"There's lots of different schools of thought on this. I tend to think the purpose of the GM is to add friction and challenge and obstacle, but not really to aim for fatality. Because if that's the point, it's trivially easy; I have infinite dragons!" I love this take, I'm showing it to my group immediately :D

I know this is a minor thing, but the style of drawing the units on the paper as though the view is close to isometric is really cool!

I love the enemy archetypes you laid out here. They feel like they are incredably useful, especially if you think of them how the creature is used in the battle and not a universal rule. A direwolf could be a 'brute' in one fight, but a 'cavalry' in another. As players get more and more tools and defence what was an 'artillery' unit might be treated as a 'ranged' and so on.

One thing DnD4E did well was try to teach GM's tactics through the use of common video game terms that were analogous to leaders, tank, DPS (ranged/melee), nukers, buffs/debuffers, healers, etc... Once you start doing that and begin planning encounter groups with a mix of monster types rather than say copy/paste monsters, the depth of many ttrpgs opens up greatly just from the mechanics angle alone.

Level 12 Encounter Tip: Just banish the demon. In BG3, if successful, the demon would be removed temporarily so you can focus on the other stuff. In TTRPG, if successful, so long as the caster doesn't lose concentration- the spawner is made a COMPLETE noncombatant, and would never return so long as you aren't in the Abyss.

I thoroughly loved this episode, so inventive and creative without getting bogged down and crunchy! Also fun tip: 35:39 if you need to increase the size of your play area but don't have the physical space to do so, consider using 10ft squares on your battle grid instead of 5ft. For outdoor encounters (or if you're really jammed for space), 20ft squares can also be used! Anyway I'm just gonna watch the whole thing again. Cheers Kyle!

"i have infinite dragons" got a chuckle out of me. I am really excited by the fact that my current play group geniuniely thinks i am trying to kill them every session. Lets me know i am doing it right.

I actually did this once with a Gnoll warband generated through Volo's Guide to Monsters. Since it was supposed to be something where the village was doomed, i decided to tell everyone to make a quick 5th level character and it would give them a sense of the oncoming danger as these characters... Which were heroes in their own right... Were attacked by a vicious warband, fighting desperately to drive off the gnolls and save as many people as they could before their actual level 1 heroes could return to their hometown. The only hero that managed to survive was the 5th level fighter after he lost his arm to a Maw Demon that was traveling with the pack. The Gnoll Hunters with barbed arrows slowed people down, the dual-dagger wielding berzerkers slaughtered, the regular gnolls felt endless and the Flind was terrifying. It was an awesome way to start the campaign.

Oh, the Act 2 Moonrise encounter was FUN. I absolutely WRECKED them by plopping a Wall of Fire at the base of the stairs and staying just out of artillery range up the stairs. A smarter AI would have avoided walking through the flames into the narrow hallway to get me.

Yessss, I love seeing some attention to tactics. So much mapping advice is focused on how to make the map pretty. Back when I was really into video game mapping, there were all kinds of tutorials about map flow, risk vs reward, chokepoints, and things like that, which are hardly ever talked about in D&D pages. I hope to see more like this!

I like the longer videos. A lot of your videos feel very condensed, like you have more to say. It's good to hear you really explore a topic.

I deployed a small summon army for that third act fight, met their chaff with my own across the entire battlefield while I punched up the right flank with the characters. I even remembered to throw my beholder bottle I kept forgetting about into their rear to cause havoc. Incredibly enjoyable encounter.

tbh, I am no dnd player, don't have any experience on this. I just let your videos play in the background while i draw maps and such. they are such an inspiration and your good-naturedness is very soothing. Thank you!

This was a fantastic video that showcased how to run tactics unbelievably well, your drawings with the commentary is so engaging and easy to follow. Its amazing how memorable these fights are just from the pictures, a real credit to BG3's design and how tactical encounters create engagement.

This is exactly what BG3 inspired me to. That, and giving my players enough environmental hazards - either to fall for themselves, or use to their advantage

Everything you draw in this video seems so simple, but is so well placed in perspective. It is effortlessly impressive.

Nice pathfinder pawns!

I liked using misdirection. I sometimes hid the "elite" boss dude/dudette into one of the other units, or hid them under stealth. I didn't make them impossible to defeat, just super hard to find. If they dressed similar to the "artillery" for the mage types and the infantry or ranged for the warrior types, sometimes I had one of each working together and did away with a brute sort.

I absolutely love this video and its formate. I think your ability to draw 3D but simple battle maps is extremely useful to understanding the flow of action - which makes sense with your bg as a storyboard artist. this makes me eager to see more battle design break downs, and trying to break then down myself.

Kyle, you keep producing GOLD! So pleased I found your channel.

Excellent video! Looking forward to setting this up more. A teacher friend of mine was just told their rent was gonna jump100/month. They can't be looking for a new place and starting a semester all at the same time. Be kind to teachers!

I really love this walk-through of encounter design because it comes from a valuable angle that is often left unexplored. 4ED was severely under appreciated by the community as a whole, and there is so much there that really does work well for the game we actually play. It may have come off as video-gamey but that's because of the intense natural language of the rules in the previous edition contrasted it so hard. I think that 4ED was a masterclass in technical writing, and user focused design, even if there were some changes that I could live happier without.

Now all we need is a copy of The Monsters Know What They’re Doing, and the party will go running for the hills

Wow you did masterfully with this. My friends and I have been RAVING how many lessons there are in this game for DMs, this just clarified it so concisely that I feel I can internalize the lessons now. Thank you! My players will forever hate you for making combat much deadlier

I really like your point of: The players will put in ALL the resources trying to burst the boss to 0HP! The DM knowing the player's resources is very important

I love this channel. You have a profound RPG knowledge, vivid drawing, good music, great character. Thank you I learn alot here. Still in the process of creating my first boardgame and this is helping tons!!

This channel ALWAYS delivers. Thank you so much, Kyle. This came at the perfect time, I was just thinking about how to incorporate the interesting and challenging elements of Baldur's Gate encounters into my own games. Looking forward to Monstrous.

⁠Personally, I love the tactical aspect and really like playing dnd combat like a proper wargame, alongside the fun role play and storytelling. Playing dnd like that makes it a perfect fusion of both styles of games, making it a really great experience. It being almost “Warhammer with a great story alongside” is really nice

While the content of the video is nothing new to me, I absolutely love your placement of the various songs from Final Fantasy Tactics throughout.

One of my DMs has been talking about introducing more tactically thinking enemies into combat for a while now, so I'll send this to him

Really well put, concise and to the point explanation of battlefield tactics for ttrpg's! I'd love to see a GM tutorial on how to introduce these kind of tactics to your players, since all the frills go to waste if your players refuse to think and just insist on rushing the center stage and get frustrated with the difficulty or, optionally, the GM is forced to play along with the suicide lunge so they don’t get wiped out. My way, I suppose, is just blatantly teaching them the meta way. Panning out the view for them, explaining these elements that go into it and asking what approaches they see for themselves in the scenario, hoping the perspective becomes automated for them as they become familiar with the concept.

If your entire channel was just thoughtful map design processes, I'd watch every single thing you put out.

The Final Fantasy Tactics music is clutching me by the body and soul.

Surprised you didn't use Flee Mortals monsters as your examples, they'd have been perfect. Great video, as always.

Hey man thanks for making such great content, always a joy to watch you draw!

I happened to run across the flee mortals book right as I was finishing baldurs gate 3 and trying to work some of the stuff I learned from the encounters in there into my campaigns to help spice up combat, and I feel like the lessons learned in there such as the sense of environmental combat it gives (something that never came up much in my games before playing it but I have really enjoyed implementing opportunity's for creative environmental advantages in combat for both sides after the fact) combine really well with the action oriented creatures and ideas from that book helping to make combat more interesting for players without having to resort to pitting them against overwhelming odds like I used to in order to provide challenge. really great book to add some more tactical depth to combat and just some fun twists on how standard monsters function to help more experienced players still get that sense of wonder at trying to figure out a new creatures move set for the first time.

It's always so interesting to see people's philosophy with difficulty in DnD. Personally as a DM I like to make difficulty a choice, either a party can take a fight and gain treasure or avoid it to save their lives. Combat itself I think is best enjoyed with odds that can be tipped by player ingenuity; difficulty and the threat of death brings out the most in players and can make for really theatrical and memorable moments.

I was content with not playing BG3 after an initial binge (that led me to beginning of act 3). I was happily typing away at my theory chapter. And then I watched this video. Brilliant. I will never look at encounters the same (so many possibilities!), and I really want to finish BG3 as well. Theory chapter: forgotten.

I love map videos like this, since I'm playing online and use Krita as a map tool. I like drawing maps myself, so advice like this helps me create somewhat fast maps with an acceptable level of detail without needing to draw the map too long

Yes! Please more videos like this

its funny the positioning of the NPCs at 16:57 is nearly identical to the last fight on the Nautilus in BG3, some good game design right there

It'd be nice to see more modules that lays out the units of each faction the way we see at around @11:20 to give you a nice overhead view of how to run most of the encounters in the book in a way that is interesting with one step less interpretation.

I'm so excited to put this into practice! It would be cool to have a poster of this (each class and a standard layout) as an add-on alongside your Kickstarter! I already kind-of redrew it, but would love something I could put on my walls

This is one of my favorite videos you’ve ever done, and you’ve done quite a few bangers. This introduction to unit types and their positioning is just what I needed. That being said, I wish the Dungeon Masters Guide - or some similar product - walked DMs through how to present a steady progression of tactical combat scenarios that both: train players how to handle them; and provide an increasing challenge based on character levels. Wouldn’t that be great? Or did I just hand you inspiration for your next dozen videos? 😃

My biggest takeaway from this is to give players pieces of intel about a big fight they're about to be a part of. I loved the perception/arcana checks in BG3 where characters mentioned the area is scorched or occasional "This is a perfect place for an ambush". But also random NPCs/animals/corpses you meet before the fight who tell you about the nearby encounter so you can prepare for it. For a player feeling like a master tactician during the fight is good, but knowing that your dialogue choices and awareness gave you an edge made it even better.

I always love your videos. So well put together! And they're always helpful, good job!

I love that the background music is from Final Fantasy Tactics. Great game to go along with a great video!

Every video of yours is a gold mine of TTRPG wisdom, and your arrows in 3D space are SO PERFECT

This was hugely helpful! Ive been thinking about how to incorporate lessons from BG3, i appreciate the breakdown

90% of my time on KZfaq is watching stuff while I work, so videos that are 40+ are ideal. I also like them.

Dude. The Zodiac Brave death knell as the intro? That is some fuckin deep magic right there. Liked. Subbed.

Love your art skills! the angeled perspective mid video was really impressive!

Thank you for calling out the spoiler sections so nicely and adding chapter markers.

Dude I love that you are using the FFT ost for background music!!! Love your content in general and find it very inspiring and helpful I just couldn’t believe I heard the shop song there haha!

One of the most useful D&D videos I’ve ever seen. Well done.

I'll definitely use this way of thinking about battle encounters from now on, the seven types of enemies will really help me, I'm not usually sure what to do with each enemy, so they end up all doing the same, but I hope that using this will help my managment skills

I have the same battle Matt! Been using it for the better part of 10 years.

Thanks for the insight on tactics! I could really use some of this information to spice up my combat encounters!

Final Fantasy Tactics music for the background music? Nice detail! You took me by surprise and I was open for your flanking charge!

Another really helpful video of which I’ll use the advice for my upcoming homebrew campaign :D

I've always wanted to get my players in the tough spot tactically, not simply depriving them of resource, but I've always been an action game guy and these ideas never clicked to me.

Top marks for using Final Fantasy tactics music and sound effects.

Amazing video. Thanks for putting in so much effort to make something really useful for dms to enhance the game. My players will be thanking you.

This is super helpful as I'm getting into the Lancer RPG, which has very challenging tactics

This video was brilliant. Love your channel man, good work!

Impressive and simply put. Thanks once again for this!

I always considered DnD tactics. Keeping track of stats of enemies, what their weak against, what they are resistant to. A lot of what is in this video pretty much shows it when you really get technical with the rules. It depends on the DM, the group and the type of campaign they are running. Some are very simple and easy to play so you can focus more on the RP while some love the harder and more rule oriented one that involves you to be more tact-filled in order to survive. It all depends on what you depends on what you consider tactics. My favorite moment when a friend of mine just started last year and was struggling a bit on combat and what he is allowed to do. He just sticks to basic moves and abilities for the first 2 to 3 sessions but then he finally had that break through that made him love DnD. The group was facing multiple invisible enemies so the players ran to the corner to try and limit the enemies access but it still was plenty of room for them to run in and attack. That was when my player asked what was around them. I told them since they were in the kitchen just the usual things you would see. Pots and pans, cooking utensils, some food.. "is there flour" I paused and said "You see a few sacks of flour stacked against the wall in the corner." Player then ask "Can I use my action to grab one of the sacks, cut it open and spread it a few feet on the floor in front of us?" I recently learned a tip from a fellow friend recently as I was still new to being a DM to not tell the what they can or can't do but to let the do it and let them deal with the consequence. I replied "It might be possible." After thinking for a moment he finally decides to try it. So now when the enemy tried to approach, they could see the foot prints. He was so elated when it worked. God I love DnD.

Awesome video. Explained well, the doodles were great, and it all had final fantasy tactics music behind it

The Elite looks like the King of Town and I'm here for it.

These diagrams are absolutely amazing

Going through my first playthrough of BG3 now and while I'm gonna cut the video off after the act 1 diagram, I have to say that you selling up the Blighted Village as a really nasty fight has me kinda regretting talking the goblins down from engaging me at all, thereby bypassing what sounds like a pretty fun tactical fight in its entirety. Maybe next playthrough XD

amazing content! keep 'em coming

I really liked the segment when you analyzed the BG3 encounters (despite me not having played it) and give your thoughts on why a certain arrangement is an interesting battle map or not. I think this is something that is done rather rarely on YT (at least on the channels I'm following) and deserves repetition: Showing something that you thought was great instead of conjuring some rules that supposedly make things great from the beginning. I do however not concur with a lot of your unit placement - so here is my take on it (although it's probably rather war-gamey): A boss/elite imho should be at the edge between front and middle guard so that it can intercept any threat, drain ressources and most importantly retreat towards the rear once it's taken enough fire. The elite is usually also the most interesting unit you have, both in respect to abilities and narrative, and giving it the chance to gain a second wind may shift the battle dynamic substantially. And it allows for high risk maneuvers, if the PCs actually manage to beat it down before it can safe itself or even pursuing into the fray - at which point I'd do morale saves for the rest of the foes, scattering the ranks of those who fail. Artillery should be at the end of the middle or even better in the rear guard because I think they need a minimum distance to be effective. So pressing forward to the artillery may even render them useless or at least putting them at a disadvantage without actively bashing it with a sword. And since they are vulnerable and slow they need a couple of meat shields while they retreat - a good place for brutes or tanks, since 1HP minions just means to put them in harms way. A summoner or a saboteur makes most sense on the flanks: It gives ranged units some additional protection and especially makes them more annoying to deal with, which puts the question to the players if they want to deal with a target that's not that threatening on a round by round basis but may catch them off guard / whittle them down / impede their progress. Cavalry stands correctly but I think an often underestimated action they could take is to save a threatened creature and make a run for it. E.g. pulling out a summoner or healer (or the elite) when they are in danger of breaking.

Great use of the FFT music and SFX!

I like the use of the final fantasy tactics soundtrack here

Brilliant video! And loved the Final Fantasy Tactics music, such a foundational game for me as a kid, and in hindsight led me to DnD later in life. Anyone else have that experience?

This is such a phenomenal video, absolute gold. Thank you for making my day!

I really appreciate the FFT music used in the background of this video.

Amazing video!! You always do a good job explaining things in a very easy way to understand, that's pretty rad! I liked that the whole vid reminded me of Fire Emblem mechanics a TON, you should definitively give it a try if you haven't! (there's tons of games btw, they're all super good!).

We need more of this tactic map

Hey mate. Nice video. You managed to put in very simple terms stuff a lot of people simply don't take into consideration. I did watch all the way until the second encounter because I didn't want to spoil the third one yet. One thing I didn't see you mention, and I use as a rule in my games, is the concept of "Group Moral". Depending entirely on the composition of the enemies, they are bound to break ranks and flee when the battlefield starts turning against them. This of course makes calculating the CR of the encounters a nightmare (we play 3e), but to me it's more realistic. Goblins will break at the first sign of danger, for example; unless there's a Boss they fear even more. Wolves might break if the Alpha falls, or if a considerable number of them are injured; but a single wolf will flee as soon as he's injured. Monsters cornered into a dead end will fight till the death if they don't culturally understand about "surrendering"; and might surrender if they know the heroes are morally bound to capture them instead of killing them. Intelligent Bosses will try to escape if their minions start falling. All these add a further layer of tactics that, sadly, VideoGames and TV/Movies totally ignore, and which culturally I feel most players thus also ignore. My players have learned from it, not only to prioritize targets and expect some enemies to flee, but also to flee themselves when a battle starts turning against them. Most importantly, it allows me to play "false retreat" scenarios when enemies are intelligent, well disciplined and trained; as well as to set up careful ambushes and such. Cheers.

I didnt really have much trubble with moonrise just going throught the front door. BUT my multiplayer campaigns all did you give me an interesting perspective on the idea of 'Intended' Solutions

Great video made even better by the Final Fantasy tactics background music 😎

Loved this video, I'm definitely gonna try and implement all this info!

I’m commenting just one more time to reiterate how great this video was. That is all.

Am I the only one playing the game and finding every fight turns into "desperately hold down a choke point against swarms of skeletons, goblins, spiders, gnolls, how did we end up here?" lmao

You write with mustard, love it

Dude, this video is awesome. Great work

Great vid thanks! :D I'd love to see some Star Borg content! 🤘

The FFT music is hitting just right.

Incredible content as usual, this was super enlightening

Excellent episode!! 👌

Generally I do aim to kill my party. I know that as a GM, there’s no way I can think of everything my players will do, so I design encounters that will always be fatal unless the party does something unexpected. I explained this in session zero as “I will try to kill your characters, but I want you to survive”. They’ve loved it so far! Makes every battle tense, they try and avoid them more often and overall it’s a lot of fun.

Excellent insights here. I have never tried tactical grid combat, but this video makes me want to try it out

So amazing video. I am huge in tactics play infact I have a raid system I made that allowes PC to have their own units to bring in huge battles like the storming of a castle. But one thing is that your elite choice is if you want your boss to be a rearguard commander but I would say elite is not just it's own unite type but an elite version of the other choices so if you wanted a vanguard boss have him be an elite brute picture a large armored man with a 2 handed sword who has the abilities of a boss pushing the infantry aside because if you want something done right you better do it your self. But again love your videos I was surprised when I wasn't sucribed changed that just now I got ya boss.

One thing I always do when making an encounter: Establish a "win condition" for each encounter. Basically, a win condition in this context is the overarching strategy that the encounter wants to play for in order to win. Let's say you have an encounter with a 5th level NPC wizard and an ogre. If the wizard opts to cast Haste on the Ogre you have a very different encounter than one where the wizard opts to cast Fireball. Any creature can be a win condition if you build an encounter that supports them correctly: If you want to win with a bunch of infantry, maybe deploy some fast-moving or sneaky monsters to ambush and distract spellcasters, or use creatures that can buff big groups. Want to win with a big juggernaut of a monster? Using a bunch of ranged minions to support him, or a caster for buffs. Keeping your win conditions varied will do a lot to ensure that your combat doesn't get stale, and that your players can't fall back on the same tactics over and over and over again. Unless it's Spirit Guardians.

Oh boy do I love seeing things like this! I've always made sure to vary the enemies in my campaigns as to where they make situational sense but still act as a cohesive 'unit' if you will. We tend to play more dark heresy and other sci-fi games and one of the challenges then is the fact that ranged weapons tend to lock down the fights. To avoid these lock downs I tend to have 2 priorites when designing the encounter: Good terrain and tactical "weakpoints". Starting with the first, good terrain. Make sure to avoid "kill boxes" where the enemies hog all the cover while the party is in the wide open. When designing the map, think of it a bit like a war game map for warhammer or something where you want an even spread of cover for both sides to dart between. The other big thing is elevation. Give the players the option to attack from above or below, place your infantry in awkward positions for your party to deal with, forcing them to have to send someone to deal with it. A rusty servitor with poor aim can be a surprisingly big threat when put on a catwalk just above and to the side of the party. As for the tactical weakpoints, think of what would be the ideal composition of units in your current encounter and then remove one part of it. You might have strong cavalry units flanking the party but no infantry to pin them down, allowing them to prepare for the attacks. The enemies may have a really powerful artillery unit but the terrain makes it awkward for them to attack unless they reach a pretty obvious vantage point on the map, giving the party a clear 'mini objective' in the encounter. The reason for these are to avoid stale encounters. A good and balanced group of enemies are effective because they are consistent but the dark side of consistency is monotony (idk how to spell that I'm sorry lol). As a DM you can fall into the trap of using the same enemy formation over and over because of worries that other formations may be too strong or weak. Similarly, the party may spot the formations and find a way to deal with them too easily, kill the artillery, avoid the ranged, tie down the cav and focus on the boss.

upvote for Final Fantasy Tactics background music.

i can say giving edges a certain colour fr changing heights is a very nice thing

The Act 3 example. I let the Spawner go off. Proceeded to turbo stomp the entire encounter anyway. Lot of fun lol (Tactician difficulty only; however I have a lot of experience with Larian games)