D&D (2024) Is Combat Tedious on Purpose?

[Lanefan]

Spending five minutes doing something incredibly boring is only "better" than spending half an hour doing something incredibly boring if you aren't repeating that five minutes on the regular.

But then in old school playstyles, every fight with three goblins in a corridor is that. Combat becomes a dull chore, not an exciting event.

If those three goblins could spell the end of your character it stops being boring real fast.

Well, at least for 4e, the idea was you don't do the "three goblins in a corridor" things as fights. Fights that are meant to be over in a couple minutes are simply too small; there's nothing to sink your teeth into, no set-piece, just another tiny bit of whittled away resources, and then another tiny bit, and then another tiny bit, over and over. Instead, one way to do them that is faster per fight is to collect many of them together as a Skill Challenge, where one of the possible results of failure is needing to get into a nasty brawl with a larger, more dangerous number of foes, especially because this allows grades of success, e.g. each successful step in the SC reduces the enemy forces, meaning narrow failure vs narrow success is a small gap, not a huge one. This means the Skill Challenge is still more involved than what any one or even three of those combats would be, but you're resolving half a dozen of them sequentially in that time, so there is still comparative time savings.

While this works as a solution on a practical level it also skips over a whole bunch of granularity and detail that I'd prefer to keep. (this was my primary objection to Skill Challenges in general, based on how I saw them implemented in the 4e modules I have)

Now, I have learned with time that this solution is simply inadequate and unacceptable for fans of old school play. That's why I have been working (very, very slowly...) on my concept of "Skirmish" rules. Skirmishes are, more or less, "little" combats. You may know that 5th edition has rules for "group skill checks"--they aren't full Skill Challenges like 4e would've done, but they're clearly more than just a single check too. That's more or less the space I'm aiming for, just applied to combats rather than skill checks. A "Skirmish" should be resolved in at most two rounds, because the whole point is to make them fast, snappy, a way to give teeth to the "whittling away resources" element of old-school playstyles that has kind of fallen by the wayside even in 5e.

If-when you get these ideas nailed down I'd be interested in giving them a look-over.

In my hypothetical "6e that more or less rebuilds 4e by taking lessons from 5e and OSR games", Skirmishes would be the bread-and-butter of a game run primarily focused on OSR play with only rare usage of "proper" combats, and generally uncommon or even quite rare in a more 4e-style game. Other editions' styles would probably involve a mix of both. You could spend a resource (a limited-uses ability, a consumable item, an NPC ally, etc.) to improve your Skirmish Roll, and there might be rare incidental benefits that make you better at Skirmishes (I imagine Fighters being particularly good at them, for example), but by and large they're a one- or two-roll per player affair, and then you move on.

As long as these rules can and do account for all the various corner-case things that can happen even in the most trivial of combats (e.g. someone fumbles and shatters an expensive magic weapon, or a foe gets hella lucky and takes out a PC against long odds) then I'd be interested.

Again, the whole idea with my hypothetical 6e is that it develops actual, functional, good rules that are directly helpful for implementing multiple different playstyles, but which can still be integrated together if the table desires that experience. It's not quite the "modularity" that the "D&D Next" playtest promised, but it's a damn sight closer than the 5e we actually got. Think of it less like rule "modules" and more like rule...."branches." All of the branches are part of the tree. All of them get proportionate resources and attention. None of them are neglected or ghettoized or dismissed as second-rate. In theory, a single campaign could try to use all of them, but it probably would be unwieldy to attempt this without great care.

And each DM could then decide which branches to use or not use, without too many knock-on effects elsewhere. Sounds good.

The only real issues might be around what the "trunk" of that tree consists of.

 

[Lanefan]

Yeap, if you want the numbers treadmill tradition growth and magic item golden showers, Paizo ate that lunch with PF2. D&D went in a new direction.

While I can happily live without the 3e-like numbers-growth treadmill, hell yeah gimme those magic items!

 

[Lanefan]

You're clearly free to do as you choose - but I've played D&D in the 70s, 80s, 90s, 00s, 10s and 20s. I've played with over 100 DMs, been a DM for hundreds of players, and I've played over 300 characters for multiple sessions each (with some running for a decade and others getting just a few sessions). I am probably in the top 1% of most experienced players in the world - and likely well into that 1%.

Hat tip, sir!

[snip some truly cool tales]

Again, you're free to just run individual sessions with no story in a sandbox world that could just as easily be randomly generated ... and that can be a lot of fun ... but everything you get out of that can be had in a campaign with a great story ... and it can be combined with so much more.

I think you're conflating emergent (or post-hoc) story with no story at all. They ain't the same.

For example, I could start a campaign by running Keep on the Borderlands, Secret of Bone Hill, and Isle of Dread sequentially each as a standalone adventure at the time and with no real overarching story in mind; and only after the fact might I (or a player, it's happened!) realize there's in fact some thread or other that ties them all together and that I can work with going forward.

Or, maybe during that run two characters have developed a rivarly, pursuit of which now supercedes all other activity for a while. Either way, there's a story has emerged where there wasn't one before, and on we go.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

If those three goblins could spell the end of your character it stops being boring real fast.

For me, it starts getting boring even faster. Because now I'm not even playing at all. I'm just sitting there, waiting to get to play again.

While this works as a solution on a practical level it also skips over a whole bunch of granularity and detail that I'd prefer to keep. (this was my primary objection to Skill Challenges in general, based on how I saw them implemented in the 4e modules I have)

If-when you get these ideas nailed down I'd be interested in giving them a look-over.

It'll probably be...a very long time. But if I do finish them, I'll share them here on ENWorld.

I will say, the way SCs should be implemented is often far removed from how WotC actually implemented them in a lot of the early/easily-accessible adventures. Which is an eternal frustration for me, because SCs can be really really great. When done well, they're memorable and exciting and offer a spectrum or space of possible outcomes, rather than the stupid yes/no binary that so many WotC adventures inflicted upon players.

So, if that criticism is mostly "WotC-written SCs usually suck, so I'd prefer not to have that happen", then believe me, I'm right there with you.

As long as these rules can and do account for all the various corner-case things that can happen even in the most trivial of combats (e.g. someone fumbles and shatters an expensive magic weapon, or a foe gets hella lucky and takes out a PC against long odds) then I'd be interested.

I'm reluctant to include fumble tables because fumble tables are extremely unpopular in general, but I could see that as an opt-in branch that could apply either way. Given my proposed idea of making it so it's quite possible to do nearly all combats as "Skirmishes"--to evoke more of an old-school feel--this is actually a good point I really should've already considered. This is part of why I enjoy engaging with folks whose playstyles are orthogonal to my own. They remind me of design needs I'm likely to forget because they aren't my design needs.

I could see this being implemented as a mix of "harsher consequences" rules (including things like fumble tables, Dark Sun-style wilderness survival challenges, and lingering injuries) that DMs could elect to use or not use, whether on a case-by-case basis or universally for a campaign, and being a tad more rigorous about Skirmishes.

And each DM could then decide which branches to use or not use, without too many knock-on effects elsewhere. Sounds good.

The only real issues might be around what the "trunk" of that tree consists of.

Sure. That is, as always, the kicker. But, in general, I aim to identify things that are hard for a DM to develop on their own, but easy to deviate away from (in the sense of game design, not in the sense of persuading players*) once they exist. Hence why I would want a generally pretty reliable monster-building and encounter-building system, because such a thing is very difficult to will into existence out of whole cloth, but very easy to simply ignore, or only pay attention to when you feel like it, if it is already present.

But, as a converse (since the above is an example where "what would be hard for DMs to develop themselves?" favors my interests, rather than opposing them), slow and methodical levelling is hard to wrangle out of a system that is fast and chunky. Not impossible, but certainly of loosely-comparable difficulty to wrangling reliable monster/encounter building out of the steaming pile that was 3e's monster design, for example. Hence the need for "novice levels" and incremental advancement; these directly implement a way to slow levelling down almost indefinitely, while still giving clear and measurable progress, and giving some of that "I want to feel like my growth is organic" feel that some players really really love.

*I am, personally, of the opinion that persuading players is, was, and always should be 100% on the DM. If the DM can't persuade the players to accept a particular set of rules for a campaign, the system neither can nor should intercede to force it to happen. That's a recipe for simmering player resentment, which is destructive to any campaign regardless of system or style.

 

[Minigiant]

If those three goblins could spell the end of your character it stops being boring real fast.

Only if that PC rolled well in play or char op.

Maybe it was just my experience, but I found players tend to tune out and actually add drag to any tedium if they roll some wimp that they are forced to make a fighter or a wizard who rolled up learned obscure spells.

Had to drop out of a group of an Old School RPG once because half the players must have punched a witch and kept rolling up just awful PCs who'd fail and die and they'd stop getting engaged because their characters stunk. Then anytime they did roll well, the stinkers next to them would botch up teamwork and get the decent PCs killed. So the group was demoralized and only meet to drink socially.

I attack. Miss.
I attack. Miss.
I attack hit. Rolled a 1 for damage. Half shot!

It think the DM's house was cursed or they really did punch a witch.

I got my dice blessed after leaving that table.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Only if that PC rolled well in play or char op.

Maybe it was just my experience, but I found players tend to tune out and actually add drag to any tedium if they roll some wimp that they are forced to make a fighter or a wizard who rolled up learned obscure spells.

Had to drop out of a group of an Old School RPG once because half the players must have punched a witch and kept rolling up just awful PCs who'd fail and die and they'd stop getting engaged because their characters stunk. Then anytime they did roll well, the stinkers next to them would botch up teamwork and get the decent PCs killed. So the group was demoralized and only meet to drink socially.

I attack. Miss.
I attack. Miss.
I attack hit. Rolled a 1 for damage. Half shot!

It think the DM's house was cursed or they really did punch a witch.

I got my dice blessed after leaving that table.

Exactly.

Some players find the above stuff exciting. They feel motivated to prove that this stinker will survive, or they laugh off the death and look forward to whatever new ridiculous shenanigans the next garbage character gets up to. It sort of threads between black-comedy slapstick (in an "America's Funniest Home Videos" way) and the thrill of fluke heroics.

Other players...it's not exciting or motivating or funny. It's just demoralizing. It sucks out all of the fun and excitement and replaces it with either dread or depression. "Oh. Great. Another character dead after doing less damage than his total HP...at first level...guess it's time to roll up another..."

 

[AlViking]

Okay?

Bit frustrating to make a passing shot at 4e and then say "but I'm not going to discuss that now."

You made an accusation about my calculations for what I could throw at a party in 5w that is not true based on my experience. I'm not going to discuss encounter building details in 4 or any other edition because it's been 10 years or more since I even thought about it. I did not take a shot at 4e, what I said applied just as much to 3e. I was discussing things like the PCs in 3e having ACs in the 30s after level 10 and the fact that lower level monsters would always need a 20 to hit where some monsters in 5e such as berserkers would still hit the average character roughly half the time.

The versions of the game have had different approaches, I like bounded accuracy because it means I can effectively use monster that have a significantly lower CR than the PC's levels.

 

[Minigiant]

I want to be clear.

I don't think Bounded Accuracy is bad. I like Bounded Accuracy.

I just think The Bounds of 8 points chosen for 5e in both 2014 and 2024 are too small.
This made the design team hit the "cap" too fast and caused an inflation of every other type of roll and an overuse of complex external aspects like bonus action features, spells, and psuedo spells.

12 point scale would have been better. A generic infantry can hit AC 22 if they are lucky. So enough of them could still be scary.

(Long rant cut for focus on the topic at hand)

 

[payn]

Exactly.

Some players find the above stuff exciting. They feel motivated to prove that this stinker will survive, or they laugh off the death and look forward to whatever new ridiculous shenanigans the next garbage character gets up to. It sort of threads between black-comedy slapstick (in an "America's Funniest Home Videos" way) and the thrill of fluke heroics.

Other players...it's not exciting or motivating or funny. It's just demoralizing. It sucks out all of the fun and excitement and replaces it with either dread or depression. "Oh. Great. Another character dead after doing less damage than his total HP...at first level...guess it's time to roll up another..."

Sometimes I feel like a nut, and sometimes I dont. Fortunately, I got RPGs with nuts and ones that dont.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Sometimes I feel like a nut, and sometimes I dont. Fortunately, I got RPGs with nuts and ones that dont.

Absolutely.

Now, how do we make a D&D that can support people who feel like a nut, and people who don't, at least at separate tables?

That's the conundrum I'd like to solve. I've seen enough truly clever game design over the years to believe there are solutions--but they'll be non-obvious in most cases.