We don't have the 15 Minute Adventure Day Problem

[Dannyalcatraz]

However, why bother to get out the crossbow or alchemical fun bags when you have a raft of mid-level spells about to get empowered or maximized by a rod and a series of high powered wands if you get desperate?

Why?

So that when the unexpected happens, you still have some serious magical punch up your sleeve! After all, you can't use your metamagic rods when you don't have spells to modify.

If we get to the end of a day and our spellcasters still have spells, we see it as kind of a minor victory...or a major one if its particularly powerful.

So we love it when our mage soften things up then stops casting spells:

1) its a vote of confidence "my buds have the fight well in hand"
2) its tactically sound
3) if the tide of battle turns, he can likely solve the problem with a spell of lower power than he would have had he not stopped casting spells.

 

[Herremann the Wise]

Why?

So that when the unexpected happens, you still have some serious magical punch up your sleeve!

If the unexpected happens to the point where it is going to challenge a 15th level Archmage, the rest of the party are in some serious trouble.

After all, you can't use your metamagic rods when you don't have spells to modify.

Almost fifty spells later, just several high powered wands as "backup". What I'm saying is at high levels, a wizard is not forced to get that desperate. If the wizard is down to that, most likely the rest of the party has been blown away already.

If we get to the end of a day and our spellcasters still have spells, we see it as kind of a minor victory...or a major one if its particularly powerful.

So we love it when our mage soften things up then stops casting spells:

1) its a vote of confidence "my buds have the fight well in hand"
2) its tactically sound
3) if the tide of battle turns, he can likely solve the problem with a spell of lower power than he would have had he not stopped casting spells.

I mean that's cool and everything but in the game I described, the player feels no need to slacken off (and nor does the party need him to - unless they wish to play). The resources at his disposal are too easy to work around; too easy to keep pulling out effective stuff. You can then try and target the mage (but I'm not a fan of that style of DMing), or if you try to challenge the entire party, you really run the risk of losing characters. The game just enters this really weird state where the archmage is king and the rest of the guys are pretty much passengers. Again please note the specific conditions in which this has happened (high level, large party, disparate power, highly optimized Archmage etc.). I can understand how your group has played and kudos to the player playing the mage for letting the others have a turn. I warn you though, at higher levels, there is no need for him to take the foot off the gas.

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise

 

[S'mon]

My experience with high level 3e has been the same as Herreman's - the Wizard dominates play, the party goes when he says go and stops when he says stop. 3e seems to lack the balancing mechanisms of prior editions such as static saves (so high level monsters usually save vs spells), monsters with effective Magic Resistance (so spells bounce off), and Fighters' superiority to monsters - quite the reverse, a Fighter PC is often overmatched by a monster of equivalent hit dice, never mind equivalent CR! It's even more obvious when running NPCs vs the party - after about 4th level NPC Fighters' real CR is nowhere near their level, while NPC Wizards can be an effective challenge.

 

[roguerouge]

Huh? I have no idea where this comes from the 5 encounters and crammed 15 minutes. The time they spend adventuring is way longer then 15 minutes. It's not about shortening time between encounters it's about adventuring and exploring and not stopping till the job is done. They don't fight every encounter if they don't need to.

I'm not explaining well.

How many encounters do they go before they rest? How long do they spend in out of encounter activities between said encounters?

If they take an hour to search, confab, and prep after an encounter, do they have to worry about wandering encounters? If so--or if the ticking timer is compelling--then they hurry from encounter to encounter. Doing so, the five encounters can easily fit in 15-30 minutes of in-game time, even if it takes 2 weeks of table time.

If they don't worry about wandering monsters (the original trash mob), then that is part of the reason you don't feel like you have the 15 minute work day.

But even if you have, say, a half hour between encounters in game time, that leads to a 2.5 hour work day, which, again, is not really what you think of when you think of heroic narratives.

 

[Noumenon]

wandering monsters (the original trash mob)

Hey, if you spend a day travelling and get just one random encounter a day, it still feels like more than a "15-minute adventuring day." So maybe the secret is to put really long elevators in your dungeon so you can feel like you're doing something besides resting.

 

[Crothian]

How many encounters do they go before they rest? How long do they spend in out of encounter activities between said encounters?

Varies on what needs done. Usually they just get the job done and rest when it is over or when the situation changes.

Last week they are in a city that has been invaded by Vampires after an object. They first go to a good church that is under siege and they try to get the Church's help. But the Church has closed down and not letting anyone in so the Party breaks in. There are about 5 encounter in there, some role playing some combat but the group never rests and when they are done there they go to a place the Vamps attacked earlier. On the way there they have attacked and have some encounters. At the new place they find it is being rebuilt, the they explore some of it and find the Vamps and fight them and end up running from them. On the way out they do try to burn the place down. They regroup for a few hours waiting till dark then go back to where they found the vampires hoping they are gone. They find one vampire and kill it and then destroy the Vampires base of operations. They then go back to the Good Church and try to help them but they are a little to late. They fight much of the Vampires minions but the Vampires get away.

That covered about 18 hours in the day. We don't have traditional random encounter. I as DM has encounters that can be placed at different placed and I can use as needed but I never roll randmoly to determine if there is an encounter and then roll to see what it is. There is no magically appearing creatures that are just there cause the dice say so.

 

[Schmoe]

I'll start by saying that I've played with 4 different groups over 20+ years, and I don't remember ever feeling like a 15-minute day was a problem except back in my younger days, when we were just dungeon crawling for the loot and there was nothing else to the adventure.

I tend to believe that the problem is largely a matter of adventure design. An adventure with closely packed combat encounters, each of which is an "edge-of-your-seat, do-or-die" affair, is going to force parties to retreat and rest frequently, or face death.

This can be prevented, however, in a few different ways:

1. Varying encounter difficulty. Not all encounters have to be nail biters. Moderately difficult and easy encounters provide opportunities for the PCs to show their muscle, manipulate opponents to their advantage, and manage strategic options.

2. Varying encounter types. A role-playing or investigating encounter takes time, can be lots of fun, and generally doesn't compromise the survivability of a group.

3. Varying encounter location. A short couple of encounters at one location, which lead to some investigation, which lead to some encounters at another location, easily space out the encounters so that players don't feel they've spent 10 minutes fighting and now they're done.

4. Story-based incentive for speed of action. This speaks for itself.

On top of that, I'd venture to say that if the 15-minute work day appears sporadically, it's not usually a problem. It's only when it becomes the standard operating procedure that people get grumpy. Here are two different adventure outlines. One of which would most likely be a "15-minutes and rest" affair, one of which would not.

A) The players have to defeat the wight lord in his lair. The lair is heavily guarded and trapped. The lair has 6 encounter locations that must be defeated before the PCs can reach the wight lord, each of which is at least EL = Party Level (PL). The wight lord is EL = PL+3.

B) The players have to investigate murders in the cemetery. At one of the murder scenes, they notice a strange tomb. Investigating reveals the tomb is trapped (EL = PL/2). After bypassing the trap, they find some wights locked within, one of which carries the grave-digger's watch (EL = PL). They confront the grave-digger with the evidence and convince him to reveal that he's been approached by a mysterious stranger with a missing left hand. Asking around on the streets, the PCs discover the stranger has been seen going into an abandoned building on Lantern Street. On their way over, however, they are targeted by an assassin who's been tipped off (EL = PL). Finally they reach the building, where they defeat the cultist's guardian (EL = PL) and a trapped room (EL = PL/2) before bearding him in his lair (EL = PL +1).

I guarantee that running adventure B would not feel like a 15-minute day. Plus, if adventure B led to adventure A, where they might have to rest once before defeating the BBEG, the players would probably not be disgruntled about a 15-minute day, because of the overall flow of the campaign.

I suppose that one possible problem is that adventure A is easier to write than adventure B, so a lot of published adventures may fall into that category. If this is the case, I'd say the burden falls on the DM to break up the flow so that the adventure continues in between forays into the dungeon.

At any rate, for those who are displeased by the 15-minute work day, I think you might be happier if adventures were designed differently.

 

[WizarDru]

I'll start by saying that I've played with 4 different groups over 20+ years, and I don't remember ever feeling like a 15-minute day was a problem except back in my younger days, when we were just dungeon crawling for the loot and there was nothing else to the adventure.

For our part, I discovered the 15 minute day on the very first play of Keep on the Borderlands, when the magic-user spent his spell (singular) and rapidly grew tired of missing all the time with his dagger, before he was murdered by a kobold.

I guarantee that running adventure B would not feel like a 15-minute day. Plus, if adventure B led to adventure A, where they might have to rest once before defeating the BBEG, the players would probably not be disgruntled about a 15-minute day, because of the overall flow of the campaign.

I see your point, but I'd argue that this is no alleviation of the "15 minute day", because the scenario you suggest doesn't address some issues that make the FMD a problem for some groups.

First, part of the issue is that some classes feel the FMD effect much stronger than others. The sorceror feels it less than the wizard, for example. The cleric usually less than the sorceror. The effects of the FMD scale with time, as well. At first level, the wizard has nearly as good a chance in combat as most of the rest of the party. By fourth level, that's no longer remotely true.

Second, variability is nice, but it needs to be said that encounters under 3e can vary wildly in difficulty based on the party make-up. The CR system is a good approximation of difficulty, but it is only that...approximate. Most undead encounters can be considered at least one CR higher if you have no cleric in your party, IMHO. A flying creature can be nigh unstoppable if the party has no ranged attackers or casters with the appropriate kind of spell.

Third, part of the function of the FMD is the lack of participation factor. Yes, the party can go on, but may be disinclined to because it's harder and less fun to do so. If the cleric is out of healing and turns and about to enter a lair of the undead, they may wish to wait until they have those resources back. If the archer runs out of arrows, the wizard of spells or the cleric of heals, the party may have little desire to push on if the going looks tough. Yes, you can create a valid reason that they might have to push on, but you can't do that every time...it gets old.

To wit:

Fourth, you've kind of loaded the deck there. A has six rooms with EL equal encounters, but you make the assumption they're all combat encounters, while varying not just the EL but the content as well for B. The two aren't mutually exclusive (though B's fun factor is dependent on having a Rogue, someone with a good spot/search and most likely a cleric on hand). In fact, adventure B is very likely to be a FMD unless the DM makes it time-dependent, because it's quite likely that someone is going to get some negative levels from the wights. If there's no restoration magic handy, that guy could possibly be rendered useless. Lose a core party member to that and the rest of the battle is suicide, hence instant FMD.

I'm not of the opinion that the FMD is a show-stopper or unique to any version (in fact, 1e was far, far more guilty of it than 3e possibly could be). But I have encountered it plenty of times and it can suck the fun right out of the room.

Encounters are a tightrope, of course. Too easy and they waste valuable player time. Too hard and they frustrate and cause players to disengage. The "fifteen minute day" problem is one of the players being unwilling or unable to continue adventuring due to a lack of resources. This can come in a variety of ways, but the ultimate result is that the players, barring DM railroading, may choose to retire for the day rather than fly afield at weakened capacity.

How much of an issue that is for a group is entirely dependent on the individual gaming group and their playstyle. For some it might be a non-issue, while for others it could be a gamestopper.

 

[Greg K]

The CR system is a good approximation of difficulty, but it is only that...approximate. Most undead encounters can be considered at least one CR higher if you have no cleric in your party, .

I agree that CR is an approximation. However, I don't agree with you about increasing the CR of undead- at least not with regards to 3e (I don't know what changes were made in 3.5). While the 3e DMG says that a fight against undead without a party cleric is tougher, it also says that it and the other things to consider are not reasons to increase the CR. The reason is that the CR actually assumes no turning is available. This was revealed by Sean Reynolds, one of the designers, on his web site where he states the following:

"The CR system regarding undead doesn't take into account turning. The CR of an undead is based on how much of a challenge it is if there is no turning available; the effect is that parties without a cleric can handle undead encounters (you don't need a cleric), but if you do have a cleric it makes these encounters a lot easier".

The original text can be found here

 

[Arnwyn]

I've never had a group, or been in a group, where the "15 minute work day" ever occurred, either. The only time a group would stop after a single encounter was when it was a truly epic encounter designed to use every bit of their abilities.

Yep. Yet another here who doesn't have the 15-minute adventuring day. I've never even heard about it until I saw the concept mentioned online (I know there's a couple of people here who don't like hearing that... Too bad.)