So monster types, or rather monster roles, let's talk about them. In general there are three kinds of them - there are speciality roles, there are the regular roles, and there is a singular sub-role.
I've already talked about one of the speciality roles:
- Minions as described earlier are 1 hp wonders that are there to crowd you and four/five/six (depending on tier) of them count as about one regular monster.
- This combat you've faced another speciality role. Our late friend Bortek was and Elite monster. Those, unlike Minions who come in swarms instead count as two monsters. As such Bortek had about twice as many hp as a regular monster (152 in his case to be precise) and packed much bigger wallop - his basic melee attack dealt 2d12+3 damage actually. On top of that Elite monsters get a +2 bonus to all saving throws (which means "save ends" effects have a harder time sticking against them) and come with 1 Action Point to give you even more trouble. Notably though most other stats like defenses don't get an upgrade, though Elites might at times get more interesting power sets (Bortek was a bit of an disappointment in that regard actually).
Regular roles are the bread and butter of monsters, and in fact monsters that have a speciality role nowdays have a regular role as well - Bortek for example was an Elite Brute. The roles are as follows:
- Artillery monsters are, as name implies, geared towards ranged and area attacks. They tend to have higher accuracy, but lower health. Gnome Illusionist you've faced this combat was of this role.
- Brute monsters come with high hit-points and increased damage (usually of melee kind) but tend to have lower than average defense values. You've only met non-pure ones thus far - Bortek and Zombie Shamblers (Minion Brute)
- Controller monsters are... well, imagine Berak but on the enemy side. Yeah. Obviously you haven't seen any yet.
- Lurker monsters tend to alternate high-damage attacks with evasive abilities on alternating turn. They don't have much in terms of health but are tricky to fight effectively. No examples yet.
- Skirmisher monsters are kind of a baseline. Their attack, health and defense values tend to be average, but they too have a niche of their own namely mobility and combat advantage exploitation. Dire Wolves this encounter didn't really get to show it off but their bites actually dealt more damage against prone targets and could knock prone if the target gave CA.
- Soldier monsters are the tough nuts to crack. They don't get higher hp, but instead they boast increased defense values. The also tend to have ways to mark enemies, and at times punish breaking those marks the way Quill does. Skeletons from first encounter were of this role.
Finally the sole sub-role is the Leader. It's kind of rare, in fact I don't think there is one in current adventure, but when they appear they're going to annoy you by granting other monsters various bonuses, temporary hp, and occasionally even flat-out healing them. Have fun.
