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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ourph" data-source="post: 5116697" data-attributes="member: 20239">If a fight is interesting, I'm not sure there is a real world time limit on how long it should take. I think tolerance for RW timing will vary from group to group. I think the main real world time factor is how long players have to wait between taking turns. If a player is waiting more than 5 minutes between turns on a regular basis, I would consider that a problem. However, I don't think waiting between turns necessarily equates to grind. Waiting longer between turns probably accentuates grind, but I don't think they are equivalent. People tend to blame HP for grind, but (outside of Solo or Elite Soldiers) I'm not sure HPs are the real culprit. IME, it's monsters with too high AC and PCs who aren't using good tactics that are most likely to cause grind. The reason Soldiers are the main culprits for grind is that they couple good HPs with high AC. In general, I don't find that the PCs having high AC or lots of healing surges is related to grind.Party composition can have an effect. If you've got a party of all Defenders and Leaders, the chances of fights getting into grindspace are greatly increased. If you've got a good mix of PCs, with maybe an extra Striker or Controller, the chances of grind are greatly decreased. If Shawn cancels and he plays the party Striker, again you may see more grind. If Bob and Joe are inexperienced and/or ineffective players who don't know how to use their powers cooperatively with the rest of the group (especially if one of them plays the Leader of the group) grind becomes more likely.The bolded above are the real culprits in my opinion. Having suboptimal at-will attacks can actually make a fight more interesting if there is real chance of the PCs dying or if the PCs use it as an excuse to rely more heavily on stunts. But there's not much exciting about stunts if it's obvious that there's no real danger but there's no way to hurry the fight along to a quick finish.I would agree with this assessment. When the fight is reduced to mere dice rolling, when tactics become irrelevant to the outcome and that goes on for more than 1 or 2 rounds, that's grind.</blockquote>

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