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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 4980720" data-attributes="member: 4937">I really didn't want to get into this, but its derailing the thread anyway so...I bet not.  Anyone that arbitrarily adds 1000 extra hit points to his NPC's to make them 'epic' is going to have no problem 'challenging' the players.  Congradulations, you've just discovered that DM's are omnipotent.  But what are you going to do with that authority?I'm one of the biggest proponents of DM authority on the boards, but if you have such an adversarial relationship to your players that you are afraid of 'looking weak' by asking them what they want from their play experience, something is big time wrong.If your players feel like they are being cheated or treated unfairly, there is a good chance that in this case it is because they have been cheated and are being treated unfairly.Having fun?  Providing a reasonable level of challenge for the offered reward?  Filling out your world so that it feels believable and immersive?I'm for exception based design as much as the next guy, but saying that you need to throw 1500 h.p. monsters out there is, particularly in the context of your other over the top advice, just ridiculous.  Arbitarily giving a monster as much hit points as a god just to up the ante is highly suggestive of arbitrarily deciding when the fight should or shouldn't be over, and of a DM with serious authority issues whose just yanking players through hoops.In the long list of bad advice, this is the worst.  While it's important that the monsters threaten the players, if you are having problems with cake walks, arbitrarily upping the amount of damage is a recipe for disaster that tends to turn the entire combat on the question of who wins initiative (which in turn tends to encourage both DM and player to cheat!).  There are so many ways to challenge players that don't depend on simplistic high stake slugfest other than upping damage that increasing damage dealt is probably the last tool you should be reaching for.I find this statement unintentionally revealling.  Whatever you do, do not turn your table into a power struggle over the game.  If your characters are being tempted to moan and complain, you've already got the game off on the wrong foot.  Do not adopt this sort of adversarial stance; you are looking for big time trouble. Beyond the problem DM/player confrontation assumed in the statement, why do you want an enemy that can 'wipe the floor with your player's characters' in the first place?  In theory, there may be a boss out there that can wipe the floor with the player characters, but such should never be a forgone conclusion nor should such a character be motivated to do so, else you are simply going to have dead characters at the hands of an utterly unfair DM toy.</blockquote>

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