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<blockquote data-quote="Elder-Basilisk" data-source="post: 3392070" data-attributes="member: 3146">The fantastic adventures mods all worked out to something like this approach. Here are some of my takes:1. When it works, it can work very well. Allowing the combat to develop slows it down and allows for it to be a story of its own with the dramatic elements of introduction, rising action, and climax.The mushroom cavern fight in Hellspike prison is a good example of this. The fight begins with an introduction. You fight a WHOLE bunch of weaker creatures. Initially, they seem almost laughably weak, but they all have a spell like ability that is almost guaranteed to do SOMETHING and there are enough of them that they will take their toll. So, from the player's perspective, it is the introduction to the fight. It, itself progresses from &quot;surprise! oh no!&quot; to &quot;this is easy!&quot; to &quot;That's an awful lot of them&quot; to &quot;This is really starting to add up; we'd better finish this quickly.&quot; At about that last point, it is usually when the players have gone far enough into the cavern to trigger the elementals and to notice the monster in the central cavern. That is the rising action where the players realize it's serious and they start getting a bit worried. Then, Vereorax appears and, both times it's happened, players figuratively dump their pants. At that point, the fight has reached the pull out all the stops climax.2. Fights where opponents arrive in a kind of staggered order also tend to feature larger numbers of weaker combatants. This allows different kinds of characters to thrive than ordinarily do. (The fighter I just ran through Hellspike Prison said afterward, &quot;This kind of mod reminds me why I have Cleave.&quot;) Similarly, they give fireballs and other area effect spells the opportunity to be the kinds of show-stoppers they were in earlier editions without actually stopping the show. If the arc of lightning kills 7 out of 8 derro, that's pretty dramatic, but when you also have a roper, a beholder, and a pair of elementals, it's not like the show actually has to stop.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Elder-Basilisk, post: 3392070, member: 3146"] The fantastic adventures mods all worked out to something like this approach. Here are some of my takes: 1. When it works, it can work very well. Allowing the combat to develop slows it down and allows for it to be a story of its own with the dramatic elements of introduction, rising action, and climax. The mushroom cavern fight in Hellspike prison is a good example of this. The fight begins with an introduction. You fight a WHOLE bunch of weaker creatures. Initially, they seem almost laughably weak, but they all have a spell like ability that is almost guaranteed to do SOMETHING and there are enough of them that they will take their toll. So, from the player's perspective, it is the introduction to the fight. It, itself progresses from "surprise! oh no!" to "this is easy!" to "That's an awful lot of them" to "This is really starting to add up; we'd better finish this quickly." At about that last point, it is usually when the players have gone far enough into the cavern to trigger the elementals and to notice the monster in the central cavern. That is the rising action where the players realize it's serious and they start getting a bit worried. Then, Vereorax appears and, both times it's happened, players figuratively dump their pants. At that point, the fight has reached the pull out all the stops climax. 2. Fights where opponents arrive in a kind of staggered order also tend to feature larger numbers of weaker combatants. This allows different kinds of characters to thrive than ordinarily do. (The fighter I just ran through Hellspike Prison said afterward, "This kind of mod reminds me why I have Cleave.") Similarly, they give fireballs and other area effect spells the opportunity to be the kinds of show-stoppers they were in earlier editions without actually stopping the show. If the arc of lightning kills 7 out of 8 derro, that's pretty dramatic, but when you also have a roper, a beholder, and a pair of elementals, it's not like the show actually has to stop. [/QUOTE]

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