Let's FIGHT!

[Bullgrit]

For our game group, I'm usually the main DM. Of the 4 of us in our lineup of players, I'm the DM more than 50% of the time. But we are now trying a round-robin style campaign -- each player in the group takes a turn DMing an adventure. So far I've DMed one adventure [4 game sessions], one other player has DMed an adventure [4 game sessions], and another player is currently running an adventure [4 game sessions so far].

Historically, and in the adventure I ran for this round-robin campaign, we have 1 to 6 combats in a game session -- we average about 4. Out combats go pretty fast -- 2-4 minutes per round, depending on a lot of variables -- so the number of combats we have or could have are not usually restricted because of how long each one takes to play out. There's plenty of time for non-combat play.

But when the other DMs (so far just 2; the 3rd is scheduled for the next adventure), we average 1 combat per game session. And where my combats ELs range from easy to challenging to tough, the other DMs seem to think all battles must be tough -- must push us to our limits. Where as in my adventures, the party can often take on more than one combat between rests, the other DMs run battles that end with us almost completely spent and needing rest before the next encounter -- this is a factor in our getting only 1 fight per game session.

Now, I don't mind the tough encounters and having to rest between each (although I think it's unnecessary for them all to be that tough), but the one fight per game session is starting to wear on me.

I don't have to have half a dozen fights every game session, nor do I want them all to be cake walks, but I'm starting to actively dislike having one (and only one) balls-to-the-wall, epic battle each game session (where we have to use all our resources to survive).

And an adventure design concept I'm coming to think is overrated: every combat should be different. DMs seem to have the idea that similar combats would be boring for everyone. In fact, one time a DM handwaved a battle because it would be exactly like the previous one (which we proved we could win). You know, sometimes it's fun to have a "do over" by tackling a similar challenge to one we've taken on before. I've often thought, "I'd love to try this again, and use new tactics based on lessons learned in that previous fight."

Anyway, I like my fellow players -- they're my friends -- so I'm just kind of griping here with no hard feelings towards the other DMs. I just wanted to post my thoughts and see if anyone else around had experienced similar situations or felt like I do about wanting more cowbell fights in their D&D.

Bullgrit
Total Bullgrit

 

[Jeremy757]

You know your really not supposed to talk about it. It's the FIRST rule.

 

[GnomeWorks]

Shorts are comfy and easy to wear?

 

[Voadam]

When I was running a weekly face to face game of 2e Ravenloft with intense investigation/politics/religious issues and tons of roleplaying focus I made it a point to always have at least one fight per session. And they were usually very intense.

Some nights there were more and sometimes the combats were easy, but mostly I thought I was doing well on the action meter by making sure there was always a point in the session where I said "roll initiative".

For me this was the more cowbell solution however.

I was playing in a separate game at the time where there were long numbers of sessions without combat. It was a fairly political/roleplay oriented game with characters of vastly different levels, I think at one point there was a first level PC walking next to a PC whose character was in the 30s. In that game who you were and what you did were more important than what level you were or how much damage you could dish out. It was fun but I do like D&D combat and wanted to make sure my games had enough to suit my preferences.