Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Li Shenron" data-source="post: 7425964" data-attributes="member: 1465">I haven't DMed the game long enough into high levels to be able to say much about the robustness of the CR/XP system. However my feeling is that many of the complaints about it come from people who are either expecting too much of it, or not even using it appropriately but fudging it grossly. I know I fudge it, but at least I don't complain about the results :/I think that many of those people play in games when one or more of the following are true:- the DM is not playing the monsters as well as they should be played (the DM probably thinks "I am too good, if I play the monsters at my best, the PCs don't have a chance")- the DM gives time for a short rest almost after every encounter- the DM gives more magic items than the standard, which is near-zero- the characters are created with generous rules on ability scores ("high-powered" campaigns were extremely common in 3e, I think some gaming groups still think it's needed)The first one is actually the most important point. If the monsters are too weak, try to ask the DM to play them as well as she would play a PC, and see the difference.Definitely. CR is said to be meant to be used as a threshold, as in "don't use a monster with CR higher than your PC party level". My guess is that a lot of DMs just think it's cool to use a monster of higher CR, but then proceed to play the monster poorly, and then blame the CR instead of themselves.Even before customising, giving magic items in the first place makes the game easier. The rules were designed to work with zero magic items. The random treasure tables include magic items, but on average not that much.Feats and multiclassing are either poor or strong choices, depending who you ask. In doubt, I'd say that a fair assessment of the CR/XP system should not include anything officially labelled as "optional".I do not want to give a judgement of the CR/XP system because I know I am not using it... mainly I run my 5e games by converting old edition adventures on the fly, so the encounters come up with whatever difficulty results from the 5e monsters' own CR and XP after conversion, which of course is different from the original edition's version of the adventure. I do check the CR and adjust the situation in the PC's favor if the CR is too high (e.g. have them catch the monster asleep, surprised, already wounded...), and sometimes I increase/decrease the number of minions.What is "right pacing" exactly? The players are more responsible than the DM to set the pacing. If they are low on resources and afraid to continue, they stop, otherwise they continue the adventuring day. The DM is primarly responsible to keep them a bit on their toe to discourage the "5 minutes working day" effect, so that the resource management aspect of the game is still interesting, but there is hardly a "right pacing" to be set beforehand.</blockquote>

Verification