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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Kalendraf" data-source="post: 1662170" data-attributes="member: 3433">I recommend starting with this:<a href="http://www.enworld.org/cc/fiend_factory/elc/encounter_calculator.htm" target="_blank">http://www.enworld.org/cc/fiend_factory/elc/encounter_calculator.htm</a>It's been an amazing tool for me when attempting to balance encounters for larger sized parties.  As a general rule, I try to keep the EL of the encounter within +/- 2 of the party.  -2 should be fairly easy, -1 should be somewhat easy, even is a typical balanced fight, +1 will be tougher and +2 will be difficult.  When you go much past +2, you begin risking party deaths, and the +4 point seems to be the point where a TPK can happen fairly easily.Of course each party and each encounter is different, so what one party might find easy, might be overly difficult for another.  While the EL calculator is a great tool, it still needs some DM-intervention at times.  For example, if your party lacked any spellcaster and just had a bunch of warriors, but the monster had abnormally high DR properties, it  could make for a deadly fight but might not show up that way in the CR/EL calculations.</blockquote>