Level Up (A5E) How do we determine the CR of an exploration hazard?

[Faolyn]

There may be a formula in the books somewhere, but for the life of me, I can't find it. Do we just eyeball it?

 

[WarDriveWorley]

Trials and Treasures page 156 has rules on creating an exploration challenge. Part 5 (on page 157) discusses how to determine the CR. Basically it's the same as a creature (subbing average DC of ability checks for AC).

 

[Faolyn]

Thanks! I did not see that.

Edit: Except that's substituting DC for AC, but not how to substitute losing Supply or fatigue/strife for damage. I guess that the save DC is the only bit that matters?

 

[Morrus]

There’s also this Journey Best Practices | Level Up

 

[Faolyn]

Awesome! That's useful, @Morrus, thanks!

 

[Faolyn]

So, uh, I've been looking through all the exploration hazards and have come to the conclusion that there really isn't any consistency in how they're written up.

For instance, a Cursed Waterway, Fey Glade, and Lifeless Desolation are all 3rd-tier Supernatural hazards. The waterway and glade are CR 11; the desolation is CR 12. If you critically fail on the Cursed Waterway, you're cursed permanently (until the curse is removed) and each PC loses 2d6+1 Supply. If you critically fail on the Fey Glade, you lose 1d4+1 days. If you critically fail on the desolation, you can't take long rests and short rests are 8 hours long. All of these are pretty bad, but they're so different.

So this isn't a bad thing, but it's slightly confusing. AFAICT, the only thing that matters is the check DCs, and that's based on the CR, but there's no real way to assign the CR because, well, there's no apparent consistency in what it means. So I guess I can just assign CR based on what I think it the DCs should be. Which is fine, but, as I said, slightly confusing.