D&D (2024) A Different Way To Run High Level Monsters

[aco175]

Does it make sense to reduce the HP threshold if the PCs fail to deal the 150hp in the first round. It seems that the overall damage is still being dealt and the monster would start to tire. Dropping it by 25-50 each round would still be hard and in a couple rounds a zone would still die once it threshold dropped enough.

I am thinking that if the players do not know how this fight is different than other fights, they might break up and have only a couple attacking different parts/zones and the 5 PCs deal a total of 150hp in the round, they manage to deal it across three zones. Maybe throw in a minimum amount needed to lower the threshold.

 

[jgsugden]

High level singular deadly combats suffer two fates: They're overpowered by PCs or the DM contrives ways to prolong them. If the PCs can prepare for the fight they have enough tools that they should be able to modify the rules of the fight to give them the win. This is true of virtually all combats once PCs hit about 13th level - sometimes earlier.

As an example, I had a party of high level PCs with two of the PCs being able to cast Distant Spell Vortex Warp. They would use readied actions to pop in a melee character that could deal 200 damage and then extract the melee PC - before we got to the end of the fighter's turn so no legendary action could be used. Against many foes, that tactic was a nearly impossible to beat winne unless I specifically built to counter it.

You're just not going to be able to contain these high level PCs unless you push contrivance and rules modifications to the point where you invalidate their high level abilities ... and at the point you do that, you're essentially taking the game away from the players and the choices they made in building up their PCs. If a PC invested in Nova Damage and you say, No more than 150 per round matters ... it is essentially telling them they can't have the PC they want to play, right?

To that end, I find that the key to higher level combats and adventures is not narrowing what we allow the PCs to do, but instead broadening their goals so that they have more than just survival and killing to focus upon. Give them things to protect. Give them things to stop. Give them environmental concerns to manage. Make the battle less about the Big Bad and increase the things the PCs need to consider. I try to use this at every level, but it become a bigger piece of the puzzle at higher levels.

You might counter my suggestion by saying that adding a thing to protect, a ritual to stop, or environmental concerns to manage is also limiting them. I agree. They can't use the abilities they gathered in the way they want to use them without allowing this other concern to fail. However, this conflicting priority is different than adding a mechanic to require limits on the damage that can be meaningfully dealt in that the conflicting priority can be story driven and part of the design of the encounter from a storytelling perspective. It adds to the epic-ness of the moment by adding to the tale ... rather than just making the combat prolonged.

But can't the PCs just focus on the enemy first and then turn to the secondary concerns? They can, but then there can be story ramifications for those choices. That is easier to do in longer campaigns where PCs have an investment in elements of the campaign, but it isn't that hard in shorter campaigns / one shots if you work with the players.

This approach has worked for me for decades. It is one of the reasons why my higher level campaigns tend to continue to work much longer than other people's games.

 

[evilbob]

Very cool. Great idea for facing Tiamat (or similar).

Re: players getting stunned, I learned back in 3.5 that stunning the party was just a bad time for everyone. People want agency, and losing a turn just feels bad. I like legendary actions that do AOE instead.

What thresholds did you use for the MoM? 150 hp again? I feel like that's one level 17 fighter's turn.

 

[evilbob]

To that end, I find that the key to higher level combats and adventures is not narrowing what we allow the PCs to do, but instead broadening their goals so that they have more than just survival and killing to focus upon.

The key difference is that instead of restrictions, you're giving them options - and they can respond with whatever tools they want. Functionality similar but oh so different in perspective. Great post.

 

[Reynard]

Very cool. Great idea for facing Tiamat (or similar).

Re: players getting stunned, I learned back in 3.5 that stunning the party was just a bad time for everyone. People want agency, and losing a turn just feels bad. I like legendary actions that do AOE instead.

What thresholds did you use for the MoM? 150 hp again? I feel like that's one level 17 fighter's turn.

Each portion had a different AC and Threshold sort of balanced (by gut) relative to one another and tat part's offensive capabilities.

 

[Reynard]

High level singular deadly combats suffer two fates: They're overpowered by PCs or the DM contrives ways to prolong them. If the PCs can prepare for the fight they have enough tools that they should be able to modify the rules of the fight to give them the win. This is true of virtually all combats once PCs hit about 13th level - sometimes earlier.

As an example, I had a party of high level PCs with two of the PCs being able to cast Distant Spell Vortex Warp. They would use readied actions to pop in a melee character that could deal 200 damage and then extract the melee PC - before we got to the end of the fighter's turn so no legendary action could be used. Against many foes, that tactic was a nearly impossible to beat winne unless I specifically built to counter it.

You're just not going to be able to contain these high level PCs unless you push contrivance and rules modifications to the point where you invalidate their high level abilities ... and at the point you do that, you're essentially taking the game away from the players and the choices they made in building up their PCs. If a PC invested in Nova Damage and you say, No more than 150 per round matters ... it is essentially telling them they can't have the PC they want to play, right?

To that end, I find that the key to higher level combats and adventures is not narrowing what we allow the PCs to do, but instead broadening their goals so that they have more than just survival and killing to focus upon. Give them things to protect. Give them things to stop. Give them environmental concerns to manage. Make the battle less about the Big Bad and increase the things the PCs need to consider. I try to use this at every level, but it become a bigger piece of the puzzle at higher levels.

You might counter my suggestion by saying that adding a thing to protect, a ritual to stop, or environmental concerns to manage is also limiting them. I agree. They can't use the abilities they gathered in the way they want to use them without allowing this other concern to fail. However, this conflicting priority is different than adding a mechanic to require limits on the damage that can be meaningfully dealt in that the conflicting priority can be story driven and part of the design of the encounter from a storytelling perspective. It adds to the epic-ness of the moment by adding to the tale ... rather than just making the combat prolonged.

But can't the PCs just focus on the enemy first and then turn to the secondary concerns? They can, but then there can be story ramifications for those choices. That is easier to do in longer campaigns where PCs have an investment in elements of the campaign, but it isn't that hard in shorter campaigns / one shots if you work with the players.

This approach has worked for me for decades. It is one of the reasons why my higher level campaigns tend to continue to work much longer than other people's games.

We did not encounter any of the problems you are concerned about. Now, it was a con game and all the pregens were built by one player. I analyzed those pregens to get my Threshold numbers in the right range,so more "organically" built PCs might play differently. But I don't think it is worthwhile to design for edgecases, whether the underpowered or overpowered build.

 

[jgsugden]

We did not encounter any of the problems you are concerned about. Now, it was a con game and all the pregens were built by one player. I analyzed those pregens to get my Threshold numbers in the right range,so more "organically" built PCs might play differently. But I don't think it is worthwhile to design for edgecases, whether the underpowered or overpowered build.

You explicitly did encounter them by your own description of the mechanics. You effectively limited how much damage the PCs could deal to the creature by giving it the 150 hp bubbles to fill out. That was you contriving a way to make the combats last longer.

Walk me through something. The reason you did this experiment was because the PCs (in mock ups before the event) were doing over 550 hp damage in less than 2 rounds.

... I playtested a couple times and each one, the damage power output of the PCs was just unbelievable, and even CR 25 Legendary creatures with minions died in less than 2 rounds...

You implemented your approach and effectively limited the damage they could deal each round to 150 hps (I have been assuming they could not deplete two 'hit boxes' in the same round - let me know if I misread that limitation ... because if I did, I'm not sure what the benefit of lowering the hp required to kill does for you here). Let's say you're looking at 90 damage per PC per turn. That would be 2 activations for a box.

Rd 1 begins: Colossus goes and deals a bunch of damage, but no PCs fall. PC 1 goes and deals 90. Legendary Action. PC 2 goes and deals 90 - filling a box. We get another Legendary Action. What do PC 3 and PC 4 get to do? Clean up summons? Heal the party? After all, they can't meaningfully damage the Colossus now because someone else did.

Rd 2 begins: Colossus goes again and is unable to fell a PC. PC 1 goes and deals 90. Legendary Action. PC 2 goes and deals 90 - filling a box. We get another Legendary Action. What do PC 3 and PC 4 get to do? Clean up summons? Heal the party?

This seems to focus the action to the PCs that go first and relegates the other PCs to clean up duty - or just hiding to wait. What if a PC that deals damage as the majority of their schtick rolls a low initiative? By the time they get a turn there is really nothing for them to do except perhaps clean up a Shield Guardian. That invalides their build.

The problems I described seem to be front and center in your situation.

 

[Reynard]

You explicitly did encounter them by your own description of the mechanics. You effectively limited how much damage the PCs could deal to the creature by giving it the 150 hp bubbles to fill out. That was you contriving a way to make the combats last longer.

You seem to have misunderstood: that wasn't a contrivance, it was a solution to a real world problem.

Walk me through something. The reason you did this experiment was because the PCs (in mock ups before the event) were doing over 550 hp damage in less than 2 rounds. You implemented your approach and effectively limited the damage they could deal each round to 150 hps (I have been assuming they could not deplete two 'hit boxes' in the same round - let me know if I misread that limitation ... because if I did, I'm not sure what the benefit of lowering the hp required to kill does for you here). Let's say you're looking at 90 damage per PC per turn. That would be 2 activations for a box.

Rd 1 begins: Colossus goes and deals a bunch of damage, but no PCs fall. PC 1 goes and deals 90. Legendary Action. PC 2 goes and deals 90 - filling a box. We get another Legendary Action. What do PC 3 and PC 4 get to do? Clean up summons? Heal the party? After all, they can't meaningfully damage the Colossus now because someone else did.

Rd 2 begins: Colossus goes again and is unable to fell a PC. PC 1 goes and deals 90. Legendary Action. PC 2 goes and deals 90 - filling a box. We get another Legendary Action. What do PC 3 and PC 4 get to do? Clean up summons? Heal the party?

This seems to focus the action to the PCs that go first and relegates the other PCs to clean up duty - or just hiding to wait. What if a PC that deals damage as the majority of their schtick rolls a low initiative? By the time they get a turn there is really nothing for them to do except perhaps clean up a Shield Guardian. That invalides their build.

The problems I described seem to be front and center in your situation.

You are making some assumptions that are wrong. Damage numbers were nowhere near that high. On occasion, a character might get close to 100 HP for a round but in general the numbers were much closer to 40.

In addition, each monster had a number of minions that it could use to heal damage done that round by use of its reaction (so only once per round). This meant that not only was the real Threshold higher than the actual number, but also that the PCs were highly motivated to eliminate those minions.

I am not going to argue with you about whether it worked or was a good time. It did, and was.

When I get a chance, I will right up a full draft of the rules and you can judge it then, if you are so inclined.

 

[LordEntrails]

Did the players know the new mechanics? Did they know they had to do 150 HP /rnd in order to make progress toward defeating it?

 

[dave2008]

You seem to have misunderstood: that wasn't a contrivance, it was a solution to a real world problem.

It seems to me, that you are also misunderstanding his point. However, I will let @jgsugden respond if they feel the need as I am not invested in this discussion as the two of you are.