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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Erratic K" data-source="post: 1166856" data-attributes="member: 14360">CR: toughness of  a monsterEL: encounter level, difficulty of an encounter.  (basically a combination of monsters and extenuating circumstances like ambush and the like).This is my experience:5 players (say avg 4th level party): can take a single CR 5 monster or other EL 5 situations if they are rested.  If not rested or with full selection of spells, they usually can't or have problems.  This becomes worse at lower levels and a little less true at higher levels. 6 players (say avg 4th level): can take a single CR 5 monster or other EL 5 situation almost anytime (unless they are mostly out of spells or HP- so I'll say if they are at least 50% prepared).  CR 6 is possible when fully rested, but you have to look out for immunities the party cannot beat.  EL 6 made of several CR 4 creatures is usually okay.more than that- the problems get worse- any given character will have a tough time with a single monster of CR equal or higher than their level.  So often you have to use higher numbers of reasonable CR creatures.  You also want to mix in some show off encounters (where the EL is lower than the party so the party can be successful).Everynow and then a Party level + 2 Encounter when rested is doable (it is like a boss or a plot changing monster).  With 6 characters they might be able to handle a EL of +3 over their party level when rested (but any one character having to stand up to a single CR 7 monster when they are level 4 or the like has good chances of dying quickly on just a couple poor rolls).By the way, my examples assume default wealth.  Magic items can skew the results quite abit.  So will heavily combat optimized parties.  Parties that are not combat optimized will have problems.  I also find that heavily multi-classed groups can have problems with creatures of higher CR than party level (usually because the CR assumes a party with a wizard/cleric/fighter of level equal to the monsters CR)-E</blockquote>

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