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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Janx" data-source="post: 2410686" data-attributes="member: 8835">It sounds like they are very risk averse, and that's probably the crux of the problem.Because of this risk aversion, they like to have the odds heavily in their favor.Now factually, the player perception that 3e is more deadly is ridiculous.  2e had way more balance issues with spells and determining encounter strength.  Nowadays, there's some pretty decent metric for designing an encounter.  Perhaps approaching the players and discussing your adventure design with them might help.  Take your last adventure and show them the encounter notes (the combat stats, not the secret political info or what-not). Basically your approach should be, "Y'all seemed overly concerned about the encounter strength.  Let me show you what you were really facing, so I can assure you that in each adventure, the fights are challenging, fair and reasonable for your PCs to win."With 2 war & battle oriented PCs, retreat and buff should NOT be a common tactic.  Granted only fools rush in, but you should not expect those 2 PCs to be so combat afraid.  Most war gods enjoy a good close fight, and heroes are those that face tough challenges.  In short, those 2 aren't likely playing their PCs in character, due to the player's paranoia.It seems like you basically need to work on reactions to PC actions:If the PCs avoid and buff then:-NPCs are disappointed in their bravery-bad guys continue on in their plan-bad guys sense coming threat and buff as wellQuickleaf had some good ideas for new directions to take things.  Basically, non-combat political threats.  Given time, the PCs might yearn for an oponnent they can kill with a blade.  What better enemy than one you can't fight for fear of hurting your position.A good extreme idea to try is to run several sessions that don't have an obvious combat solution.  Basically, no MM critters.  Just in-town talking and dealing with situations.  Investigations, rumor collecting, parties, and gossip.JanxJanx</blockquote>

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