In Draw Steel, each Monster has a level, an organization (or what I like to think of as "Rank") and a group role. While the level and organization give you a sense of how dangerous a monster is, and roughly how many you should throw at a party of a given size and level, the role is a little more nuanced.
With the exception of Solo monsters, whose group role is "I am the entire fight" (though complex terrain can make such a monster more interesting,) group roles are there to give you a sense of what the monster is there to do. There are a fair number of these roles. I want to go through each of them and give a sense of what kind of abilities you find on these monsters.
Ideally, I'd like to get to a point where we can understand these well enough to start home-brewing creatures, but the asterisk here with all my Draw Steel stuff is that I still have yet to actually play the game.
Monsters of any organization level from Minion to Elite will also have one of these roles. Leader and Solo monsters are both designed to be the only monster of their type in the encounter. A Leader is meant to have several other monsters fighting alongside it, while Solo monsters are truly designed to be fought on their own.
Let's start with a list of the monster roles: Ambusher, Artillery, Brute, Controller, Defender, Harrier, Hexer, Mount, and Support.
Ambushers:
Ambushers are meant to sneak up and strike at more vulnerable targets.
For example, the Angulotl Slink has a free maneuver that costs Malice that will allow them to leap 3 squares and hide if they land in a place of concealment.
A higher-level ambusher, the Shadow Elf Mournblade, (level 6 rather than 1) has both a signature ability that turns them invisible until the start of their next turn as well as a maneuver that lets them teleport up to 10 squares if they're concealed (such as, for example, by being invisible) into an area of darkness.
Artillery:
Artillery is honestly fairly straightforward: these are the monsters that sit far back and try to strike from afar.
The level 5 Hobgoblin Incendiarist, for example, has a signature ability with a range of 10 that can also light a target on fire, and a 3-malice ability that can hit an area with fire damage and inflict this burning condition.
The Frost Giant Storm Hurler, a level 8 elite artillery (giants are mostly elite) also has a ranged signature ability, throwing ice javelins that can inflict bleeding and slow targets, and a 3-malice ability that launches massive icicles that land on the battlefield and explode if not destroyed before the giant's next turn.
Brute:
Brutes are fairly simple big bags of Stamina and damage. They often have ways to push foes around or just overall be enough of a problem to draw fire.
The level 2 Gnoll Bonesplitter has a signature ability that can push or potentially grab targets.
The level 5 Troll Glutton has a signature ability that can slow the target and, with malice, heal them for the damage they do, as well as a 3-malice main action ability that lets them shift up to 6 squares and slam into foes.
Controller:
Controllers often can move creatures around the battlefield or otherwise restrict their enemies' movement.
The level 7 undead Haunt slides targets with its signature ability, as well as using a 3-malice ability that can knock people prone in a burst area with a rider that prevents creatures from using the Stand Up maneuver.
The level 6 Voiceless Talker Invader has abilities that grab, push, and vertically slide.
Defender:
Defenders are there to help reduce the damage that their allies take.
A level 4 Flesh Mournling (basically a Frankenstein's Monster-like creature) can prevent enemies from shifting and has an ability that can frighten targets.
The level 1 War Dog Neuronite can designate an ally with a 1-malice maneuver to either taunt all targets in a 5-foot burst around them, or they can grant the ally damage immunity 3 against any enemy in that burst.
Harrier:
Harriers are there to chase down elusive foes.
The level 1 Radenwight Ratcrobat can hit two targets with their signature ability, and can shift between strikes and again after the second strike.
The level 3 Minotaur can shift 3 squares when it makes its signature ability (which is, itself, a charge ability, so they can even take the charge main action and still do this - and that's with a speed of 8).
Hexer:
Hexers are all about putting status conditions on their foes.
The level 1 Lizardfolk Bloodeye can restrain targets with their signature ability, and have a 2-malice action that can reduce the target's line of effect (essentially cutting short the range of their ranged abilities).
The level 8 Rival Talent (one of several stat blocks that gives you enemy adventurers) can daze targets with a 2-malice ability, or can spend malice on their signature ability force foes to shift up to their speed where the talent wants (as long as it's not into any harmful terrain) and make free strikes against targets of the Talent's choice (each other, for example).
Mount:
Mounts are actually kind of special: they are designed to be ridden by other creatures, who can use the "Ride" movement action to move the mount's speed.
The level 1 War Spider is one of the mounts Goblins use, and has a defensive ability to protect its riders and has a passive ability that lets riders launch themselves off of its back.
The level 1 Servitor War Walker (it does seem most mounts are level 1,) preferred by Dwarves, provides cover to the three size 1 allies riding it.
Support:
Support creatures are there to back up and aid their allies, often by restoring stamina or granting temporary stamina.
The level 1 High Elf Palinode has a maneuver that can teleport two nearby allies to their side and grant 5 temporary stamina.
The level 9 Multivok Chief (basically big dwarven-made robots) can use a triggered action that can grant temporary stamina, as well as an aura that restores 15 stamina to nearby Servok (the other kind of Valok robot, which is less humanoid in shape) at the start of the chief's turns.
So, there you have it: a few examples for each group role.
The idea here is that when you build an encounter, you should try to think about what the objectives of the encounter are and how the monsters might be set up to achieve their objectives. The Monsters book gives lots of guidance on different encounter scenarios. As an example, if the objective is to take out a high-value target, like an enemy commander, consider giving them a number of defenders there to keep them safe.
If the encounter is one in which the party is on the defensive, consider using more brutes and ambushers. A besieging army is probably sending brutes up on the front lines, artillery launching attacks from far away, and perhaps some ambushers or harriers trying to get behind the walls to compromise the defenses.
I also think that you could reward players' clever strategizing: say the party is there to eliminate a major villain, like a Human Bandit Chief. If the bandit chief knows that the party is coming for them, they might surround themselves with defenders, like the Human Knave. But perhaps the party has pulled something, like perhaps going behind the bandit chief's back to speak with one of their lieutenants. Perhaps in a Negotiation, they convinced that lieutenant that he should withhold his own men from protecting the boss, and maybe this lieutenant is the one who commands the gang's Knaves.
Now, the encounter's actual difficulty (as in the Encounter Value budget) might not even change, but perhaps instead of getting defenders that will make it harder to strike the bandit chief, now they've got to hire a bunch of low-level ruffians to guard them, like the Rogue minions, who are ambushers, not defenders. They might still pose a threat, but it'll make the party's goal of alpha-striking the boss far easier to achieve, and thus actually make the encounter easier.
Even if you don't want to get that complex, I do really like how this system gives you some guidance on how to make a more dynamic encounter. Putting only Brutes in your encounter will probably make for just a big slog, but if you pair Brutes with a small number of Support creatures, suddenly you give the players a strategic choice: risk another turn or two of the Brutes' damage to try to burn down the Support monsters first, or try to chew through the Brutes' stamina as quickly as you can on the logic that the Support monsters won't really be much of a threat once the brutes are gone.
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