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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AaronOfBarbaria" data-source="post: 6939598" data-attributes="member: 6701872">To you, perhaps. To a majority of the gaming community? I don't think so. I don't see how you aren't aware of the inconsistency in your opinions you've expressed.In one post you decry how little help there is for new DMs to actually run things "right" - which I still would love to see your answers to my questions regarding exactly what you think could be done better than the advice WotC is already making sure to include - and say that it's the game's "fault" if things don't go according to plan.In the next, you seem to believe that new players and DMs wouldn't be completely left in the dust by a game that expects them to be players of intermediate or greater skill by being designed for such a degree of players.Where as I think it makes perfect sense to aim at the lowest skill players so that no one feels like they are staring down a "must be this tall to ride" sign suggesting they bugger off to some other game, and then assume that with play experience comes the ability to elevate the game on your own - which is working out for so many of the rest of us that I can't help but feel that you, just like us, have the ability to do the same, but refuse to actually do it.That runs reverse of everything I've experienced or been told on the matter....and if WotC gave you the super-charged monsters you'd like, I'd have to run them as if they were mentally deficient in order not to slaughter the PCs at my table.I much prefer the monsters as-is, which I can use to challenge my players without any difficulty by virtue of being an experienced DM - and with you and I being equals, or you being the superior DM, that means you could do it too, if you wanted to, of course.I am not "interfering" by sharing my opinion in a public forum. If you really feel like any disagreement with you is an "intrusion", you should not be posting on a forum - a blog with no comment section is a more appropriate place to share your thoughts if you aren't willing to treat other's opinions with the respect you demand of your own.If monster design does that, it forces players to play their character in a specific way or fail - forcing everyone to be an optimizer is not a preferable state.Especially not when the DM of optimizing players can accommodate the higher difficulty challenges such characters can handle through use of the tools already available - if they stop complaining that the game has decided to support other play-styles and skill levels and just do it.So I'll close with asking again: What could Curse of Strahd say instead of, or in addition to, the  paragraphs describing Strahd's tactics that would help a DM not have  the kind of unexpected result and minor mistakes that the OP describes  experiencing? How can the game teach a DM to do it "right" in such a way  that no portion of the reason for things going "wrong" can be said to  be the DM's completely understandable, entirely not condemning, human  error? [MENTION=6787650]Hemlock[/MENTION] gave an answer, though it's not one I can really respond to yet, as I am still rolling around the ideas presented in my head so I can determine what I think about what was said.</blockquote>

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