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Message: <blockquote data-quote="hawkeyefan" data-source="post: 6966806" data-attributes="member: 6785785">I won't disagree with your assessment...I even agree with it to an extent. I address it in my game in a number of ways, many of which have been discussed before and whichI won't bother going into now. What I do want to mention, however, is that in your description and examples, the PCs are always master tacticians...moving from cover to attack and then back into cover, and so on. They work in unison, and they try to maximize their actions. But you never describe the monsters in the same way. Why do the PCs all have cover available, but not the monsters? Why do the monsters not attack from range? Why don't the monsters ready actions to shoot once a PC steps from cover or starts to cast a spell? Why don't the monsters attack and then take cover and repeat?If the monsters behave tactically as well, that goes a long way to balancing things out. Whether it's 300 orcs or a Balor and some demonic underlings, there's no reason for them to sit around and wait to be slaughtered. Each and every enemy NPC should be behaving as tactically as the PCs. I mean, why wouldn't they? Does an orc think "I'm just an orc soldier...I'm expendable"? I think it's far better to play most enemies as if they want to win and more importantly to live.My point being that not everything boils down to the abilities of the monsters; how they are run and what the DM chooses to have them do can be just as impactful, if not more so. You described monsters as bags of hit points...and it sounds like that's how you think of them. Players pick up on that...they know to expect it. They are not surprised by the creatures' behavior in any way. This plays into my last point...you have to surprise players. If every single enemy is run simply as an obstacle to be defeated, then that's all they'll be...and then your players won't behave as if they are anything more than that.This is why your PCs wouldn't flee from a horde of orcs and why you don't even think that's odd. All you are thinking of is the game mechanics and not what those mechanics are designed to represent.</blockquote>

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