DM Encounter Advice

[Ridley's Cohort]

Key summary: players should have the opportunity to realize the nature of their mistakes, and back off.

I think this is a good summary, and well worth committing to memory.

Until the PCs hit middling high levels where they might be expected to have powerful mobility enhancing magic, it is often too difficult to disengage from a losing combat without conceding the lives of the majority of the party. That is a slight overgeneralization, but only a small one. When the opposition is run aggressively, the RAW does not give much room for error to even a PC who moves 30 -- lots of monsters move faster, especially on their home turf.

IMNSHO the DM should fudge things to make the mistake more obvious earlier than is necessarily dictated by the rules. FREX, one of the PCs might "luckily" make a spectacular Listen roll that tells him in amazing detail the composition of the enemies that are 2 or 3 rounds away. If the PCs know for certain that they are going to lose in 4 rounds, they are less likely to stick to the doomed path.

"Realism" can cause TPKs. There are both advantages and disadvantages to realism. The DM should do so with his eyes open.

 

[Rel]

"Realism" can cause TPKs.

That's a feature, not a bug, right?

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

That's a feature, not a bug, right?

Depends on which side of the screen you are sitting on.

 

[Hussar]

Something else to remember, and this is something I'm constantly guilty of, is that the players NEVER have as much of the picture as you do. What may seem blindingly obvious to the DM doesn't necessarily mean it's so clear to everyone else.

Really, dropping the Cluebat on the PC's many, many times isn't a bad thing.

 

[Wraith Form]

There was only one small problem with the overwhelming encounter in your post (which from the sound of things was a success anyway, as it wasn't a TPK), the players didn't get quite enough of a chance to realise how tough it was. There was just a tiny mistake imo - when the rabbit came out you shouldn't have had it being chased. That started the encounter off with the PCs believing it was a small, manageable monster group. So given that info, it was understandable that they fought. Instead you could just have had the abberrations not spot the rabbit, and the PCs would have gotten the info.

This was basically my exact thoughts as I read your post.

 

[Wraith Form]

Really, dropping the Cluebat on the PC's many, many times isn't a bad thing.

Link disabled, sorry.

 

[Hussar]

Link disabled, sorry.

Weird, it works for me. Hrm... let's try again:

 

[NCSUCodeMonkey]

That's a feature, not a bug, right?

Heck yeah!

 

[kigmatzomat]

Another alternative to just brutalizing the players in combat is to brutalize them socially. Say they're riding along a small trail and find goblin tracks. The players can a) ignore them or b) go hunting. If they hunt, they can easily kill the goblins they find in a small camp with lots of trap-making supplies.

Regardless, they get to the town the next valley over, who has some form of monster problem. The townies beg for assistance/offer reward/etc and when the players agree, they are told that the only people to meet the monster and survive are the goblin trappers that live back up the road. When asked, the townies agree that the goblins are ignorant and rude but smart enough to figure out that (X number) goblins isn't enough to really challenge the town. Plus, they seem addicted to java beans/cocoa/whiskey/other local product and find it easier to buy the stuff than make it themselves.

It either indirectly punishes them for killing the goblins without at least a little Q&A or gets them used to the idea that sometimes it's worth it to open discussion with the monsters.


Another option is the "ransom" approach. Have an intelligent foe who's obviously on the losing end of the fight, throw down their weapons and yell "I surrender and offer ransom!" The players will be confused at first but essentially the foe will offer to buy his own life. Could be he has a cache of goodies too heavy to carry around, or his tribe will be willing to provide something of value for the hostage's safe return.

This also gets rid of the problem some people have with giving out treasure. How do you justify an ogre carrying around a crystal mask, porcelain statue, or even a hundred pounds of copper coin? Much easier to say they are in the ogre's hoard, not their pack.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

Without having read other responses in the thread yet...

First of all, one thing I really hate in D&D is the idea that as you level up, you only ever face monsters tailored to your level. So I usually design my sessions with that in mind. Obviously, as a general rule, whatever the PC's fight they can beat - but I like to put things in the world that they just have no chance of beating at that level (because, realistically, that is the case) as well as things that don't stand the foggiest chance against them. I think it's more realistic.

If you read the DMG again (for the first time? ) you'll find that encounters really ARE supposed to work that way. To an extent it's accurate in that the party's level is used as a gauge for what to throw at them, but the encounters themselves are supposed to vary between very easy, and NEAR TPK's. Encounters are supposed to be DESIGNED to fit the DM's needs at a given point. Some easy, some deadly. On top of which I think there is also the suggestion that there SHOULD be things in the campaign world that the party might be aware of and encounter in some way, but that they CANNOT defeat. This gives the campaign setting a feeling of NOT being tailored specifically to the PC's but that the world they move through has content that is independant of the PC's - even though the encounters DO use the party level as a design centerpoint.

Was that wrong? Should I design every encounter so that the party, if they so chose to do, can run in and kick every thing's a**?

No, but you DID miss a fairly important little nuance. You designed the ADVENTURE, but not the individual encounters in such a way as to avoid what happened - the party charging in and then being in way above their heads but unable to realize or understand their danger in a timely manner.

What advice can you give to me? What am I doing wrong here? I know I'm far from a great DM. I'm still trying to learn. I do way, way better on the whole social interaction side of things than I do on the combat encounter side. But I thought this session was going to be a really fun, sneaky, stealthy session - not a "oh god, we're overwhelmed, stuck, and now fighting for our lives, while also frustrated and upset because this is completely and totally impossible" kind of session.

In an ADVENTURE that is being designed to be completed by sneaking and stealth you MUST design initial encounters that will ensure that the PC's understand the dangers of open confrontation and that stealth is the preferred option. Just because the druid HAPPENS to grab a rabbit to use as a scout doesn't count. What would have happened if he HADN'T? YOU need to communicate the necesary information to the party rather than the party being so tediously thorough as to eliminate possible disasters FOR you, if you see what I mean.

You establish for the party the problem - BBEG making bigger evil guys out of lesser evil guys - with friends and family as unwilling victims as well. You lead them to the location where this will take place. Good so far. If, however, the rest of the adventure is to require them to be sneaky you MUST design the next encounter/set of encounters to communicate clearly to the party that they MUST be sneaky. You can't just leave it to them to MAYBE figure that out for themselves.

Any DM can kill the PC's without thinking (often that IS the reason - they weren't thinking) so you have to arrange events to make it their choice between direct assault/certain death, or stealth/likely success. That means that they have to become aware that those ARE the choices in the first place.

For example, the PC's come upon a cave in the wilderness. They enter and are all killed in 2 rounds by the Great Dragon Carexhaust. You can't then tell them, "Well you should have known better that Carexhaust lived here," if you haven't ever given them reason to know that, let them TRY to know that, or just provided that bit of trivia anyway. You have to have made the PC's aware of the legendary dragon and where his lair was, or given clues as they approached the cave that what was inside or in the area was DANGEROUS. PC's should NEVER, EVER walk into certain death unless it is by their own stupid choices - generally a choice to IGNORE all the danger signs and warnings that you give them.

The DM always wins by default. For the PC's to succeed he has to CONSTANTLY provide them the knowledge and the opportunities they will need to do so. PC's survive and succeed because you let them. They have to work for it, but you make it much more difficult for them when they work in the dark.

Advice? Please...? (Feel free to make fun of, mock, and chastise me for poor DMing, too - I have it coming. Won't take it personally. I need to learn...)

You're funny looking. Monkees can be trained to be better DM's than you. Don't ever do this again or I'll burn your DM screen.