It's fun to play as a human, dwarf, elf, etc., but sometimes a player wants something more unorthodox.  Maybe he wants to be an orc barbarian or a thri-keen paladin.

Many iterations of Dungeons & Dragons had various suggestions for monster PCs.  

I heard that the official systems (Complete Book of Humanoids for 2nd Edition, Savage Species for 3rd Edition) were unbalanced and didn't work well.  I have experience with Savage, but not Humanoids.  Can anyone tell me how the 2nd Edition book handled things?

Many DMs are not fond of the idea of monster PCs: perhaps its for fluff reasons, in that the monsters are always evil, have unbalancing abilities, or otherwise unsuitable for play.  Other DMs approach it halfway, and restriction monster options to the more "down to earth" ones.  An orc PC is easier to manage than a Balor, for example.  And many DMs worry that some players want monster PCs just so that they can emulate Drizz't.

How do you handle the idea of monster PCs?  What are your thoughts on the concept itself?

It's a nice one off every once in a while, but not a regular thing.  I don't recall Complete book of Monsters being that unbalanced though, but I could be misremembering.


One of my favorite things as a DM when the players wanted to play monsters was to have them play in the same game world as their PCs.  So when we stopped the monster campaign and resumed the original one, the PCs found that half of their lands and strongholds were raided

One of the most fun campaigns I ever ran was an old dnd module called 'Reverse Dungeon'

The players were all kobolds, goblins, and a sneaky humnanoid from the fiend folio (can't recall the race name).

It was awesome!


The epic moment in the game was  when the characters brought down a single dwarven fighter when a party of do-gooders raided their caves.

Raiding the nearby human farms for chicken was also amazingly fun.




I prefer 'good guy' PC's, but it was fun.

My youngest son played a Skeletal Warrior (named Scratch) for a while.

Paizo's "We Be Goblins" scenario might appeal to you. It's a freebie, too.

Since I have GMed everything from Star Wars to D&D to RIFTS, I can say it varies. I actually like the way 3e handles it, though. 'Monster fluff as levels' seems like a good balance.

In 2E Ravenloft they eventually put out rules for undead PCs (I think they were asically emulating world of darkness with these). Dont remember which book the rules were from (maybe the requiem boxed set but I could be wrong). The Van Richten guide to the created had rules for pc golems as I recall...its been a while...but i seem to remember these being interesting.

In 2E ant PC couod become a lycanthrope of course

I think there may have been a humanoids handbook of some kind that allowed for some mpnster races. Drow were definitely a possibility. I think (and needto check on this as I could be confusing my editions here) some of th pe 2e mm entries had modifiers for pc versions of the monsters.

Darksun had rules for thri keen, half giants, etc.

I pretty much stuck with normal humans and demihumans.

We once played a campaign based in the Broken Lands of Mystara using 2e AD&D and The Complete Book of Humanoids book.  I played a Flind (gnoll).  It worked out well, and the rules in the CBoH weren't terribly bad.  No one seemed terribly overpowered compared to the other humanoids, nor to the standard PC races.

You say that like humans, elves, and dwarves can't be monsters.

Quote from: Libertad;565490How do you handle the idea of monster PCs?  What are your thoughts on the concept itself?

I like the concept and use Orcs of Thar's monster PC rules for Labyrinth Lord or just have the Player create a new character race/class using the Basic D&D Custom Class Template. For 3.x/Pathfinder, I just have them use the monster description and add character levels which is easy as pie.

Here's the kicker though, I only let certain Players that I know can handle it do this. I have no problem telling a munchkin "no".

Quote from: Bill;565636One of the most fun campaigns I ever ran was an old dnd module called 'Reverse Dungeon'

The players were all kobolds, goblins, and a sneaky humnanoid from the fiend folio (can't recall the race name).

It was awesome!


The epic moment in the game was  when the characters brought down a single dwarven fighter when a party of do-gooders raided their caves.

Raiding the nearby human farms for chicken was also amazingly fun.




I prefer 'good guy' PC's, but it was fun.

I've heard about Reverse Dungeon, and I can't imagine why the concept didn't extend to later editions or got picked up and remodeled during the d20 boom.  It's too good an idea not to use.

I played in a Pathfinder game where we played as creatures locked up and being harvested for magical ingredients. We broke out and ended up running the business.

I was a Mummy sorcerer, we had a Barbarian werewolf (when he raged he turned into a werewolf) and vampire. Someone was going to play a water creature to help fill out the Monster Squad, classic monster motif. We had a kobold thief. Everything was going OK until someone joined as a Rakasha monk (he was a power gamer and really upset the balance of what were doing) then someone found a deck of many things. I've yet to play in a campaign where a deck of many things didn't just wreck fucking everything, and that held true in this game.

It was a lot of fun, though! I had a blast basically playing my character like Vision from the Avengers.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;565491It's a nice one off every once in a while, but not a regular thing.  I don't recall Complete book of Monsters being that unbalanced though, but I could be misremembering.


One of my favorite things as a DM when the players wanted to play monsters was to have them play in the same game world as their PCs.  So when we stopped the monster campaign and resumed the original one, the PCs found that half of their lands and strongholds were raided

You talking about Savage Species? If so it wasn't horrible you could tweak it when it went wrong in places. I definitely thought it was interesting idea but not to everybody's taste or not for a regular game. I would rather play White Wolf for the "I'm a monster deal".

Quote from: Libertad;565713I've heard about Reverse Dungeon, and I can't imagine why the concept didn't extend to later editions or got picked up and remodeled during the d20 boom.  It's too good an idea not to use.

It's a fun read, and serves well as a basis for a 'monster pc' campaign.
Easy to flesh out the module and make it your own.


The module assumes low stat goblins as pc' but I let them gain levels normally as the game progressed. That would probably be the difference between a one shot and a full campaign.

I ran a game of Castles and Crusades (4th) where the PCs were all goblins, orcs, and kobolds. It was pretty fun for everyone - they saw themselves and other monster races as the good guys, while the humans, elves, dwarves were evil invaders who burn villages down for experience points. The PCs were seen as super heroes by the other monsters because they were the only ones who could level up like the "monsters" who always kill them.

It was light-hearted and a bit of a comedy campaign.

I used the Palladium Fantasy versions of goblins, orcs, and kobolds because I like them a LOT more than the D&D versions.

Quote from: Bill;566002It's a fun read, and serves well as a basis for a 'monster pc' campaign.
Easy to flesh out the module and make it your own.


The module assumes low stat goblins as pc' but I let them gain levels normally as the game progressed. That would probably be the difference between a one shot and a full campaign.

I took a look at that when I ran my game. It provided some inspiration - One game session the PCs had to defend a goblin village and their, "holy magic box of awesome treasure" that they keep poorly defended in the center of the village. The PCs had to make traps and fortifications within a limited amount of time; different types of traps and fortifications took differing amounts of time to construct.