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Encounter lethality
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<blockquote data-quote="Harzel" data-source="post: 7524568" data-attributes="member: 6857506"><p>Actually, I think this is not quite right. These are actually the amounts of <strong>adjusted XP</strong> per character that a party is <em>expected to be able to handle</em> in a "day" (period between long rests). I admit that the DMG text is a little confusing on this point, but here is the whole section that precedes the table.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>The <em>only</em> place in the text that talks about the character "earning" XP is the first sentence of the third paragraph. The rest of this, I believe, makes clear that the table is intended to be a guideline for the maximum amount of combat opposition that a party can handle in a day, as measured by <em>adjusted XP</em>, which in general is greater than awarded XP (if you follow the DMG guidelines).</p><p></p><p>Further on in your posts you make at least two other assumptions about things that vary quite widely between tables. The first is sessions-to-advance-a-level (for various levels). For many tables, the amount of play time needed to advance is an outcome of play, not a prescribed goal. As such it depends, among other things, on the balance between combat and the other pillars and how or whether XP is awarded for the other pillars, which can vary a lot.</p><p></p><p>The second is the accuracy of the difficulty implied by the DMG's labels for various encounter XP thresholds. At least on these boards, I believe the general consensus is that those labels might be appropriate for very casual or very inexperienced players, but that many tables will find them a very significant overestimate. My players for instance are definitely not optimizers, power-gamers, nor tactical experts; after several years of play, a couple of them have to be reminded what advantage/disadvantage is. Nevertheless, they typically trounce anything up to the 'deadly' threshold. They may get a little nervous, but they're really in no danger of anyone actually dying.</p><p></p><p>So, with due respect for the work you put into your calculations, I think your results are probably of limited applicability.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Harzel, post: 7524568, member: 6857506"] Actually, I think this is not quite right. These are actually the amounts of [B]adjusted XP[/B] per character that a party is [I]expected to be able to handle[/I] in a "day" (period between long rests). I admit that the DMG text is a little confusing on this point, but here is the whole section that precedes the table. The [I]only[/I] place in the text that talks about the character "earning" XP is the first sentence of the third paragraph. The rest of this, I believe, makes clear that the table is intended to be a guideline for the maximum amount of combat opposition that a party can handle in a day, as measured by [I]adjusted XP[/I], which in general is greater than awarded XP (if you follow the DMG guidelines). Further on in your posts you make at least two other assumptions about things that vary quite widely between tables. The first is sessions-to-advance-a-level (for various levels). For many tables, the amount of play time needed to advance is an outcome of play, not a prescribed goal. As such it depends, among other things, on the balance between combat and the other pillars and how or whether XP is awarded for the other pillars, which can vary a lot. The second is the accuracy of the difficulty implied by the DMG's labels for various encounter XP thresholds. At least on these boards, I believe the general consensus is that those labels might be appropriate for very casual or very inexperienced players, but that many tables will find them a very significant overestimate. My players for instance are definitely not optimizers, power-gamers, nor tactical experts; after several years of play, a couple of them have to be reminded what advantage/disadvantage is. Nevertheless, they typically trounce anything up to the 'deadly' threshold. They may get a little nervous, but they're really in no danger of anyone actually dying. So, with due respect for the work you put into your calculations, I think your results are probably of limited applicability. [/QUOTE]
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