NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celtavian" data-source="post: 6859292" data-attributes="member: 5834">This is a really strange question. I will answer it, but I always assume this is obvious. Because RPGs are math-based. If you don't understand how the math works, then you will have a very hard time modifying in a useful fashion. You also have to let players figure out optimized tactics, so you know how to counter them. By playing out of the box and letting the players "break the game", you see what needs to be done to fix some of the problems. Optimizers show you how to get the highest AC, how to do the most damage, which spells are best the majority of the time, which classes combine to make the most powerful multiclass. They take the game and show you all the options that will cause you problems as a DM. Then you can start modifying to deal with these things. That's why you start out using the base game. Even a simple RPG like 5E requires a lot of play to see how all the parts work together.I don't believe environment should be a factor. That's not to say you can't occasionally have an environmental factor, but it should have nothing to do with the challenge of the creature. Giants are not just found in heavily advantageous environments. Giants wander around like other creatures with zero environmental advantages. Dragons are supposed to be able to decimate lands outside of their lairs. Trolls are supposed to be able to control bridge crossing. Demons are supposed to be amongst the most fearsome creatures in existence. All of this should be true if you put them in a grass field by themselves. If you're engaging in design, you have to ask yourself: would this creature be dangerous in a grass field in a wide open place? Would Smaug be frightening in a place like that? Would the Balrog of Moria be frightening in a grass field? And so on and so on. If you as a DM are required to use extreme environmental advantages to make a creature of legend dangerous, then something is wrong with the base design of the creature. Adding the environmental factors on should make the whole situation even more frightening and challenging, but should not be the sole reason the creature is a challenge at all. That's the basis that informs my creature design choices. I want creatures like Balors and Dragons to be dangerous and challenging in a completely neutral environment. That is very, very important to me. Suffice it to say if a creature of legend in a white room can't challenge a party, it's not strong enough for my tastes. A PC party should be afraid to enter a white room against a Balor, Marilith, or Dragon. Right now that isn't the case unless they are very low level. That is disappointing.Given the way 5E is right now, most creatures should be fleeing from adventuring parties. Dragons should be hiding or just straight up running from PC parties. Balors should be teleporting away and flying as far off as they can. Monsters should be running like a scared rabbit or bird from PC parties given how little chance they have of defeating them. When you have a power gap where a creature like a Death Slaad should be dropping to his knees and begging for his life from the PC party, that's not very fun as a DM. If you were writing a comic right now, the frost giants in encounter 1 have the best chance of survival by running from the PCs or negotiating with them. By attacking the PCs, they pretty much sealed their doom. You have to wonder if the giants know this and would act accordingly. Giants would tell themselves, "Group of human adventurers. We better start begging for our lives or we're dead. Maybe if we give them our gold, they'll let us live." That would be the smart play by the majority of monsters in 5E right now.</blockquote>

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