When I make adventures there are encounters that are going to be easier or very difficult for the players. In Knowledge Illuminates, a 1st level adventure, there is an encounter with an Ankheg that could be party killer. If the party tries to go toe-to-toe it won't end well. But if they choose to go after it, they'll need to come up with a plan. That's where the fun is. Also, in the same adventure, there is a very bad, bad magic item that could do bad,bad thing to the players. But at no time is anyone telling them they have to use it. There is a group that will tell them not to use it and there are enough hints that using it will be a bad, bad idea.
While I don't like to go out of my way to see that encounters are balanced for the party. I do playtest my adventures. I try to run them at least twice and if I can get some one else to run the adventure once. I want to see if I inadvertently created a death trap. While I am not into balancing encounters I also won't create unavoidable, mindless death traps. It's frustrating to the players and boring to me. When I playtest an adventure I can see where the problem are.
A good GM can also adjust the difficulty level of an adventure fairly easy. I can build an adventure for 1st thru 3rd level dudes. My parties usually consists of four guys. So that's what I write for. If your group has six to eight guys the encounter might be to easy. So while an adventure may have a suggestion of levels, it depends on size of the party. Some of them bring hirelings in tow. At this point the GM could increase the number of the enemies or increase the hit points or hit dice of the creatures. Or whatever way you chose to create.
I've had dragon or giants or liches in 1st level adventures. Usually they played an peripheral role, but if the PC wanted to challenge, suck up to, or, as one player wanted, to pee on the sleeping giant than rewards are given out for stupidity, cleverness or the distance of the urine stream. Most PCs are smart enough to avoid, or watch. But once in awhile a player is going to want to make a power play at a low level. If they can pull it off, bravo. If they don't, more likely they'll be rolling up a new guy.
In my experience, these unbalanced events/encounters are what my players find memorable. They can be built into an adventure arc the players are working through. Think of Conan and his parents and friend slaughtered by Thulsa Doom's men. It set up the first stage of an epic.
The DM is the game balance.
ReplyDeleteI strongly (but respectfully) disagree. At least for "exploration based, sandboxy" games. Players are the game balance. The DMs role is to present world in a way the players can evaluate threat and risk it, mitigate it, or decide it's too tough and avoid.
DeleteBut, to your point, when running a "fixed" adventure a DM should be able to lower/raise risk (level) unless they are ok with party deciding to "avoid" the entire adventure for greener pastures.
Than I am out of balance Jason. ha. Like Norman wrote, I'll write up a scenario with a bad, bad bug in it and the players access the critter as killable and attack. I won't balance the bug because they were too low of level to attack. I may have a 'red shirt' get the brunt of the attack to illustrate the the bug is king. For now.
DeleteI've had low level characters encountering minotaurs, medusas, trolls, giants,m vampires and if they decide to attack with no plan they characters get to die. Players can be smart regardless of the level of their characters, if players don't learn to have characters run away at low level they aren't going to know when to do so at higher level.
ReplyDeleteAmen Brother JD!
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ReplyDeleteI believe that if you put it in front of me it is a problem, I am supposed to solve. So if the GM puts a Hill Giant in front of my 1st level fighter there is some plot he has prepared that I need to confront. When I plan for a session I make encounters easy, hard and challenging. This does not always mean that it is solved by swinging a sword. But if you put something in of a PC they are going to think it is part of the adventure. They may be supposed to follow the giant to the orc lair and PC may do something like attack it.
When all else fails run X5 the Temple of Death
Two of my PCs died with you wrote Temple of Death. Just like that.
DeleteI dunno. That's one way to play. Another way is to create a grand situation (let's call it a "sandbox") that could apply to any character of any level. Then, let the players make choices about how to move through this "sandbox". If they move into the area with the hill giant, then they encounter the hill giant. If their characters don't have the power to deal with it directly, then they have to avoid it or cut the Gordian knot somehow.
DeleteAny players who think about a meta concept like "the adventure" and apply it as if it had meaning deserve their characters' fates in such a play style.
For me, I really dislike the idea that the players are "supposed" to do any particular thing. That way lies "Story First" gaming and railroading.
Random encounters happen. Why would any Player -- or DM -- think that "bugbears" are the worse things the party can run into?
ReplyDeleteSure, the occasional Hill Giant, or Ettin, perhaps even a juvenile dragon, just starting out, are sleeping in the very cave the group chose to get out of the weather. Oops!
Players need to realize that attacking everything in sight is not always the right answer.
My Players tend to start acting -- and fighting -- like a "team" by the end of the fifth, or sixth, Adventure. Yeah, I know "how dumb can they . . . "
It's true. And without team work, most of the things they run into are going to kill them. Sorry. Sometimes, the DM does need to intervene to prevent TPK.
But that's the DM's decision.
I never intervene to prevent a TPK. And to be honest, my players are usually cracking up as it happens. It's usually fun. Then we make some new guys.
DeleteOh, I never said it was "needed," only that the DM was the only one who could prevent it. when my Players do something that stupid, I'm happy to let them die too! LOL
Deletehehe, yeah. While I enjoy the occasional TPK, it rarely happens. My players are on to me.
DeleteI think the problem with the concept of game balance is that it is generally used to mean that every encounter is set up so that players can face the foe toe-to-toe in combat on even terms.
ReplyDeleteThe problem with balance in that sense is that players have absolutely no incentive to find any way around a problem other than simply fighting it.
Throwing in situations where straight-up combat won't work (and giving players enough up front info to discern this) allows/inspires/forces players to come up with more creative ways to handle situations – set up an ambush, create a diversion, talk to the bad guys, run away, make allies and come back with them, etc.
Of course, the part about giving the players enough up front info to make that call is really the vital component, otherwise they may think they can take on an adversary in straight-up combat and get slaughtered in an unforseeable mismatch, which isn't necessarily fun either.
I try to think of balance differently, where balance means "giving players a reasonable enough amount of info to evaluate risk and formulate a plan." In that sense, I see balance as crucial. If the first level characters have the opportunity to avoid that encounter with the red dragon, or talk their way out of it, or run away from it, etc. then the encounter is "balanced" in my mind.
"I try to think of balance differently, where balance means "giving players a reasonable enough amount of info to evaluate risk and formulate a plan.""
DeleteWhile I completely agree with the sentiment, I'm not sure that I'd call that "balance".
Well said Chris. I think that's what I was trying to say, but never got there.
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