In the newest D&D Fourth Edition excerpt, “Minions,” D&D uptakes the old concept of the “mook”. I’m not sure if Feng Shui, a HK action movie game by Robin Laws, was the first game to use mooks, but it certainly popularized them. A minion, or mook, is an opponent designed to be one of those guys that goes down like tenpins in the movies.
And you know, they did a good job here! I know you’re getting used to me squealing like someone’s poking red hot nails through my nutsack at each of these 4e excerpts, but that’s only when they deserve it.
A minion is of a power level equivalent to any other monster except it has only one hit point. So it can still have a good to hit, a big attack, etc., but one hit takes it out.
Goodman Games has a Wicked Fantasy Factory line of D&D adventures where they had mook rules and “finishing moves” and other cool stuff. But actually these mook rules are better, because the point of mooks is little to no record keeping. In WFF, mooks still had hit points.
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