Monsters in the Menagerie naturally sort into one of three general categories. There are Mindless monsters, which have no real awareness of themselves and their surroundings. Most Oozes and Constructs fall into this category, as do many of the more common types of Undead. There are also animal monsters. These monsters have a limited awareness, but lack the intelligence required to make choices beyond basic instincts. Finally, there are intelligent monsters. Intelligent monsters are fully sentient, and have a full awareness of their own self, and the capacity to truly understand that there are other thinking minds that exist.
For mindless and animal monsters, there typically is not much room to tinker with the basic structure of the creature as presented. Templates, like we looked at last week, offer a handy set of tools to make broad adjustments. For intelligent monsters, though, the statistics presented in the Menagerie are more of a starting point than a complete picture of an individual. Just like player characters have the capacity to grow and change over time, in their own personal ways, intelligent monsters also have access to this expanded potential. In this way, these intelligent monsters can be thought of as highly unusual NPCs, as opposed to simply stat blocks to be navigated and bags of Hit Points to be whittled down.
In general, the basic statistics presented in the Menagerie can be considered the baseline for the species. This baseline is fine for many "invisible" NPCs, such as random passersby on the street in a settlement. Player characters are unlikely to have extended interactions with these sorts of NPCs, and thus giving a lot of thought to them in advance is not really a great use of limited session prep time. For "visible" NPCs, the ones that the party is likely or intended to interact with, such generic statistics may be somewhat unsatisfying. When it comes to visible NPC monsters, a degree of customization is helpful for making a character memorable, and adding verisimilitude to the world that the players are exploring.
Simply giving a visible NPC an interesting personality might be sufficient in many cases, especially in a situation where players decide to interact with an invisible NPC by surprise. For antagonists and allies, however, making additional mechanical customizations can help strongly reinforce the chosen personality (or subvert it) in a way that feels organic. In this way, the easiest mechanical customizations to use are class features, perks and spells. A sneaky sort of monster might feel more complete with the ability to leverage its stealth into Sneak Attacks. Similarly, an NPC monster devoted to a deity might feel incomplete without some access to divine spells granted by that deity.
How much customization is warranted is largely a judgement call for each individual situation. At low levels in particular, just a little touch here and there might be enough to get across the idea. Simply giving an NPC monster access to Flurry of Blows can be more than enough to get across the idea of a monastic type. As levels get higher, however, the vast array of options available to player characters increases the relative threshold of "completeness." Since higher-level player characters generally have many class features and perks themselves, they also largely expect the same would be true for their friends and foes.
This can be handled in a couple of different ways. A monster NPC that is intended to be a strongly involved and recurring NPC might benefit from having all of its customizations planned in advance. This degree of forethought is extremely helpful for consistency, but is not always fully necessary. For monster NPCs that aren't necessarily intended to be strongly involved, but become so through player character intervention, it can be fine to leave these customizations undecided, and sprinkle them in as they become appropriate to the story. This flexibility can give a GM a chance to show off some interesting abilities that players did not choose themselves, or to reward a player's investment in the world by presenting an ally with narrative tools they might need, but not have themselves.
For magic-using NPC monsters, the spells that the individual knows are just as important as the perks it has, if not more so. Whether a monster chooses offensive spells, defensive spells, or support spells says a great deal about their outlook. As with perks and class features, these spells can be decided in advance, or can be chosen on the fly based on the needs of the story as it develops.
For intelligent monsters, the stat blocks presented in the Menagerie are almost more like templates than complete summaries. When using these monsters in an adventure, a GM should consider whether these statistics are actually sufficient, and ought to be prepared to enhance them for their specific uses. Indeed, first party adventures for Realm of Runes will rarely use intelligent monsters directly out of the Menagerie without also providing some interesting and unique twists to suit the individual in question. Next week, we'll take a look at the ways the Menagerie helps you pick monsters when planning an adventure, or when you need something quick when an adventure goes in a direction you didn't expect.
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