Data science investigations into the mechanics of the world's greatest role playing game

[smbakeresq]

That's what I'm saying.

It took me a while to figure out what CR was actually trying to measure - and how well it does so.

It doesn't measure a monster's defensive staying power - its hit points - in any way that reflects the "growth spurt" that the PCs get at 5th level for example - where the fighters are essentially doubling their damage output and spellcasters are getting fireball and the like.

I come to see CR as nothing but the roughest measure of a monster's power, and not in monster vs PC way. Rather, it's really just telling you which monster is stronger than another, so that if a CR 4 creature didn't provide quite the oomph you expected it to, you should try a CR 5 next.

None of them account for environment conditions or traps and hazards that can greatly up the difficulty of encounters, nor that the PC can be encountering them after being worn down by others. There isn't really any way listed on how you should get XP in those situations, or how it all adds up. I really think they just couldn't get CR and XP and leveling integrated so just said f**k it.

 

[Oofta]

CR, much like The Pirate's Code, the code is more what you'd call "guidelines" than actual rules. I don't know how you could have anything particularly accurate, it's a starting point and that's all.

At least it's better than what we had in 2E and prior.

 

[Satyrn]

None of them account for environment conditions or traps and hazards that can greatly up the difficulty of encounters, nor that the PC can be encountering them after being worn down by others.

Yeah, definitely none of that is taken into account in CR.

It's vaguely addressed by the "XP budget," although there are so many such factors this is even less accurate in its ability to judge a balanced encounter, and so again I find it best used as an initial guideline to be adjusted based on how well it worked in the previous encounter.



But, I've also also given up on the idea of balanced encounters, and now randomly generate nearly every group of monsters the PCs face, and so the vague accuracy of CR, and the rougher guesstimate that is the XP budget is a sufficient tool for my needs.

It's kinda weird that while figuring out just what the heck CR means (because I was homebrewing a monster manual's worth of fiendish cannon fodder and Pandoran beasts) I changed how I build encounters to have pretty much no concern for balance.

 

[5ekyu]

That's what I'm saying.

It took me a while to figure out what CR was actually trying to measure - and how well it does so.

It doesn't measure a monster's defensive staying power - its hit points - in any way that reflects the "growth spurt" that the PCs get at 5th level for example - where the fighters are essentially doubling their damage output and spellcasters are getting fireball and the like.

I come to see CR as nothing but the roughest measure of a monster's power, and not in monster vs PC way. Rather, it's really just telling you which monster is stronger than another, so that if a CR 4 creature didn't provide quite the oomph you expected it to, you should try a CR 5 next.

Agree -

My experiences are:
CR only really does some of its job well at levels 1-4. (But IMo thats Ok cuz by then you should have some basis for estimation under your belt.)
CR only really provides some comparative rankings between monsters and its going to be necessary to gauge your PC group performance vs several encounters etc to see how they fit in that mix.
CRs best IMO feature and somewhat most reliable is as a risk factor - specifically at the individual monster level - that putting a higher CR than the party beast into the mix adds a degree of risk due to the possibility of a damage quick-output or feature on the monster that exceeds a party in some imbalancing way. The chances of a rock-paper-scissors unexpected outcome goes up.)


Most of these are pretty old hat to in my experienced seasoned GMs. After all, a lot of systems have (or had) little or no CR system and it has to be all done by the GM anyway. A problems sometimes rises when newer Gms or some players take CR as more than it is meant to be or can be.

 

[smbakeresq]

Agree -

My experiences are:
CR only really does some of its job well at levels 1-4. (But IMo thats Ok cuz by then you should have some basis for estimation under your belt.)
CR only really provides some comparative rankings between monsters and its going to be necessary to gauge your PC group performance vs several encounters etc to see how they fit in that mix.
CRs best IMO feature and somewhat most reliable is as a risk factor - specifically at the individual monster level - that putting a higher CR than the party beast into the mix adds a degree of risk due to the possibility of a damage quick-output or feature on the monster that exceeds a party in some imbalancing way. The chances of a rock-paper-scissors unexpected outcome goes up.)


Most of these are pretty old hat to in my experienced seasoned GMs. After all, a lot of systems have (or had) little or no CR system and it has to be all done by the GM anyway. A problems sometimes rises when newer Gms or some players take CR as more than it is meant to be or can be.

That's the general idea. The rock paper scissors unexpected though is what makes games great.

As a side note, something that has always worked for years is putting in a trap door/floor behind or to the side of the BBEG fighting position, be a throne or dais or whatever. It never fails that a PC will run or land there thinking it is somehow safe. Works even better if you use a printed out representation of the area. Its a way to up encounter difficulty but use the same creatures, if the PC falls into the trap its "their" fault, not yours.

 

[smbakeresq]

All of it is guidelines, the whole thing.