This is mostly a poll. Mostly for PF.
How many rounds does a typical encounter last for your group?
How many encounters per in-game "day"?
How many encounters per gaming session?
Then , what type of game do you have? Low magic? AP? Highly houseruled? Are you the DM or player?
Typical combat: 3-5 rounds
encounters per day: very variable, 2-6 or something.
encounters per session: really variable, between 3-7 aprox.
Type of game: half AP / half house campaign setting. High magic, low on houserules, different DM for each campaign. Middle-high on optimization. Better stats than basic rules.
Group of old time friends; styles of play fairly similar.
One of our best (IMHO) 3PP designers has weighed in on this via PM;
Creighton Broadhurst:
"1. 5-10 (but we've been as high as 56!)
2. between 1 and 10; normally about 5
3. Combat encounters: about 3-4"
One of the devs = Adam Daigle has said :
"Hmmm... I've never really kept count. We typically play for about 4 hours at a time (after work in the conference room), and the number of encounters and how long they last really depends on the encounter and the level of the PCs. Some are over in 3 rounds, some take more time. I'm not sure if there is any "typical" that I've seen. I'll try to pay more attention to that so I can provide better answers.
EDIT: I see you asked James the same question. Any answers he gives can double for my answers, because he's in all four of the games I'm in (either as a player or as the GM)."
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1. 5-7 rounds. We're reaching the tipping point (level 10+) where DR is supposed to offset larger damage totals. Thus far, it has not been successful and I expect this number to start to drop.
2. 3-5 Encounters. In one of the campaigns I'm playing in, we have a party member who enjoys dragging the party on after all daily resources have been exhausted. Strangely, his characters seem to die a lot.
3. 3-4 Combat Encounters with one group, with 1 or 2 RP scenes. The other group tends to get 1-2 combat encounters, with a long argument over something IC. I'm all for IC development of plot, but we've got to work on our battle rhythm - wayyy too much time spend debating actions on initiative steps.
Both of these games are APs - Shattered Star and Kingmaker.
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1. 5-10 Sometimes circumstances may increase or decrease that figure but I would say the average is in that ball field.
2. This is where my table may vary widely from others. Due to AP play sometimes we have one encounter per day and other times we have had up to a dozen. My group really has no expectation so if we role play an entire session away nobody minds. To be honest the heavy combat games are not that enjoyable unless its storming the BBEG's place which is usually the case for high encounter days.
3. We game for 4 hours on average. Sometimes less sometimes longer. This answer will mirror my answer for question 2 but I would say usually at least one encounter per session but not always.
4. Currently I am running the Carrion Crown AP. My other group was running Serpent Skull but the GM got frustrated with PF and asked to quit it in favor of something else. That something else ended up being Traveller which I am now also running.
James Jacobs has said "I suppose 4 rounds.
Usually 4 to 6 encounters per day.
Usually 4 to 6 encounters per session (I generally run for 3-4 hours at a time).
I don't plan for a typical encounter lasting any amount of time at all, frankly. They'll last as long as they need to.
As for "per game day," the game assumes that the PCs will encounter 4-6 encounters of their APL per day but that really can vary. If your group is more into doing 1 big encounter a day... that encounter should be longer with multiple "waves" of foes."
How many rounds does a typical encounter last for your group?
As GM: I'd say an average of 4, but with 2 and 3 being more common than anything longer.
As PC: Probably 3. 2 is more common, but a couple have been "wave" style encounters that would drag the average up.
How many encounters per in-game "day"?
As a GM: This is probably my biggest gripe with 3rd (and 4e) D&D, because the concept of a day with lots of encounters in it is totally absurd to me. My group faces a number of encounters that make sense for them to face. This might be 1, this might be 10, it might be zero--there's no specific number I aim for. I suppose it probably averages at around 2, maybe 3, but 0 and 1 are the most common numbers.
As a PC: Most commonly, just 1. Sometimes, it's a gauntlet and we'll face 5 or 6. We're pretty much in control, though, thanks to our magical resources, so we can decide when to stop/when we need rest.
How many encounters per gaming session?
As a GM: Again, this varies so much. Last session, the group had zero encounters. The session before that had one. The one before that had, I want to say 5, maybe 6?
As a PC: Probably 3 or 4. The GM is a little slower with the rules than I am, so the fights take forever. It's gotten a lot better, though, after he saw me running the game with no battlemap--getting rid of it probably halved the time our fights take.
Then , what type of game do you have? Low magic? AP? Highly houseruled? Are you the DM or player?
As a GM: I use no magic items, ever (except as MacGuffins). Magic is generally a PC and powerful monster only sort of thing--average npcs basically have zero access to it. I highly discourage people from playing full casters or obsolete classes like Rogues or Fighters, though, and I tend not to run into the high levels, so magic never takes over. As I mentioned above, I don't use a battlemap at all.
In the specific setting I'm running, dimensional magic (summoning and teleportation) doesn't work properly and is extremely dangerous due to setting phenomenon that the PCs will likely eventually investigate. It's a baseline just barely iron age sort of deal, so a lot of gear doesn't exist (Greatswords, Full Plate, etc.), and there are no Composite Longbows because, well, they never really existed (there are composite shortbows, though).
There are no resurrections in my games. Only Breath of Life works (though I'm more lenient on the timing of it). Otherwise, dead is dead. You make a new character. Don't die.
In return, however, I don't use all those BS, "It's cool, they'll just rez him" abilities, like instant death effects or permanent debuffs (ability drain, negative levels, permanent curses etc.) at all. I hate that stuff--death should mean something, it shouldn't be a question of a single roll. If you die, it's because you did something foolish, not because you didn't roll a high enough save. And permanent penalties just become a tedious game of finding a spellcaster to cure you (which is not available in my game, anyway). Often, when I've got a permanent penalty, I'd rather just die and make a new, unpenalized character, rather than waste resources removing that nonsense.
I houserule lots of minor things to make the game more balanced. Nothing major, but too many little things to realistically list. The PCs mostly don't care about mechanics or balance in any way--they are not math people and have trouble totaling their dice, never mind optimizing characters. So, most of my houserules are unnnoticed/just make me feel better about the game. I also make it a point to offer help and suggestions for character building, to keep things more balanced.
As a PC: It's a pretty bog-standard Pathfinder game. Spellcasting is everywhere--half the game, it feels, has been spent finding higher level spellcasters to remove various permanent BS penalties (one guy had a curse that gave him -4 to all rolls, another had a mark of shadow that needed break enchantment to remove that allowed members of this guild of fetchling assassins to know our location at all times. We were level 4 and 5 at the time, mind you. He uses by-the-book magic mart rules, with the purchase limits and all that jazz.
We started playing Carrion Crown, but nobody liked it, so we started over and now we're basically just murder hoboing around the River Kingdoms. It's...ok. The GM doesn't houserule so much as he "misrules." He'll make mistakes about the rules, but when they are pointed out, he'll determine he likes the mistakes better and declare them a houserule. Rarely, he'll make reasonable ones, like magic traps can't just be found with Detect Magic (because the trap system is stupid and this makes it slightly less stupid). Other times, it will be crazy stuff like incorporeal creatures having 50% miss chance AND taking 50% damage from corporeal sources.
He's one of those GMs that thinks the PCs can't have fun unless the challenges have them down to the very end of their rope. Nothing can be easy--if something is easy, he'll just send more and more until we can't handle it any more, even if it's only easy because of our excellent preparation (oh, you actually took Resist Fire before facing fire elementals? Well, how about Colossal Elementals against your level 5 characters?!) It's a fairly common problem, I know, but that doesn't make it more palatable.
Ok. And I hope we can get a few more devs and staffers to weigh in.
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Running my group through Second Darkness, and the average single combat only lasts for 2-3 rounds at most. However, on a number of occasions, the group will purposely chain together every single combat in a single area, so that they can finish before the haste duration runs out...meaning the combat actually last about 7-8 rounds all up, but involves multiple groups of bad guys.
This is mostly a poll. Mostly for PF.
How many rounds does a typical encounter last for your group?
How many encounters per in-game "day"?
How many encounters per gaming session?
Then , what type of game do you have? Low magic? AP? Highly houseruled? Are you the DM or player?
3 rounds for most groups I have GM'd for.
The number of encounters vary, but normally not more than 4.
Sessions vary. I try to get at least one combat since I tend to attract players that get bored if they are doing too much research(non combat stuff).
I generally run high magic. As for the rules I have a few houserules, not so many that it causes any real problems.
Interesting results, such a high variance .
1. as many as it takes (avg 2.5)
2. as many as it takes (avg 3 - mix of combat/non-combat)
3. as many as my players want (avg 3 - mix of combat/non-combat)
4. homebrew
I have honestly asked this before in a couple different ways. I never got very solid or quantitative answers, so I'm a bit jealous. However I Think I and my gaming group fall squarely into the average that most folks have mentioned here. One thing I would like to know though is how you have zero encounters in a game session? Isn't that called bookkeeping? I enjoy RP, though my players don't as much. We generally though have at LEAST one encounter in a session, even if that encounter is purely resolved with roleplay. If I got together intending to play my game, and the ONLY thing we did for 4.5 hours was chit-chat and level up our characters, I think I'd probably go insane. That is something I could've done over email.
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I have honestly asked this before in a couple different ways. I never got very solid or quantitative answers, so I'm a bit jealous. However I Think I and my gaming group fall squarely into the average that most folks have mentioned here. One thing I would like to know though is how you have zero encounters in a game session? Isn't that called bookkeeping? I enjoy RP, though my players don't as much. We generally though have at LEAST one encounter in a session, even if that encounter is purely resolved with roleplay. If I got together intending to play my game, and the ONLY thing we did for 4.5 hours was chit-chat and level up our characters, I think I'd probably go insane. That is something I could've done over email.
This is off topic and could probably use its own thread. However, we play lots of games besides PF so its not unusual for us at all to interact in character during a session. We will act out any number of events that are relevant to the game. Often times encounters are avoided through role play instead of met with violence. It could be done over email I suppose, but that sounds awfully lame.
/thread jack
How many rounds does a typical encounter last for your group?
**3-8 I suppose. There have been some pretty damn long lones over the years though, two minutes or more.
How many encounters per in-game "day"?
**No real pattern.
How many encounters per gaming session?
**One to three, sometimes none.
Then , what type of game do you have? Low magic? AP? Highly houseruled? Are you the DM or player?
**Kind of high magic for PCs and important NPCs, but regular people don't have it. Playing Kingmaker right now. Its our first AP. No house rules. I used to DM all the time, but have been a player only for over two years.
One thing I would like to know though is how you have zero encounters in a game session? Isn't that called bookkeeping? I enjoy RP, though my players don't as much. We generally though have at LEAST one encounter in a session, even if that encounter is purely resolved with roleplay. If I got together intending to play my game, and the ONLY thing we did for 4.5 hours was chit-chat and level up our characters, I think I'd probably go insane. That is something I could've done over email.
The session before last, the PCs more thoroughly explored areas they had already cleared out of threats in a "dungeon" below their home city. They spent several hours, real time, exploring the place (it was a sci-fi style research facility and they were really digging having that stuff described from the perspective of an iron age fantasy character). Ultimately, they went the one direction they hadn't yet explored and found a way down deeper to a large cavern. They fought a mummy on the way (the cavern is basically home to a ruined mesoamerican style city--they actually came down the step pyramid where the mummies they've been fighting wandering above came from).
They cast Hide from Undead and went down. The PCs with darkvision were all absent, so they had to struggle in near total darkness--only distant fires lit their way. They discovered a river and another mummy that was trying to find a way across without getting wet (since that will ruin mummification--I know it's not in their stat block, but it's common sense for me). This mummy failed its save and could not detect them. They contemplated trying to shove the mummy into the water, but opted instead to wait and found an Advanced Stone Guardian entered the scene and attacked the mummy. A bunch of children came and started slinging ineffective stones and throwing ineffective spears at the mummy from across the river, cheering on the statue.
They realized these might be the missing children they had read bounty posts for up in the city--poor kids had been disappearing for close to 3 years--and so they tried talking to them. They spoke to the kids for a while, earned their trust/respect enough to keep them passive, and came across the river. Time ran out and we had to end the session there.
So, last session started where we left off. They found the children had a village down here, somehow. They explored it a bit, asked the children questions. They determined they were being kidnapped and brainwashed by someone they just referred to as the Prophet--he told them their families didn't care about them and that since the surface world would soon be wiped clean, they wouldn't survive anyway. He was trying to teach them to be warriors, to survive in a post-apocalyptic world.
The Prophet had apparently been through the sci-fi research facility above and took genetically engineered crops down that could grow in the dark. He brought down bright lights that he turned on and off in time with the sunrise/set to keep their sense of night/day. They found out he came and went via the river and used a special device to bring the children he was "saving" down (it's basically a Star Wars style rebreather that he got from the research facility).
They started discussing who this guy might be and they correctly guessed he was a foe they had faced three levels back who had escaped them (the biggest clue being that he was an undine). They were all waiting for his return and a big showdown boss fight, but when he did finally return (with another child he had taken), they were ready to attack, but he was not aggressive.
He seemed to barely recognize them and instead started questioning them about how they got here, etc. They were taken aback and didn't attack--they spoke to him at length and were conflicted. He basically claimed to have received visions of the apocalypse from a pantheon that he was actually vehemently opposing when he first encountered them. He said that his previous self had been killed and he was reborn after their encounter. He said that the world would be destroyed by some invading force and that only the underworld would be safe. He was trying to preserve the world by "saving" children and teaching them to survive after the impending disaster.
They were hesitant, but friendly enough with the Prophet to convince him to let them hang around and help. They actually spoke amongst themselves for a bit, discussing the possibility that he was actually telling the truth and had indeed received visions of the end times. The most religious guy in the group meditated on the issue and ultimately determined that the Prophet had to be insane--kidnapping children was never ok for any reason, and his pantheon was a good one, so the Prophet could not possibly be receiving instructions to kidnap children from them. Speaking to the children and the Prophet more confirmed this for them.
They decided on a plan--they would "help" the prophet for a while, and interact with the kids, hoping to slowly undermine the crazy teachings and get the children to want to be rescued before they made their move. In the meantime, the Prophet asked them to help him with a mission, and they agreed. He brought them up the underground river and out a cenote in the swamps outside of the city, and set about stealing lizardfolk eggs from the tribes there (because all children deserved to be preserved). He had already scouted it and only needed the PCs basically to carry the eggs. He snuck past their picket lines (and cast Invisibility on the one PC who had bad Stealth), then invisibly took eggs one at a time to the PCs who were again conflicted about what to do.
The lizardfolk were enigmatic--nobody could speak with them (no comprehend languages in this setting), so nobody knew what they wanted, but they had seemed friendly in the past, only recently becoming aggressive and dangerous to the people of their home city. They didn't want to aggravate the issue by stealing their eggs, but also didn't want to blow what they had going with the Prophet and the children or to cause a scene behind lizardfolk sentry lines, so they just accepted the eggs and went with him quietly.
When they returned to the underground cavern, they interacted more with the children and Prophet (the Ranger tried to teach them other fighting styles than the one the Prophet knew and endeared the kids to his wolf, the religious guy tried to teach them correctly about the faith they were supposedly indoctrinated into, and the undine chick tried to get closer to the Prophet to see what he was thinking.
The session ended after the Prophet told them he had a mission to undertake. He would either need the PCs to retrieve an item for him that was several days of travel away, or watch the children for him while he went to get it. They talked it over amongst themselves quite a bit, but ultimately decided they would go for the item. It would give them a chance to try and get the missing kid's parents to send mementos and stuff down to prove they did care and wanted the kids back (since families not caring was a cornerstone of the brainwashing) as well as giving them leverage by controlling an item he wanted and possibly recruiting help to get the kids out.
They told the Prophet and the kids, planned the journey a little bit, and then time ran out and we cut just before they were going to leave.
And that's how you have a session with 0 encounters. No fights. No significant rolls--just a few stealth rolls (with invisibility to help for the sucky guy), some "does he really believe this crap!?" Sense Motives, a variety of knowledge checks, and the religious guy asked for a Wisdom check during his meditation to get some insight into the situation (he rolled a natural 20, so I decided to all but tell him the guy was nuts).
That's it. And it was fun. A lot of fun. One of the most fun sessions of Pathfinder I've had, actually, and the PCs all agreed and have since raved about how well the game is going.
Our group has a lot of "badly-built" PCs (only by the optimisers yardstick) all at about 6th or 7th level. We've fought plenty of big goblin mobs and similar recently, with most encounters making it to double figures.
But on the whole, the average encounter probably last between 5 to 6 rounds.
2-5 rounds, heavily weighted towards 2.
10 per day
3-6 per session
APs
DM.
Reasons for the numbers: large party, 5-6 players, most are optimized (not munchin or power gamer, just very good at the roles they have chosen). Short encounters means very little in the way of resources spent per encounter, which means the adventuring day is very long.
APs are also full of mook fights, against CR=APL or +1 (and due to large party, requires me to add mooks or increase HP to max to even reach that). Since they know what they are doing and have played well together they take down bosses (CR=APL+3 or higher)before they really get going most of the time.
It is still a challenge for them, I generally don't pull punches (will if its my fault and I missed something, that is pretty much it). I get PCs to danger zone HP and apply nasty hard to deal with conditions all the time (most APs end up with double digit body counts, but they get better since death is only a inconvenience to pathfinders apparently). PCs manage just fine due to preparation and knowing the game system. I limit item availability by settlement size, but if it comes under those limits some time resource in game can usually find what they are looking for, IMHO its a good balance between Monty Haul/MagicMart vs NoFunAllowedSersiousBusiness/NoMagicItemsForSale style.
I allow nearly all Paizo published material that came out for PF (so no 3.5 stuff). No evil characters, causes to much trouble IMHO, and I can't be bothered to fix butthurt players feelings when somebody "roleplays their alignment" too hard. PvP is not allowed short of mind control, attempts to do so will result in suspension of game for the night, I have got better things to do than watch neckbeards go crazy over dividing loot or whatever causes such urges.
Not a huge amount of RP, only one person really gets into it effectively, the other player who wants to RP always takes too long to realize the situation and misses opportunities to RP (low Wis IRL).
[. Often times encounters are avoided through role play instead of met with violence. It could be done over email I suppose, but that sounds awfully lame.
That's an 'encounter". MPL had several "encounters'. But I digress.
"The heart of any adventure is its encounters. An encounter is any event that puts a specific problem before the PCs that they must solve. Most encounters present combat with monsters or hostile NPCs, but there are many other types—a trapped corridor, a political interaction with a suspicious king, a dangerous passage over a rickety rope bridge, an awkward argument with a friendly NPC who suspects a PC has betrayed him, or anything that adds drama to the game. Brain-teasing puzzles, roleplaying challenges, and skill checks are all classic methods for resolving encounters, but the most complex encounters to build are the most common ones—combat encounters."
So, even if no dice are rolled, it's an encounter. But yes, most encounters are combats.
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[. Often times encounters are avoided through role play instead of met with violence. It could be done over email I suppose, but that sounds awfully lame.
That's an 'encounter". MPL had several "encounters'. But I digress.
"The heart of any adventure is its encounters. An encounter is any event that puts a specific problem before the PCs that they must solve. Most encounters present combat with monsters or hostile NPCs, but there are many other types—a trapped corridor, a political interaction with a suspicious king, a dangerous passage over a rickety rope bridge, an awkward argument with a friendly NPC who suspects a PC has betrayed him, or anything that adds drama to the game. Brain-teasing puzzles, roleplaying challenges, and skill checks are all classic methods for resolving encounters, but the most complex encounters to build are the most common ones—combat encounters."
So, even if no dice are rolled, it's an encounter. But yes, most encounters are combats.
Fair enough I assumed we were discussing combat encounters. If we widen to your definition, then I probably have dozens of encounters every session.
How many rounds does a typical encounter last for your group?
Depends on the level of the party. At low levels (1-7) usually between 3-7 rounds. At mid-level (8-12) 2-5 and at high-level (13-17) it's 1-3. Since I GM adventure paths, I need to combine 3-5 AP encounters to get a fight to last longer than that. I'm GM'ing Wrath of the Righteous now, which goes to level 20 and I fully expect combats to last only 1-2 rounds at the last levels. I am also always putting at least 50% more opponents into encounters as soon as the mid-levels roll in and it gets crazier the higher the levels go up. Maxed out hitpoints, advanced templates, double advanced templates and so on.
How many encounters per in-game "day"?
Depends on the AP, but for a lot of them it's either "one encounter per day" or "too many to finish the dungeon in one go".
How many encounters per gaming session?
We play three hours per session, once a week. The number of encounters varies highly with the complexity of the encounter and if I feel that its importance warrants drawing it on the battlemap, which is about 50% of the time at low level and increases with higher levels (since complexity does as well and players need to know where to lay down their area of effect spells). Usually there are between two to five encounters per session, but especially complex fights may take up an entire evening.
Then , what type of game do you have? Low magic? AP? Highly houseruled? Are you the DM or player?
We have been playing AP's for the last 5 years and have completed Curse of the Crimson Throne, Carrion Crown and Jade Regent. I abandoned Kingmaker because it bored me to tears and was frustrating in other aspects. Before that, it was homebrewn stuff, first under AD&D and later 3.0 and 3.5. I've been the GM for about ten years, we've been playing for fifteen by now.
We have six players, which makes the AP's difficult to adjust from the start and gets worse as the levels go up. The campaign is "standard magic", so you can get magic items in towns of the right size. Houserules under me are more of the restrictive type, to keep things on track. Basically, they boil down to "No Blink spell, no Gunslingers and Summoners, no evil characters (and you don't get to play "CN, wink wink"), magic item crafting limits as clarified in Ultimate Campaign, no irresponsible dump-statting". And surely some other minor stuff I am forgetting right now.
OTOH, I am more than willing to give out some minor boosts if someone bothers to come to me with a good character concept and I almost always give the players 20 points to build their character, since I personally think that it encourages them to play the more MAD classes and doesn't have a huge in-game impact (since I discourage min-maxing character stats).
I am also a player in another group with other people and things are a bit different there. Only four players, the GM is more prone to foisting some unwanted effects on the players ("Now the gnomes tricked you with magic into buying 700 gold pieces of scrolls of spells you didn't want and will never use and you don't even remember that you didn't want to buy those spells. Because they are gnomes and quirky and stuff!" And worse) and generally more in line with how AP's are designed (four players at 15 point buy).
1. Now 2 to 20 depending on how prepared the party is
2. 1 epic fight, to clearing a castle room by room
3. really depends if engaged in a dungeon with 0 telepotation effects or out in the countryside
DM'n Wrath of the Wicked players are 15th lich's and vampires and Mystic level 5 so they steam roll or tuck tail a lot. And the occasional bring wave upon wave after them by very loudly announcing their presence.
We play a lot of different games with different rules.
Currently we are running one with 30 point buy 2 traits and standard WBL. Around 12 encounters per day and around 12 skill encounters too. I would say 5 rounds per encounter (not skill based ones) is average but encounters tend to be really swingy, sometimes it takes 2 to 3 rounds for characters to get into position. We got through 5 encounters the last session but it was a shorter one and some last minute equipment buying and character making was going on.
Two groups, very different ones.
Group 1 (Rise of the Runelords):
About 3-5 encounters a day, lasting 3-4 rounds apiece. My Barbarian and the Monk/Magus/Fighter/Alchemist (He's a lot more effective than that sounds, I assure you) pretty much mulch anything we come across (Book 5, we're level 14) with some team support and buffs from the casters (Oracle, Sorcerer, Wizard now replacing our previous Druid, Sorcerer, Witch combo. The Druid's AC died and she was rebuilt as a Dark Tapestry Oracle, and the Witch died and reincarnated, with a rebuild as a Wizard).
That's usually one session there.
Some houserules. Items are sold at 100% of their price, spontaneous casters have the same casting progression as prepared casters, other minor stuff. High magic, as is the default, I feel like the wealth is high too but I think that's just because I'm unused to higher level play, since I'm fairly certain we're within a reasonable distance of WBL.
Group 2 (Way of the Wicked):
About 1 encounter a WEEK, at most, but lasting usually no less than 6 rounds. Encounters are sparse, but brutal when they do show up (last few memorable encounters have been a Huge Gorgimera, followed by a battle with a high level Cavalier, a high level Cleric, and a group of ~8 level 5-ish Roughriders. A few encounters before that since we had some minor ones was a rival 4 man party, and upcoming is a fight with a Silver Dragon, and possibly a strike team of Paladins backing him up.).
We're currently level 8, and the party make-up consists of a Necromancy focused JuJu Oracle (me), an Arcane Trickster, a Barbarian, and an Anti-Paladin.
Minor houserules, including the same buy/sell items rule from the RotRL game (it originated with this GM, the RotRL GM is a former player of his), High Magic, WBL tightly adhered to.
Both games are 25 PB, 3 traits (2 normal, one campaign, though the WotW game has a 4th trait for a half-cohort to do minion-y non-combat things).
I'm a player in both of these.
I'm in a bunch of PbPs as well, and am running two, but those are a bit harder to gauge since I usually forget what round we're on by the time the next round starts.
That's an 'encounter". MPL had several "encounters'. But I digress.
"The heart of any adventure is its encounters. An encounter is any event that puts a specific problem before the PCs that they must solve. Most encounters present combat with monsters or hostile NPCs, but there are many other types—a trapped corridor, a political interaction with a suspicious king, a dangerous passage over a rickety rope bridge, an awkward argument with a friendly NPC who suspects a PC has betrayed him, or anything that adds drama to the game. Brain-teasing puzzles, roleplaying challenges, and skill checks are all classic methods for resolving encounters, but the most complex encounters to build are the most common ones—combat encounters."
So, even if no dice are rolled, it's an encounter. But yes, most encounters are combats.
If you're going to measure encounters as, "any situation in game at all," rather than as something overcome with dice, then I have no idea how to answer the encounter-based questions. I guess I have a crap-ton per day, and a crap ton per session, then?
I don't know, count however many encounters you think I had in my long-winded description and use that number.
Oh, encounters including skill checks and stuff?
Gonna have to go with mpl on this one.
"Enough" or "I don't keep track" or "Too many to count" are good answers in that case.
I don't know what the OP was counting or what you all define as "encounters" but I like to think of it as nouns (people/places/things) the PCs meet that advance the immediate story for all of them at once.
So, when during Downtime my paladin PC meets a saucy babe at the bar, accuses her of prostitution, and storms off to play with his greatsword again, that's a non-encounter. If however the magus during that same Downtime comes back to a sketch he made of a runestone, studies it by taking a 20 in the city's libraries and realizes that they've found the key to unlocking a new section of the dungeons beneath the old castle ruins, this then is an encounter.
He didn't have to roll anything, and heck he didn't even have to talk to anyone but me. But the info gained and shared w/the party acts as a catalyst to their shared narrative, driving them deeper into their adventures. It just so happens that, with my players being who they are, most meetings with foes or things on the road of adventure end in combat :)
That's why I made the remarks up thread that I did. If an encounter, in my brain, can be a diceless dialogue between the GM's world interacting in a significant way with the party as a whole, then what would an ENTIRE session without an encounter be? I imagine it would be like sitting down to an MMORPG and spending the entire time equipping your character, designing their armor, and wandering aimlessly in town or wilderness without triggering a single NPC or monster. In other words...bookkeeping and mapping.
Might be reasonable to say it counts if it's an opportunity to earn experience.
Sean K Reynolds weighs in:
"Answers are for James Jacobs's game, which I've been playing for a while now. We're 12th level.
>How many rounds does a typical encounter last for your group?
I don't usually keep track, but IIRC it's about 4-5 rounds.
>How many encounters per in-game "day"?
Hmm, we've infiltrated an evil city, and most of our sessions require us to get into an enemy location, clear it out, and get back, so we don't have the option of sleeping at the enemy location. That means we'll go 2–3 sessions in the same place, which puts us (with the answer to the next question) at about 4–9 encounters per day. We're usually low on resources when we stop, so I'd lean toward the higher number.
>How many encounters per gaming session?
Our sessions are usually just 3-3.5 hours (7pm-10:30pm), so we usually only get 2–3 "real" encounters in (discounting obstacles that are easy to overcome but still expend some resources).
>How many of each do you design a AP for?
That's more of a Jacobs or Rob question. They have some general numbers to aim for, and part of it is based on page count and part is based on making sure each volume of the AP is giving enough XP to advance you to the level range of the next volume.
>Finally do you mind if I include your answers in my poll?
I don't mind. :)"
My own answers are
7-12 rounds
1-5 encounters per day
2-4 per session
OK for the Pathfinder Devs the number of rounds range seems to be 3-10, average 6, mean is 5.
For number of encounters it’s around 6
Per session it’s around 4.
For posters;
# of rounds average is 5 (about the same as the devs)
# of encounter per game day= 4 (lower than devs)
# of encounters per session= 3.5 (about the same)
The big variance is number of rounds. Runs from 2-10 average.
This is important I think. There’s a big debate about healing in combat. Well, if you run only 3 rounds, then sure, you’d hardly ever heal during combat. If you’re running 10 rounds, then heck yeah, you need healing!
Which means to me, you need to know what sort of game a OP is talking about before we weigh in on "healing is useless'.
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If you’re running 10 rounds, then heck yeah, you need healing!
Perhaps the reason for combats running longer is that there are more healers and less damage dealers in the group? Or perhaps it's due to the campaign often forcing the combative characters to not be able to fight to their strengths? Or perhaps the characters are just not particularly specialised/optimised?
I see combats run longer on average at lower levels, and there is the odd standout case. Like, for instance, a combat in a PFS mod recently, where the party was totally mismatched to the critter they were fighting - it could fly and had missile weapons, the group was geared for melee combat. And THAT combat took on the order of 10 rounds. But it certainly wasn't the norm.
As has been said, some people just don’t care about super-optimizing their characters. And there are a number of DM (I have one) who will simply adjust the encounter until they feel it is “challenging”.
I think that it’s due to incompetence is rather rare, at least among those who answered my poll. They seem to know what they’re doing.
In our campaign, combat tends to last anywhere from 3-7 rounds (maybe even longer if it's a hard fight). We usually have 3-6 encounters each day, with shorter days having harder fights on average and longer days being easy up to the final fight. In any one gaming session we tend to get anywhere from 3 to 10 encounters, depending on how focused the group is.
I'm a player in this campaign. The DM uses the Golarion setting but not an AP, we have below-average magic, and there are very few houserules.
This is important I think. There’s a big debate about healing in combat. Well, if you run only 3 rounds, then sure, you’d hardly ever heal during combat. If you’re running 10 rounds, then heck yeah, you need healing!
Actually, that is backwards. Since the faster combats are more geared towards rocket tag in the direction of players-vs-monster, but the other direction (monsters-vs-players) is more geared towards being able to hit the player characters at all, multiple monsters can gang up on a PC and put some hurting on him without downing him, so that he'll need imminent healing during the combat to avoid going down permanently from a lucky crit.
This is important I think. There’s a big debate about healing in combat. Well, if you run only 3 rounds, then sure, you’d hardly ever heal during combat. If you’re running 10 rounds, then heck yeah, you need healing!
Which means to me, you need to know what sort of game a OP is talking about before we weigh in on "healing is useless'.
I don't know about this premise. For example, my experience is encounters that last 2-3 rounds most often, but I am definitely an advocate of in-combat healing provided that you do it right.
I am a huge fan of support characters and have played quite a few of them through the years. I'd rather buff, heal, and CC than deal the most damage, to be honest.
But healing in Pathfinder has to be done correctly, just like blasting does. A normal Fireball is a waste. A Fireball cast by a Draconic/Orc Sorcerer (Possibly insert of one Flame Oracle/Admixture Specialist/Theologian) with Spell Focus/Elemental Focus and Magical Lineaged Metamagic is awesome. Likewise, a Cure Moderate Wounds cast by a Cleric otherwise dedicated to beating face is kind of silly, but a Hospitaler Paladin or Oracle of Life with the proper revelations, Quick Channel, and Fey Foundling is fantastic.
And there are a number of DM (I have one) who will simply adjust the encounter until they feel it is “challenging”.
This is interesting and explains a lot about your preferences. Personally, I find the idea of changing the encounter on the fly to make it properly challenging to be anathema. Everything the GM does to make it harder (or easier) on the fly like that reduces my agency in the world.
It harms immersion, too, since it pushes the bounds of plausibility when every encounter ends up just happening to fall into the sweet spot of challenge. I don't know, I'm just not a fan of that kind of game. But then, I'm not really a fan of challenge based games in general, like 3rd and 4th edition D&D or Shadowrun.
And there are a number of DM (I have one) who will simply adjust the encounter until they feel it is “challenging”.This is interesting and explains a lot about your preferences. Personally, I find the idea of changing the encounter on the fly to make it properly challenging to be anathema. Everything the GM does to make it harder (or easier) on the fly like that reduces my agency in the world.
It harms immersion, too, since it pushes the bounds of plausibility when every encounter ends up just happening to fall into the sweet spot of challenge. I don't know, I'm just not a fan of that kind of game. But then, I'm not really a fan of challenge based games in general, like 3rd and 4th edition D&D or Shadowrun.
Note, I have ONE.... of four. Mind you , one of the others is 4th ED, which is a different kettle of fish as regards encounter scaling.
But even my bog standard, play it as it is writeen 15pt, more or less PFS, AP running DM has longer encounters than 2-3 rounds.
And, as you have said, the games you run are hardly standard PF by anyones measure. They do sound fun, tho.
The length of (combat) encounters varies greatly. Encounters where the party is challenged tend to last 5-8 rounds on average, with at least one I can remember lasting around 25-30 rounds (granted, in that particular encounter, the PCs were able to lock the bad guys in for 10 rounds or so while they buffed and healed back up to full hp). In contrast, encounters where the party meets less challenge tend to be over in 2-3 rounds (or even during round 1).
The challenging encounters tend to be APL+1 or higher, and consist of multiple enemies working together. Single "boss" battles usually last only 3-4 rounds, even if that "boss" is at APL+3 or more.
Likewise, the number of combat encounters in an in-game day also varies considerably (depending on a number of factors). I think the highest in my current game has been around 10.
The type of game is an AP, where I am the DM.
A typical encounter should late 2-4 rounds, depending on the set-up. A large encounter with a miniboss/BBEG should probably only one or two longer than that. The only time I have experienced long encounters was in the two final encounters of a level 1-20 campaign. The first one lasted about 6 rounds (spanning about 3 hours in real life) where the party had to fight an absurdly powerful barbarian and two incorporeal (who did practically nothing). The barbarian died in three rounds, and then was promptly resurrected by the impossibly angry god sword he was wielding. The last encounter only lasted that long because the final boss (Orcus himself) was hiding from the party trying to ambush him (the party had gotten so strong at that point that Orcus was legitimately afraid of their power).
A typical encounter should late 2-4 rounds, depending on the set-up. A large encounter with a miniboss/BBEG should probably only one or two longer than that. The only time I have experienced long encounters was in the two final encounters of a level 1-20 campaign. The first one lasted about 6 rounds (spanning about 3 hours in real life) where the party had to fight an absurdly powerful barbarian and two incorporeal (who did practically nothing). The barbarian died in three rounds, and then was promptly resurrected by the impossibly angry god sword he was wielding. The last encounter only lasted that long because the final boss (Orcus himself) was hiding from the party trying to ambush him (the party had gotten so strong at that point that Orcus was legitimately afraid of their power).
I've found that long combats are the result of difficult environments more than any other factor. Combats in water, combats using flight heavily, combats with massive terrain altering spells (solid fog, walls of thorns, entangle, and a whole host of others). Other methods of generating long combats involve deceptive monsters that can hit and run, or aren't what you think they are. Phase spiders are a good example, and incorporeal creatures are really nasty this way. High level casters who make good use of magic jar or summon gobs of demons/devils with sacred summons can make a combat bog down for a VERY long time.
I actually had an enemy "solo" boss abuse the summons hard (did a one shot dungeon done up in a tuned MMO dungeon style, complete with trash, DPS checks, and a end boss with adds, but followed all encounter design rules in terms of CR math), round one, sacred summon max ereynes with superior summons, augmented summon, swift action inspire (evengelist cleric of asmodius), move action quick channel to protect his summons with an anti party debuff alt channel. Full attacks from the archers put the PCs immediately on a defensive footing. Just getting through the field of fire that the archers put up was daunting, and waiting out the summons wasn't an option either, since he had more spells incoming. Fight took about 8 rounds when it was all over, and instead of fighting the summons they went for caster assassination followed by a bugout by all PCs via transportation items (teleport scroll, ninja abundant step, full run with magic boots, ect). It took 8 rounds because I messed up and didn't reposition him 5 feet on turn 5, if i had remembered to it would have been much longer since he would have been able to avoid the lockdown combat maneuver monk that got through the defensive line.
Nice math, but why only a single foe?
Here's what James Sutter said:
Only have a moment to answer, but:
1) Maybe three?
2) My group's pretty good about that... I think they've only slept twice in the time it's taken them to get most of the way through The Asylum Stone! So I'm not sure, but a bunch.
3) Two or three solid fights? (I've got a huge group, which makes things take longer.)
4) There are all sorts of calculations that go into the number of encounters per AP, having to do with the amount of experience needed to achieve the number of levels we want for that adventure. I'll let one of the AP developers answer that one. :)
In my current group, a combat is usually either about 2 rounds or well over 10. This is usually the difference between catching one or two big guys alone versus taking on half an army of weenies. We tend to play at range and don't have much in the way of area effects, so it's not terribly surprising that we end up with longer combats. Plus, we only have three PCs, and two of them are straight-up martial types and the other is focused on buffs.