D&D General Structural Flaw of the D&D Combat System

[M_Natas]

After playing RPGs for several years and attempting to design my own adventures, RPG systems, and homebrew rules, I've noticed a structural flaw in D&D combat that detracts from the excitement: the suspense curve is inverted. The optimal strategy for a D&D fight is to inflict as much damage as possible early on to quickly kill the monster(s), and the rules make it very easy to do so.

As a result, players tend to use their biggest resources, such as high-level spells and limited-use abilities, as early as possible if they perceive the monster as a threat. They try to avoid using any limited resources if they think the monster(s) pose no threat. This leads to front-loaded (boss) fights where all the big cool stuff happens at the beginning, and if the fight drags on, it devolves into a slugfest where the characters spam cantrips and make normal weapon attacks. The dragon, for example, often gets killed by a normal melee attack or an eldritch blast rather than the lightning bolt or the fighter's eight attacks with their action surge.

This is often less true for monsters, as they usually have recharge abilities for their big attacks.

As a result, the suspense curve for players is inverted because if they don't use the optimal strategy, the fight becomes more challenging for them.

To make (boss) battles more exciting and to encourage players to use bigger abilities later in the fight, we need to change something on the design level. One possible mechanic that came to my mind involves giving classes abilities or feats that charge up during combat. For the first two or three rounds, a character would engage in mundane activities like making normal attacks or using cantrips, charging up their special ability. Then, on round three, they can use their special ability to inflict more damage. They must then recharge again. This would create a dynamic where the fight starts small and ends big, rather than vice versa.

I have provided some examples as a proof of concept, but they are not perfect or balanced yet. They are merely intended to illustrate what I envision:

Fighter:
So, let's say a fighter has a special attack called Coup de Grace. It is a special attack, that targets a weakness of a creature, doing double the damage on a hit.
It would read something like that as rules:

Charges:
When you just take the normal attack action (including extra attacks) on your turn, you get a charge point (name is up for debate). You can accumulate charge points up to an maximum equal to your proficiency bonus.
You can spend Charges to activate special abilities as a bonus action:
True Strike (2 Charges):
You studied the movement of your enemy. All the attacks of your next attack action have advantage.
Coup de Grace (3 Charges):
You figured out the weakness of your enemy. You are able to attack the creatures weak spots. Until the beginning of your next turn, that creature is vulnerable (taking double damage) on all attacks from you.

Wizard:
Charges:
When you only cast cantrips on your turn and no leveld spells, you get a charge point (name is up for debate). You can accumulate charge points up to an maximum equal to your proficiency bonus. You can spend Charges to activate special abilities as a bonus action:
Overpowered spell (2 charges):
The next spell you casts counts as a level higher.
Adapted spell (3 charges):
You figured out the vulnerabilities of the enemy creature. It gets vulnerability against the next spell you cast against it.


With such rules in play, without changing anything else, suddenly it makes sense use the big abilities later in the battle and not at the beginning, so you don't start the fight with an explosion but end it in one.

The biggest problem I see so far is, that it collides with Kipoints and sorcery points pretty hard. Especially the sorcery points of the sorcerer take up a similiar design space.

What do you guys and girls think? Is this something feasible? Did somebody try something similiar? Does somebody has developed other solutions?

 

[mamba]

First of all, I do not see this as a flaw, but as the logical way a fight progresses. Watch a boxing fight that goes over 12 rounds sometime

Second, I believe this is only more ‘cinematic’ if the PCs then kill the enemy in their charged-up round and not two rounds after that when they are slugging it out again, waiting for their superpowers to recharge.

Finally, the closest thing to this I am aware of is the escalation die from 13th Age.

 

[M_Natas]

First of all, I do not see this as a flaw, but as the logical way a fight progresses. Watch a boxing fight that goes over 12 rounds sometime

Yeah, but what is more fun to watch? ^^ I confess, I'm not a boxing fan.

Second, I believe this is only more ‘cinematic’ if the PCs then kill the enemy in their charged-up round and not two rounds after that when they are slugging it out again, waiting for their superpowers to recharge.

Good point.
Maybe using the charged abilities themselves gives additional charges or the charges are not used up, so after round 3 the whole power level goes up.
Or maybe it is a general rule: after three rounds of combat all characters were able to figure out the weak points and their attacks get advantage or double damage. Hrm.

Finally, the closest thing to this I am aware of is the escalation die from 13th Age.

I have never played that, but I now I will take a look into 13th Age.

 

[James Gasik]

D&D combat is supposed to be fast by design. Focus fire and using your best resources first ensure you will take less damage from enemies you face.

Back loading PC damage will result in PC's taking more damage from monsters; this will have impacts on how many encounters PC's can handle per game day, as well as how challenging individual encounters are.

If you want cinematic combat where PC's have to "build up" momentum, I can think of a few ways to do it, like 13th Age's Escalation Die, or even an idea I've been kicking around lately, having abilities that only come online when players are below 50% health (4e's "bloodied" condition).

But this would necessitate making healing better too, I think. It would take a lot of playtesting to get this balance just right. Magic could work similarly how it does in card games, where you can't cast level 3 spells on turn 1, but have to wait to turn 3 as you "charge up" mana to cast them, but it does remove alpha striking as a strategy, and you'd best make sure your players are on board with this idea before you even start testing it.

 

[toucanbuzz]

Alternately, change how combat itself flows.

Rather than have all enemies show up at once, as if you're in an old Western showdown, use waves. Instead of similar-level enemies, use a lot more "minions" (e.g. kobolds) against higher-level parties. Have enemies call for reinforcements, dungeon fights attract nearby foes, and so on. By dragging out the combat into more rounds this way, you encourage players to save some "punches" until later in the battle without having to change the core rules. It's also a common wartime & D&D boss tactic: lure out the big guns before committing your elite by sending fodder.

While not every combat need run this way, do it enough times and your players will know that if they do shoot off their "big guns" at the start of battle, they risk more enemies coming to the battle and may be in trouble.

 

[M_Natas]

D&D combat is supposed to be fast by design. Focus fire and using your best resources first ensure you will take less damage from enemies you face.

But it is only fast until it isn't (if you do not beat the Monster in the first few rounds). That usally happens with boss monsters / bbeg fights. They tend to be longer than three rounds in my experience.

Back loading PC damage will result in PC's taking more damage from monsters; this will have impacts on how many encounters PC's can handle per game day, as well as how challenging individual encounters are.

So far my experience is, that the game in 5e is broken anyway. It is the rare expecting that I see more than two or three battles between two long rests.
But you are right, that needs to be taken into account. But by adding the Charging ability (or a similiar system like your Magic proposal) would also power up the PCs, so the damage to the PCs could be similiar, if balanced right.
One could even argue, that just giving them a charge per round no matter what could work, too an be even easier. So they can go nova in round one and extra nove in round 3.

If you want cinematic combat where PC's have to "build up" momentum, I can think of a few ways to do it, like 13th Age's Escalation Die, or even an idea I've been kicking around lately, having abilities that only come online when players are below 50% health (4e's "bloodied" condition).

I like the below 50% health idea, too. It could be incorporated into the charges, like you get double the charges and the maximum increases, so more abilities get unlocked.
At what point am I reinventing 4e with its Per Battle abilities?

But this would necessitate making healing better too, I think. It would take a lot of playtesting to get this balance just right. Magic could work similarly how it does in card games, where you can't cast level 3 spells on turn 1, but have to wait to turn 3 as you "charge up" mana to cast them, but it does remove alpha striking as a strategy, and you'd best make sure your players are on board with this idea before you even start testing it.

I just force my players to go along ^^. Nah, we have our regular campaign and when Players are missing, we do Oneshots where we can test out such crazy ideas. Everything goes there.

 

[M_Natas]

Alternately, change how combat itself flows.

Rather than have all enemies show up at once, as if you're in an old Western showdown, use waves. Instead of similar-level enemies, use a lot more "minions" (e.g. kobolds) against higher-level parties. Have enemies call for reinforcements, dungeon fights attract nearby foes, and so on. By dragging out the combat into more rounds this way, you encourage players to save some "punches" until later in the battle without having to change the core rules. It's also a common wartime & D&D boss tactic: lure out the big guns before committing your elite by sending fodder.

While not every combat need run this way, do it enough times and your players will know that if they do shoot off their "big guns" at the start of battle, they risk more enemies coming to the battle and may be in trouble.

That is good advice. Especially with smart enemies that strategy makes a lot of sense.
I also changed some Monster design. When the Monster gets below a certain threshold (like bloodied condition), it changes and uses a different tactic. Like if an animated armor gets below 50% HP, the armor gets destroyed and it turns in to the ghost who had possessed the armor.

 

[Lord_Blacksteel]

It's been this way in D&D for a long time and I do not see it changing but it has been addressed in other systems.

4E D&D addressed it with the At-Will/Encounter/Daily structure for powers and players tended to save those big booms for the big encounters.

The Sentinel Comics RPG is a flavor of Cortex but one of the interesting things they did is set up a Green/Yellow/Red hierarchy where some of your powers are linked to a particular status "color" - encounters start at green, then move to yellow after a few rounds (unlocking some powers), then go to red after a few more unlocking your strongest powers. This is also tied to a character's health so if Jazz Man takes a beating early on he may be able to use his yellow or red powers early on. It's worth a look if you'd like to see how one other game tackled it.

 

[Stormonu]

Several other games over the years (Iron Heroes & Chronicles of Ramlar) use a mechanic called momentum. In these systems, you have access to your basic attacks, but to "open up" using the more powerful abilities you have to essentially build up momentum to use them. As you make successful attacks or complete other actions, you are awarded with a certain amount of momentum, say 1 point. Those points may be tracked on each character independantly, or as a group. Then, casting something like a maxxed out lightning bolt may cost 5 momentum, generally allowing you to quickly end the combat.

Depending on the system, momentum may be kept until used - or in the case of Ramlar, until someone blows a roll. The latter creates a "push-your-luck" sort of system. Maybe you can risk everything to build up to that death spell against the dragon that will instantly end the fight, or you can make smaller leaps forward with enhanced attacks that chip away at the dragon at an accelerated rate.

 

[payn]

There are two dynamics at play in my perspective on D&D. The first is an adventuring day. This means you have a finite amount of resources and have to use them cleverly to rule the day. This is a bit of an old school mindset that player skill is the exciting part as the game unfolds. The other dynamic is adventuring encounters. The encounter itself is the game experience and should always be fun in a self contained way. This is a more modern take where round by round tactics are more important than upfront strategy.

My recommendation is to examine these systems for types of play.

• 3E/PF1 Strategy based adventuring day.
• 4E/PF2 Encounters based adventuring.
• 5E hybrid of the day/encounter tactics and strategy without emphasis on either.

The proposed items above sound very encounters based design, and thus unlikely to be adapted in 5E. Though, maybe thats your in to lean 5E in that direction as a homebrewer indie developer?

 

[Larnievc]

After playing RPGs for several years and attempting to design my own adventures, RPG systems, and homebrew rules, I've noticed a structural flaw in D&D combat that detracts from the excitement: the suspense curve is inverted. The optimal strategy for a D&D fight is to inflict as much damage as possible early on to quickly kill the monster(s), and the rules make it very easy to do so.

As a result, players tend to use their biggest resources, such as high-level spells and limited-use abilities, as early as possible if they perceive the monster as a threat. They try to avoid using any limited resources if they think the monster(s) pose no threat. This leads to front-loaded (boss) fights where all the big cool stuff happens at the beginning, and if the fight drags on, it devolves into a slugfest where the characters spam cantrips and make normal weapon attacks. The dragon, for example, often gets killed by a normal melee attack or an eldritch blast rather than the lightning bolt or the fighter's eight attacks with their action surge.

This is often less true for monsters, as they usually have recharge abilities for their big attacks.

As a result, the suspense curve for players is inverted because if they don't use the optimal strategy, the fight becomes more challenging for them.

To make (boss) battles more exciting and to encourage players to use bigger abilities later in the fight, we need to change something on the design level. One possible mechanic that came to my mind involves giving classes abilities or feats that charge up during combat. For the first two or three rounds, a character would engage in mundane activities like making normal attacks or using cantrips, charging up their special ability. Then, on round three, they can use their special ability to inflict more damage. They must then recharge again. This would create a dynamic where the fight starts small and ends big, rather than vice versa.

I have provided some examples as a proof of concept, but they are not perfect or balanced yet. They are merely intended to illustrate what I envision:

Fighter:
So, let's say a fighter has a special attack called Coup de Grace. It is a special attack, that targets a weakness of a creature, doing double the damage on a hit.
It would read something like that as rules:

Charges:
When you just take the normal attack action (including extra attacks) on your turn, you get a charge point (name is up for debate). You can accumulate charge points up to an maximum equal to your proficiency bonus.
You can spend Charges to activate special abilities as a bonus action:
True Strike (2 Charges):
You studied the movement of your enemy. All the attacks of your next attack action have advantage.
Coup de Grace (3 Charges):
You figured out the weakness of your enemy. You are able to attack the creatures weak spots. Until the beginning of your next turn, that creature is vulnerable (taking double damage) on all attacks from you.

Wizard:
Charges:
When you only cast cantrips on your turn and no leveld spells, you get a charge point (name is up for debate). You can accumulate charge points up to an maximum equal to your proficiency bonus. You can spend Charges to activate special abilities as a bonus action:
Overpowered spell (2 charges):
The next spell you casts counts as a level higher.
Adapted spell (3 charges):
You figured out the vulnerabilities of the enemy creature. It gets vulnerability against the next spell you cast against it.


With such rules in play, without changing anything else, suddenly it makes sense use the big abilities later in the battle and not at the beginning, so you don't start the fight with an explosion but end it in one.

The biggest problem I see so far is, that it collides with Kipoints and sorcery points pretty hard. Especially the sorcery points of the sorcerer take up a similiar design space.

What do you guys and girls think? Is this something feasible? Did somebody try something similiar? Does somebody has developed other solutions?

I dunno man, you’re describing a Dragon Ball fight progression. PC should be professionals who don’t take chances.

For a Gladiator who is wowing the crowd power abilities sound great but there is a lot of showmanship in gladiatorial fights.

Not so much in grim life or death struggles.

 

[Oofta]

Like others, I don't see a big issue. At least not one that can't be handled in other ways. Some have already been mentioned.

• send enemies in waves, with cannon fodder going in first.
• have the waves come from multiple directions, potentially using cannon fodder as a distraction.
• Even if it's not waves, have enemies attack from multiple directions.
• use illusions to similar effect.
• occasionally have a lot of lower lethality fights. Limit rest opportunities (this can be a whole other thread).
• make the environment important to the fight.
• don't sweat it if the PCs occasionally have an "I win" button to push.

 

[Stalker0]

I dunno man, you’re describing a Dragon Ball fight progression. PC should be professionals who don’t take chances.

For a Gladiator who is wowing the crowd power abilities sound great but there is a lot of showmanship in gladiatorial fights.

Not so much in grim life or death struggles.

Its a question of how much fantasy do you want in your fantasy? Do you want fights like they have in the movies, a long more draw out affair. Or do you want realistic fights where duels are often settled in seconds?

 

[OB1]

Making fights more cinematic/exciting is one of the reasons that I changed the 0HP rules to have the "Slowed" rather than "Unconscious" condition when at 0HP (and the condition remains until PC makes a DC19 Con save while they are above 0 HP). What this has meant for big combats is that there is usually at least 1-2 PCs with the condition at the end of the fight, making the party scramble to both keep them alive and still inflict damage on the monsters. Cinematically, this models the bloodied combatant who keeps on fighting while at the edge, and has made big fights all the more exciting.

 

[Larnievc]

Its a question of how much fantasy do you want in your fantasy? Do you want fights like they have in the movies, a long more draw out affair. Or do you want realistic fights where duels are often settled in seconds?

I’m hoping my next campaign will be Dark Sun so the power up style of fighting is something I’m in favour of in a gladiatorial setting.

 

[Larnievc]

To make (boss) battles more exciting and to encourage players to use bigger abilities later in the fight, we need to change something on the design level.

Just a thought but a player might use lower level spells/abilities to burn through legendary resistances and then unload the nukes.

 

[Brotton Goodfellow]

In my experience, having smaller groups or mobs of minions involved can change how the PC’s approach a bigger fight. Or having something to do during the encounter other than engaging the enemy helps get away from the slog for one or more players. Something I want to implement more is adding timers to encounters. Along the lines of, “In 2 rounds, more hobgoblins are coming through the door.”

For those less significant fights, honestly, once the tables have turned in favour of the PC’s, having the bad guys flee or simply ending the combat by saying, “You mop up the rest of the skeletons with ease,” skips the slog and gets everyone back to the juicer bits of the game. I’ve done the latter plenty of times, maybe giving the bad guys one last parting shot before they are destroyed, and there’s no complaints.

I think it’s also important that monsters unload everything within the first two rounds, otherwise they are likely not going to have a chance to use their cool powers.

 

[MarkB]

As a result, players tend to use their biggest resources, such as high-level spells and limited-use abilities, as early as possible if they perceive the monster as a threat. They try to avoid using any limited resources if they think the monster(s) pose no threat. This leads to front-loaded (boss) fights where all the big cool stuff happens at the beginning, and if the fight drags on, it devolves into a slugfest where the characters spam cantrips and make normal weapon attacks. The dragon, for example, often gets killed by a normal melee attack or an eldritch blast rather than the lightning bolt or the fighter's eight attacks with their action surge.

One existing mechanic that does counter some of this is legendary resistances. Experienced parties will strike a fine balance when fighting a legendary opponent, whereby they commit resources just sufficient to provide a meaningful threat to the foe, such that the foe will commit to using its legendary resistance to counter it, but they will hold off on using their really big guns until after those resistances are gone.

In extending this, it might be better to concentrate more upon the target creature needing its defenses to be worn down, rather than introducing charge-up mechanics for the PCs.

As a for-instance, maybe a creature might be heavily armoured (natural or worn) over its vital areas such that critical hits scored against it deal no additional damage, losing that feature once it becomes bloodied (half hit points), so that paladins may be tempted to hold off on some of their smites and fighters to hold off on their action surges until the creature reaches that state.

 

[MichaelSomething]

I thought resource management and attrition was the whole point of D&D combat?

 

[Yora]

I thought resource management and attrition was the whole point of D&D combat?

That was 40 years ago.

Resource management was abandoned in the mid-80s in favor of scripted set-piece scenes that form a coherent pre-written story.

The situation that players throw out all their best abilities at the start of a fight and then go through less and less powerful and interesting option comes from the simple fact that they don't need to save anything for later and that they have the confidence that they can not lose the fight. If they play really poorly, the GM will fudge things so the pre-written story can continue as the script demands.

Everything is completely different when the PCs have to fight for their lives and also will have to fight their way back out of dangerous places. There is a tension and hesitance to use all your best powers at the start because you really might need them later. As the fight progresses and things don't look good, using the really powerful guns now instead of saving them for later becomes increasingly attractive and ultimately urgent. We won't be able to fight our way back up to the surface if we die right here and now.

The great majority of problem with D&D is that it stopped wanting to be a dungeon crawling game 40 years ago, but also always wanted to maintain the appearance of still being the same game.