5e combat system too simple / boring?

[Dom de Dom]

I'm liking that you are recommending in part to change the emphasis away from combat.. perhaps this is something I should look at! I've only just returned to DMing after nearly 20 years so its kind of in at the deep end for me at the moment!

 

[Dom de Dom]

STX Bob - about the flavour text that's fine, but if you're doing the same thing every round it quickly runs out of steam...

 

[alfarobl]

It is boring if you keep it tactical only with grid. I started playing similar to 3.5 but moved now to gridless more narrative combats it works ten times better, faster and more fun. Try to avoid square grid rules and play it making it fun without focus on rules but rulings during combat.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

there are very interesting combats in 5e. Today a simple encounter became very intense because of the thread that the PCs loot might fall into the river and the boos they saved are destroyed. A sleet storm freezing the water made everything really really complex wven though the monsters only hit twice or so.

 

[MechaPilot]

I find that the simplicity of 5e's combat system can lead to a situation where people just do the same thing all the time. To alleviate that, and because it makes the game more fun for me, I try to encourage in-combat improvisation as much as possible.

This encouragement takes two forms:
1) Do not punish the player for trying to do something out of the ordinary.
2) Monsters improvise too.

The theory behind #1 is that a player is less likely to try to do something interesting if it's likely to blow up in her face or be totally ineffective. Here's an example to clarify what I mean. Say that a player says her character wants to try to knock an enemy to the ground with her attack. Knocking someone prone is significant, so I can't just tack that on to a normal attack with no changes. What I usually do in situations like that is allow the additional effect if the attack beats the target's AC by 5 or more. However, so as not to punish the player for trying something fun, I allow the attack to do damage (but not knock the target prone) if the attack roll beats the target's AC by less than 5.

#2 is both a threat and a display. It's a display because it gives players an idea of what I allow (I usually explain the rule I'm using when a monster improvises, so the players know my standard for such things). It's a threat because the monsters will improvise, and if you're not going to do likewise you had best at least be ready for it when it happens.

 

[werecorpse]

STX Bob - about the flavour text that's fine, but if you're doing the same thing every round it quickly runs out of steam...

Correct, but IMO flavour text is a way to focus on story not mechanics. Watch a combat run on Critical Role on Geek & Sundry for fun examples.

IMO 3&4e moved towards the idea of really making the combats more fun by focussing on the tactical element of combats above other features of the game (4 more than 3). They both became complex and combats bogged down for hours. 5e does this less than both and is trying to shift focus more to exploration, roleplaying, interaction etc. so they made combats simpler.

One issue in 5e with unlimited decent cantrips is that spellcasters (especially at low level with hardly any spells) can feel a bit boring. This can be the same with other classes but I suspect this lessens at higher levels. I have found players can handle some supposedly tough enemies at quite low levels so my suggestions are:
1. really mix it up. Put in a horde of kobolds (my players fear pack attack), then an invisible stalker
2. give players in combat ability options - scroll of slow, arrow of shatter, potion of fire breath
3. Make combats short & with a purpose beyond combat
4. Focus on the other "limbs" of 5e exploration & roleplaying

Oh and throw in flavour text especially on the big moments.

(Btw I use a system with one use items like potions and scroll to say that each time you use it roll a d4 on a 2-4 the magic remains or there is still some liquid left etc. This encourages freer use of the items and keeps those player combat options available longer)

 

[Jester David]

It's a comparison problem.
5e battles are boring compared to 4e, in which battles could be a lot of fun independent of anything else. You could just play the game as a delve where you moved from battle to battle and have a blast, DM optional.
5e battles are exciting compared to, oh, say FATE, or dozens of other RPGs where there's far less character advancement or combat powers and everything is more story focused.

 

[BoldItalic]

The game is more fun if you treat it as collaborative story telling and adapt the combat mechanics to the narrative, rather than hoping to infer the narrative from the mechanics.

Here's a paragraph of narrative. It's a slice from an encounter between a party of PCs and two giant hawks, and it comes from the Tap Tap Tap thread.

In the blink of an eye, a hawk had snatched Clotbert tightly in its talons and begun to soar aloft. It all happened so fast that, by the time Rylnethaz could shout a warning, it was already too late. But the hawk was quickly aware that not all was as it should be; it was accustomed to prey that was soft and furry, not hard and covered in chainmail. It supposed that its toes must be doing something wrong and glanced down to see what was amiss. That glance was its undoing, for it was momentarily blinded by a flash of holy light from Clotbert's hand. It instinctively loosed its grip and Clotbert fell to earth, his arms windmilling frantically. He fell in a heap with a sickening thud and was still. It would be a long time before he stood on his feet again.

Now translate that into 5e combat mechanics.

• The hawk moves flying and makes a grapple attack on Clotbert. *DM rolls dice* It succeeds. It then moves the remainder of its fly speed upwards.
• On his turn, Clotbert casts a spell *rolls dice* and saves versus the grapple *rolls dice*. He takes falling damage and *rolls dice* is unconscious.

All legal 5e stuff, but ... a lot less dramatic. That's because although you can infer the underlying mechanics from the narrative by stripping away all the technicolor stuff, you can't go the other way and infer the narrative from the mechanics because the interesting bits aren't there inside it. There is more to the story than just the mechanics. If all you do is play through the mechanics, of course it will be dull.

 

[Reinhart]

Alright. Let's just be honest here: If you use 5e's combat system as written, it often is a simple rinse and repeat set of actions against monsters that are just bags of hitpoints. If you are specifically relying on the game mechanics to offer your players interesting tactical choices, look elsewhere. But then again, most RPG combat systems aren't the brilliant strategy games they pretend to be, and they're each built with different goals in mind.

That said, you defaulted to D&D for a reason. If you don't expect the system to create most of the interesting tactical choices for you, then you'll probably do alright with D&D 5e. It's not hard to fill in the gap, you just need to make sure that you're not just repeating the same scenarios but with different monster names. The GM skill I suggest that you practice is managing the stakes of each encounter. The game is more interesting if the players have more ways to fail than dying and more ways to measure success than how many corpses are on the ground. Once the consequences of combat become more varied than just death or XP, you'll have players a lot more interested in what is happening. Plus, managing stakes is a skill that carries over into running pretty much all RPG's.

 

[devincutler]

If you look through the various variants and options in the DMG you can find a bunch of ways to add tactics to combat. The flanking rule, the various injury rules, the weapon speed rule, and variant initiative rules. Heap enough of those onto the base system and you will probably have a more complex system.

Additionally, character choice is an issue. Compare a Champion Fighter versus a Battle Master Fighter. One gets a bunch of maneuvers to fiddle with. The other guy just rolls for critical hits.

I personally think there are enough opportunities for bonus actions and reactions and use of per rest powers on almost every class to make the choices interesting, while still keeping combat times down enough to focus on the story telling and exploration aspects of the game.