How have you used terrain to make combat more tactically interesting & exciting?

[Ahglock]

I break terrain into two types.

1. Traps and other dangerous obstacles.

2. Tactical advantage terrain, like cover, or hard to reach places.

1. I like using these infrequently. We had one encounter where the party held the line near one, and the fight basically became how many people can we throw into a deep well. Cool at first, but it kind of became a boring gimmick.

2. I like this in every encounter. I try to avoid overusing, the bad guys have X static tactical advantage though. What usually happens in these cases is its a pain in the butt peppering of damage form a source you can't reach for a while, then hey you get to them and look its a standard slugfest. But I do like scattering tactical advantages across the battlefield so the players and enemies can move into and out of these spots as the battle progresses. Even basic pillars add something to the fight IMO.

 

[Markn]

I have run quite few encounters for 4e. My group has played Keep on the Shadowfell and then we started back on 1st level and have just reached 8th.

I've seen a number of encounters with different criteria and styles.

First, I would say that anybody who has access to D&D insider should definately check out Dungeon Magazine and if you don't have access to it, you should get it. While I have not used any adventures per se, I have found a LOT of encounters adaptable to my own campaign and many of the encounters give me new ways of building them. It is a fountain of ideas.

Having said that, I have found that encounters that have a goal besides a straight up fight to be the most exciting. Rescuing a prisoner before he dies, recovering a magic item before the bad guy flees with it, escaping a trap before it goes off are all examples of this. Here are some encounters I have run or been a part of:

This one is from dungeon. It is essentially a dungeon like room that has several platforms at different levels. Enemies are spread out on the the platforms encouraging the PCs to work their way up the room. In addition to that the room is filling with a dangerous substance (could be lava, water, whatever you like) and after a few rounds the lower platform is engulfed, then 2 more rounds later, the next platform is engulfed and so on. This encourages movement not only by the players but also by the monsters. This is a great example of a dynamic fight.

Another fight I ran just last session was made up of mostly controllers. It was essentially a cultists lair but it had the main area of the chamber, it had some stairs with a ledge that was 10' high and I had four large bird cages haning about 15' up he wall in each corner of the room. At the beginning of the fight, all the PC's except one were in the centre of the room, a twilight encanter and a medusa were on the ledge and I had Harpies in the cages. One PC had snuck into the room as a rat and had climbed up to the ceiling rafters. Originally, the PCs thought that the harpies were captives but as the fight progressed they realized that the cages acted as cover for the harpies providing protection and the harpies could get out by opening the cage door because it was not locked. With the harpies able to pull the PCs, the twilight encanter able to bind or blind the PC and the Medusa able to slow, immobilize and turn them to stone the PCs were always on their toes and could easily be caught by themselves. I sprinkled in a few dopplegangers to do some damage and it was a lot of fun all around. The 10' ledge forceed Pcs to go up there to tackle the monsters since they were out of melee reach. This isn't a great example of terrain use but does serve as an example how mundane rooms can be a bit more interesting with the proper creature types.

Another fight I was a part of as a player was in a burning corn field. Fire and smoke created concealment and the rows of corn made it so anybody could pop out from nowhere. It was a hide and seek type fight that worked really well.

Yet another fight was at a gnoll encampment that had lots of tents and cages of prisoners. We showed up, kicked some @ss and then the DM had a returning war party come from the otherside of the clearing. We were caught in the middle and then had to make the best use of the tents and crates in the area to get some cover.

While none of these examples provided contain any sort of fantastic terrain each encounter featured an element that made the terrain a tactically superior option in combat. I've found there to be two key things. First, find a reason for the PCs use the terrain or be forced to make use of it, otherwise the terrain just sits there. Secondly, fights where the PCs are mixed up with the bad guys (this could be surrounded, caught between two groups or interspersed with them) makes things more dynamic.

As a DM, if you don't give the PC's a reason to use the terrain and make options that make the use of terrain an optimal tactic, then PCs will just stand there and slug it out because THAT option becomes the superior tactic.
I have found this to be the most radical change in thinking from 3e to 4e. I sometimes forget to do this and it quickly turns into a boring fight.

 

[RangerWickett]

One of my DMs ran a fight with a blue dragon on the roofs of a halfling pontoon village. It was cool because, even though the dragon could fly to get away from some of our attacks, we could dive in the water to avoid it. That, plus jumping between rooftops and using improvised weapons like clothes lines and fishing nets was fun. Certainly the weirdest dragon fight I've ever played.

 

[chaotix42]

Here are some pics of the map I used for my sewer encounter. The PCs began the encounter on the catwalk by the broken bridge, ready to exit the area but yet to cross. Two Heralds of Tiamat are persuing the PCs, an adult black dragon and an adult green. The black surfaced right next to the PCs and hit them with his breath weapon while the green flew in from the southeast along the canal. The PCs fought all across the map, doing their best to lay low two solo opponents.



The room on the east side of the map contained the volatile boiler, mounted on the west wall. When the PCs blew it up I erased it and caved in the adjacent wall, turning the new area into difficult terrain that granted concealment. When the green dragon flew through the opening he triggered a collapse and I colored in a few spaces a bit darker - those granted total concealment.



Here you can better see the portcullises and the nearby levers that controlled them. I didn't bother to draw in broken portcullises - we all remembered where they were. I suppose I could have put down a few twisted bars.



Here you can see the one remaining barrel. The western dead end contained three barrels, while the one to south had a happy little friend which was thrown at the two dragons near the end of the fight.

You can see the spaces with pipes in them - those little clusters of black widgets. As with the portcullises I didn't bother to draw in the clouds of steam once the pipes were destroyed. Probably should have but we remembered - the fight was moving around so much they didn't matter for too long anyway.

 

[Paul Strack]

In my last session, the group entered a cavern with a shallow river running through it. The PC side of the cavern was clear (no cover) but the monster side had plenty of cover (stone columns). The river was 5 squares wide and difficult terrain. All the monsters had ranged attacks.

None of this was very complicated to set up or sketch out, but it made for an interesting fight as the players were forced to invent their own cover (hide behind the Paladin!), distract the enemy as they crossed the river and shuttle around to get a clean LOS for ranged attacks.

 

[dangerous jack]

Here are some pics of the map I used for my sewer encounter.

Cool maps. Sounds & looks like a fun one. Thanks for posting these.

Vampires in a chamber where thin beams of sunlight are breaking through the ceiling/walls, illuminating certain spaces. Let the PCs attack weakened areas to let in more sunlight! Idea yoinked - thanks

Great idea, and I'll yoink it myself. Add in a few pivoting mirrors to redirect sunlight to really give the PCs some battlefield control. I've always wanted to try something like that.

 

[DanmarLOK]

I've used the flaming torches from the Scales of War - Rivenroar starting adventure to good effect, they're useful for dividing the battlefield randomly into pockets as the flame spreads and shifting, pushing, sliding creatures into them works well.

I've used large braziers of flaming coals and stone cauldrons of acid that could be dumped in one direction causing two squares of diffcult terrain or a burst 1 that starting or passing through them caused damage.

Hanging chains in a tortuer chamber that could be used to bypass formations with an acrobatics or athletics roll.

Tables that could be tipped over to provide cover.

And in one case with a hill giant some stone columns that he could smash and cause an explosive blast of shrapnel and that weakened the ceiling above that required perception or dungeoneering check to notice which sections were going to fall down.

12-18" deep depressions filled with mud and topped with a light layer of snow that knocked prone (save avoids) and stopped movement that affected both sides. Just a random chance to encounter one during the movement rather than trying to figure out the pre-plotted positions.

Kind of a classic but heavy chandeliers that could have the rope or the hook the rope was tied to cut / broken to drop the chandelier that could catch someone below it or cause difficult terrain.

I draw a / in each square a mob dies and turn it into a X when two die there which creates difficult terrain.

Umm let's see what else. parapets and rooftops and upper floors, standard stuff.

That's all I can think of that might be unique enough to mention.

 

[caranha]

1st level adventure, the characters had to sneak into a noble state's catacomb and steal his treasure.

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1- The secret back entrance to the catacomb featured a largish (10 squares) rope bridge over a chasm, with a bunch of kobolds on the other side. On the way in, the characters could make a small acrobatics contest with kobolds on the bridge to shake it and make them fall prone/into the chasm. On the way back, they cut down the bridge to lose the pursuing guards.

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2- The last combat encounter, before the lord's secret studio, featured a small circular room with 2 square radius. The doors leading in and out of the room were heavy iron doors which could be slided up into the ceiling by pulling a chain, but would fall back as soon as the chain was released (so someone had to hold them open). Inside the room were two mechanical guardians.

When the characters entered the room, the guardians activate, and the circular room starts to spin at a high speed (90 degrees at initiative 0). Characters who entered the room were at -2 to attacks until they got their bearings (save ends - the constructs were immune). Entering or leaving the room required a moderate athletics check, with the character getting prone on a miss.

Finally, there were two sets of blades were on the walls in the N and S ends of the room (the doors were E and W). Any creature (enemies included) near the wall when the room spun whose path would go through the blades received a pretty nasty attack.

The result was a really cool looking fight (Battling clockwork robots in tight quarters on a spinning platform), with the melee characters fighting to stand in the middle of the room and trying to bull rush the two constructs into the traps set in the wall, and vice-versa.

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3- In another (1st level) adventure, an underground L-shaped chamber had a number of small tunnels connecting different parts of it. A group of goblin sharpshooters were hiding in these tunnels and would poke their heads out to snipe the party, and when noticed would rush back and head to another end of the tunnel to try again.

As luck would have it, no one in the party was small, so they had to play whack-a-mole with the sharpshooters.

(some options which were not explored by the group: Burning some of the props in the room to smoke the goblins out of the tunnels, using Stealth to move around silent so that the goblins would not know the position of the party while they were moving inside the tunnels)

 

[Rughat]

I'm loving the great ideas in this discussion. Side question: how much information do you give your players about the terrain features? Do you tell them "You see X" and leave it to them to figure out how to use it? Do you say "A DC 15 strength check will break this pipe, injuring anyone in a 2x2 burst around it and granting concealment for two turns?" Somewhere in between?

 

[keterys]

If you've got Thunderspire Labyrinth, check out the rooms with the last 3 of 4 relics and the guardian's room, for examples of terrain in use.