Encounter planning wackiness?

[Michael Silverbane]

Every single encounter that I've designed has varied the number of monsters, anywhere from 1 seriously bad dude to literally hundreds of actors, in neatly organized squads.

What do your PCs have against actors?

[/off topic]I do hope that 5 monsters for 5 pcs is the way that things go. That will make things considerably easier for those of us with non-standard groups.

Later
silver

 

[Raloc]

Honestly, I like this better than CR = 4 PCs to 1 monster of CR equal to party level. It always seemed kind of sucky to have to use fractional CR monsters or use monsters below the party level constantly (and using just one = meh). As long as it's not 5 PCs to 4 monsters it should be good.

 

[Stogoe]

The 3e CR system assumed that 1 CR X monster was a match for 4 Level X characters. And it didn't really scale linearly or geometrically, so trying to figure out how many CR Y monsters were a suitable challenge for a Level X party was like a shot in the dark by a blind amputee. I really hope it's a typo or something that got changed.

 

[Gundark]

I personally like the Star Wars Saga method of encounter design. The 5 on 5 model while simple seems a bit too neat. After awhile parties are going to be expecting 5 monsters per encounter.

Player 1 :"Hey where is monster #5?"
Player 2: " Maybe he's invisible?"
Player 3: "I cast the 4e version of invisbility purge!!!!"
DM: "sigh!"

As an aside I thought I remember Mearls saying something about a large # of goblins (20?) being an appropriate encounter for low level characters?

 

[Knight Otu]

As an aside I thought I remember Mearls saying something about a large # of goblins (20?) being an appropriate encounter for low level characters?

Minion goblins. Four minion monsters equal a single normal monster. Two normal monsters equal a single elite monster, and five normal monsters equal a solo monster. Thus, a five-person party can presumably meet single monsters, four monsters (an elite and three normals), ten monsters (8 minions, 1 normal, 1 elite), and so on. Also, traps and environmental hazards can substitute for monsters as well.

 

[Doug McCrae]

I'm sure that, like 3e, it's not a hard and fast rule. If you want to mix things up a bit you can put a 10th level party of 5 PCs up against 6 level 10 monsters, or 4, or 3 level 12s or 7 level 9s or whatever, in addition to the minions, elites and bosses already mentioned.

 

[Dausuul]

The 3e CR system assumed that 1 CR X monster was a match for 4 Level X characters. And it didn't really scale linearly or geometrically, so trying to figure out how many CR Y monsters were a suitable challenge for a Level X party was like a shot in the dark by a blind amputee.

Actually it did scale geometrically. +2 CR = double number of monsters. So one CR 12 monster = two CR 10 monsters = four CR 8 monsters = eight CR 6 monsters, give or take. (Past eight monsters it started getting wonky.) If you just want to go one step, multiply by 1.5, so one CR 12 monster = three CR 9 monsters.

It was a long way from perfect, but I found it worked okay most of the time, at least in the mid-levels. Stuff below CR 3 was messy, and of course the whole game starts to break down about level 12 or so.

 

[Irda Ranger]

However, on the subject of Encounter Planning, I am still having trouble wrapping my head around how the different power distinctions (solo, elite, standard and minion) will work within a relative span of levels unless WotC have enough monsters of every power distinction of every type at every level.

They don't need a monster for each level. They need a chart for each role. "This is how many HP, how much damage, and what the BAB, Defense and AC should be, etc. for a Brute for levels 1-30. Now take the Brute of your choice and scale appropriately." There's probably also a simple formula for multiplying HP to get you Solo, Elite, Normal and Minion for each level.

aka, "Say hello to my 30th Level Solo Ogre." aka, "That's one serious Ogre." aka, "Look, the Rogue is doing his tomato paste impression."

I hope there's some discussion about how certain Roles excel in certain environments. For instance, (and any French Knight can tell you this) on an open field 10 Artillery enemies are a lot more powerful than 10 Skirmishers or Brutes; but (and any Persian Emperor can tell you this) in close quarters where they can use terrain to control the flow of combat, 10 Brutes could hold off, oh, I'd say .. 33,333 Skirmishers. etc.

 

[Counterspin]

It's based on the xp value, so just because 4 monsters of level x equal the xp value you're shooting for with a party of level x doesn't mean the scaling is bad.

 

[Sir Brennen]

I'm sure that, like 3e, it's not a hard and fast rule. If you want to mix things up a bit you can put a 10th level party of 5 PCs up against 6 level 10 monsters, or 4, or 3 level 12s or 7 level 9s or whatever, in addition to the minions, elites and bosses already mentioned.

I'm pretty sure that it's been mentioned that you basically add up the XP value of monsters of varying levels to be about the same of 5 level X monsters, so it's quicker and presumably a bit more accurate than figuring out combos of differing CRs.