The importance of monstrous variation in TFT

[hcobb]

One of the major character types in TFT is the Scholar, generally replacing Brand-X RPG's priest. And one of his greatest powers is given at

ITL 42 "He is capable of recognizing all races of intelligent creature and all types of monster and beast in this book, and he knows all important information about them; ..."

However there isn't room ITL to list out a huge number of different critter types and therefore the players will quickly come to memorize all the important stats of all of the major monster types, even if their characters aren't expected to.

In order to preserve the Scholar archetype, apply the other part of the Expert Naturalist power "... he can make a good guess (3/IQ) as to the general nature of new beings the GM has introduced." I would assume that this also includes remembering some obscure reference in some old book he's read.

So every adventure ought to include a new monster variation or two. Dragons that don't breathe fire but instead shoot lightning bolt level charges through their claws, trolls that spit acid, or whatever, but also include some limit to the fitness of this monstrous variation that explains why it doesn't out-compete the more common type outside of this one valley. The lightning claw dragons have a harder time feeding themselves because they lack a ranged attack, or the acid trolls require a special diet, etc.

Monstrous variation is required in this game, because the monsters don't have the flexibility that allows constructing a formidable big bad on say a 15k XP, $200k budget, just using the character construction items in the book.