I've written a few times regarding not being able to challenge my groups. (Most recently in this thread:
D&D 5E - A Mess of OP Characters (magic items, rest mechanics, etc.))
I want to work on a house rule document to present before the start of the next campaign to keep this type of experience from happening again.
What am I trying to avoid?
- Game unbalancing magic items
- Having to restructure the game and redesign monsters after 5th level or so
- Accommodating a fun and challenging experience for 6-7 players
- Preventing spellcasters from going nova easily
- Short adventuring days
I'm getting intense feedback from the gritty rest mechanics. I also suggested rolling for stats, and that was scoffed at. I don't expect the group to be amenable to other systems, such as the OSR variety.
I still want to DM for this group. They really enjoy it - but it's hard to keep pace with their power level. Even in the default game, they easily get so overpowered that I can't adapt.
Well, there's a dozen solutions you can implement – but if they're an immediate bounce off point for your players, those dozen solutions might as well be zero solutions. Based on what you've shared of your players enjoying the power fantasy & resisting OSR-ification of 5e, I would avoid ANY changes to player-facing rules. I would also avoid "compensating for Monty Haul with treasure deletions." Unless you discern otherwise, sounds like either of those interventions would be met with pushback from your players.
So I'll pitch 4 GM-side solutions. Adapt what works for you, discard the rest...
"Attack" their Magic Items:
A solution to handing out too many / too powerful magic items
I don't mean force item saving throws like AD&D, rather create scenarios where the sacrifice of a specific magic item is necessary to complete their quest. For example:
- They need a unique spell/ritual from an archmage NPC who in return wants their mantle of spell resistance in preparation for an upcoming duel against a rival mage.
- They Stone Mouth of Gorath Tor – entry into the dungeon – can only be opened if two magical gems (such as their gem of seeing & a hag eye) are placed within its eye sockets – causing the gems to transport to the Ethereal demiplanar prison where Gorath Tor broods.
- Realizing they need to create a self-fulfilling prophecy of the Sword-in-the-Stone to get the young regent to be recognized by fractious nobles, the PCs must give up their sun sword (ancestral blade of the ancient royal lineage) and find a way to bind it to the rock until the young regent draws it forth.
Layer Your Combat Design:
An alternative solution to having to redesign monsters/rules after PCs hit 5th level
When you want to present a challenging combat, try to circumstantially increase the challenge with a "story" of what's unique about the combat. Think of reinforcement waves, terrain disadvantaging PCs / advantaging monsters, ambushes, withdrawing through traps / lairs of other monsters, dramatic terrain changes (floor crumbling), synchronicity of monster abilities, goals that require the PCs moving around and doing things besides just attacking monster HP, etc.
Yeah, it's more work than throwing a quick combat together, but it's
less work than redesigning monster from ground up. AND it's
more effective than rules-of-thumb like "increase monster hp 50% and damage 100%" or whatever. In other words, IME layering your combat design gets you more bang for your buck (more challenge for players for the prep you put in) than any other intervention.
Adventure Design by Thinking in Spell Slots:
A solution to spellcasters going nova
Every adventure you prepare needs to include both carrot and stick ways to reduce the available spell slots of the PC casters. Here are a couple examples:
- This dungeon has massive boulders blocking "doorways" – too heavy for all but a stone giant to move. Some of these boulders are hidden galeb duhr, who don't take kindly to being prodded and can conjure rolling boulder traps / more of their kind if they become hostile. Spellcasters need to constantly keep detect thoughts or similar magic going to discern which are boulders / which are creatures, and rely on telekinesis (or similar spells) to open the "doors."
- The environment is hostile, such as a desert with extremely cold nights and extremely hot days, such that having resistance to cold or fire is necessary to avoid ongoing exhaustion/damage. Protection from energy will need to be active on multiple PCs & combats often focus on disrupting the concentration of casters.
- Crumbled stone bridges litter the mountainside adventure site. Either magical flight is necessary to bypass them, or expending spell slots to temporarily recreate the original stone bridges.
- In a palace where everyone is cursed with permanent sleep, spell slots can be used to temporarily communicate with a sleeper who murmurs answers to questions as if in dream.
- Magic missiles launch between giant cracked mirrors in this dungeon, requiring the PCs to use copious castings of shield to mitigate damage until they find a way to deactivate the source of the magic missiles. Oh, the brooch of shielding the sorcerer wears? As she absorbs missiles with it, tell her it's getting supercharged and vibrating with magic – in the boss fight, give her the option to destroy the brooch to unleash the pent up magic missiles (incorporating Attack Their Magic Items).
- A woodland mythal binding an elven lich suppresses spells of 4th level or higher across a six-mile area. However, one of the PCs' elven allies shows them a ritual whereby casters can burn lower-level slots to lower the mythal's defenses allowing them to force through higher level spells. Neither the lich, its minions, or the hobgoblin rival party knows this trick. If the party allies with the hobgoblins they could share this trick... but if they fail their saves against the crypt thing's detect thoughts, the crypt thing may learn the trick and share it with its lich master (tying into the point below about Anticipate Your Dials).
Understand the Details Hidden in the Combat Budget & Anticipate Your Dials:
A solution to short adventuring days
As a rough starting point, aim to include 100% of the party's Adventuring Day (Adjusted) XP Budget across your 1 or 2 encounters. This value can be calculated automatically on Kobold Fight Club or using DMG page 84. For example, a seven-person 9th level party gives a starting point of 52,500 (adjusted) XP.
Let me emphasize STARTING POINT. You don't want to just apply this blindly. Because you want to consider the specific monsters. For example, quicklings play more like CR 2 or 3 than CR 1, whereas RAW dragons probably won't be able to consistently threaten 6-7 PCs (4-5? yes, probably. 6-7? no, probably not)
You don't need to redesign monsters. But you do need to be able to scan a stat block in advance and understand its strengths/weaknesses in order to gain a sense of how it might play with YOUR group. Yes, this affects your prep, but just as importantly it gives you a sense of dials you can adjust on the fly to manipulate the combat towards the desired challenge level you imagine it should have.
I'll give ONE example in detail (you'll see Layering the Design at play here too)...
- I want to throw a LOT of shadows at the PCs, and I know shadows damage Strength. This is completely different from most monsters, as the Adventuring Day XP Budget is designed around Damage and Hit Points, but shadows circumvent that. While it's hard for an individual shadow to hit my 9th level PCs (they have high AC), a hit deals on average 9 damage, AND 2.5 Strength damage. My party mostly left Strength as a dump stat, averaging 10 Strength. So four successful attacks from a shadow will be lethal, despite only reducing a PC to half their hit points or so.
- Importantly, my party lacks a cleric, so there's no Turn Undead auto-win button to consider here. Similarly, they lack the ability to create sunlight, so the shadows' Sunlight Weakness won't come into play. HOWEVER, they can easily create ample bright light, negating the Shadow Stealth trait. And the paladin deals radiant damage, so he'll one-hit-kill any shadow he strikes.
- Four shadows per PC (assuming 7 PCs) gives me something like 28 shadows. They only have an adjusted XP value of 8,400 – nowhere near our 52,500 value. It would take SIX such encounters to get close to that value. BUT I need to consider whether the scenario will encourage shadows to focus fire on just a few PCs – that could make it a lot more dangerous. Let's say I decide the shadows will NOT focus fire, but spread attacks pretty evenly. So I'm looking at having ~28 shadows on the map at any one moment, with reinforcements constantly flitting in.
- With this "never-ending stream of shadows" scenario, I want to include a puzzle or skill challenge that, once resolved, stops additional shadows from materializing. Players will need to decide who focuses on the puzzle/challenge, and who focuses on attacking/defending against the shadows.
- What dials do I have in the moment to increase the challenge (I'm focusing on increasing in this scenario, since that's your focus, but if I was actually doing this for my table, I'd also jot a few ways to decrease challenge in the moment)? (1) I can add more shadows in the next wave. Easy. (2) Boosting the attack of the shadows will make it more dangerous, for example via the Help actions, extinguishing the PCs' bright light source to allow Shadow Stealth to kick in, or a tilting floor trap knocking PCs Prone. (3) Though the paladin has revivify and they have a single-use magic item that resurrects, I could create a unique effect for this scene so that instead of "If a non-evil humanoid dies from this attack, a new shadow rises from the corpse 1d4 hours later", the new shadow rises immediately & focuses fire on the PC from whom it was spawned if that PC is resurrected. (4) I could separate the party - maybe the tilting floor trap can send a PC into an alcove pit trap...which shadows can swarm and focus fire thanks to their Amorphous trait.
EDIT: I wouldn't expect anyone to write most of this stuff out. A few quick notes – "28 shadows max per round, reinforcements appear area 6C, dials to increase challenge: more shadows, kill the lights, tilting floor trap, immediate shadow spawn, focus fire" – would suffice. I wrote this out in longer form so you can follow my thought process (which is the important part).
