Let me start by saying that being a GM is my favorite experience in tabletop gaming.
I've been gaming for about a year and I've noticed something in most gaming groups in which I've participated.
Nobody is a slave to the rules.
This is a good thing, and I'm not putting that up for debate, because the Core Rulebook itself says that we can do whatever works best. As a GM, I try to stick to the rules as much as possible, but I'll admit that I use far less crunch than the books advise. What I mean is this:
My worlds or locations typically don't have stat blocks. I rarely use tables for item / character / encounter generation. My NPC or monster stat blocks are typically abbreviated and incomplete (if I missed something I come up with it on the fly). I eyeball CR for encounters. I don't pay much attention to how much treasure is too much or too little. I try to build characters and locations naturally and creatively rather than sticking to preset tables and equations.
Don't get me wrong--combat, leveling, and basic gameplay mechanics are all in line with the rules. But when I build scenarios--and when other GMs build them, even for games like D&D 4e--I don't stick to the full crunch and I don't see others sticking to the full set of crunch. That is, I typically don't build everything (monsters, NPCs, items, locations, encounters, etc) from scratch, but I build, rearrange, borrow, recycle, make up, and steal what I need and what suits me and my players.
Now this has never led to any real problems that couldn't be solved with a "+2/-2" solution or some creativity on my part, but when I crack the less-read sections of my Core Rulebook or GMG, I can't help but wonder if I'm missing something critical to the gaming experience by not crunching through everything. I've made an effort to spend more prep time building adventures "by the book", but I'm not sure how much attention to fully fleshing out everything numerically and formally is necessary for a quality experience.
I have a feeling that I'm not qualified to be a convention or Pathfinder Society or official GM because of my philosophy. The other GMs I've played with seem to do things this way too, rarely acting like programs that churn out adventures, and more picking and choosing scenario building methods as they suit them.
If you have any thoughts on this I'd like to hear them. I'm interested in hearing about what chapters or rules are most useful (or not) to you as GMs.
I have a feeling that I'm not qualified to be a convention or Pathfinder Society or official GM because of my philosophy. The other GMs I've played with seem to do things this way too, rarely acting like programs that churn out adventures, and more picking and choosing scenario building methods as they suit them.
I think you need to draw a line between two different "GM hats".
There's the hat you wear as, essentially, "Adventure Author" even if you're not writing an adventure for other people to run, or even if you're making stuff up on the fly because the players went in a radically different direction than you anticipated.
There's another hat you wear as, essentially, "Rules Arbitrator."
If you're running a module someone else wrote and sticking pretty faithfully to it, whether as a PFS GM or someone running an Adventure Path or the like, you spend a lot more of your time wearing the Rules hat and less time wearing the Author hat.
I'm not sure if I explained that well. Does that at all make sense?
Yes. We've never used pre-published adventures. I suppose that all of those adventures ARE built with strict attention paid to all of the design concepts and methods. I've used pre-published material for inspiration; I suppose that if I were to design adventures to those standards I'd quickly run out of free time.
Lots o Good Stuff
I just wanted to send out my kudos and thanks for keepin hope alive for your approach.
I think it's a question of style and a need for professional publishers to have an 'assumed baseline' to work from. We've been playing various RPGs for slightly over thirty years and our group plays pretty much like yours - we don't stat up villains, adhere to 'wealth per level', look up DCs or use much of the crunch available other than PC generation. This is true regardless of which system we've played. Nonetheless, when we want some complicated rules subsystem (or more frequently when we want to create one and can use a starting point) we can usually find one to build from in one of the systems we've played over the years.
One weakness of this approach (as you allude to with the organised play comment) is that it's potentially less portable to a new playing group or at least could cause problems. If I were to start playing with a new group, I suspect I'd brush up on the ACTUAL rules rather than whatever we've been playing for the last few years. Again though, I think it's about an established, agreed upon baseline rather than a "right way to play".
Thanks for the response guys. Good points all around.
I am also of the "Do what I want school".
However, I have found some benefits to using tables and statting up NPCs. One thing is that using tables provides a more 'existential' feeling because PCs don't just encounter what's on the top of my mind, but could encounter something because it is on the table, its number came up, and there was no reason why it couldn't be there.
I also have been known to randomly generate random encounter tables. One such table had a good chance of encountering a stone golem, so I had an area with stone golems all over the place, including under water. That inspired an idea of a prior civilization that used stone golems extensively, before the land became flooded.
(I usually determine the "random" encounters ahead of time and write them out. Saves a lot of time at the table that way.)
Also, statting NPCs out can help give me ideas. I created an evil druid once, and gave him the Craft <Item> of Wonder feat. (Which in my campaign replaced the Craft Wondrous Item feat) So I had him make a few magic necklaces for his minions, one of which ended up in a PC's hands, and a cursed collar to prevent his captive from casting any magic spells.
And if you have a really cool idea, statting the character out can provide a reality check. There is just so much coolness you can have in an 8th level NPC.
But the majority of NPCs that the PCs meet don't have any stats at all, until I need them.
RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
|
However I don't eyeball CR for encounters, unless it is a weird encounter which CR would be hard to calculate using the standard rules.
This point is one I have issues with. Every time I read fantasy, there are the encounters that the character or group cannot win. So they avoid, retreat, or flee. So whenever I get a new group or player, I give the "You can't/won't be able to win every encounter." I make sure I toss them an insane encounter once every 3-4 sessions. Only once were they able to defeat the monster that was CR +9 above the group.
Just be prepared for when you get players that can reverse engineer a monster because they used to be a DM. This normally does not happen unless you almost kill them or do kill them. I would also let them know about how you do things up front. Other than that I say do whatever works and allows everyone to have fun. :)
Throwing an impossible fight at the party is kind of a dumb move. It's essentially railroading, only you don't even have a cool plot in mind. You're just pushing around the PCs and punishing them arbitrarily for not deciding to run away like wussy little pansy cowards.
|
Throwing an impossible fight at the party is kind of a dumb move. It's essentially railroading, only you don't even have a cool plot in mind. You're just pushing around the PCs and punishing them arbitrarily for not deciding to run away like wussy little pansy cowards.
That would be completely dependent on the campaign I would say Prof. Take a look at the Kingmaker random encounter tables for instance. For all you know, these high level threats may very well be plot devices in Thomas' campaign.
As long as characters have some knowledge skills, they should be able to have a shot at deciding something is too powerful for them and run away. Nothing wrong with that at all, and can be cery good for immersion and world building. Far from what I would call a dumb move, but then people have different play styles I guess.
Cheers
Ugh, I'm not a fan of random encounters to begin with, so that's not the best example :p
Don't get me wrong, I can see the place for similar styles of encounters. I've done it before where the game started off with all the PCs as runaway slaves. The important thing, I think, is to put the PCs in a situation where they know running is the best idea. If it's just "You come across a spectral troll and it charges you" out of the blue at an early level, that's not really something I'm into.
Another thing is to make the battles hard without being impossible...but to then have reinforcements "on the way" so now they're injured and their spells are gone, and that's just after one fight, and woops more are coming! It gets the sense of "Time to run" without bringing down the hammer of potential TPK.
|
RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
|
Throwing an impossible fight at the party is kind of a dumb move. It's essentially railroading, only you don't even have a cool plot in mind. You're just pushing around the PCs and punishing them arbitrarily for not deciding to run away like wussy little pansy cowards.
I just like to add some more background to my world. So at first level they take a caravan through the big scary woods which is the goblins territory. They are attacked by a few goblins. If the party explores, they find the goblin camp containing hundreds of goblins. The goblins have been there for years, never leaving the woods. The locals are afraid to roust them and the party at their level can't finish them off. So I have just created a plot for later.
Or they make see a T-Rex. I don't force them to fight but I am a big proponent of turning it into a roleplay or skill encounter to avoid it. But later they may decide they want some dinoskin leather armor and come hunt it down.
EDIT:
4th lvl party ignored the literal "There Be Dragons' signs and warnings from the villagers. They went down into the underground path. They met an ancient brass dragon that 'taxed' them for their trespassing. At the behest of one player, the bard, who lost a +2 weapon, they decided to return and rob the dragon. When their sneakery failed and rather than try diplomacy, the bard attacked. Rest was history. The bard was soon asked to leave the group.
In my over 20 years of being a GM for (A)D&D I never crunched out anything to total perfection. Not even close, in fact.
The adventures I wrote circulated my school back then and copies of them even were played at local conventions (without me knowing beforehand - funny thing to suddenly play your own adventure).
So, no, I would say it isn't necessary at all to put the crunch before the flavor.
BUT, that doesn't mean that crunch is unecessary!
I have a good grip of the rules and can judge situations quite well (or so I am told). This helps alot if you want to save the time for building crunch.
Once in while I turn to crunch for inspiration and to see if I am still doing it right and I would advise every GM to to the same or else you easily become entangled in your own believes differing the actual rules - often for no good reason.
Finally there is this phenomenom that is called "organized play", which is pretty much dependant on crunch and there are quite a lot of players liking that (which I can't imagine why - but thats my problem).
@Thomas LeBlanc
To be fair, your earlier post sounded like you tossed in an impossible encounter every 3-4 sessions without regard to reason, story or anything.
The post seemed to imply it was more to teach the players than anything about creating the feel of a living world.
I can totally understand the second reasoning, it simply makes sense. You don't make an entire society of goblins an appropriate CR combat encounter simply because the players are low level. Circumstances might allow a diplomacy or sneak encounter that is of the correct CR, because you can tweak the circumstances of how the players are introduced to this new situation from your end without artificially depowering a hundred strong goblin force.
This is typically something you'd see in sandbox games, and really does give the campaign a feeling of "living world", even if it's mostly made up on the spot.
I think mostly what Prof Cirno was against was the whole impression of:
Let me start by saying that being a GM is my favorite experience in tabletop gaming.
I've been gaming for about a year and I've noticed something in most gaming groups in which I've participated.
Nobody is a slave to the rules.
The vocal minority is a very vocal minority.
I try to build characters and locations naturally and creatively rather than sticking to preset tables and equations.
Absolutely the right approach... keep it up.
|
I used to be more in favor of this style...until one of my DMs started not having time, and started just randomizing EVERYTHING. Stats, items, PLOT, encounters. When a fight is too hard for us (for whatever reason), he just deus ex machina it away. It's really terrible.
It's almost like this:
"Your party is traveling through this part of the Underdark to track down a renegade cleric who has stolen holy items. You are ambushed by an army of drow. You are losing, the party will die...until the mind flayers ambush them in the process. They let you know that you were the perfect distraction. Before they enslave you, you are rescued by an another army of neutral stone giants living in the Underdark. They rescued you because they want to use you to destroy the drow."
Sounds good? Except it doesn't matter what we do, we can't get the main quest done because the DM decides all of a sudden this side quest is a good idea. We only play maybe once a month. So what turned out to be a good idea from the start...ends up going completely off the tracks and whims on the DM, making it no fun for anybody.
DMs...please keep in mind the objective of the party, and what they players want to do with their characters, not cool sidequests that end up nuking the campaign.
I ran Hero for years without stating everything up. It baffled me to hear people complain about how complicated and time consuming Hero was compared to other games. I might note combat abilities for encounters I anticipated a fight for. If the PCs went off the reservation, as they always do, I would improvise. They attack an NPC I did not anticipating them attacking? I would guestimate what sort of combat abilities this NPC should have.
It is not like there is no warning. PCs often spend inordinate amount of time discussing their devious plans right there in front of you. I can not count the number of times I would use one of their own ideas against them without anyone the wiser. I get to use a great idea and the player thinks he figured out my dastardly plan.
I concede this style is not for everyone. I think that is essentially what we have with the OP. Style. It is not wrong or right, just different.
@BYC: That sounds like just bad DMing...
|
It is not like there is no warning. PCs often spend inordinate amount of time discussing their devious plans right there in front of you. I can not count the number of times I would use one of their own ideas against them without anyone the wiser. I get to use a great idea and the player thinks he figured out my dastardly plan.
This is my favorite tactic even in published adventures and players eat it up. I cannot say how many times I have changed my own prepared tactics so that the players plan can work out to be cooler.
Regarding the OP. For a DM the rules are guidelines for fun. If you can break a rule to make things more fun for the players then do it. The only time it is wrong to break a rule is when you are making an arbitrary decision to save an NPC or a plot point you like.
One example I like to give is from a battle with a Kua Toan monk (D&D) and some other Kuas. The monk gave the casters especially the cleric no end of trouble. The cleric used the last charge on his wand and the monk evaded it. Cleric was out of actions. The player says, "if I had one more action I would stab you in the eye with this thing!" Which is double funny because Kua Toa have huge eyes. I say, "go for it, make a roll." Cleric rolls a 1. Monk's turn is next. He sticks his tongue out, jumps in the water and uses his natural swim speed plus monk speed to motorboat away. They group still talks about that damn monk. The one that got away. A bit of a fisherman's story but happened in water temple of RtoTEE.
I use encounter tables as guidelines to see what monsters fit in what environment naturally but I never roll on them. I may take Utgardloki's idea of misplacing creatures to create a more fantastical environment.
As far as pathfinder society play goes they are attempting to make games run consistently across the world so that a player can take his character from Iraq to Nebraska and play it without anyone raising an eyebrow. It does require a certain dedication to the rules that even a self professed rules lawyer and long time DM such as myself shies away.
As far as players bumping into tougher creatures--I've done this on numerous occasions, or, rather, THEY'VE done this. I always make it clear that an encounter may be out of their reach, and that they should probably pursue plot hook "x" to overcome this obstacle later, but sometimes they press on. This can create a new encounter--that is, the escape, the chase, the running for survival with low HP, magic, and items--that is a whole lot of fun.
Furthermore it does lend itself to worldbuilding. If the players bump up against something stronger than them, it reminds them that this world doesn't exist just to be exploited for loot or XP; they are exploring a "real" world in which their actions have consequences and sometimes not everyone or everything in the setting has some direct gaming functionality.
That's not to say the PCs aren't the center of our gaming experiences. They are! What I mean is that every NPC or setting should not simply be there for our heroes to change radically. What sense does it make for a group of 2nd level PCs to march into the imperial castle and demand an audience with the emperor or else they initiate combat? They're gonna get tossed out on their butts or in prison, which in of itself makes for a fun set of encounters and new plot possibilities.
I want my PCs to be able to discover the secret lair of the villain early on--but I also don't want to *cheat* them by allowing them to sack it on their first attempt. This game is about the journey, not the plot resolution.
It comes down to campaigns, I suppose.
To put it in perspective, the game I'm currently running:
The group started off as a mercenary group working for an independent city state meant to be similar to the Venice republic, who more or less serves as Adventurer's Central. The game itself is 500 years after your semi-bog standard setting shattering event, so there's plenty of old ruins with ancient secrets, hidden magic, and forgotten technology around.
For me, it didn't make sense to throw them into situations drastically above their head. Why would their mercenary guild do that? They'd be sent into problems they could actually handle.
That isn't to say they never met problems far bigger then they could take care of, but it was never just a snarling monster or an extra large hungry wolf. When they were sent as part of the bodyguard trope to a diplomatic expedition to the Lands of Twilight to the west, they met the gold dragon that can serve as a potential BBEG (if they pursuer that general plot line). They've also encountered agents of a renegade member of the Gnomish Creator's Guild.
By having them meet or hear about the major shakers in the world, I feel it helps build tension far better then just throwing them at something that makes them run away. Mind you, having that "FFFFF RUN" can be good and really tense if the scene or campaign would be helped by it, but things like just too powerful random encounters or the like don't really feel that way to me. I'd rather have a tense scene caused by the players being narratively in the Wrong Place at the Wrong Time, or due to them bungling hard, rather then "Well I rolled a 5 on the random encounter table sooooo..."
Throwing an impossible fight at the party is kind of a dumb move. It's essentially railroading, only you don't even have a cool plot in mind. You're just pushing around the PCs and punishing them arbitrarily for not deciding to run away like wussy little pansy cowards.
Knowing you are out matched and acting accordingly is not cowardise.
A fight you cannot hope to win is not neccissarilly rail roading, it can be a challange all its own, set around accessing the danger you find yourself in, about avoiding said threat, escaping it, and then finding a way that is not simple strength of arms, to end the threat. Not to mention of test of character for both player and PC.
Hell, this type of encounter is one of the foundational elements of call of cthulhu, along with investigation, bashing cultists over the head and loosing your mind, and frankly, i think of your average call of cthulhu investigator being considerably more brave than your average DnD adventurer. I mean in DnD your a fantasy superhero fighting goblins and dragons. In Call of cthulhu, your a geek fighting alien gods.
This point is one I have issues with. Every time I read fantasy, there are the encounters that the character or group cannot win. So they avoid, retreat, or flee. So whenever I get a new group or player, I give the "You can't/won't be able to win every encounter." I make sure I toss them an insane encounter once every 3-4 sessions. Only once were they able to defeat the monster that was CR +9 above the group.
I have no idea how this is even supposed to work. The answer to fight/flight question in DnD is the same as in, say, Bleach. If someone is so powerful, that you absolutely cannot beat him, you also won't be able to escape from him. In fact, in DnD at least half of the party is likely to be knocked out by such enemy's first action. The only exceptions are monsters that essentially are environmental hazards, assuming the environment is constructed in a way, that prevents scratching them to death from safe range.
I won't continue this "too hard monsters debate", however I play mainly the same style as Jpraab. However you need a very profound knowledge of the rules.
There are some deus-ex machina complications, keeping them to a minimum is the most important part for me.
But for the rest, I think my players always enjoy the style. One thing I lack is names, every person my players meet are supposed to have names, and they often ask (more like a reflex). And making them up is a weakness, but the players roll with it.
I hope you have fun with your players, and aren't sad about never being able to GM a PFS game.
One advice tough, don't let your players know that you have no stats at all, I always keep a small (blank) book that I open when every once and then (because I once told a miss even before I looked at the dice and a player noticed it).
It's not fudging dice when they don't matter in the first place ^^
And I only write this because I know that my players don't know my account here.
One thing I lack is names...
I have an Open Office Calc sheet that pulls a random trait from Heroes of Legend and a random name from a list of over 100 I pulled from various sources on the net. On refresh, I get 20 male names and 20 female names. I would print off the sheet for each session and when the PCs bumped into an NPC I had created on the fly, I would select one of the names, mentally make note of the trait and then jot notes down next to that name as the NPC developed.
One thing I lack is names....
I use Behind the Name's random name generator quite a lot. Chaotic Shiny has several generators available. I've made use of a few of them from time to time. Another technique is that when a player asks for an NPC's name, you ask the player to that player's left to supply the answer.
If it's working for you, great. I personally wouldn't want to play in a game like that, but it seems like you're enjoying yourself.
|
RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
|
I use Behind the Name's random name generator quite a lot. Chaotic Shiny has several generators available. I've made use of a few of them from time to time. Another technique is that when a player asks for an NPC's name, you ask the player to that player's left to supply the answer.
Gasparo Gerfried = awesome!
Jearr Maendrifo = goodThanks for the links! I tried each one once...
|
Yes. We've never used pre-published adventures. I suppose that all of those adventures ARE built with strict attention paid to all of the design concepts and methods.
Not all the time; there's a lot of times an NPC or monster has a non-standard statblock, and the author admits there isn't an existing spell or template for it.
As long as they point it out, and show they've taken the implications into account (Creature X has +4 Str and Con, so it's CR has been increased...) I don't have a problem.
Gasparo Gerfried = awesome!
Jearr Maendrifo = goodThanks for the links! I tried each one once...
You're welcome!
Does that result in a lot of your NPCs being named Joe and Fred?
Not too often. Bob also makes an appearance at least once a campaign. BTW, our exchange over your avatar inspired me to create this monster. :)
I tried to append this to my earlier post, but the forum, once again, ate it.
As far as random encounters go, I've always been a fan of them, going back to 2nd edition. I don't like every encounter being tailor made for the group, or even the group's level. It's just not as fun to me or te people I play with. I've lost more than one character that way, but when it only takes minutes to write up a new character, I don't see what the big deal is.
I can see where having encounters that cater to the group could be good, but it's just not my preferred way to play.
|
Me personally, I don't care for random encounters. Any encounter that doesn't enhance the world or the story is a waste of gaming time. Now, this is colored by the fact that I'm in the military, and I can never be sure I'll have the time with my group to finish the campaign. I'm not saying characters should never have encounters while traveling or while resting in dungeons, but it should make consistent sense. No 'blarg I'm a troll' out of thin air.
Something I've done in the past (and probably will do again).
I simply memorized the CR table in the back of the book. Then I throw out the description I wanted and use the stats that worked for that encounter. Since I knew what the challenge of the encounter was supposed to be (based on where in the adventure it was) I knew what stat line to use and simply grabbed what abilities worked for the encounter.
This isn't something I would advocate for everyday gaming -- but if you know your group and what something more "free form" on your end as a GM simply knowing what the numbers should be around and knowing the special abilities means that you can "dress" the monsters however you want and still present the level of challenge you want for that encounter.
Me personally, I don't care for random encounters. Any encounter that doesn't enhance the world or the story is a waste of gaming time. Now, this is colored by the fact that I'm in the military, and I can never be sure I'll have the time with my group to finish the campaign.
Well, in that case, it makes a bit more sense. Many of my friends in the military are the same way, they'd rather feel like they've really accomplished something in-game when they play.
|
|
Exactly. There's nothing wrong with a game where you roleplay bartering with the general store owner the entire time. But when you don't know if you'll be gaming with them in a month, it can get frustrating knowing nothing really happened.
I've done that too Abraham, although not to that extent. Just guesstimated what a Warrior 3 would have statwise without writing it out. I should probably go over those guidelines a bit so I can use them when I need to.
I have thought about running a random encounter as the same spot where bandits attacked you on a road but instead there is a monster eating there corspe makes more sense than blar I am the troll. Having wolves or something with scent track the party from behind and attack them while they are making camp wolves would do this with their speed and work well not sure of other monsters. Dire wolves could provide even more of a challenge. I do not write everything out when making some npcs but make a stat block and work from memory. I know what a rouge 1 gets.
Finding the general store owner dead could make a fun twist in an low level urban campaign. That should have some in character roleplay.
Feeling like you accomplished something is important.
|
|
Any encounter that doesn't enhance the world or the story is a waste of gaming time.
Wolves tracking a wounded party or carrion crawlers feasting on the corpse they killed on their way into the dungeon enhances the world.
A rune giant jumping the party as soon as they leave town begs the question of why the town is still standing with such a threat in the area. Too many such encounters breaks verisimilitude.
There are two types of random encounter charts. There are RECs that contain a mix of encounters everywhere from CR "haha" to CR "holycrudrunaway", and there are charts that are tailored specifically for the level of the PC party. The second one is usually not terribly objectionable, because there's already obviously thought that went into its creation. One way I've found to make the first less objectionable is to keep in mind that not every encounter has to be a combat encounter. You just rolled up a Red Dragon when your 3rd level party is wandering around in the wilderness? Let them see it off in the distance, perhaps killing a wyvern for food or some such.
This way both adds to the world and lets you show the PCs that they aren't the biggest fish in the pond -- yet -- without putting them in an untenable position.
Of course, if they then proceed to say, "A dragon! Let's go kill it!", by all means, make them fight it. I had a group do that to me once; not all of their characters survived the experience, and they had a very healthy respect for dragons afterward.
|
RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
|
There are two types of random encounter charts. There are RECs that contain a mix of encounters everywhere from CR "haha" to CR "holycrudrunaway", and ...
One way I've found to make the first less objectionable is to keep in mind that not every encounter has to be a combat encounter. You just rolled up a Red Dragon when your 3rd level party is wandering around in the wilderness? Let them see it off in the distance, perhaps killing a wyvern for food or some such.This way both adds to the world and lets you show the PCs that they aren't the biggest fish in the pond -- yet -- without putting them in an untenable position.
Of course, if they then proceed to say, "A dragon! Let's go kill it!", by all means, make them fight it. I had a group do that to me once; not all of their characters survived the experience, and they had a very healthy respect for dragons afterward.
Exactly
Which is why if I'm going to use a random encounter chart, I write the chart myself with an idea of how to use each one.
I wrote up random encounter charts, random weather charts, and random terrain charts for an entire region once (for the main region in A History of Ashes, for the record). After realizing how much work that was and how much of a pain it was at the table, I hit on the bright idea of using pre-existing charts -- but rolling them ahead of time. That way the encounters were still randomly determined, but I was able to tailor the actual encounters that were in fact rolled. Best of both worlds IMO.
I often steal chunks of published adventures, changing plots and even descriptions as I need to make them work in my home games. Having those published chunks all follow the same in-depth rules makes it rally easy to do this without accidentally changing the "rules of reality" on my players.
I read everything, and a lot of it colors my ad hoc rulings, even if I cant consciously remember where I read a rule.
Sometimes I'm flummoxed, and I need to look something up because I have no clue. That's rare, and searchable PDFs makes it much faster, but when it happens I love having the rules in there.
And after that, I just make stuff up, often on the fly. I've run fights with foes that were no more than an attack bonus and a handful of dice for damage, and they died when the players had done "about" the right amount of damage. (Not often mind you - there's no need ususally - but I've done it.)
I think having that strong framework of rules makes everything easier, even when i dont use them all.
I'll use random encounters in something like the start of kingmaker or in the middle of a disputed region with a large war going on, or something similar, but as others above described I'll roll them up before I get to the table -- that way I know how to use them appropriately for my group.