Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
White Dwarf Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Nest
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions, OSR, & D&D Variants
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
EN Publishing
Twitter
BlueSky
Facebook
Instagram
EN World
BlueSky
YouTube
Facebook
Twitter
Twitch
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions, OSR, & D&D Variants
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Looking for advice on combat DnD 5e as a DM
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 6911274" data-attributes="member: 996"><p>Don't worry, in 5 or 10 years, it'll be old hat.</p><p></p><p>That's a tad unusual. 5e combats tend to go quickly, often a round or few, even when longer, the rounds can tend to go quickly...</p><p></p><p>A lot of things can contribute to bogging down. Is a lot of time spent looking up rules, say re-reading spells, for instance? Do players take a long time to decide on their actions? Do they change their minds part way through and 're-wind?' Do you find you have to describe the whole scene and possible options to each player at the start of their turn every time?</p><p></p><ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">If you're using a play surface, like a chessex battlemat, you can just draw in the affected area, otherwise just place tokens at strategic points to mark it. If you're running TotM, the trick is not to keep careful track of the area and who's in it, and how they'd have to move to avoid it, etc - you just have to <em>sound confident</em> when telling the player's who's in it, and how they'd have to move to avoid it, &c.<br /> <ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Sounds like you could cut down on the size of your encounters. Gravitate more towards combats where the party outnumbers the monsters. A lone monster can be tricky to make challenging, but if the biggest issue is combats taking too long, the odd anticlimactic beatdown shouldn't be too much of a problem. The party outnumbering the enemy 2:1 might be a good thing to aim for. It means fewer turns for your to worry over, and monsters going down faster. <br /> <br /> It might also be that your players aren't being quite as deadly to your monsters as they could be. When the party focuses on one monster at a time and burns them down quickly, each monster taken out of the initiative order speeds the combat slightly from then on.<br /> <br /> Probably a good call. Instead, if you want to use a magic-using foe, pick a spell or three (a beefed up cantrip, so it always has something to cast, and whatever couple other spells fit it best) and use spell cards or just write down the cogent bits on a copy of the monster or NPC, itself.</li> </ul></li> </ul></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Tony Vargas, post: 6911274, member: 996"] Don't worry, in 5 or 10 years, it'll be old hat. That's a tad unusual. 5e combats tend to go quickly, often a round or few, even when longer, the rounds can tend to go quickly... A lot of things can contribute to bogging down. Is a lot of time spent looking up rules, say re-reading spells, for instance? Do players take a long time to decide on their actions? Do they change their minds part way through and 're-wind?' Do you find you have to describe the whole scene and possible options to each player at the start of their turn every time? [LIST]If you're using a play surface, like a chessex battlemat, you can just draw in the affected area, otherwise just place tokens at strategic points to mark it. If you're running TotM, the trick is not to keep careful track of the area and who's in it, and how they'd have to move to avoid it, etc - you just have to [i]sound confident[/i] when telling the player's who's in it, and how they'd have to move to avoid it, &c. [LIST]Sounds like you could cut down on the size of your encounters. Gravitate more towards combats where the party outnumbers the monsters. A lone monster can be tricky to make challenging, but if the biggest issue is combats taking too long, the odd anticlimactic beatdown shouldn't be too much of a problem. The party outnumbering the enemy 2:1 might be a good thing to aim for. It means fewer turns for your to worry over, and monsters going down faster. It might also be that your players aren't being quite as deadly to your monsters as they could be. When the party focuses on one monster at a time and burns them down quickly, each monster taken out of the initiative order speeds the combat slightly from then on. Probably a good call. Instead, if you want to use a magic-using foe, pick a spell or three (a beefed up cantrip, so it always has something to cast, and whatever couple other spells fit it best) and use spell cards or just write down the cogent bits on a copy of the monster or NPC, itself.[/list][/list] [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Looking for advice on combat DnD 5e as a DM
Top