Captain Anorak's Guide to Gaming
Purposeless Monsters
In many hack fantasy games, there are dragons. Their main purpose seems to be to sit around in caves inside 'dungeons' snoozing on top of a pile of gold, fighting anyone who comes along to steal said treasure. The enquiring mind, on hearing of this, shrieks 'Why?'

Dragons are just one example among the plethora of 'monsters' which exist in AD&D and other games of its ilk. These monsters appear to have no purpose in life but to lurk in dungeons, fight adventurers and have treasure. There is no explanation as to why they are there, what they want or how they live.

Normal animals inhabit an area because they can find food there and raise young. Such considerations do not seem to apply to 'monsters.' For example, in Dragon Warriors there is a kind of monster called a gargoyle, which is essentially a living statue. The rulebook says that these can be found in underworlds (the DW term for the 'dungeons' of D&D) and describes how they attack. That's it. There's no explanation as to why they should be there, how they live or why they would attack. If the rulebook explained that they were guardians created by sorcery, that would be fine - then the GM should only use them when it makes sense in the scenario that a sorceror of sufficient power to make them would have put them there. If the rulebook said that they were creatures of magical origin, but they had to eat meat to live and reproduce like normal animals, that would be fine - then the GM could use them in any place where wild carnivores might be nesting. But the idea that this consideration could enter anyone's mind seems to have escaped the writers of Dragon Warriors.

See also Character Purpose.