DMing and the game of balancing responsibility as DM

[Brauron]

I'm not sure I phrased that title right to get at what I'm trying to get at.

First off, I learned how to GM on Call of Cthulhu. So my instinct, in building encounters, is that I don't really think too much about "balancing" an encounter. I'm getting better about that, but I still tend to throw tougher-than-average encounters at the PCs.

Last session, we had our first PC death of the campaign. Our Half-Orc barbarian, weakened by a lucky critical hit from a Hobgoblin with a scimitar, charged at an Ogre, which I'd modified to be carrying a Greatsword instead of a Greatclub. The Ogre also had Improved Critical as a feat, because I failed to notice the prerequisite of BAB +8. This is my mistake and I take full responsibility for it.

In rebuilding that Ogre, I made it much more dangerous -- the Greatsword increased its general damage output, and then I also upped its odds of scoring a critical hit. And then I threw it at the PCs almost immediately after they had a rough fight with Hobgoblins -- though to play Devil's Advocate, the guy playing the cleric could have been a little less judicious with casting healing spells. C'est la vie.

So this whole situation kind of has me thinking about my responsibility as a DM to provide relatively balanced encounters. I recognize that I'm not obligated by the fact that I'm DM to throw easy encounters at my players constantly -- and that they'd probably grow bored and resentful if I did. And some encounters that I think will be a challenge end up being fairly easy for them, and some that I think will be short work for them kill PCs.

Any advice on building encounters that are moderately challenging while still being tactically interesting? Or is this one of those things that can only be learned through experience?

If it helps any, the PCs are a Half-Elf archery track Ranger 4, a Human Cleric 4, and a Human Fighter who uses a bastard sword and shield 4. Accompanying the party is an NPC Dwarf Monk 1/Wizard 3. All are very unoptimized.

[Zadus]

In my oppinion there is no easy way to balance encounters and every party behaves differently. A party of wizards is going to have a tough time defeating a golem and a party of fighters is going to have an even harder time with a ghost.

I think the best thing to do is look at the party's strength and weaknesses and bring in monsters that cater to them. Try a few similiar encounters and keep an idea of what works and what doesn't. I'd also try and mix encounter difficulties. Nobody likes being put through the grinder. A few easy fights every now and then is a good thing and gives the players a chance to enjoy their characters abilities and play around a bit more with the encounter.

I'd also suggest the character's focused on melee have atleast one ranged weapon. That helps a whole lot.

And to keep battles interesting, throw some weird/out of the ordinary stuff in there. A moving platform, a rope to swing from, anything that changes things up just a little bit is cool.

[valadil]

How well a group does depends more on how they play together than how optimized any individuals are. Start the campaign assuming they don't know how to synergize. Throw them encounters at their CR. When those start getting to be too easy, ramp it up a little with CR +1. I usually do this until they're at CR + level/4. So a level 8 party would be fighting CR 10 (8 + 8/4) enemies. Boss fights are an extra CR or two higher.

There are a couple things to look out for with this approach. Spell levels matter a lot. If your enemies are two levels higher, their spells are going to be a whole lot more powerful than those of the PCs. Casters often end up at PC level. Levels 6, 11, and 16 are also interesting because that's when BAB splits. A level 4 fighter taking on a level 5 fighter is reasonable. 5 vs 6 is not. 6 vs 7 becomes reasonable again. I find that this gap is where I'm most likely to accidentally brutalize PCs.

Finally, feel free to fudge your encounters. Just because I made a mistake prepping for the game, doesn't mean the PCs should die. If that ogre is too powerful, take his improved critical away. If you low ball the players and they find a fight too easy, give each enemy 50% more HP. I know there are some GMs that disagree with this approach. The way I see it is that I have a finite amount of time to spend preparing my game. I can make a fudge free encounter, if all my time is spend looking at numbers and running simulations. Or I can guess at an encounter, fudge it later, and spend the rest of my time planning plot and NPCs. Guess which method results in a better game.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

A DM is not obligated to present his players with a balanced encounter. He is obligated to present his players with a fun encounter.

A fight against hordes of goblins at level 10 where they can go to town and kill everything is not balanced, yet can be very fun. An escape from a rampaging demonic dragon at level 10 where tactics and trickery are more important than strength and turning back is certain death is not balanced, yet can be very fun. A fight against a Colossal animated object at level 10 in a featureless 100-by-100 room is balanced, yet can be very boring.

If your players enjoy having a few tense battles to the death, keep throwing those gigantic greatsword wielders at them; if they enjoy having many beatable battles, don't. If they enjoy the tactics of battle over the pure hack-'n'-slash, throw some kobold ambushers with crossbows at them; if they enjoy straightforward combat with fair odds, don't. If they enjoy the middle road of "moderately challenging but still tactically interesting" encounters, throw a lot of those at them; if not, don't. It's up to you and your players to decide what they find fun, and then it's up to you to make those encounters and those players to let you know if they had fun and, if not, how you can improve. Enjoyment takes precedence over balance.

[Brauron]

Valadil -- I do usually fudge things to keep the PCs from dying in vain. Unfortunately, because of where we'd been forced to set up this session, I didn't have a screen and we were all pretty closely gathered around the battlemat. The attack roll for the Ogre came up a natural 20 and confirmed, right under that player's nose.

Pair'o Dice -- very well put. My players do have fun, and are quite vocal about that point. I try to provide a mix of encounters -- A major upcoming encounter will be the PCs being treated to dinner at a very upscale restaurant by the grateful father of an NPC they rescued. Into this, enters a group of bandits who, by CR, will be a fairly easy encounter -- it'll be the environment of the restaurant, with tables, etc. everywhere, that will make it challenging and interesting and, hopefully, fun.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

Pair'o Dice -- very well put. My players do have fun, and are quite vocal about that point. I try to provide a mix of encounters -- A major upcoming encounter will be the PCs being treated to dinner at a very upscale restaurant by the grateful father of an NPC they rescued. Into this, enters a group of bandits who, by CR, will be a fairly easy encounter -- it'll be the environment of the restaurant, with tables, etc. everywhere, that will make it challenging and interesting and, hopefully, fun.

Excellent. If your group is already having fun, there's no real need for you to change anything--if the player of the dead character was greatly upset, you might want to pull back a bit, but it sounds like they enjoyed the battle and moved on, in which case you should keep giving them the exciting encounters they want.

[JonestheSpy]

Just to chime in - players should NOT not not feel confidant that every encounter will be "balanced". If they see a big ass ogre with a greatsword, they should tread cautiously. And hey, maybe that group of gnolls is actually being led by a powerful rianger. A bit of anxiety is entirely appropriate in combat, and you can ALWAYS be taken down by bad luck.

When you look at heroic fantasy - from Lord of the Rings to Watership Down to Star Wars, you'll notice that the good guys actually spend a lot of time running away.

[Brauron]

When you look at heroic fantasy - from Lord of the Rings to Watership Down to Star Wars, you'll notice that the good guys actually spend a lot of time running away.

Now THAT is a good point.

[Gralamin]

Something kinda parallel to the advice here.

Although Fun encounters are important, what makes encounters fun differs from person to person, and knowing what sort of players each of yours are is important.

In addition, sometimes the Theme of a game makes some encounters not appropriate because they aren't balanced. For example, if your playing a game where Players are Big Damn Heroes, then Attacking them with a stronger dragon they must run and fight from is alright, but attacking them with a single individual stronger then them, with little choice but to run away to survive isn't going to be conductive to the game experience.

Basically, Make sure your players know what type of game your trying to DM, and what type of players they are.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

Now THAT is a good point.

Indeed. That advice was given in older edition DMGs--the world isn't built around the PCs, the PCs are in the world, so they shouldn't magically have all balanced encounters just because they're PCs. "Old-school" dungeons usually featured a much higher "sneak around or run away" to "fight it out" encounter ratio.

[arguskos]

Indeed. That advice was given in older edition DMGs--the world isn't built around the PCs, the PCs are in the world, so they shouldn't magically have all balanced encounters just because they're PCs. "Old-school" dungeons usually featured a much higher "sneak around or run away" to "fight it out" encounter ratio.

And interestingly, this philosophy seems to have fallen by the wayside in more recent editions. I am unsure if the game design has caused this, or if the mentality of the players has, but in either case, I see more and more players who treat the world as their playground. It is greatly frustrating.

[AstralFire]

And interestingly, this philosophy seems to have fallen by the wayside in more recent editions. I am unsure if the game design has caused this, or if the mentality of the players has, but in either case, I see more and more players who treat the world as their playground. It is greatly frustrating.

Despite my typical advice in threads that the game should be tailored to the PCs, I also view the world this way. To me, being fair and balanced to the party just means giving them a good chance of surviving if they take the right, logically presented tactic.

Sometimes this is running away.

And I don't pull punches when I make it quite obvious a situation is dangerous and a PC decides to depend on PC immunity only to find out they don't actually have it. I hate killing a PC, but I will do it through mere averages if they attack everything that is hostile without evaluating the situation properly.

[arguskos]

That's what I'm saying is correct and good Astral. It's just that many players and DMs I've spoken to and/or observed seem to think that PCs have plot armor by default now, and that they can do no wrong, yadayadayada. Which, honestly, aggravates the hell out of me.

I run a world dammit, not a video game. If a player wants to be the invulnerable Chosen One of Fate, he can bug off and go play Halo. If he wants to play a character and change the world around that character through meaningful action, then my table is ideal for him.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

I run a world dammit, not a video game. If a player wants to be the invulnerable Chosen One of Fate, he can bug off and go play Halo. If he wants to play a character and change the world around that character through meaningful action, then my table is ideal for him.

Completely agreed. PCs are special just like everyone else--if they have to work hard to be heroes sans plot armor and such, so do PCs.

[AstralFire]

Case in my point, I recently had a game with a monstrous spider that was shown to be one-shotting - effortlessly - hounds that had been a typical (not trivial, not amazing) encounter for the party. It's grabbing hold of a rope and shaking it to try and remove the two PCs on it.

One of the PCs jumps off the rope and launches herself at the spider.

Despite the fact that two of the PCs indicated they were going to shoot the rope on their next turn to cut off the spider's access.
Despite the fact that the character in question has Wis in the 15 or 16 range (forget which) and positive Int.
Despite the fact that this character is a Jedi.

Given the overwhelming common sense that this character should have, I actually took a moment to warn the player OoC that she got a very bad feeling about this.

She chose to do so anyway, citing it was within character for her. Okay. Can live with that.

She was not, however, happy with me when the spider knocked out a third of her hit points, poisoned her, and put her two steps down the condition track immediately on the first round, despite her 'very defensive build'. And then when on the second, the spider brought her down another quarter and she moved another two steps down - if you're not familiar with Saga, it's similar to 3.5 in some ways. She is now moving at half-speed and has a -10 penalty to basically everything with a d20, another hit and she's KO. Luckily the rest of the party was able to rescue her, but she was a bit huffy the rest of the night because she went and solo challenged a monster meant for a party of four people four levels higher than her and lost.

I really had no idea what she expected. The spider was an easy encounter; it had no way of getting up after them, it was merely there to provide a sense of urgency. It was an easy encounter, but it was not an easy monster, because sorting algorithims of evil when adhered to too strictly move from 'interesting' to 'artificial feeling'. But against both IC and OoC wisdom, she went and attacked it anyway, and was not happy with me when her 'awesome build' folded like an accordion.

Also reminds me of a time that I was running a game where I explicitly allowed all published material, barring anything that pushed Tier 1. This was to be a playtest for some homebrew rules I was looking at, and thus I warned all of the PCs in advance that these were going to be tough fights.

One of the PCs freaked out at me and was sulky for the rest of the night when his awesome L12 uberdefender found itself against an ogre with Thicket of Blades, a reach weapon, and an ability that let him reroll miss chances. What the heck? I'm not an optimizing genius, but even I know miss chances are the lynchpin of defense at high levels. What's so illogical that monsters will adjust to this? In a playtest, no less?

[Kylarra]

Your PCs should have a reasonable amount of plot armor, in that if they proceed along the logical path, unavoidable encounters should be about their ECL.

This does not and should not protect them from their own stupidity, but on the other hand, if you're not playing ToH-style, they shouldn't be going against things where the only recourse is to run away, assuming they're following your rails. :p

[AstralFire]

Your PCs should have a reasonable amount of plot armor, in that if they proceed along the logical path, unavoidable encounters should be about their ECL.

This does not and should not protect them from their own stupidity, but on the other hand, if you're not playing ToH-style, they shouldn't be going against things where the only recourse is to run away, assuming they're following your rails. :p

It's all about balancing the various ratios of encounter types, and I suspect we're on similar pages here.

[bosssmiley]

@OP: You are not there to protect the players from the consequences of their choices. After you've asked "Are you sure you want to do that?" your obligations as Nanny are discharged and they're on their own. Your role is to fairly referee the trouble they've gotten themselves into.

Holmes' Basic D&D had the following title for the combat section of the book:

MELEE RESOLUTION -- CONQUER, WITHDRAW, SURRENDER OR DIE!

Note that only one of the four options implies that the PCs win.

[arguskos]

Note that only one of the four options implies that the PCs win.

Precisely! This here is a great point. It also helps that "overcoming" challenges (whatever "overcoming" actually means in context of each situation) gave XP, meaning that running away could actually give you XP if you managed to accomplish something by doing so.

[JonestheSpy]

Precisely! This here is a great point. It also helps that "overcoming" challenges (whatever "overcoming" actually means in context of each situation) gave XP, meaning that running away could actually give you XP if you managed to accomplish something by doing so.

Definitely. I would also add that

Your PCs should have a reasonable amount of plot armor, in that if they proceed along the logical path, unavoidable encounters should be about their ECL.

is true up to the point that unavoidable combat encounters should be within ECL. As in the spider example above, nothing wrong with having monsters the players can't beat if there's ways around them. And hey, maybe the players will surprise you and come up with a brilliant strategy so they do fight and win - they just have to be prepared to suffer the consequences if they fail.

[Kylarra]

is true up to the point that unavoidable combat encounters should be within ECL. As in the spider example above, nothing wrong with having monsters the players can't beat if there's ways around them. And hey, maybe the players will surprise you and come up with a brilliant strategy so they do fight and win - they just have to be prepared to suffer the consequences if they fail.

Yes, I meant combat encounters.

[Jair Barik]

Throw things that they won't be expecting at them but make it so their not overly powerful.

Examples, a Quell from LM will be potentially dangerous and make later challenges harder. Put some basic undead or groups of monsters after it that fight tactically and you have an exciting encounter. Same goes for mindmoss.

Make up weaons e.g. I had Troglodytes with medieval flamethrowers. Players didn't expect and it made the next encounters cool as they learnt more about the new weapon (then threw them all away when they saw a trog explode, the weapon being highly unstable and experimental).

Trapped encounters, swinging blades moving walls and opening and closing spiked pits all add to excitement. Killing off random enemy goons but keeping the players on their toes at the same time.

[Skorj]

I've never liked trying to created "balanced" combat encounters in the first place, since the goal is fun after all. You can easily assign most encounters (after the fact) to one of the following difficulty levels.

• Trivial - no point in even running the encounter.
• Easy - no question that the party will win, but it will cost them resources.
• Balanced - some question whether the party will win, especially if they aren't at full.
• Hard - the party will probably lose unless it's properly prepped and has the initiative.
• Impossible - the party can't win without a plot coupon.

By this definition, a "CR appropriate" encounter is Easy, not Balanced. I think this is the biggest mistake new DMs make. "Balanced" encounters (by my arbitrary definition above) are absolutely the hardest to get right as a DM, and often lead to cheap, undramatic PC death.

Easy encounters are fun, and easy to get right as the DM. With some experience you can throw them together on the spur of the moment, and if somehting goes wrong it won't lead to PC death, merely to the party using an embarassing amount of resources (use up all healing spells, whatever). The party still cares about these fights because of that.

Hard encounters are fun, if the party has the ability to research the encounter a bit ahead of time and make prepping for it part of the game, but the party does deserve a bit of plot armor if they stumble into one and are trying to run away. If the party is properly prepped, there might still be PC death, but it will usually be a good dramatic story that will be retold for some time.

[AslanCross]

I always go for the challenge and not the coddle. My players tend to be ridiculously lucky, and as of late have been getting cocky. While I want them to ultimately succeed, encounter after anticlimactic cakewalk encounter does not add up to a memorable and fun story. The feeling of winning by the skin of one's teeth or winning due to superb planning is rewarding to both the players and myself.

[Narmoth]

Finally, feel free to fudge your encounters. Just because I made a mistake prepping for the game, doesn't mean the PCs should die. If that ogre is too powerful, take his improved critical away. If you low ball the players and they find a fight too easy, give each enemy 50% more HP. I know there are some GMs that disagree with this approach. The way I see it is that I have a finite amount of time to spend preparing my game. I can make a fudge free encounter, if all my time is spend looking at numbers and running simulations. Or I can guess at an encounter, fudge it later, and spend the rest of my time planning plot and NPCs. Guess which method results in a better game.

That's the old way of running things. Before CR, you just looked at the Xp and stats, and made a guess. If you guessed wrong, you changed the encounter in-game.

Anyway. My advice is to find out how dangerous your players want the world to be.
As an example: I larp. Scandinavian larp is pretty intrigue-driven, with only a bit of fighting. Thus, characters are almost only killed as part of the storyline intrigue. Still, for me it feels very wrong if I can't be killed by an accident, or by a drunk fight in the tavern. I like to know that I'm never guaranteed to win the fight, and always can die.

[Brauron]

Thank you all for the advice and words of encouragement. It means a lot to me, and it's heartening to see that I'm more or less on the right track.

Jair Barik: Funny you should mention new weapons, as I've been having fun with just that concept. I threw an assassin (not in the prestige class, just a rogue) at the party who wore a pair of bladed gauntlets -- basically Freddy Krueger's glove x2, a skull mask and a gore-caked robe to spread terror.

The PCs sold the gauntlets as soon as they could find someone to buy them.

The next major "move the main plot along" adventure I have planned involves the PCs being sent to infiltrate a small Hobgoblin military outpost to investigate reports of a secret weapon. The secret weapon turns out to be a Scorching Ballista (Heroes of Battle) mounted on a turntable atop an armor-plated cart -- essentially, a tank. It's inefficient (can only fire once per minute, plus I'm ruling that it takes a full-round action to aim the darn thing), hard to maneuver and relatively easy to disable (especially since the gunner is out in the open), but it's the look on the players' faces I'm going for.

[TheThan]

Its nice to see so many “old school” Dms. I’ve grown a little sick of hearing people pissing and moaning about how their DM is unfair and isn’t being nice etc. so it’s a breath of fresh air to find people who agree with my philosophies about Dming.

[Swordguy]

You know, the fascinating thing is the juxtaposition of opinions expressed in this thread and the Stupid Death: Characters perishing in undramatic / unlucky ways thread.

In that thread, good DMing is being expressed as not killing players without a plot-centric reason and with much thought about whether the death would make a better story, while in this thread, good DMing is being expressed as presenting challenges appropriate to the game world, and happily killing the PC if they aren't smart enough to run away if the challenge is too great.

Both are valid styles, but having both threads next to each other on the forum is amusing

[Random832]

What that really says is that it's hard to objectively say what makes a "bad DM" - it depends on the group as much as how the DM actually runs the game - what may be good for one group can be denounced as "treating players like children" by another group.

A "good DM" is as easy to define as it is abstract and meaningless - one who provides a good experience for all the players. A "bad DM" is harder to define.

[Kaiyanwang]

Just to chime in - players should NOT not not feel confidant that every encounter will be "balanced". If they see a big ass ogre with a greatsword, they should tread cautiously. And hey, maybe that group of gnolls is actually being led by a powerful rianger. A bit of anxiety is entirely appropriate in combat, and you can ALWAYS be taken down by bad luck.

When you look at heroic fantasy - from Lord of the Rings to Watership Down to Star Wars, you'll notice that the good guys actually spend a lot of time running away.

Completely agree. A Dm can be a real jerk with a surpise attack 300d6 dsneak attack poisoned and with save or-die mixed with save or suck.

But other times, PC die because players don't understand when's the time to give up.