How do monsters assess threats?

[HoboKnight]

Hey guys,
so, I have a coven of hags, my party will soon find. I wonder, how would hags react to a group of armed men/adventurers barging into their lair? Fire off a few shots, see what happens, try to bail if this fails? How do monsters assess how powerful of an opponent is approaching them?

thanks

[Lemmy]

Hey guys,
so, I have a coven of hags, my party will soon find. I wonder, how would hags react to a group of armed men/adventurers barging into their lair? Fire off a few shots, see what happens, try to bail if this fails? How do monsters assess how powerful of an opponent is approaching them?

thanks

Well, hags are pretty smart... So they'd probably do it the same way players' do: based on their appearance and whatever they know about the adventurers' background.

If you see a dude with a pointy hat and a glowing staff, he's probably caster. Caster are dangerous. The guy in armor swinging a greatsword s probably a warrior, maybe a paladin if he has a holy symbol and an uptight attitude...

About how powerful they are exactly... That's harder to assess, but a good indicator would be the quantity and quality of their magical gear, as well as things like trophies (you probably don't want to mess with the man wearing a cloak made of dragon scale) and the place where they are (if the only way to reach the coven's secret location is going through the Swamp of Death and Dying and defeating the black dragon who guards it... Then they can more or less safely assume they are powerful enough to deal with those threats).

[Anymage]

If some complete unknowns bust down the door, the hags will shoot to kill. Of course if low level characters who haven't made any name for themselves get anywhere near the hags' lair, the hags are likely to shoot to wound with the intent of scaring off the visitors and letting them serve as examples that the area is not safe. If there's no reason for the hags to have heard of adventurers causing trouble, the hags are likely to treat any trespassers as minor nuisances unless said trespassers clearly show that they're appreciable threats.

Assuming that the PCs have made a name for themselves as troublesome do-gooders, expect the hags to set more preparations. When the adventurers get close the hags should be ready to spring their own ambush, unless the party as a whole is exceptionally sneaky. If a party has shown themselves to be a threat and does manage to breach the hags' defenses, flight is probably wiser than a last stand with the odds against them. Really, the monsters' foreknowledge and the party's rep are significant enough complicating factors that there is no one-size-fits-all answer.

[Pauly]

Hey guys,
so, I have a coven of hags, my party will soon find. I wonder, how would hags react to a group of armed men/adventurers barging into their lair? Fire off a few shots, see what happens, try to bail if this fails? How do monsters assess how powerful of an opponent is approaching them?

thanks

I am going to assume the hags are cold reading the group.

1) Perimeter. The hags will have a perimeter of sorts, maybe with low level traps and/or guard monsters. This isn’t to ward off a powerful raid, it’s to stop random wanderers getting too close or to serve as an alarm that a raid is incoming. Hags will treat a threat detected here with suspicion. Hags will be alerted and investigate.

2) dead zone. An open space between the perimeter and the main defenses. Anything moving in this area should be detectable by the hags. A threat detected here is considered hostile. Hags will be alarmed and will commit some of them to attack and hold the remainder in reseve.

3) main defenses. A threat detected here is an immediate danger and will activate the full defensive capabilities immediately.

[Tanarii]

Old school D&D they made morale checks something like when they first take damage, are at half health, lose the first member of their group, or lose half their group.

That'd give you a good idea of thinking about when they might break and run. Depending on your system it might be too late to try at 1/2 health or 1/2 group size. e.g. in D&D 5e if you want that long you're already dead.

[Vahnavoi]

The first question is, how do you?

If you, the human brain actually making decisions, don't have experience of threat or risk assessment, it will be that much more difficult to make those considerations from the viewpoint of another.

A basic risk evaluation matrix has at least two dimensions: frequency of risk and severity of risk being realized. Third possible dimension is cost of avoiding the risk. This kind of evaluation is done based on known information. Mostly, information of past events, unless the hags actively spy on their surroundings and try to predict or divine the future.

So, on that note: how common is it for armed strangers to barge into their lair? How threatening have they been in the past? Have the hags done anything to prevent people from reaching their lair, and how confident are they in their precautions? Is the existence of dangerous enemies known, or not known?

There are many possible answers, and when fed to a risk evaluation matrix, they lead to different conclusions.

On one end, we have a situation where this hasn't happened once. The hags didn't know anyone was coming to their lair, much less that it would be armed strangers. As above poster suggested, this could be grounds for immediate morale check. The hags might flee or surrender simply out of shock. A more steely-nerved hag might ask the invaders to "put down your weapons, dears, tea is almost ready. Now, who are and what brings you to my little hut?", etc.. If there is no immediate escape, the hags might panic and fight like cornered rats.

On another end, we have a situation where the hags are well aware of armed strangers roaming about, and have spied on this band specifically. They already know how hard it is to find their lair and how threatening enemies who do so are. They know who this specific band are and what they can do. Now it's a question of how much the hags are willing to pay to prevent the risks. In this situation, they might set up three-layer defense, as above. The first layer is to ward off threats that are common, but cheap to deal with - ordinary humans and wild beasts, for example. If an enemy is scared off by the first layer, they're not a big deal, reset the traps and continue business as usual. The second layer exist to gauge intent of a possible enemy. Enemies that get through the first layer by accident, aren't likely to continue through the second. If an enemy does cross the second layer, that's how you know they're determined to get you.

The third layers contains more expensive, harder-to-replace traps, for enemies that are rarer and costlier to deal with. If an enemy can get through this layer, it's usually grounds for retreat or surrender. If an enemy cannot get through but might come back later, it might still be grounds for abandoning the lair - an infrequent but severe and costly risk has just become more frequent, and holding the lair has become prohibitively costly.

As a continuation on morale rolls, morale is typically checked differently for individuals or groups. If the coven of hags is classic three, you might use either. The thresholds are:

- individuals check morale at first blood and at 50% hitpoints
-groups check morale at 20% casualties (incapacitation) and 50% casualties

Only enemies that pass both checks fight to last drop of blood, but may be amenable to players surrendering. An enemy that fails a check will try to flee or surrender, depending on intelligence and available options. If both escape and surrender are denied, an enemy will fight in panicked rage until either all enemies are dead or an escape route presents itself.

The chance to pass the check ought to depend on personality and wits of the enemy. Traditionally, only enemies with no concern for their continued existence (golems, unintelligent undead etc.) always pass morale. All other have at least a small chance to fail. Morale can be updated based on new information. In the above examples, the hags likely fight with lower morale against a completely unknown opponent, or an opponent they know to be strong, compared to a known weaker enemy.

These principles can be applied to all kinds of monsters, but the further they get from human, the more you have to do exotic considerations such as: what are the cognitive abilities of this creature? What kind of senses does it have, and what kind of information do they give it? On one end, you have creatures that will ignore risks that seem obvious to humans - because they literally can't perceive them. On the other, you have creatures that will spot and react to risks before humans can even notice them. In between, you have creatures that will react strongly to perceptions based on what predicted risks in the past, but doesn't necessarily do so now (problem of induction). Humans can do this too, every time you hear a story of players playing paranoid because of the one time they were screwed over, this is likely in effect to some degree or another.

[Mastikator]

Send a couple of disposable minions to engage the party, watch what they do. The party's tactics and special abilities/spells will inform the hags who is vulnerable to what, who to focus, etc.

[Sapphire Guard]

How big is the lair? Are we talking a house in the middle of the forest, or the whole forest that the adventurers happen to be passing through? If they come into the house, are they waving weapons or politely asking for water.

I suspect the hags would be prone to hide and watch, given the choice, and make an assessment from there

[Kurt Kurageous]

Something has already gone very wrong if an adventuring party manages to stroll into a hag lair. But even then, the hags will have an escape plan and a plan to return. The escape plan includes taking the good treasure with them and going in a way the intruders cant easily follow.

I agree that there will be tripwires of some sort that make the hags aware of the intruders. If the hags identify the intruders as adventurers, they likely will avoid the fight. Monster parents use stories of adventurers to scare their kids into being good (which is evil).

Ideas to help this escape include invisibility, multiple plausible exist going in different directions, magic mouths filibustering or pretending to converse, illusions of walls or barrriers.

I find 3x focus fired lightning bolts in one round to a be a reasonable coven opening move which buys the hags a bit of time.

[stoutstien]

Unless they have some obvious and irreplaceable reason to protect their 'lair' and they have the means they would GTFO.

Hags as a general rule don't lack experience and awareness to realize that it's not worth the risk and would circle back on their own terms.

[Quertus]

Hey guys,
so, I have a coven of hags, my party will soon find. I wonder, how would hags react to a group of armed men/adventurers barging into their lair? Fire off a few shots, see what happens, try to bail if this fails? How do monsters assess how powerful of an opponent is approaching them?

thanks

That is what I would describe as an Epimethian approach to intelligence, determining what they can figure out after the fact. If your hags are idiots (like most humans), then that’s appropriate.

However, as others have pointed out, there is information available to the wise, even if this is the first they’ve been aware of this threat.

They made it here. Presumably, “here” isn’t “in the middle of the city”.

They made it here… on purpose or by accident? Do they seem surprised to see the hags, or was this their goal all along? Are they screaming, “Die, evil hags!”, or asking, “do you by any chance have 6 fingers on your right hand?” or “did a floating Sphere with too many eyes happen to come this way?”?

They made it here… having encountered that. Do they smell of Minotaur blood and wet gnoll fur? Are they covered in Demon ichor and Dragon scales? Does their breath smell of fairies tea and nymph cookies? This gives some idea of their threat level and backing.

They made it here… in this state. Do they have massive burns and hydra-bite-sized chunks of armor and/or flesh missing? Do they look like they just rolled in mud to keep the flies away, or like they just polished their armor?

And that’s without any forethought whatsoever, without even doing something like owning a guard dog, or looking out the windows, to know anything about the adventures before they kick in the front door.

[Saintheart]

Try Keith Amann's The Monsters Know What They're Doing. It's fifth edition, but still handy. This is his particular page on hags (with links to revisits of the topic.)

[stoutstien]

Try Keith Amann's The Monsters Know What They're Doing. It's fifth edition, but still handy. This is his particular page on hags (with links to revisits of the topic.)

Eh. I'd take it with a good helping of "people rarely actually do know what they are doing" to prevent static play.

While it is more interesting than running everything like mindless bags of HP exchanging stabs until they feel the risk isn't worth it, this method also relies on two very important aspects to function.

The first is you have an established game balance point they are trying to maintain so these combat encounters are engaging and rewarding while also not feeling like a treadmill of pointless progression.

Then you have the concept of every NPC having a thorough understanding and Mastery of their own abilities. This make sense at a surface level but in play it also has flaws. Existing isn't a static thing. Neither the party nor the NPCs should be acting with any preconceived notion of truly understanding the other side so you could have the same encounter that can go a thousand different ways because of just tiny random factors. Using formulated flow charts doesn't take in account this agency that everyone acts with.

There's really not much point in trying to predict how the hags will react because we don't know how the players are going to approach yet past probably wanting to avoid a fight because that is inherently risky.

The story is not written yet.

If you can answer who they are, where they are, and what they're doing the rest will fall into place but not in a way that's so formulated the scene is pointless.

[King of Nowhere]

most of those points were already made, but here's my contribution

- gear is the most obvious. depending on how visible magic gear is in your world, the guy with a sword covered in glowing runes is probably powerful. he could also just be a rich dandy who spent money on a powerful sword but never really trained to use it, but how willing are you to risk it?
- how they got there is another major hint. if you live in a dangerous place, those people are obviously competent enough to deal with that danger. if you didn't saw them coming by foot, they probably teleported, so they are at least strong enough for that.
- you could summon a few critters and throw them at the party, without revealing yourself, just to see how easily they deal with it. you can get a good idea.
- you could use an illusion of a powerful monster, and see how they react. if they feel concerned or not. if they spot the illusion.
- check other magical effects. for example, a powerful druid may leave no traces behind him. A powerful monk may drink water from a suspicious source without worrying if it may be poisonous. A powerful wizard almost always has some long term buffs that you can recognize. speaking of that, check for invisible members.

- fluff. this is very campaign-dependent. somebody mentioned trophies. in my campaign I established that low level healing leaves scars, high level healing doesn't, so the lack of scars is a telltale sign that somebody is probably very strong. posture? somebody very skilled may reveal it in the way they move, the way their eyes dart everywhere and they're never distracted. your campaign may have other subtle clues that observant people may use.

Now I want to run a scenario with somebody pretending to be strong by accurately faking all of the above signs. could be hilarious in the right conditions.