Is 3e combat too short?

[Elves]

In number of rounds, 3.5 combat is pretty short. Once enemies are in striking distance, 1-2 round resolution is common and very rarely will a combat go over 5 rounds.

It has the advantage of brevity over 4e and 5e which have been criticized as slogfests, but it does constrict the possibilities for viable game abilities. 1, it means the value of an action is high, so few things are worth spending an action on. 2, it means there isn't much time for ramp-up or over-time effects, which removes one axis of expressivity that abilities could otherwise have.

I don't have a feeling either way, but it does seem like a modestly higher round count could bring out more expressions from the gameplay. It means fewer encounters per session, but by the same token it can be underwhelming when a big fight is over in a round or two.

A frequent retort is that if length is achieved through higher HP totals, that only empowers the already superior SOLs. 4e and 5e brought a decent solution to this by replacing instantaneous SOLs with duration effects that require multiple failed saves over successive turns to kill/incapacitate and normalizing a save each round to break the effect even if affected.

What are your feelings about the ideal combat length?
How long do your encounters usually take?

[Zanos]

Yeah, in practice I've found that combats that last longer than 5 rounds are very rare, and single rounds tend to take a long time to play out. To compound things, combats that take more than 5 rounds also tend to have many combatants, which makes each individual rounds longer, in real time. And of those combats that do last longer, the fight is usually decided a few rounds in, with the rest of the fight being cleanup. Death spiral just seem to be a core part of the system, really. If you're up against two equally strong monsters and kill or disable one of them, it might take just as long to down the other, but with half their offensive power gone the fight is more than likely over.

I'm not really sure how the designers expected people to resolve 4 CR = ECL encounters per session. Maybe they played 8 hour games, or didn't do any roleplaying? Not that I haven't had 8 hour sessions, but 4 hours of real time seems to be the norm.

A side effect of this is that I have a heavy bias against any form of short duration buffing builds. There are some like haste that can nearly double the parties damage output, or like enlarge person that can massively change how enemies have to fight, but am I really going to spend 20-50% of my combat actions casting a short duration buff on myself? Sure, there are some very good ones, but if a build requires a turn to buff up to be effective I generally don't consider that to be all that viable in actual play.

Encounters could probably be a bit longer, but I'm not sure how to approach doing that while also making rounds shorter. Even though 4e and 5e are simpler it doesn't seem to have actually helped much, the core problem of getting people to decide what they want to do quickly remains.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I don't play 3e, so I can't comment directly.

But I would question anyone who considers 5e combat a slogfest (in terms of number of rounds). I think in 5+ years of running 3 games a week (well, except during the pandemic) I've gotten to 10 rounds...once? twice? And those were wave-style fights.

Plus, when run right, 5e rounds each take about the same time as single turns took in the PF game I played. And that was at low levels.

4e, in my experience, had super long battles both in terms of rounds AND (most critically) in terms of real time because turns took forever.

For me, personally, I'd rather not take more than 3-5 rounds total for most combats. I don't like rocket tag, but long drawn out fights are annoying.

[Thunder999]

Given how long combat takes to actually play out, the last thing I want is to make fights take more rounds.

It's not like short fights are problematic, if anything it adds to feel of the game for most fights to be won in under a minute, makes combat feel a little more deadly than it is.

[Calthropstu]

Your gms don't really set up very good combats then. My record for number of rounds is 43. Lasted 3 sessions.

With my current group, my record is 29. Sure, a lot of combats last only 1-5 rounds, but it's an intense 1-5 rounds. How much should I put in? Will I have enough firepower for what's coming? How many top tier spells and abilities do I have left? Is the barbarian holding up on rage? As those short combats drain your party resources, you get more worried about the eventual boss fight.

[Kayblis]

I feel this is a result of both sides of the system, palyers and DMs alike, focusing more on offense than defense. It's just easier to win the race if you deal more damage, instead of dealing with your enemy's attacks if he survives. Whenever you see people complaining about uberchargers, it's not that they're unbeatable, but they just deal too much damage for normal play. It requires you to neutralize the tactic(be it fatigue or any barrier) to allow for the usual game to be played, which isn't fun for the player. Any tactic can be countered, but if you counter it every combat with increasingly contrived methods, it starts to look like a personal thing, and it'd be better to just not allow the playstyle if you can't let it play properly in your table.

More than damage potential, I feel more creatures should have movement options and defensive options beyond the basic. I've implemented some creatures with Quickness(the Ekolid ability) and Parry(the Dragon Mag #301 feat line) to great success, as a way to improve these two points. It doesn't feel cheap, as they're spending the feats to get it and/or are rare creatures.

I recommend everyone to try this once, follow the guideline for Swashbuckling Campaigns and give Parry(only the first feat) to every humanoid as a baseline(yes, including players). This alone has made the game more enjoyable to my friends, as you have a reason to pay attention to the enemies' rounds and can react without having to get a class feature that works with Immediate actions. Raising the baseline is always good.

[Elves]

Even though 4e and 5e are simpler it doesn't seem to have actually helped much, the core problem of getting people to decide what they want to do quickly remains.

If nothing else you can bring out the chess clocks. You don't have a million hours to decide things in the midst of action afterall.

[Thurbane]

Given how long combat takes to actually play out, the last thing I want is to make fights take more rounds.

It's not like short fights are problematic, if anything it adds to feel of the game for most fights to be won in under a minute, makes combat feel a little more deadly than it is.

^^ This. My experience is that fights, especially around mid-levels where we usually play, can take up a lot of IRL time to resolve.

Even though 4e and 5e are simpler it doesn't seem to have actually helped much, the core problem of getting people to decide what they want to do quickly remains.

Agreed. While I haven't played a significant amount of 4E, we did do a fairly long 5E module recently, and I didn't find the combats flowing much faster than in 3.5.

[Biggus]

I feel this is a result of both sides of the system, palyers and DMs alike, focusing more on offense than defense. It's just easier to win the race if you deal more damage, instead of dealing with your enemy's attacks if he survives. Whenever you see people complaining about uberchargers, it's not that they're unbeatable, but they just deal too much damage for normal play. It requires you to neutralize the tactic(be it fatigue or any barrier) to allow for the usual game to be played, which isn't fun for the player. Any tactic can be countered, but if you counter it every combat with increasingly contrived methods, it starts to look like a personal thing, and it'd be better to just not allow the playstyle if you can't let it play properly in your table.

Yeah, I've reached similar conclusions, currently I'm trialling a bunch of houserules to make defensive fighting more viable (everyone gets higher AC, shields are significantly improved, and tactics which allow one-round kills against high-HP opponents are banned or nerfed). Combats still don't tend to take more than two or three rounds at higher levels, but at least it's not straight whoever-wins-initiative-wins.

More than damage potential, I feel more creatures should have movement options and defensive options beyond the basic. I've implemented some creatures with Quickness(the Ekolid ability) and Parry(the Dragon Mag #310 feat line) to great success, as a way to improve these two points.

I can't find the Parry feats, what page are they on?

[Quertus]

If 3e is played right, each turn should take about 30 seconds or less.

Don't slow the game down. Don't make us do fiddly math in the middle of combat. If you can't Persist the buffs, don't cast buffs.

It's amazing how fast encounters fly by when you follow this mindset to its Determinator level of maximal efficiency.

But, yes, most 3e encounters don't last very long (in game; ie, very many rounds). It certainly limits your witty banter with a single foe, or your number of opportunities to convince them to surrender / buy your cookies / whatever else you're selling.

But otherwise, no real problems characterizing the charters, no.

[Kelb_Panthera]

My experience seems to be atypical. Finally got a new group together a couple years ago now and we have -rarely- had an encounter last fewer than half-a-dozen rounds. I'll happily grant that only two of us have the system mastery to do any serious optimization and I'm sandbagging a bit. I can't remember a single 2 round encounter yet, much less a single round encounter. Single creature encounters are extremely rare for us and I suspect that has more than a little to do with it too.

As for ideal, it's hard to say. Player side issues have been dragging things out to well over an hour per encounter. One total newb with focus issues and one player that has serious issues with rule retention tend to drag things down. I'd hazard that 5 to 10 is probably about right for justifying the complexity of the system. Much less makes it difficult to do much and much more would be a bit of a slog even if the players were a bit quicker.

[Faily]

Can't say there's been a huge change in the number of rounds played across editions for me. But I'm personally not a fan of "padding" combat like I've heard 4e does by giving Boss Monsters and obscene amount of HP.

Even though 4e and 5e are simpler it doesn't seem to have actually helped much, the core problem of getting people to decide what they want to do quickly remains.

^^ This. My experience is that fights, especially around mid-levels where we usually play, can take up a lot of IRL time to resolve.

Agreed. While I haven't played a significant amount of 4E, we did do a fairly long 5E module recently, and I didn't find the combats flowing much faster than in 3.5.

Agreed with this.

Not played 4e, but I personally didn't feel like things flowed faster in 5e than in 3.5/PF. It goes about the same pace.

IME, the only thing that will make combat flow at a good pace is to have players that 1. pay attention, and 2. know their character and rules well. IME, this applies across all character levels, based on the different groups I play/played with.

One of my groups have never had a problem with a flow of combat in any edition of D&D we've played (3.5, PF, 5e) as most turns are resolved at a good pace, people usually know what they'll do on their turns and know their character's options well enough to adjust quickly when situation changes (I want to add that this is the group that has the highest overall rules mastery when it comes to these games too so it certainly helps). The other groups got varying levels, and sadly the group I play with weekly is the one that is always the slowest on getting through combats (and pandemic hasn't made it easier as we're all playing from home and two of the players often have disturbances from partners and children. It is what it is).

Things that can help combat run more smoothly:

• Make notes as combat progresses, such as calculating new bonuses for your attack rolls (if you have party members that like casting buffs, or you have a specific bonus against this type of enemy, on your note-sheet just write up your new total modifier to attack/damage). For me this helps a lot because I am bad at math and so I use less time trying to remember all the bonuses and adding things up.
• When it is not your turn, plan your next action. If you're casting a spell, make sure you know its range/targets/save/duration by either checking your sheet, book, or app. This means that when its your turn you already have that information on hand, instead of a "oh I forgot the range on this" or "was it Fortitude or Will?".
• Outside of combat, it doesn't hurt to engage with the others (IC or OOC) to plan tactics for fights.

[Yael]

If 3e is played right, each turn should take about 30 seconds or less.

Don't slow the game down. Don't make us do fiddly math in the middle of combat. If you can't Persist the buffs, don't cast buffs.

What do you mean exactly by that? By the duration of the spell? Or that if you want to cast a buff it must be persisted? Either way seems restrictive to options.

[Gruftzwerg]

Regarding HP:
I also did used extra enemy Hp for a group of 6+ players once where I talked with the players about it, since a few wanted to play some more dmg optimized builds.

Other than that:
Our table already generally uses often "max HP for everyone" because we all thing that HP optimization is to bad in 3.5 compared to damage optimization. I never did understand the idea of rolling HP. Having different HP for different classes, yeah I got that. But rolling HP? Do we roll skill points? No, so who had this glorious idea for HP? really..^^


Another optional HP (homebrew) rule that I like is to alter the "Disabled", "Dying" and Death thresholds:

Disabled: from "0 HP" till "-1/2 max HP"
Dying: when below "-1/2 max HP" and above "-max HP".

Early levels are a bit deadlier for most builds. But with increasing lvl the thresholds increase. This allows for slightly longer combat and new dimensions of role play opportunities.
Because normally you almost never become Disabled (0hp). Chances are already low for low level characters and with increasing level the chance gets minimal. And then it is to fast over with the slightest breeze (1 dmg).
With the altered rules the Disabled status will happen much more often. This gives opportunities and reasons for one side of a battle to retreat or beg for mercy. Normally you wouldn't had the opportunity at all. But the altered thresholds create those.
Finally the dying threshold doesn't become a joke at higher levels. Normally with higher dmg at higher lvls you skip disabled and often even the dying status. Imho it looses all of its purpose.
With the altered rules it remains useful at later levels. Maybe adjust the possible dmg per turn to character lvl so that the dmg doesn't become to easy to ignore it.

[Zombimode]

In number of rounds, 3.5 combat is pretty short. Once enemies are in striking distance, 1-2 round resolution is common and very rarely will a combat go over 5 rounds.

They may only take 5 rounds, but they still take 5 hours to execute

[Saintheart]

In number of rounds, 3.5 combat is pretty short.

Try it in PbP and see whether it's short.

[Quentinas]

Trisha, Silph, Pandora, Errethera, if you have session this afternoon ,and you have a mercane in your party don't read this post

Today my party .that is composed from a lesser drow ranger 3/cleric 3/ Sword dancer 6, an hengeyokai (weasel) factotum 9/Dungeon delver 1/An homebrew class that give her an animal companion and other bonuses but no spell, a Gnoll Duskblade 9 and a lesser aasimar shadowcaster 6/Master of shadow 6 will have an encounter with 2 midgard dwarf battlesmith 5 that are escaping from a ruin chanter with two ruin elementals.
They don't have to fight each of these enemies (as you can see the ruin chanter and two ruin elementals is a cr 15 as encounter) but they can choose
Help the dwarfs and try to beat the ruin chanter (this will be quite long as no one of the player is quite the optimizer and i expect at least 10 round)
Help the ruin chanter and beat the dwarfs (this will be shorter...but I don't expect that they will win in 5 round...maybe one or two round more as the dices for the hit point for one of the dwarf were quite high and they have around 30 of AC)
Ignore the situation (and this require roleplay)
This is a casual encounter in a table I created , as they are on Nidavellir on the plane of Ysgard and I didn't like the manual of the planes encounter table for ysgard

Considering that a fight with 3 bar-lgura when they were level 10 and there wasn't the shadowcaster (okay they had only half of their spells and was an ambush) with two of three characters was teleported away from these demons with the third that seeing the situation, knowing that the teleport for three times in a row failed against him choosed to fail his save to be with his companions (hoping that he would be here) , endend in 10 rounds , I think that the average number of rounds depend on two things . First the optimization of the party , and second the monsters (and the tactics ) the DM choose. If the party is optimized nearly then what the DM puts of monster I think that 5 rounds for many combats is not so much , if the party isn't optimized is not so easy doing maximum 5 round of combat for each encounter, so depends so much on system mastery rather than "the combats are too short, the combats are too long"

[smetzger]

If 3e is played right, each turn should take about 30 seconds or less.

Don't slow the game down. Don't make us do fiddly math in the middle of combat. If you can't Persist the buffs, don't cast buffs.

It's amazing how fast encounters fly by when you follow this mindset to its Determinator level of maximal efficiency.

You have mentioned this before. I don't see how this ban on non-persist buffs would work.... maybe my definition of a buff and yours are different.

For example...
Rogue - can he not use his ring of invisibility or drink a potion of invisibility once the fight starts?
Wizard/Cleric - I just saw the enemy Rogue disappear , can I not cast see invisibility or invisibility purge?
Wizard with a bunch of non-spellcasters - Seems like Haste is a very optimal choice of spells to cast. Why can't I cast it?
Cleric - i just saw the enemy cast a summon spell. Why can't I cast Prot from Evil so I can't be attacked by the creature?
Gish - why can't I cast shield before wading into melee?
Cleric - barbarian is stuck in a grapple or entangle spell. Why can't I fast freedom of movement on them?

Does wildshaping count as a buff? How about polymorph?

I guess I just see a lot of frequent things happening in combat where a buff spell is needed in order to overcome the obstacle.

If you consider the above actions to be 'buffs' - how are the obstacles overcome?

[Xervous]

3.5 is structured to encourage hitting the JRPG auto battle button, prevailing expectations are that most fights go to the death. If the round count were much shorter initiative would be the coin flip that determines victory. Increasing the round count past a point doesn’t add much since the vast majority of combat interaction is governed by a flowchart that vacuums STR combatants into the melee gravity well. You won’t see new tactics generally; if something was worth stalling for it was a thing you accomplished on the party level. Lots of archetypes don’t have much in the way of combat choices (much less choices overall) so you’re not actually adding anything beyond the literal extra turns of doing the exact same thing except the conclusion will be more obvious as you slog towards it.

[Learn34]

So, my (limited) experience thus far is that unless everyone is playing bone-dead-stupid characters who's only options are "move here" and/or "hit it with a stick", then combats take a long time. Obviously system mastery helps, as does enforcing turn time limits (e.g. 1min to declare your actions), but your entire plan can easily be thrown off by what ever the person/monster before you in initiative does.

My current table is a microcosm of alot of the discussions/disagreements I've seen on these forums lately, and we recently got through a fight which took 3(?) 4+hr sessions (6 PCs, 1 PC-NPC, 17-ish monsters). The second session took ~5hrs to get through 8 rounds, with 1 PC paralyzed for 4 of them.

Buff spells can easily be accounted for by the party having standard picks and making alternate sheets/cliff-notes cards rolling those in. Especially for high-granularity rules systems like 3.5/PF, excel sheets et.al. are great.

[PoeticallyPsyco]

Regarding 4E, longer encounters works well for the highly tactical combat. When 4E is at its best, everyone's best powers are a) single use, b) tend to be very different from their other powers (you tend to want to avoid redundancy when selecting powers so you can cover more situations), and c) will often significantly change the battle. This tends to make combat very dynamic; there might be an obvious best move for the first person up, but they won't have that available next turn so they'll have to come up with something else, and their move will also change the battlefield or the opponents, so everyone after them has to adapt to the new state of affairs. Enemies having distinct tactical roles combined with good use of terrain will also tend to make each fight feel relatively unique.

Where I was going with this is that that needs more rounds to fully develop than 3.5 usually does, and crucially will actually develop and change in interesting ways over those multiple rounds. 3.5 has some of that for the player side of things, between martial initiators (who usually can't refresh their maneuvers each round and so must use different ones as the fight goes on) and spellcasters (who often don't want to cast a redundant spell), but not to the same degree and not with all or even most classes. Similarly, on the monster side of things, the DM can build so monsters have distinct roles and a combat style that evolves as the combat goes on, but it's by no means the default (and there aren't any handy guidelines for that design ethos included in the DMG/MM like in 4E). So usually 3.5 won't benefit as much from longer combats, because it's not designed with that in mind. And even 4E, which is designed with that in mind, can screw it up and turn into a slog-fest if you're not careful (though apparently the later Monster Manuals were much better about this).

[King of Nowhere]

My experience seems to be atypical. Finally got a new group together a couple years ago now and we have -rarely- had an encounter last fewer than half-a-dozen rounds. I'll happily grant that only two of us have the system mastery to do any serious optimization and I'm sandbagging a bit.

I feel this is a result of both sides of the system, palyers and DMs alike, focusing more on offense than defense. It's just easier to win the race if you deal more damage, instead of dealing with your enemy's attacks if he survives.

this.
the fights were supposed to last longer, but optimization pushed them shorter.
not only increasing damage was easier than increasing defence, but more important, there is magic. and magic has so many avenues of offence, it's virtually impossible to stop all of them. got loads of hp? target saving throws. Got all three high saving throws? use no save touch attacks. got high touch ac too? quicken true strike, possibly some debuffs first. got high spell resistance? there are spells that ignore that. and let's not even mention those spells that screw you up without any kind of counterplay.
the thing is, in order to defend, you have to defend against each and every possible attack. in order to get good at killing, you only have to focus on doing one thing.
oh, and then they introduced stuff to break the action economy that made things even worse. so you won initiative and you make your round first? well, between belt of battle and celerity you actually get to make 2 rounds first. just in case the opponent survived the first round...

so, eventually it became more efficient to use your build resources to kill the opponent before he gets to act, than it is to use those same build resources to thoughen up.

my solution has been a general nerf of every optimized strategy of attack, but most especially those that ignore defences (no save spells are the main offenders here, but there are also some martial things, like the aforementioned uberchargers or those weapon enchantments that turn everything into touch attacks). this ensurees fighting lasts a bit longer.

[Quertus]

What do you mean exactly by that? By the duration of the spell? Or that if you want to cast a buff it must be persisted? Either way seems restrictive to options.

You have mentioned this before. I don't see how this ban on non-persist buffs would work.... maybe my definition of a buff and yours are different.

For example...
Rogue - can he not use his ring of invisibility or drink a potion of invisibility once the fight starts?
Wizard/Cleric - I just saw the enemy Rogue disappear , can I not cast see invisibility or invisibility purge?
Wizard with a bunch of non-spellcasters - Seems like Haste is a very optimal choice of spells to cast. Why can't I cast it?
Cleric - i just saw the enemy cast a summon spell. Why can't I cast Prot from Evil so I can't be attacked by the creature?
Gish - why can't I cast shield before wading into melee?
Cleric - barbarian is stuck in a grapple or entangle spell. Why can't I fast freedom of movement on them?

Does wildshaping count as a buff? How about polymorph?

I guess I just see a lot of frequent things happening in combat where a buff spell is needed in order to overcome the obstacle.

If you consider the above actions to be 'buffs' - how are the obstacles overcome?

I haven't been very clear, have I?

Let's start with a few examples of what fiddly math looks/sounds like:

Battletech

Medium range is 6, I jumped is 9, two woods is 11, target's defence is 13, pulse laser is 11, targeting computer is 10.

Bad 2e

My THAC0 is 9. I rolled a 12. 12 is 3 better than 9, so I hit 3 better than 0; ie, AC -3. But my strength gives me a 1-point bonus, and my weapon is +3, so that's… AC -7. Any other bonuses? Oh, you cast prayer? So, that's, what… AC -8?

Bad 3e

My attack bonus is +12, +2 for flanking, +1 from higher ground, +2 for charge… do I count the effective +2 for my target having charged, or is that figured into his current AC?

OK. So, what buffs am I under that affect this? +1 from Haste? That's cool. And another +1 from Prayer? And +1 from the Bard. Of course.

So that's… +20 total.

(Bonus points: Wait - what are the types on those? Do they all stack? Nobody knows? OK, let's look them all up.)

-----

If you can't <roll> <math> <declare> in about 30 seconds, and it's because you're doing fiddly math, that's too slow for 3e for my groups.

OTOH, many of the same players also play Battletech, and we *love* the fiddly math there. In Battletech, the fiddly math is a fun minigame; in 3e, it breaks the rule of "don't slow the game down".

Now, yes, not all turns are that fast - occasionally there are legitimate questions to answer, even if people have been paying attention. But *most* turns in 3e can be taken very quickly, so long as everyone is on the same page about *what* actually slows the game down.

And… if, in your groups, that's *not* fiddly math? If your players can keep all that in their heads, or on scratch paper, roll a die, and tell you an AC / tell you if they've hit (and for how much damage) in just a few seconds? Then my comments are not applicable to your tables.

But tables I've played at, fiddly math has been a strong contributor to Sloth's campaign. Or the campaign's sloth. Whichever.

Is that "restrictive"? To answer that question with a question, is "don't play a character you can't play quickly" and "don't make other people play their characters slowly (with fiddly math)" as rules derived from, "don't slow the game down" restrictive?

So, in practice, it's less a ban and more an awareness. When people notice, they self-correct, just like with Balance to the Table.

If you can somehow play a self-buffing Abjurant Champion Wild Shape character, who never casts the same buff routine & never fights in the same form twice, and can still take your turns in seconds? Great.

If you can't figure out Power Attack math in a minute? Maybe you should be playing a simpler character.

Just… IME, fiddly math has slowed down every group in every RPG and war game I've ever seen have to handle it.

Lastly, some obstacles, the party is explicitly OK with slowing down for. Like… "everything hinges on this one roll", or "we know that we're walking into a Medusa nest tomorrow - what's every buff we can possibly pile on?" scenarios, for example.

But I figured it best to state it as a hard rule because, if you want to experience the difference for yourself, you'll probably need to use the "hard rule" version, for at least a 1-shot, to get everyone onboard to truly experience it.

[heavyfuel]

I think it has to do with the amount of optimization that is put into most characters. Being able to one-shot a CR=ECL monster is not that difficult with some 3e builds. Uberchargers, Wraithstrikers, and a few ToBlers can do it, as can some more builds that are borderline TO, like Mailmen.

Longer combats do occur in low OP. I once entered a game with a full-support Charisma based Cleric (Dynamic Priest feat meant that most of my BFC and blasting were 100% useless). The level 6 Fighter was the best damage dealer with an average of d8+8 per attack, so even a single CR 6 enemy would take multiple rounds for the party to beat.

Fun group, though.

I don't play 3e, so I can't comment directly.

But I would question anyone who considers 5e combat a slogfest (in terms of number of rounds). I think in 5+ years of running 3 games a week (well, except during the pandemic) I've gotten to 10 rounds...once? twice? And those were wave-style fights.

Plus, when run right, 5e rounds each take about the same time as single turns took in the PF game I played. And that was at low levels.

4e, in my experience, had super long battles both in terms of rounds AND (most critically) in terms of real time because turns took forever.

For me, personally, I'd rather not take more than 3-5 rounds total for most combats. I don't like rocket tag, but long drawn out fights are annoying.

This has been my experience as well. It does get sloggier by the level, though. In 5e, damage does not scale nearly as fast as HP, so by levels 14+ it does get pretty tedious.

[PhoenixPhyre]

This has been my experience as well. It does get sloggier by the level, though. In 5e, damage does not scale nearly as fast as HP, so by levels 14+ it does get pretty tedious.

In my experience, the single most important factor is decisiveness of the players. I can take a party of people who actually know what they're going to do through a level 20 combat in less time than another party of less decisive people through an "easy" level 1 encounter. Both take between 3-5, maybe 6-7 max rounds.

[Elves]

Being able to one-shot a CR=ECL monster is not that difficult with some 3e builds.

Basic PHB-only martial kills most CR=ECL monsters with a full attack at most levels. Raging barbarian, TWF sneak attacking rogue and mounted paladin straight off WOTC's iconics character sheets all do 275-300 damage with fra @ 20th, similar to a 20 HD foe with +10 Con (see balor). Rocket tag was a thing before splats.

[Kesnit]

Yeah, in practice I've found that combats that last longer than 5 rounds are very rare, and single rounds tend to take a long time to play out.

That's on the players, not the system. Between players not paying attention and players who choose not to do their math beforehand, rounds can take a long time. I keep a folder with notes on all the abilities my PCs have - as well as AB, CMB, and DC - so when it's my turn, I can just say "I grapple the monster. The CMD is Z." If I have a buff or debuff that affects those numbers, I can write it (in pencil) on my notes. The same thing works for casting spells. Cast the spell, tell the DM what the DC is. DM rolls for any/all affected enemies. Or tell your allies what bonuses they have and have them write it on their sheets.

To compound things, combats that take more than 5 rounds also tend to have many combatants, which makes each individual rounds longer, in real time.

Which means the DM has to be prepared with info on the enemies. Using the same stats for multiple enemies will speed things up here, too. I've run combats with 4 PCs and 10 enemies (of 3 different types) that go quickly because everyone is prepared when their turn comes around.

I'm not really sure how the designers expected people to resolve 4 CR = ECL encounters per session.

It's not "per session." It's "per in-game day." That day can stretch over multiple sessions, if necessary.

Encounters could probably be a bit longer, but I'm not sure how to approach doing that while also making rounds shorter. Even though 4e and 5e are simpler it doesn't seem to have actually helped much, the core problem of getting people to decide what they want to do quickly remains.

^This. Rounds become shorter when everyone is prepared. If you want to keep the encounter moving, put people on a timer. If they can't say what their character is doing within a reasonable limit, they move to the bottom of the initiative for that round. If they still can't come up with something, their character does not act and the party moves into the next round.

IME, the only thing that will make combat flow at a good pace is to have players that 1. pay attention, and 2. know their character and rules well. IME, this applies across all character levels, based on the different groups I play/played with.

Yes.

One of my groups have never had a problem with a flow of combat in any edition of D&D we've played (3.5, PF, 5e) as most turns are resolved at a good pace, people usually know what they'll do on their turns and know their character's options well enough to adjust quickly when situation changes (I want to add that this is the group that has the highest overall rules mastery when it comes to these games too so it certainly helps).

System mastery helps. But just knowing what the PC can do will go a long way. As I said, I have note sheets with all my character's info (including what all powers do) that I can review before my turn comes up. No need to go book-diving. (When I play casters, I make a spell book sorted by level so I can look up any given spell. To save paper and make searching easier, it's a Word file in the cloud I can access on my tablet.)

Yes, this requires a little effort on the part of the players to put it together. But it pays for itself in ease of access and less frustration.

Things that can help combat run more smoothly:

• Make notes as combat progresses, such as calculating new bonuses for your attack rolls (if you have party members that like casting buffs, or you have a specific bonus against this type of enemy, on your note-sheet just write up your new total modifier to attack/damage). For me this helps a lot because I am bad at math and so I use less time trying to remember all the bonuses and adding things up.
• When it is not your turn, plan your next action. If you're casting a spell, make sure you know its range/targets/save/duration by either checking your sheet, book, or app. This means that when its your turn you already have that information on hand, instead of a "oh I forgot the range on this" or "was it Fortitude or Will?".
• Outside of combat, it doesn't hurt to engage with the others (IC or OOC) to plan tactics for fights.

I think I love you.

but your entire plan can easily be thrown off by what ever the person/monster before you in initiative does.

That can happen, but not often. Which is why everyone needs to be paying attention so (1) they are aware their plans may have to change, and (2) they are aware of everything on the battlefield and can have a tentative back-up plan if their first plan falls apart.

[heavyfuel]

Basic PHB-only martial kills most CR=ECL monsters with a full attack at most levels. Raging barbarian, TWF sneak attacking rogue and mounted paladin straight off WOTC's iconics character sheets all do 275-300 damage with fra @ 20th, similar to a 20 HD foe with +10 Con (see balor). Rocket tag was a thing before splats.

I mentioned splats, but my point is about optmization, not splats.

Plus, relying on a full attack means you have to wait at least until round-two to kill, unless you optimize and have a way of moving and dealing enough damage. Plus, a lot characters below high-OP probably don't have attack bonuses that high, so a Balor with 39 AC (at will Unholy Aura) has a very decent chance of surviving.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Basic PHB-only martial kills most CR=ECL monsters with a full attack at most levels. Raging barbarian, TWF sneak attacking rogue and mounted paladin straight off WOTC's iconics character sheets all do 275-300 damage with fra @ 20th, similar to a 20 HD foe with +10 Con (see balor). Rocket tag was a thing before splats.

Got a link to those iconics? My gut is saying that doesn't sound right. Memory can be a funny thing if you haven't looked at 'em in a while.

[Quentinas]

If i remember well (but i'm not sure it's the iconic characters he said) there were some iconic NPCS in Enemies &Allies but it's a 3.0 book if I'm not wrong