Hmm, OK. In our particular fight, there were actually more combatants involved. It broke down like this:
2 PCs
Minion Group A
Minion Group B
Boss
My intent was to have Group B defend the Boss, while Group A did a full frontal assault. The PCs engaged the Boss straight away. I had Group A attack, while Group B scripted Block for the boss. (And I did that wrong, as was pointed out. It turned out to be a very quick fight, as the enemies were not tough, only plentiful. The whole point was to see if the PCs could stop the boss before his “evil plan” was carried out, and the boss was cut down in the very first exchange!)
So, going by what has been said in this thread, should the fight scene have instead been broken into “stages” for the PCs to work through? Like this:
Stage 1: PCs vs Group A
Stage 2: PCs vs Group B
Stage 3: PCs vs Boss
Each new stage might start at different times for each of the PCs, depending on how long it takes each PC to get past the minions that engaged them.
Is this correct? And if so, is it possible to reverse the situation, allowing the PCs to break up into different groups, forcing the NPCs to engage them in stages? ie. There are four fighters and a sorcerer. Two of the fighters rush forward to meet the enemy, while two of the fighters hang back to guard the sorcerer.
Stage 1: Enemies vs PC Group A
Stage 2: Enemies vs PC Group B
Stage 3: Enemies vs PC Sorcerer
Am I getting it now, or am I wildly off? This seems kind of wrong to me somehow. It makes it too easy to keep those sorcerers and archers safe…