So, I’ve been DM-ing a D&D game for about a year now.  My last session, I feel, was probably one of the best.  It incorporated new elements that the players hadn’t really dealt with before, and provided a surprise outcome that they were not expecting.  Also, this outcome was completely driven by their own choices during the encounter.  I set this up to try and address some trends I’ve been seeing, and it’s possible that other DM’s encounter some of these same trends.  In my game, we are dealing with new and relatively new players, and an inexperienced DM.  We all like each other, so that helps.  So, first, what I wanted to do with this encounter was:

1. Reward risk taking.
2. Change the outcome based on choices.
3. Provide an out to end the encounter before the traditional “kill all bad guys” end.

The reason I wanted to reward risk taking is that my players are largely risk-averse.  When they enter a room, they huddle on one side of the room behind the fighters and lob their attacks at the bad guys.  While effective, this behavior causes the encounter to drag out for a long time and makes for occasional uninteresting gameplay.  So, I added room elements that would seriously effect the outcome of the encounter, depending on their choices.  This is why I like rune circles…you can make them do anything you want. 

Unfortunately for my players, they chose poorly and ignored that element.  As usual, they focused on the bad guys only, so I made them pay for that.  I had a “shadow pit,” for lack of a better term, in the middle of the room that they were ignoring/avoiding.  Avoidance was fine, Ignoring it was not good.  I tied the rune circle to that shadow pit as a magical switch.  If the big bad guy got to the circle first (which would only be triggered if his guardian wraiths and dracolich were killed), then the circle would cause a serious transformation to him as he called forth the spirit of Orcus.  It would also cause the shadow pit to grow, based on a moderate DC check.  If he got to the circle, I would perform this check after every player’s turn, to emulate an ongoing chant in the game play.

After a couple of successful checks, the shadow pit had grown to obscure the big bad guy from the party’s view (he was on the opposite side of the room, the shadow pit was between the players and him).  At this point, he underwent a transformation into a demon.  A couple of my players got aggressive at this point and ran through the boiling shadow.  I did not tie any effect to this, only if they started their turn in the shadow.  Once they got to the other side, they were able to see the transformation.  One player was able to move in such a fashion that they could attack the guy.  This caused him to turn his attention from his ritual to the player, and those players in his field of vision were immediately frozen in a dream state.  If the big bad guy was able to then continue his chanting, the shadow pit would continue to grow to consume the entire room in boiling shadow.  Once this happened, all the players were trapped in a dream state, and that ended the encounter.

Now, if the players had been less risk-averse, they could’ve got to the rune circle first and been able to trigger an action with a difficult Arcana or History check that would have reduced the shadow pit in size, and caused damage to the big bad guy.  this would’ve ended the encounter much sooner with a “successful” outcome.

Hopefully, this encounter taught my players to pay attention to the room layout and to everything that they can see.  Also, to use what is around you, not just bash away at baddies.  Only future encounters will tell.