DM Wounded in RPG Combat

Last week I started running our old campaign again--the one that began in 2003 when D&D 3.5 was released.

I knew I had limited time to run the game--everyone's a lot busier than we were eight years ago. So I plotted a small arc out over 5 sessions and off we went. 

The first session concentrated on role-play and exploration. There was an option for combat, but the characters were able to say and do the right things to avoid the confrontation. However, a D&D 4e character sheet is jam packed with combat options--at level 12 there are several pages of combat options--and I knew it would be only a matter of time before the players got restless watching all those nifty powers go unused. So at the end of session 2 I forced a fight.

We have a pretty strict cutoff time of 10 p.m., and I've promised the players I would abide by it. Since there wouldn't be a standard 3 encounter combat arc (about the amount of time it takes for the PCs to expend their resources before an extended rest), I increased the difficulty slightly. Five level 12 PCs vs. seven level 12 monsters. That's almost 2 encounter levels higher. Not bad for characters with all their resources. 

Nevertheless, despite prompting the players to keep things moving, the encounter lasted until 10:30 p.m. 

Ironically, the monsters were fast-moving wights. I pictured them moving like the zombies from 28 Days Later. As usual, I prompted the players to describe their actions cinematically, but that was probably only fun for about half an hour or so. Around 45 minutes in, I think we were all getting weary but the monsters were still coming on strong. After that, I feel like the battle boiled down to die rolls. Both the PCs and the monsters were positioned optimally so there wasn't much reason to move, just hack and slash.

By the time we finished, I think we were all pretty tired. I hastily cleaned up. The players said they'd had a good time and they left, but they're my friends and they have good manners.

I went to bed worn out and agitated, woke up five hours later annoyed and a little depressed. Something about that fight rubbed me the wrong way. I compared the monster stats to other monsters of the same level, but there was no discrepancy. I looked over the characters to make sure they had all the "equipment bonuses" they needed at their level, but that checked out too. 

I think what bothered me most was that the game had consisted of two hours of real time role-play and exploration/challenges where lots of things had happened over the course of a few days (game time), whereas the next hour and a half of play (real time) had been dedicated to about a minute or two of game time. And how important was that combat really? In our previous campaign I usually chose the battle pretty carefully. For the most part they occurred at dramatically appropriate moments (and they were all heroic tier combats). Even though I'd pushed role-playing and character in last night's session, I feel that the fight overshadowed those elements and became the most important part of the session--perhaps in a similar was that the players' character sheets include combat mechanics that overshadow the "human" aspects of the character. 

I'm going to take the blame for all of this. The fight wasn't completely arbitrary, but much of it was. Going forward, I think I'll return to "fights as options." That is to say, there won't be much combat in the game that the PCs don't initiate themselves.

It could be that I've been playing too many indie RPGs or falling too much in love with the simpler mechanics of early RPGs like Star Frontiers, but it's probably both of these at once. I've always been a story/role-play DM, and I'm only becoming more so in my (relative) old age as a gamer. Fights should be exciting. They should be tense, dramatic, suspenseful, or else they should be light, fast, and fun. They should be quick duels to the death or a few minutes of swashbuckling action. They should move the story along, not drag it down like a millstone. A week ago I saw Lifeline Theatre's phenomenal production of The Count of Monte Cristo (extended through November 13th--go see it!). There was a tense sword fight in that show that seemed to last about 45 seconds; it was quick, impassioned, and it looked extremely deadly. When it happened, the audience sat up in their seats, leaned forward. That's what a fight should feel like. You can see a snippet of it here, 37 seconds into the video (side note: there's a strong D&D contingent at Lifeline; the combatant on the right is a renowned Pathfinder GM in these here parts). 

The Count of Monte Cristo, trailer from Lifeline Theatre on Vimeo.

So what am I going to do about it?

I'll be phasing out any combat that's not absolutely necessary and letting the player characters pick their fights more often than not. I may rule that critical hits either bloody or kill non-elite and non-solo creatures automatically (but not PCs); it's easier to bring in a  new monster into a fight to make it harder than to seamlessly get rid of active combatants. I may tax PC resources a little more so that their daily powers and some healing surges return more slowly (i.e. after 3 encounters regardless of extended rests). These are all just possibilities that I'll likely improvise as I proceed, trying to find the right mix for my D&D group. Mostly, though, I'll just focus on character and story like I usually do. I still hold that combat should be a single interesting part of the story; it should not be the story. Last night I let it get out of hand.