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Message: <blockquote data-quote="CleverNickName" data-source="post: 5840930" data-attributes="member: 50987">Random Encounters in 3.5E: Lessons LearnedYesterday, I ran a five-hour long D&D gaming session with five other friends.  (We are currently playing a 3.5E game, using the core rules and the Frostburn supplement.)  This time, however, I put together a few Random Encounter Tables to use with the adventure:  one for the overland trip to the ruin, another for the ruin itself, and one for the dungeon beneath the ruin.  Pretty standard, for back in the day.Since the party is made up of five low-level characters (1st & 2nd level), I made sure that nearly all of the creatures on the random encounter tables were EL 1.  There were a couple of encounters that were EL 2 with a 10% chance of appearing, and one EL 3 with a 5% chance of appearing.  The point of the higher EL encounters?  To keep the party guessing, and to reinforce the fact that the area they are traveling through is dangerous, and not a place to get cozy and hang out.  In other words, your standard Random Encounter Tables.The base chance for an encounter was 10%, checked twice daily while traveling overland (and hourly, when they were in the dungeon.)  This base chance was modified by +/- 5% based on the party's actions.  Moving quietly, not using fire, doubling back to cover their tracks, etc, would reduce the chance by 5%, while carrying light sources, casting noisy spells, bashing down doors, etc., would increase that chance.  Again, pretty standard.The adventure was simple: the local thane has hired the party to clean out a nest of goblins.  The nest is a ruined lighthouse on the shore, about 3 days away on foot across open terrain.  Your typical 3.5E low-level adventure, except this time, I am using random encounters.Here's how it shook out.-----AWESOME:It kept the party guessing, it broke up the monotony of overland travel, and it created an air of danger.  For the first time in years, the players were discussing things like "it's safer to stay on the roads," "we should avoid the swamp, because that guy at the bar said a black dragon lives there," and "we barely got away...we should warn others that an ogre lives in that cave."  <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=":)" />MEDIOCRE:It really slowed the game down, though.  All that extra mystery and roleplaying took its toll on our game time.  With each battle taking up between 30 and 45 minutes of our time, we ran out of time before the party could even make it to the dungeon.  I'm not saying this is a problem--personally, I think that days-long journeys through wild countryside should be just as memorable as the destination.  But not all DMs would agree.AWFUL:Combat takes too long, and more combat only makes the problem worse.  This is a known issue, so I won't say anything more about it.More encounters on the road means that the party needs to pack extra provisions and supplies...about 50% more, in fact.  More healing potions, more scrolls of magic missile and bless, more arrows, maybe even a spare weapon or two.  I think the 3.x and 4E playstyle has spoiled us...nowadays, the players expect to arrive at every dungeon fully-rested and well-stocked with magic, and the dungeon seems to expect it too.  But with random encounters thrown into the mix, this never happens.So the result: the party gets halfway to their destination after a battle or two, decides that their situation is less than ideal, and turns back to get more supplies.  Over and over again, until they get lucky and have an encounter-free journey, or (more likely) they go broke buying potions and accept their fate.-----So random encounters presents two challenges in the 5E system.  The first (and most important, IMO) is the length of combat:  more encounters of any kind will slow the game down.  Random or scripted, if a battle takes longer than 10-15 minutes under the new system, they need to go back to the drawing board.But equally important is the dependence on resources.  3.5E is, admittedly, a very magic-dependent game...and 4E isn't much better, what with all of the emphasis on powers, class abilities, and healing surges.  (Magic by another name, is still magic.)  They need to remove the expectation that the party will start every day refreshed and fully-charged...on both sides of the screen.Players will need more ways to be resourceful...spells and potions have limited uses, so you must learn to save them for very special occasions.  Skill challenges, not superpowers, should be your bread and butter.  DMs: you need to cut the players some slack, and anticipate that the party will not be facing each encounter under optimum conditions.  If you want the party to clean out the entire dungeon in a single day, you need to make sure that you are using a reasonable number of encounters...random or otherwise.  We need to learn to challenge the party with traps, puzzles, and interesting terrain...not wave after wave of goblin soldiers.Just my two coppers.</blockquote>

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