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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Blackbrrd" data-source="post: 6311530" data-attributes="member: 63962">I just finished up my third session in this campaign. The second session focused on them getting the information they knew to the Baron without getting themselves hanged and getting a chance to reclaim Redwood for one of the characters (Stellian).The third session started out with the actual adventure, Reavers of Harkenworld. It went really well, with the PC's going for Tor's Hold first, and then striking at the Bullywugs there. All the time, stripping the dead Iron Circle soldier groups they met on their way of their armor and stashing it in a wagon they stole from the Iron Circle, donating it to the cause at Tor's Hold.Analysis of my DM-ingLooking back at the session I find that pacing in my group is very much up to me as a DM. Sometimes  my players just start going on and on about something inconsequential.  In situations like this, I like to move things a long with a quick: "Is  this what you do?" Players: "yeah". Me: "Ok, then this happens and you  are on the way to X".The reason I started doing this was as a reaction to what the players mentioned in some of the earlier campaigns I ran several years ago. They commented that it got kind of boring when they just didn't quite know what to do, and every plan somebody had got shut down by the arguments of another PC.Because of this, I started thinking about it, and started giving out hints that the PC's should know, maybe with a bit of skill checks and such. After some back and forth and they are still stuck, I do as mentioned above, suggesting that they run with one of the plans they have come up with. Sure, it's a bit pushing them a long, but it really beats having 2-3 out of 4 players getting bored because they can't really agree to what they should do.Another thing about pacing is how to handle PC's that comes up with good ideas that will involve a lot of role playing, but it slows down the pace of the adventure. I know that about half the players don't enjoy sessions that are mostly RP, so sometimes run situations that would be suitable to run as pure role playing as skill challenges and summaries of actions instead of running the actual thing.For instance, last night, the players wanted to to a  quick recruitment run before going to Harkenworld (I was just about to  start "Reavers of Harkenworld"). There was a huge refugee camp right  outside Fallcrest, so we all figured it should be pretty easy. I ran a  quick skill challenge and within  30 minutes of the idea being hatched, they had 8 guys on the way to  train peasants in Harkenworld to help in a revolt they hoped to setup.Looking back, it worked out very well, but if I had planned for it, I could probably have run it as regular RP, and had some interesting situations occur (combat and some proper conflict) in between all the talking.Lastly, I just wanted to say that I do find it amusing how an optimized party can plow through an encounter. In Reavers of Harkenworld, there is an encounter, E3 that happens in a tavern, that they absolutely bulldozed through. This is even with a 4-man party, instead of 5 as it's written for. 4e plays quite differently* when you run with MM3 monster stats and optimized characters. Instead of combats dragging on, you get some good spikes in damage from both sides. For instance, the Rogue regularily one-shots ordinary monsters of the same level, and if the monsters get their encounter powers to hit, they might bloody a character in one hit. Instead of encounters lasting for 5-6 rounds, most encounters are resolved in 3-5 rounds.Initiative managmentI have started doing the initiative with small cardboard triangles with the name of the PC or monster written on both sides. When we roll for initiative, I set them up in the right order in front of me so both the DM and the players can see who's turn it is, and who comes next. I then use a token that I move along to show who's turn it is. This has really sped up combat, since the players intuitivly knows when their turn is up, plans ahead, and usually start rolling their dice immidiatly when their turn is up.*I am also playing in a 4e group of unoptimized characters, running in an adventure with MM1 stats. Combat there has a tendency to really drag on, at level 7+ often up to 7-8 rounds.</blockquote>

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