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In a Solo-Campaign, would making a Solo PC equal to 4 PCs be unbalanced?
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<blockquote data-quote="FireLance" data-source="post: 1403248" data-attributes="member: 3424"><p>CRs and ELs are based on a party of 4 PCs properly equipped for their level and (this is important) having a good mix of abilities. The "traditional" four capabilities in a D&D party are: front-line combatant, skill-user, divine spellcaster and arcane spellcaster. Parties (and solo adventurers in particular) missing one of these capabilities may have a harder time in certain encounters. The most recent Dragon magazine has an article on how to run adventures for parties missing front-line combatants and skill-users. The next one will have another on how to run adventures for parties missing arcane and divine spellcasters. They might be worth a read if you're running a solo campaign.</p><p></p><p>In addition, CRs and ELs are only a guideline. DM judgement is still necessary to determine whether a particular creature may be "too tough" for a party or a solo PC. For example, a 3rd-level paladin is immune to fear and would find it easy to defeat a vargouille, whose main ability is to paralyze its opponents with fear. A party adventuring with a 3rd-level paladin would also have an easier time of defeating such creatures as the paladin's Aura of Courage grants a bonus to saves against fear. However, a 3rd-level bard, rogue, sorcerer or wizard adventuring solo might fail the save (Fortitude - a poor save for these classes), be paralyzed and killed.</p><p></p><p>Generally, adding abilities and equipment to a character can make her more powerful and better able to handle challenges. However, a solo adventurer's biggest weakness is still the save or die (or paralyze, or dominated, etc.) effect. A single unlucky roll can derail a solo campaign. To mitigate, you can introduce the Action Points system in UA and allow the expenditure of an action point to re-roll or even automatically succed at an important saving throw.</p><p></p><p>As for balance, the advantage to a solo campaign is that you don't have to balance your single PC against any others, so you can make her one-of-a-kind and give her any special equipment or abilities you want, even faster XP gain than normally allowed by the rules, ignoring XP penalties for level adjustments, etc. You might want to make it clear that this is special treatment, though, so that she doesn't expect this when she plays with other PCs.</p><p></p><p>That said, my personal preference is to play by the book and just pit the PC against carefully selected (not "too tough") opponents with CRs 2 to 4 less than the PC's level, or opponents that the PC is particularly well-equipped to deal with, such as vargouilles for a 3rd-level paladin character.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="FireLance, post: 1403248, member: 3424"] CRs and ELs are based on a party of 4 PCs properly equipped for their level and (this is important) having a good mix of abilities. The "traditional" four capabilities in a D&D party are: front-line combatant, skill-user, divine spellcaster and arcane spellcaster. Parties (and solo adventurers in particular) missing one of these capabilities may have a harder time in certain encounters. The most recent Dragon magazine has an article on how to run adventures for parties missing front-line combatants and skill-users. The next one will have another on how to run adventures for parties missing arcane and divine spellcasters. They might be worth a read if you're running a solo campaign. In addition, CRs and ELs are only a guideline. DM judgement is still necessary to determine whether a particular creature may be "too tough" for a party or a solo PC. For example, a 3rd-level paladin is immune to fear and would find it easy to defeat a vargouille, whose main ability is to paralyze its opponents with fear. A party adventuring with a 3rd-level paladin would also have an easier time of defeating such creatures as the paladin's Aura of Courage grants a bonus to saves against fear. However, a 3rd-level bard, rogue, sorcerer or wizard adventuring solo might fail the save (Fortitude - a poor save for these classes), be paralyzed and killed. Generally, adding abilities and equipment to a character can make her more powerful and better able to handle challenges. However, a solo adventurer's biggest weakness is still the save or die (or paralyze, or dominated, etc.) effect. A single unlucky roll can derail a solo campaign. To mitigate, you can introduce the Action Points system in UA and allow the expenditure of an action point to re-roll or even automatically succed at an important saving throw. As for balance, the advantage to a solo campaign is that you don't have to balance your single PC against any others, so you can make her one-of-a-kind and give her any special equipment or abilities you want, even faster XP gain than normally allowed by the rules, ignoring XP penalties for level adjustments, etc. You might want to make it clear that this is special treatment, though, so that she doesn't expect this when she plays with other PCs. That said, my personal preference is to play by the book and just pit the PC against carefully selected (not "too tough") opponents with CRs 2 to 4 less than the PC's level, or opponents that the PC is particularly well-equipped to deal with, such as vargouilles for a 3rd-level paladin character. [/QUOTE]
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In a Solo-Campaign, would making a Solo PC equal to 4 PCs be unbalanced?
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