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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Quickleaf" data-source="post: 7439693" data-attributes="member: 20323">Yes. I've been in a similar situation as a DM several times. What worked for me is to narrate failed rolls in increasingly interesting/tense ways & to describe the cause of missed attack as something external to the PC. I've noticed this minimizes player frustration/exhaustion. It also gives the players something to build off of and potentially exploit.Here's an example, using your scenario:Ranger rolls a 1 to hit with Arrow of Dragon Slaying. You describe the dragon uttering the name of another dragon (its ancient rival), and the arrow veers off course, hurtling into the clouds and the horizon to seek out that rival dragon. Now the players have a bit of a mystery they can explore if they wish, and might even seek out that rival dragon later (e.g. if they have to retreat & seek out allies to take down the dragon).From the player's perspective, something interesting happened even though their attack was technically a miss. Notice that I didn't use the language "the PC missed". This can help reduce that sense of frustration from a series of bad rolls. With my specific example, it also establishes that this dragon has magic powers outside of what the players are familiar with. You can continue playing up that theme with further bad rolls for the PCs' attacks; maybe the sorcerer's fire bolt ricochets off the dragon's hide and scorches a passage with a flammable gas pocket.The more you respond in this way as a DM, the more players will pick up on these "throw away" narrative bits and begin to use the environment/circumstances to their advantage.</blockquote>

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