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<blockquote data-quote="Dr_Ruminahui" data-source="post: 4886092" data-attributes="member: 81104">Usually I don't adjust XP based on how difficult the encounter is, as it tends to all come out in the wash (some end up being too easy, some too hard).&nbsp;That said, where the encounter is drastically easier/more difficult than expected, I will adjust things.&nbsp; For example, I once had an encounter where my players fought a bunch of zombies and used absolutely zero resources (didn't lose any HPs and used no dailies) - I think I gave little or no XP for that.&nbsp; Likewise, I had an encounter where a blue dragon didn't have any room to fly and attempted to negotiate once it was bloodied - only gave half XP for that one.&nbsp;In your case, I would give more XP - the way the hexer was played basically made it a totally different monster.&nbsp; From the sounds of it, his damage transference to the players gave him rouhly the HP of an elite, so making him the equivalent XP award (so, double) sounds appropriate.&nbsp; Then again, it depends on your group - if the level progression seems too slow, err on the side of &quot;topping up&quot; the XP for hard encounters, or if progression seems too fast, reduce the XP for extremely easy ones.&nbsp;All that said, I think I would shy away from altering XP awards if the difficulty difference is based purely on the luck of the dice.&nbsp; Rather, I'm more likely to alter awards based on encounter design factors (for example, if the party needs to climb a cliff to get to the enemy archers, those archers will be worth more XP), or if a major rules slip up made the critters much more/less powerful (my last boss fight I forgot to use either of his action points [I'm bad for that] but it balanced out with my accidentally giving the boss more saves versus the dangerous terrain than I was giving to my players, so I didn't change the XP).&nbsp;As for your friend's DMing - I know people make mistakes, but it seems he got pretty much every ability the hexer has wrong... wow...&nbsp; I guess from now on you should make sure he really reviews the monster abilities before gaming.&nbsp; That and if things seem odd, ask him about it...</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Dr_Ruminahui, post: 4886092, member: 81104"] Usually I don't adjust XP based on how difficult the encounter is, as it tends to all come out in the wash (some end up being too easy, some too hard). That said, where the encounter is drastically easier/more difficult than expected, I will adjust things. For example, I once had an encounter where my players fought a bunch of zombies and used absolutely [i]zero[/i] resources (didn't lose any HPs and used no dailies) - I think I gave little or no XP for that. Likewise, I had an encounter where a blue dragon didn't have any room to fly and attempted to negotiate once it was bloodied - only gave half XP for that one. In your case, I would give more XP - the way the hexer was played basically made it a totally different monster. From the sounds of it, his damage transference to the players gave him rouhly the HP of an elite, so making him the equivalent XP award (so, double) sounds appropriate. Then again, it depends on your group - if the level progression seems too slow, err on the side of "topping up" the XP for hard encounters, or if progression seems too fast, reduce the XP for extremely easy ones. All that said, I think I would shy away from altering XP awards if the difficulty difference is based purely on the luck of the dice. Rather, I'm more likely to alter awards based on encounter design factors (for example, if the party needs to climb a cliff to get to the enemy archers, those archers will be worth more XP), or if a major rules slip up made the critters much more/less powerful (my last boss fight I forgot to use either of his action points [I'm bad for that] but it balanced out with my accidentally giving the boss more saves versus the dangerous terrain than I was giving to my players, so I didn't change the XP). As for your friend's DMing - I know people make mistakes, but it seems he got pretty much every ability the hexer has wrong... wow... I guess from now on you should make sure he really reviews the monster abilities before gaming. That and if things seem odd, ask him about it... [/QUOTE]

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