D&D General GM's are you bored of your combat and is it because you made it boring?

[Cadence]

That's just my point: NPCs 'built' differently than PCs means by default that one or the other does not fit the story.

Why does the master village black smith or sage have massively more hit points than the apprentice?
Why does the sage have more hp, weapons, and armor, and BAB than the spellcaster?
Should the 20th level sage be able to annihilate a 5th level fighter in combat? (20d6 hp and +15/+10/+5 ?)
Does an NPC elf wizard need to go adventuring to level or could they have studied for centuries?

I'm pretty good with the PCs being able to get everything NPCs have. I think the other way around is trying to force a story that doesn't make sense.

 

[Helldritch]

Each editions had its own strengths, weaknesses and ways to handle things that the others did not. I always said that what a player can do, so can his foes. But the reverse is not true. It never was and never will be and nor should it be.

Evil cheats. Evil does not play fair. That is why BBEG should have powers and abilities that are not available to players. Be it better HP, a bit more spell slots or whatever. What is important is that those changes are written down and not made on the spot for the personal enjoyment mischief of the DM. My players are well aware of my rule for BBEG and they love it even if that rule makes it so that they often get get their asses kicked of harder than what was originally written in an adventure module. I had to do this simply because groups are 6 players with a few followers (depending on the levels) and with every players above 4, BBEG tend to get weaker.

But otherwise, no change is needed in 5ed. Just avoid monotype encounters for fights you want to be harder and all should be good.

 

[Rabulias]

I also struggle with the idea (in 3.5) that an adventurer putting skill points in Profession (Baker) could quickly (like in a year or two of adventuring in game-time) equal or outstrip the skill of a baker who spent 30 years baking.

 

[Lanefan]

Why does the master village black smith or sage have massively more hit points than the apprentice?
Why does the sage have more hp, weapons, and armor, and BAB than the spellcaster?

They don't. That's 3e thinking.

Should the 20th level sage be able to annihilate a 5th level fighter in combat? (20d6 hp and +15/+10/+5 ?)

If the sage had picked up any combat training (rather unlikely) during his sage-ing years then sure; but most likely no. Again, though, you're thinking in 3e terms where NPCs have actual levels in what they do and where those levels drag all sorts of unrelated-to-their-field training baggage along (e.g. a sage learning how to fight).

Get off the 3e train, think of training or study in a non-adventuring field as being training only in that field (e.g. a potter trains to be a better potter but that has nothing whatsoever to do with how well she fights or climbs walls), and you'll be a lot closer.

Does an NPC elf wizard need to go adventuring to level or could they have studied for centuries?

Could have studied for centuries as a stay-at-home wizard. Note this means said wizard would not have the same physical combat skills or hit points as a field-adventuring wizard of the same level as the stay-at-home hasn't had that sort of physical training.

Elves in particular are interesting - they live long enough to learn enough to become high level in numerous classes over their lives; I always assume they lose those learned abilities if they're not maintained, which leads me to a design issue I've had for decades: there's no mechanism in any version of the game for how class abilities decay over time if not used or maintained.

 

[Lanefan]

I also struggle with the idea (in 3.5) that an adventurer putting skill points in Profession (Baker) could quickly (like in a year or two of adventuring in game-time) equal or outstrip the skill of a baker who spent 30 years baking.

My answer here, were I running a 3e-like game, would be to divorce Profession skills from all the other skills and run them thusly:

You can pick one Profession. (option: if you like you can roll a d6, with a '6' allowing you to pick a second one; repeat until you do not roll a 6)

For each Profession, roll a d10 during char-gen for how good you were at it before you started adventuring; the roll becomes how many skill points you get to put there. Thus, if you chose Baker and you rolled 7 on the d10 you start with 7 locked-in skill points in Profession: Baker.

But - and here's the key bit - to change or advance this number further requires spending (several months? a year? two years?) of downtime functioning as a practitioner of that Profession rather than as an adventurer. You cannot augment a Profession skill just by adding points to it during level-up.

Adventuring-related Professions such as fletcher or leatherworker that could be practiced and maintained in the field might not have the same strict downtime requirements, that'd be up to each table/DM to determine.

 

[Cadence]

They don't. That's 3e thinking.
If the sage had picked up any combat training (rather unlikely) during his sage-ing years then sure; but most likely no. Again, though, you're thinking in 3e terms where NPCs have actual levels in what they do and where those levels drag all sorts of unrelated-to-their-field training baggage along (e.g. a sage learning how to fight).

Get off the 3e train, think of training or study in a non-adventuring field as being training only in that field (e.g. a potter trains to be a better potter but that has nothing whatsoever to do with how well she fights or climbs walls), and you'll be a lot closer.

Could have studied for centuries as a stay-at-home wizard. Note this means said wizard would not have the same physical combat skills or hit points as a field-adventuring wizard of the same level as the stay-at-home hasn't had that sort of physical training.

Elves in particular are interesting - they live long enough to learn enough to become high level in numerous classes over their lives; I always assume they lose those learned abilities if they're not maintained, which leads me to a design issue I've had for decades: there's no mechanism in any version of the game for how class abilities decay over time if not used or maintained.

I think I was following up to your "Having everyone work on the same foundation was something 3e got 100% right. Making that foundation stupidly complicated, however, was not." and failed to quote it.

 

[Lanefan]

I think I was following up to your "Having everyone work on the same foundation was something 3e got 100% right. Making that foundation stupidly complicated, however, was not." and failed to quote it.

I get ya.

 

[Argyle King]

This very true if your using average level X fight single boss CR level X+1. Less true if your using 3 boss fights with each being CR X/3. Though the Action economy is a little longer, Damage scales with the party and Monster HP to meat it. If your using lower monsters the increased actin economy and utility can keep the threat level while party damage should out curve the HP so fights will be less of a slog. That's my experience any way.

The group I'm in rarely uses a single creature as a boss fight. We learned to not do that back in 4E, despite 4E saying that's how the game should work.