With Wizards of The Coast releasing not one or two, but three new editions –Player Handbook, Dungeon Masters Guide, and Monster Manual – we now have a chance to run encounters a different way.
Luckily, D&D Beyond has gone above and… beyond, creating a guide that helps run exciting and efficient encounters. You can read more about it here! This article will go into some of the details that Davyd Barker (who wrote the original post) explained.
DM Preparations for Encounters
There should be a few main plot points that must be decided before your players face the complete unknown. The job of a Dungeon Master is to help their players determine and figure out a solution to the problem.
Types of Encounters in Your Game
Barker describes four example situations that can occur from an encounter.
- Brokering peace between hostile factions
- Retrieving an important item
- Taking out a special target
- Stopping a cult’s ritual
These can all be broken down into peace talks, retrieval of an item/object, taking out a target, and stopping the opposition’s goals. As the adventure starts have these options in mind.
As a Dungeon Master, you have the ability to assign checks based on what your players want to do. This is why planning everything out from beginning to end tends to never work out. You either send your players through the shallow-storyline-tunnel ending or as a DM feel like you did not get to tell your story, ending in frustration for either side.
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Do Not Be Scared for Your Players
Sometimes, you do not achieve your goals. It is a real feeling that everyone goes through and can be relatable, making the experience more immersive. Failing in your game could give your players the motivation to keep going.
There will always be two outcomes to an encounter. The players will achieve their goal or they will not. As mentioned above, failing is not always a bad thing. When planning your next encounter, give them a close battle, not a one-sided beating that ends in two to three rounds.
If they do end up failing, have something prepared for the experience. Just as you should come up with different solutions for encounters, be on standby with your player’s last requests.
It also does not have to be a situation where if they lose, they die. You don’t give the full kingdom’s treasure to the heroes who stopped a gang of hooligans from messing up the local tavern. Try to match the punishment to the importance of the situation.
This is why, when your players win, they can look back at all the times they might have failed and feel real excitement at victory.
Choosing Encounters for Your Game
This portion is what DM’s probably have the hardest time figuring out. Luckily, we have an article dedicated to tools that a Dungeon Master can use – here. We mention Donjon.com for dungeon building, but they also have an amazing Encounter Size Calculator based on challenger rating.
Based on what we have seen from the website and personal experience, we would reccomend going up a scale or two on their challenger scale. This is important for low-level fights, as players tend to be able to one-shot them quickly,
In D&DBeyonds article, encounters are put into three categories – low, moderate, and high difficulty. Low-difficulty fights should have a few exciting moments but should leave characters with a few knicks here and there. The possibility of a healing potion might be needed.
Medium-difficulty starts to up the ante. With enough mistakes and not enough preparation from players, their party might not leave the encounter as one. These are the encounters where punishments become real and should stay with the players going forward.
Davyd Barker says that high-difficulty encounters could be “lethal for one or more characters, and the party will need to employ cunning tactics and quick thinking to emerge victorious. And even then, they still might need some luck.“
Closing Thoughts
In the rest of the article, they go into detail about XP levels and what monsters you should choose based on these factors. While this website is a milestone-leveling household, we honor those who use it and reccomend checking out the article for the full deep dive.
One final tip we would like to share with you is to make sure the encounters seem like they would be placed there even if your players never stumbled upon it. While woah-factors are fun, the immersion is what most will look for. Gygaxian Naturalism (wow we so happen to have an article on that as well) is the pinnacle of creating an in-depth fantasy realm. Creating realistic situations and ecosystems following a simple thought process.
Encounters are what bring the players and the DM together in direct interaction. Making them memorable and challenging will leave your players wanting more and maybe even show up on time for the next session.
Remember DM’s, if they beat all of your traps and encounters, reward your players kindly!
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