Ok, buckle up cuz this is another of my now infamous (and annoying) Griping-About-and-Fixing a part of my gaming. Sorry for the wall of text below.
My players have said that the megadungeon game has gotten a bit stale. They've pointed to the fights. The source material I'm using for said megadungeon is sparse on details and their descriptions have the dungeon as a lot of picked over, empty rooms with bits of trash on the floor along with very sparse furnishings from occupants.
To pep things up I've begun adding more dynamic rooms and environments. There have been 2-story chambers with galleries, hanging banners and tapestries. There have been fireplaces (even though science would dictate that this far underground some of these rooms would be choked with wood smoke), tables and chairs, wood shelves full of crockery or arcane substances, hanging chandeliers and even a large open room with a deep pool of water containing an aquatic naga. I've even spontaneously added pit traps or spilled oil, or even leaking gas in one room even though the encounters didn't have these in my original designs.
Now, I've specifically asked the players what they find boring and they have mentioned the fights. They all assure me they don't want to quit the campaign and they're having fun otherwise, but lately the fights have been boring. However, I feel like I'm using all the tricks I know to add some spark to the combat.
PCs are level 6. We have a half-dwarf paladin with a Large sized mount (he usually doesn't summon it unless the PCs are in a large enough space for it), a human Wizard (Fire Wizard), a half-elf U-Monk and an elf U-Rogue (Scout).
However, here's the thing - none of the players is actually engaging with the environment. All of our combats follow a pattern: I describe the scene and the PCs proceed with a sort of military precision. The rogue checks for traps while the monk (second best Perception) keeps lookout. They just finished a mission with a time crunch and now they're just exploring the dungeon a bit, so I don't have a ticking clock on them right now.
After the rogue gives the all clear for one section of hallway or one area of a room, the PCs move to this "safe zone" while the process repeats. In cases where the rogue finds a trap (she has a freaking +16 from 10' to notice these, even when just taking a slowed Move action, not even actively searching) she works to remove it while the other PCs use ranged weapons to cover her. Finally, if there's a terrain feature such as a patch of mold or pool of water that the rogue can't easily or safely navigate the super-genius wizard (with a feat that lets him make all knowledge checks untrained AND gives a bonus on them all) analyzes said terrain feature from whatever the safest possible distance is.
Once combat starts, the ONLY actions taken by the PCs is to maximize their weapon or spell damage output in the most efficient way possible. Period. They don't try for Higher Ground bonuses by climbing up on tables or furniture; they DO use Flanking, but only if the PCs involved can be on solid, flat ground. No one cuts down banners, smothers enemies in tapestries, throws oil or explosives into lit fireplaces, knocks over shelving units, swings on chains for a Bull Rush into a pool and so on. Its just: analyze environment; identify foes/monsters; engage foes/monsters; move to efficient melee if possible; inflict damage until all foes destroyed.
Oh yeah... and no enemies ever escape unless I full-on pull GM fiat. Their penchant for melee and ruthless exit covering means that unless I give the monster a magical means of escape such as teleportation or Shadow Walk, foes are systematically cut down, every time.
I mean, what MORE can I do here? I've been making the dungeon more dynamic, terrain wise. I've had foes/monsters take advantage of some of these terrains, inflicting the Entangled condition on PCs or trying to use furniture to knock them prone. I've included monsters with Climb and Fly speeds and one group of Large sized creatures using the Hover feat so that these monsters gain tactical advantages while forcing the PCs to use sub-optimal combat methods.
All this has done has made my players grumble that these monsters seem to "know" their weaknesses. In the meantime they've won every fight they've been in without a single PC falling below 1/4 of their HP for over a level now.
I don't know folks. I have talked with my players, they say the fights are getting stale. I have tried injecting life into said fight scenes with terrain, traps, and environmental factors as well as changing up monster tactics. What more can I do to pep things up?
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Sounds like its time to move them on from dungeon monsters and onto seasoned, rival NPCs adventurers that are competing for the same resources, and that have a looser hold on morality in attaining their goals. Seeing their own tactics turned on them might force them to reassess their choices and try to branch out to deal with such encounters in the future.
Or, its time to throw something dangerous at them. I don't want to assume anything, but it sounds like the party has not been stressed enough to the point that all their resources are gone and they have to get inventive in order to survive an encounter. If they can breeze through four encounters, give them six. Have one encounter bleed into another. Make resting dangerous.
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Being 'bored' by the fights could mean a lot of things. It's best to find out specifically what they mean before trying to fix a problem that you can't fully identify.
• Fights are boring because we're never challenged
Up the difficulty of fights by using higher CR creatures, more numbers, smart lair design, or rival PCs built like they are.
• Fights are boring because we always do the same things.
Change the terrain or adversaries to deny them their standard tactics. They can't simply cover the exits if the room is re-arranging around them and they can't advance in echelon if the whole 'floor' is a series of multi-level invisible planes and the enemy flies.
• Fights are boring because they're all so similar.
Vary opponent types and numbers so that what the opposition does is so wildly divergent from one encounter to the next that they will always be kept guessing.
• Fights are boring because they never seem to lead anywhere.
The group needs to feel like they are making progress in solving the 'story.' If there is just 'big-dungeon' to explore then you may need to add factions and rivals and side-quests into your campaign.
There could be a lot of other reasons too. Ask them for specifics before you go changing things.
I will try to get a more articulate description of WHY they're bored, that's a great suggestion. I do try to challenge the party though. I don't want to overwhelm them but lately I've designed mostly APL +3 or bigger encounters using a combination of different foes, mixing in NPC classes or even PC classes.
I'm not much of a strategist myself y'know. I'm actually pretty bad tbh. But I try to use things like Obscuring Mist, debris clouds, or battlefield control effects the best I can. The few times these efforts have actually impacted a fight, the feedback I've gotten from players is negative.
My personal feeling is that these players have optimized for winning conflicts through direct damage. Period. Anything that impedes the use of that strategy is perceived as a strategy or encounter specifically designed to counter them.
Damage works. With Diplomacy or Intimidate and trying to talk your way out of things, the villain might come back after you later. This party has NEVER snuck past any monsters/NPCs except for ONE encounter where I put a hill giant in their way at level 1. The excuse I always get from the paladin is that he's wearing Medium armor and between that and his low Dex (a 13) he would DEFINITELY be detected; nevermind the fact that the Wizard has at least 2 scrolls of Invisibility on his character sheet he hasn't used since he made them at level 3.
But damage though... damage ends fights. Weaker foes, stronger foes, it doesn't matter. The goal is to blitzkrieg on their enemies and destroy every foe they can. They even listed off the pros to that strategy early on in the campaign. By slaying every monster/foe they don't have other foes in the dungeon learning of them and their powers/skills, they don't have to face the same foes again later, and there's less of a chance that the alarm is raised.
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Those are all valid statements of valid strategies. They are a matter of game design. Whoever does the most HP in damage fastest is very likely to be the winner.
The problem is that if they are optimized to do damage and they view anything you do to minimize the damage they can cause as 'unfair.' Their expectations are at fault. They are bored because there is no challenge and they don't want to be challenged because it means they might 'lose.'
In high stakes games, characters get killed and missions fail. Sometimes evil wins.
As far as strategy goes, you can always ask for help here before you run something. Tell the collective conscious what encounter specifics (creatures, numbers, terrain, resources you have available, party composition, etc.) and somebody here can write out tactics to turn it into any level of massacre you want.
If or when Quixote gets to this thread, I'm sure he'll have something to say about your players' behavior and attitudes . . . . and he won't be wrong.
That aside. You have my ongoing sympathy, and the advice you've been given so far is quite good.
Coming at it from another angle, it may just be time for you to force a little bit more role playing into the game. Your players are pretty clearly solid tacticians (at least within your play style), but whether they realize it or not (or admit it), I'm sure part of why they're bored is because they've reduced every encounter to a numbers game, with almost zero character acting.
Throw in some encounter with opponents who aren't inherently evil/hostile. Have them use non-lethal attacks and try and engage in diplomacy (or at least conversation) after the fighting has begun. Could be a case of mistaken identity, competing for resources, or other confusing events that lead to blows. Either way, give the "enemy" NPCs powerful ways to stop the fight, and force some other interaction. Give peace a change :p And, if your players bull through and still just go for the kill, have there be consequences in lost allies, loot, opportunities, and reputations.
If after all of this and the other ideas, your players are still "bored", then let the horses know that they're at the water, and they've consistently refused to drink.
Good luck man. I'd love to play at your table.
I remember playing Doom in God mode in the 90s. It was fun for a while but there wasn't a challenge. Problem was when I switched off God mode I died shortly afterwards, which wasn't fun either.
I think Mark's players are suffering the same problem. They are bored with the encounters they can win without significant risk and don't like it when there's the possibility that they will lose.
Given Mark's posts for the last few months or so I think he needs to have a discussion with his players about the sort of game they want and the sort of game he wants to GM.
I was coming back to this thread this morning and some of your comments were reminding me of something the paladin player has now said a couple of times to the other players. He's urged the party to move forward in the dungeon in places b/c: "We're supposed to be 'heroes' or 'adventurer' after all."
How do I put this? They don't "adventure" so much as they crawl. They investigate every square inch before they progress. On the one hand this has gotten 2 of the players pretty invested in the backstory of the campaign, which is nice. On the other hand the group moves very slowly through the dungeon trying to reason out every step they take.
Perhaps another part of their frustration is the fact that they're so busy zeroing in on the trees they're missing the forest around them? I don't know. Again, I need to have more of a conversation with my players I think.
It does pull the group slightly out of the immersive experience, but sometimes the best thing to do is just tell folks when there's nothing significant to find.
This happens in my group semi-often. I'm an explorer, analyzer type, but my husband is more like your Paladin player, "Onward!".
We usually allow for a question or two, and whomever is GMing still tries to put in lots of scenery, back story, and/or flavor; but to avoid bogging down the game, sometimes we just ask if there's anything to find. Obviously this can make searching a bit meta-gamey, but it helps the game flow better. It's a balancing act.
Sysryke wrote: It does pull the group slightly out of the immersive experience, but sometimes the best thing to do is just tell folks when there's nothing significant to find. I own one of Goodman Games' Original Adventures Reincarnated series for D&D 5E, and the authors of the update actually address the fact that many dungeon maps from that era had a LOT of empty, undetailed spaces. They advise glossing over most of the "yet another room with no monsters, special features, or treasure" parts, then resuming normal exploration-mode speed again shortly before they actually find something interesting.
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In an effort to get them to be a bit more reckless you could add a long hallway, presumably they are carrying light as they do not all have darkvision.
This allows a long dark hallway to provide total cover to a creature with 90+ darkvision who can see them because they are illuminated.
This enemy can now fire his longbow(or whatever) at the PCs without them even being aware of the threat.
"As you are searching the floor for traps an arrow screams over your head and impales the wizard 20 feet behind you, an instant later, three more arrows rush towards you, one narrowly misses your head, the other two fly true, striking the wizard twice more!"
Roll initiative.
This will force them to rush forward and engage with an enemy without prior knowledge of what they are moving into, now you can have a trap they don't notice as they rush into combat, a side hall that they won't be able to investigate as arrows keep coming from the darkness each round. Out of this side hall you can have more enemies to surround the party.
Obviously the ceiling behind them will collapse as this happens blocking their retreat to where they came from and will be forced to pursue or be slowly pin pricked to death by arrows.
This encounter can even be done with just 10 level 1 warrior orc/kobold/whatever you want with darkvision, and is far below their actual CR and the traps added on make it 'fair'.
6 of these warriors are in the hall at their max range firing once each round and falling back 30ft. This would give 3+ rounds before they can be engaged. This gives you 24 arrows shot before these 1 hit warriors start getting slaughtered. The other 4 warriors can pop out from the side hall once the party passes them and can start shooting the party from behind, surrounding them.
This type of encounter does two things, it makes it scary for the wizard, as he will be the main focus of the arrows (he would appear to be the easiest to hit by the warriors) and it wouldn't feel like you're specifically targeting their weaknesses by making a flying enemy or an enemy with SR.
You also have the advantage of the party not knowing if any of these enemies got away. If they end up slaughtering them all, they would have no way of knowing if there were more watching from afar and fled once it looked bad.
In addition, if the party can't handle the onslaught you wouldn't need to add the 4 from the side hall, or you could have them flee or just disappear (as if they had been summoned monsters) or whatever you want to do as a GM.
All of these possibilities lead to an opportunity for there to be something scarier deeper in the dungeon.
This got kind of rambly, but basically what I'm saying is that using darkness and forcing them to move before exploring will make them not notice risks.
More risk = less boring... Hopefully.
Mark, you've posted several times over the last year or more about your group running at a crawl and each time the advice has been to apply time pressure. Is there any particular reason you're not heeding the advice and applying time pressure to the party?
Hugo Rune: I did apply time pressure on their last "mission." They needed to get from a colony of ratfolk in the dungeon down to defeat a vampire before it "awakened" a shrine to an evil deity. The clock gave them one day to do so, but they actually failed due to their own meticulous nature. The consequence was a brutal fight with an allied naga in the shrine plus both aquatic creatures AND the vampire spawn.
The PCs survived this fight. They even found a letter from the vampire, who has escaped, taunting them over their failure. Since they'd survived the final battle though and had prepared for the eventuality that the "awakened" shrine could be Consecrated back into dormancy, they had brought a contingent scroll of Consecrate with them and shut the place down again.
This mission over, they are now just exploring more of the dungeon between missions... not on a clock again. The clues they're currently following suggest that by assembling a McGuffin they can gain access to a deeper area of the dungeon. Since this McGuffin quest has been a fixture of the dungeon for a long time, the players figure there is no rush to completing it.
I have taken this advice to heart Hugo Rune and I appreciate any further suggestions. Maybe I need to raise the stakes? Attack an NPC among the ratfolk colony that the PCs hold dear or something?
Also, to *Thelith: I like the long hallway of Darkness. Unfortunately the U-Rogue has selected an alternate race trait that gives her 60' Darkvision, then a feet that increases it to 120'. So long as her PC is alive and conscious, the party has a scout with a Perception check of +17, 120' Darkvision and Trap Sense using a Double Move action each round (moving at 15' instead of 30' per move).
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Okay, so you need a longer hallway.
The rogue can see 120 feet.
The group of adventurers holding a torch at the end of a dark hallway can be seen from 500 feet because they are illuminating themselves.
On the other hand you could have an illuminated hallway which towards the end gets dark, the enemy could hide in that darkness and see the party from 1000 feet away and they would be invisible to the party until they were close to the darkness (and even then, just for the rogue).
You can also figure out what level trap requires a 38 to see and the rogue won't notice it, and unless he is taking 1 minute per 5 foot square (god I hope not) he is only 'taking 10' on these checks so anything 28 or higher to see would escape his notice.
Another thing you could do is force him to roll his check for every 5 feet he moves. This will slow the game down immensely, however, perhaps at some point they will give up this strategy due to boredom...
You could always have water rush in behind them, slowly filling the dungeon.. they gotta move or they will drown.. perhaps a gelatinous cube of some sort (let's just pretend it's nigh impossible for them to kill, because you can choose what kind of cube it is...) that is slowly following them, they have to keep moving or be consumed, no time to search squares..
I've never played this way, I always want to move along to the next big thing, not walk around an empty dungeon..
Sounds like they constantly need a clock running, it doesn't necessarily have to be xyz happens at noon. But if their environment forces them to move it does the same thing.
Pull in some star wars and have the walls start closing in on them.
Or the ceiling lower, or the floor begin to slant, eventually requiring climb checks.
Don't let them get a night's rest so the casters can't prepare new spells.
Page through some monsters and find one that has a +18 stealth so he can hide from the rogue and ambush the party.
I really like *Thelith's advice.
To condense it a bit on some parts. If you're players always have a 20 foot latter, it's not somehow wrong for you to occasionally throw in a 30 foot wall. Or vice versa.
Your players truly can't have it both ways. Either they want some excitement, which means danger, challenges, and risk of real failure, OR they can play their optimized characters, only face things they're built to handle, and enjoy Rofflestomping over all they see. But, they can't complain about being successful and bored. That's a scenario where no one wins.
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