Dynamic Encounters

In isolated encounters where the PCs have plenty of time to recover from hazards' effects, simple hazards can feel more like speed bumps than true challenges. But when combined with other threats, even simple hazards can prove perilous. A noisy explosion can draw attention, allowing foes to burst through the door for a dramatic start to the encounter. Radiation is especially tricky as it can cause the PCs' gear to glitch, which can be especially devastating in encounters where the PCs rely on tech gear to move, such as jetpacks, or attack enemies who are far away. Simple hazards can also be an active part of an encounter, particularly if the foes know how to avoid triggering them.

As their name suggests, complex hazards are a more powerful tool for encounters. Because they continue to act, they're an ongoing presence in the fight. When combined with hostile creatures, complex hazards offer the PCs plenty of choices for what they want to do next. This is particularly true if foes benefit from the hazard. Should the PCs first disable the array of pipes spewing flammable gas into the room, or should they prioritize the fire elemental creeping closer and closer to the growing cloud of explosive fumes? There's no right answer, and the PCs' choices have a clear impact on the obstacles they face. Hazards in combat shine when they give the PCs ways to contribute meaningfully other than dealing damage to a creature. Interesting actions to disable a hazard are a fun way to give several PCs something fresh and different to do rather than piling on damage.

While some battlefields are relatively static, allowing the PCs and foes to clobber each other until one side wins, complex or evolving battlefields can lead to far more memorable encounters. One of the most straightforward ways to create an evolving battlefield is with dynamic environmental features. Maybe the floating platforms that make up the room's floor shuffle around on their own turn each round, or various squares teleport creatures to different locations—possibly between two rooms where separate battles take place simultaneously. These dynamic features have some overlap with complex hazards, though they don't tend to be an opposition or obstacle specifically threatening the PCs.

Similarly, a third party in the encounter, perhaps a rampaging monster or a passing security robot, could pose a danger to both sides but potentially benefit either. For instance, perhaps the PCs or their foes could harness this third party as a dangerous but powerful ally with a successful skill check of some kind or by making a risky bargain.

Sometimes the evolving battlefield is more of a state change, or series of state changes, and less of a constant presence. For instance, defeating the rogue AI controlling a space station could cause systems aboard the station to malfunction, perhaps turning off the artificial gravity and forcing the PCs to deal with the remaining robots while floating. Major physical changes to the environment, such as the collapsed portions of a room rising and falling or water beginning to rush in and fill the room, can force the PCs to rethink their plans to handle the new situation. Sometimes the evolving battlefield is more of an unexpected plot twist that occurs in the middle of the encounter. Perhaps the evil tyrant reveals that they were a dragon all along, or security robots arrive to help whichever side is outmatched. Whatever you choose, make sure it changes things up and makes the encounter feel more dynamic and different. For instance, raising up a portion of the battlefield that isn't particularly relevant when neither the PCs nor their foes are likely to care is less interesting than raising up the pedestal holding the datapad the PCs and their enemies are trying to recover.

Picture this: the PCs storm a fortified outpost. They choose to eschew stealth in favor of a direct approach. A drone spots them and raises an alarm. The sound of alarms blares throughout the base as enemy troops ensure that everyone is ready for a fight. And then, they politely wait in whatever room they were already standing in for the PCs to come and attack them. It sounds pretty unrealistic, and it feels unrealistic at the table. Many players find it far more satisfying when their foes take reasonable actions and countermeasures against them, such as moving to defensible positions behind cover or banding together with allies. Taken to an extreme, combining encounters can quickly lead to fights that are unwinnable, so be careful. In the outpost example, some troops might come out to attack the PCs, while others cluster around the control station. Perhaps each individual patrol of soldiers around the castle is a trivial-threat encounter, but as they gather together, they form groups of gradually escalating threat. Such groups give the PCs a sense of how challenging their opposition is, so that if a fight against six soldiers is a challenge, they won't try to pick a fight with 30. When the PCs' foes amass into an overwhelming force, give the PCs fair warning and a chance to retreat and try again another day. Of course, if the PCs come back after the alarm has been raised, the soldiers are likely to change their rotations to better secure the base.

The most common reason to separate an encounter into multiple pieces is to set up a combined encounter, like when an injured foe retreats to gather reinforcements. This provides the PCs with a choice: do they ignore the fleeing enemy and focus on the battle in front of them, or do they split their own forces, weighing the risk of being led into a dangerous encounter against the chance of stopping later foes from preparing for their approach? An encounter might also separate into pieces because of dramatic changes to the battlefield, such as a collapsing ceiling or a magical wall that prevents those on each side of the barrier from accessing the other without spending actions to bypass the obstruction.

Time pressure adds an extra sense of urgency to any encounter and can be a great way to make an otherwise trivial- or low-threat encounter tactically engaging, satisfying, and memorable. After all, while low- and trivial-threat encounters have an incredibly low chance of defeating the PCs, the opposition can usually hold on long enough to make the PCs spend a few rounds to defeat them unless the PCs expend more resources than they normally would on such foes. Time pressure is often related to a secondary objective in the encounter, though it could be a countdown directly related to the encounter itself. For instance, if the midwife's ritual will cause a polymorphic wave to consume the station in 4 rounds, the heroes need to defeat the midwife before then!

One of the simplest and most exciting ways to create a dynamic encounter, even if the combat itself isn't so difficult, is to add a secondary objective beyond simply defeating foes. Perhaps the imperial troops are about to execute captives, and some of the PCs need to divert their efforts to avoid a massacre. Encounters with a parallel objective that requires PCs to take actions other than destroying foes can keep those foes around long enough to do interesting things without inflating their power level. It also gives PCs skilled in areas related to the side mission a chance to shine.

Sometimes a secondary objective might present a time limit, like if the PCs need to prevent evidence from being deleted, either by fighting quickly or by disconnecting or stealing the computer it's stored on. Another type of secondary objective relates to how the PCs engage in combat with the primary opposition. The PCs might need to use nonlethal attacks against security guards who mistakenly believe the PCs are criminals, or they might need to prevent security drones from retreating to alert others. Options like these highlight mobile characters like the operative. You could even create truly off-the-wall secondary objectives that require the PCs to lose the encounter in order to succeed. The PCs might need to put up a believable fight but retreat and let foes steal their urban cruiser in order to follow the foes back to their base. Secondary objectives are a great way to highlight different abilities in combat and make for a memorable encounter, but—like all of these tactics—they can become annoying if overused.

Most encounters assume that the PCs' opponents work together to oppose the PCs, but when groups of foes have been collaborating and fighting together for a long time, they can develop additional strategies. Consider giving each member of these tightly knit teams a reaction triggered by their allies' abilities, or another benefit they gain based on their allies' actions. Just as a team of PCs learns how to position the solarian so they aren't in the way of the ranged fighters and minimize the harm they take from the soldier's Area Fire, NPCs can learn to complement each other's strategies and avoid interfering with each other. On the opposite end of the spectrum, opponents with poor coordination make the fight much easier for the PCs. Poor coordination between mindless creatures is common, and PCs can use clever tactics to run circles around these foes. When intelligent creatures accidentally (or deliberately) harm each other or pursue conflicting strategies, particularly if they engage in banter with each other as they fight, it can make for an amusing break in the typical rhythm of combat.

When taken to its extreme, synergy can represent the actions of a hive mind or a single massive creature. These synergistic components can be creatures, hazards, or both. For example, instead of representing a previously unseen Swarm entity the size of a warship as a single foe, you could represent each of its pincers as an individual opponent. Perhaps this bespoke Swarm creature can sacrifice actions it would otherwise use to crush PCs in its maw to use its pincers more freely. In this case, you could model a field of pincers as a complex hazard that mainly reacts to the PCs moving within it, but allow the Swarm's body to act with a few pincers directly.

Sometimes, a bit of misdirection can add a lot of interest to an encounter, especially against offense-heavy groups. Rather than amping up the opposition to match the PCs' firepower and creating opponents whose own offenses are too powerful for the PCs' defenses, consider a little sleight of hand. For instance, a villain might have a hologram or disguised robotic double with just enough durability to take a few hits while the true villain is hiding nearby, ready to emerge and attack. Illusion spells and holograms can allow a foe to attack from a safer position, and possession grants the foe a disposable body unless the PCs brought along spirit blast or similar magic. Sometimes you can even hide the villain in plain sight, or the villain dies the first time the PCs defeat them in combat. Some might escape, perhaps through teleportation, misdirection, or with other ploys. When a villain escapes and lives to fight the PCs again another day, it's good to have that foe learn from their past failures. In their next encounter with the PCs, give them additional minions, spells, or other defenses designed to counteract the strategies the PCs used against them previously. Even if the villain doesn't escape, they might have other tricks up their sleeves, such as rising again to oppose the PCs. They could well return later in the adventure—or they might come back immediately for a second battle, so long as there's a proper justification for doing so. For example, defeating an otherworldly villain's outer shell might reveal its terrible true form, or an evil witchwarper from another timeline might have a more powerful alternate self who already defeated the PCs once and is wise to their tricks the next time he faces them!