, so a mid level mook can realistically afford a handful of magic arrows, I don't have to worry about he PCs getting flooded with +1 bows, and they nicely bump the difficulty in otherwise pedestrian encounters).