Yes and no. I'm not going to get into it here, but I am not convinced by Paul's monster CR calculation methods.
That's a different topic altogether.
FWIW, it's leaps and bounds better than what WotC published, both in terms of guidelines and as monsters. It seems WotC may backtrack a bit on their own approach with the next edition of D&D, where something they call "iconic" is strictly stronger than other spells/creatures of the same level and CR, but even then, experience as a DM is the only thing that matters.
Actually "Elite" monsters are a thing in A5e (see Great Wyrm dragons and others) and they are not part of O5e or the table I presented. The tables as about "Epic" encounters, not elite monsters. Epic encounters are a step above "Deadly" encounters. I am happy to explain it, and the math behind it, if you want. Or you can link to the source material in the link I provided in my first post.
I'm curious about it, but I don't recall anything above deadly in o5e, especially as a tag to a monster. To me it seems the wrong solution to a problem in handling monsters and generating encounter.
There was an Elite template in the old, excellent Trailblazer, but interestingly the only thing it was doing under the hood was multiplying it's HP, and it did work brilliantly.
I will agree at low level that chart is less useful because of the danger of one-hit kills. This is not much of a danger after level 7-8 and for some groups a bit lower. If I made the table,* I would take that into account as it is pretty easy to do. I am happy to make a revised table if you like.
Honestly, and with all due respect, I really don't find that table useful, especially because I cannot agree with the base principle or raw numbers presented there. I don't need it. It's the wrong tool for fixing a different problem, i.e. many new DMs don't know how to challenge their players and look for "bigger numbers" as if it was a solution. It's not their fault, but I don't think this approach does anything good except escalating monsters and Pcs power.
*If it wasn't clear, I did not develop the table. It was from another person's blog. The original article is linked in the thread I made discussing the table (which was linked in my first post).
I cannot find any link in the post where you shared the table. That said, online I find a lot of stuff. Some good, a lot mediocre, and some outright terrible.
Again, nothing a said was about "elite" monsters. The table is for standard O5e & A5e monsters.
My bad, I wrote elite instead of Epic. Neither are defined officially in the MM or DMG, we only have legendary in o5e as far as I remember.
That said, again, for standard o5e monsters it's most likely wrong.
Take any standard CR 15 monster (there are 2 adult dragons, a mummy lord, and the purple worm). Look not just at their damage, but also their other abilities. Do you really, really think a party of level 5 PCs has any hope, if the monster is run even just decently?
Of course if they just stand there as meat bags, a party may be able to take them down, but that's not how most monsters should run.
A dragon should fly and use a lot of flyby attacks, breathing on the opponents and likely taking one or 2 down every round and lazily flying around for its breath to recharge. Or even use its melee attacks, but just to toy on the opponents.
The mummy lord has some seriously dangerous spells (insect plague is devastating on spellcasters) and can become a whirlwhind, becoming
immune to ALL damage and most conditions. On top of that it can use dreadful glare, likely disabling melee brutes with low wis saves
The purple worm can bite and swallow one creature per round, which on top of dealing damage, makes the target blinded and restrained. And then there's the stinger, which is a very likely one shotting machine for level 5 pcs...
