High Level Campaign Combat - Secrets to your Success

[WizarDru]

One quick search, and I found a previous post I made on this topic, which I'll reiterate here. These actually apply across the spectrum of levels, but become all the more critical at high levels.


Here's some quickies that I've derived from running a group of 6 from 1st to 22nd.


1. Always announce who's turn in intiative it is, and at least the next two players coming up. This gives the players a chance to choose their actions and research relevant rules questions before they have to act.

2. Have all players have relevant rules information when their action comes up. This includes having the page open to the ability being used in the PHB, such as a Bull Rush, or the spell listing. If it's a spell, they should know the DC and the type of the save, as well as the results of a successful save. For a skill or feat, they should know what the relevant rolls and modifiers are, such as their grapple score.

3. Put a time limit on rules reasearch and judgement calls. If you can't find a definitive answer in the rules in a short amount of time, make a call and move on. Don't waste time arguing and don't change your ruling later, even if you decide it wasn't the best ruling to make. Research the rule later, but don't interrupt the flow of the game for it. Enlist the aid of your players whlie doing the research, to speed the process. Utimately, don't sweat the small stuff. Focus on the game, and keep moving. Don't get bogged down. Remember the GURPS rule: "When in doubt, ROLL and SHOUT."

4. Have players make relevant rolls ahead of time, to prepare for their turn. If necessary, let them make the rolls while you verify the next player's action, then return to them for the result. If a player is casting a fireball, have him roll against SR and his damage ahead of time. If he's going to attack five times using his bow, have him roll the attack rolls and miss chances before you get to him.

5. Make spell cards to place on the table, listing all the relevant effects of each spell in operation during combat. This saves the PCs forgetting spell effects during the combat, allows players to quickly reference things like the effects of haste, bless or holy aura, and speeds up play.

6. Have all sub-characters move with their associated character, not on a separate initiative. Have all similar non-boss monsters move as a group in large combats. Have all cohorts move with their leader, all animal companions and familiars with their friends and masters, and all companions or npcs move together. If you have a battle with a lich, two ogres magi and six ogres, have the ogres all move at the same time. Simplify the initative order whenever possible.

7. Put bookmarks or post-it stickers in both the DMG and PHB to frequently referenced pages. Need to refer to the environmental effects pages all the time? Put a label sticker on it or other pages you know you're constantly flipping to, such as grappling and special actions, or to the section on damage effects (what's the difference between stunned and dazed, again?)

8. Recognize 'torch-lighting' issues and handwave them whenever possible. Some things are pendantic or not-fun to cover in-game. Don't force players to announce every insiginificant action or play through every tedious encounter, if the answer is never in doubt. If the party encounters a weak opponent that has no chance against them, don't play the combat out. If a party member can eventually succeed at a task with repetition and little or no risk, simplify it to a single roll or just assume success. Don't waste time with things that don't matter or waste the collective group's effort and attention

Hope that helps.

 

[WizarDru]

Heck, our party sorcerer's sheet has a space on it for temporary hit points from false life.

At high levels, this can become impractical to expect, IME. In a typical combat, I see no fewer than 20 active spell effects that I take notice of. I have had combats where more than thirty spells are interacting. Now consider that the players may have access to Anti-Magic Field and Dispel Magic.

In a recent game where the players fought the Githyanki Lich-Queen, the cleric charged into combat, cast Anti-Magic Field on himself and grappled her! PCs and monsters alike all suddenly had radically different stats. Was this affected? How about this? In one round, I've had a character wildshape into a Kraken, become nauseated, stunned, failed a save against replusion, gain, lose and gain spell resistance back...and that's not including two attacks he took or the spell and fear effects he encountered and resisted.

It's nice to expect them to know DCs and most of the major numbers...but I wouldn't expect them to know everything. It's difficult to calculate all those numbers ahead of time. Two of my players use spreadsheets to track all of the modifiers in play, in addition to our table-cards with spell-effects.

 

[Leopold]

The link just goes to a page that links back to EN World. What's up?

CRAP!!!! That sucks! It's this ubersweet initiative chart the Neg~Zero was selling and it was the best thing ever to save time and track inits and counters.

gonna find out why thats gone!

 

[Delemental]

What I have noticed is that Combat is becoming slower, longer, and more confusing the higher the PCs get. The options for the PCs are endless and they seem to forget all their pluses from spells or magic items as the battle rages on. So they are having a hard time keeping track of all their bonuses. I have also noticed that the creatures have far more abilities and options. Lately, I have forgotten some abilities of the creatures as well, despite preparing beforehand more than I ever have.

Pkitty's already given some good advice about initiative and bonuses. Our group uses the tent cards to track intiative - we have one card for each player, plus cards for the bad guys, friendly NPC's, etc. We line them up on the edge of the battlemat, so that not only can you see who's coming up next, but you can see the entire initiative lineup.

I imagine the difficulty you're running into is that at these levels there are numerous temporary effects thatn can be thrown into a combat. It does, unfortunately, take a while to figure out a full attack routine with Improved Two-Weapon Fighting and Weapon Finesse using two rapiers while under the effect of haste, cat's grace, and you just got hit with doom. The idea of using 'effect cards' like Pkitty suggests could be a help. Another thing you could try is to start the beginning of each round with a 'status report' to remind everyone what's going on - "Okay, in this round the bless spell and the bard's inspire are still active, and the slow is still in effect until we hit the evil sorcerer's initiative right after Grognard's turn". It would act as a trigger for people to start computing their bonuses early in their turn.

As far as tracking monster abilities, again probably the best thing is to look at each monster and ignore anything that won't come into play. You could also make your own set of index cards for the monsters, with the important stats written down and then at the bottom list a few 'contingency' tactics. Things like "If the demon falls below half hp, it will use blasphemy" or "The cleric of death will save his death touch ability to use on a wounded arcane caster."

 

[Storminator]

I have an Excel spreadsheet for my character sheet. I have all my regular spell effects autocalculated and togglable. So when the Shield spell goes up, my AC gets recalculated. I also have a dead magic zone switch which alters everything.

I've found my spreadsheet grows over time as we decide on new consistent tactics. The day we had a large combat and I forgot my computer I nearly cried.

We've also got 3 laptops at the game, all with access to the DM's own PHB, which has all his house rules incorporated. So any of us can look up the spells, feats, etc, as we play. I tend to look up spells for the players without laptops.

PS

 

[Delemental]

Two more suggestions:

If you have a situation where your players are commonly using the same set of buffing spells or abilities, perhaps you could make one of those index tent cards reflect an entire "buff suite" where the sum effects of all the things are tallied.

Also, one of the best things you cn do is discuss the situation with your players. REgardless of what you do, the slowing of combat at higher levels is inevitable, and will only get worse. Let your players know that you want to keep combat as streamlined and lively as possible. Perhaps the group of you can brainstorm solutions, or come up with a few personal shortcuts you could all use.

 

[Piratecat]

Two more suggestions:

If you have a situation where your players are commonly using the same set of buffing spells or abilities, perhaps you could make one of those index tent cards reflect an entire "buff suite" where the sum effects of all the things are tallied.

Also, one of the best things you cn do is discuss the situation with your players.

Two excellent ideas. I often do separate stats for buffed up monsters; I learned that the hard way after a wizard with dispel magic got enthusiastic, and I had to convert on the fly.

 

[GMVictory]

I invoke GMV's 4th Law of Gaming. "I am not responsible for your bonuses or advantages inherent to your character. If, after the attack, spell, manuever, etc., you fail and then remember another bonus. Too late. Your character was distracted, scared, nervous, affected adversely by a spell, etc. and didn't utilize his capabilities to the fullest. It happens. This applies to the GM too. If I don't remember something about the opposition that I'm running, I can't say I forgot and change how things are going. Even the bad guys have crappy days."

 

[S'mon]

I invoke GMV's 4th Law of Gaming. "I am not responsible for your bonuses or advantages inherent to your character. If, after the attack, spell, manuever, etc., you fail and then remember another bonus. Too late. Your character was distracted, scared, nervous, affected adversely by a spell, etc. and didn't utilize his capabilities to the fullest. It happens. This applies to the GM too. If I don't remember something about the opposition that I'm running, I can't say I forgot and change how things are going. Even the bad guys have crappy days."

That's my rule too - it's up to players to keep track of PC stuff, as DM it's not my job to wirry about it. Likewise if I screw up running my monsters and forget an ability, well strike one for the PCs. I'll remember next time! My PC group is currently 11th-14th level, and I haven't noticed combats appreciably dragging. I do use mostly fairly 'mundane' opponents like giants and non-spellcasting humanoids who are simple to run, it makes the rare demon, devil or enemy wizard stand out and be a source of considerable consternation!

 

[Elocin]

My group uses the Initiative sheet attached in the following link. Not very fancy but it gets the job done (tracks Init. from 1 - 30 and also tracks spell effects on characters that the DM casts on them).

Also as a player the way I speed up our games (7 people all 15th level) Is as soon as my turn is over I immediately roll attack/damage rolls again so when the DM gets back to me I say I hit three times for such and such damage. There are usually enough critters flaying around that if the one I was attacking goes down I just pick another one I want to attack (I play an archer person). Now if the DM does something funky then I still have plenty of time to modify my attack before he gets to me most of the time.

Otherwise most everyone has covered everything else that you can do to speed up combat.



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