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Message: <blockquote data-quote="DaveDash" data-source="post: 6482796" data-attributes="member: 6786202">What I am realising is that years of CRPG/strategy/tactical war gaming has honed my skills and expectations to be what is far above the baseline of what D&D 5e is designed for. This is true for my friends who are also in my group, and I suspect you are also on that level.I look back at older editions and ponder why I didn't have the same 'difficulty' (as in, too easy) problem that I find in 5e. There are reasons for it built into the system, but it's also the fact we're a hell of a lot more experienced gamers now than then.5e is also a simpler system to 'game' than some of its previous counterparts. I'd never consider myself an 'optimizer' or powergamer in 3rd edition, or anywhere close to that, but in 5e it's much easier to end up at that level. As Zard pointed out above, the group that I DM for picked some very "optimal" classes and subclasses, but not really out of a desire to powergame, but rather min/max and still play the classes they enjoy the most. That this is considered "optimizing" now is telling of the system.What made me realise this is I have been watching a few YouTube games of 5e. In one of these games the DM is unable to challenge the players, and the players are also clearly computer gamers/wargamers, based upon their strict following of RAW, and comments about various games on the market. They blow through LMoP with ease, even though the DM has ramped up a lot of encounters, and they've structured their party in an optimal manner, and make good use of gaining advantage/positioning/sneak attacks/etc.Other games on youtube though really struggle with LMoP, they make very un-optimal tactical decisions, pick sub par spells, cast the wrong spells at the wrong time, and such. These guys still have a blast playing the game, but the game baseline level is really designed for that kind of player, not you or me.I do agree though, and have pointed out in earlier posts in this thread, that SilverFireSage may have a very different experience as his main group players naturally progress to higher levels, and obtain the experience (real life experience that is). But this also really comes down to what kind of group he has, some groups (and perhaps even most groups) just don't care to "game" the game as much as perhaps you or I.The solution for me at present seems to be to ramp up numbers of lower CR monsters, and hit points on solos, which is quite easy to do. 5e is very forgiving it seems in some respects, you can ramp up the numbers of lower CR creatures and increase the challenge without stepping into TPK territory too quickly. Even large numbers of low CR monsters may not directly threaten high level party members, but they sure chew up resources they didn't want to spend.There are some gotcha's though, some extremely potent and deadly lower CR monsters: Fire Giants, hell hounds (used in numbers), NPC assassin, Glabrezu (Power word stun on a CR9 and darkness spam), Flame Skulls. Others as written are total duds, such as the Drow Wizard, which has far too low hitpoints for its CR (it actually has a defensive CR of about 2) and can be focus fired down in one round (or turn at higher levels).</blockquote>

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