Having played and run far more brutal (and to my mind better designed) TTRPGs, something more like Blades in the Dark, the brutalistic damage, injury, and death mechanics in those games often mean that players try to avoid combat more than running headlong into it.
Yes, but that's not the same question as "do PCs think they can beat everything".
There are basically two major reasons for avoiding combat (assuming combat success serves a viable purpose)
You might lose.
You might win, but suffer unacceptable costs.
5e has greatly reduced the risk of the second thing, and death checks are part of that (as are a general lack of lasting injuries or save or die mechanics, and the existence of spells such as revivify), but outright losing is still out there. If anything, it becomes more likely, because there's no real way of scaring the PCs short of TPK scenarios, whereas in AD&D a monster with no real shot at beating the party might still kill a PC with a save or die.
So I took this same conversation to my group last night after a couple of sessions (both by different DMs) and we were up late talking about it.
What we all came to the conclusion was that any plyer who joins needs to be told something very simple and direct:
In this game, a character can and will die as a result of their actions, because this is not a game where monsters are evenly matched; it is a game where a lucky blow from a low level monster will take you out, and where a casual sweep of a high level monster can erase an entire party. In films, novels, and fairytales, the hero must work to overcome things that are always more powerful than they -- for this game, that is the standard we use. Assume you can die in any encounter, if the Fates (dice) so choose. If you are so invested in your character that you cannot allow them to die, you need to play a different character.
Needless to say, we got heavily sidetracked, and our general rules for CR were updated again*, but that was what we all sorta agreed on as the base for our introductions to new players.
* = We do not use standard CR. We can adjust a monster along some 25 to 30 different aspects, and we have expanded CR up to 50, but only have 0 and 1/2 beneath 1, so it works out to roughly 2.5 CRs per level, giving a "regular" and "hard" challenge for each level. Our minimum expectation is that for damage the monsters do 1.25 average damage of the party, and have 1.5 times the average hit points, on a per monster basis, with, as of last night, a general expectation of 3 encounters per game day, so we needed a very different sort of CR system. A newchange was a decision to expand the CR further (to 60, plus an N (between 0 and 1/2) for "normal people equals") so we can have a "hard", "medium", and "easy" difficulty rating, with "very Easy" and "vry hard" moving it up one CR. This is what happens when you have too many "optimizers" giving DM style suggestions, lol.
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Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
So I took this same conversation to my group last night after a couple of sessions (both by different DMs) and we were up late talking about it.
What we all came to the conclusion was that any plyer who joins needs to be told something very simple and direct:
In this game, a character can and will die as a result of their actions, because this is not a game where monsters are evenly matched; it is a game where a lucky blow from a low level monster will take you out, and where a casual sweep of a high level monster can erase an entire party. In films, novels, and fairytales, the hero must work to overcome things that are always more powerful than they -- for this game, that is the standard we use. Assume you can die in any encounter, if the Fates (dice) so choose. If you are so invested in your character that you cannot allow them to die, you need to play a different character.
. . .
Yours is different wording than what I use, but same here for any game that I have run, over the years. Some folks understand statements like this better than others. I've known at least a couple individuals who would seemingly listen when this was said to them, then seemingly forget that it was ever mentioned. Such is the way of human interactions, I suppose.
I think the death saves thing brings out the "we can beat anything" attitude.
I doubt it. Death saves do increase what the PCs can beat, but that's just an objective power issue, not an attitude.
The thing is the players know that unless they take double their max hp in one hit, they will survive any amount of damage. They will only then go into death saves. Unless they are hit again death saves ensure a minimum of 2 rounds of life (aside from nat 1 and nat 20).
Previous editions (fuzzy memory but how I ran it) you died at -10 hp with blood loss of -1hp per round.
---
5e example: PC with 30 hp will only get one-shotted if they take 60 hp damage in one hit. Even if they are at 1 hp, they still only die if they take 31 hp damage in one hit. players know this which gives them a certain attitude about death. If they take 55 damage in one hit, they are just unconscious and have to make death saves.
Cure Wounds or Healing Word for even 1 hp of healing will pop the PC up with no side effects and resets the death save meter.
---
Old Wysp example: Both the 60 and the 55 and even a 40 damage hit will kill you outright. Or if the PC is down to 1 hp an 11 point damage hit will kill them.
If you are at -8 hp and somebody hits you with a 2hp heal, the bleeding stops but you are still in danger and still unconscious.
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"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
I think the death saves thing brings out the "we can beat anything" attitude.
I doubt it. Death saves do increase what the PCs can beat, but that's just an objective power issue, not an attitude.
The thing is the players know that unless they take double their max hp in one hit, they will survive any amount of damage. They will only then go into death saves. Unless they are hit again death saves ensure a minimum of 2 rounds of life (aside from nat 1 and nat 20).
Previous editions (fuzzy memory but how I ran it) you died at -10 hp with blood loss of -1hp per round.
---
5e example: PC with 30 hp will only get one-shotted if they take 60 hp damage in one hit. Even if they are at 1 hp, they still only die if they take 31 hp damage in one hit. players know this which gives them a certain attitude about death. If they take 55 damage in one hit, they are just unconscious and have to make death saves.
Cure Wounds or Healing Word for even 1 hp of healing will pop the PC up with no side effects and resets the death save meter.
---
Old Wysp example: Both the 60 and the 55 and even a 40 damage hit will kill you outright. Or if the PC is down to 1 hp an 11 point damage hit will kill them.
If you are at -8 hp and somebody hits you with a 2hp heal, the bleeding stops but you are still in danger and still unconscious.
Now see, all of that was super nice compared to me, lol. Old days, you hit 0, you was gone. Folks would haul your corpse back to the town and pay a priest to raise or res you-- but only if they really needed, ya.
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Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
I'm personally not a fan of leaving "unwinnable" encounters in my games, but that's just my playstyle. If I were in a similar situation, I would have narrated that this was an overwhelmingly large force and that battling head-on would be a death sentence. So I'd give the players an opportunity to hatch a plan to infiltrate or weaken the force for the session. But that's just me, I'm sure everyone has their own DM style that works for them.
The thing is the players know that unless they take double their max hp in one hit, they will survive any amount of damage.
Yes, but that doesn't mean you can't be beaten. What it mostly eliminates is "win at a cost"; if the fight isn't a TPK, it's unlikely anyone will die.
I think we're saying the same thing =)
My point is: nothing about 5e means you can't lose a fight, so an expectation of always winning does not come from the combat rules (including death saves). It could come from elsewhere in the rules -- the PCs are quite unlikely to lose any fight that's built following the encounter building guidelines -- but those are pretty clearly only for encounters that are an expected part of an adventure.
I'm personally not a fan of leaving "unwinnable" encounters in my games, but that's just my playstyle. If I were in a similar situation, I would have narrated that this was an overwhelmingly large force and that battling head-on would be a death sentence.
This is the key, in the narration from the DM. If as a player, the narration of the encounter sounds like something where the players are "supposed to fight", then that absolutely should be a winnable fight. The original poster's description sounds like it was narrated clearly as an unwinnable battle, but maybe that somehow didn't translate to the player.
Someone above made the comparison to video games, but I really think that is not the culprit here. Video games constantly present players with unwinnable battles, and any new player to DnD is going to understand that their character is a not a god and there there will be opponents that they cannot yet beat at this point in the story. The big difference is that in video games it very clearly tells you that you cannot win because it simply won't even let you attack, whereas DnD relies on the DM to properly convey information that seems clear to them in their head but is not necessarily clear to players.
If the stronghold is far too difficult for the party because this is a sandbox campaign with areas meant for much higher level characters, then this should've been conveyed to the players. It's not meta-gaming for the DM to be like "your characters realize that these enemies look WAY stronger than your party and they could wipe the floor with you guys". The OP's description sounded like the enemies gave those warnings but that isn't the same as it being narrated directly from the DM as being facts that the characters themselves know. Every BBEG always warns the party of their imminent demise, right before the party defeats them, so that can easily be misconstrued if the information doesn't come from the DM
I'm personally not a fan of leaving "unwinnable" encounters in my games, but that's just my playstyle. If I were in a similar situation, I would have narrated that this was an overwhelmingly large force and that battling head-on would be a death sentence.
This is the key, in the narration from the DM. If as a player, the narration of the encounter sounds like something where the players are "supposed to fight", then that absolutely should be a winnable fight. The original poster's description sounds like it was narrated clearly as an unwinnable battle, but maybe that somehow didn't translate to the player.
I think part of the OP was that one person in the party thought every encounter that the party come across should be a winnable combat. That belief made them charge into bad situations or to aggravate NPCs that could harm the party.
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"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
My two cents... This is a result of linear video game culture. Back in 1E there was an adventure with a notorious black tower that if the characters attempted a frontal assault, the DM was simply instructed to inform them that their assault, while valiant, was eventually overwhelmed by numbers, and to roll new characters. There was no mercy in 1E.
I would argue to use this opportunity to teach the player to think creatively, and maybe not run headlong into death...
My two cents... This is a result of linear video game culture. Back in 1E there was an adventure with a notorious black tower that if the characters attempted a frontal assault, the DM was simply instructed to inform them that their assault, while valiant, was eventually overwhelmed by numbers, and to roll new characters. There was no mercy in 1E.
I would argue to use this opportunity to teach the player to think creatively, and maybe not run headlong into death...
I think I remember playing this adventure. I would estimate though the problem is multi-modal. Yes, 5e has gotten a lot more favourable to players. However, there's also a massive amount of 'advice' swirling about the internet in particular that often draws a line and simply says 'this is bad'. Take for example the recently Phandelver and Below adventure book there's a section referring to player consent when there is the chance the player character might be altered by Illithid means. Contrast this though with Baldur's Gate 3...the same player consent isn't necessarily asked for when it comes to what might happen to the character. There is it feels an overattachment to singluar characters between players and their characters that is reinforced somewhat through the various Youtube, and even forums like these that often seem to suggest that any alteration, or change to the character must absolutely have player consent.
Now, to be clear, I don't think player consent is a bad thing, however I don't think the way it's often worded is very condusive to the way a story could unfold. For example, let's say a player decides to be flying 300ft in the air (through means of a creature/pet/spell whatever) and gets knocked unconscious...they're going to fall and at that height they'll hit the ground within one round (6 seconds)...that's a massive amount of damage potential. Now there are, and I've seen it happen, people out there who say that this shouldn't result in character death even if the dice roll out that way. The counter point to that though is that the player has chosen to be flying that high. If they haven't assessed the risks, it's on them. Perhaps they'vge not considered what options or abilities the enemies have, but even so the death would be as a result of their own choice. Cause = Effect.
Now, let's say the DM recognises that the player is really sad to lose said character, perhaps the DM can fiat a way to drop a handy Scroll of Resurrection in the way of the party...perhaps one of the defeated enemies is carrying one (lucky party)...I think there are a lot of DMs who would hesistate to inflict ongoing wounds or injuries on that character. This is where there the system pushes the players. In 5e, the system means that injuries are optional rules. In other game systems injuries are core mechanices. As I referenced earlier - Blades in the Dark is a brutal system in which damage can really have massive effects down the line. Healing is incredibly difficult and as a result, players of that game do tend to be a lot more cautious.
And this is where there are inconsistencies in a system like 5e. For example Regenerate is a spell that exists and if you aren't using the injury rules in the DMG is almost a pointless spell. I suspect though that this is down to a lot of what makes 5e being inherited from previous systems and the laughable excuse for writers in stweardship of the game at present not considering why things are being inherited. We've seen this in the playtests. Rather than build from the group up, they've trying to inherit and subtley edit old content. Frankly it show how poorly skilled the current custodians are at their jobs.
My point here is that it's not one reason. It's loads of reasons. It's the game system, it's the 'advice' that exists out on youtube, it's the let's plays and TV shows, it's the rather forgiving nature computer games have assumed, it's all of this and probably more too. And there's nothing actually wrong with it. If that's a play style a player prefers, that's cool.
I think the biggest take away for us as GMs is to highlight what our playstyle is in our session zero. Be up front with it. Death can and will happen in this game. There are ways around encounters beyond just throwing yourselves into combat. This allows you to set up the table according to your playstyle, but also signals to the players that's how it'll be. And of course keep open the door to say 'look if this style doesn't work for you, please feel free to leave - no hard feelings'.
Ever been in a game/campaign where no character has yet died, but a player loudly complains that the DM is being unreasonable and unfair, because some encounters cannot be won through direct, frontal combat, at that party's current level?
This happened after the party was forced to retreat, a couple of times. The last straw for this player; us showing up a the gate of a stronghold, with clearly too many opponents to overcome, who warned us then allowed us to leave. The setting is a sandbox, and this particular player ran the leader PC, choosing our party's path.
In other words, this player was implying, then later confirmed, that they believe that all encounters presented to them should be set/adjusted so the party can engage and defeat everyone or everything they encounter, at their current level.
Though this mindset likely existed back in the 70s, 80s, 90s, I had not experienced this particular one from a fellow player until recently.
Do any of y'all see this come up? Does it happen very often?
This sadly is a common problem I have ran into along my DMing experiences, more recently in the past 10 years and it is especially common in the greater organized play space. I have weeded out this sort of thinking in my current regular gaming group but it took a lot of communication and actually removing a couple of players who weren't willing to adjust to my DMing style. I run a sandbox style game and have multiple groups of PCs going concurrently that all exist in the same world/timeline and I've just explained to all my players before they come into the game that they the player always have a seat at the table but that their characters aren't afforded the same courtesy. I'm not an adversarial type of DM and I'm not trying to "win" against the players but when I am running a creature that is out to harm or kill the party in some way I will run that creature and its actions in line with its motivations and the current circumstance so unfortunate choices and bad dice rolling can lead to characters needing to retreat and/or death. If a player is particularly attached to a character then I will find a way to bring that character back but it might not be immediate and at a bare minimum it will have to be something that is earned in the story.
The problem with this line of thinking that I see happening is how I believe it is starting to influence game design. I think this is why we are seeing redesigns of counterspell and the move away from things like legendary resistance and legendary actions because so many players can't handle when a creature is a real threat. I've seen so many players who want to be spoon fed information and don't want to have to really earn anything they just want to build a character that is the mechanical equivalent of an easy button. I personally don't understand how that is rewarding or satisfying. I had a player who wanted to play an eloquence bard just so he could essentially hit the skip button on social encounters but when I gave him NPC's that had high enough insight to challenge him (such as I made his characters wife have a very high insight and advantage on detecting his deceptions) he lost it, even though this wasn't a common problem he encountered it was just that to him he had felt he should have won the game at character creation. I would say as a general rule, if you have people in your game who have a play style that doesn't fit with your group then maybe talk with them as a group to reset expectations and if that doesn't work then don't play with those people. People can be friends without playing D&D together.
In this game, a character can and will die as a result of their actions, because this is not a game where monsters are evenly matched; it is a game where a lucky blow from a low level monster will take you out, and where a casual sweep of a high level monster can erase an entire party. In films, novels, and fairytales, the hero must work to overcome things that are always more powerful than they -- for this game, that is the standard we use. Assume you can die in any encounter, if the Fates (dice) so choose. If you are so invested in your character that you cannot allow them to die, you need to play a different character.
This is exactly the kind of game that I prefer to play in. Characters are a dime a dozen, its the challenges you face and overcome that make them legends and make moments that will last through the years. To me, this isn't a game for participation trophies.
Ever been in a game/campaign where no character has yet died, but a player loudly complains that the DM is being unreasonable and unfair, because some encounters cannot be won through direct, frontal combat, at that party's current level?
This happened after the party was forced to retreat, a couple of times. The last straw for this player; us showing up a the gate of a stronghold, with clearly too many opponents to overcome, who warned us then allowed us to leave. The setting is a sandbox, and this particular player ran the leader PC, choosing our party's path.
In other words, this player was implying, then later confirmed, that they believe that all encounters presented to them should be set/adjusted so the party can engage and defeat everyone or everything they encounter, at their current level.
Though this mindset likely existed back in the 70s, 80s, 90s, I had not experienced this particular one from a fellow player until recently.
Do any of y'all see this come up? Does it happen very often?
I've heard of players like this, but have never actually been in a game with them and I'm very glad for that. They're likely a very small percentage of players, though my guess is that there are a lot of them considering the dozens of millions of individuals that play D&D.
Also, Martin, the injury rules are neat. I watched most of the Aerois campaign - which utilized them - and they were impactful at the first bunch of levels because the DM provided ways to get them healed, but they were nasty inconveniences in the meantime and forced the group to go out of their way for aid. However, the mechanics were only a fraction as relevant in the upper second tier of play, and you might want to do something to worsen them overtime if medical help for the PCs is readily available.
And finally, an alternative way of making death saves nastier would be use to use the method Sanvael outlined HERE.
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The way i like to do thing encounters are run as is ... I never change stats but I will allowfor stealth or intelligance as ways to avoid combat where needed if combat is lvl apropriate stealth will instead give an oppetunity attack and itelligence get outs will have a higher dc
Just to say, that thought process is a valid way to play the game and isn't bad. If anything's at fault, it's that the Session Zero either didn't happen or didn't establish the type of game well enough for the players to understand.
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I know what you're thinking: "In that flurry of blows, did he use all his ki points, or save one?" Well, are ya feeling lucky, punk?
Ever been in a game/campaign where no character has yet died, but a player loudly complains that the DM is being unreasonable and unfair, because some encounters cannot be won through direct, frontal combat, at that party's current level?
This happened after the party was forced to retreat, a couple of times. The last straw for this player; us showing up a the gate of a stronghold, with clearly too many opponents to overcome, who warned us then allowed us to leave. The setting is a sandbox, and this particular player ran the leader PC, choosing our party's path.
In other words, this player was implying, then later confirmed, that they believe that all encounters presented to them should be set/adjusted so the party can engage and defeat everyone or everything they encounter, at their current level.
Though this mindset likely existed back in the 70s, 80s, 90s, I had not experienced this particular one from a fellow player until recently.
Do any of y'all see this come up? Does it happen very often?
I can assure you that this mindset never existed in the 70's, 80's or 90's as there was no such thing as encounter balancing or the idea of level balance. In fact, it was really uncommon for characters to be of the same level in a campaign.
This was all introduced with the CR rating concept in 3rd edition I believe.
Ever been in a game/campaign where no character has yet died, but a player loudly complains that the DM is being unreasonable and unfair, because some encounters cannot be won through direct, frontal combat, at that party's current level?
This happened after the party was forced to retreat, a couple of times. The last straw for this player; us showing up a the gate of a stronghold, with clearly too many opponents to overcome, who warned us then allowed us to leave. The setting is a sandbox, and this particular player ran the leader PC, choosing our party's path.
In other words, this player was implying, then later confirmed, that they believe that all encounters presented to them should be set/adjusted so the party can engage and defeat everyone or everything they encounter, at their current level.
Though this mindset likely existed back in the 70s, 80s, 90s, I had not experienced this particular one from a fellow player until recently.
Do any of y'all see this come up? Does it happen very often?
I can assure you that this mindset never existed in the 70's, 80's or 90's as there was no such thing as encounter balancing or the idea of level balance. In fact, it was really uncommon for characters to be of the same level in a campaign.
This was all introduced with the CR rating concept in 3rd edition I believe.
Heya OSR!
I gotta say,I ran into it a little in the 80's and 90's -- but definitely not nearly as often.
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Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
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Yes, but that's not the same question as "do PCs think they can beat everything".
There are basically two major reasons for avoiding combat (assuming combat success serves a viable purpose)
5e has greatly reduced the risk of the second thing, and death checks are part of that (as are a general lack of lasting injuries or save or die mechanics, and the existence of spells such as revivify), but outright losing is still out there. If anything, it becomes more likely, because there's no real way of scaring the PCs short of TPK scenarios, whereas in AD&D a monster with no real shot at beating the party might still kill a PC with a save or die.
So I took this same conversation to my group last night after a couple of sessions (both by different DMs) and we were up late talking about it.
What we all came to the conclusion was that any plyer who joins needs to be told something very simple and direct:
Needless to say, we got heavily sidetracked, and our general rules for CR were updated again*, but that was what we all sorta agreed on as the base for our introductions to new players.
* = We do not use standard CR. We can adjust a monster along some 25 to 30 different aspects, and we have expanded CR up to 50, but only have 0 and 1/2 beneath 1, so it works out to roughly 2.5 CRs per level, giving a "regular" and "hard" challenge for each level. Our minimum expectation is that for damage the monsters do 1.25 average damage of the party, and have 1.5 times the average hit points, on a per monster basis, with, as of last night, a general expectation of 3 encounters per game day, so we needed a very different sort of CR system. A newchange was a decision to expand the CR further (to 60, plus an N (between 0 and 1/2) for "normal people equals") so we can have a "hard", "medium", and "easy" difficulty rating, with "very Easy" and "vry hard" moving it up one CR. This is what happens when you have too many "optimizers" giving DM style suggestions, lol.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
Yours is different wording than what I use, but same here for any game that I have run, over the years. Some folks understand statements like this better than others. I've known at least a couple individuals who would seemingly listen when this was said to them, then seemingly forget that it was ever mentioned. Such is the way of human interactions, I suppose.
The thing is the players know that unless they take double their max hp in one hit, they will survive any amount of damage. They will only then go into death saves. Unless they are hit again death saves ensure a minimum of 2 rounds of life (aside from nat 1 and nat 20).
Previous editions (fuzzy memory but how I ran it) you died at -10 hp with blood loss of -1hp per round.
---
5e example: PC with 30 hp will only get one-shotted if they take 60 hp damage in one hit. Even if they are at 1 hp, they still only die if they take 31 hp damage in one hit. players know this which gives them a certain attitude about death. If they take 55 damage in one hit, they are just unconscious and have to make death saves.
Cure Wounds or Healing Word for even 1 hp of healing will pop the PC up with no side effects and resets the death save meter.
---
Old Wysp example: Both the 60 and the 55 and even a 40 damage hit will kill you outright. Or if the PC is down to 1 hp an 11 point damage hit will kill them.
If you are at -8 hp and somebody hits you with a 2hp heal, the bleeding stops but you are still in danger and still unconscious.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
Now see, all of that was super nice compared to me, lol. Old days, you hit 0, you was gone. Folks would haul your corpse back to the town and pay a priest to raise or res you-- but only if they really needed, ya.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
Yes, but that doesn't mean you can't be beaten. What it mostly eliminates is "win at a cost"; if the fight isn't a TPK, it's unlikely anyone will die.
I think we're saying the same thing =)
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
I'm personally not a fan of leaving "unwinnable" encounters in my games, but that's just my playstyle. If I were in a similar situation, I would have narrated that this was an overwhelmingly large force and that battling head-on would be a death sentence. So I'd give the players an opportunity to hatch a plan to infiltrate or weaken the force for the session. But that's just me, I'm sure everyone has their own DM style that works for them.
My point is: nothing about 5e means you can't lose a fight, so an expectation of always winning does not come from the combat rules (including death saves). It could come from elsewhere in the rules -- the PCs are quite unlikely to lose any fight that's built following the encounter building guidelines -- but those are pretty clearly only for encounters that are an expected part of an adventure.
This is the key, in the narration from the DM. If as a player, the narration of the encounter sounds like something where the players are "supposed to fight", then that absolutely should be a winnable fight. The original poster's description sounds like it was narrated clearly as an unwinnable battle, but maybe that somehow didn't translate to the player.
Someone above made the comparison to video games, but I really think that is not the culprit here. Video games constantly present players with unwinnable battles, and any new player to DnD is going to understand that their character is a not a god and there there will be opponents that they cannot yet beat at this point in the story. The big difference is that in video games it very clearly tells you that you cannot win because it simply won't even let you attack, whereas DnD relies on the DM to properly convey information that seems clear to them in their head but is not necessarily clear to players.
If the stronghold is far too difficult for the party because this is a sandbox campaign with areas meant for much higher level characters, then this should've been conveyed to the players. It's not meta-gaming for the DM to be like "your characters realize that these enemies look WAY stronger than your party and they could wipe the floor with you guys". The OP's description sounded like the enemies gave those warnings but that isn't the same as it being narrated directly from the DM as being facts that the characters themselves know. Every BBEG always warns the party of their imminent demise, right before the party defeats them, so that can easily be misconstrued if the information doesn't come from the DM
I think part of the OP was that one person in the party thought every encounter that the party come across should be a winnable combat. That belief made them charge into bad situations or to aggravate NPCs that could harm the party.
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My two cents... This is a result of linear video game culture. Back in 1E there was an adventure with a notorious black tower that if the characters attempted a frontal assault, the DM was simply instructed to inform them that their assault, while valiant, was eventually overwhelmed by numbers, and to roll new characters. There was no mercy in 1E.
I would argue to use this opportunity to teach the player to think creatively, and maybe not run headlong into death...
I think I remember playing this adventure. I would estimate though the problem is multi-modal. Yes, 5e has gotten a lot more favourable to players. However, there's also a massive amount of 'advice' swirling about the internet in particular that often draws a line and simply says 'this is bad'. Take for example the recently Phandelver and Below adventure book there's a section referring to player consent when there is the chance the player character might be altered by Illithid means. Contrast this though with Baldur's Gate 3...the same player consent isn't necessarily asked for when it comes to what might happen to the character. There is it feels an overattachment to singluar characters between players and their characters that is reinforced somewhat through the various Youtube, and even forums like these that often seem to suggest that any alteration, or change to the character must absolutely have player consent.
Now, to be clear, I don't think player consent is a bad thing, however I don't think the way it's often worded is very condusive to the way a story could unfold. For example, let's say a player decides to be flying 300ft in the air (through means of a creature/pet/spell whatever) and gets knocked unconscious...they're going to fall and at that height they'll hit the ground within one round (6 seconds)...that's a massive amount of damage potential. Now there are, and I've seen it happen, people out there who say that this shouldn't result in character death even if the dice roll out that way. The counter point to that though is that the player has chosen to be flying that high. If they haven't assessed the risks, it's on them. Perhaps they'vge not considered what options or abilities the enemies have, but even so the death would be as a result of their own choice. Cause = Effect.
Now, let's say the DM recognises that the player is really sad to lose said character, perhaps the DM can fiat a way to drop a handy Scroll of Resurrection in the way of the party...perhaps one of the defeated enemies is carrying one (lucky party)...I think there are a lot of DMs who would hesistate to inflict ongoing wounds or injuries on that character. This is where there the system pushes the players. In 5e, the system means that injuries are optional rules. In other game systems injuries are core mechanices. As I referenced earlier - Blades in the Dark is a brutal system in which damage can really have massive effects down the line. Healing is incredibly difficult and as a result, players of that game do tend to be a lot more cautious.
And this is where there are inconsistencies in a system like 5e. For example Regenerate is a spell that exists and if you aren't using the injury rules in the DMG is almost a pointless spell. I suspect though that this is down to a lot of what makes 5e being inherited from previous systems and the laughable excuse for writers in stweardship of the game at present not considering why things are being inherited. We've seen this in the playtests. Rather than build from the group up, they've trying to inherit and subtley edit old content. Frankly it show how poorly skilled the current custodians are at their jobs.
My point here is that it's not one reason. It's loads of reasons. It's the game system, it's the 'advice' that exists out on youtube, it's the let's plays and TV shows, it's the rather forgiving nature computer games have assumed, it's all of this and probably more too. And there's nothing actually wrong with it. If that's a play style a player prefers, that's cool.
I think the biggest take away for us as GMs is to highlight what our playstyle is in our session zero. Be up front with it. Death can and will happen in this game. There are ways around encounters beyond just throwing yourselves into combat. This allows you to set up the table according to your playstyle, but also signals to the players that's how it'll be. And of course keep open the door to say 'look if this style doesn't work for you, please feel free to leave - no hard feelings'.
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This sadly is a common problem I have ran into along my DMing experiences, more recently in the past 10 years and it is especially common in the greater organized play space. I have weeded out this sort of thinking in my current regular gaming group but it took a lot of communication and actually removing a couple of players who weren't willing to adjust to my DMing style. I run a sandbox style game and have multiple groups of PCs going concurrently that all exist in the same world/timeline and I've just explained to all my players before they come into the game that they the player always have a seat at the table but that their characters aren't afforded the same courtesy. I'm not an adversarial type of DM and I'm not trying to "win" against the players but when I am running a creature that is out to harm or kill the party in some way I will run that creature and its actions in line with its motivations and the current circumstance so unfortunate choices and bad dice rolling can lead to characters needing to retreat and/or death. If a player is particularly attached to a character then I will find a way to bring that character back but it might not be immediate and at a bare minimum it will have to be something that is earned in the story.
The problem with this line of thinking that I see happening is how I believe it is starting to influence game design. I think this is why we are seeing redesigns of counterspell and the move away from things like legendary resistance and legendary actions because so many players can't handle when a creature is a real threat. I've seen so many players who want to be spoon fed information and don't want to have to really earn anything they just want to build a character that is the mechanical equivalent of an easy button. I personally don't understand how that is rewarding or satisfying. I had a player who wanted to play an eloquence bard just so he could essentially hit the skip button on social encounters but when I gave him NPC's that had high enough insight to challenge him (such as I made his characters wife have a very high insight and advantage on detecting his deceptions) he lost it, even though this wasn't a common problem he encountered it was just that to him he had felt he should have won the game at character creation. I would say as a general rule, if you have people in your game who have a play style that doesn't fit with your group then maybe talk with them as a group to reset expectations and if that doesn't work then don't play with those people. People can be friends without playing D&D together.
This is exactly the kind of game that I prefer to play in. Characters are a dime a dozen, its the challenges you face and overcome that make them legends and make moments that will last through the years. To me, this isn't a game for participation trophies.
I've heard of players like this, but have never actually been in a game with them and I'm very glad for that. They're likely a very small percentage of players, though my guess is that there are a lot of them considering the dozens of millions of individuals that play D&D.
Also, Martin, the injury rules are neat. I watched most of the Aerois campaign - which utilized them - and they were impactful at the first bunch of levels because the DM provided ways to get them healed, but they were nasty inconveniences in the meantime and forced the group to go out of their way for aid. However, the mechanics were only a fraction as relevant in the upper second tier of play, and you might want to do something to worsen them overtime if medical help for the PCs is readily available.
And finally, an alternative way of making death saves nastier would be use to use the method Sanvael outlined HERE.
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HERE.The way i like to do thing encounters are run as is ... I never change stats but I will allowfor stealth or intelligance as ways to avoid combat where needed if combat is lvl apropriate stealth will instead give an oppetunity attack and itelligence get outs will have a higher dc
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Just to say, that thought process is a valid way to play the game and isn't bad. If anything's at fault, it's that the Session Zero either didn't happen or didn't establish the type of game well enough for the players to understand.
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I can assure you that this mindset never existed in the 70's, 80's or 90's as there was no such thing as encounter balancing or the idea of level balance. In fact, it was really uncommon for characters to be of the same level in a campaign.
This was all introduced with the CR rating concept in 3rd edition I believe.
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I gotta say,I ran into it a little in the 80's and 90's -- but definitely not nearly as often.
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