How many rounds should a good encounter last?

[ruleslawyer]

If you can win without even having a combat, than don't have a combat. Unnecessary combats are foolish risks of character death. Why do it?

Agreed. My group is very, very good at resolving encounters with negotiation and trickery, including judicious use of Bluff, Diplomacy, and Intimidate (as well as gifts of meat and whiskey for those hungry thirsty orcs!).

However, there are all too often situations in which the PCs cannot avoid combat; usually, those have to do with horning in on someone's claimed territory (which happens in the course of, say, exploring dwarven or elven ruins overrun by orc tribes) or being the target of an assassination attempt, piracy, or the like.

In which event, combat has taken about 7 rounds (30 minutes real time) on average. We haven't had any "boss fights" in our campaign yet, although the party has faced two EL +4 encounters to date (an aboleth and a berserker plus two minions). The bossiest boss of the game so far was cut down in one round, so hardly counts.

 

[Kmart Kommando]

Longer than 10 rounds, so the secondary poison saves come into effect when the players totally forget about them.

 

[Jan van Leyden]

There are two different things to consider here, first being the amount of real time spent in combat. For most encounters (Stormtrooper variant) it should be dealt with in 10-15 minutes. Even players not so much interested in the combat can keep their concentration up for this time. A more complex, dramatic encounter could be anywhere from 30 minutes to one hour or even more.

The second point is that, regardless of the amount of real time, any character and any foe has to be able to make lots of decisions. Give them lots of things to do in a combat and ample rounds to actually do them. I want the combat not to be a linear progression towards victory, but seeing the tide turn in the midst of it.

At the ideal game table I want lots of rounds in a rather short time span. This would mean that each round should take only a short time to resolve.

While the first games of 4e may fit this bill, I doubt that this balance will consist for a long time. There will no doubt be extensions, and lots of it, which tend to complicate the running of combat. At some point separate elements of combat will start to interact (bonus stacking anyone?) implying some bookkeeping. Combat rounds will start to take longer, players will start to optimize their decisions and the rulse-wise interaction between the characters.

So I expect the satisfying combats in the first games to run for, say, 20 rounds and after 3-4 years of playing 4e for 5 rounds.

If the designers can prove me wrong, I'll be a very happy camper.

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Huldvoll

Jan van Leyden