D&D Combat is Boring (and how to fix it)

So combat is important for D&D, but the thing is that combat can be very boring in DnD, so how do we fix that?
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Here are some other videos on combat and tips on how to get better at running it:
• How To Make D&D COMBAT...
• Fixing my BORING D&D c...
• Felix Tips: SPICE UP Y...
Video Editing by the amazing Bia: / bnazf
Writing, Illustration, and Narration by me: / antodemico
Additional sketches by the amazing Fey: / feymilde

[@pointyhatstudios]

Hit them with the one two punch of the extremely clickbaity title 😌👊 Y'all know how many versions of these videos are out there, I needed to do it for people to actually click on it, pls forgive me 🙏

[@TinyRobotED-tm9rs]

Hi

[@harlanlamar1874]

Beanies are better than hats

[@TinyRobotED-tm9rs]

@@harlanlamar1874 HERESY AND TREASON

[@williamoskerson1218]

Lol absolutely love your content, would click regardless. Pointy hats are best hats.

[@lincolndunford6693]

@Harlan Lamar And helmets are better than beanies

[@NoSystemFound]

The worst part about watching the newest Pointy Hat video is waiting two weeks for another one

[@TinyRobotED-tm9rs]

I completely agree

[@pinkwooper5129]

Truth

[@andreiafernandes2798]

Agreed, but the wait makes it better. Like how you enjoy a meal more when you’re famished.

[@elpidadonce]

Absolutely.

[@justanotherchannelonyoutub126]

No kidding. I’ve been watching all of his videos for the last few week during my lunch break and when I finished I realized that I’d have to wait

[@animemaniacforever]

I barely see this mentioned, but one of my DMs at some point ran a Waves combat scenario, where our goal was to protect a key NPC in their mansion from waves of enemies swarming from all sides. We even had the time to prepare the environment with traps and stuff, it was awesome!

[@SockieTheSockPuppet]

Exactly. I find it a little weird how he brought up videogames, but didn't bring up how wave tactics has been a thing for ages. I myself even have come up with dynamic ideas for boss fights, and one was exactly a wave scenario. It was pretty much a siege of an enemy guard stronghold, with the final fight of the stronghold involving both a growing fire in the garrison and an increasing amount of guards due to an alarm bell. The longer it took to take down the guards and mid-boss, both the fire would spread and more and more guards would appear (so long as the alarm bell was still "on"). So you either slam all of the guards and boss and book it before the next wave of soldiers get there, do something about the alarm so that reinforcements stop getting alerted, or try and do something about the fire (or even make it worse with powder kegs if you want). Maybe it's just me, but I always come up with options ingrained into specialized combat encounters.

[@declanreiser236]

Yep one of my favorite sessions ever was like this to ! We had to protect an island from a pirate fleet we knew was arriving later. So we had to figure out the environment and lay things out in our favor first !

[@cass6020]

I ran like 10 sessions for a pair of Gamers who really liked Monster Hunter and found out that my favorite thing as a DM is getting into the head of a monster and giving the players a chance to prepare for encounters that are generally more potentially lethal than what a random encounter can be

[@memyself229]

I want Fortnite save the world in DnD 😂

[@drahydra]

As someone who runs a lot of survival-focused games, many of the encounters I ran ended up being target changing, as the monsters attacking the party are usually going for their supplies, not their throats. Crowd control becomes very important when it's about getting some desert bandits away from your jugs of water, for instance.

[@xCCflierx]

Defending supplies is a great goal. When the goal is no longer to kill the enemy, killing the enemy can also be seen a s a bad thing If you kill their friends while they are down they might get desperate and decide if they're going to die anyway, might as well spoil your food and water so you eventually follow and die.

[@LewisDruid]

I kinda like the Fire Emblem approach. Introduce things like “get to x point before the enemy” “defend person/position until help arrives” “defeat the leaders” etc. Mix it up with more strategy needed, more/different lose conditions, and subverting expectations about what’s to come.

[@jossebrodeur6033]

Yeah, at the end of the day D&D xombat plays like a strategy game, so it's easy to inplement. An early game boss I find great for new players is a Goblin Shaman performing a ritual, and they're going to sacrifice someone to do taht. The party has 10 turns until the ritual is complete, and if they take oyt the shaman the other goblins will surrender. Until then, the other goblins will actively work to protect the shaman from the party.

[@toasterroast7678]

@@jossebrodeur6033 When running something like this, do you tell the players the number of rounds remaining or just use context clues?

[@thomasquesada7248]

@@toasterroast7678considering a turn of dnd is 6 seconds, if they know it it can totally be given through context

[@astridmarie6412]

Here’s some other ideas: • An important NPC is possessed or being manipulated in another way that makes them hostile. The goal is to figure out how to get them back, subdue them without hurting them and overpower the hostile effect. The effect could be from a magical necklace, a spirit or something else • Take a sense away with a sudden entrapment in a bubble of magical darkness, silence, zero gravity ect. it will force the players to think creatively and choose whether to stay and fight or try to find their way out. • The environment itself is the hostile enemy. Make an obstacle course for the party to get through made of a sentient environment. You can’t just kill an entire forest. They don’t have a single creature to keep track of but everything around them has the possibility to be hostile

[@gerlofwoudstra7506]

Great suggestions. I remember a session where we had to go into an underwater cave with zero visibility, each tied with a rope to each other in a line. The GM used notes to communicate with players to make sure that nobody knew what was happening to each other and we all freaked out when suddenly the line would go slack.........

[@Typhoon.703_]

I throw my own idea into the mix. Have multiple possible win states in an encounter if possible. Say a group of bandits attack the party, your party can: 1.- kill them all. 2.- Make them flee. 3.- Negociate with them. 4.- Escape.

[@oblivion715]

Bold of you to assume you CAN'T kill an entire forest.

[@slinelol]

I had a great battle around your first suggestion once! Gonna put it down here so people have an example. I played a barb meatshield tank and our GM threw my thoughed to be dead husband at us, corrupted by the big bad evil. My charakter couldn't bring himself to hurt his love, still grappling with the fact he is indeed alive. I just kept on restraining him on the ground, taking an enemy out of the fight but also denying my team one of their biggest sources of savety, my like 130hp compared to their 60. The goal of my team became to protect us while not dying themself and I was rolling social checks on a low charisma charakter with special bonuses on my role depending on what I brought up from my background. One of the greatest fights which literally brought me to tears when the big bad teleportet my husband out of the fight into imprisonment once i broke through the corruption. On top of this aaaaaaaaamazing fight our group now had an additional quest with personal stakes

[@SwayRod836]

In the campaign I play in my character was banished to Purgatory (first layer of Hell). The other characters set out on an odyssey to rescue him. I actually created a new character to temporarily join the party. Meanwhile out of game I planned with the DM to change my character from a fighter to a barbarian because he'd naturally go insane down there. He liked the idea and also had my character be controlled by the boss of that area. When the reveal happened I ended up fighting the party as my old character and with them as my new character and I gave it my all playing opposing characters.

[@ether4211]

Mage Ball has been canon in our DMs campaign for years. It starts with a Wizard slapping another Wizard with a mage hand and challenging them to MAGE DUEL. If accepted both teams are teleported to 'the void' a white space with a basketball court and the Space Jam music starts. The ball is a sphere of Annihilation and can only be moved via magic and magic items. You roll initiative and whoever gets their ball though the enemies hoop 3 times first wins.

[@rowdyriolu1]

I love how you specify that the Space Jam music starts playing

[@ether4211]

@@rowdyriolu1 we play on Roll20 and our DM always had the music and demiplane prepped for a emergency mageball game to occur at any time lol.

[@ether4211]

@@morrigankasa570 my wizard banished the ball after her team scored so that nobody else could use it.

[@johnnelson4411]

This sounds wonderful 😂

[@jackinthebox8177]

Me and my homie playing mage ball to decide who pays for our drinks at the local tavern tonight (I have no coins and I suck at mage ball)

[@Arthas30000]

9:00 Change the target 11:15 Reach a goal 13:05 Style Points 15:04 Sports

[@dydchilensis240]

Thx bro.

[@gerozeal2410]

I can hear the Smash announcer with these encounter options.

[@AgtShadowWalker]

I had the idea for a combat encounter recently. The goal is essentially to Protect the NPC. A monster (in my lore, a Fiend) requires a ritual to make them vulnerable. The NPC will complete the ritual in x amount of turns. If the monster dies too quickly, it will simply regenerate somewhere else in the world. So, the party needs to NOT kill the monster too quickly, otherwise it will escape. But about halfway through, the monster catches on and starts targeting the NPC. I think you can see where this is going. Just a fun little idea I thought would be fun.

[@Funstun-yk7oo]

This is actually a really good one. Even has two fail conditions which would be great rp scenarios

[@pyroceltic]

This reminded me of a combat I ran where the goal was to rescue a person that was kidnaped. So not only did the party have to defend themselves, they had to catch up to the kidnapped person, save them and then take them away from the bad guys without being harmed. It was a chase, rescue and escape whith weird terrain and we all had a lot of fun.

[@RedBlitzen]

THIS reminded ME of an idea I had for a boss battle. Some background, to set the scene. To keep it simple, for some time now the pc's have been hearing about a serial killer in a region. They keep breaking into places by means unknown and either killing people or kidnapping them. Maybe they hear about this when someone asks them to fill in for guards that were ordered back to the city to try to stop this guy. At some point, the party discovers the killer is a cannibal. He literally eats his victims alive! And lately, he's been going after KIDS! The boss battle is to keep the killer away from a kid in a mansion. The party racing after the killer, trying to drop him before he reaches the innocent child. Meanwhile the killer is dropping Misty Step, Mislead, Command, etc.

[@timelessadventurer]

This sounds awesome! Thanks for inspiring us!

[@shineshadow]

More ideas: Protecting casters while they perform a ritual. Adding siege weapons to Combat that have to be fired to go to the next area. Adding some Spell circles or altars to combat which allow you to damage certain enemies. Finishing a mechanism or repairing a construct while fighting. Snatch and Grab some Item from the enemies while having time constraints. Kill some assassin during a theater Play without the audiance finding Out. Fight on a giant creature that is fighting another giant creature until you can get on the enemy

[@Doublemonk0506]

Adding one here: Herd a group of NPCs to an area while dealing with enemy NPCs who'll interfere with the herding Example: LV 1 players herding sheep to a pasture while a rival farmer uses dogs and explosive to scare the sheep away

[@davisperry8755]

I’ve ran a version of the last one before, with the goal being to enter inside the wierd magic kobold mech and get a flag whilst it was fighting something

[@wafflingmean4477]

The snatch and grab makes me think of a fight in Campaign 2 when the villain and his allies had stolen something from them, and they try to fight his whole party to get it back, quickly realise they're out of their depth and it becomes a desperate struggle to just get the thing they need and break combat so they can live to fight another day when they're better prepared. I thought it was one of the most tense fights of the whole campaign.

[@ooooneeee]

The one about defeat an assassin in the audience of a theater performance is an amazing idea. Great for rogues, Spellcasters and sniper rangers.

[@shineshadow]

@@ooooneeee Thanks! It is a weird subtype of an Heist or Assassination. You could also make it the Goal to simply say it must look like an accident or get someone else to kill the Target. Basically everything that forces them to think in a new Way.

[@EspyMelly]

The style battle literally rewards characters for yelling out their attack names as they're doing them. The power of magic and anime.

[@Aphidae]

Clerics have both the power of god and anime on there side!

[@Signedcentaur]

BORN IN A WORLD OF STRIFE! AGAINST THE ODDS! WE CHOOSE TO FIGHT! BLOSSOM DANCE!

[@flameofmage1099]

Finally. My cool stuff that wastes my turn matters!

[@samh9154]

I was really inspired by overwatch and "push the cart" mechanics. Having a really heavy artifact to transport and having players decide how to use their actions to push or fight really helped. I also had a bridge that was just big enough for the cart so players had to either be in front or behind. The trick was the bridge could only handle a certain amount of weight and if it got too heavy, it would collapse.

[@charlieluscombe9074]

Amazingly well timed because ive just started a new campaign with 4 brand new players so I gave them a *very* simple combat to ease them into it and get them used to the mechanics and one of them fell asleep so-

[@alexanderkorol677]

I will never understand some people...It takes me an eternity to fall asleep in perfect conditions.

[@Sezenian]

Same here Amazing Coincidence

[@victorvictor_dead_kro_nov_jail]

so bring them a bodak or maybe try to see if the other players don't take eons to play because I'm to familiar with this... but yeah the bodak could work too

[@Cassapphic]

It could probably be that combat was moving slower than usual due to having to regularly remind players of core rules. I recently started playing dnd as a DM who has never played with a group of friends who are all new and our very first combat was very slow and clunky as I had to explain people's options a lot and they slowly got used to it, but by the end of the session combat moved much faster as people knew what they could do (except abilities they forgot like sneak attack, or me having to remind the barbarian to rage)

[@ElijahForLong]

My favorite one shot I run, the party is tasked with retrieving a dragon egg from a sleeping dragon lair. When they get there, they encounter a group of bandits who wish to steal the egg and a group of towns guard who wish to destroy it. So the whole encounter is about retrieving the egg while making as little sound as possible while also having to deal with two other groups with their own agendas.

[@ElijahForLong]

I also do a sport called Goblin dash. It's basically American football, but the balls a goblin who really doesn't want to go into the goal.

[@lordmarcusrax]

​@@ElijahForLongbeautiful

[@yoshilovesyoshi]

Sounds fun! I'd like to run it with my group too! Do you have stat blocks that I could use to run it?

[@ElijahForLong]

@@yoshilovesyoshi I just used an adult red dragon, 1 bandit captain, 4 bandits, 1 knight, and 2 guards. The guards only tried to attack the players if necessary, but the bandits didn't care who lived or died, as long as they got their payday. As for the dragons sleep mechanic, I think it was something like this: Stealth checks to not wake the dragon started at a dc 8. At the end of a creatures turn, it makes a Stealth check. If a creature took no actions on it's turn other than for movement (or movement spells and abilities that didn't require verbal components), it makes the Stealth check with advantage. If it spoke aloud during it's turn, attacked a creature, or generally took an action that generates a normal amount of noise, they rolled straight. If they failed a check to cross difficult terrain or dash silently, used an especially loud spell or ability (such a shatter), or similar effect, they roll with disadvantage. Every time a creature fails the Stealth check they make at the end of their turn, they increase the dc by the amount missed (up to 4). When the dc reaches certain points, the dragon stirs causing different effects, such as knocking over piles of gold, blowing fire in its sleep, and waking at a dc 30. The players also got a sleeping potion that decreased the dc by 5 and if a creature cast sleep, it decreased by the spell level. Sadly I haven't ran it in several months and I don't know where the map is.

[@yoshilovesyoshi]

@chanelinks7851 thank you! That's all still very helpful!

[@Oliviaevans2726]

I think one of my favorite shifts, which I feel like isn’t talked nearly enough is to save people. That there are innocents dying and rubble falling, and they can kill the baddies but if all of the civilians die the victory is hollow. It makes a cool balance when I’ve done it, where the martials and especially my barbarian shine because they run out and hold back the enemies as the casters use their battlefield control in interesting ways to get people to safety

[@kylekain5241]

Had a battle of the bands where players had to describe their own performance rolls against the enemies performance rolls and the bard had to make it all make sense together. It was a blast.

[@crazytiger1017]

I REQUIRE MORE INFORMATION

[@jbpeony7872]

our regular DM uses filler episodes to our campaign where we go out to the beach and use our skills and spells for innocuous tasks like cooking or volleyball. It was so fun we ran a combat like a dodgeball game once: the goal became increasing your AC so you dont get hit, the bard gives out bardic to help others hit the opposing team or using the dodge action to impose disadvantage. You could also do a DEX save to catch the ball but if you fail you get hit. all that stuff. it was so fun~!

[@DevonRegular]

In our current campaign we entered a competition that had goals like capture the flag, race, and obtain item from extremely dangerous cage before all other teams. It was a lot of fun and made us really think about our skills

[@tootsiehunter7523]

There was this one fight that actually was a couple weeks ago and it left the campaign on a cliffhanger, but everyone's been busy so we haven't been able to continue. The fight started cause someone in the party was blackmailed into stealing some very powerful items from the party to save their adoptive father. Instead of kill him (also cause he was playing a totem barbarian) it was to incapacitate and take the stones back. We ended up using polymorph and turning him into a sloth

[@brookejon3695]

Polymorph is the goat

[@jenschristensen1774]

@@brookejon3695 My players polymorphed an human overpowered opponent into a turtle, buried her in a deep hole and lifted the spell, thus crushing her. Rinse and repeat with a giant scorpion turned into a worm and put into a crevasse. So, now they often meet more enemies than they can polymorph 😉

[@Blizzic]

A great place to look for more goals is game modes in multiplayer games. King of the Hill, Capture the Flag, Assault (planting the bomb at a location and making sure it goes off), Oddball (hold onto the macguffin for as long as possible), Kill Confirmed (enemies drop something when beaten that you need to collect to win), Territories (you need to secure several different areas of the environment at once to win), stuff like that. Another great source of inspiration are military situations/strategies. For example, if the players are serving as the Rear Guard, their objective is to make sure that someone else escapes in order to win. If the players are doing a raid, their objective might be to prevent someone’s escape from a compound, meaning everything except that specific target is a distraction or in the way. There’s all sorts of stuff you can do, and it can be fun as hell!!One of my favorite combats I’ve ever run was basically a game of One-Bomb Assault.

[@Jummugest]

Hello Blizzic

[@cobaltCarnivore]

I read "raid" and thought of something; maybe set it up so actually fighting anyone is completely irrelevant to the goal but difficult to avoid and the goal itself is to grab or destroy as much of a target resource as possible. Maybe you're raiding an invading army's camp in the middle of the night and fighting them all head-on is just impossible, but loosing their horses, trashing their tents, and looting gold, supplies, and equipment are all on the table. You could even scale the reward according to how much the players managed to do before they had to make their escape.

[@SusCalvin]

One way to look for objectives is local police reports on muggings and apartment stabbings, or accounts of drunk landsknechts in brawls. Like mercs pulling swords over a gambling debts. Or straight up line combat.

[@MayBeSomething]

Let me get this straight. Mario Kart/NASCAR in D&D, AND sports in D&D? I tried to theory-craft a hockey game, so this is incredible! Thanks, Pointy Hat! Edit: I write my comments during the end ramble.

[@zibbitybibbitybop]

DM in group I used to be in had us play a made-up sport that kind of resembled a cross between soccer and quidditch. It was great, but he didn't have a name for it, so we ended up just calling it elfball because it was an elf game in canon. 😂

[@shovel662]

Adding a morale mechanic to large battles would also be useful. Clump hundreds or thousands of enemies together, and give each group normal HP and HP based on cohesion. Make them unable to lose HP without first taking enough casualties for people to start running away. Your party has to cause fear and confusion instead of bonking. So charging headlong into them won’t work, but if the wizard disintegrates a bunch of them at once, and then the whole party leads a charge into them, the bad guys route.

[@SusCalvin]

I know the junkies have morale 6 and roll 2d6 against it. Typically as they take a casualty. If it fails, they break and route. The PCs can do more to scare them if they can figure it out.

[@bobon123]

I was sent here by the mention by DnD short. He made an absolutely _horrible_ video about making combat fun, linking you, and honestly I started watching this with the worst possible bias. I was very happy to be forced to change my mind. Very firm understanding of TTRPG mechanics and spirit, and suggestions that are actually valid. I do most of these regularly already: races, protect the king, internal sports... mostly everything other than the style points, and this gave me an idea for the next session where the player could end up in a gladiator ring. But even if not fully novel, the list and organization of the material is very reasonable and the ruleset for the sport event is a super interesting work. Congrats, liked and subscribed!

[@necroboost]

You should make a actual monster named pointy hat

[@Benjamin-jk1bs]

that's brilliant

[@LeRodz]

Wouldn't that basically be a smarter mimic?

[@BruceWayneTho]

The thing that got me to love Pointy Hat was the end ramblings! I do love D&D, am huge nerd and *live* for the memes/jokes all the way through but when I first watched one of your videos, I was touched by how humble and genuine your endings are; I really felt the love through the screen! 😁 I don't often feel like a creator cares so deeply about a viewer, thanks Antonio DeMico, you're awesome 😊

[@sbentley9664]

when you discover blood bowl

[@lilysapphire3434]

Another great video! This explanation is so helpful, I was having troubles planning an encounter that wasn't fight ir run!

[@Brianna-eo8nu]

-I know you don’t read comments, but- I think a tip of the hat episode on custom homebrew races would be pretty cool. It’s a pretty broad category, but I think it would be great to hear your tips on the subject.

[@pointyhatstudios]

i read comments :)

[@Acefdiamonds]

​@@pointyhatstudios so are you going to do an episode on it because I would benefit with that

[@jamesrichardsoniii4801]

Homebrew classes and subclasses would be neat, but perhaps WAY too much work to put into. Especially if you want to make the class function differently from every other class. Or, maybe rules on how to create balanced homebrew classes and subclasses without making them too overpowered or underpowered. Making them better balanced.

[@SavageBeer]

Recently, i've had "the party must move a payload to a safe space while warding off ennemy attacks". It was really effective at pushing the players to coordinate their actions.

[@SusCalvin]

We like to plan out travel to avoid fights. Most of the time, murderhobo bums are not looking to fight. Usagi Yojimbo had one story where the peasants have one decoy caravan and an elder dressed as a vagrant walks with Usagi. And avoids paying him for protection.

[@BorgLDS]

Really enjoyed the video! I think I’ll play around with the idea of a racing league as a city side activity in my pathfinder campaign as a way to spice up combat style encounters. An interesting direct combat encounter I participated in was the party fighting against a sorcerer using a magic orb to conjure large amounts of monsters. Our goal was to get control of the orb and hold onto it for 5 rounds in order for the sorcerer to lose connection to it and the monsters disappear. It was a lot of fun because it let a relatively low level party fight monsters we wouldn’t have encountered at that point since we didn’t have to actually defeat them. The GM made up rules for holding onto the orb, passing it between players, etc.

[@seaborgium919]

Man your ad spots are always so good

[@theprofessor6582]

I was just thinking about the idea of adding sports into my world-building. Thanks again Hat of The Pointy End. Oh and to answer the last question, I was in a CoC campaign where I and the other players had to destroy an iron-clad ship bombarding a Japanese island. Instead of fighting, we found a way to sneak in, take some gold, rescue a captive, fill the engine to the brim with coal, clogged the smokestack with my own clothes, distract the crew long enough to escape by throwing the very gold we stole at their feet, and ultimately blow up the ship, all without throwing a single punch.

[@MeanAndPristine]

I know you get a lot of people saying you should make more videos but I appreciate the time and effort you put into making quality content

[@VBMstudioz]

Every AD that popup in your videos i mute'em and go to watch the product you made for us at the end(in this case the sport match), i'll tank it whenever it comes up if you stay bringin us this high quality videos, u're huge, u're a monster Antonio Demico and i love it with all my strenght! Cheers from Brazil

[@DerrickMatthews]

Got my subscription!! The fact you shared that for free was clutch. I commend your hard work!

[@SuperKrisco]

I felt like a spoilt child when you were doing the whole "that sports thing is a lot of work" schtick, coz I was thinking "you'll do it for us". I think you're the best DnD creator on KZbin now, I never miss a video.

[@James-oi9vu]

I’m not clever enough to make a good “soccer players need high CHA to fake injuries” retort so I’ll go with another encounter I used initiative for! My players were on the first of its kind steamboat, chasing a traditional oars-and-sails riverboat that had had a three day head start. All the things that could go wrong with a prototype machine did go wrong - broken parts, leaking pipes, etc etc - and the players leveraged their skills in some very clever ways. Our wizard used Shape Water to condense and recirculate the steam while the monk slipped between hot pipes to knock the filter back into place. It was a cool session.

[@SusCalvin]

Running a vehicle together is fun. Coriolis and other games are centered around the ship.

[@thomasreinoso8106]

Your videos are always lovely. I see every single second of it, and it's worth it.

[@elijahvanvlack3704]

Hey Pointy Hat. I discovered your channel very recently when I wanted to figure out how elves would work in my D&D game. I really enjoyed the video, and I proceeded to watch every video on your channel in under one week. You make great content, and I really appreciate all the hard work you put in. I was a little disappointed when I saw that this week’s video was about combat, since the topic has been talked about a lot, but you have a great spin on it, and I want to use some of the ideas you talked about in my games

[@jdman2210]

Murph does a fantastic job designing his encounters for Naddpod, the 2 easiest examples are the 2 crew’s battle against akarot in which they try to prevent him from sending high level monsters such as a tarrasque to the material plane. They do this by interrupting the ritual and killing enough mages to give them disadvantage on the contested arcana check. And the second is when Balnor is separated in the circle of violence.

[@halcyon_echo42]

Also the levels of Hell were amazingly well thought out different encounters with multiple win conditions throughout

[@Benjamin-jk1bs]

one time I was dm for some veteran players and they hated combat so for them I changed it and mixed it with roleplay and they loved it it was hard to make it work but it made for a memorable and fun champion

[@denvvver2]

I like these ideas a lot, but there is one issue I often ran into; I find calling for initiative to be rolled and putting on a tense BGM will more often than not just end with players blasting first and ask questions later. One thing I do at my table to hopefully mitigate players' tensions is to introduce the idea of "Quick-Time". I make sure to introduce the mechanic early on, but basically, it's the exact same as combat (you still roll initiative and have the same action economy), but with 2 changes: 1; if all the actions you take on your turn are focused on accomplishing one goal, you get advantage on whatever rolls you make to accomplish that. For example, you're just trying to escape a cavern full of falling rocks. If you only move and dash and try to accomplish that goal, you'll get advantage on all Acrobatics checks you make. Or if you're just trying to talk down a tense situation, you'll get advantage on your Persuasion check. 2; if you deal damage or get damaged, combat starts with the same initiative order. I also try to keep a very obvious playlist of general dramatic music Vs. explicit combat music, so players aren't as trigger-happy when they're not hearing the usual battle music. As much as we try to play with various rulesets to make our visions come true, at the end of the day immersion is a psychological thing. If players feel threatened, they will attack, no matter how obviously you think you made it seem that the goal of the encounter is something different.

[@izitest2785]

Great ideas antonio, this reminds me of this post i once read of someone changing their leveling-system into a puzzle where they have to solve it to find the "orbs of the swamp that grant power". Really changes the perspective of it all!

[@elijahfenter1178]

This! So much of this! I've been searching for so many ways to spice things up and I'm glad you layed out some genuine examples. I honestly wouldn't mind more of them or even more story ideas around them. I often find myself stumped by how I can fit the mechanical idea in with the current narrative.

[@flyingkumquat4845]

Is it just me, or is there anyone else who has never played DnD, but only other systems (dark ehresy 40k in my case), but still gets a bunch of inspiration from pointy's videos?

[@SlavicChautauquan]

I can't say I never played DnD, I used to run it, but right now I've been leaning on lots of more far reaching systems, and I think a lot of the great stuff pointy does is in the dissection process. Letting us think about how or why things run as they do, and then figuring out how to focus our storytelling in that fashion. DnD might be the juggernaut, but good advice for storytelling is often system-agnostic.

[@flyingkumquat4845]

@@SlavicChautauquan Totally agree with that one. Watching a bunch of videos by different youtube creators (dungen dudes, pointy, etc.) just to get some more ideas about how to run things. I can come up with a 100 different ides for overall sotry lines etc. in my chosen setting, but how i do the little things has so much more influence than probably everything else on how i dm, it's ridicilous

[@moralsupport1582]

Engagement comment!

[@andiroo4103]

I 100% agree with your take. I’m not a DM, but I can speak from experience when I say that one of the most fun times I’ve had was in a combat scenario where we had did a “gladiator style” fight to the death, mixed with CTF. This gave us two fun ways to win and it created a divide in our party where the fast but weak people went on offense while others stayed on defense. This especially became fun because we had to think about whether it was worth trying to win (by getting the flag) or focus on killing the enemies and winning the fight.

[@comrad3892]

Antonio is resposible for me re-thinking how I run my games every video that he makes. Every time I hope that even one of his advices miss, but every time he hits me with a banger that sparks the creativity in me to do better. Thanks hat man

[@lonelytac0]

When you mentioned the "Get to a goal" one I remembered how games like Fire Emblem and the Mario x Rabbids have stuff like that, so it would be interesting to take some of those, like defeat the boss enemy waiting at another point in the map, do certain tasks, like getting items to places, or destroying certain objects, escort only the npc to a place, have at least a player get there with like an item bandits want, survive x turns, complete the puzzle while in combat, stuff like that can be more exciting then "kill everything", like at least give your players ways of getting rid of enemies besides combat

[@rockyable8916]

The gaia online comment made me spit take. Well done Antonio! I also had a fun “sports” game that I added to my campaign which had an indestructible orb fall at the PCs’ feet and it started a city wide game called Fizzball. A loud bell rings in town signifying the game’s start and the premise is simple, deliver the ball to Fizzwizzle, the city’s local artificer. The person that does gets a reward and this is common knowledge. The PCs had so much fun trying to pass the ball and protect the carrier from the hoards of townsfolk trying to seek the prize. It turned into a race and a sport! Thank you for all of the amazing content!!!

[@KarnageReigns]

I always watch till the end! Love your goofy antics and your voice is very easy to listen to!

[@easiestcc6451]

If you wanna make combat more interesting with these tips, use statblocks and minions from Matt Colville's "Flee Mortals!". You can also slap on Villain Actions from that book to make the encounter more like a boss fight. For an example, I'll use a famous boss fight from Dark Souls 1. If your fight is a duo fight where one twin acts right after the other, you can make it to where if they kill one twin, the big guy uses a villain action to have extra lightning damage and attack faster for the rest of the fight. Or if they kill the big guy first, the small twin uses a villain action to become giant and his attacks are not only fast, but also more dangerous due to the fast speed now that they do more damage for the rest of the fight.

[@discomfort1074]

Also make sure to put pillars in the boss arena that players can hise behind because having pillars in an arena is the PINNACLE of boss fight design

[@Monk9619]

The protect the thing while destroying the thing from the other people is something I have thought about a lot but in the context of two powerful wizards fighting while the goons of the evil wizard try to help their master and the PCs helping their guy. Each round you would have lair actions based on how much damage they did against the evil wizard vs the minions. Haven't rounded it out yet but that makes that kind of encouter even more engaging

[@ianeller3047]

That embedded ad transition was ::chef's kiss::

[@syrupchugger421]

So many great ideas to implement! I'll definitely be using these to help flair up my next campaign. Thanks again!!

[@BWiltfong1]

I really enjoyed this take on changing up objectives, definitely a couple ideas I'll be using in my next campaign. One alternate objective combat I've used is a slight variation of the single-target objective. I use it sparingly, but I have a few boss monsters that essentially "eat" their minions. The fight starts heavily pitched in the enemy's favor insofar as action economy and either for more life or some alternate buff, the central monster will very visibly consume, kill, immolate, etc a minion. This gives the group the option of focus fire the boss to reduce the heat or kill the minions to starve the boss. This also means if things start to go south, I can have the boss creature act selfishly and take another piece off the board. The downside is that this can make fights quite long, and if they happen too often, it can feel like a schlog to get through with an enemy that just won't die. However the party also sees tangible progress of whittling the boss down and the satisfaction in their voices is evident when the boss is out of helpers/snacks. Bonus points if you can give the party an alternate way to remove the minions as well. I had candles that could be snuffed as an action to remove a Shadow off the field. Of course, for those without darkvision, this also meant less light to see by.

[@LusterMoonYT]

I'm surprised you didn't talk about the most exciting and easiest way to make combat interesting. A timer irl and when it hits zero something extremely bad happens lol (bomb in the building, sinking ship, cultists summoning a really bad dude, etc) I love massive environmental changes that completely shift the way people play. The environment and the stakes are the ultimate meta-breaker to get your players off their character sheet and into the action

[@inamelzvoice]

Or if a timer irl is too stressful for some players, it can be a X number of rounds timer!

[@SapphicAshley]

you can only do that once, though, and i'd imagine it would be hard to set it for the right number: to high and there's no tension, to low and the party just won't be able to make it in time

[@LusterMoonYT]

I try not to make the fail consequence something that just wipes the party. More like set backs or mission failure Also this is just one example. The way to keep combat interesting is to have a multitude of win/fail conditions other than just fight until one side reaches zero hit points. My personal favorite is to impose environmental challenges that make decision making less about optimal damage and more about taking advantage of the situation. Of course, nothing wrong with a good slug fest for your players to test out their new toys when they get them

[@benjaminparent4115]

We went full circle here. TTRPG evolved from Wargames which are riddled with things like time limits, and alternative win condition etc. Then people forgot about that made combat all about killing enemies, realised it was boring, then they started doing all of those things again. Personally the best advice I can give is too simply look at wargame scenario/ battle report, those scenario are specifically created with the intent of being fun and challenging combat. They are riddled with good ideas. Like timed condition, alternative objective like defend/capture the token, environmental damages etc. Hey there is even whole genre RP wargames. Which are centered around the idea of telling a story accross multiple scenario.

[@calvinecker5969]

I love your stuff! :D It is helping me so much as a DM! Keep it up, Hat!

[@gioiabishop8702]

Your videos inspire me to do more prep as a DM. THANK YOU!

[@Sezenian]

"Add more minions" is usually something the DnD videos throw you to death with... Pointy Hat brought something actually unique to the table. And I really appreciate it! Your videos are very inspiring! Thank you for making them!

[@liamthomas1726]

Epic, this is going straight into my campaign! Thanks Hat man!

[@Cryonami]

Loving the content, man! I even referenced your "Making Good D&D Characters" video in a college essay about D&D, so take that as you will

[@dinbabwa452]

Great content! Love the product integration. This ad actually gave me chills over the idea of a world anvil. And the bit about getting paid... Chefs kiss. Great production!

[@RukaKikuchi]

I recently did a session for a campaign I'm currently running that wasn't for combat; it was for improvised theatrical performance! Long story short, my group was trying to gain the trust of a royal family by putting on this impromptu performance with singing, interpretive dance, and magic, with the end goal being to appease the princess (make her smile, as the queen put it.) They not only succeeded, but it was revealed that one of the characters was also a long-lost princess thought to be dead! It was honestly really fun to do, as I also got to re-flavor an NPC's spells as added flair to the performance (i.e. making it snow indoors.)

[@marilou1068]

These videos are fun, interesting and actually makes me want to DM! And I really love the pacing and energy, up to the last second!

[@AlecMHansen]

Your video makes me super stoked to see you and the other ‘Tubers at the Gencon event! Me and my friend snagged tickets and I’m sure it’s totally gonna be worth it!

[@yuki9270]

Thanks for these cool ideas! I’m about to do my first campaign as the DM and your videos are helping me understand how to make the Game more fun!

[@unwantedsoup7333]

I’ve been giving extra damage due to style points for my characters forever now, it’s honestly one of the biggest things I’d recommend a new DM doing, it encourages so much roleplay and makes combat so much more fun

[@ChesireWaltz]

This freshens combat SO SO MUCH. Especially for martials. I don't do style points but I instead greatly reward environmental/circumstantial damage which essentially works the same way, and I don't reward them trying to cheese the same move over and over, though it's rarely an issue. It's a little loosey goosey but my players love it. I see people online worry about it discouraging players from using their basic attacks but... So what? No one says to tune down a spell otherwise a wizard won't want to use their dagger or cantrips! But it makes my players scour the map looking for things to use, and they end up having to put time and effort into setting things up, engaging with the tools they're given. I much prefer for my players to have a fight in a ballroom and instantly ask if there are chandeliers to drop, spirits to light on fire, over them assessing that there are no environmental threats and then just swinging at the enemy with a sword until a spell caster changes the conditions of the field. Because if the optimum move is always a a basic sword swing with a flank for advantage... It makes you fight the same way in the forest, in the market, in a jail, what are these places if not empty set dressing if you can't meaningfully engage with them?

[@dtllmpn]

We had to race another team of NPC's to find an eccentric wizard who was hidden, or kidnapped, or otherwise missing. The Wizard was petrified and mentally compelled to stay in this hidden bunker surrounded by various constructs. The Wizard was compelled to solve a puzzle about cheese. So we had to convince the wizard to abandon the puzzle and leave the bunker while minimizing contact with robots. This as after a couple of false leads. It turns out a team that was bitter about losing had ties to a mafia, and wound up trying to sabotage the whole thing by stealing our benefactor who vouched for us, so after winning, we had to find our sponsor, and force them back into public service (the prize for the backer) it was wild, but a fun time.

[@user-yd4fu9yg6e]

I'm new to DnD and learning a lot on KZbin! But Antonio, I must say you're really really good! Your videos are interesting, very funny and creative (I love your drawings!)! I'm glad I got to know your channel!

[@helenengberts8266]

pointy i LOVE the little bits at the end where you pretend that you’re not ab to give the rule set to us!!! and then ‘surprise’ us that it’s FREE?? what a deal!! never change bestie

[@LisekTheFox]

Iam always so hyped for new Pointy Hat Content *screams*

[@carlosmenchon7242]

To make the combat interesting I try to add terrain, create my own monsters with interesting mechanics and always important for the plot. A few tips are letting the players know about the mechanics so they can use them and always knowing the capacities of the pc

[@sourpepsi9689]

Great video!! Can’t wait for the fey-wild video :D

[@mcshannon02]

I found your channel and watched alot of these. I am going to print out a few of your shared ideas and try out in my games.

[@Teachidoll]

I love your videos. Love your humor and how you explain things. And then give us the info for free when you could easily put it behind a patreon.

[@Marmaladeraptor]

I love the style points encounter. Makes me want to make a "PVP" fight where the whole point is not actually kill each other while maintaining kayfabe

[@broke_af_games9661]

Thanks for the pdf, man. Very appreciated.

[@egomane3]

Once again a great video from you. A few exciting ideas that I will try out or at least take inspiration from. Keep it up, good work!

[@jaxfrost7417]

Genuinely this is the best D&D KZbin Channel I've watched. Your ideas and and content give me so much inspiration to make stuff for my players it's genuinely so high quality, I don't know how you do this as frequently as you do, you're doin god's work out here

[@tehaus10]

Letting us know you read the comments was your worst mistake... You're doing great bud! Appreciate you. Hope you're having a good week. =)

[@nicknolte5700]

The tittle wasn't slightly annoying, you're amazing! I friend recommended you and I loved your vids!! XDXDXD

[@Momplestiltskin]

I stayed for your ramblings until the end! I've been procrastinating the very last session of my years-long campaign, and this gave me the ideas I needed to finish it!

[@cgkase6210]

Imagine playing a sports game with the wizard teammate using Gust to throw the ball towards a teammate instead of letting the enemies pick up the ball Edit: Second video wishing for game with pointy hat

[@SusCalvin]

This is what you do in Blood Bowl. Each team can have wizard outside the game. They can use one spell per game. There are two allowed spells, fireball and lightning. Both toned down to knock people over.

[@Reubenaut]

Some of these sound like skill challenges and I feel like people often forget about them especially when they can be great

[@doppelkammertoaster]

These are amazing. Thanks for sharing them with us!

[@DirgeOfSanity]

I've been looking for a way to change up my combat for a rotating arena type campaign, and your input has given me so much inspiration! 😤 love your videos

[@deepseastonecore3017]

Wumpa Fruit or Paopu Fruit?

[@TheRavensong]

I love seeing other people come to the same ideas I’ve had! I included rules for chariot races, quidditch, and blitz all for my world 😊

[@genobreaker1054]

That was the single smoothest transition to sponsor I have ever seen. Bravo!

[@shrinidhishriganesh160]

Super helpful, thanks so much 😊

[@okmultilaughs8376]

OMG i have made a rollar durby combat thingy, it involves the sport and racing you spoke about, im really looking forward to them playing.

[@nickdrage3730]

Roller Derby is an interesting idea, do you put them on rollerskates?

[@okmultilaughs8376]

​@@nickdrage3730 absolutely they have to have 4 defenders and 1 point scorer, the point scorer has to complete the course 6 times to win, the teams can fight each other but if they hit the dying state they are out instead of rolling death saving throwns they can also tag other team members In (because I have more than 5 ppl playing d&d but only 5 ppl can play roller durby) Also referring to the actual question, they wear roller skates and when turning they have to move as if it's an arc so they can't go forwards then directly right, they have to use movement to make it round a bend. I'm also a new DM so this is my first game but I want to make it more interesting for my players. And go the extra mile so they can have a fun experience, rather then just reading from a book.

[@captainthorrek262]

A roller derby session sounds like an absolute blast!

[@okmultilaughs8376]

​@@captainthorrek262 hopefully they will enjoy it.

[@nickdrage3730]

@@okmultilaughs8376 oh I like the tagging people in idea. I don't know how that works in actual Roller Derby, but having the players on the "sideline" pleading "put me in coach", or a limping player struggling off the course saying "we need to win this, avenge me" gives you the opportunity for proper sports movie moments....

[@echocereal6255]

I feel that in my opinion a more apt argument for "dnd is a combat game" is that classes dont give enough out of combat benefits, fighter gets literally nothing except maybe a skill thing on a subclass and out-of-combat options directly compete against combat options making the opportunity cost too high for most players to select, this of course is all fixable without making any too radical change i believe. Sadly, WOTC doesnt really seem that they will do that, martials still have to little out-of-combat features

[@fishyfishyfishy500akabs8]

This. Also alot of out of combat stuff is in my experience dependent on DM fiat as he said when he said that it’s rules light. Asking: “Can I strike up a conversation?” can go a million different ways depending on the table. The DM can say: “no”, the DM can say “Yes sure, what do you start with?”, etc.

[@lucamonticelli267]

Also the fact is that you have to take a class, a race as well as class features and specific abilities that determine what it can or cannot do. Also the game gives the master almost no rules for running out of combat situations or roleplay. If you prefer roleplay instead of combat games like DND and pathfinder force you to engage in a rather complex character creation, with lots of limitations and give you nothing more than skill check + d20, or spells which are class limited.

[@jessegrizzle4340]

Great video and really fun ideas! You are my favorite and most pointiest hat on the internet =)

[@skitsandbits6374]

Love your videos, u are underrated and under appreciated

[@Crisopeia]

30 likes 0 views

[@Shalakor]

Mine showed 110 likes and 389 views, but says 0 Comments.

[@EmethMatthew]

This is excellent suggestions and thank you for providing the sports rule set!

[@RobTheNewb]

Love the vids man. Keep it up

[@scottlewis1639]

We love your ramblings! One of my favorite different combat encounters we did was for an archfey (see what I did there? Topical I know) who was the lord of the hunt, and to win his favor we had to compete in a hunting contest. There were points for who could hunt the most of each type of monster with some requiring knowledge rolls to find or tracking checks to hunt down, and others being large and worth lots of points but genuinely being dangerous. It put our party in a spot where we were racing another team to kill a giant monster but we needed to be the ones to kill it and that lead us into a scenario where we HEALED THE MONSTER so it wouldn't go down on the other hunting party's turn. The other hunting teams were also fleshed out and had the quirky traits few usually do, some acting as foils to our own team, which I know is something you enjoy funny hat creature