D&D (2024) Is Combat Tedious on Purpose?

[Lanefan]

One solution is - don't even bother. That's what i do. Dropped trash encounters. Only fights party get's into is meaningful fights and fights that make sense in setting. No more bunch of small encounters whose only purpose is to force players to spend some slots or other abilities and then force them to burn recovery abilities, so i can just force same expenditure again trough few encounters. That attrition game gets boring super fast. I activly encourage players to not spare resources "just in case there is bigger fight around corner". There isn't one. I telegraph trough descriptions if the fight is against someone important or against minions.

Thing is, those "trash encounters" still produce both xp and loot - maybe not in huge amounts each time but in the long run it all adds up - and for that alone, they're valuable.

Now, to avoid combat being tedious and grindy, I tailor encounters. I know what's average my group can dish out per round if they go nova and if they don't go nova. So, "small" encounter is one where they can beat it with only their non expendable resources, and monsters have enough hp to survive one round of average damage, do their cool stuff once, then die round two. For "big" encounters- same thing, but they can survive average "nova", act once, die round two.

For me the encounter is what it is, regardless of the party that meets it.

If party rolls well (crits, above damage) they sometimes put them down in round one. Well, so what. At least they feel awesome cause they rolled super well. Either way, they get to use all their cool toys, feel like big heroes and have fun. If they fight big bad and maul him round one before it even gets to act, who cares. High fives and GG for all.

On this much, we agree. If the dice say the PCs win easy, they win easy, even if I'm quietly disappointed as DM.

Where we disagree is when things go sideways, as in...

Other thing i do, is avoid cleanups. Sometimes luck isn't there. People roll low, lot's of misses, lots of low damage rolls. Once they drop opponents to 30% ( either in number of opponents or in number of total enemy hp), i zoom out from combat as a minigame and turn it into narration game. I tell them what oponents are doing ( fleeing, surrendering, some may fight to death) and then players just tell me what they do. No dice rolls needed. I know they will win, they know they will win. No point in dragging it on for few extra round just so they can confirm win trough dice.

...this. Sure the foes might be down to 30% of what they started with but if the PCs are down to 20% there's no way the rest of that combat should be handwaved. And what do you do if it's the PCs who are down to 30% of what they started with but the foes are still rockin' - do the PCs get handwaved to a loss?

Never mind there's always the chance, no matter how small, of the nearly-beaten foes making a mighty comeback (i.e. your DM dice roll smokin' hot for those that are left). Further, there's also the chance even in the most trivial of combats of someone fumbling and breaking a significant possession - a weapon, a shield, whatever - and-or whaling on an ally, which IMO dictates the combat has to be played out.

 

[GrimCo]

Xp if you play with xp. If you don't ( most people i know don't and have switched to milestones ages ago), no loss there. Loot is also insignificant, at least in 5e, if you can't buy magic items. After level 3-4, you got best mundane items you can have. Also, if you are short of cash and morally flexible, there are easier ways to get money in D&D than doing trash encounters.

We don't do fumbles. Nat 1 - you miss. I find weapons breaking and such to boring and they don't add up anything significant (i couldn't be bother to track durability of items). Also, at some point, gear becomes either magical or things like mithral/adamantium.

I handwave only if it's certain the PC's will win, but it will take time. It's like chess. You can see the opponent is gonna win in 3-4-5 turns, no matter what you do. You can eatiher play it out for the sake of playing, or you tip the king and shake hand. Since we are very limited with time to play (3-3.5h top for entire session, including at least half an hour to just catch up and socialize), i'll rather tip the king and go on with something else.

It's probably playstyle thing. I'm gunning for action movie. Rule of cool, kick ass and chew bubble gum. Most of games are also pretty combat light ( with encounter or two per session), so there's very good chance PCs enter combat at or near 100%. Don't get me wrong, we all love good tactical combat and challenging edge of the seats encounters. We just don't have enough time to play that kind of game.

 

[AlViking]

That bold bit is still the problem though. Rest rules themselves set the bar so low the only reasons are effectively "will our gm used fiat to one off change resting rules this rest or will they just troll us into submission with an endless chain of pointless interruptions'.the rules there set the stage for the GM having a choice a choice between failure and creating frustration when it comes to inappropriate rests.

What works for me may not work for thee. Some people will feel that any and all restrictions or limitations on their characters is adversarial and there's nothing I can do about that. We're all just doing the best we can at running the game to make it fun for everyone at the table. If you ever want to discuss solutions instead of just telling me that I'm doing it wrong we can chat.

 

[AlViking]

One solution is - don't even bother. That's what i do. Dropped trash encounters. Only fights party get's into is meaningful fights and fights that make sense in setting. No more bunch of small encounters whose only purpose is to force players to spend some slots or other abilities and then force them to burn recovery abilities, so i can just force same expenditure again trough few encounters. That attrition game gets boring super fast. I activly encourage players to not spare resources "just in case there is bigger fight around corner". There isn't one. I telegraph trough descriptions if the fight is against someone important or against minions.

Now, to avoid combat being tedious and grindy, I tailor encounters. I know what's average my group can dish out per round if they go nova and if they don't go nova. So, "small" encounter is one where they can beat it with only their non expendable resources, and monsters have enough hp to survive one round of average damage, do their cool stuff once, then die round two. For "big" encounters- same thing, but they can survive average "nova", act once, die round two. If party rolls well (crits, above damage) they sometimes put them down in round one. Well, so what. At least they feel awesome cause they rolled super well. Either way, they get to use all their cool toys, feel like big heroes and have fun. If they fight big bad and maul him round one before it even gets to act, who cares. High fives and GG for all.

Other thing i do, is avoid cleanups. Sometimes luck isn't there. People roll low, lot's of misses, lots of low damage rolls. Once they drop opponents to 30% ( either in number of opponents or in number of total enemy hp), i zoom out from combat as a minigame and turn it into narration game. I tell them what oponents are doing ( fleeing, surrendering, some may fight to death) and then players just tell me what they do. No dice rolls needed. I know they will win, they know they will win. No point in dragging it on for few extra round just so they can confirm win trough dice.

Sometimes I have one fight per long rest sometimes it's a half dozen. If it is that one fight per long rest it's likely to be difficult and include goals or tactics that stress the party's capabilities but that's half the fun.

 

[payn]

Xp if you play with xp. If you don't ( most people i know don't and have switched to milestones ages ago), no loss there. Loot is also insignificant, at least in 5e, if you can't buy magic items. After level 3-4, you got best mundane items you can have. Also, if you are short of cash and morally flexible, there are easier ways to get money in D&D than doing trash encounters.

We don't do fumbles. Nat 1 - you miss. I find weapons breaking and such to boring and they don't add up anything significant (i couldn't be bother to track durability of items). Also, at some point, gear becomes either magical or things like mithral/adamantium.

I handwave only if it's certain the PC's will win, but it will take time. It's like chess. You can see the opponent is gonna win in 3-4-5 turns, no matter what you do. You can eatiher play it out for the sake of playing, or you tip the king and shake hand. Since we are very limited with time to play (3-3.5h top for entire session, including at least half an hour to just catch up and socialize), i'll rather tip the king and go on with something else.

It's probably playstyle thing. I'm gunning for action movie. Rule of cool, kick ass and chew bubble gum. Most of games are also pretty combat light ( with encounter or two per session), so there's very good chance PCs enter combat at or near 100%. Don't get me wrong, we all love good tactical combat and challenging edge of the seats encounters. We just don't have enough time to play that kind of game.

Milestone FTW

 

[tetrasodium]

What works for me may not work for thee. Some people will feel that any and all restrictions or limitations on their characters is adversarial and there's nothing I can do about that. We're all just doing the best we can at running the game to make it fun for everyone at the table. If you ever want to discuss solutions instead of just telling me that I'm doing it wrong we can chat.

I think that you are exposing the problem with so many of 5e's trite house rule "solutions" to obvious problems that 5e bends over backwards to create. When obvious problems are pointed out in criticism of said house rule patches the 5e ruleset's inability to have its self created obvious problems easily fixed tends to get shielded by dismissing those criticisms with little more than YMMV & "works for me [must be a you problem]" rather than engaging with the criticism. That endless shielding of 5e's flaws ensures that 5e combat is still tedious after 11 years.

The new mm might have taken some baby steps towards doing better. Ones that should have been done years ago. Unsurprisingly doubling down on years of "5e is the best selling edition ever, wotc should never address [that] & should let it ride as is" resulted in too much of the other core books being not worth the squeeze to fix them or they lack support for alternative rules subsystems other than "PCs don't die " that would have helped address things in ways that created enough excitement to be worth it. At this point it's probably too late for a shakeup book like the 2e' player options:combat and tactics or 3.5's unearthed arcana/phb2/tome of battle:Bo9S that we should have seen years ago & long before the totally but not really compatible2024 edition that's not a new edition.

 

[tetrasodium]

Milestone FTW

Shifting to milestones feels like an effort for 5e to just invoke the wizard of Oz's curtain and declare the benefits exp brings to an ongoing campaign as an incentive while highlighting the efforts to remove the functional viability & value of other motivational incentives like magic items treasure->gold & various no longer all that consumable magic items.

It's not a shift without cost

 

[payn]

Shifting to milestones feels like an effort for 5e to just invoke the wizard of Oz's curtain and declare the benefits exp brings to an ongoing campaign as an incentive while highlighting the efforts to remove the functional viability & value of other motivational incentives like magic items treasure->gold & various no longer all that consumable magic items.

It's not a shift without cost

I’ll pay it all day. My gaming has only improved with milestone and reduction of required magic item golden showers.

 

[AlViking]

I think that you are exposing the problem with so many of 5e's trite house rule "solutions" to obvious problems that 5e bends over backwards to create. When obvious problems are pointed out in criticism of said house rule patches the 5e ruleset's inability to have its self created obvious problems easily fixed tends to get shielded by dismissing those criticisms with little more than YMMV & "works for me [must be a you problem]" rather than engaging with the criticism. That endless shielding of 5e's flaws ensures that 5e combat is still tedious after 11 years.

The new mm might have taken some baby steps towards doing better. Ones that should have been done years ago. Unsurprisingly doubling down on years of "5e is the best selling edition ever, wotc should never address [that] & should let it ride as is" resulted in too much of the other core books being not worth the squeeze to fix them or they lack support for alternative rules subsystems other than "PCs don't die " that would have helped address things in ways that created enough excitement to be worth it. At this point it's probably too late for a shakeup book like the 2e' player options:combat and tactics or 3.5's unearthed arcana/phb2/tome of battle:Bo9S that we should have seen years ago & long before the totally but not really compatible2024 edition that's not a new edition.

I, and my players, have a lot of fun playing the game. That's all that matters to me.

 

[Incenjucar]

Shifting to milestones feels like an effort for 5e to just invoke the wizard of Oz's curtain and declare the benefits exp brings to an ongoing campaign as an incentive while highlighting the efforts to remove the functional viability & value of other motivational incentives like magic items treasure->gold & various no longer all that consumable magic items.

It's not a shift without cost

It's an opportunity to shift from grinding to more impactful and meaningful combat and to develop more meaningful uses for treasure.