“How To Fix Slow Combat?” Is The Wrong Question…

Of all the posts I see on Reddit, RPG forums and social media requesting advice on running 5e D&D, DMs asking their peers for tips on how to speed up combat are by far the most frequent.

It seems to be a real bugbear of many DMs. And while the usually solid advice given in response to those aforementioned requests will undoubtedly help referees shave some time off their combat durations, there’s only so much a slightly more streamlined initiative system can do to speed up your game.

Today, I propose to look at the “problem” of slow combat from a few different angles first, before trying to solve it, because I think it’s likely that many DMs are asking themselves the wrong question to begin with… while simultaneously underappreciating their ability to take control of the situation.

It’s important to stay sanguine when fighting sahuagin… (Art by WOTC).

Three Questions To Ask Before Asking How To Speed Up Combat

1. Do Your Players Think Combat Takes Too Long?

A question I would advise DMs to address first, before obsessing over combat speed, is: “Do your players think combats are too long?”

There are a couple of reasons why I think this could be revealing question. The first is that combat is the favourite part of D&D for many players, and, while you might be impatient to get on with the story you’ve prepared, they might not care that a combat takes up 25, 50, 75 or even 100% of a session. Sure, they might get a little bored waiting for their turn… but then again they may not. They also have to wait for their turn to speak, or act, out of combat as well, so their entire experience of D&D is that they are only “on” some 10-20% of the time anyway (depending how much talking the DM does). Combat is not really that different, it’s just in combat their “on” and “off” phases are more clear and regulated.

Maybe your players prefer long combats? Stranger Things have happened…

The second reason is that the dramatic tension of a combat burns much stronger and lasts much longer for players. As the DM, you may know that the fight is up, because you know the strength of the monsters, how many HP they have left, what special abilities they have – or no longer have – in reserve, and so the suspense of who will win the fight dissipates for you more quickly, and you may lose interest in the scene. Players are not privy to all the info you have, and their experience of a combat is very different. For them a fight will likely feel on the edge for much longer. And, even when they suspect the fight is won, it’s still their beloved character on the line and they don’t want to take a hit, least of all a critical hit (if you use the Lingering Injuries table… which, for all its flaws, means that no combat is without risk!). Nor do they really want to use any resources that they might need later in the day. You might know that the players can take a long rest after this fight, so any HP or spell slots lost are meaningless, but they don’t know that. For all they know, there might be more monsters hiding behind the trees, a wave of reinforcements on their way, or many of a thousand other circumstances that might occur before they can recuperate.

For this very reason, I don’t like the advice “just call the fight” when you, the DM, think a combat is done. Sure you can save a few minutes of game time, but – aside from the fact that meaningful stuff can still happen, even when victory is assured – players love the satisfaction of killing a monster. A far better option is to reduce a monster’s HP “behind your screen”. This might feel a bit fudgey, but it works and you can nearly always justify the chicanery by remembering that monsters have a wide HP range… the Monster Manual gives an average total HP based on their hit dice and Constitution, but it makes sense that not all your monsters would have that exact average.

If you feel that, once the wheels of a combat are set in motion, the DM shouldn’t touch the dials, then another useful technique is simply having nearly-defeated monsters run away. Players will rarely let fleeing foes escape alive, in case they bring back reinforcements, so you will still have to play a round of two or combat, but things usually drastically speed up at this point – the players should get a free opportunity attack or two to begin with (which might be enough to end things), and then folks will likely just fire off their cantrips or bows (the mechanics of which everyone knows, so no looking up spells), while you no longer having to roll attacks for the monsters. Obviously, if a full scale chase develops whatever you do don’t get out your DMG and reach for those terrible chase rules (or even these better ones). Just settle it with a single contest (Athletics vs. Athletics or Stealth… whatever you decide is most apt). Monster wins it escapes, player wins they kill it escaping.

Note: having monsters run away is almost always a quicker way to end a combat than having them surrender, which can slow the storyline down further as players pore over the dilemma of what to do with their freshly-acquired captives.

2. Are Your Combats Really Too Long? Or Are They Just Too Boring?

The second question to ask, before trying to speed up your fights, is would you even need to speed them up if they were more exciting, and everyone was loving every moment of them? Chances are, if a DM wants to speed up combat, it’s because folks on the table are losing interest during the fight. As discussed, first check in with your players to see if they really are losing interest, or if it’s just you! And then have a think about why people are losing interest, and what could make your combats better (for either you or the players, or both), instead of faster.

How to design better combats is too big a topic to handle here, but it’s something I’ve covered before on this blog, so head over.

DRAGONBOWL gives the Kiss of Death to boring combats…

Generally speaking though boring combats tend to be either a) fights with low risks or stakes, or b) fights where the smartest thing to do each round is the same thing each combatant did last round, leading to a repetitive slog (we can label these “undynamic fights”). I could probably also add c) fights which don’t advance the storyline at all, and feel like a time-filling distraction*.

Random encounters can often trip all three of these red flags, but particularly a) and c) and is why I hardly ever use them. If you feel you need to add at least a chance of a random encounter to disrupt players’ meta-gaming rest habits, I’d suggest that the problem is more with D&D’s rest rules than its combat rules, and perhaps you should consider changing how long rests work instead. Another tip is to disrupt rests with something that takes 10 seconds of session time to describe but does the same job as a 30-minute random encounter… “it starts to pour down with rain, and you pass a miserable and restless night.”

Related to designing better combats, but not the same, is how to run better combats. Or how to run combats better, I could say. Again a big topic, but one thing that can make a big difference is to keep your narrative descriptions of dice rolls going right til the end of the fight. I myself have a bad habit of giving them up half way through, as I manage all the book-keeping and rules queries, but keeping players immersed in the combat with vivid details should keep them more engaged even when the only thing left to do is clear up the remaining mooks. An end of round summary of the current state of play can really bring a fight into focus, as players consider the status quo and their options for the next round. “Ok, Hank has just taken out the minotaur champion with an arrow through the throat, Bobby is in a spot of bother with the two remaining orc warriors and Diana has dealt an almighty whack to the orc shamen, who looks to be on his last legs… but you see him reaching into his components pouch…”. Yes the dramatic peak of the fight has passed, but there’s still tension and danger in the scene, so be sure to convey that.

*although these are maybe harder to quantify, as any wandering monster in a dungeon crawl is arguably part of the storyline as a dungeon crawl is a story/game about resource management. The same wandering monster in the wilderness, where encounters are spread further apart, is a meaningless distraction, however, as any resources lost will be recuperated easily. (I’m still testing solutions here on meaningful travel encounters, involving rejigging rests and incorporating exhaustion in combination with my “powering through” exhaustion using hit dice house rule).

3. Why Does Combat Take So Long in D&D?

Another crucial question that I feel gets lost in the slow combat conversation is why 5e combat is slow in the first place compared to some other systems (I’ve played plenty of games where combat took WAY longer to resolve than in D&D!).

By far the biggest drag factor in 5e’s combat experience is the amount of player choice and options the system offers. Which brings me to two crucial points… only one of which I will make now (the later is further down the page), and that is: isn’t player choice a good thing?

Personally, I love 5th edition combat precisely because I get a tonne of options to play with each round… at least if I’ve given some thought to my character creation. Not only do I usually have a few good options for my action, but rinsing a bit extra out of a bonus action is fun and satisfying (despite Mike Mearls’ regrets!), and optimising a build to get some regular use out of reactions is also rewarding for players who like to think and plan strategically.

Some other games I’ve played since getting back into RPGs are Mothership, Paranoia, Call of Cthulhu and Mini Six, and the combat in all of them is frankly dull. You attempt to hit with your best attack option and then repeat until the monster (or you) is dead. In many of those systems it doesn’t even matter who you’re attacking, as there is no AC, or variable difficulty, it’s just the exact same roll every time. Roll your “guns” and then rinse and repeat. Meanwhile, if you think hit points suck as a mechanic, wait until you play a game where you become ineffective the moment you’re wounded… and you’ll suddenly realise the massively unrealistic HP system is the secret success juice of Dungeons & Dragons!

GMing Paranoia for the Barcelona Roleplaying Club… great for dark dystopian comedy, treachery and high jinks. Not great for strategic and heroic combat. (Photo by Archivo Arcano).

So yeah, combat takes longer in D&D than many systems that want to focus on narrative play. But these faster systems lack meaningful choices or strategies, in order to resolve combat so quickly, often creating pretty boring fights as a result (mechanically at least… you can go wild with the descriptions and out of the box thinking, to create a cool scene, but the mechanical resolution is usually the same, whatever you describe).

So there’s an almost unavoidable give and take when it comes to combat in RPGs. If you want a wide variety of player (and monster) options, and interesting more complex abilities, turning combat into a game within the game (which I personally love), then you have to accept there’s going to be a time cost to that. I’ve made my peace with that, and in fact I think 5e hits a sweet spot of options and complexity in relation to speed of play.

But Seriously… How Do I Speed Up Combat?

Ok, so now you’ve asked yourself those three potentially more important questions about combat in 5e, it still makes sense to keep our combats as lean as possible. So let me share my thoughts on how to go about this.

The One Fundamental Thing…

But, before I get to the “shave off a few seconds here and there” tips, there’s one fundamental thing you can do to keep combat fast-paced. And that is actively manage the time at the table.

This ties back to my earlier statement that D&D combat offers lots of player choice. Player choice is great, but it can be a major time sink… but only if you let it. As the DM, you are in control of the table, so use your authority and game management skills to keep people on track.

Run your combats like an actual frenetic combat. Speak faster than usual, point at the player who’s turn it is, briefly recap the situation they’re faced with if necessary, and demand “what does Conan do?” If they don’t answer immediately, emphasise the fearsomeness of the monster bearing down on them, describe how the villagers to their left are being torn to pieces, remind them that their teammate is down, but most of all remind them they have to make a snap decision. Not an optimal one. Sure it would be nice to be able to flick through their spellbook, remind themselves which spell does what, and then choose the best option, after a little conference with their fellow players, but they don’t have that luxury. They are neck-deep in a do-or-die scenario and they have to decide now!

Instead of looking up fireball, could you maybe just cast it Geoff? (Art by WOTC).

I know, I know. You have a problem player, who won’t respond well to this at first, but try training them. Try punishing them for repeat offenses, lightly as you can at first (dropping them to bottom of initiative order, removing their movement or bonus action for dawdling) but then more harshly if they don’t (“you are overwhelmed by the action unfurling in front of you and are forced to take the Dodge action as you desperately try to recall your spells. Ok, we’re back with Breanna…”).

Get an egg timer to put some visible and objective pressure on them. I bought a set of timers to help me run some epic combats that I knew wouldn’t fit into a session otherwise. My experience was that the psychological pressure, as much as the sand, helps keep people ticking along – and the presence of the timers also show you are being serious about trying to speed things up. (Note: you actually need two egg timers, because if you say give a player a minute and they use half, you need a second ‘full’ timer to give to the next player). Of course, you’ll still need to pause and reset the timer at times to explain things, discuss rules etc., but it still helps to have them.

To conclude. If you can train your players to a) be prepared and b) react with their gut instincts to developments rather than try to pick the optimum option, then you’re addressing by far the biggest time cost in combat, which is players deciding what their character will do on their turn.

16 Quick & Dirty Tips for Faster Combats

Here are some other tips that should help streamline your 5e fights. Some are much-cited classics, but you might find one or two new ones here…

1. At the start of combat, delegate a player to note down everyone’s initiative in a visible place (so everyone can consult it and see when their turn is coming up. You can also verbally remind people their turn is coming up soon, but you should find this becomes unnecessary if everyone can track the initiative order themselves).
2. If you (or your appointed initiative tracker) are busy doing something else at the start of combat then just use passive initiative for monsters (10 + their Dex). It’s actually nice to have them act at a predictable count anyway. (And if you want to run multiple groups of monsters at different times in the chain, you could do 13 + Dex for the boss, 7 + Dex for the minions…. or 5, 10 and 15 if you have three groups etc.).
3. Consider keeping the same player initiative for the entire session, so you don’t have to roll it again next combat. Useful if you are planning lots of small fights in one sitting.
4. If you know a combat is gonna happen have the battlemap ready drawn before the session.
5. Have all the appropriate monster stat blocks you think you will need directly at hand (better to print them than flick between pages of the Monster Manual). Also read these stat blocks before the session. Note any resistances (they are easy to miss!), but more importantly look up descriptions of spells you are likely to use in the fight, and bookmark these.
6. It’s usually best to restrict yourself to running a max. of 3 different monster stat blocks in a fight.
7. Delegate a player to record how much damage each monster takes during the fight, and have them write it visibly on the battlemap, or somewhere else where everyone can see. (I often write it on the little counters I use to represent monsters themselves, or get a player to do it). This reduces the number of questions you have to field as the DM, as folks can see themselves which beasties are injured. Obviously you don’t reveal how many total HP the monsters have… just how much they have taken.
8. Ensure each player has their own d20 and the most common damage dice they use in front of them at all times… paladins need a bunch of d8s, rogues a bunch of d6s etc.
9. Have enough dice ready for your monsters, including their damage dice. I don’t like using average damage, as a personal preference, but for speed it’s obviously handy. Or you can use the old d6 or d8 variable on average damage (eg. if a monster does 4d8 (18) damage you just roll d6 and then treat a 1 as a -3 modifier and a 6 as a +3 modifier to the average etc.).
10. Have at least one dice tray on the table, and insist the players use it. This way people don’t spend half the session chasing lost dice under sofas, arguing over whether it should count or not, and then finally re-rolling it (…off the table again).
11. Encourage players to have the PH open at the appropriate page when they are casting an unfamiliar spell, or to have the description ready on their phone etc..
12. Make house rules for major time sinks, like the 2014 version of conjure animals.
13. While they can be fun, I try to discourage familiars and steeds, or limit their screen time. And, unless you have a tiny party, there’s no need at all for sidekicks or henchmen… the game works best when one player controls one character/stat block.
14. Don’t let players confer too much once combat is underway. They can shout a phrase at each other, but not much more. The heat of battle isn’t a time to have a debate.
15. Introduce a “two snack bowls maximum on the game table at any one time” rule, so you don’t have to waste time clearing a space on the table whenever combat starts, and there’s room for the actual game equipment… like character sheets, dice and dice trays.

And a reminder of the golden rule:

16. Force players to make quick “in the moment” decisions when it’s their turn.

A Word On Critical Hits & Fumbles

So, rather unfashionably, I have a real soft spot for both Critical Hits (by which I mean Lingering Injuries from Critical Hits) and Critical Fumbles. My homebrew tables of the latter have served me pretty well over the years and have proved quite popular on the DMs Guild (I have homebrew tables for Lingering Injuries too but never got around to publishing them!).

However, both Lingering Injuries and Fumble Tables really slow the game down, while typically their effects are a bit too punitive and frustrating for players, so recently I’ve been just ignoring additional effects on natural 20s and 1s, in a bid to keep the action zipping along.

Anyhow, if you do lean into Critical Hits and Fumbles, it’s really important to have your tables of choice ready for instant reference… because trying to look them up mid-combat can be a real momentum killer.

Meanwhile, stay tuned to the blog (you can subscribe on the right), because I’m working on a new super simple solution for 20s and 1s that hopefully add just the right amount of additional jeopardy into combat, without turning heroes into jesters – or serial amputees.

Your Thoughts on D&D Combat?

Quite a lot to take in today, but as always I’d be interested to hear about other people’s thoughts and experiences, along with any useful tips I’ve missed or am unaware of. Do stick ’em in the comments!