D&D 5E Monster Tactics: How Ruthless a DM are you?

[the Jester]

Don't forget to include personality too. Dragons are supposed to be haughty and arrogant. If your dragon's buddy's ever found out about his tactics he would be the laughing stock of all of the dragon socials. The big cowardly dragon who was afraid to fight the PCs.

Dragons fight like Genghis Khan. It doesn't matter how you win, only if you win.

 

[Eric V]

My monsters fight as smart as their stats and personalities indicate they should.

In the case of the dragon you mentioned, I'd actually have taken another option: Breathe, fly away for a while, wait for the pcs to expend resources. Come back, breathe, fly away. Repeat a few times. Only come in for the kill once they were already softened up.

That makes a lot of sense. However, even when creatures are smart, sometimes they are really arrogant, and so don't make the best tactical decisions based on that flaw. Think of how Dr. Doom usually loses, despite being smarter in every way than his opponents.

 

[billd91]

That makes a lot of sense. However, even when creatures are smart, sometimes they are really arrogant, and so don't make the best tactical decisions based on that flaw. Think of how Dr. Doom usually loses, despite being smarter in every way than his opponents.

Another issue to keep in mind is that most monsters that have any decent brains aren't fighting just to whittle away PC resources (including hit points or PC kills). They're going to fight to survive and live to fight another day. That means they may hit hard enough to gain the room they need to get away or at least fight while conserving their own hides. That may give the PCs more opportunity to be clever, but most monsters aren't winning a brute force fight against multiple PCs anyway.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Think of how Dr. Doom usually loses, despite being smarter in every way than his opponents.

So the dragon should send a Simulacrum at the party, while it remains a thousand miles away and safe in its lair? The actual Dr. Doom has only lost twice.

 

[Ahrimon]

I'd have the dragon fight smartly, but in it's arrogance would land to engage. Then if things went bad it would retreat and begin plotting a terrible revenge. The PCs get their victory and earn a long time enemy. =)

 

[DaveDash]

I play the enemies based on their personality and intelligence/wisdom.

I will kill characters outright even when they don't have much of a chance (i,e let's say they roll bad initiative or are surprised by Assassins), ambush them when they're resting, and pull the entire dungeon onto them if it makes sense to.

They need something to spend all that gold on now in this edition (raise dead).

Having said that though, I haven't killed (or even dropped) a character yet in 5e. I've come close (Enemy wizard + Bigby's Hand + nearby cliff). My campaign started at level 11, it seems much harder to drop characters now due to hit point scaling and such.

 

[Dausuul]

My monsters fight as smart as their stats and personalities indicate they should.

Yup, same here. Zombies shamble forward and attack the nearest foe until it drops. Ogres whale on whoever dealt them a lot of damage most recently. Ghouls are ambushers who like to rip into fallen foes, which makes them very dangerous (if you drop to zero, they'll finish you off instead of moving on to your still-conscious buddies). Mind flayers are clever tacticians but cowardly. They'll bail on a winnable fight, leaving their thralls to die, if they feel personally threatened. Dragons are bold, cunning fighters, using hit-and-run tactics from the air and aggressively targeting the biggest threat, but they're arrogant and overconfident, which can sometimes be used against them.

 

[ranger69]

I have always tried to use rational tactics depending on the creatures personality, wisdom and intelligence. Most creatures would rather run to fight another day.
However, in 3.5, I have not hesitated to use coup-de-grace if it was a reasonable tactic by the opponent.

 

[Riley37]

In one of my favorite game arcs, the party was travelling through mountains to retrieve a McGuffin (the flower of a plant which only grew in the mountains and only bloomed in that season), and the main adversary was a Chaos Troll. The GM played it as "cunning, not smart". It didn't have the INT to devise traps more complicated than, say, a tripline or deadfall, but it knew where to set those up so that it could attack while we were dealing with a trap. It used harassing tactics to get us to deplete magical resources. It used its "home ground" knowledge of the terrain. It would run away to regenerate. We got the McGuffin... by keeping the troll at a standoff, not by killing it.

The player group was two teenagers playing warriors with high stats but few skills, and two adults playing veterans with lower stats and lots of skills; the teens played impulsively, the adults played more of a goal-oriented strategy. That was a good match for the GM's methods. He wanted the teen players AND their PCs, to learn from their elders, while also having moments of glory that the elders could not directly match.

 

[Eric V]

So the dragon should send a Simulacrum at the party, while it remains a thousand miles away and safe in its lair? The actual Dr. Doom has only lost twice.

How current on Doom are you? He's lost a bunch of times in person and his plans getting foiled also count as losses.