It's been quite some time since I decided to pick up questing.

I'm not entirely sure of this, but I'd like to affirm the concept of creating a monster that isn't part of the game itself. I've done something similar in the past with a few quests, but I'm unsure if anything regarding that has changed or not.

So long as it's explained, Yoku, I'm pretty sure it's alright. During Shattered Souls I invented a monster or two, which were explained by the event and the strangeness of Amethos' power. Oh, and try not to over-power your character. I think that's the real key.

I mean, how are those players who have never picked up .hack supposed to know what a Sled Dog looks like, or how a Mu Guardian fights? There are plenty of points against having people stick strictly to the regular 150 or so monsters in NISDIP (gotta catch 'em all!), so like I said, I think you're fine.

Granted, I'm not in charge of grading. Zan might have something different to say about it...

I've been creating monsters a lot, lately, especially for my storyline, and I don't really see that there's a problem to it, but like Jpec said, it all depends on what the grader says. ^_^

I haven't run into any problems mutating/creating monsters in quests, I use 'em for the Clan Quest and have fun doing so. It's like breeding monsters on Monster Rancher 3, only, y'know, more fun!

That said, I know Zan specifically creates monsters for the Eventide Crescendo and the like, I don't believe there's a problem but, like Dien said, Zannio's a good one to ask about the boundaries. (Holy epic mother of toast I can't spell this one word right.)

Like Dien said though, s'long as you have an explanation backing up the monster's 'where the crap did that come from' question you'll get? I think you'll be okay.

The only real limitations that you have in creating monsters are fairly common sense-like restrictions. You shouldn't have data bugs of any sort and most of the time you shouldn't be creating spells/skills for them to have. Though I'm sure both of those are broken on a fairly common basis these days anyways.

Back in the day there used to be restrictions that you had to stick with the game's monsters, and only Main was allowed to use custom monsters (since only the hackers had the skill to make new monsters) but that's long past the ability of any of us to enforce. I just chalk it up IC-wise to the proliferation of hackers, as well as random official patches that may release new monsters. Not exactly the most //infection canon, but it works.

Of course, it's still the domain of the hacker elites to have brutally overpowered monsters that are invincible save for one single tiny weakness and that delete you when they kill you. But... that's just high stakes roleplaying. =P

Actually, what counts as a real attack is itself flexible due to our own lack of information on what constitutes a real attack. We only list player skills, really, but a lot of monsters have unique skills. For example, my Infection guide lists Red Wyrms as having something called Breath x3, indicating that they breath fire (presumably for triple damage of the base attack or something). There's a separate list where all the monster-only attacks are listed. My Quarantine guide doesn't mention non-player skills except for the phases and Cubia.

... *glances at the TotC team* You guys should know that feeling.