D&D 5E How are the Monster challenge ratings matching up in game?

[jwalter]

Does any one know of a nice CR v. level balance generator?

 

[epithet]

Does any one know of a nice CR v. level balance generator?

Kobold fight club. Google it, it has what you need.

 

[Oofta]

As with all things, it depends. I use CR as a base guideline and then adjust for the party. If you have a group of 4, use 6-8 encounters per long rest, minimal magic items, average group tactics, decent monster/encounter strategy, point buy or average rolls (no rerolls/statistical anomalies), etc then it works decent. Throw any one of those things off and you may have to make adjustments.

Don't underestimate the number of PCs and action economy, especially versus solo monsters. At higher levels, solos don't really work particularly well (I'm not sure they have in any edition) so you have to add minions, tactics, hazards or some combination therein.

In my experience, I had to increase the party be 2 "PCs" for one group to balance out right, the other using kobold fight club things worked fairly well with a straight calculation.

 

[Stalker0]

In general once my party hit Level 10+, I found CRs to be way too high. My party could easily take on monsters many CR above the expected number with ease.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

I think it's unwise to use CR as anything other than a very rough guide.

 

[Zardnaar]

In general once my party hit Level 10+, I found CRs to be way too high. My party could easily take on monsters many CR above the expected number with ease.

This I think perhaps you need to test it wit no feats, see if the critters are a bit tougher.

RAW though you can get +7 CR above your level roughly IIRC for a 5 person party an still be in the guidelines. The xp budget runs out fast when you add more monsters and solos die to fast.

 

[Nevvur]

Does any one know of a nice CR v. level balance generator?

I prefer this chart over the encounter building guidelines in the DMG. Don't know who the creator is, but it was posted publicly here on enworld a few years ago, so I hope the author doesn't mind me reposting it:

player level chart

 

[g4m3kn1ght]

I largely if not actively ignore CR. It seems like it is more balanced for monsters you run multiple of, hordes of humanoids like orcs and goblins and such. 'Boss' monsters (dragons and such) tend to be underwhelming unless you build in some environmental gimmic for the players to contend with in addition to the monster. I have had better luck throwing high level evil characters against my players than generating a challenge with monsters as is.

It might just be my play group but I have found CR and its equivalents to be an ineffective metric to design encounters and random encounter lists from.

My advice: Image what you want an encounter to be, look up monsters for examples of mechanics you can use during the fight. Give them rough values for attack, dam, ac, and other stats and fudge those as needed. It keeps players off balance and keeps things interesting.