D&D 5E My most basic advice for DMs who want more interesting & dynamic combat

[Shiroiken]

One of the biggest things I've found to make a dynamic combat is to have the enemies start in multiple locations. If you just have everyone smash together into a large melee, then movement becomes largely irrelevant. With multiple directions to deal with, the party either has to separate into several smaller skirmishes or leave the "back rank" characters open to attack. In these cases, the PCs might even need to take an OA to switch between them (e.g. the paladin wants to take on one big bad, but a cleric with Spiritual Guardians wants a bunch of minions instead).

To a lot of players, "you can but at a penalty" is functionally "you can't."

Sad, but true. Some players just can't see the potential reward worth any penalty or risk. Of course, some DM can't think of worthwhile rewards to go with said penalties either...

 

[LordEntrails]

If your players regularly take extra risks just because... well, good for you but I've never seen it.

My experience is this depends upon how layers view their characters and if character death is a real possibility. Often times players get heavily invested in their characters. Huge backstories, and where character death is not something allowed. In those cases, players don't take chances with their characters.

But, when character death (and TPKs) are real players invest less emotionally in their characters and are willing to put their characters at risk.

It can be influenced by the DM, if they want.

 

[Retreater]

To avoid a single opportunity attack, I've had players slow down the game, count out the optimized movement pattern, stop and look up feats and skill descriptions, go to the pizzeria down the street and purchase a calzone to tempt me to not attack their character, call their wife to beg me to not take the free attack, email Chris Perkins and wait for his response before finishing their action, drive to the FLGS to see if the newest printing of the PHB has errata that would stop the opportunity attack. These all make combats take a long time.

 

[Jacob Lewis]

Combat in D&D is rarely all that interesting without tension, suspense, or some level of personal or emotional investment. If you know how to create any of these for your players during other parts of the game, then you already have all the tools you need to inject them into your battles. Otherwise, its just a contest 'til the end to see who has any hit points left.

 

[el-remmen]

If your players regularly take extra risks just because... well, good for you but I've never seen it.

Not sure if you read what I wrote carefully enough because I did not write "just because." In fact, I wrote the opposite of "just because." I could be wrong in my judgement but doing something "to look cool" feels closer to "just because" than I am taking this risk to go back up my ally or to save the potential human sacrifice or whatever.

 

[jmartkdr2]

Not sure if you read what I wrote carefully enough because I did not write "just because." In fact, I wrote the opposite of "just because." I could be wrong in my judgement but doing something "to look cool" feels closer to "just because" than I am taking this risk to go back up my ally or to save the potential human sacrifice or whatever.

I've found that this doesn't happen naturally in 5e. Backing up an ally is usually pointless (as discussed, since moving means you take the opportunity attack, but staying still means you get to make an opportunity attack agaisnt them), and the advice for designing encounters doesn't tell you to do more than use the right number of enemies.

 

[el-remmen]

I've found that this doesn't happen naturally in 5e. Backing up an ally is usually pointless (as discussed, since moving means you take the opportunity attack, but staying still means you get to make an opportunity attack agaisnt them), and the advice for designing encounters doesn't tell you to do more than use the right number of enemies.

I guess my advice is not for you or your table then. The advice about designing encounters found in the DMG (I guess?) is not what we're talking about in this thread, and to be honest I haven't read it. I tend to trust my experience as DM (and player) over whatever the books suggest.

 

[jmartkdr2]

I guess my advice is not for you or your table then. The advice about designing encounters found in the DMG (I guess?) is not what we're talking about in this thread, and to be honest I haven't read it. I tend to trust my experience as DM (and player) over whatever the books suggest.

I mean, I think "do what @el-remmen does" is good advice. I just think it does need to be said to new dms.

 

[Guest 7034872]

Well, okay--I'll speak up as one of those new DMs.

I can't give advice because I'm just on the cusp of my first-ever real DMing experience (I wrote a big adventure that we'll start in March), so knowing what I'm doing is almost certainly something I'll need to achieve down the road a-piece. I have been very happy to read and take el-remmen's advice, though, and one piece of advice I do keep subvocalizing to myself is, "The game is not about its rules; it is collaborative improvisational storytelling."

Idunno--I guess because I considered studying law before I went into philosophy (and maybe because I'm part German), I have a regrettable tendency to get hung up on rules, and I learned long ago that tendency kills the game if you let it. So I'm trying really hard not to do that now. I've written hundreds of pages for this thing, read dozens of books on it, and watched literally hundreds of hours of video material on how to do one's best job as DM, but in the end I still find myself standing on virgin snow, about to break its serenity forever with that fateful first footprint. It feels a bit like Calvin & Hobbes' final comic strip, but with more vertigo.

Thanks for the tips on how to enliven combat, el-remmen: I had noticed its tendency to get mechanical and rote, and I suspect you're right that making opponents smarter and less predictable, along with having more attacks of opportunity around to facilitate such NPC cleverness, will help.

We'll see...

 

[el-remmen]

Well, okay--I'll speak up as one of those new DMs.

I can't give advice because I'm just on the cusp of my first-ever real DMing experience

Here's the thing. Not all advice is going to be good for everybody and no advice is every going to be 100% a perfect fit.

For example, while I understand "collaborative improvisational storytelling" is some people's approach to the game, it is not really mine.

But in general my advice for a new DM is to just run the game as much as possible and expect things to not always run the way you expect and just roll with mistakes because mistakes and oversights will happen. It is not the end of the world. In fact, they can help a lot in terms of learning what not to do or to try differently. As long as in general you and your players are having fun, that's what matters the most.