D&D 5E How much fighting do a typical D&D session have?

[abirdcall]

Fights are too long. Not in game too long, but real-time too long. I do my best as DM to speed them along while trying to make them narratively exciting. My players are also good at declaring and resolving actions while adding a bit of descriptive spice.

But it gets draining as DM to handle all of that. Last session was introducing new PCs to the party and I basically sat back as the two remaining PCs talked with two new PCs in character and told them what was going on. It was fun.

So, I'm hoping the next adventure is one with more exploration in it as that's less in-game work for me but it's still fun.

I have found the Greyhawk Initiative variant to both speed up combat in my games and lower the narrative load that I experience as DM.

 

[MechaPilot]

At least half.

Probably somewhere between half and two-thirds, if I'm being really honest.

My players tend to use combat to solve their problems, even when I give them non-combat ways in which an encounter can be resolved. Sigh. I try to incentivise non-combat means of resolution, but my players like fighting, and it's my job to make sure they're having fun too.

 

[The_Gunslinger658]

Combat in D&D pretty much comes down to the DM's style on how his adventure unfolds, how many encounters he designed into his adventure, I usually do not run canned adventures so I am not sure on how many combats are accounted for in those type of adventures. For me as a DM, I love combat encounters and make sure there are at least three to four in a 4 hour session. Hacknslash baby, thats the ticket.

Scott

 

[Spookyboots]

Honestly I only run one or two combats a session but my player's love risk and danger. It was not happening with the amount of combat they were getting themselves into, haha. I run a sandbox and they enjoy the world building and exploring just as much as the combat.

To make what little combat we have more dangerous in bursts rather than a bunch of small combats between rests we added some house rules.
Exploding damage dice, it makes combat super deadly and fast.
We use the 50 uses for the d50 critical hit chart by Goodman games.
We just started using a variant of the Greyhawk initiative system.
We implemented Beyond weapon damage by kobold press to add more tactical choices in the quick combat.
I run higher challenge combats (characters with rolled stats throw all of the CR balance out of whack).
I showed up to the last session with a sand timer in case the new initiative system slowed combat down. Four very drunk players killed 15 orcs in about 20 minutes. Granted they are levels 3 to 5 but the initiative kept everyone engaged and going fast. On the flip side the fighter with 48 hp was knocked down to 2, the way of the death monk was down to less than half.

As stated above it comes down to players and DM. We had to find ways to balance what little combat we have and characters with good attributes.

 

[THEMNGMNT]

I am DMing my first campaign in a long, long time with three old friends from my grade school days. It's online. All of us are still getting used to the game again. We just finished our fifth session and the characters are level 3. Sessions are 3 to 5 hours long. I favor lengthy set piece battles that typically consists of 3 to 5 waves of enemies. Those battles seem to take between 45 and 75 minutes. We usually have one or two combats per session. Combat makes up about 50 percent of the time with the remainder of the session being roleplaying and planning. The rest is chatting, food, breaks, etc.

 

[bgbarcus]

We usually get about three hours play time per session. Most sessions are roughly half combat, a few are entirely combat, occasionally I slip in one fight only because I have a couple of players who feel like their time was wasted if they don't get to kill something. My target is 40% combat, 40% role play, 10% visiting with friends.

 

[jasper]

20% to 30% ....... oh you mean in game fighting.

 

[transtemporal]

Maybe a third to half the session. Occasionally if the PCs are dithering, they don't even get to a combat encounter and spend an entire session planning or talking to NPCs.

 

[MNblockhead]

In my eight-hour sessions I've had games that were spent on almost nothing but combat and other where there was no combat.

I like to mix it up and I also leave it to my players. They can always run try to run away and spend their time shopping. Or they can go looking for combat. Some of it is outside my control.

 

[Ancalagon]

Our sessions are usually 3 hours or so. Many sessions have no combat at all. When we do have combat, it tends to take about an hour or more per combat with and we usually only get through one or two combats per adventuring day.

This is very similar to our situation, although when there are fights they can easily take up most of the session if it's a "serious" fight vs a little "scrap".