Again, when talking about deadly equaling challenging, Tomb of Horrors is an extreme case.
What people? You are making a broad assumption.
Different people have different ideas of what is challenging. Personally, I think Tomb of Horrors is challenging because I really have to think and figure out the traps and puzzles it presents. It requires me to carefully approach and experiment and engage with environment instead of just using a prepackaged solution (skill check, spell, class ability, etc).
It is fair that you don't consider deadly to be challenging. But there are others who do and, in my case, I have explained why.
I have pretty much never heard the original tomb (or even really most of its iterations) being described as well designed in terms of player enjoyment. It is more often described as a meat grinder where you brag for surviving it, or taken as an example of grudge dungeons.
From what I have heard, if you walk in the front door of the Tomb, you trigger a trap and die. In fact, most of the traps I've been told you don't even bother to have the players roll. If they trigger it, they die.
And frankly, I don't get what you seem to mean by "approach and experiment" instead of using "prepackaged solutions". I'm going to pull this quote up:
Not pixeling, interacting with the environment. How do characters interact with traps and puzzles in your game? How do you run a poison needle trap on a door lock?
Pixeling is a term from those old King's Quest style games where one had to do a random thing to a random location. Checking the door knob for a poison needle or looking for pressure plates in front of the door is not pixeling. These are things that are logical and intuitive to the environment.
See, I've heard pixeling referred to pretty much exclusively as clicking on every single space in an area. In DnD, that is walking 5 ft, tapping every space you can reach with a 10 ft pole, stepping 5ft and repeating. Knocking on every wall for secret passages.
And, you can't just assume any of this, the players must specifically say it. First the player has to declare how they check the area in front of the door, then the door itself, then the frame, then under the door, then the door jam, then the handle, then the hinges.
And, what I find amusing is that Lanefan points out that they established a SOP so thoroughly that they only need to say "I thief the door" and they can skip saying everything else. At my table we would say "I investigate the door". Now, at my table, I don't assume that the player will succeed, so the dice are rolled, and checking an object or location is investigation. I'm guessing that at Lanefan's table, they just assume success?
And so, are these "pre-packaged" skills? Is the fact that I don't make players lay out, step by step, perhaps in a written document so we don't forget and can reference it, every single thing they do to carefully check a door for traps, does that make it less somehow?
Look, I know this is a style thing, but don't go around saying 5e is less challenging because we don't spend time and paper writing out SOPs for everything. Trust me, I could take the time to do that, but I feel it would add nothing except time.
And, even while using skills, you can interact with the environment. You can ask things, you can grab a handful of flour and drop it by a wall to see if there is a passage, you can pick up the vase and see if there is something under it. I'm not going to stop anyone from doing any of that. And sure, drop flour by the secret door in the south corner, and you find the draft.
But I don't require it. And I don't think that decision has anything to do with the game itself. In 5e you can run it either way, and that is a DM choice. So, it doesn't change how challenging the system itself is.
Of course players can learn from them. Each player's experience with every monster gives new insight in how to approach them in the future. Imagine the first time a player ever fights a troll. When they figure out that they need fire, they learn to use fire against trolls the next time they encounter them.
With concern to the wraith. Of course you learn something, here are some examples:
- They can drain Con or even levels.
- Yes, sometimes it is best to avoid them.
- They can hire a high level cleric.
- They can bring a form of radiant damage, or bring lots of holy water.
- They can scout the dungeon and find another way around them.
- They can distract the wraith while another player goes and grabs its loot.
There myriad things that can be learned in that situation and myriad approaches that can be taken to overcome such a challenge.
The wraith is an example of a monster that presents an obstacle that cannot be easily or effectively dealt with by using normal, rules-based, approaches (combat) and where the consequence in doing so is deadly or debilitating (not easily overcome or shrugged off).
The challenge is in figuring out an alternative approach.
In 5E, by contrast, the wraith can still be dealt with through normal means. Between still taking half damage to the ubiquity of spells removing the danger of its resistance it can be approached the same as any other threat. It doesn't present a challenge in overcoming it.
So.. they learned that you should bring a cleric to fight an undead... That they can distract a monster instead of fighting it...That using damage types or items that work against undead against an undead is a good idea....
I'm sorry, why do you need permanent ability drain to teach these things? They seem like pretty basic things to figure out. Sort of like bringing fire to fight a monster made out of dry wood. Or a class called "Giant Slayer" to kill giants.
And, the Wraith can completely be taken out by combat. Turn Undead is a combat ability, in fact it is the only class feature I see for clerics in 3.5. Since Holy Water hurts undead, you can throw vials at it. Which is combat.
What you mean is that you can't just hit it with a sword until it dies. But, you can also do that if the sword is an anti-undead or anti-etheral sword.
And, your contrast is completely wrong. Wraith's do present a challenge in 5e.
- Their resistance makes attacks by normal weapons less effective, which makes them a more difficult target
- Their resistance to elemental damage actually makes spellcasters less effective in fighting them, in fact with immunity to necrotic and poison, and resistance to acid, cold, fire, lighting and thunder most spellcasters are going to have trouble hurting them fully.
- They are also immune to many status effects, making them difficult to debuff or lockdown
- The fact that they deal necrotic damage makes them pierce resistances from classes like the barbarian easier
- Flight makes it easy for them to escape
- Incorpreal movement acts defensively and offensively, in fact the Wraith could choose to take 1d10 damage and be completely immune to the party's damage for that round
- By reducing their max hp, the Wraith makes healing the damage they inflict difficult if not impossible, making dealing with further threats a difficult proposition
- They can instant kill by reducing the max hp to 0
- They can create their own minions as an action, so a wraith flying above a battlefield can bring a new enemy to fight the players every single round until it has been longer than a minute.
And you can say "but they were deadlier in B/X" but that does not mean they are no challenge at all in 5e. Especially since it is resistant to many many spells.
If a DM wanted to take an extremely deadly creature and have them attack with surprise against their players, they are free to do so. My point is that they would have to accept that by doing so, they are probably going to kill their characters. But this is a DM decision. I can do the same thing in 5E or any other edition. I can decide to have Banshee's or Archmages with Fireball surprise and kill my player's characters as well.
I never said there is lack of surprise in B/X. I just said that there is a chance of surprise (your example assumes that surprise is automatic).
In B/X, surprise is rolled on a d6. On a 1 or 2 (some monsters or player classes have different odds), the side surprise their opponent. Surprise is rolled for both sides (although in dungeons, torch light usually removes the possibility of the party getting surprise).
Of course, a DM can, by fiat, give surprise to the monsters (or players for that matter) if the situation warrants it. But in a typical encounter where parameters haven't been described, that is base the rule.
In 5E, the DM would roll the monster's stealth vs. the player's perception to determine surprise. This is the mechanic in B/X that performs that same function.
When the rules for surprise are used, in B/X, poisonous spiders surprising and killing everyone becomes less likely.
Your example assumed that surprise was achieved, the spider hit with its attack, and the player failed it's save. You are making the claim that death is arbitrary and doesn't provide any lessons to learn and you are supporting that claim by stating the possibility that a very unlikely event can happen.
An analog of your claim, in 5E, would be a surprise from a multiattack creature that crits on all its attacks and kills a PC automatically. It is unlikely but possible.
My question to you: what do you want/expect a player to learn as a result of an ambush?
My thoughts are that there are tons of things to learn and ways to approach such a situation. Some of my examples:
- Travel more spread out so PCs can flank or spot ambushes on the flank.
- Bring war dogs or such that have a good sense of smell and can alert the party to danger
- Have a character scout ahead so the party doesn't all get ambushed.
- Approach the ambush site from a different direction and attempt to ambush them instead
- Use spells to hide party number or obscure their location
- Use a decoy to draw out ambushes and counter with their own ambush
All of these things can be done to mitigate getting killed by goblin ambushes. The challenge is in that one can't just wander carelessly and expect to survive an ambush. One has to consider options and tactics that will improve one's chances to survive.
Lumping all this together.
So, surprise is the essentially the same across editions. Good to know.
And, again, you seem to be putting forth the idea that without instant death or long term maiming, players won't learn things like "players should scout ahead to avoid ambushes" or "you should use a decoy to draw out the enemy" or "use a pre-packaged solution to solve the problem ie spells"
But, I think that if I asked my players "how would you prevent an ambush?" they are going to give some pretty good answers, despite the fact that they can recover after a long rest. Because getting ambushed is dangerous and they don't like it. I don't need to kill characters for them to realize this. They know already, and they will act to prevent ambushes already.
But, if they are ambushed, it isn't a death sentence.
And, I'm still confused how a spider, which is an ambush predator, successfully ambushing a party member would be so unusual that you start calling it GM fiat. The fact is, I don't even need to ambush. A spider can charge headlong into the party, and if they successfully bite and the character fails the save, they die. I'm sure there were other monsters who used poison as well, who could do the same thing. Just charge the party, and the party risks immediate death.
The ambushes were mostly because they are already a bad thing that the party is trying to prevent, and failing to prevent that is something they don't want. And poison that kills you instantly just makes it that much worse. And like you said, there are many ways to do this, even in 5e. It has nothing to do with challenge though.
You seem to be mischaracterizing "combat as war" as an antagonist relationship between the DM and the Players. The responsibility of the DM in a "combat as war" style game is not to devise ways to auto kill the PCs, its to present an environment that allows players to use "combat as war" tactics in a meaningful way.
Some of the ways to do this is to provide usable information, run monsters in a way that provides players meaningful choices, provide consequences that are understandable and expected.
The best description and explanation I can refer to is this video:
Running Combat as War
You seem to be thinking that I'm talking about killing players, but that isn't why I'm talking about archers using poison.
Combat as War means both sides are trying to win, and will use all resources at their disposal to try and ensure victory. You are no longer "playing nice".
So, if you are a goblin, living in nature where plenty of deadly toxins can be found, and you know you are going to be fighting people bigger and stronger than you, people you want to give no chance to respond and attack you, why are you not using those toxins?
Watch Rambo, even the newest one, where he sets all those traps. He isn't fighting fair, he isn't trying to give them a chance to retaliate, the point is to take out the enemy effectively. Boltholes, hit and run tactics, catching fire to the room and closing the door. The point isn't to be fair, it is war.
And that is because the consequences are understandable and reasonable. People do not play fair when fighting for their lives. They use every tool at their disposal to survive. So, Combat as War is running combat realistically, rather than in a "fair" way that is entertaining.
Scouting isn't something you just state you succeed at. But the act of scouting is going to provide a more favorable possible outcome. This is contextual. What are you doing to scout? What is the environment like? What aspects of the environment can you use to shield your location or obscure your approach. How you role-play will determine whether you succeed or feel. These are considerations that directly affect your outcome to scouting.
Why does role-play come into it?
Legitimately, the only thing I can think of is that you want to assume the character is an idiot. Do I really need to specify that when creeping through the castle I duck under the windows to not be silhouetted? How does the player decide anything about the environment? If you describe a room full of wooden boxes and clear glass boxes, do I need to specify that I am hiding behind the wooden boxes? Or if I say I try and sneak through the room do you assume I will not use any cover what so ever?
And once I describe that I am moving silently, using my toes to feel ahead of me and clear the ground of breakables before stepping heel first to reduce the sound, while sticking to the shadows and using the boxes to break line of sight with the guards, while making sure to only move through clear sight lines when they have turned away... do I immediately succeed?
I've used the environment, described every step, accounted for complications, so do I just succeed or will you have me roll?
If you have me roll, what is different between that and saying "I sneak through the room" and then you having me roll?
My response was an argument on how to eliminate the coin flip dungeon.
A coin flip dungeon occurs when die rolls and mechanics, only, determine success or failure. Exploration relying solely on Perception checks, Investigation checks and other skill checks or skill challenges, results in a coin flip dungeon experience. The hope is to just roll high.
But you are relying on the same things. Unless describing means you automatically succeed, and then I just write a book, reference it for the correct environment, and go through a monologue of every action I take.
Torches have weight. Only so many can be carried.. They also can be extinguished by wind or disarmed or lost. Rations, same with Goodberry. There are choices on how many torches and how many rations to carry. This may prevent from equipping certain other useful equipment, it may also prevent from being able to carry the treasure you discover.
Outlander basically eliminates a lot of challenge from wilderness travel. I house rule that out.
Foraging is a good choice for adventuring in the wilderness. The consequence to foraging is that it prevents Passive Perception from being used to keep watch for encounters.
The use of rations, torches, foraging, are all choices that have consequences in the game. Managing them is a part of the challenge.
Okay, everything has weight, torches are just one thing. They are also easy to make as well.
If you are worried about the wind, you just use a lantern. Hooded Lanterns burn for six times as long, can't be extinguished, can have the hatch closed to prevent the light from going out, and wiegh only slightly more than a torch.
Even a party with only 10 strength each, assuming 6 members, can move 1,800 lbs before any other considerations. At that point, 10 lbs in light and 10 pounds in food is really not much of anything.
Your houserules non-withstanding, you only need one person to forage for food. Which leave 5 people using passive perception. Also, there is no reason to assume that if you can forage while traveling, you can't set up camp two hours early and forage around the camp for those two hours, which negates the issue. And in fact, in literature, that is the most common way it is done.
So, sure, you can make these things a challenge. But really, it isn't as worth it as people seem to think.
For example, that 2 lbs lantern that gives 6 hours of light? The Light Cantrip you are saying replaces and removes the challenge is less bright for only an hour. So again, saying "this cantrip removes the challenge" seems to be misunderstanding the myriad of ways that the problem can be solved mundanely.
With wraiths, a Fighter can't view her stack of hit points as a manageable resource like she can against more mundane foes, because ANY hit could be very bad news. Add to this, all that armour isn't going to be of as much use as normal thus making the odds of getting hit that much higher, and yeah - you've got a situation where the Fighter is best off using ranged weapons or even just standing down.
