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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Rel" data-source="post: 1190513" data-attributes="member: 99">Well I certainly agree that the next session should be a "good time" for the players.  But then that was really my goal for the first session too.  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f600.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":D" title="Big grin    :D"  data-smilie="8"data-shortname=":D" /> I appreciate that most of you supported the decision I made and agreed that it isn't always easy to come up with the perfect solution to such a problem in the middle of a session.  As I said right from the start, there's been no lasting harm done by the way I handled the encounter.  But I do think that I've arrived at a philisophical "middle ground" between the two extremes (in my view) of sticking to the letter of what I have written in my notes (even if it means wiping out the party when they make a questionable decision) and "spoon feeding" them the encounters so that even if they make bad decisions that they'll still be just fine.This middle ground is thus:  I'm going to try to keep firmly in my mind the purpose behind the encounter in the metagame sense and alter things such that this purpose can be achieved if at all possible.In retrospect, after careful consideration, I think the call I made was not the best one.  That isn't because it wasn't a reasonable outcome given the circumstances the party put themselves in compared with the preparations the bad guys made.  It was not the best call because the encounter failed to achieve its purposes.There were two goals that I was going after with the encounter.  First I wanted to just give the party a chance to test themselves in combat against opponents who were tough, but straightforward and beatable.  Second, I wanted to plant the suspicion in the mind of the party (and in particular that of Speaks With Stone) that it might be enemy Druids who sent the Shambling Mounds after them.Neither of those goals were met.  The combat was entirely one-sided and, once the Druid and Barbarian lost the Initiative they were doomed.  And instead of hinting at the Druids, I laid those cards right out on the table.  And that's why I should have made a different call:  The path I chose left very little chance that either of my goals for the encounter would be met.But it did teach me this valuable lesson about being mindful of the purpose of an encounter in deciding how to react to changing circumstances during the game.  And so in that sense it was very instructional.I thank you all very much for helping me organize my thoughts and give other insights to the situation.  This is one of the primary reasons that I value this community so highly.</blockquote>

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