Stalker0's Guide to Anti-Grind

vagabundo · Jul 17, 2009

I think there are two dials that you use in encounter planning that will speed up play:

- Following the excellent OP when designing encounters using standard creatures from MM or NPCs.
- Create a house rule for dialing down HP and increasing damage.

I think the response to this will vary from group to group, depending on how tactically minded they are, their class/role mix and how optimised their characters are for damage or how synergistic their power mix is with the other characters.

This stuff should be cover more in the DMG - hopefully DMG II will have some good advice for tailoring combats to your party.

It is important to teach some tactics to your players after an encounter, esp for novices and the more casual players.

*Thread bookmarked.

0-hr · Jul 17, 2009

I think that our tactics and organizational skills are ok because things move along well in our other games (which includes a lot of 3.5 and Star Wars Saga recently). I'll start tracking rounds and looking for areas to increase efficiency, but my gut feeling is that it critters just have a ton of hit points relative to the damage being put out by the PCs.

Nebulous · Jul 17, 2009

Drkfathr1 said:
Fantastic article. I think many would find this far more informative than the chapter in the DM's guide.

This combinded with your Skill Challenge system shows some really top-end design work.

Hear that WoTC? You should hire this guy as a freelancer.

Yeah, he should be a 4e game designer. Both the Obsidian and the Monster advice deserve to be in the DMG2 (or 3).

Scholar & Brutalman · Jul 19, 2009

Having just run a particular fight in The Temple Between module in the Scales of War AP, I'll add:

Avoid three-way battles with 16 monsters, none of whom are minions. Running a battle with yourself just slows things down while turning the players into an audience for more of each turn.

Avoid having a lot of monsters with powers that require book-keeping, such as regeneration or recharge powers. Everything that slows down the DM adds to grind.

Avoid monsters with powers that include the combination "at-will + daze + save-ends". You can replace daze with immobilize or any of the other crippling status effects. Recharge + crippling + save-ends is almost as bad.

Avoid really big encounter areas that take up nearly all of a battlemat. They take ages to draw, and give monsters too much room to avoid being in AoE attacks.

Damn fight took four hours.

S'mon · Jul 23, 2009

After running 2 sessions of 4e (adapted 3e Vault of Larin Karr), I have had a good number of fights (9 by my count), only 1 was dull.

They were:

Session #1

1. PCs vs hobgoblins in market square:
Hobgoblins: 6 minions, 1 archer, 1 soldier
A fairly easy introductory skirmish. Minions died easy. The archer escaped while the soldier held off the PCs, who chased him to:

2. PCs vs hobgoblins trying to break into a mill house:
Hobgoblins: 1 archer (from fight #1), 1 commander, 1 warcaster, 8 minions
4 minions formed a battle line and were immediately wiped out by the Invoker PC.
However the Warcaster's magic KO'd several PCs and they were only saved by the arrival of the town guard, most of the hobgoblins escaped.

3. PCs vs a 'Cloaker' under the town inn:
Improvised stats, kinda wonky

4. PCs vs a ghost in the tunnels:
Not too grindy despite the 1/2 damage from incorporeal

Session #2

PCs rested in the dungeon then pressed on

1. PCs ambushed by 3 giant weasels - reskinned wolves w 1/2 hp
I found this a fun little skirmish

2. PCs vs goblin hexer, 2 hobgoblin minions, 2 giant weasels
OK, not too challenging

3. PCs came up into the hobgoblin fort feast hall...

Initially there were sitting around the table:

4 hobgoblin grunts lv 3 minions
1 hobgoblin soldier lv 3
1 hobgoblin archer lv 3

Subsequent reinforcements were:

1 hobgoblin commander lv 5
1 hobgoblin archer lv 3
6 hobgoblin grunts lv 3 minion

Because the minions were slaughtered by Invoker attacks that didn't target AC their Phalanx Soldier ability didn't come up for them. The archers don't have it, so it was really just the soldier and the commander. 1 attack missed the commander due to Phalanx Soldier.

This was probably the highlight.

The second archer and commander when they were the last survivors failed a morale check (2d6 B/X style) and ran for it; the archer escaped but the commander was hunted down and evebntually killed in fight no. 4.

5. After that the PCs searched the fort, opened the sealed-up stable block, and met the Gelatinous Cube (level 5 elite brute) sealed up there. That was when things got grindy. The Cube's constant grabbing of PCs followed by their escapes took a lot of time, and prevented the PCs focusing damage on it. It turned out to be a very boring, grindy monster. Luckily a PC eventually dumped a sack of salt on it, killing it instantly!

Nebulous · Jul 23, 2009

Scholar & Brutalman said:
Avoid really big encounter areas that take up nearly all of a battlemat. They take ages to draw, and give monsters too much room to avoid being in AoE attacks.

Damn fight took four hours.

In general i would agree, but i ran a really big 5th level fight with 6 PCs and probably 30+ monsters. It got split up over two sessions and the whole thing took at least 5 hours. I wouldn't want to do that normally, but it was a good climax to the adventure. And i had the battlemap made up prior to the game, so there was no need to draw anything. Otherwise, yeah, that can be a time-suck.

kitsune9 · Jul 23, 2009

Stalker0 said:
Stalker0’s Guide to Anti-grind

I hope the guide was of use, good luck in your games!

Thanks Stalker for the article. I heard that grind was a big hassle for 4e, so should I pick it up to play, I'll bear this article as my notes for the campaign.

Obryn · Jul 23, 2009

Ki Ryn said:
I think that our tactics and organizational skills are ok because things move along well in our other games (which includes a lot of 3.5 and Star Wars Saga recently). I'll start tracking rounds and looking for areas to increase efficiency, but my gut feeling is that it critters just have a ton of hit points relative to the damage being put out by the PCs.

The truth is that they do have a large number of HPs, relative to average damage, but not everyone running 4e more or less BTB runs into the grind issues you've noted.

I think Stalker0's notes are pretty excellent, and well-taken. It's good, solid advice to keep combats challenging without a major rules overhaul.

I don't think you need to change HPs or damage to make combat fast... A lot of it is, as noted above, player and DM preparedness. A lot is having competent (not min-maxed, but competent) PCs. A lot is using your encounter powers every fight. A lot is not being stingy with your daily powers - blow them in medium-difficulty fights; don't save them for a potential disaster that might not materialize. A lot is switching your tactics to account for party synergies - set up combat advantage for your rogue, set up big AoEs for the Wizard, knock people into the fighter so he can lock them down, etc. A lot is just giving attack bonuses to everyone - put your leaders to work giving everyone else boosts!

All of these can make fights go pretty darn quickly. Soldier and solo fights (and particularly elite soldier and solo soldier) fights can still grind. If you have smart tactics, know your capabilities, and keep things moving, you might find the grind disappears.

I'm not saying it's not a problem - it absolutely can be. But this guide is a good starting point, as are the other pieces of advice dropped here. If nothing ends up working, using a -HP/+Dmg houserule might be what you have to do - but I haven't found the need so far.

-O

Novem5er · Jul 23, 2009

Agreed - great article!

While I've applied several of the tactics in the OP to my game, I've unfortunately had to go a step further. We've reduced monster HP by 50% and I add bonus damage to each monster attack equal to 1/2 level + 1.

We've run it this way for 3 sessions now and my players love it! The combats go much quicker, feel more fluid, and we get more out of each session. The only problem I have with it as a DM is that it screws some monsters out of (save ends) affects or special attacks that are intended to use several times a fight. Since the combats last half as long, monsters (and PCs to a point) have half as many rounds to hit.

The bonus damage helps keep things pretty deadly. Our level 6 monsters are doing +4 damage with each hit. It doesn't look like a lot on paper, but when a Brute hits you for 2d6 + 11 with a Basic attack, the players take notice... especially when a character is double-tapped in a single round.

I'm of the opinion that 4e combat as written is just fine... when you have 5 dedicated players who've memorized their powers, think tactically, and are engaged during everyone else's turn (AKA paying attention!). For my group, though (with 5-7 players per week!) normal combat rules meant that half the group was "done" with the battle 30-45 minutes before it was really over.

Mostly, my players kept getting pissed that they could Crit with an Encounter power and not even bloody a dang Gnoll. We went from that, to one-hit killing Wereboar when the dice are with us... and when half the party is down 2-4 healing surges at the end of it, it feels right.

Iron Sky · Sep 30, 2009

Nifft said:
Nice stuff. It jibes well with my experiences.

The one trick I'd add is:

Turn a Solo into an Elite - Take a Solo monster 2 (or more) levels below the party. Cut its hit points in half, but otherwise leave it unchanged. Price it as an Elite of its level +2. Add minions & regular monsters to taste.

Cheers, -- N

There is some danger with turning solos into elites straight-up... as I found out in my game last week. I took some creatures I'd made as solos and just turned them into elites. Suddenly their powers I'd designed to be balanced with them as solos made them overpowered elites (which proceeded to kill 80% of my PCs, to death).

I would probably trim a power or two from most solos if I turned them into elites...