Average rounds per encounter?

[DarkLord Of DForce]

Just curious, I tried to search for this and couldn't find much - but I'm sure its been asked before...so...

On average, how many rounds does a typical encounter last under 4e?

I realize there are lots of variables that could affect this, like party size, monster group size, solo boss vs no solo boss etc,...but I'm just looking for a rounded off, typical number.

Our group is level 10, consisting of the following:

Fighter
Ranger
Paladin
Avenger
Warlock
Wizard

Thanks!

 

[Alisair Longreach]

I have made some calculations on 4E encounter durations but I haven't posted them.

I took the average damage for an at-will/basic attack for a non-striker PC and divided that with the average hp of a standard monster of equal level. This gives the average number of hits to kill the monster. The average to hit chance of PCs vs monster are 50% +/- 10% which means it takes two attacks to get one hit. Bonus damage from Encounter and Daily powers takes care of the decimal fraction of hits.

The average length of an encounter are as a rule-of-thumb shortened by one round per PC Striker.

The average length of an encounter four your party against an equal number of monster of equal level should by my calculations be 13 rounds.

The average combat round takes in my experience 1.5 minutes per player plus 3 to 5 minutes for the DM to resolve which gives a time of 12+ minutes per round.

The usual time for your party to resolve an encounter should be around 3 hours.

A few house rules to speed things up:

Add the 1/2 level bonus to damage for both PCs and Monsters. This gives a higher damage output and faster killing of monsters.

Action Point every encounter. This gives your players an extra standard action in every encounter and helps resolve the combat a bit faster.

Ignore the rules for Milestones. This makes Magic Items with Daily powers more useable and elimininates some irritating accounting.

 

[Destil]

This is a huge can 'o worms, man. It's a pretty debated issue in 4E...

That said, it really really depends on the game. I'd say in my heroic tier game a typical combat last 4-5 rounds, while in the paragon tier one I play in it's more like 6-8. But typical fights are the outliers for me.

 

[ValhallaGH]

Well, according to the Monte Carlo thread, the encounter duration varies with level.

Assuming that the trends for 1 PC versus 1 Monster remain the same when expanded to 5v5, you should average 6 to 8 rounds for any given level, assuming challenges within 3 levels of the party. If you go up to 4 or 5 levels above the party, expect to see a jump in encounter duration, averaging around 10 rounds and some taking 20 or more to resolve.

If Alisair's round duration estimates are accurate (they seem off to me but I don't have any data to hand), that is 1.4 hours per combat encounter. So two combat encounters and about an hour and a fifth of good RP each night, which sounds about right.
I know some fast groups that can resolve an 8 round fight in about 40 minutes, but they are fast by definition.

 

[The Human Target]

I have made some calculations on 4E encounter durations but I haven't posted them.

I took the average damage for an at-will/basic attack for a non-striker PC and divided that with the average hp of a standard monster of equal level. This gives the average number of hits to kill the monster. The average to hit chance of PCs vs monster are 50% +/- 10% which means it takes two attacks to get one hit. Bonus damage from Encounter and Daily powers takes care of the decimal fraction of hits.

The average length of an encounter are as a rule-of-thumb shortened by one round per PC Striker.

The average length of an encounter four your party against an equal number of monster of equal level should by my calculations be 13 rounds.

The average combat round takes in my experience 1.5 minutes per player plus 3 to 5 minutes for the DM to resolve which gives a time of 12+ minutes per round.

The usual time for your party to resolve an encounter should be around 3 hours.

A few house rules to speed things up:

Add the 1/2 level bonus to damage for both PCs and Monsters. This gives a higher damage output and faster killing of monsters.

Action Point every encounter. This gives your players an extra standard action in every encounter and helps resolve the combat a bit faster.

Ignore the rules for Milestones. This makes Magic Items with Daily powers more useable and elimininates some irritating accounting.

If this were true for my group, I would never ever play 4E again.

Ever.

And I think we come in pretty slow compared to most groups.

 

[FireLance]

My experience from the fights that I've run in my current lower Heroic (the PCs just hit 5th level) Eberron campaign is that they last from 4 to 5 rounds on average.

EDIT: I should add that I am using a combat escalation house rule described more fully here.

 

[Alisair Longreach]

Here are my calculations, discuss.

PCs vs Monsters by RAW Monster CON = 12 +½ level

Level [W] Ability Magic Feat Total Monster hp Hits
1 5 +4 - - 9 28 3,1
2 5 +4 +1 +1 11 37 3,4
3 5 +4 +1 +1 11 45 4
4 5 +4 +1 +1 11 54 5
5 5 +4 +1 +1 11 62 5,7
6 5 +4 +2 +1 12 71 6
7 5 +4 +2 +1 12 79 6,7
8 5 +5 +2 +1 13 88 6,8
9 5 +5 +2 +1 13 96 7,4
10 5 +5 +2 +1 13 105 8
11 5 +5 +3 +2 15 113 7,5
12 5 +5 +3 +2 15 122 7,7
13 5 +5 +3 +2 15 130 8
14 5 +6 +3 +2 16 139 8,7
15 5 +6 +3 +2 16 147 9,2
16 5 +6 +4 +2 17 156 9,3
17 5 +6 +4 +2 17 164 9,7
18 5 +6 +4 +2 17 173 10,2
19 5 +6 +4 +2 17 181 10,6
20 5 +6 +4 +2 17 190 11,2
21 10 +7 +5 +3 25 198 8
22 10 +7 +5 +3 25 207 8,3
23 10 +7 +5 +3 25 215 8,6
24 10 +7 +5 +3 25 224 9
25 10 +7 +5 +3 25 232 9,3
26 10 +7 +6 +3 26 241 9,3
27 10 +7 +6 +3 26 249 9,4
28 10 +8 +6 +3 27 258 9,5
29 10 +8 +6 +3 27 266 9,8
30 10 +8 +6 +3 27 275 10,2

 

[Jhaelen]

A can of worms indeed!

Bonus damage from Encounter and Daily powers takes care of the decimal fraction of hits.

Sorry, but that's not even remotely accurate. Encounter and Daily powers add way more than just a decimal fraction. Many daily powers grant bonuses that last for the entire encounter.
You also ignore buffing effects that scale by level.
You ignore area attacks.
You're also ignoring critical hits which become a lot more potent the higher your level (due to magic items bonus dice).
etc.
etc.

My advise: Try the game as is. Protocol the length of combat in your games and if you notice combat length is actually increasing, start to implement small changes to alleviate the problem (if you feel it _is_ a problem).

 

[AllThatRemains7]

hmm.. logical answer.

How long it takes depends on too many situations and could range from 15 mins to 3 hours or so, how many rounds is equally eratic.

At lower levels the players are just getting used to their characters and I'd say an average encounter would take 3 to 5 rounds and solo battles the same. The harder encounters that push the players to the edge should take around 7 or 8 rounds. As far as epic levels though, if your players put some effort into their characters a fight should never last past 6 rounds even against a deity. I can't imagine being in a battle for 12+ rounds.. some of the people I play with would just leave mid encounter if it were so.

As for your situation I would try to make the encounters on the shorter side because you have a larger than average group.

 

[AllThatRemains7]

I agree with Jhaelen.

Also don't mess with the rules of the game to "speed things up" either. The rules are that way for a reason and any change can throw off the balance of the game.