Quote from: Old Geezer;797619It's because the fight cost him "hit points" and for the sake of game balance recovering a valuable resource, i.e. hit points, has to have a tangible cost; either time or the expense of magical healing.

If you look on it as a game of resource management it makes perfect sense.

Really I do understand how hit points work in OD&D.

Hit points just don't work the same way in Robin Hood. Once you introduce things outside of the duel like game balance and game resource management and hit points that take days or magic to recover you are no longer modeling the Basil and Errol duel with Errol in his unblemished tights and every hair still in place at the end of the fight. What you are modeling is a longer series of encounters which are more like Die Hard or REH Conan where the hero picks up lots of knicks, slashes, and scratches as he goes along to the point that at the end of the movie he clearly isn't prepared to fight a second duel that was as tough as the first one.

If you want to ignore the inconsistencies with D&D hit points and the duel in Robin Hood that is your choice or if you just don't find the inconsistencies very jarring to you that is your experience. But it is just a tad frustrating to see you repeatedly wave your hands around as if there aren't any inconsistencies to notice or for other people to find jarring.

Quote from: jibbajibba;797550Except Robin never wears any armour so would be easy to hit and in that fight with the sheriff of nottingham neither are armoured so it looks a lot more like a duel or a scene from En Garde surely

Which is exactly why increases in level mean increases in hit dice/hit points: so that *unarmored* characters can get better at surviving fights.

Quote from: jibbajibba;797600hmmm.... dubious.
And to return to my OP if Robin has a bunch of extra HP they come from Dex not Con.

They come from neither, in the  case of Robin Hood. They come from level.

But here's a couple questions for you, jibba:

(1) You don't get a DEX AC bonus in certain situatiions, such as when attacked from behind, since the DEX bonus represents the ability to dodge an attack. If you switch to DEX adding hit points, would high DEX characters take extra damage?

(2) Certain attacks have a special effect if the attack roll is 4 or more points above the score needed. For example, a purple worm swallows a character whole, resulting in death if the character isn't rescued. Likewise, a Sword of Sharpness severs a limb, causing instant death in the case of severing the head. In neither case does the amount of hit points matter, only the armor class and any  modifiers to the attack roll. If you switch to DEX modifying hit points, high DEX characters will be just as likely to die as low characters. Are you OK wwith that?

Quote from: Bren;797604Works as long as we don't think too much about why Robin, who was never even scratched, is totally unfit to fight Guy of Gisborne until after Robin has spent 3 or 4 weeks for natural healing up.

Actually, Robin Hood does take a cut in the ribs at 1:46 in the video I linked to. It doesn't look bad, but Hollywood was under the Hayes Code and couldn't show more than few drops of blood back then.

Quote from: Elfdart;797754Actually, Robin Hood does take a cut in the ribs at 1:46 in the video I linked to. It doesn't look bad, but Hollywood was under the Hayes Code and couldn't show more than few drops of blood back then.

It's too blurry for me to see any blood at all. Just him grabbing at his side as if the actor might have been whacked accidently or as if the character was hit with the flat of the blade. This one has a sharper picture on my computer, but I still don't see any blood. the "hit" occurs about 1:55 in this version.

But we know he can't have be bleeding because he still has hit points left and as OG said, the damage only occurs after you are out of hit points.

Some of the reasons I don't like/haven't done duels:

• it requires agreement between the two sides, which is already unlikely when one of the sides is me, or else
• it requires some third party to push it, which usually translates to a GM determined to do this, possibly to the point of railroading but certainly strongly restricting the player's options;
• the stakes are typically lower than a regular fight to the death, and therefore less compelling (to me, at least);
• the losing party may just escalate anyway, even if you got agreement beforehand;
• from a game point of view, it's boring for everyone else and even for the participants, who have fewer options (swapping opponents, helping/being helped by an ally, or using any of the strategies ruled out by the conditions of the duel, such as using armor);
• if there are different rules for duels from regular fights, then it's difficult to keep them in balance, and there's a roleplaying burden to avoid going with the mechanically advantageous approach.
• if the duel is between player characters, I generally don't care for PC vs PC conflict, for several reasons.

But I will conced that jibbajibba's enthusiasm for duels in RPGs is impressive, and I will make a point of considering a duel at the next reasonable occasion, playing or DMing.

Quote from: jibbajibba;797514Some settings mean that not accepting a challenge is effectivily admitting cowardice this is true from an Arthurian romance to a Rennaisance setting to ancient Japan to the American west so not exactly a narrow range.

#2 above, where the third party is social standing or whatever.

QuoteDisagree here much more likely to be asked to take it outside by the heavy set bald guys in the suits.

Again the two guys squaring up in the car park/street is a pretty common trope.

#4, or #2 with bouncers; it seems to me that friends of the guy who's losing are likely to jump in (maybe with a flimsy excuse that that other guy is cheating or whatever), and then the other guy's friends jump in.  And even more likely in D&D where the sidelined player characters are looking for an excuse to be in the action.  If you have no friends to back you up, then it turns out you're just a solo adventurer fighting a single enemy.

Quotebut again historically and in the source fiction settling a battle through a contest of champions or using that as a precursor to a battle is really common so ...

#4 and #5.

QuoteA duel is a pretty traditional way for a lawful PC to call out an issue with another PC. We have done magical duels as well as martial ones. And depending on the setting not accepting a challenge might well loose you a lot of social capital.

#7, #6, #5, #2.

QuoteWell D&D like all RPGS has moments where all of the PCs aren't taking part, from  the rogue scouting ahead to the Hacker, to the guy in the library doing research. Managing that is just a GM 101 task.
Combats in my games are never dull. We never say I rolled a 4 you rolled a 15 you take 4 damage i rolled .. etc never happens. Fightes are detailed with description and repartee, tricks and manuvers and twists and turns. We can recount battles blow by blow 20 years later down the pub and the good ones get written into legend.

The duel I was bystander for was pretty recent, in 5e, and coerced by the lawful evil opponent who wanted a duel (and correctly assessed that he was many levels higher).  It took over an hour and wouldn't have been helped (sped up or made more interesting) by colorful descriptions.  Most of the situations where fewer characters are involved are resolved with one quick skill check for each character, and usually the other characters aren't completely sidelined.

QuoteNo it wouldn't have been dull it would have been awesome. The cavalier wasn't allowed to choose armour or weapons as he called the duel that was the barbarian's point. Sorry if that wasn't clear.  
The rivalry went on for years after with the duel hanging over them and the Cavalier calling for a battle from horseback with shiled and lance and the Barbarian saying he was challenged and he was ready to finish the job in the circle unarmoured with knives....

So wouldn't most characters avoid making a challenge, given that the challenged could probably find some advantageous choice?  Would the cavalier still have made the challenge if he were levels lower, even if the barbarian would have accepted armor and cavalier weapons?

My thoughts on recourse were that the cavalier would fall back on sneering about dishonorable forms of combat and "might as well dress as apes and fling feces at each other" and so on, which would mostly salvage his reputation with his own social circle at least (well, better than being killed).

QuoteWell there are lots of settings, just look at the number of fantasy novels. I can see that at the point at which the party is actually being beset by creatures trying to harm them a duel is unlikely but a game exists in a far wider context that that. And some settings have dueling as a central tenent I think the D&D Mystera Savage Coast might have had additional rules for it even. But any game that needs a separate combat system for a common combat trope as its core system doesn't fit ... well it might need a tweak.

I guess I wasn't clear.  I don't mean the party was sometimes beset; I mean that their entire races were constantly in peril, and wasting energy on fighting among themselves would be disastrous.

For duels to make sense there needs to be an actual society in the setting. Typically the society will need to be some type of honor culture, which historically was not too uncommon. Many warrior cultures have been honor focused. Of course it also helps if the PCs have a place in society (or are trying to make a place in society) rather than being streotypical murder hobos who can wander from place to place without roots or repercussions.

If the culture doesn't care about honor or if the players don't need to care about the culture, duels will understandably be rather rare.

If instead of hp you give a parry chance (e.g., RuneQuest) the way that works out in practice tends to ramp up odds ratios very quickly. If you just give a better hit chance and/or more damage per hit (as in The Fantasy Trip, or missiles in Tunnels & Trolls) then high-level fights become like quick-draw gunfights rather than the duel in "The Princess Bride".

In either case, you also tend to introduce an element of random sudden death (potential one-shot kills); and the improbable outliers are more likely to fell longer-played characters.

These are all reasons one might prefer something like D&D style hp. T&T originally had armor that got worn down like hp, so each round (barring ties) brought a fight closer to resolution and armor itself never made a figure invulnerable. Lee Gold's Lands of Adventure treated armor as a multiplier of several sorts of point, so a hit commonly meant just one step of subtraction (vs. two in RQ, TFT, later T&T, etc.). That also meant that armor gave in one sense a constant ratio of improvement, as opposed to deducting a variable proportion of hit chance (D&D) or damage per hit (RQ). Whatever the foe, a 2.5x suit of armor meant it would take 2.5x the hits to take down the target.

In D&D, a -1 to hit with d8 or d10 damage means from one perspective a saving of on average about a quarter point per attack. On the other hand, another 5% chance not to get hit with something really nasty can be effectively a Save Vs. Death!

Considering how long it takes to finish high-level fights, I would be inclined in sum to speed it up. If you give them better AC and/or more hp, that would mean bigger bonuses to hit and/or damage. As in 4e, that would increase the advantage of higher-level figures fighting lower-level foes. That in turn can  be offset by giving a lower hp ratio: Instead of 8x,  an 8th-level figure might have only 4x the hp of 1st level (or an even smaller increase).

Separate dodge/parry points and wound points allow a lot of fine-tuning. There can be a chance of bypassing the former (a sort of compromise between D&D and RQ), and they can be recovered more quickly if one likes.

Slow recovery adds a strategic aspect to the game. If one chooses a more rapid pace of operations, one goes out with less than full hp. On the other hand, magicians in most versions regain their spells overnight. Clerics can greatly help get fighters on a similar schedule, but some asynchrony may persist despite that. Faster recovery can go to the extent (as in 4e) of making it unusual to have an encounter while at seriously reduced hp, producing more tactical-level consistency.

Quote from: Bren;797867For duels to make sense there needs to be an actual society in the setting. Typically the society will need to be some type of honor culture, which historically was not too uncommon. Many warrior cultures have been honor focused. Of course it also helps if the PCs have a place in society (or are trying to make a place in society) rather than being streotypical murder hobos who can wander from place to place without roots or repercussions.

If the culture doesn't care about honor or if the players don't need to care about the culture, duels will understandably be rather rare.

Duels can be rare in a very honorable society as well; for example, it can be seen as most honorable not to challenge, or accept challenge from, someone you know to be weaker.  And not dueling when there are more important matters can also be a higher form of caring about the culture.  I would rank paladins in a typical D&D setting as the most honorable of characters but also among the least likely to duel, regardless of the overall level of dueling.

Historical analogues are a poor guide to a world with D&D levels of magic; blindly recreating medieval society without any consideration of the changes that magic would bring is hardly a superior style of play.

Quote from: rawma;798026Historical analogues are a poor guide to a world with D&D levels of magic; blindly recreating medieval society without any consideration of the changes that magic would bring is hardly a superior style of play.

Ah yes, argumentum ad fireballum. No one was blindly recreating medieval society in this sub thread, so that's just a strawman. On the other hand, history, whiich shows us how people have behaved in different cultures and in different places and times, is a better guide to how people might behave that just making random shit up with no guide at all. And starting out by defining Paladins as not fighting duels and then using Paladins that don't fight duels as proof that honorable societies wouldn't fight duels is just a wee bit circular.

Quote from: Bren;798047Ah yes, argumentum ad fireballum. No one was blindly recreating medieval society in this sub thread, so that's just a strawman. On the other hand, history, whiich shows us how people have behaved in different cultures and in different places and times, is a better guide to how people might behave that just making random shit up with no guide at all. And starting out by defining Paladins as not fighting duels and then using Paladins that don't fight duels as proof that honorable societies wouldn't fight duels is just a wee bit circular.

You can throw out religious arguments, which get settled as soon as the patriarchs have a chance to cast a commune spell.  You can throw out inherited titles of nobility; you're a Lord because you reached 9th level as a fighter, and baronies in D&D go to those who are powerful enough to clear them.  Unsanctioned killings within society could be solved trivially by trials, not by combat but by scrying magic.  Yet history is filled with wars over religious minutiae and with hereditary nobility and with murders.  If the American revolutionaries had heeded history to judge how people would act, George Washington would have been king, because a republic couldn't possibly work.  Fireballs are a fairly trivial thing and alone would not cause substantial changes in society.

The D&D setting generally seems to imply that magic and miracles have been around for a very long time (hence all those artifacts and ruins containing mighty magics).  Our society has more changes without precedent in history from technology over a shorter span than that, and it's not clear to me that technology is as powerful as the magic of raise dead, commune, wish and gate.  My world does hinge on relative commonness of magic; no objection to worlds with less, but I'm not going to rig my world just to match historical norms when magic is that common.

Are we a less honorable society given that duels appear to be less common in today's society, or are the only honorable people the ones having bar fights?  You do say "many warrior cultures", not all warrior cultures let alone all possible warrior cultures, "have been honor focused"; I suppose the exceptions don't count.  Nobody was not having a society or playing streotypical (sic) murder hobos or not caring about their game world's culture in this thread, either, so I'm not the one introducing strawmen; just reflecting the tone of argument I'm presented with.  But I keep forgetting appropriate smileys.  

I take paladins from their description in D&D rule books.  Do you think they are inclined to dueling over honor?  Do you think they are dishonorable?  I think the answer to both questions should be no, and not because one implies the other; and therefore a society of paladins would likely not have dueling over questions of honor, and yet would be very honorable (if impossible for anyone else to live in) (or, more reasonably, paladins raise the average honor level and lower the average dueling-over-honor level of their societies).  I can see paladins "dueling" for other reasons, such as witnessing to a heathen (whom they would like to convert or redeem), but I think I would just call that fighting.

Quote from: talysman;797751Which is exactly why increases in level mean increases in hit dice/hit points: so that *unarmored* characters can get better at surviving fights.

They come from neither, in the  case of Robin Hood. They come from level.

But here's a couple questions for you, jibba:

(1) You don't get a DEX AC bonus in certain situatiions, such as when attacked from behind, since the DEX bonus represents the ability to dodge an attack. If you switch to DEX adding hit points, would high DEX characters take extra damage?

(2) Certain attacks have a special effect if the attack roll is 4 or more points above the score needed. For example, a purple worm swallows a character whole, resulting in death if the character isn't rescued. Likewise, a Sword of Sharpness severs a limb, causing instant death in the case of severing the head. In neither case does the amount of hit points matter, only the armor class and any  modifiers to the attack roll. If you switch to DEX modifying hit points, high DEX characters will be just as likely to die as low characters. Are you OK wwith that?

I) Well if you wanted to stick purely to the D&D paradigm then agreed you have a slight issue but no different from the HP you gain as skill (per level). Dex bonus to HPs simply means you are better at the skill represented by HP. So its an issue that you already have in the game and why Rogue sneak attacks do extra damage because they are bypassing that skill.
Personally I would go one step further. Use a Wound/Vitality model and unseen attacks, specifically surprise attacks come straight off wounds no HPs used. (in my heart-breaker rogues don't get backstab multipliers they get bonuses on surprise and surprise attacks bypass HP)

II) well sword of sharpness used to work on a 20 regardless (might have changed since 2e) and I think purple worm used to be similar.  
In a game where you were to use Dex to improve HP then the obvious answer to these would be based on the number of remaining HP - so a strike that does 50% of your remaining HPs means you are swallowed or similar or just set a critical threshold depending on how common  you want the effect to be 19-20, 20 etc ...  
In any case having specific attacks that exploit aspects of your combat model will be affected by any change to the combat model and new ways of achieving he same result in the game world will occur.

As an aside my heart-breaker doesn't use Dex to add HP, though I considered it. It used Dex to add defense, but defense increases through level and Armour absorbs damage rather than making you harder to hit. I felt this was a superior model all round. But hard to apply in D&D especially it seems this iteration where Damage has exponentially grown. and AC is banded to a maximum. So not worth discussing in a conversation on D&D.

Quote from: rawma;797861Some of the reasons I don't like/haven't done duels:

• it requires agreement between the two sides, which is already unlikely when one of the sides is me, or else
• it requires some third party to push it, which usually translates to a GM determined to do this, possibly to the point of railroading but certainly strongly restricting the player's options;
• the stakes are typically lower than a regular fight to the death, and therefore less compelling (to me, at least);
• the losing party may just escalate anyway, even if you got agreement beforehand;

I can see all of that but could obviously give you a thousand roleplay setting actual play based reasons why these rules not apply in some circumstances.

Quote

• from a game point of view, it's boring for everyone else and even for the participants, who have fewer options (swapping opponents, helping/being helped by an ally, or using any of the strategies ruled out by the conditions of the duel, such as using armor);

Its no different to a hundred other 1:1 situations. And the other PCs can do lots of stuff from running a book on the fight, selling tickets, setting up a sweet little con off the back of it, using it as a distraction to grab the McGuffin etc etc

Quote

• if there are different rules for duels from regular fights, then it's difficult to keep them in balance, and there's a roleplaying burden to avoid going with the mechanically advantageous approach.
• if the duel is between player characters, I generally don't care for PC vs PC conflict, for several reasons.

Agreed there should not be any different rules for duels versus regular fights.
My entire point
Any combat system that claims to be a fair abstraction of "the fantasy milieu" should be able to cope with the typical standard tropes of that milieu.

QuoteBut I will conced that jibbajibba's enthusiasm for duels in RPGs is impressive, and I will make a point of considering a duel at the next reasonable occasion, playing or DMing.



#2 above, where the third party is social standing or whatever.

Cool and yes society can be coercive and I would say any game where the PCs are entirely out of any society even if t was the society of the party needs to work on that.

Quote#4, or #2 with bouncers; it seems to me that friends of the guy who's losing are likely to jump in (maybe with a flimsy excuse that that other guy is cheating or whatever), and then the other guy's friends jump in.  And even more likely in D&D where the sidelined player characters are looking for an excuse to be in the action.  If you have no friends to back you up, then it turns out you're just a solo adventurer fighting a single enemy.

Seems like you haven't  been in may fights outside bars
In actuality and in play this is exactly what happens but the duel kicks off first and runs a few rounds.

Quote#4 and #5.

#7, #6, #5, #2.

The duel I was bystander for was pretty recent, in 5e, and coerced by the lawful evil opponent who wanted a duel (and correctly assessed that he was many levels higher).  It took over an hour and wouldn't have been helped (sped up or made more interesting) by colorful descriptions.  Most of the situations where fewer characters are involved are resolved with one quick skill check for each character, and usually the other characters aren't completely sidelined.

Not to knock your game but sounds a bit like crappy DMing. A duel between 2 characters shouldn't take an hour to resolve and if it was going to the GM should have taken it off line.

QuoteSo wouldn't most characters avoid making a challenge, given that the challenged could probably find some advantageous choice?  Would the cavalier still have made the challenge if he were levels lower, even if the barbarian would have accepted armor and cavalier weapons?

My thoughts on recourse were that the cavalier would fall back on sneering about dishonorable forms of combat and "might as well dress as apes and fling feces at each other" and so on, which would mostly salvage his reputation with his own social circle at least (well, better than being killed).

Of course that is where roleplay comes in. PCs do not always more rational optimal choices some of them are chaotic, some burdened by honour others are totally self centered.
Deek Devalier challenges three veterans to duels on his first day in Port Mara not because he thinks its an advantageous strategy but because he feels they have insulted his honour and he has no choice.
the cavalier did exactly what you say. He claimed it was beneath him to roll round in the mud and that the barbarian should fight like a gentleman. In the society of the world, his noble mates it was a convincing argument so he wasn't exiled or given white feathers or chased out of town. In the Society of the party we all knew he was just scared of getting a whooping so we would rag on him constantly.

QuoteI guess I wasn't clear.  I don't mean the party was sometimes beset; I mean that their entire races were constantly in peril, and wasting energy on fighting among themselves would be disastrous.

And yet in every war there ever was it happens.
Very few people see that as a race we are all in this together and we need to pull through. What they see is you just knocked over my beer so I am going to smack you in the face.
If people weren't like that we would live in a socialist utopia where the world's resources were spread evenly across the globe and no one was hungry or destitute etc.

Quote from: rawma;798078You can throw out inherited titles of nobility; you're a Lord because you reached 9th level as a fighter, and baronies in D&D go to those who are powerful enough to clear them.  Unsanctioned killings within society could be solved trivially by trials, not by combat but by scrying magic.

You don't see a contradiction between these two points?

QuoteIf the American revolutionaries had heeded history to judge how people would act, George Washington would have been king, because a republic couldn't possibly work.

Rome was a Republic. Jefferson, to pick just one of the founding fathers, was quite well aware of that. It is not an accident that the USA, like Rome, has a Senate. Washington, DC is filled with neoclassical buildings. And contemporaries compared Washington after his decision to retire after his second term to the Roman Cinncinatus. More history.

QuoteAre we a less honorable society given that duels appear to be less common in today's society,

Yes. By and large we are a society of laws not of personal honor. That's one of the reasons we no longer have duels as a way of settling disagreements.

QuoteI suppose the exceptions don't count.

I said many not all because I don't know about the mores of all warrior cultures. But so far, no one has provided any actual exceptions.

QuoteI take paladins from their description in D&D rule books.  Do you think they are inclined to dueling over honor?

It seems a reasonable interpretation. They are the champion of their god. Surely their god will help to ensure that the right will prevail. So why not settle a disagreement via a duel between champions?

QuoteI can see paladins "dueling" for other reasons, such as witnessing to a heathen (whom they would like to convert or redeem), but I think I would just call that fighting.

Heathen doesn't make sense in a D&D context. People don't disbelieve that the paladin's god exists. All the gods exist. Some people just choose to reverence some other deity. Having a paladin demonstrate that their deity is worth reverencing because the paladin, acting as the deity's champion, is able to honorably defeat an opponent in one-on-one combat might get people to change their allegiance.

Quote from: Bren;798135You don't see a contradiction between these two points?

Rome was a Republic. Jefferson, to pick just one of the founding fathers, was quite well aware of that. It is not an accident that the USA, like Rome, has a Senate. Washington, DC is filled with neoclassical buildings. And contemporaries compared Washington after his decision to retire after his second term to the Roman Cinncinatus. More history.

Yes. By and large we are a society of laws not of personal honor. That's one of the reasons we no longer have duels as a way of settling disagreements.

I said many not all because I don't know about the mores of all warrior cultures. But so far, no one has provided any actual exceptions.

It seems a reasonable interpretation. They are the champion of their god. Surely their god will help to ensure that the right will prevail. So why not settle a disagreement via a duel between champions?

Heathen doesn't make sense in a D&D context. People don't disbelieve that the paladin's god exists. All the gods exist. Some people just choose to reverence some other deity. Having a paladin demonstrate that their deity is worth reverencing because the paladin, acting as the deity's champion, is able to honorably defeat an opponent in one-on-one combat might get people to change their allegiance.

Trial by combat , which is of course a duel was more than common, it was a standard way to settle disputes.
Then you get the  fencing schools of German universities like Heidelberg where getting a scar and walking away was a sign of bravery, so not sure how that might fit in with a duel to the blood or whatever. .

I can entirely imagine a setting where the Paladins of a law/War god say Tyr or a god of justice wander the land calling forth the accused (using that great Justicar Background) and challenging them to single combat to prrove their guilt or innocence.

I can even see that duel being to first blood so that the guilty can pay for their crimes back to society in some way.

Quote from: jibbajibba;798095I can see all of that but could obviously give you a thousand roleplay setting actual play based reasons why these rules not apply in some circumstances.

Sure.  Further thought leads me to believe that replacing some longer negotiation with a quick "you can have if your best can beat me at "; even with my complaints that's bound to be more interesting and the players can take it or leave it, but either way we're done with what might otherwise be a lot of talking.

QuoteSeems like you haven't  been in may fights outside bars
In actuality and in play this is exactly what happens but the duel kicks off first and runs a few rounds.

So, it's still a duel even though everyone else jumps in?  And I would think duels depend on some sort of agreement; if the rogue just sneak attacks and kills someone it's a fight, not a duel.  Otherwise my thief once dueled five dragons in a very short span of time.

QuoteNot to knock your game but sounds a bit like crappy DMing. A duel between 2 characters shouldn't take an hour to resolve and if it was going to the GM should have taken it off line.

It was in the Horde of the Dragon Queen, the half dragon champion wants a duel and will kill prisoners if he doesn't get it.  (Still playing, so no spoilers please.)  My notes had it taking 15 rounds; we put up a hard-to-hit, decent HP but not very attack-effective fighter, and the opponent started with an inferior weapon and spent at least one round taunting the fighter.  And the fighter healed twice (potions) before the end of the combat, and the rest of us asked various questions during it, but not really getting much for it (enjoyment, satisfaction or information).  And 5e is not yet fully familiar, and the fighter player was new to D&D, so there was some slowness with the game mechanics.  It took the entire session, with the intro (my one contribution was an excellent Insight roll that assured us the lawful evil half-dragon would keep his word), but we started late and only have a couple hours normally anyway, so I may be exaggerating a little.  But it did go 15 rounds.  I can't say the DM was that good.