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Message: <blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 4584839" data-attributes="member: 2067">Yaaay, I'm a useful person! <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />Some follow-up!That's going to be a little more system-dependent. A lot of DMs do this kind of automatically, though.For instance, last weekend I was DMing a 4e combat and it had reached the point where the players knew they would win if they just kept hacking. I was fighting them with a team of soldier-type enemies that could basically mark them. I used this to lure one or two of them away from the rest, and then spring a trap on those two during the Climax. The trap drove walls between the members of the party. So it went sort of: "Hi, there are bad guys here, we must fight them (intro). We fight them, but we have the edge (tension), they should be mopped up quickly. ON NO! SUDDEN TRAP! SPLIT PARTY! EVERYONE'S BONED! (Climax)"4e's way of using traps makes this kind of easy to do. But you can pretty much do things like this no matter the system. Rules that are built around it will take better advantage of it, though. FFZ milks it for a lot of Attack/Defense flipping, so that the combatants won't always be on the aggressive. This is pretty true, but, IMO, it makes the game more fun. If you're going for a stricter simulation, you're probably OK with a few unsatisfying combats because, well, that's the way the world works, buddy! <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> In the Real World, combat doesn't really follow this arc very well, that's for sure. I've got no real qualms in changing the play experience to get my blood and my players' blood pumping a little faster, myself. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> Final Fantasy Zero uses this structure as the guiding force in almost friggin' everything. In encounters, about encounters, through campaigns...the "one year episodic structure" of the game is built around doing this over and over again as ways to raise the stakes until you finally confront your One-Winged Angel at the end. FFZ is unabashedly narrative, though. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> That's why I couldn't just squat on it with FFZ. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /> If this thread helps some ENWorld DMs become more aware of the structure and to make their games better by hewing to it, that'll be awesome. Depending on how flexible you want to be, you can weave that into it. If the PC's easily protect themselves, then the dragon has ONE MORE trick up it's sleeve! If the PC's manage to kill the dragon quickly, then there was an EVEN BIGGER dragon lurking behind it. What would become kind of an unsatisfying "climax" becomes instead part of the tension. The climax is something else.The idea is to constantly build up the tension until it reaches a WAHOO point. If the intended climactic combat wound up being a flop, chuck a bigger one at them! The more familiar you are with your players the easier this is, because the better you can predict them. But the general approach is kind of universal. Save the big guns for the later rounds, use the small and middle-sized guns at first. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> Indeed. It's so effective to see the worry start to appear when players approach that "one of us is going to fall down" point. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />That's pretty true. Just like I wouldn't bother using this structure in D&D combats that are just about whittling away your HP, save-or-die works fine in that context. If save-or-die effects took 5 rounds to cast (and then still did damage if they didn't outright kill you) the tension would still be there. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /></blockquote>

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