Help... understanding monster levels vs. XP

[Imaro]

Ok, this may be a silly question, but could someone tell me how the level of a monster and it's XP value relate. If a monster is a higher level than the PC's but XP wise fits into an encounter for them... is that cool to use or does level determine what monsters should be used in an encounter? Any help would be appreciated.

 

[Trevelyan]

Technically you only need to reference the xp value of the monster, but the DMG advises against including monsters more than a few levels below the PCs or much more than six levels above the PCs as the way in which damage and defense scores scale means that such encounters will likely be extremely one sided. Pitting the party against higher level monsters is likely to exhause more of their daily powers so two such encounters in a row is likely to be lethal. Likewise, a monster eight levels above the party is expected to cause at least one character death, and more than one such creature will risk a TPK.

 

[keterys]

Level 1 monster is worth 100 XP
Minions 1/4
Elites x2
Solos x5

Every 4 levels doubles XP (Ex: 5th is 200 XP, 9th is 400 XP, 13th is 800 XP, etc)

 

[Imaro]

Technically you only need to reference the xp value of the monster, but the DMG advises against including monsters more than a few levels below the PCs or much more than six levels above the PCs as the way in which damage and defense scores scale means that such encounters will likely be extremely one sided. Pitting the party against higher level monsters is likely to exhause more of their daily powers so two such encounters in a row is likely to be lethal. Likewise, a monster eight levels above the party is expected to cause at least one character death, and more than one such creature will risk a TPK.

Thanks, this is what I wasn't understanding.

 

[Palladion]

Ok, this may be a silly question, but could someone tell me how the level of a monster and it's XP value relate. If a monster is a higher level than the PC's but XP wise fits into an encounter for them... is that cool to use or does level determine what monsters should be used in an encounter? Any help would be appreciated.

DMG 56 shows the correlation of monster level to XP value as well as an explanation. Hope that helps.