If you’re going to be a hero, you need an enemy—preferably several of them, from scheming masterminds to evil minions, and everything in between!

Only the heroes or exceptional Monsters get to add The Escalation Die to their attacks (noted in their write-ups). Consequently, most monster defenses start slightly higher than they would in a game that didn’t use The Escalation Die.

Monster damage: Most monster attacks deal a set amount of damage instead of being expressed as dice rolls like player character attacks. Monster abilities, triggered powers, critical hits, and the big difference between a hit and a miss vary the amount of damage the Monsters deal.

Monsters’ triggered abilities: Instead of requiring a separate die roll to see which attack Monsters use, use the natural result of the creature’s d20 attack roll to see what other riders or attacks trigger. The standard default is 16+. Unpredictable Monsters can have effects trigger on other rolls, such as odd/even, 5 or less, 6+, etc.

Where to Find Monsters

If you are running one of the free adventures, you probably have what you need.

If you are making up your own adventures, you’re eventually going to want to read the main book and get hold of one or more of the bestiaries. But before spending more money, you can find a few more Monsters in the other adventures and in the 13th Age 2-Hour Demo and The Next Valley Over: a 13th Age Glorantha 2- Hour Demo that are linked to from the 13th Age Resources page.