D&D 5E DM's, what's your experience with suggested Challenge Ratings?

WhosAChaoticGoodBoy · Mar 20, 2017

Hi folks. New DM here.

The DMG has some info on how to configure an encounter by difficulty depending on the party size and party level, but I'm wondering what your experiences are following these parameters.

Advice on what made for better/worse CR calculation is also welcome.

Tangential info:

I. If relevant, I have the assumption that the more creatures the CR is distributed upon, the harder the encounter is based on how action economy works (i.e, an encounter with four CR 1/2 creatures is harder then an encounter with one CR 2 creature)

II. My group tends to multiclass/minmax/optimize, which I think throws a wrench in the assumptions the DMG makes with CR calculation -- can anybody share their experience with how multiclassing/optimizing impacts CR calculation?

Quickleaf · Mar 20, 2017

WhosAChaoticGoodBoy said:
Hi folks. New DM here.

Yah

Our ranks are growing!

The DMG has some info on how to configure an encounter by difficulty depending on the party size and party level, but I'm wondering what your experiences are following these parameters.

Advice on what made for better/worse CR calculation is also welcome.

You're going to need to learn your players and the monsters. Expect a trial-by-error period where the DMG guidelines give you a starting point. It's unlikely you'll get encounter balance "perfect" (whatever that means) just beginning to DM. And that's fine.

I'll offer a bit of advice, and I'm sure others will too, but ultimately your own trial-by-error and observations with your group are all that matter.

Tangential info:

I. If relevant, I have the assumption that the more creatures the CR is distributed upon, the harder the encounter is based on how action economy works (i.e, an encounter with four CR 1/2 creatures is harder then an encounter with one CR 2 creature)

That's usually correct, and it's built into the effective XP encounter multiplier in the DMG.

II. My group tends to multiclass/minmax/optimize, which I think throws a wrench in the assumptions the DMG makes with CR calculation -- can anybody share their experience with how multiclassing/optimizing impacts CR calculation?

Yeah, a savvy group of players who've optimized will definitely be able to face steeper opposition. That has certainly been true in my games.

Also, I'd pay more attention to Adventuring Day XP (in the DMG). It's easy for DMs to focus on encounter building with the Easy/Medium/Hard/Deadly thresholds laid out in the DMG, but you also want to understand the pacing of your adventures and how that relates to setting up / foreshadowing a particularly challenging combat.

EDIT: Also, read monsters before using them whenever possible. Usually you can get away with running monstrous humanoids (orcs, goblins, gnolls, kobolds, etc) without doing so, but more complex monsters like medusae, dragons, and intellect devourers really need to be grokked by the DM before sitting down to play. A lot of play reports abound with DMs misusing complicated monsters because they overlooked an important detail (a recent example was a Death Tyrant beholder being turned by a cleric and having no escape route or minions or traps or any other options for how to handle that situation).

Tony Vargas · Mar 20, 2017

WhosAChaoticGoodBoy said:
I'm wondering what your experiences are following these parameters.

I suppose you could say 'mixed.' TPK and 'too easy' being the extremes.

I. If relevant, I have the assumption that the more creatures the CR is distributed upon, the harder the encounter is based on how action economy works (i.e, an encounter with four CR 1/2 creatures is harder then an encounter with one CR 2 creature)

Very relevant, and the encounter guidelines try to take that into account. There's a table of multipliers for larger encounters.

II. My group tends to multiclass/minmax/optimize, which I think throws a wrench in the assumptions the DMG makes with CR calculation -- can anybody share their experience with how multiclassing/optimizing impacts CR calculation?

A party of optimized PCs can rollover something that'd TPK a sub-optimal party...
...they might also be TPK'd by something the sub-optimal party wouldn't even pick a fight with. :shrug:

My conclusion was "don't bother." I ran games for 20 years before 3.0 took a stab at CR, and can just run 5e combats the way I did back in the day. Keep the monsters' stats (if you even bother to fully stat 'em out) behind the screen, adjust on the fly as needed to make a good fight of it, and pay attention to what your players enjoy.

MonkeezOnFire · Mar 20, 2017

1) This is mostly true at low levels but once the party gets access to reliable AOE spells then its not. Heck even at level 1, a high roll on sleep can trivialize this type of encounter. In my experience the toughest combats are with enemies roughly equal in number to the party's size where each opponent is roughly equal in challenge. This way there is no single target that holds most of the challenge where if that target falls then then combat's tension goes with them, but the combat also can't be blown away by AOE spells. I've also found that single enemy encounters are very scary if the single enemy higher CR than what the party's level is expected to be able to handle. For instance with the advice you received you might be inclined to throw a dragon at low level PCs (since single encounters = easy). But this can easily be a tpk as low level PCs lack high burst damage and the dragon can most likely knock someone out every round (or all of them with breath weapon).

2) In this situation I'd shift the difficulty evaluation by one. Medium becomes your new easy, hard becomes medium, etc. Also not that deadly means "risk of one PC dying" not "possibly tpk." PCs are expected to win hard encounters without loss. This doesn't fit all games, so if your group expects that every combat be a challenge I'd throw mostly hard and deadly encounters their way with the occasional medium or easy to show them how cool they are.

UngeheuerLich · Mar 20, 2017

Not too bad actually. But I usually don't bother.
Higher and lower challenge rating can feel threatening or not depending on how you play them and sometimes how the dice fall.
I play PotA and my players search their own way through the adventure and started way ahead in levels and go in higher and lower level areas.
They have won higher CR encounters and felt as if they could lose on a CR 2 encounter when they were level 6.

But from the DM side I knew that the higher CR encounter was deadly if they didn't use their resources that well and hadn't had some luck and that the CR 2 encounter wasn't really threatening.

iserith · Mar 20, 2017

WhosAChaoticGoodBoy said:
Hi folks. New DM here.

The DMG has some info on how to configure an encounter by difficulty depending on the party size and party level, but I'm wondering what your experiences are following these parameters.

Advice on what made for better/worse CR calculation is also welcome.

Tangential info:

I. If relevant, I have the assumption that the more creatures the CR is distributed upon, the harder the encounter is based on how action economy works (i.e, an encounter with four CR 1/2 creatures is harder then an encounter with one CR 2 creature)

II. My group tends to multiclass/minmax/optimize, which I think throws a wrench in the assumptions the DMG makes with CR calculation -- can anybody share their experience with how multiclassing/optimizing impacts CR calculation?

The best advice I can impart is to learn the difference between challenge and difficulty and what makes a good challenge. Then everything else will fall into place and you'll know what to do.

Challenge is a situation you can win or lose. Difficulty is what kind of skill level or resources are required to win at the challenge - the harder the difficulty, the better skill (or more resources) will be required. Encounter difficulty in the DMG speaks to Difficulty as I have just defined it, but here's the important bit: What makes a Challenge good is that its Difficulty can be modified by the players' decisions. This means their decisions are meaningful. This is a thing we generally want in our games.

Therefore, when you set up an encounter, know that the Difficulty by the numbers in the DMG does not take into account the specific decisions the players make. They may make great decisions that reduce the difficulty sometimes to the point of trivializing the encounter, leading you to believe that the encounter guidelines are wrong. Similarly, they may make poor decisions that greatly increase the difficulty which can lead you to a similar conclusion. They're not wrong though - that's exactly how a good challenge should work. So bear that in mind.

Your instincts are correct with regard to the number of creatures in the challenge - the difficulty will go up, as reflected in the adjusted XP value. As well, I recommend that in order to challenge your experienced players, make sure the battles take place in an environment favorable to the monsters in some way. That's a very easy way to take the Difficulty up a step without adjusting the XP reward. It has the added effect of making your scenes much more dynamic and interesting, especially if the PCs can take advantage of it. (Side note: If both the PCs and the monsters can take advantage of a terrain feature, then it's a wash as to Difficulty.)

Ralif Redhammer · Mar 20, 2017

I’ve found them to be generally pretty close. With a significant number of min-maxers, I would tend towards using the higher difficulties more often.

One thing I’ve found is that even if by XP budget, a monster is right for the group, if it’s not a creature designed to be taken on solo, the PCs are going to have an easier time as they all hammer on the monster.

ad_hoc · Mar 20, 2017

My experience with CR is that it is accurate. Keep in mind that all sorts of things will skew the results.

Party size is a big one. The game works best with 4 and works fine with 3 or 5. 6+ characters strain the system and require the DM to compensate. Same with only 1 or 2 characters.

Magic items. The CR doesn't take them into consideration.

Circumstances. Gaining surprise or being surprised will have a huge impact for example.

And of course if you don't have at least 4-8 (depending on difficulty) encounters/long rest then the party will be able to defeat high CR creatures. This is a bigger factor if there are many long rest classes in the party.

aco175 · Mar 20, 2017

I found that good parties can handle more than you think. I tend to set up dungeons with 3-5 encounters per day with 1 rest in there someplace. I may give out a bit more magic than the DMG dictates but I think that is only a part of the power the PCs have. I also like to give an easy encounter mixed in with the hard and deadly ones. I would say the mix in a 5 encounter day looks like:
1 easy
1 avg
2 hard
1 deadly

LordEntrails · Mar 20, 2017

You need to go back and re-read the DMG section. 4 creatures @ CR1/2 does NOT =2!

I think the multiplier is 1.5 or 2, so it equals CR 3 or CR 4.

I have found the DMG guidelines to be near useless for most of my regular campaigns/parties. They are extremely good working together and with tactics and can easily double the daily XP and almost double the encounter XPs recommended in the DMG.

But, when I run a convention game, or with a new group of players, or with one of my regular parties, I find the DMG to sometime be even too difficult.

In other words, it's a guideline. A useful one, but as a DM you will have to learn what your party can handle. And if they are regular players and learn from their mistakes, then they will get better and the guidelines will become under-rated.

I find that running multiple creatures is easier to tailor an encounter to the party because the effectiveness of the NPC's vary on their tactics, and with multiple creatures, I can have them use good or poor tactics as needed to keep the challenge where I want it.

Lots of good links and sources for new DM's on this thread, GM Advice