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Message: <blockquote data-quote="MrMyth" data-source="post: 5120594" data-attributes="member: 61155">Yeah, poor encounter design will be a problem no matter what game you are playing. I had another LFR adventure where we fought an entirely encounter of insubstantial, regenerating creatures with at-will attacks that weakened (save ends). Enter a party with few strikers, no radiant damage (to turn off regen), and generally non-optimized PCs... and it was a long, dull combat. The next fight, with an elite soldiers 4 levels above us with a rechargable ability to heal 1/4 of his health, was not much better.  But the problem wasn't the system, but a terrible adventurer writer who wasn't interested in entertaining encounters, but instead in ones designed to 'beat' the party. This outlook of DM vs Player mentality was really terrible in Living Greyhawk, and I've been sad to see similar creeping into LFR. For myself... I run a 6 player game, and some combats run long, and some run short. Sometimes long combats are even a good thing - we had a 3 hour combat in the last session, but it also consisted of two distinct waves of enemies punctuated by a complex skill challenge in between. To deal with a fight with ~30 enemies and ~20 skill checks, as the climax of that level's story arc, 3 hours didn't seem grindy during the time playing it. It was a little shocking after the fact, but as long as everyone remained involved during the battle, it felt perfectly fine.  There were two other fights later that session that ran maybe 30-45 minutes each. One involved a bunch of high-damage enemies (soldiers with high-crit weapons) and the other a solo that ignored status effects like stun, and instead just became more and more vulnerable to damage as the fight went on.  So while I think the potential for grind is there, it comes down to encounter design more than system limitations. WotC has clearly made some adjustments for it already, and included advice on dealing with it in various places. I don't think there is any need for them to directly 'address' it - though sure, more advice or guidance is always welcome, along with more products to make running encounters quicker and seasier. (Whether in the form of dungeon tiles or more DDI programs.) But I don't think there is need for an 'official response' on the issue.</blockquote>

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