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Do the Monster Building Guidelines Work?
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<blockquote data-quote="M_Natas" data-source="post: 9156678" data-attributes="member: 7025918"><p>I tried to build my own monster building guidelines for better Monsters and I think I figured some things out with the existing Monsters and the 5e Monster Builder.</p><p></p><p>At least for Level 1 ^^.</p><p></p><p>So, what I did was, I built an average adventuring party (point buy, fitting races for optimised ability scores, so a 16 in the main stat, +1 in Constituion) and from that average adventuring party I averaged the average adventurer of Level 1.</p><p></p><p>The average adventurer of Level 1 has:</p><ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">10,25 HP</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">AC 15</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">+5 to attack</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">does on a hit an avg. of 8,75 Damage.</li> </ul><p></p><p>With one short rest and no other means of healing (potions, magic) an average character <strong>has an average HP Budget of 17 HP for one adventuring day.</strong></p><p></p><p>If you roll for Stats, that could change to an additional +1 to attack and damage and HP.</p><p></p><p>The Monster Builder and CR Guidlines are supposed to be be for the adventuring day concept.</p><p>So we have easy, medium hard and deadly encounters.</p><p></p><p>At Level 1 there are supposed to be either 12 easy, 6 medium, 4 hard or 3 deadly encounters in one adventuring day.</p><p></p><p>I ran the numbers and what came close to existing Monsters and the guidelines is the following:</p><p></p><p><strong>A medium encounters should deplete 16% of the HP of the HP Budget of all characters (so the 17 HP per Character).</strong></p><p></p><p>A hard encounter 24% and a deadly 32%. An adventuring day should deplete on average 96% of the HP Budget.</p><p></p><p>That's what I found when I looked at the existing Monsters and my average adventure guy.</p><p></p><p>Now, I tried to build a monster created according to 4e: One Monster per one Character. I think that makes everything easier for creating encounters, when you look at an per character base (which Xanathar reintroduced).</p><p></p><p>So, now, I looked what that would mean ...</p><p>According to the encounter building guidlines, 4 CR 1/8 creatures are a hard encounter for 4 Level 1 characters and 4 CR 1/4 Creatures are a deadly encounter for 4 Level 1 Characters.</p><p></p><p>So now I could compare my Creature Designer (its just an Excel Sheet) with existing creatures.</p><p></p><p>I had my Creature Designer based on 3 Round Encounters and mathematically Monsters created with that should do exactly what they are supposed to do (on average): Deplete the ressources named at the choosen difficulty with that encounter.</p><p></p><p>So I calculated how much AC and HP that monster should have to last 3 rounds and then calculated how much damage it should do at a given attack bonus.</p><p></p><p>Like with an AC of 10 a Monster should have between 14 and 21 HP to last 3 rounds against one character of Level 1. With an attack bonus of +5 it should do 1d4 of damage (hard difficulty) or 1d4+1 / 1d6 damage (deadly difficulty) to deplete the HP the correct amount (on average).</p><p></p><p>Now, I looked at the Monsters in the MM and found, that a lot have to low HP and to strong an attack. Like the Bandit. A bandit has 12 AC and only 11 HP. On average a Bandit will only last 2 rounds against an average level 1 character. And when I adjusted the damage output to 2 rounds instead of 3, my excel sheet aligned with the Bandit stat block quite well.</p><p>Or Kobolds who only have 5 HP at 12 AC. They only last one round. With pact tactics their attack bonus is effectively a +9, so their damage output mostly fits (it is a little lower than expected).</p><p></p><p>That was for hard encounters (CR 1/8 creatures). So.I checked the deadly encounter with CR 1/4 creatures. The Goblin fits, if you account for him surviving on average for two rounds. 15 AC and 7 HP, doing on average 5.5 damage per round.</p><p></p><p>A Zombie will survive 3 rounds (AC 8, 22 HP) doing 4,5 damage on average on a hit (I calculated 4 damage).</p><p></p><p></p><p>Some monsters are too strong, like the wolf, which does on average 7 damage on a hit with an effective +9 to hit (thanks to pact tactics). It should do, according to my math, on average 3,5 damage, if you ignore pact tactics they should do 5.5 damage. So that Creature is pretty dangerous.</p><p></p><p>So the Monsters I checked fall roughly into my calculations.</p><p>You just need to account for the expected combat rounds, which can vary from 1 to 4 (Blink Dog) or even 5 (flying sword, which does way to much damage).</p><p></p><p>So, now with all that figured out, I looked into the DMG Monster Builder.</p><p></p><p>AC 13 is fix for CR 1/8 creatures. Having 7 to 35 HP. With 7 HP a monster survives in average of 2 rounds. With 35 HP the monster survives on average 7 Rounds!</p><p></p><p>With an attack bonus of +3 it should do on average 1,3 to 4,5 Damage (my calculations). The DMG Monster Builder says 2-3 Damage, so directly in the middle of that.</p><p></p><p>For CR 1/4 it already gets crazy. Ac 13, 36 to 49 HP.</p><p>+3 to attack, 4 to 5 Damage on Average.</p><p>Such a monster would survive 7 to 9 rounds, and should do 1 to 2 damage a round.</p><p></p><p>Now, CR 1/2 should be 2 Characters per Level 1 Monsters.</p><p>According to the DMG, that should be AC 13, 50- 70 HP, +3 Attack, 6 to 8 Damage.</p><p>That again would.last 7 rounds, and should do 2,5 to 3,5 damage.</p><p></p><p>Now if we go to CR 1 it goes okay again.</p><p>A CR 1 Creature has AC 13, 71 to 85 HP, +3 to attack, doing 9 to 14 damage.</p><p>With my calculations that monster would last 4 rounds, doing 9 to 12 damage.</p><p></p><p>So, the DMG Monster Creator is actually broken at CR 1/4 and CR 1/2, leading to extremely long and deadly fights. CR 1/8 and CR 1 work as intended.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="M_Natas, post: 9156678, member: 7025918"] I tried to build my own monster building guidelines for better Monsters and I think I figured some things out with the existing Monsters and the 5e Monster Builder. At least for Level 1 ^^. So, what I did was, I built an average adventuring party (point buy, fitting races for optimised ability scores, so a 16 in the main stat, +1 in Constituion) and from that average adventuring party I averaged the average adventurer of Level 1. The average adventurer of Level 1 has: [LIST] [*]10,25 HP [*]AC 15 [*]+5 to attack [*]does on a hit an avg. of 8,75 Damage. [/LIST] With one short rest and no other means of healing (potions, magic) an average character [B]has an average HP Budget of 17 HP for one adventuring day.[/B] If you roll for Stats, that could change to an additional +1 to attack and damage and HP. The Monster Builder and CR Guidlines are supposed to be be for the adventuring day concept. So we have easy, medium hard and deadly encounters. At Level 1 there are supposed to be either 12 easy, 6 medium, 4 hard or 3 deadly encounters in one adventuring day. I ran the numbers and what came close to existing Monsters and the guidelines is the following: [B]A medium encounters should deplete 16% of the HP of the HP Budget of all characters (so the 17 HP per Character).[/B] A hard encounter 24% and a deadly 32%. An adventuring day should deplete on average 96% of the HP Budget. That's what I found when I looked at the existing Monsters and my average adventure guy. Now, I tried to build a monster created according to 4e: One Monster per one Character. I think that makes everything easier for creating encounters, when you look at an per character base (which Xanathar reintroduced). So, now, I looked what that would mean ... According to the encounter building guidlines, 4 CR 1/8 creatures are a hard encounter for 4 Level 1 characters and 4 CR 1/4 Creatures are a deadly encounter for 4 Level 1 Characters. So now I could compare my Creature Designer (its just an Excel Sheet) with existing creatures. I had my Creature Designer based on 3 Round Encounters and mathematically Monsters created with that should do exactly what they are supposed to do (on average): Deplete the ressources named at the choosen difficulty with that encounter. So I calculated how much AC and HP that monster should have to last 3 rounds and then calculated how much damage it should do at a given attack bonus. Like with an AC of 10 a Monster should have between 14 and 21 HP to last 3 rounds against one character of Level 1. With an attack bonus of +5 it should do 1d4 of damage (hard difficulty) or 1d4+1 / 1d6 damage (deadly difficulty) to deplete the HP the correct amount (on average). Now, I looked at the Monsters in the MM and found, that a lot have to low HP and to strong an attack. Like the Bandit. A bandit has 12 AC and only 11 HP. On average a Bandit will only last 2 rounds against an average level 1 character. And when I adjusted the damage output to 2 rounds instead of 3, my excel sheet aligned with the Bandit stat block quite well. Or Kobolds who only have 5 HP at 12 AC. They only last one round. With pact tactics their attack bonus is effectively a +9, so their damage output mostly fits (it is a little lower than expected). That was for hard encounters (CR 1/8 creatures). So.I checked the deadly encounter with CR 1/4 creatures. The Goblin fits, if you account for him surviving on average for two rounds. 15 AC and 7 HP, doing on average 5.5 damage per round. A Zombie will survive 3 rounds (AC 8, 22 HP) doing 4,5 damage on average on a hit (I calculated 4 damage). Some monsters are too strong, like the wolf, which does on average 7 damage on a hit with an effective +9 to hit (thanks to pact tactics). It should do, according to my math, on average 3,5 damage, if you ignore pact tactics they should do 5.5 damage. So that Creature is pretty dangerous. So the Monsters I checked fall roughly into my calculations. You just need to account for the expected combat rounds, which can vary from 1 to 4 (Blink Dog) or even 5 (flying sword, which does way to much damage). So, now with all that figured out, I looked into the DMG Monster Builder. AC 13 is fix for CR 1/8 creatures. Having 7 to 35 HP. With 7 HP a monster survives in average of 2 rounds. With 35 HP the monster survives on average 7 Rounds! With an attack bonus of +3 it should do on average 1,3 to 4,5 Damage (my calculations). The DMG Monster Builder says 2-3 Damage, so directly in the middle of that. For CR 1/4 it already gets crazy. Ac 13, 36 to 49 HP. +3 to attack, 4 to 5 Damage on Average. Such a monster would survive 7 to 9 rounds, and should do 1 to 2 damage a round. Now, CR 1/2 should be 2 Characters per Level 1 Monsters. According to the DMG, that should be AC 13, 50- 70 HP, +3 Attack, 6 to 8 Damage. That again would.last 7 rounds, and should do 2,5 to 3,5 damage. Now if we go to CR 1 it goes okay again. A CR 1 Creature has AC 13, 71 to 85 HP, +3 to attack, doing 9 to 14 damage. With my calculations that monster would last 4 rounds, doing 9 to 12 damage. So, the DMG Monster Creator is actually broken at CR 1/4 and CR 1/2, leading to extremely long and deadly fights. CR 1/8 and CR 1 work as intended. [/QUOTE]
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