Look, they’re the main characters of the story, they’re supposed to look badass sometimes…
It’s honestly really funny to me how frequently some DMs forget basic writing principles. If something is set-up, either by yourself or your players, you should find a way to pay it off. It’s a really lame story if your monk has developed an immunity to poison and it never comes up a single time. Chekov’s gun was made to be fired!
You also don’t need to make every enemy an idiot like a videogame. Monk catches an arrow? Archer wastes a turn figuring that out, calls it out to his teammates start of next turn and targets someone else.
A green dragon, depending on your source books, should be more than smart enough to notice its breath attack didn’t work on someone and change tactics.
It doesn’t work in every situation, like with enemies that shouldn’t be smart enough to figure it out, but there’s some great room for fun reminding your players that the enemies aren’t always braindead.
It also can add an extra layer to combat. Take out the commander that’s noticing this stuff to prevent it. Kill the archer before he can call out the monk caught his arrow, so another archer wastes a turn.
Talking is a free action. He’d say it right away.
But by no longer utilizing poison against the party because of the monk, the monk has effectively made the entire party immune to poison by virtue of it no longer being present in encounters! Hah!
But seriously though, cutting out stuff you know the party will hard-counter is just going to make the party not feel as cool. A balance of both is important. Believe me, as the guy in the party who could cast Silence, I know; hard-countering every boss encounter kind of makes the boss feel lame instead of fun.
I feel like too many DMs play against the players instead of with them
The goal is not for the DM to win and feel cool
The goal is to let the players win and feel cool
The goal is to let the players win and feel cool
I wouldn’t use “win” here because that’s not always the case. I’d say’
“The goal is to acknowledge players decisions and show that their actions matter, regardless of the final result.”
I prefer the BLeeM method: try to kill them and then be amazed at how they, like cockroaches, survive anyways
The number of online dms I hear complaining about flight speed races and flight spell boggles my mind. You just got licence to make 3d puzzles and encounters. And also show those players why spiders in magic the gathering had the ability to defend against flying creatures through out the 90s
I’m somewhat glad that Pathfinder doesn’t have silence in the same way that dnd has and nerfed the shit out of counterspell as well. The second one makes it so much more satisfying when you get to do it.
I don’t understand how silence “hard-counters”… I mean it blocks most casting for a round but it’s only a 20 foot sphere, that can easily be moved out of. Yes it gives like one turn of disabling a caster, but honestly, lots of spells give that already.
Dilligent casters in a magic heavy setting probably know the dangers of silence and have prepared ways to work around it.
I just don’t understand how it’s possible, like you say, “hard-counter every boss”. In specific situations, sure. But “every”? That would seem to me like just not a very smart/tactical DM you play with.
I managed to work up an immunity to Poison, so our DM had a drow princess get one last action when she got to 0 hp to attack me with her only attack spell as I had severely pissed her off, and it was cast at 5th level
But her only attack spell was Ray of Sickness
How long did you have to spend to become immune to Iocane powder?
But you know that I know that you know that I know!
Did that and when the monk was engulfed in the cloud of poison taking no damage he felt like quite the badass going for a flurry of blows with advantage (I told him with advantage because the dragon wasn’t expecting him to be unfazed and he kept himself concealed in the cloud on his approach).
That’s also when the rest of the party found out the monk was immune to poison.
10/10 would do that again
Last campaign I ran the paladin was so proud of herself for smiting down a couple lesser demons and gushed about it for the rest of the week. So for the next 3 arcs of that campaign I snuck in a cambion who was hounding the party and got his lights clocked in multiple times just knowing the dopamine release it gave that player even when every ‘challenging’ encounter crafter for that group was done in about 5 terms and took me nearly and hour to craft ahead of time.
To me as the DM it’s your job to learn what quirks or functionality of the players particularly enjoy about their characters and find a way to sneak in encounters, puzzles or situations that give that player time to shine and enjoy it. Even and especially if it trivializes the challenge you put into it.
First, hell yes.
Second, if you like being an adversarial DM, just let them know that’s the type of game you like to run. They don’t have to play and you will have to find some players that like that style.
Let your players do cool shit. Let them be good at what they built their character for. You can challenge them while still giving them opportunities to be awesome.
I’ll say that it’s less of an issue, 9 times out of 10, because what they’re going to be good at is weathering repeated encounters.
There’s so many monsters that do poison damage - especially in the mid levels - that you’d be hard pressed to run a campaign where they just stop showing up. Are you just not going to send anyone through the Underdark because a Monk is in the party? Stop using half the demons, aberrations, and magical beasts in the MM?
But for climatic fights, it can add to the drama when the encounter is on disadvantagous terms. Sometimes the cool shit is overcoming the seeming impossible.
No party is immune to 100 twig blights in close proximity.
Turn undead and fire spells.
This was always frustrating. One particular dm did that a lot. Oh, x was showing up so someone took y ability to deal with it? X no longer shows up ever again. Cool. Feels bad.
I have started to balance the game less and less and its getting more and more fun.
I mean, the Monk being immune to poison doesn’t save anyone else in the breath attack.
Part of D&D is building synergy between the classes and operating as a team. At the same time, it’s the group’s biggest vulnerability.
Mind-splort the meat shield, gum up the support, grapple the damage dealer, or backstab the controller. Suddenly, the team is scrambling as their game plan falls apart.
And green dragons have so many tricks up their sleeves! The last thing I’m worried about is the breath weapon. It’s our horny bard falling for her damned come-hither smile that keeps me up at night.
My favorite dragon encounter was a dragon that I still don’t know the species of. The damn thing was puce. My DM didn’t want us to have any meta knowledge.
It was fun though because of how we got to, and dealt with, said dragon. Dragon was in a mountain lair that, when scryed upon it was revealed, was full of traps and minions.
My wizard figured out that she had just enough 8th and 9th level spell slots to cast Xorn Movement, and Improved Invisibility on the entire party (no invisibility on herself though), and still have 2 casts of Unfailing Missiles (9th level spell she created). We successfully snuck into the dragons lair, and took positions. Our monk was ready to grapple its tail, our rogue was ready to backstab, and was flying because he had a magic item, our cleric was prepping Harm,and our fighter was annoyed that I put her behind myself.
I tapped said sleeping dragon on the nose, and said in Draconic, “Wakey wakey.” The dragon opened its mouth to use whatever breath weapon it had, and I said, “That’s not a good idea, that will just make me and my friends angry.”
The dragon then realized I was speaking draconic and parlayed with us. We explained that we didn’t even want to be there, but the gods had tasked us with the eviction of the few dragons that weren’t supposed to be on this particular prime material plane in the first place. We also explained that we had brought with us 20 empty bags of holding, and would prefer to relocate them off the plane to a plane of their choice. Thankfully that dragon took the deal. The other three ended up with their souls in rather large black diamonds, that the God of Knowledge had provided us.
Honestly, why do DMs feel the need to try and wipe the party? DMs should be hoping the party succeeds because the party is usually going to find a way to wipe without their assistance.
Usually it is one of two things. Either the person is just a toxic asshole who wants to fuck over everyone, which is not that rare or they think of themselves as a player as well a bit too much. While the Dungeon Master is a part of the game and a player, sometimes the line can get a bit blurred where it seems like the Dungeon Master is playing against you to win. Does not mean that they’re a bad dungeon master. Sometimes mistakes just happen or people get swept up, or other things they’re going on. Soft reminders like saying that you enjoy all playing the game together or other such language that makes it seem cooperative helps to extinguish this behavior from a dungeon master. Using language like you’re beating the dungeon master, even if it’s in a joking way, can instill that behavior in the dungeon master themselves.
