So there are certain things that always happen in my games, and for good reason: they benefit the PCs. But the sheer predictability of them is making me want to scream, and I'm just wondering if anyone here has advice on how to shake things up a bit.
1. Fighting from the doorway. It never fails. There might be five monsters in a 30 x 30 room, but what will happen is that the PCs will open the door and never actually enter until all the monsters are dead. If they're high enough level, they'll chuck fireballs into the room until the monsters die. If not, they'll stand in the doorway and do other ranged attacks, forcing the monsters to come to them and try to fight while the PCs hold the strategic chokepoint. Bodies pile up in the doorway.
Of course it makes a ton of sense tactically, but I've gotten super-bored with every single combat going this way. I'd like to find a way to have any other configuration for the battle: either somehow get the PCs to actually enter the room, or ... I dunno, get the monsters into the hallway somehow?
2. Scouting. Any time the PCs come to a new location, they won't venture in as a group. They'll summon a familiar or, barring that, send the stealthiest group member on ahead to scout the place out. Again, I know why they do this, but I feel like it leads to the Shadowrun "decker problem," where I'm running a longish section of the game for just one player. Yeah, the players chose to do it, but pretty often it seems like the rest of the group just checks out and makes dice stacks while the scout player does his/her thing. I'd rather have everyone engaged!
The common suggestion to deal with this problem is to have something attack the scout, but I feel like that's a tool that should be used sparingly. Does anyone know any other way to discourage this from happening?
3. Caution. I recently ran a dungeon crawl for a group of very experienced players, and I just felt like it was their goal to interact with the dungeon as little as possible. These were high-level characters (a party of six PCs at level 13), with a ton of tools to deal with anything that happened, and I don't have PC permadeath at my table anyway unless the player wants it; but they touched nothing unless they absolutely must, and tried not to even enter rooms. Their ideal way of handling the place was never to touch anything except with mage hand or by having a summoned earth elemental bring it to them. They also sent the elemental first into every room and corridor to see if anything attacked it or any traps went off. Again, I understand why they do this, but I feel like it leads to a less fun experience for them as well as for me.
I asked a similar question last fall about an environment that wasn't even a dangerous dungeon. There, most of the answers focused on telegraphing safety. But I think this is just a deeply engrained habit for this group, so in this specific case, I think just countering their go-to solutions will have to be enough. Can anyone suggest reasons why a character might have to do a task / retrieve an item / open a door personally instead of using mage hand or a summoned creature to do it?
IMPORTANT: I'm not asking any of these questions because I want to screw over my players, or because I think they're too good at handling my challenges. I'm asking because I think these habits, sensible though they are, are getting in the way of fun and engagement for all of us. I am hoping to get both them and me out of a rut, so I can create better challenges and more memorable adventures.
1. Fighting from the doorway. It never fails. There might be five monsters in a 30 x 30 room, but what will happen is that the PCs will open the door and never actually enter until all the monsters are dead. If they're high enough level, they'll chuck fireballs into the room until the monsters die. If not, they'll stand in the doorway and do other ranged attacks, forcing the monsters to come to them and try to fight while the PCs hold the strategic chokepoint. Bodies pile up in the doorway.
Of course it makes a ton of sense tactically, but I've gotten super-bored with every single combat going this way. I'd like to find a way to have any other configuration for the battle: either somehow get the PCs to actually enter the room, or ... I dunno, get the monsters into the hallway somehow?
2. Scouting. Any time the PCs come to a new location, they won't venture in as a group. They'll summon a familiar or, barring that, send the stealthiest group member on ahead to scout the place out. Again, I know why they do this, but I feel like it leads to the Shadowrun "decker problem," where I'm running a longish section of the game for just one player. Yeah, the players chose to do it, but pretty often it seems like the rest of the group just checks out and makes dice stacks while the scout player does his/her thing. I'd rather have everyone engaged!
The common suggestion to deal with this problem is to have something attack the scout, but I feel like that's a tool that should be used sparingly. Does anyone know any other way to discourage this from happening?
3. Caution. I recently ran a dungeon crawl for a group of very experienced players, and I just felt like it was their goal to interact with the dungeon as little as possible. These were high-level characters (a party of six PCs at level 13), with a ton of tools to deal with anything that happened, and I don't have PC permadeath at my table anyway unless the player wants it; but they touched nothing unless they absolutely must, and tried not to even enter rooms. Their ideal way of handling the place was never to touch anything except with mage hand or by having a summoned earth elemental bring it to them. They also sent the elemental first into every room and corridor to see if anything attacked it or any traps went off. Again, I understand why they do this, but I feel like it leads to a less fun experience for them as well as for me.
I asked a similar question last fall about an environment that wasn't even a dangerous dungeon. There, most of the answers focused on telegraphing safety. But I think this is just a deeply engrained habit for this group, so in this specific case, I think just countering their go-to solutions will have to be enough. Can anyone suggest reasons why a character might have to do a task / retrieve an item / open a door personally instead of using mage hand or a summoned creature to do it?
IMPORTANT: I'm not asking any of these questions because I want to screw over my players, or because I think they're too good at handling my challenges. I'm asking because I think these habits, sensible though they are, are getting in the way of fun and engagement for all of us. I am hoping to get both them and me out of a rut, so I can create better challenges and more memorable adventures.
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