DESIGNING BATTLES

<h1>DESIGNING BATTLES</h1>
<p>
  As the Game Master, your role is to create battles that challenge the Player
  Characters and enrich the story. The following pages will provide you with a
  variety of tools and guidelines that will help with the mechanical side — but
  first, there are a few important points you should try to remember.
</p>
<ul>
  <li>
    <strong>Relevant battles.</strong> A battle takes place when two sides are
    at odds and resort to violence in order to achieve their goals. Battles
    should be meaningful: they should build upon what previously happened in the
    story, add new interesting characters or plot elements and move things
    forward in some important way.
  </li>
  <li>
    <strong>People, not numbers.</strong> Characters are more than their stats.
    They have emotions, a personality, their own lives and goals — when they
    fight, they do so for a reason. Even the ones that aren't the focus of your
    story should be treated as more than disposable, faceless pawns.
  </li>
  <li>
    <strong>More than the sum of its parts.</strong> There are a variety of
    elements that can alter the threat posed by a situation — the options
    available to Player Characters, for instance, or the particular synergy
    between two monsters. Once you add the environment, the whim of the dice and
    the occasional use of Ritual magic into the mix, you can see that there is
    no way to foresee the outcome of a battle — and that’s okay. Being the GM
    has nothing to do with being “in control”, but rather with your ability to
    react to unexpected situations. Battles are just like that — sometimes,
    things will get weird, or the heroes will steamroll their foe. Don’t sweat
    it too much.
  </li>
  <li>
    <strong>Balance.</strong> While the advice in the coming pages is geared
    towards building a somewhat balanced challenge, remember that there’s
    nothing wrong with an easy battle every once in a while, or the occasional
    super-hard boss fight. Just don’t make those the norm, or they'll lose their
    charm!
  </li>
</ul>
<p>
  More importantly, respect the Players' expectations and what you discussed
  during session zero (see <a href="/books/core/#page-147">page 147</a>), and
  design battles in accordance with what you agreed upon in terms of challenge
  and complexity.
</p>
<ul>
  <li>
    <strong>Take your time.</strong> When the heroes decide to fight an enemy
    for which you don’t have any combat stats ready, it’s perfectly okay to
    pause the game and take your time to design those creatures. The rules on
    <a href="/books/core/#page-302">page 302</a> have been designed specifically
    to make this process as smooth and fast as possible; once you have
    familiarized yourself with them, creating new adversaries will only take a
    few minutes.
  </li>
</ul>
<p>And there’s always the Bestiary, of course!</p>