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D&D 101: A lesson in fun
- Thread starter Faerl'Elghinn
- Start date
Wulf Ratbane
Adventurer
Parlan said:
Well, I'd say that depends on the kind of undead-- but generally speaking, I'd guess that the sort of folks who like to play rogues (in particular in a party composed entirely of rogues!) would look to this as just another chance to puzzle out a solution.
Lots of opportunity for the roguey-thinky, if you ask me.
"We can take those ghouls if we just had enough alchemist's fire and tanglefoot bags... Here's the plan..."
Wulf
To hammer the "it's not linear" point home some more:
16 CR 1 monsters are *not* equally powerful as one CR 16 monster.
16 Ftr1 are no match for one Ftr16
As Wulf said it so well on the previous page: You have GOT to stop looking at the EL system as a linear system!
By the way, this is a different argument than the one that Pcat and others are making. We're *not* making any value judgements here about whether doubling the number of opponents makes the enounter "twice as hard" (whatever that means). It's just that the CR and EL *numbers* are not means to be additive! A lvl 2 PC is not designed to be exactly as powerful as 2 lvl 1 PCs. A CR 2 creature is not designed to be exactly twice as difficult as 2 CR 1 creatures. That's just not what the CR numbers mean, or how you're supposed to use them.
If you *really* want to get something that's additive, you could assign a new value called "Difficulty Level" (DL) to each creature. DL is equal to 2^(CR/2), so a CR 2 creature has a DL of 2, a CR 10 creature has a DL of 32. This new "difficulty level" is additive! Four CR 10 creature (4 times DL 32) are equally difficult as two CR 12 creatures (2 times DL 64) or one CR 14 creature (DL 128).
16 CR 1 monsters are *not* equally powerful as one CR 16 monster.
16 Ftr1 are no match for one Ftr16
As Wulf said it so well on the previous page: You have GOT to stop looking at the EL system as a linear system!
By the way, this is a different argument than the one that Pcat and others are making. We're *not* making any value judgements here about whether doubling the number of opponents makes the enounter "twice as hard" (whatever that means). It's just that the CR and EL *numbers* are not means to be additive! A lvl 2 PC is not designed to be exactly as powerful as 2 lvl 1 PCs. A CR 2 creature is not designed to be exactly twice as difficult as 2 CR 1 creatures. That's just not what the CR numbers mean, or how you're supposed to use them.
If you *really* want to get something that's additive, you could assign a new value called "Difficulty Level" (DL) to each creature. DL is equal to 2^(CR/2), so a CR 2 creature has a DL of 2, a CR 10 creature has a DL of 32. This new "difficulty level" is additive! Four CR 10 creature (4 times DL 32) are equally difficult as two CR 12 creatures (2 times DL 64) or one CR 14 creature (DL 128).
rushlight
Roll for Initiative!
Bah.
From my DMing experience, the whole CR or EL thing is more art than science. You can debate mathematical theories for this and that, statistics for the other or whatever... but it comes down to what your party can and can't do.
Example:
My party consists of four 20th level PCs. There's a wizard, a paladin, a cleric and a ranger/rogue. Pretty average. The foe they encoutered was a Pit Fiend - CR 20. Now, they did beat this encounter. After the forth try - and two near deaths (-9 HP!) for the paladin. Mechanically, they should have defeated this monster with moderate effort. Their lack of decent tactics, and effective use of their resources nearly killed the paladin twice. (Note: if you are the main line fighter, it's not a good idea to charge the Pit Fiend while your support is 30-40 feet away.)
Same party, a few days later:
They have managed to get to the final BBEG of this section of the campaign. The BBEG was a 20th level sorcerer death slaad, with several 17th level death slaad buddies, and some 18th level grey slaad fighters. They mowed through the buddies in about 3 rounds, with only a small percentage of HP loss. Then they reached the BBEG - who they had been chasing for months (and to whom the Pit Fiend mentioned above was a lackey). Well, needless to say they nearly had him dead in two rounds, while he had yet to even scratch a PC. So, in good DM fashion - I faked it. I made some slight "on the fly" modifications to the BBEG, and gave the PCs some trouble.
(I knew that they would waste him in the end, but since this was supposed to be a climactic battle with the mastermind they had been persuing. As a player, it would pretty much suck if we killed the BBEG in seconds - that battle needs to be fun and last a while. Now, I didn't tell my players that I modified the BBEG, but they did really enjoy the battle. They commented several times how difficult it was to beat him. I could also tell that the difficulty of the battle made it mean something. They appreciated that.)
Anyway, you use should CR and EL as guidelines only. They become nearly meaningless without a party to put them in context. If your party all have armor of Heavy Fortification, a rogue 10 levels higher than the party isn't much of a challenge - they're immune to it's power. If they all have rings of Fire Immunity, then a Fire Elemental isn't really a challange, no matter what the levels or CR. Conversely, a party of 3rd level PCs without appropriate armor will face a challange against a couple of orcs.
In order to set up a balanced encounter, you must know what your PCs can do, what they defeat easily, what gives them some trouble, and what they just can't handle. Once you know all that, then you can find a range of monsters appropriate for them - and then you can take that range and use the CRs to see if it's too far one way or the other. CR is certainly much less useful than the information about the party.
From my DMing experience, the whole CR or EL thing is more art than science. You can debate mathematical theories for this and that, statistics for the other or whatever... but it comes down to what your party can and can't do.
Example:
My party consists of four 20th level PCs. There's a wizard, a paladin, a cleric and a ranger/rogue. Pretty average. The foe they encoutered was a Pit Fiend - CR 20. Now, they did beat this encounter. After the forth try - and two near deaths (-9 HP!) for the paladin. Mechanically, they should have defeated this monster with moderate effort. Their lack of decent tactics, and effective use of their resources nearly killed the paladin twice. (Note: if you are the main line fighter, it's not a good idea to charge the Pit Fiend while your support is 30-40 feet away.)
Same party, a few days later:
They have managed to get to the final BBEG of this section of the campaign. The BBEG was a 20th level sorcerer death slaad, with several 17th level death slaad buddies, and some 18th level grey slaad fighters. They mowed through the buddies in about 3 rounds, with only a small percentage of HP loss. Then they reached the BBEG - who they had been chasing for months (and to whom the Pit Fiend mentioned above was a lackey). Well, needless to say they nearly had him dead in two rounds, while he had yet to even scratch a PC. So, in good DM fashion - I faked it. I made some slight "on the fly" modifications to the BBEG, and gave the PCs some trouble.
(I knew that they would waste him in the end, but since this was supposed to be a climactic battle with the mastermind they had been persuing. As a player, it would pretty much suck if we killed the BBEG in seconds - that battle needs to be fun and last a while. Now, I didn't tell my players that I modified the BBEG, but they did really enjoy the battle. They commented several times how difficult it was to beat him. I could also tell that the difficulty of the battle made it mean something. They appreciated that.)
Anyway, you use should CR and EL as guidelines only. They become nearly meaningless without a party to put them in context. If your party all have armor of Heavy Fortification, a rogue 10 levels higher than the party isn't much of a challenge - they're immune to it's power. If they all have rings of Fire Immunity, then a Fire Elemental isn't really a challange, no matter what the levels or CR. Conversely, a party of 3rd level PCs without appropriate armor will face a challange against a couple of orcs.
In order to set up a balanced encounter, you must know what your PCs can do, what they defeat easily, what gives them some trouble, and what they just can't handle. Once you know all that, then you can find a range of monsters appropriate for them - and then you can take that range and use the CRs to see if it's too far one way or the other. CR is certainly much less useful than the information about the party.
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Wulf Ratbane
Adventurer
Parlan said:
Depends on the game and the players. I agree about 90% with the orginal poster regarding the role and responsibility of the DM in that regard.
I personally prefer a certain amount of "status quo" and verisimilitude in my games, and tend to let the chips fall where they may. That said, I play with experienced players who generally demand that of me; and that being said, I think it is important to preserve some sense of continuity and story, and will fudge on occasion if necessary to prevent an untimely or simply unlucky TPK.
If the players make all the decisions AND the dice are at least fairly average, then I think it's only fair-- and in fact, absolutely necessary to the enjoyment of the game-- that the players live or die by those decisions.
Wulf
Caspian Marqine
First Post
Situation specific
Well, in my short time GMing 3E I've noted several deals, the CR is quite nice as to figuring out generally what you should be doing, but more importantly to figure out difficulty of an encounter you have to get directly to the numbers.
Firstly, figuring out to hit numbers, if the guy is really hard to hit, his AC should be around 15+ the highest BAB in the party. (this came up after the fact that a GM I played with stuck us up against a couple of lads with an AC of 31, against 4th level characters, DM genie error). And then there's the question of the monster/s HP and damage output. I assume for a difficult fight would be something like 5-10 rounds of the PCs wailing on the threat, not really sure what goes since haven't had many fights lsat more than 5 rounds. Damage output wise, monster should be leaving dents equivalent to its threat. Muddle with these factors and you get more control over what you want the encounter to be like I figure.
Jonathan
Well, in my short time GMing 3E I've noted several deals, the CR is quite nice as to figuring out generally what you should be doing, but more importantly to figure out difficulty of an encounter you have to get directly to the numbers.
Firstly, figuring out to hit numbers, if the guy is really hard to hit, his AC should be around 15+ the highest BAB in the party. (this came up after the fact that a GM I played with stuck us up against a couple of lads with an AC of 31, against 4th level characters, DM genie error). And then there's the question of the monster/s HP and damage output. I assume for a difficult fight would be something like 5-10 rounds of the PCs wailing on the threat, not really sure what goes since haven't had many fights lsat more than 5 rounds. Damage output wise, monster should be leaving dents equivalent to its threat. Muddle with these factors and you get more control over what you want the encounter to be like I figure.
Jonathan
Saeviomagy
Adventurer
Faerl'Elghinn said:
So you're complaining because your party got trashed by a couple of tendriculi? Is that it?
The EL and CR system works to a limited degree. In broad strokes, and for most monsters, it gives GM's an idea of what their party can take, and what rewards they get for it.
Of course it cannot possibly take in every single variable, like party members without knowledge skills, DM's who think that a 15 foot plant with a total hide modifier of -9 and no move silently skill to speak of is invisible and silent, a party who runs away from an opponent with inferior mobility and no ranged capability to speak of thereby abandoning their friends, party members with AC's that are pitiful for their level or bad luck on the dice.
rushlight
Roll for Initiative!
We also agree here. Now, I wouldn't intentionally oppose my players with a monster that is too far above their ability - although there are many that are. Usually, when they wander by accident into an area where they shouldn't be, they'll get signals - and it's their job to correctly interpret the signals. If they choose to ignore them, then I can't be held at fault - I don't want to railroad them, even if it's for their own good. I do present them with challenges, and some are quite difficult.Wulf Ratbane said:
Every challenge that I intend for them to fight can be won. However, players do tend to wander where they shouldn't - and worse, they sometimes get an "invincible" air about themselves. This usually results in a player death or two. Next time, they will learn that when they see three dragons of three different colors, perhaps shooting one and charging the other two isn't really a good idea...
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