I haven't been DMing long. A little over 12 months. And my group has fun. We play for 3 hours every week, and it's a nice mix of combat, investigation, RP.... I put in a lot of work, drawing maps, developing NPC's, and I love drawing over arching storylines that work through PC's back stories to engage them and flesh out their characters. We are in our 3rd major campaign, and each one has either resolved a personal quest or evolved it in some way, while sowing seeds of future adventures. I find it a lot of work, but a lot of fun.
So I'm really disappointed in myself when one of my players comes to me and says he is thinking about retiring his Barbarian (who he loves playing) because he is worried that he is OP and takes away from the combat fun for the rest of the party. I don't believe a player can be OP, it's just a failing on my part to design combat that challenges the group in a variety of ways. This barbarian just mows through things. He did 80 points of damage in his turn the other night and just sawed a Barbed Devil in half. This is my fault. So help me, please, with my combat. At the start it was easy, but as my PC's are getting more powerful I'm struggling to keep up with it. It seems only 3 sessions ago that they fought a Thayan Red wizard and a bunch of wraiths and wights and was about 1 bad dice roll from a TPK. It was tense and exciting and beautiful. They loved it.
Please, some practical tips on making good combat for a party with a variety of range/melee fighters and a couple of spellcasters. At this point, I feel like I need to include more range attacks and change the spells up a bit for casters rather than just go with what's in the campaign guide.
A quick question, is the barbarian truly destroying everything and killing the combat for the other players, or is the player getting bored of the characters and wants to nicely change it up?
As far as encounters go, mixing in range and magic will change the pace, and is a great idea. Flying creatures tend to make a melee God suddenly wish they were a wizard, and will shine the spot light on other players with more range abilites.a
A other idea is to use more swarm tactics and minions. Does the evil alhoon maybe have a small army of orcs that can slow the barbarian down, doesn't matter his damage out when faceing a hoard of orcs. Sure he kills one a hit, but it wears him down. Also having a fight after fight with no resting time will take some wind out of every character's sales , and might give you the "holy crap we lived" enjoyment you talk about from the red wizard example.
He definitely doesn't want to change, but feels he needs to for the rest of the party to have more fun. That's not a sacrifice he should have to make.
I worry about too many monsters bogging down combat. So rather than a bunch of CR1 monsters, I throw in a 5. But that probably plays to his strengths way too much.
Thanks for the advice though, I'll definitely put it to use.
Have you spent time calculating challenge ratings for the party? The DMG is handy to help figure out appropriate levels, numbers of monsters, etc, based on party size and level. There may be some other resources in Volo’s too.
I have indeed. But I think my issue is as I mentioned above is that I try to have a big CR critter and a couple of low level ones rather than stacks of low level ones. But it means that he can focus his offense too easily and effectively. Kobold Fight Club is another good tool for CR guidance, btw.
Even if this is your fault ( and I'm not convinced that anyone is "at fault" here ), you're at least trying to make it better.
Not knowing your party, or how you structure combats, it's hard to give advice, but I can give you some pointers that come to mind.
Mix up opponents. Don't use just one kind of creature. Make sure these creatures cooperating makes sense, but mix in different creatures with different tactical strengths. If you have some tank creatures duking it out with the Barbarian, while the rest of the Party is forced to handle the goblinoid archers, or the wyverns doing fly-by swoop attacks, it's suddenly a lot more complex than trading blows at close range.
Make sure the opponents are tactically smart. Have they encountered the Party before ( or has anyone from their faction done so and survived to spread word )? Well then, they have an idea of what the party tactics are likely to be, and will have brought friends and/or gear meant to deal with those tactics. If the party is new to them, make sure that the opponents play to their strengths. If they're better at range, have them fight at range. Make the tactics of the bad guys a problem the Party needs to find a way to solve.
Mix up the environment & terrain. A combat with a herd of creatures in a forest clearing ( or large open cave ) is a lot different than a running combat on horseback while trying to chase down the escaping bad guys, or leaping from branch to branch of an enourmous tree 50' above the ground. Well designed terrain can be dynamic, and almost a participant in the battle, as changes to the environment change the nature of the battle. Good example of this would be a hotspring flat, bubbling dangerous explosions of scalding mud at semi-random intervals, or fighting on an ice floe where huge fissures split the ice and sometimes isolate parts of the battle from the rest. And lord help the Party if this terrain is something the bad guys have had time to prepare with pit traps, and ambush screens, and the like.
Mix up the activities. Combat does not need to be the only thing going on. What if the party is trying to fight their way out of the hold of a ship, as the ship is sinking, and the party is trying to open the cell trapping one of their members, with the action flipping back and forth between the party members trying to keep the Merrow at bay, and the Rogues are trying to puzzle open the lock ... oh no ... the ship just capsized on her side, everyone make a dexterity save ...
Steal every tactic, complication, and reversal you can mine out of popular entertainments ( books, movies, video games ).
And - ultimately - accept that some times, the Dice Gods will just bless the Party, and they will not be able to lose - they'll walk over the bad guys like they're nothing. That's not your fault.
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I have indeed. But I think my issue is as I mentioned above is that I try to have a big CR critter and a couple of low level ones rather than stacks of low level ones. But it means that he can focus his offense too easily and effectively. Kobold Fight Club is another good tool for CR guidance, btw.
Oh no - don't do this!
Action Economy - all Players beating on a single ( or few ) opponents - means that the bad guys get much fewer attacks than the bad guys.
If you can sketch out the math, the bad guys and the Players should be getting roughly the same number of attacks ( or actually the same proportion of damage to HP in per turn ).
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Thanks for the advice guys, particularly Vedexent. You've given me plenty to think on and plan for my next session. I'm definitely going to go more bad guys. And I'm also going to work on my terrain rather than just going with what's on the map in the guide, which tends to be flat and tight.
Jack Joke, not really. He has +1 to his AC and that's about it.
First, it sounds like you have a player that is really interested in how EVERYONE feels while playing. That's a great start.
Also, as others have mentioned. A couple of major things to keep in mind:
1) Action economy: how many actions do the opponents get compared to the party
2) Terrain: if you have a melee heavy party, throw some flying/climbing creatures in. Or form bottlenecks, or have your monsters avoid bottlenecks.
Is this a multiclassed character? what level is your party?
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"An' things ha' come to a pretty pass, ye ken, if people are going to leave stuff like that aroound where innocent people could accidentally smash the door doon and lever the bars aside and take the big chain off'f the cupboard and pick the lock and drink it!"
There's some really useful discussion here, loving it!
One of my favourite tricks for fights where I am not sure on the quantity of monsters I should throw at the party is to use a summon or reinforcement mechanic.
Yup, if they're mowing through the monsters too fast, I just throw more of them in there, possibly with some tougher variants leading groups of the regular ones.
There's various scenarios where this can occur - a magical spell/device activated by a bad guy can summon forth monsters to attack the party, with a delayed effect that warps in additional monsters every few rounds (aka when I feel it is needed to push the challenge).
This isn't something I will do often - but it's a mechanic I find useful if I am DM'ing for a group of characters I don't know well enough to accurately determine how well they deal with threat.
I would also ask the other players how they feel about the Barbarian killing everything in combat.
For example in my group i have a barbarian who, through judicious use of magic items, can murder a Balor in one turn. I have a plan to nerf that Barbarian but that's beside the point, he is effectively the only damage dealer in the party, everyone else has RP skills or similar, so they all love it when he outputs over 200 damage a turn.
A way forward if nobody is doing anything in combat is to add complications that require more than just brute force to overcome while in combat (For example a Balor exploding inadvertently killed a few dozen innocent bystanders because the Barbarian killed it in one round before they could escape).
There's plenty of ways to fix it without having the player retire their character.
If you're going with one baddie against a team, consider giving that baddie some legendary actions to balance the scales. This allows for the monster to do certain things after a players turn. Depending on what monster I'm throwing out, I make these different. For a more roguish enemy I give them a disengage & move ability, a hide ability, and an attack ability -- and then depending on how deadly the monster is and how many are in the group, they get 1-3 legendary actions each round. This is a quick way to make a single boss monster a good fight.
I also exercise separate HP pools. This ensures my baddies always get to use the cool tool in their arsenal. For example, I might have a boss with 150hp. Honestly, 150hp is going to be easy to demolish if its the only target. But! I make them three separate pools of 50hp. Once the party brings down 50hp, the baddie gets to do one big thing-- Maybe a recharge ability, or something I just make up-- immediately. In other cases, it might get a new power, or that might trigger reinforcements or an environment change. Then the next 50hp, once again something happens, something else. The final 50hp is where the players actually get to kill the dang thing. This allows for variety in combat, ensures the baddie uses its cool abilities in combat, and lets me have firmer control on the duration and intensity of the combat.
My advice; add extra monsters that focus on the Barb. Remember, this isn't a competitive game. It isn't a video game or board game. You are more like a director than a referee. DMs can't cheat. It is technically impossible for them to do so. While it may seem "wrong" to toss a troll into the group of goblins and have that troll really want barbarian for dinner, it isn't wrong. It is in fact exactly what you are supposed to do.
PS: Declaring, "the adventurers are now so wealthy and powerful that they retire to grand estates and feast while discussing their days of glory", is a viable option. Starting new characters is part of the fun of DnD. This may be concerning to some as they are invested in their characters, but all stories must end. Simply be honest and tell your players that you are having trouble with actually challenging their more powerful selves and that you'd like to start over where you can get more experience such that later, when you return to their original team, you can do them all justice.
I also exercise separate HP pools. This ensures my baddies always get to use the cool tool in their arsenal. For example, I might have a boss with 150hp. Honestly, 150hp is going to be easy to demolish if its the only target. But! I make them three separate pools of 50hp. Once the party brings down 50hp, the baddie gets to do one big thing-- Maybe a recharge ability, or something I just make up-- immediately. In other cases, it might get a new power, or that might trigger reinforcements or an environment change.
I really like this mechanic! It has the potential to change the entire nature of the combat, partway though the combat!
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I also exercise separate HP pools. This ensures my baddies always get to use the cool tool in their arsenal. For example, I might have a boss with 150hp. Honestly, 150hp is going to be easy to demolish if its the only target. But! I make them three separate pools of 50hp. Once the party brings down 50hp, the baddie gets to do one big thing-- Maybe a recharge ability, or something I just make up-- immediately. In other cases, it might get a new power, or that might trigger reinforcements or an environment change. Then the next 50hp, once again something happens, something else. The final 50hp is where the players actually get to kill the dang thing. This allows for variety in combat, ensures the baddie uses its cool abilities in combat, and lets me have firmer control on the duration and intensity of the combat.
I've been using this approach for many years now and it has a great effect, especially in light of the new players to D&D being involved in video games more often than not. The thing is, I don't like combat in D&D, it's boring. As a BBEG I get to swing, hit, swing harder, and then my players get to hit me back a dozen times, sometimes locking the BBEG out of any actions for a while. It becomes a game of attrition when you simply increase the HP or AC of the monster or running the risk of DM vs Player trying to make the combat feel dangerous for the players. Using something akin to the boss fights in video games has really turned combat on it's head for me, and my players, since they now have a fight that changes and so must they. This also allows for some very dramatic turning points in a combat that follows a fairly similar mechanic to 4e and good narrative flow. Fight starts and everyone swings, the boss takes significant damage and pulls out some big guns, then the boss sees they're losing and tries to run or complete his objective, finishing with victory or defeat for the heroes.
Tiered fights, this uses suggestions from most of the posters here:
Stage 1: Boss has 150 hp, the fight starts with an arrogant monologue and taunting. The boss tests the waters maybe by calling out his minions to attack the players. Otherwise he uses some simple attacks, tools, and abilities to harass the characters trying to get them to waste resources. Meanwhile they continue to work toward their end game, sacrificing the child, powering up the doomsday device, or what have you.
Stage 2: Boss has 100 hp, the fight gets personal and the boss recognizes the heroes as a threat. If he hasn't already tossed out minions, he does so now. His attacks get more aggressive and his tactics change from whittling down resources to trying to take out the major threats. He'll focus fire on the tank or the damage dealers, he'll grab/use a weapon/skill that is overwhelming to the combat. He's becoming more invested in removing the interference to his goal.
Stage 3: Boss has 50 HP, the fight has gone terribly wrong. He uses an ultimate ability, does something to severely impede the heroes, or pulls out a secret weapon. A wall drops between him and the heroes, he attempts to teleport away with the sacrifice, he drinks a potion or uses a spell to make himself into some massively powerful abomination, or he brings out some great fighter/beast that he feels is a last resort. Once again his tactics change, now he's more concerned with either survival or completing the end game at all costs.
This type of combat can really help give different players in the group their time to shine as well. I have a barbarian in my campaign who is very hard to kill, it's just the way a tanky character should be. I also have other characters who are more than happy to let the barbarian do all the work since they feel safe.
In the last combat that the group had they ended up watching, for the first time in a great while, as the barbarian was unable to help in any significant way. He has no magical weapons, and they had to fight 2 elementals, his ability to smash things hard was ineffective. His damage reduction was circumvented by having elemental damage rather than physical. However, the 4 casters in the group got their time in the light since they could use their powers to do what the barbarian couldn't. Before the elementals became the threat of the fight, they were simply attacking some higher ranked druids who were just lobbing spells at the party. The barbarian made their lives miserable since he could deal out so much damage and take a lot of punishment. When the druids had suffered enough damage and harassment, they just shifted into elemental form and took to removing the threat.
There's a lot of useful information in this thread, I hope all of this helps you in your games.
I'm curious if anyone has created an encounter in which maybe an orc chieftain or orug calls out one or two fighters/barbarians and the rest of the party and orc tribe watch as the chief/orug proves his strength and superiority? I envision the use of the HP pool being handy in dealing with a scenario like this, and I'm seriously contemplating this scenario for Wyvern Tor in LMoP, substituting an orug for the ogre. Party is currently lvl 3, and there are 6 of them, of which, 2 are fighters.
If he loves playing the barbarian, then why does he want to retire it for a silly reason like that? Have the other players complained about it?
Barbarians and fighters are supposed to hack monsters to pieces. Its their job!
In my brother's campaign one of the characters really is OP, a so called "bearbarian" cheese build, but he brilliantly solved this problem by "giving" the fighter a belt of hill giant strength. Casters can get wand of the war mage; anything that gives a character a general plus to hit or damage works great because 5e combat is very much about the hit points. When the players feel more confident they are able to tackle monsters of a much higher CR than the level they are at, unless you play them like a d#ck and use every advantage they have to the hilt (like flying and legendary actions for example). The characters in my campaign defeated a CR 16 dragon on lvl 9; granted one of them died and only one character was left standing when the great worm fell. But it was epic, just like the battle you described. Don't be afraid to let the party find some way of raising their dead compatriots even if they can't cast raise dead etc. The church is always in need of donations. Half the dragon's hoard, perhaps? How else is a religion supposed to get rich?
Stage 3: Boss has 50 HP, the fight has gone terribly wrong. He uses an ultimate ability, does something to severely impede the heroes, or pulls out a secret weapon. A wall drops between him and the heroes, he attempts to teleport away with the sacrifice, he drinks a potion or uses a spell to make himself into some massively powerful abomination, or he brings out some great fighter/beast that he feels is a last resort. Once again his tactics change, now he's more concerned with either survival or completing the end game at all costs.
So do you play completely fair here by pre-planning what the Boss has, or would you scale the last ditch resources to how well the Party has done in the combat? If the Party has been easily kicking his ass, taking little damage, he has a pretty hefty secret weapon ( just off the top of my head, perhaps a one-shot item like a sealed caly urn which contains 1 or more bound Fire Elementals - never used it before because he never had an emergency like this ). If the Party is pretty torn up, and has been really working at the battle, well ... he might just be tapped out, and tries merely to flee.
I think I would lean to reality is adjusting to the Party's state, camp. After all, as DMs, we still want the party to win, but we want their win to be exciting, hard fought, and have them feel it was well earned.
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Stage 3: Boss has 50 HP, the fight has gone terribly wrong. He uses an ultimate ability, does something to severely impede the heroes, or pulls out a secret weapon. A wall drops between him and the heroes, he attempts to teleport away with the sacrifice, he drinks a potion or uses a spell to make himself into some massively powerful abomination, or he brings out some great fighter/beast that he feels is a last resort. Once again his tactics change, now he's more concerned with either survival or completing the end game at all costs.
So do you play completely fair here by pre-planning what the Boss has, or would you scale the last ditch resources to how well the Party has done in the combat? If the Party has been easily kicking his ass, taking little damage, he has a pretty hefty secret weapon ( just off the top of my head, perhaps a one-shot item like a sealed caly urn which contains 1 or more bound Fire Elementals - never used it before because he never had an emergency like this ). If the Party is pretty torn up, and has been really working at the battle, well ... he might just be tapped out, and tries merely to flee.
I think I would lean to reality is adjusting to the Party's state, camp. After all, as DMs, we still want the party to win, but we want their win to be exciting, hard fought, and have them feel it was well earned.
I do a little of both, I have the abilities and effects already on the stat block so that I can seamlessly transition between the stages. Having a pre-planned strategy allows me to focus more on what's going on in game rather than making stuff up on the fly. However, as you pointed out, if the battle seems one sided, and it's not integral to the story at that moment, I will easily make the BBEG run away, escape, or otherwise turn the battle into a defeat without a TPK.
For example, last Saturday: I had the BBEG show up, I knew that he was going to start by being arrogant and toying with the party using simple spells to harass them. Once he started to take a noticeable amount of damage I had one of his minions show up and start attacking one of the characters in particular due to that one supposedly having what the BBEG wanted. As the BBEG got to about half health I had him take on an elemental form, one that would reduce the effectiveness of the melee fighters. When the fight hit it's climax, the players buying in to the urgency of the fight, I had a third druid show up, this one intent on keeping the dead bodies of the characters. This was all planned from the beginning, and it played out almost exactly as I envisioned.
However, soon after the third druid showed up the fight took a nasty spin for the characters. I watched as one of the players went down and failed 2 death saving throws, the other characters were in no shape to help her. I also watched, much to my pleasure and surprise, as one of the other players chose to run away. That gave me the insight that I needed to know that the fight was not going to end well for the players. I decided, instead of a TPK, I would turn it into a defeat, let the characters hit 0 and end the game with them being captured. It wasn't what I was hoping for, I had wanted them to realize they were outclassed and give in to the BBEG's demands. However, players are as stubborn as the day is long, so I turned it into a way I could turn the loss into something story related.
Sigh.
I haven't been DMing long. A little over 12 months. And my group has fun. We play for 3 hours every week, and it's a nice mix of combat, investigation, RP.... I put in a lot of work, drawing maps, developing NPC's, and I love drawing over arching storylines that work through PC's back stories to engage them and flesh out their characters. We are in our 3rd major campaign, and each one has either resolved a personal quest or evolved it in some way, while sowing seeds of future adventures. I find it a lot of work, but a lot of fun.
So I'm really disappointed in myself when one of my players comes to me and says he is thinking about retiring his Barbarian (who he loves playing) because he is worried that he is OP and takes away from the combat fun for the rest of the party. I don't believe a player can be OP, it's just a failing on my part to design combat that challenges the group in a variety of ways. This barbarian just mows through things. He did 80 points of damage in his turn the other night and just sawed a Barbed Devil in half. This is my fault. So help me, please, with my combat. At the start it was easy, but as my PC's are getting more powerful I'm struggling to keep up with it. It seems only 3 sessions ago that they fought a Thayan Red wizard and a bunch of wraiths and wights and was about 1 bad dice roll from a TPK. It was tense and exciting and beautiful. They loved it.
Please, some practical tips on making good combat for a party with a variety of range/melee fighters and a couple of spellcasters. At this point, I feel like I need to include more range attacks and change the spells up a bit for casters rather than just go with what's in the campaign guide.
A quick question, is the barbarian truly destroying everything and killing the combat for the other players, or is the player getting bored of the characters and wants to nicely change it up?
As far as encounters go, mixing in range and magic will change the pace, and is a great idea. Flying creatures tend to make a melee God suddenly wish they were a wizard, and will shine the spot light on other players with more range abilites.a
A other idea is to use more swarm tactics and minions. Does the evil alhoon maybe have a small army of orcs that can slow the barbarian down, doesn't matter his damage out when faceing a hoard of orcs. Sure he kills one a hit, but it wears him down. Also having a fight after fight with no resting time will take some wind out of every character's sales , and might give you the "holy crap we lived" enjoyment you talk about from the red wizard example.
He definitely doesn't want to change, but feels he needs to for the rest of the party to have more fun. That's not a sacrifice he should have to make.
I worry about too many monsters bogging down combat. So rather than a bunch of CR1 monsters, I throw in a 5. But that probably plays to his strengths way too much.
Thanks for the advice though, I'll definitely put it to use.
Have you spent time calculating challenge ratings for the party? The DMG is handy to help figure out appropriate levels, numbers of monsters, etc, based on party size and level. There may be some other resources in Volo’s too.
I have indeed. But I think my issue is as I mentioned above is that I try to have a big CR critter and a couple of low level ones rather than stacks of low level ones. But it means that he can focus his offense too easily and effectively. Kobold Fight Club is another good tool for CR guidance, btw.
First of all - don't beat yourself up to much.
Even if this is your fault ( and I'm not convinced that anyone is "at fault" here ), you're at least trying to make it better.
Not knowing your party, or how you structure combats, it's hard to give advice, but I can give you some pointers that come to mind.
Steal every tactic, complication, and reversal you can mine out of popular entertainments ( books, movies, video games ).
And - ultimately - accept that some times, the Dice Gods will just bless the Party, and they will not be able to lose - they'll walk over the bad guys like they're nothing. That's not your fault.
Hope some of that helps!
Best of luck.
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
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Oh no - don't do this!
Action Economy - all Players beating on a single ( or few ) opponents - means that the bad guys get much fewer attacks than the bad guys.
If you can sketch out the math, the bad guys and the Players should be getting roughly the same number of attacks ( or actually the same proportion of damage to HP in per turn ).
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.
Does the barbarian have a magic item (or two) that might be tipping the scales in his favor?
Thanks for the advice guys, particularly Vedexent. You've given me plenty to think on and plan for my next session. I'm definitely going to go more bad guys. And I'm also going to work on my terrain rather than just going with what's on the map in the guide, which tends to be flat and tight.
Jack Joke, not really. He has +1 to his AC and that's about it.
Don't beat yourself up over this.
First, it sounds like you have a player that is really interested in how EVERYONE feels while playing. That's a great start.
Also, as others have mentioned. A couple of major things to keep in mind:
1) Action economy: how many actions do the opponents get compared to the party
2) Terrain: if you have a melee heavy party, throw some flying/climbing creatures in. Or form bottlenecks, or have your monsters avoid bottlenecks.
Is this a multiclassed character? what level is your party?
"An' things ha' come to a pretty pass, ye ken, if people are going to leave stuff like that aroound where innocent people could accidentally smash the door doon and lever the bars aside and take the big chain off'f the cupboard and pick the lock and drink it!"
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D&D Beyond FoundersThere's some really useful discussion here, loving it!
One of my favourite tricks for fights where I am not sure on the quantity of monsters I should throw at the party is to use a summon or reinforcement mechanic.
Yup, if they're mowing through the monsters too fast, I just throw more of them in there, possibly with some tougher variants leading groups of the regular ones.
There's various scenarios where this can occur - a magical spell/device activated by a bad guy can summon forth monsters to attack the party, with a delayed effect that warps in additional monsters every few rounds (aka when I feel it is needed to push the challenge).
This isn't something I will do often - but it's a mechanic I find useful if I am DM'ing for a group of characters I don't know well enough to accurately determine how well they deal with threat.
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I would also ask the other players how they feel about the Barbarian killing everything in combat.
For example in my group i have a barbarian who, through judicious use of magic items, can murder a Balor in one turn. I have a plan to nerf that Barbarian but that's beside the point, he is effectively the only damage dealer in the party, everyone else has RP skills or similar, so they all love it when he outputs over 200 damage a turn.
A way forward if nobody is doing anything in combat is to add complications that require more than just brute force to overcome while in combat (For example a Balor exploding inadvertently killed a few dozen innocent bystanders because the Barbarian killed it in one round before they could escape).
There's plenty of ways to fix it without having the player retire their character.
If you're going with one baddie against a team, consider giving that baddie some legendary actions to balance the scales. This allows for the monster to do certain things after a players turn. Depending on what monster I'm throwing out, I make these different. For a more roguish enemy I give them a disengage & move ability, a hide ability, and an attack ability -- and then depending on how deadly the monster is and how many are in the group, they get 1-3 legendary actions each round. This is a quick way to make a single boss monster a good fight.
I also exercise separate HP pools. This ensures my baddies always get to use the cool tool in their arsenal. For example, I might have a boss with 150hp. Honestly, 150hp is going to be easy to demolish if its the only target. But! I make them three separate pools of 50hp. Once the party brings down 50hp, the baddie gets to do one big thing-- Maybe a recharge ability, or something I just make up-- immediately. In other cases, it might get a new power, or that might trigger reinforcements or an environment change. Then the next 50hp, once again something happens, something else. The final 50hp is where the players actually get to kill the dang thing. This allows for variety in combat, ensures the baddie uses its cool abilities in combat, and lets me have firmer control on the duration and intensity of the combat.
My advice; add extra monsters that focus on the Barb. Remember, this isn't a competitive game. It isn't a video game or board game. You are more like a director than a referee. DMs can't cheat. It is technically impossible for them to do so. While it may seem "wrong" to toss a troll into the group of goblins and have that troll really want barbarian for dinner, it isn't wrong. It is in fact exactly what you are supposed to do.
PS: Declaring, "the adventurers are now so wealthy and powerful that they retire to grand estates and feast while discussing their days of glory", is a viable option. Starting new characters is part of the fun of DnD. This may be concerning to some as they are invested in their characters, but all stories must end. Simply be honest and tell your players that you are having trouble with actually challenging their more powerful selves and that you'd like to start over where you can get more experience such that later, when you return to their original team, you can do them all justice.
I really like this mechanic! It has the potential to change the entire nature of the combat, partway though the combat!
Consider it stolen ;D
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
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I've been using this approach for many years now and it has a great effect, especially in light of the new players to D&D being involved in video games more often than not. The thing is, I don't like combat in D&D, it's boring. As a BBEG I get to swing, hit, swing harder, and then my players get to hit me back a dozen times, sometimes locking the BBEG out of any actions for a while. It becomes a game of attrition when you simply increase the HP or AC of the monster or running the risk of DM vs Player trying to make the combat feel dangerous for the players. Using something akin to the boss fights in video games has really turned combat on it's head for me, and my players, since they now have a fight that changes and so must they. This also allows for some very dramatic turning points in a combat that follows a fairly similar mechanic to 4e and good narrative flow. Fight starts and everyone swings, the boss takes significant damage and pulls out some big guns, then the boss sees they're losing and tries to run or complete his objective, finishing with victory or defeat for the heroes.
Tiered fights, this uses suggestions from most of the posters here:
Stage 1:
Boss has 150 hp, the fight starts with an arrogant monologue and taunting. The boss tests the waters maybe by calling out his minions to attack the players. Otherwise he uses some simple attacks, tools, and abilities to harass the characters trying to get them to waste resources. Meanwhile they continue to work toward their end game, sacrificing the child, powering up the doomsday device, or what have you.
Stage 2:
Boss has 100 hp, the fight gets personal and the boss recognizes the heroes as a threat. If he hasn't already tossed out minions, he does so now. His attacks get more aggressive and his tactics change from whittling down resources to trying to take out the major threats. He'll focus fire on the tank or the damage dealers, he'll grab/use a weapon/skill that is overwhelming to the combat. He's becoming more invested in removing the interference to his goal.
Stage 3:
Boss has 50 HP, the fight has gone terribly wrong. He uses an ultimate ability, does something to severely impede the heroes, or pulls out a secret weapon. A wall drops between him and the heroes, he attempts to teleport away with the sacrifice, he drinks a potion or uses a spell to make himself into some massively powerful abomination, or he brings out some great fighter/beast that he feels is a last resort. Once again his tactics change, now he's more concerned with either survival or completing the end game at all costs.
This type of combat can really help give different players in the group their time to shine as well. I have a barbarian in my campaign who is very hard to kill, it's just the way a tanky character should be. I also have other characters who are more than happy to let the barbarian do all the work since they feel safe.
In the last combat that the group had they ended up watching, for the first time in a great while, as the barbarian was unable to help in any significant way. He has no magical weapons, and they had to fight 2 elementals, his ability to smash things hard was ineffective. His damage reduction was circumvented by having elemental damage rather than physical. However, the 4 casters in the group got their time in the light since they could use their powers to do what the barbarian couldn't. Before the elementals became the threat of the fight, they were simply attacking some higher ranked druids who were just lobbing spells at the party. The barbarian made their lives miserable since he could deal out so much damage and take a lot of punishment. When the druids had suffered enough damage and harassment, they just shifted into elemental form and took to removing the threat.
There's a lot of useful information in this thread, I hope all of this helps you in your games.
I'm curious if anyone has created an encounter in which maybe an orc chieftain or orug calls out one or two fighters/barbarians and the rest of the party and orc tribe watch as the chief/orug proves his strength and superiority? I envision the use of the HP pool being handy in dealing with a scenario like this, and I'm seriously contemplating this scenario for Wyvern Tor in LMoP, substituting an orug for the ogre. Party is currently lvl 3, and there are 6 of them, of which, 2 are fighters.
If he loves playing the barbarian, then why does he want to retire it for a silly reason like that? Have the other players complained about it?
Barbarians and fighters are supposed to hack monsters to pieces. Its their job!
In my brother's campaign one of the characters really is OP, a so called "bearbarian" cheese build, but he brilliantly solved this problem by "giving" the fighter a belt of hill giant strength. Casters can get wand of the war mage; anything that gives a character a general plus to hit or damage works great because 5e combat is very much about the hit points. When the players feel more confident they are able to tackle monsters of a much higher CR than the level they are at, unless you play them like a d#ck and use every advantage they have to the hilt (like flying and legendary actions for example). The characters in my campaign defeated a CR 16 dragon on lvl 9; granted one of them died and only one character was left standing when the great worm fell. But it was epic, just like the battle you described. Don't be afraid to let the party find some way of raising their dead compatriots even if they can't cast raise dead etc. The church is always in need of donations. Half the dragon's hoard, perhaps? How else is a religion supposed to get rich?
So do you play completely fair here by pre-planning what the Boss has, or would you scale the last ditch resources to how well the Party has done in the combat? If the Party has been easily kicking his ass, taking little damage, he has a pretty hefty secret weapon ( just off the top of my head, perhaps a one-shot item like a sealed caly urn which contains 1 or more bound Fire Elementals - never used it before because he never had an emergency like this ). If the Party is pretty torn up, and has been really working at the battle, well ... he might just be tapped out, and tries merely to flee.
I think I would lean to reality is adjusting to the Party's state, camp. After all, as DMs, we still want the party to win, but we want their win to be exciting, hard fought, and have them feel it was well earned.
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.
I do a little of both, I have the abilities and effects already on the stat block so that I can seamlessly transition between the stages. Having a pre-planned strategy allows me to focus more on what's going on in game rather than making stuff up on the fly. However, as you pointed out, if the battle seems one sided, and it's not integral to the story at that moment, I will easily make the BBEG run away, escape, or otherwise turn the battle into a defeat without a TPK.
For example, last Saturday:
I had the BBEG show up, I knew that he was going to start by being arrogant and toying with the party using simple spells to harass them. Once he started to take a noticeable amount of damage I had one of his minions show up and start attacking one of the characters in particular due to that one supposedly having what the BBEG wanted. As the BBEG got to about half health I had him take on an elemental form, one that would reduce the effectiveness of the melee fighters. When the fight hit it's climax, the players buying in to the urgency of the fight, I had a third druid show up, this one intent on keeping the dead bodies of the characters. This was all planned from the beginning, and it played out almost exactly as I envisioned.
However, soon after the third druid showed up the fight took a nasty spin for the characters. I watched as one of the players went down and failed 2 death saving throws, the other characters were in no shape to help her. I also watched, much to my pleasure and surprise, as one of the other players chose to run away. That gave me the insight that I needed to know that the fight was not going to end well for the players. I decided, instead of a TPK, I would turn it into a defeat, let the characters hit 0 and end the game with them being captured. It wasn't what I was hoping for, I had wanted them to realize they were outclassed and give in to the BBEG's demands. However, players are as stubborn as the day is long, so I turned it into a way I could turn the loss into something story related.