D&D 5E Challenging High-Level 5e Characters

[Quickleaf]

Can you outline the clustered initiative thing for me? Or restate it in a different way than earlier :'D

Sure. A 4-person party face some goblins, an ogre, and an evil mage. They get the following initiative results...

19. PC Rogue
15. Goblins
14. PC Cleric
13. PC Fighter
8. Evil Mage
6. Ogre
3. PC Wizard

After the goblins go, the cleric & fighter can go in whatever order they like, and I even let them intermix their turns. For example, the fighter might to run past ogre (to reach the evil mage), provoking an opportunity attack. Let's say fighter got hit and downed. The cleric could move in and heal the fighter up. Then the fighter could keep moving.

Even if you don't like the messiness of intermixing turns, this approach allows for more strategy. For example, if the PC Wizard had init 14, and PC Fighter 13, the fighter could choose to attack then get out of the way for the wizard to fireball.

EDIT: In fact, just realized that in my theoretical here, the Wizard & Rogue can do the same thing.

 

[Quickleaf]

It's a good idea, but if their deliberations are adding an extra hour (give or take) to encounters, then asking them to complete it while you set up is... ambitious. IME, the best option is to have a conversation with them like they're adults (this is assuming they're adults; I really haven't had much experience running for kids, apart from when I was still a kid). That way the group can discuss it and come to a consensus about how to handle the issue.

I've had DMs try to impose arbitrary limits on planning (you have X amount of time to decide what you do) and unless the group has bought in, it tends to go over like a lead balloon. The thing those DMs didn't do was actually discuss it with their group.

I agree that an initiative system that is reasonably predictable and consistent helps with this. The default 5e system makes turn order too random and unpredictable to easily plan around. Which can be fun in a way that demands adaptation, but for groups that spend a lot of time discussing tactics it just means another round of discussion as soon as their plan goes off the rails.

Yeah, it's very group dependent.

For example, I had a group of Navy intelligence guys who could really get lost in the details of a plan. 30-60 minutes easily. With them, I was able to say: "For this infiltration adventure, we have about 4 hours in our session, let's devote the 1st hour to planning and recon, and the rest to playing it out?" We agreed quickly, and for them it worked great to focus them, give the player who got antsy during planning that reassurance that it wouldn't just spin on forever, and gave the deep-planners of the group a satisfying chunk of time to get into the details.

Since doing that, I've had much more success with encouraging a football huddle at start of combat than I've had falling flat on my face with that suggestion. Across a wide spectrum of groups in-person and on-line. But yeah, YMMV.

 

[Stalker0]

I found the hardest thing to meet in OP's criteria were running challenging high level encounters that didn't take two or three hours to run.
Any tips there?

Terrain and environment is nice because it can often add damage or threat but there are no HP to eliminate, the terrain threat often ends when the fight ends.

From the dm side, I now use a dice roller for most of my rolls. Some of my players still like physical but when you’re rolling for a dozen monsters I just prefer the raw speed of a dice roller. Or if it’s a consistent every round effect, i may just use the average.

 

[ECMO3]

If you have your canonical four player party and your monster is dropping two of them every turn then they're not going to get very far. And dropping three is TPK territory. Now, if you had a six or eight player party then that's another matter.

A party can usually deal with 2 PCs being downed every turn as long as someone who is not downed has healing. If someone who is not downed has healing word one PC getting downed doesn't really even reduce the parties overall effectiveness.

Healing Word is really one of the most powerful spells in the game. It is a bonus action to cast so you don't even lose your action and you bring a downed guy back and he is not any worse for the wear.

 

[Micah Sweet]

A party can usually deal with 2 PCs being downed every turn as long as someone who is not downed has healing. If someone who is not downed has healing word one PC getting downed doesn't really even reduce the parties overall effectiveness.

Healing Word is really one of the most powerful spells in the game. It is a bonus action to cast so you don't even lose your action and you bring a downed guy back and he is not any worse for the wear.

Yeah. Really not a fan of Healing Word. It changes the whole game.

 

[Distracted DM]

Yeah Healing Word is ... yeah. Bonus action heals change a lot. Especially RANGED bonus action heals.
I wonder if making it Touch range would assuage some gripes- I'm guessing that the purpose for HW's existence is so the cleric doesn't have to spend their turn healing another character and not doing damage etc. themselves.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Yeah. Really not a fan of Healing Word. It changes the whole game.

Yeah Healing Word is ... yeah. Bonus action heals change a lot. Especially RANGED bonus action heals.
I wonder if making it Touch range would assuage some gripes- I'm guessing that the purpose for HW's existence is so the cleric doesn't have to spend their turn healing another character and not doing damage etc. themselves.

Do you think these issues would be meaningfully addressed if healing word could only be used a limited number of times per day?

 

[Micah Sweet]

Do you think these issues would be meaningfully addressed if healing word could only be used a limited number of times per day?

Potentially. But of course it's not a cantrip, so it already is limited.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Potentially. But of course it's not a cantrip, so it already is limited.

How about a limited number of times per recipient? Perhaps, for example, Con mod?

 

[Fanaelialae]

A party can usually deal with 2 PCs being downed every turn as long as someone who is not downed has healing. If someone who is not downed has healing word one PC getting downed doesn't really even reduce the parties overall effectiveness.

Healing Word is really one of the most powerful spells in the game. It is a bonus action to cast so you don't even lose your action and you bring a downed guy back and he is not any worse for the wear.

I'm not following your math here.

Standard 4 person party. 2 PCs downed every turn. One healer (I'll be generous and assume the healer won't be targeted unless all other party members are downed first). I'll also assume side initiative, since that way downed party members won't have their turns skipped if they would act before the healer's turn. The healer will use HW on their turn to get an ally conscious. Since you can't also cast a non-cantrip spell on a turn that you cast a BA spell, we'll assume that's all the healing they can provide (most healers don't have class features that provide non-spell healing options). I'll also assume a powerful solo monster so that the damage remains consistent throughout the encounter.

Start: 4 acting party members (APM)
Monster acts: 2 downed party members (DPM)
Players act: 3 APM
Monster acts: 3 DPM
Players act: 2 APM
Monster acts: 4 DPM (probable TPK)

If the party wins initiative, they have 9 combined turns to take down the monster before the monster takes them out. If they lose initiative, they have a total of 5 turns to take the monster out.

Admittedly, if the players can kill the monster quickly enough, the fight might be winnable. But since HW only restores enough HP to be conscious (the next hit is likely to down the character again) the DPMs/rnd could easily increase if the monster has AoEs or multiple attacks, since it just needs to tap the HW recipients to down them again.

I'm not disputing that HW changes the dynamic of combats. It certainly does. However, unless you have multiple healers in the party, or a life cleric that can heal using a class feature, or the party has enough offense to kill the monster before it takes its 3rd turn, I don't see how you can down 2 characters a turn and not have it result in a TPK, even with HW. Unless you have some kind of house rule that allows a caster to cast 2 HWs a round, but that would be more an issue with that house rule than HW, IMO.