D&D 5E 5e XP Chart Progression Question

[blondbauke]

Tradition is doing things in a bad way because that's how they've always been done. I agree with your assessment.

It's weird to see how XP are only given for defeating monsters (or that's all that is being considered here). You are encouraged to fight them rather than bypass them & not encouraged to do other useful things (rescue prisoners etc). Phandelver does have a bunch of plot XP in it though so it's there in the designer's minds at least.

In the DMguide, there is a section about XP for non combat encounters tho, altho just rescuing the prisoners without any problems, is kinda just in a works day

 

[robus]

I think your calculation is correct, i still dont understand why my party (party of level 4, Rogue, Hunter, Fighter and Barbarian) went through 21 orcs and a orc war chief in one encounter.
We're playing a non magic campagne, something happened 500 years ago and were trying to find magic back in the world.
But shouldn't we NOT been able to kille 21 orcs (CR 0.5) and a orc war chief (CR 4), even if there were first 3 orcs, then 4 orcs, then 5 orcs, then 4 orcs and then 4 orcs with a warchief.
If I look at the whole encounter, we had 5 small encounters, with the CR of 1.5, 2, 2.5, 2 and 6.
Which make total exp according to the book,
3 orcs = 3x 100 xp x2(multiplier for 3-6 mobs) = 600 xp
4 orcs = 4x 100 xp x2(multiplier for 3-6 mobs) = 800 xp
5 orcs = 5x 100 xp x2(multiplier for 3-6 mobs) = 1000 xp
4 orcs = 4x 100 xp x2(multiplier for 3-6 mobs) = 800 xp
4 orcs + warchief = (4x 100 xp + 1100xp) x2(multiplier for 3-6 mobs) = 3200xp
600+800+1000+800+3200xp makes a total of 6400xp.
IF u look at a deadly encounter for 4 level 4 chars, thats 4x500 xp, so how can we survive a 3 times as deadly encounter.
After that we killed a group of 19 orcs and warchief and oroc.
After that we killed a group of 10 Ogres.
before we found the first group orcs, we just dinged level 4, and now were almost level 6. Is my math completely wrong?

I think we're going to need more info. Were the monsters asleep? Were the players super lucky with rolling high initiative?

Basically what happened?

Because it doesn't seem like it should be easy. But D&D is not a board game so the circumstances matter a lot.

 

[blondbauke]

I think we're going to need more info. Were the monsters asleep? Were the players super lucky with rolling high initiative?

Basically what happened?

Because it doesn't seem like it should be easy. But D&D is not a board game so the circumstances matter a lot.

we were the ones being ambushed, and some of our party couldnt see well in the dark, so had to go around with a torch.
we kinda were at disadventage. we had 2 ppl going below 0 but we could get them alive again, was the last round orso.
dont really have any other circumstances:S

 

[Tony Vargas]

IF u look at a deadly encounter for 4 level 4 chars, thats 4x500 xp, so how can we survive a 3 times as deadly encounter.

'Deadly' in 5e doesn't mean "This is it, we're all going to die," it's more like "WARNING: This encounter may contain monsters processed on equipment used to process peanuts or tree nuts."

 

[blondbauke]

'Deadly' in 5e doesn't mean "This is it, we're all going to die," it's more like "WARNING: This encounter may contain monsters processed on equipment used to process peanuts or tree nuts."

In the DMG "Deadly" means, if u dont use ur brain ur party could die

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

My rule of thumb is that at about 3x or 4x Deadly, whoever fights more intelligently should win/survive. (That generally should be the player characters if I'm doing my job correctly. Exception: if they're fighting highly intelligent and militarily-experienced adversaries like drow, mind flayers, or veteran scro/hobgoblins, it's possible for the monsters to play smarter than certain players.)

At 5x or 6x Deadly, it's more likely than not that players who just charge in swinging will lose/die, although sometimes they come surprisingly close to victory based on die rolls and/or magic items.

Anything of Medium difficulty is a curb stomp, unless the enemies are playing smarter than the PCs (e.g. drow again), in which case the players can still lose and I will loudly gloat about it (while secretly hoping they'll fix their tactics and do better next time).

Generally a fight of M Nth level PCs against their mirror-image doppelgangers will work out to about 3x Deadly. Since the CR calculations undercount a number of class abilities that don't show up well in the CR system (e.g. crowd control, stealth), that implies that 4x Deadly is approximately the right ballpark for player-vs-monster "fair fights", which matches my experience.

Of course, triumphing over a peer is less fun than triumphing over a more-powerful foe. 10x or 20x Deadly fights are exhilarating when you find a way to win anyway, through skill. That's my philosophy, anyway. (And that's why TPKing the PCs with the occasional highly-intelligent drow in a Medium encounter is a guilty pleasure for me. )

 

[blondbauke]

My rule of thumb is that at about 3x or 4x Deadly, whoever fights more intelligently should win/survive. (That generally should be the player characters if I'm doing my job correctly. Exception: if they're fighting highly intelligent and militarily-experienced adversaries like drow, mind flayers, or veteran scro/hobgoblins, it's possible for the monsters to play smarter than certain players.)

At 5x or 6x Deadly, it's more likely than not that players who just charge in swinging will lose/die, although sometimes they come surprisingly close to victory based on die rolls and/or magic items.

Anything of Medium difficulty is a curb stomp, unless the enemies are playing smarter than the PCs (e.g. drow again), in which case the players can still lose and I will loudly gloat about it (while secretly hoping they'll fix their tactics and do better next time).

Generally a fight of M Nth level PCs against their mirror-image doppelgangers will work out to about 3x Deadly. Since the CR calculations undercount a number of class abilities that don't show up well in the CR system (e.g. crowd control, stealth), that implies that 4x Deadly is approximately the right ballpark for player-vs-monster "fair fights", which matches my experience.

Of course, triumphing over a peer is less fun than triumphing over a more-powerful foe. 10x or 20x Deadly fights are exhilarating when you find a way to win anyway, through skill. That's my philosophy, anyway. (And that's why TPKing the PCs with the occasional highly-intelligent drow in a Medium encounter is a guilty pleasure for me. )

But is DND made to survive 2x deadly or even 3x deadly encounters?
If im reading the dmg, it states that u should look at the party chars first, and then u have 4 options of encounters.
Or is just my math incorrect?
were playing a non magic campagne btw, or close to.

 

[Tony Vargas]

But is DND made to survive 2x deadly or even 3x deadly encounters?

DND, sure. Parties, maybe.

were playing a non magic campagne btw, or close to.

What do you mean by that?
No magic items? No problem, magic items aren't assumed in the encounter guidelines.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

But is DND made to survive 2x deadly or even 3x deadly encounters?
If im reading the dmg, it states that u should look at the party chars first, and then u have 4 options of encounters.
Or is just my math incorrect?
were playing a non magic campagne btw, or close to.

I'm not sure exactly what you're asking, but--I try to avoid learning too much about the PCs' stats. My rule of thumb comes from computing difficulty after-the-fact*, and from looking at the CR of theorycrafted PCs. At the table I specifically avoid crafting encounters to the players. Rather, I telegraph threats to the players and left them craft their actions to the situation and/or game world.

* I'm generally aware of roughly what level everyone is, which is enough data to crudely compute encounter difficulty after the fact.

 

[blondbauke]

We have no magic users and no magic items, and still we kill like 3X deadly encounters.

The thing what im asking is: is my calculation right or am i doing something wrong?
Cuz now our DM just puts an encounter on our way, and we kinda level up each encounter.
As i see the table that was made, it tells me we need 10 encounters to level up, not just 1 or 2.