D&D 5E Monsters struggling to hit players? Common?

[iserith]

My idea was to replace the Advantage granted from flanking with just a +1 to attacks against a flanked opponent.

I'm not sure that really succeeds at achieving the goal you set forth. It makes the game more fiddly and prone to people trying reversies when they inevitably forget they didn't apply the bonus they should have. It risks creating problems you might not have now for no real upside.

I would suggest that if you want the combats to be more tactical, introduce better terrain and alternate victory conditions. If you want to do damage to highly armored PCs, use spells with saving throws against them. If you want multiple weaker monsters to serve as a threat, look at the Mob rules in the DMG, page 250, which are basically auto-hits given a certain number of attacks (at the cost of never having any crits).

 

[MNblockhead]

I tried and then dropped flanking rules for the reasons explained by others upthread.

Far more useful are the optional mob rules in the DMG. If you have enough attackers there are a certain number of automatic hits each round.

Having a huge mob of fanatic kobolds swarm out many caves in a large cavern, willing to die for their draconic overlord and just swarm over the high level tank can bring back the fear more effectively than a high CR level boss monster. Sure, the party will mow them down, but wave after way will soften those PCs up right quick and it warms this DMs heart to see the fear and shame in the eyes of players of high high-level characters as they watch their hit points fall away to lowly kobold attacks.

Also, traps hit tanks better than attacks. Smart monsters are going to know that there a high-level adventurers / heroes out there that will waste them in a direct fight. Maybe your kobolds have trouble hitting the paladin, which is why they design ceilings to drop on him.

More monsters should fight smarter. Strength in numbers, ranged attacks, choke points, traps, anti-siege weapons. The party is told that the cave is defended by only 20 kobolds. But they have couple Hwacha, allowing them to make 200 rocket attacks each round for two rounds. Will the party even stick around for the third round to learn that the kobolds shot their load?

Not every battle should be like that. But every now and then throw your party an unexpected challenge to keep them on the toes. Again, not every challenge...unless they're kobolds.

All kobolds should be Tuckers kobolds.

 

[Unwise]

It is important as a DM to remember that having 20 AC and being super hard to hurt is the main schtick of those character classes. While a mage is melting faces with fireball, or a cleric is raising the dead, the fighter is hard to hit. There is little appreciable difference between classes as far as HP goes, it is really only AC that separates the 'tank' from the 'squishies'.

A sword and board plate character is also giving up Polearm Master and GWM schenanigans to be harder to hit. It can be frustrating as a DM, but I would not work to overcome it much. A good mix of some saves instead of attacks, some enemies with pack tactics and some higher level but less numerous monsters should sort it out. I am not saying to increase the use of those disproportionately, just make sure that they are in the mix.

 

[S'mon]

A sword and board plate character is also giving up Polearm Master and GWM schenanigans to be harder to hit.

I remember playing Primeval Thule campaign with my halberd wielding Slayer barbarian alongside a Protection style Fighter. She had AC 21 and at 5th level typically hit once per round for around 7.5 damage (d8+3). Meanwhile I had AC 16 and Reckless Attacked GWM PAM 3-4 times per round for around 60 damage... Basically I could stand behind the unhittable Fighter and chainsaw through the monsters; if any tried to reach me I got my opp att on them so they rarely even bothered.

 

[Sadras]

My early experience in the lower levels matches up with the OP. The monsters usually have a +2 to +4 to hit and really struggle against the higher AC's. There are a few things you can do before making any changes to the monster stats:

* Increase the number of monsters;
* Play the monsters like a powergamer i.e. let them flank, help (to gain advantage), attack from range, use ambushes and traps, cover;
* Use area affects attacks, magical and non-magical; and
* Do not be afraid using a more powerful monster with a higher 'to hit' bonus. If you worried that it is too powerful, you could easily have it partly wounded or suffering from a condition (also think diseases or madness).

Like many others have said, as you enter mid-to-higher levels the monsters begin landing blows more often.

 

[Rya.Reisender]

I think this is all intentional as it actually increases the fun players have in combat.

Basically players hit monsters most of the time - they would have less fun if they missed more often than they hit. Monster have high HP to rebalance this.

PC on the other hand have less HP, but are also hit much less. This also increases the fun. The dynamic that hits are rare, but if they hit, they can be pretty bad, really requires the players to react more to what's happening so they need to constantly reconsider their strategy, which definitely makes combat more fun for them.

Also it results in battle outcomes to be quite different. You may have a battle where the PCs didn't take any damage at all. Which is nice because then they can continue traveling / exploring without downtime. On the other hand, every third or so battle requires their everything, so they also still feel the sense of threat and are scared to die.

 

[Li Shenron]

My experience at running 5e is admittedly low.

However, I've been a player in several campaigns. I've started to notice that monsters appear to struggle to land attacks on players, in some instances needing to roll extremely high to even touch a PC. In some cases, if a paladin, eldritch knight, or similar such characters are in a group, it appears that CR-appropriate creatures are often just praying for a critical so as to be able to do anything.

I'm unsure if this is a common occurrence or some weird oddity of the character building choices common among those with whom I game. As I, at some point, will likely be running future campaigns, I'm trying to be cognizant of issues which may occur.

I realize that, as DM, I'm not necessarily trying to kill a PC, but I feel as though some fights become anti-climactic (and start to really drag at higher levels) when monsters appear to be somewhat impotent.

I'd appreciate input concerning whether or not this is a "problem" others have encountered.

I do agree with the feeling that the monsters miss more often than the PCs, but I think this is by design, and the general intention is to increase the possible number of encounters in an adventuring day.

If you want to change this, you can use higher-CR monsters, or use more monsters per encounter, or just play the monsters smarter in combat, but then you have to be prepared that the adventuring day will shorten.

 

[5ekyu]

My idea was to replace the Advantage granted from flanking with just a +1 to attacks against a flanked opponent.

I have toyed with making flank benefit read "when flanking, you may help the opposing attacker's help roll agsinst this targrt as a bonus sction."

This gives it a cost to perform and limits it to one attack. Imo even a +1 is too much free for a slight reposition. This let's flanking turn into a tool for those who dont have other better bonus action uses.

However, its theory cuz we have not tried it, flanking not our preferred style at all.

 

[Baldurs_Underdark]

If your players have too high AC, just Fireball them.

 

[Imaculata]

I had similar issues in 3rd edition, where player armor can get absurdly high (especially with certain prestige classes).

So what I do, is throw monsters at them that are 2 CR's higher than should be appropriate, and I use monsters that attack other weaknesses of their characters. I still struggle occasionally to land hits, but when they do hit, the damage can be insanely high.