D&D General Playing D&D without combat

[Scruffy nerf herder]

Let's phrase this with two lines of questioning:

-In some recent sessions I didn't put the players in a real combat encounter more than once, over the course of three sessions. In fact in one of them we didn't even crack out the map and minis.

Were we in some way not playing D&D? Was it not "truly 5E"? Does that amount of RP focused content sound appealing or unappealing? And lastly, have you ever tried this kind of play yourself?

-Is it even possible, or ever desirable, to play through a fairly long combat free stint of a campaign?

 

[payn]

-Is it even possible, or ever desirable, to play through a fairly long combat free stint of a campaign?

It is, but when I choose D&D, its because it provides a robust combat system. It can surely be done, but I'd go elsewhere if that is the goal.

 

[LordEntrails]

Why would I pick a game if I'm only going to use only 10% of the rules?

Because you find it fun?

 

[Stormonu]

I’ve had sessions of D&D with no combat, it’s still D&D. However, if I were doing a long-term game that had no combats, I’d probably use a different system altogether.

 

[Iry]

Yes, you were absolutely playing 5E D&D.
Yes, you can play an entire campaign without a single combat and have tons of fun.
However, there are MUCH better game systems for this style of play.

 

[cbwjm]

You can play without doing much combat, but with so much of your class geared towards combat, I do find it can get a little boring with extended periods without combat. Like others have said, if that was the sort of game we were signing up to play, I think a different system might be better.

 

[Baldurs_Underdark]

Yes, yes, yes.

Especially if the PCs find other means to overcome obstacles, avoiding combat but still solving the challenge, they should be given all the praise, rewards and of course XP.

Of course it's also possible that the players/PCs just sit in the pub and roleplay insignificant stuff, delaying the whole campaign with meaningless roleplay. Then I'd put in a few trolls to go smash-smash.

 

[Ondath]

Let's phrase this with two lines of questioning:

-In some recent sessions I didn't put the players in a real combat encounter more than once, over the course of three sessions. In fact in one of them we didn't even crack out the map and minis.

Were we in some way not playing D&D? Was it not "truly 5E"? Does that amount of RP focused content sound appealing or unappealing? And lastly, have you ever tried this kind of play yourself?

-Is it even possible, or ever desirable, to play through a fairly long combat free stint of a campaign?

What "counts" as D&D is a fairly vague question and I think the answer also has to be vague - but it doesn't mean there is no answer.

While a lot of the book's page space is dedicated to combat rules, you can have a session without combat and it'd still easily count as D&D. Did you use skill checks? Refer to your character's unique abilities as determined by their class or heritage? Was the world built with D&D assumptions (planar realms, magic understood in discrete slots, etc.)? Then this was clearly a D&D game.

There is a larger discussion to be had, though. Would it still count as D&D if you heavily homebrewed the game so there are only 3 abilities, skills use a percentile dice system and combat is resolved through dice pools? I think the line blurs a bit. Some games can still be clearly D&D despite being heavily homebrewed, while others would clearly start working with different system assumptions, thus no longer be D&D.

The more important question I think is whether everyone at the table played the game they wanted to play - if they did, then I think it matters little if what you played was D&D or Pathfinder or Exploding Kittens. We use the labels only to help us play better games, so the rest isn't important.

That said, it does irk me when people use D&D as a catch-all term for TTRPGs of any kind - there was a video by this D&D channel called Bob World Builder (super chill dude, usually great content) where he was talking about how D&D could be anything, and gave an example of how he played a "D&D" game ran by a kid in summer camp where the story was that the main character in a modern world would sneak into some facility, and he proudly tells how they made up the character abilities and resolution mechanics on the spot and how it was a fun game of D&D. That just... feels wrong to me. Sure, it sounds like a good TTRPG session (and I'm sure he and the kid had fun!), but if you're playing with completely different action resolution mechanics and a completely different setting, why call it D&D at that point?

 

[Immoralkickass]

Playing D&D without combat is like sitting in a car without driving it.

Is it possible? Certainly. Desirable? Probably not. Are you truly using the car? In your own definition, maybe, but not for its intended purpose.

 

[aco175]

Some depends on your players and how they like things. There are some players you show up to roll dice and kill things. They tend to look for a fight if none is presented. I try to present and opportunity at least once per night, even if it does not lead to actual fighting from talking or paying a bribe or such.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

I think it's entirely possible to play D&D with little-to-no combat. My one group only plays for two hours at a time and sometimes things just line up that there's no combat during a session.

As long as the players are happy, that's enough. People come to play D&D with a variety of likes and dislikes. It's all a valid way to play D&D, whether it's a socio-political game of intense RP or a nonstop dungeon crawl.