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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Mesh Hong" data-source="post: 5157881" data-attributes="member: 73463">sorry if I've come to this thread a little late.  An encounter is too easy, or trivial, if the PCs do not expend any healing surges or use any daily powers. My personal opinion on this is that unless it was a backdrop for revealing a major plot point it was a waste of valuable game time and design effort. This is probably the only situation that I have come across as being the definition of grind. Going through the motions with no threat or motivation other than the abstract notion of xp gain.  By my definition 0% of combats should be easy, not 70%, but I do realise that our definitions are not the same. Combat should be part of the story, usually the business end. Combat is part of the exploration or resolution phase of an adventure. The investigation and decision phases usually do not include combat, or if they do they are probably so low key that they can be decided with a bit of description and a skill challenge. I agree that combat shouldn’t dominate the play experience, but it will usually decide the outcome.   I do see what you are saying but if a combat is easy then why do you need to “rescue the princess, steal the battle plans, and run for your life”? Why don’t you just stand your ground and kill everything. Surely you would be more inclined to get the job done and leg it if you were facing an overwhelming or serious threat?  It’s a fair point, but a DM should be asking themselves that question when designing any encounter or story element. As I have previously alluded to I believe that any combat should be meaningful and have a story point, no combat should be trivial.    Here is where it gets interesting. My own experience is that the whole style of play changes depending on what tier the PCs are in. 1: Heroic: Lots of encounters, many as you say at standard level or even 1 below with encounters rarely being deadly. 2: Paragon: Less encounters, many still at standard or level +1, but with more deadly and a few potentially lethal encounters. 3: Epic: Fewer still encounters, all encounters are at least dangerous, lots are deadly and some are potentially overwhelming. In my game my 6 PCs are close to level 25. I have pretty much abandoned the encounter design and monster creation guide, I have had to as Epic characters really have to face Epic threats. Everything my PCs do has an impact on the game world, some of those impacts are massive and long reaching. The stakes are high and they have everything to lose….. In conclusion I pretty much agree with you in designing a Heroic tier story. But I think your approach becomes less relevant as you progress through Paragon tier and is redundant in Epic tier. Of course this is only my opinion and experience. The beauty of roleplaying games is that everyone interprets their world and game experience in their own way.</blockquote>

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