D&D 5E A benchmark for Encounter Deadliness

[dave2008]

I have a couple more concerns, here:

• What happens when word gets out that the DM is calculating how deadly his encounters are, and then putting kid gloves on them?
• What's wrong with deadly encounters? Whose expectation is it that the PCs should be able to slaughter everything they meet?

I think you are still misunderstanding. This knowledge doesn't mean you have to nerf the encounter. It just means the DM goes into it knowing it may be deadly and the PCs may have to do something special / different to get out of it. There is nothing wrong with deadly encounters; heck I had my lvl 6 group encounter a buffed up ancient black dragon. There is also nothing wrong with the DM knowing an encounter is deadly before hand, I just don't see why you feel the need to argue against knowledge, but.... nope I can't think of a reason.

Heck, I might use the info to make an encounter more dangerous, not less so!

Mike's (the other one) system might say that Ned and co. were in a world of pain. Had GRR Martin been using that system, we might not have been lucky enough to witness it, in favor of a smaller number of Lannister men, all of whom, including Jaime, would be slaughtered, and great XP awards would promptly go around.

So do you nerf encounters that you know are deadly? I don't think GRRM does.