Non-Combat Combat

Non-combat combat. A weird combination of words, I’m sure, which is exactly why I want to talk about it today. First, let’s break down what I mean by it in the context of roleplaying games.

Combat, in roleplaying games is a remarkably common affair. A group of goblins show up, the adventurers draw their swords and axes and a few minutes later, there’s bloody corpses everywhere.

“Beardman, your turn.”
“I use cunning rethoric!”

What it also is, is a very regimented affair. The goblins show up, everyone rolls for initiative. One by one, everyone takes their turn to perform whatever actions they’re allowed and when everyone’s been, the turn rolls around again. This has a noticable effect on players, who know that when Initiative has been rolled, shit just got real.  Initiative means there’s things on the line and people are going to die.

Which brings us to non-combat, which is generally safe, a little freeform and lower-takes than the life-or-death of combat.

So why not combine both?
That’s right, today we’re talking about introducing combat mechanics to ratchet up the tension in non-combat situations.

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Player Ability vs Player Challenge

A few weeks ago my sunday D&D group reached 7th level and with 7th level came a whole host of new spells and abilities that gave them several brand new ways of murdering their enemies and taking their things. This also meant that the standard way of providing them with a challenging encounter didn’t quite work anymore so I had to go looking for new ways of threatening their treasure, lives and friends (in that order).

Tarrasque
Appropriate challenge for a lvl 20 party? yes
Appropriate challenge for a lvl 5 party? probably not

This post, I’d like to take a moment to look at challenging players in the context of their abilities, especially at higher levels. I’ll be going over when to let players revel in their power and how to properly challenge their more powerful abilities.

So without furder ado, let’s get into it.

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