Spicing Up Encounters: No More Blandits

You know the scene: your players are moving from one part of your story or world to the other, and it's time for an encounter. Your players grow excited at the rumblings of combat, and you unveil the enemies they're about to face off against. It's bandits. (Or goblins. Or whatever typical enemies typically make up the encounters in your world.) How exciting is this the third time it happens? Even with strategic details that change, some players are going to get bored fighting against the same old bandits (or blandits, as I call them) before too long. But you can mix these encounters up and provide something exciting for your players with just a bit of creative thinking. Read on for ways to create more memorable encounters. 

There are a few ways that you can spice up encounters. You can completely change the enemy type (while still staying within the story you're telling), you can create unique types of enemies, and you can mix enemy types to create new versions of foes for your players. Each one creates novelty in a different way, and that's important; the human brain craves novelty, so providing it to your players will make your game appeal to them on a deep level. Let's get into the first method. 

You can completely change the type of enemy your players normally face. Let's say that you're dealing with a campaign about small towns being targeted by bandits. Your players have faced a number of bandits, and some of the charm of fighting bandits has begun to wear off. You might mix it up in a small or a large way. Let's say that the next town the players visit is a port city--now, rather than bandits, you can translate the idea to the setting and make them pirates. Now you have the opportunity to have a chaotic pirate battle that allows you to use some bandit tactics and motifs but give them a new face with the pirate design. Similarly, a mountain settlement might feature mountaineers who fight with distance weapons like bows and polearms, and a town of poor folks might have a farmers' militia with farming tools as weapons. Perhaps a deep forest community fight like hunters rather than skirmishers, and a supernatural twist could surprise your players with lycanthropic fighters. These are all minor changes, basically akin to putting a new video game skin on the same character; and yet, each of these twists on the blandit changes the way that the enemy fights, and thereby the tactics that the party will need to use to defeat them. With this method, you get to keep your encounters simple but keep them varied. 

You could just as easily create unique types of enemy. Let's say that you've run a few encounters with bandits or some comparable enemy, and again you need to mix things up. So we'll create different types of bandit. Think about the way most video games work: there isn't so much one enemy you fight, but an army of enemies with varied skills and weaknesses. You can reproduce that in your game with just a few small twists. Below is a list of several types of enemy you can create that have distinct abilities to make them more unique: 

• Tank: These enemies are covered in heavy armor, perhaps finely-made armor, and perhaps cobbled together from whatever was available (pots and pans, sheet metal, washboards, etc.). Because of their armor, they don't move quickly, and most of their strength is used wearing the armor, so they don't deal loads of damage. But they will be hard to hit (at least an 18 or 19 Armor Class), and that will make dealing with this enemy a greater challenge than simply being a bandit. 
• Sniper: These enemies are not particularly well-defended; rather, they use speed and maneuverability to stay out of reach of the players. From that distance, they use ranged weapons to deal damage that cannot be answered. A lot of GMs will keep ranged weapons out of the hands of enemies, but a few well-placed snipers can give the players a much harder time with the group than they anticipate. 
• Explosives Expert: These enemies are neither heavily defended nor prepared for a long fight; their strength in combat is that they can deal heavy damage to a number of players at once. You can equip this enemy with classic in-game devices like Alchemist's Fire or your take on a rudimentary explosive device. Whatever the nature of your device, it should be something that can deal lots of damage suddenly, making these enemies targets your players must quickly deal with. 
• Commander: Oftentimes, GMs operate groups of enemies like they operate with a hivemind; every NPC knows what's going on across the battle, and the GM's knowledge of tactics is uniform across the group of enemies. You can avoid this conundrum and spice up battle by adding a commanding character who calls out strategic maneuvers and may even be able to provide small buffs to the other enemies. They are not the best combatants, but they are capable of turning the tide of a battle. 
• Rogue: So often in battle, all of the enemies take formation and fight openly without variation. You can change that with rogue NPCs, enemies who can use stealth to disappear from combat and reappear only to sneak attack a party member. Like the Sniper, these enemies are not well-defended, but they use maneuverability to make the most of their attacks. You can have these enemies disappear by positioning them behind cover and then rolling Stealth to leave cover unseen. 
• Weapons Experts: Sometimes, even just adding an interesting weapon to an NPC can be enough to set them apart from standard sword-and-shield blandits. A bandit with a reach weapon is considerably different from a bandit with an axe; a bandit with a whip will mix up combat entirely. Take a look at some of the more exotic weapons and use them to spice up your enemies. Players will remember "that guy with the pike" better than you might anticipate. 

These are just a few variations and enemy types. I recommend also describing these enemies as having distinctly different physical appearances. Tanks and Weapons Experts may be big and muscular, where Snipers, Rogues, and Commanders would be smaller but also have specific uniforms: Snipers and Rogues might want different kinds of camouflaged whereas the Commander wants something that sets them visibly apart in battle. I also recommend having your enemies communicate verbally in battle, suggesting maneuvers and calling out player strategies; not only does this make the enemies more challenging and realistic, but the players will be deeply engaged when the enemies are responding to their strategy in real time. 

A final note about these enemy types: as you can probably tell, most of the enemy types above are basically classes from D&D. That's intentional; just as player characters have distinct skills and fighting techniques, so should the enemies in the world. If everyone just smashes swords together over and over, your players are bound to get bored with encounters. By mixing up combat with the same variation that players get to enjoy, we can keep the game balanced and keep our players guessing. 

If you want to mix enemy types together, you can use both of the methods outlined above to create memorable enemies. A bandit with a sword has nothing on a pirate explosives expert or a hunting sniper or a mountaineer with a halberd. Any of these twists on normal enemies creates novelty for your players, which keeps them engaged. 

Some folks might counter that it doesn't make sense to have a smattering of enemy types--why would a pirate, a hunter, a mountaineer, and a rogue all work together? That's essentially what the party of player characters is, though. The variety of classes makes a party stronger and more ready to deal with anything. Similarly, a strong crew of bandits might employ various experts to improve their odds of success. 

You might also mix up your encounters by having different groups of enemies take different strategic approaches. The party might encounter skirmishers, tanks, a pincer attack, a balance of ranged and melee approaches, bandits who focus on spellcasters or healers, or enemies who strike and retreat, strike and retreat. These strategies make enemies more unique, as the battles themselves will change in response to the strategies. 

I also like to add some flair to my encounters by giving the enemies magic items. An enemy cleric with Bracers of Armor is a formidable foe; a bandit with a bastard sword that lights enemies on fire must be taken seriously; an enemy who can summon an ally to fight with them changes an encounter completely. 

Ultimately, it all comes down to this, though: encounters should mean something. If you're not playing a combat-based game, you don't really need encounters. If you are running a combat campaign, encounters should be varied and exciting. Increase the power of your enemies and develop them beyond just a type. This guide can help as a starting point, but to further develop them, start thinking about what you want the enemies to be like. Memorable foes have complexity, so give them more personality than just opposition. 

That's all for now. Coming soon: what to offer in city marketplaces, why roleplaying is the height of gaming, and how to build a player stronghold. Until next time, happy gaming!

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