Thunderspire Labyrinth #5
I’ve heard and read of others thinking that combats still take too long. They’ve come up with various solutions such as adding a bonus to hit depending on which round of combat you’re on.
Here’s my solution and it’s easy to do; be prepared.
Unless you’re totally winging it, DM’s have needed their notes ready and in order before the game since its inception. I try to have all creatures in each combat shown on a single piece of paper, with separate check boxes for encounter powers if there are more than one of the same creature.
More than ever before players need to be prepared also.
If you’re a player and you have to add your personal strength modifiers to your math, you’ve just wasted time.
Example: A level 2 fighter with an 18 strength, the Power Attack feat, and a +1 greatsword, using his Cleave attack in combat.
Cleave
At-will, Martial, Weapon
Standard Action Melee weapon
Target: One creature
Attack: Strength vs. AC
Hit: 1[W] + Strength modifier damage, and an enemy adjacent to you takes damage equal to your Strength modifier.
Increase damage to 2[W] + Strength modifier at 21st level.
Power Attack
When making a melee attack, you can take a –2 penalty to the attack roll. If the attack hits, you gain a +2 bonus to the damage roll (or a +3 bonus to the damage roll with a two-handed weapon).
This extra damage increases by level, as shown on the table below, but the attack penalty remains the same.
Level Extra Damage (Two-Handed Weapon)
1st–10th +2 (+3)
11th–20th +4 (+6)
21st–30th +6 (+9)
It’s a waste of time each round if you have to do the math, because most of it will never change. Your stats only change now when you level so why have all the extra information?
Having that on your character sheet is a giant waste of space. You should only have the name and PHB page number of that power on the sheet, then you have a separate sheet (or cards) with all of your on it with all of the math done already.
The above should then look like this:
Cleave (Standard, At-will) – Martial, Melee Weapon (greatsword)
+9 vs. AC; 1d10 + 5 damage, and an enemy adjacent to you takes 4 damage.
Power Attack = +7 vs. AC; 1d10 + 8 damage, and an enemy adjacent to you takes 4 damage.
The only modifiers that come into play are ones that happen during the game.
In our game, you know who the prepared ones are because their round takes less than a minute and they rarely say things like “plus my charisma modifier”.
But then again, I get picked on when I push for people to hurry up.
Those people never played much D&D prior to 3E. Back when all non-spell attacks were generally 1 or 2 swings, with damage rolls that hardly changed and combat rounds took half the time they do now.
Our lineup for this session:
Aaron, playing Valenae, the level 6 eladrin rogue
Scott, playing Earl, the level 6 dragonborn paladin
Mike, playing Ander, the level 5 elf cleric with some ranger multi-classing
Justin, playing Stout, the level 5 dwarf fighter
“Eladrin; like elves, but gayer.”
- Justin
I should probably not quote Justin anymore.
We last stopped with the party defeating Urwol the Master Smith and his subordinates in the Southeast tower of the Horned Hold.
This tower was cleared out, so they had 2 options of where to continue; via corridor to the southwest tower (where the scout ran to), or via bridge to the north tower. They opted for the less traveled bridge to north tower.
After picking the lock, they entered an abandoned and ruined room with rubble nearly everywhere as most of the non-stonework fallen off the walls and ceiling. The room was otherwise boring to them, but not the next one.
The next room held a pair of duergar guards and a pair of animated clockwork arbalesters (automated crossbows). In a common room adjacent to the new room and the last was also another guard and a duergar theurge (wizard).
Earl acted first in the initiative, and for whatever reason he tried peaking into the common room. He saw the guard and the theurge, and they saw him.
End result, the party had two fronts to fight with Stout taking on the 2 guards and arbalesters and Earl taking on the guard and theurge, while Valenae and Ander went wherever need and opportunity took them.
Here’s a nice combo; Spiritual Weapon and Sneak Attack from range. It allows our rogue to avoid the usual severe beating he receives by getting flanking from range.
This fight took a little while to play out, but teamwork and controlling both front lines made it easy enough.
I hate the fighter’s ability to stop someone from running with an opportunity attack. It ruins a lot of my fun. Especially when the theurge tried to run to get some help when he was instead stopped, surrounded, and slaughtered.
The group now had control of the bridges leading to both southern towers, so instead of pushing ahead and clearing out the northern tower and possibly getting flanked by the denizens of the southwestern tower, they instead chose to charge to the southwestern tower and clean it out first.
The southwestern tower was on alert and prepared for the party to come through either entrance to the tower.
The party charged in and burst open the door, and were kept at the door for a few rounds by the guards while the rest of the duergar in the tower (3 scouts and a champion named Rundarr) got into combat from their starting positions.
Valenae did his best to deal damage while taking as little as possible, to moderate success.
Ander healed when he needed to and otherwise made his attacks from range (there’s still something wrong about clerics having a laser attack).
Stout and Earl did their usual front line defense with Stout taking the brunt of the early attacks, and Earl taking the brunt of the attacks from Rundarr. That turned out to be a very one-sided deal.
While the duergar scouts were turning invisible and sneak attacking at every opportunity, Rundarr waded into melee, apparently unconcerned with the damage he was taking, and was allowed to attack twice each round.
The party was ok with that until Rundarr became bloodied. He then grew to large-sized, got reach 2 with his hammer, and a +5 to damage with each attack.
In one round Rundarr hit and critted Earl, taking Earl from max hp to single-digits.
Then get this: they started to whine about how much damage they were taking from the scouts and Rundarr. But during this same combat they were using most of their daily powers, and at one point Stout dealt 1d10+7 damage to any enemies adjacent to him automatically, no attack roll, they just had to start their turn next to him.
In spite of Rundarr’s massive damage-dealing, of the party focused on him and he didn’t last long. Once he dropped, the scouts were doomed. One managed to escape, never to be seen in the Horned Hold again.
In spite of having used several daily powers, the party was good on healing surges, so they headed back to the northern tower. Interestingly they chose to keep to the less traveled road and found an old door with a rusty lock.
Inside was an old temple to Baphomet, with several human bodies lying on the floor.
When Stout investigated one of the bodies, it sprang up and attacked him. That’s when those who don’t have the Monster Manual found out that undead don’t drain levels at all now; they just suck out healing surges with every hit.
Five dead wights later, and the party was suddenly low on healing surges and had to rest. They chose to stay in the nasty chapel to rest because they figured no one came here often.
It was late in the session, but not too late, so they quickly explored more of the main section of more traveled section of the tower.
When they had a combat in the next room, I called it a “speed combat”. In other words, if you weren’t ready, your PC delayed until you were ready.
The combat was pretty simple for the DM to run, 4 more orc berserkers and an ogre.
The fight was a quick and simple bash-fest that the rested party dominated, and was otherwise uneventful.
We then stopped for the night.
Here’s my solution and it’s easy to do; be prepared.
Unless you’re totally winging it, DM’s have needed their notes ready and in order before the game since its inception. I try to have all creatures in each combat shown on a single piece of paper, with separate check boxes for encounter powers if there are more than one of the same creature.
More than ever before players need to be prepared also.
If you’re a player and you have to add your personal strength modifiers to your math, you’ve just wasted time.
Example: A level 2 fighter with an 18 strength, the Power Attack feat, and a +1 greatsword, using his Cleave attack in combat.
Cleave
At-will, Martial, Weapon
Standard Action Melee weapon
Target: One creature
Attack: Strength vs. AC
Hit: 1[W] + Strength modifier damage, and an enemy adjacent to you takes damage equal to your Strength modifier.
Increase damage to 2[W] + Strength modifier at 21st level.
Power Attack
When making a melee attack, you can take a –2 penalty to the attack roll. If the attack hits, you gain a +2 bonus to the damage roll (or a +3 bonus to the damage roll with a two-handed weapon).
This extra damage increases by level, as shown on the table below, but the attack penalty remains the same.
Level Extra Damage (Two-Handed Weapon)
1st–10th +2 (+3)
11th–20th +4 (+6)
21st–30th +6 (+9)
It’s a waste of time each round if you have to do the math, because most of it will never change. Your stats only change now when you level so why have all the extra information?
Having that on your character sheet is a giant waste of space. You should only have the name and PHB page number of that power on the sheet, then you have a separate sheet (or cards) with all of your on it with all of the math done already.
The above should then look like this:
Cleave (Standard, At-will) – Martial, Melee Weapon (greatsword)
+9 vs. AC; 1d10 + 5 damage, and an enemy adjacent to you takes 4 damage.
Power Attack = +7 vs. AC; 1d10 + 8 damage, and an enemy adjacent to you takes 4 damage.
The only modifiers that come into play are ones that happen during the game.
In our game, you know who the prepared ones are because their round takes less than a minute and they rarely say things like “plus my charisma modifier”.
But then again, I get picked on when I push for people to hurry up.
Those people never played much D&D prior to 3E. Back when all non-spell attacks were generally 1 or 2 swings, with damage rolls that hardly changed and combat rounds took half the time they do now.
Our lineup for this session:
Aaron, playing Valenae, the level 6 eladrin rogue
Scott, playing Earl, the level 6 dragonborn paladin
Mike, playing Ander, the level 5 elf cleric with some ranger multi-classing
Justin, playing Stout, the level 5 dwarf fighter
“Eladrin; like elves, but gayer.”
- Justin
I should probably not quote Justin anymore.
We last stopped with the party defeating Urwol the Master Smith and his subordinates in the Southeast tower of the Horned Hold.
This tower was cleared out, so they had 2 options of where to continue; via corridor to the southwest tower (where the scout ran to), or via bridge to the north tower. They opted for the less traveled bridge to north tower.
After picking the lock, they entered an abandoned and ruined room with rubble nearly everywhere as most of the non-stonework fallen off the walls and ceiling. The room was otherwise boring to them, but not the next one.
The next room held a pair of duergar guards and a pair of animated clockwork arbalesters (automated crossbows). In a common room adjacent to the new room and the last was also another guard and a duergar theurge (wizard).
Earl acted first in the initiative, and for whatever reason he tried peaking into the common room. He saw the guard and the theurge, and they saw him.
End result, the party had two fronts to fight with Stout taking on the 2 guards and arbalesters and Earl taking on the guard and theurge, while Valenae and Ander went wherever need and opportunity took them.
Here’s a nice combo; Spiritual Weapon and Sneak Attack from range. It allows our rogue to avoid the usual severe beating he receives by getting flanking from range.
This fight took a little while to play out, but teamwork and controlling both front lines made it easy enough.
I hate the fighter’s ability to stop someone from running with an opportunity attack. It ruins a lot of my fun. Especially when the theurge tried to run to get some help when he was instead stopped, surrounded, and slaughtered.
The group now had control of the bridges leading to both southern towers, so instead of pushing ahead and clearing out the northern tower and possibly getting flanked by the denizens of the southwestern tower, they instead chose to charge to the southwestern tower and clean it out first.
The southwestern tower was on alert and prepared for the party to come through either entrance to the tower.
The party charged in and burst open the door, and were kept at the door for a few rounds by the guards while the rest of the duergar in the tower (3 scouts and a champion named Rundarr) got into combat from their starting positions.
Valenae did his best to deal damage while taking as little as possible, to moderate success.
Ander healed when he needed to and otherwise made his attacks from range (there’s still something wrong about clerics having a laser attack).
Stout and Earl did their usual front line defense with Stout taking the brunt of the early attacks, and Earl taking the brunt of the attacks from Rundarr. That turned out to be a very one-sided deal.
While the duergar scouts were turning invisible and sneak attacking at every opportunity, Rundarr waded into melee, apparently unconcerned with the damage he was taking, and was allowed to attack twice each round.
The party was ok with that until Rundarr became bloodied. He then grew to large-sized, got reach 2 with his hammer, and a +5 to damage with each attack.
In one round Rundarr hit and critted Earl, taking Earl from max hp to single-digits.
Then get this: they started to whine about how much damage they were taking from the scouts and Rundarr. But during this same combat they were using most of their daily powers, and at one point Stout dealt 1d10+7 damage to any enemies adjacent to him automatically, no attack roll, they just had to start their turn next to him.
In spite of Rundarr’s massive damage-dealing, of the party focused on him and he didn’t last long. Once he dropped, the scouts were doomed. One managed to escape, never to be seen in the Horned Hold again.
In spite of having used several daily powers, the party was good on healing surges, so they headed back to the northern tower. Interestingly they chose to keep to the less traveled road and found an old door with a rusty lock.
Inside was an old temple to Baphomet, with several human bodies lying on the floor.
When Stout investigated one of the bodies, it sprang up and attacked him. That’s when those who don’t have the Monster Manual found out that undead don’t drain levels at all now; they just suck out healing surges with every hit.
Five dead wights later, and the party was suddenly low on healing surges and had to rest. They chose to stay in the nasty chapel to rest because they figured no one came here often.
It was late in the session, but not too late, so they quickly explored more of the main section of more traveled section of the tower.
When they had a combat in the next room, I called it a “speed combat”. In other words, if you weren’t ready, your PC delayed until you were ready.
The combat was pretty simple for the DM to run, 4 more orc berserkers and an ogre.
The fight was a quick and simple bash-fest that the rested party dominated, and was otherwise uneventful.
We then stopped for the night.
posted by BlueBlackRed at 6:15 AM
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