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<blockquote data-quote="iserith" data-source="post: 6661153" data-attributes="member: 97077">Though I will &quot;check my work&quot; with the DM guidelines after the fact just to see where the encounter difficulty has fallen, I chose &quot;through some combo of DM intuition and feel.&quot;I imagine the scene first and worry about the numbers later. If I find that the numbers make the scene a difficult battle, then I create goals for the monster or PCs that do not require a fight to the death. In addition, I might add a couple ways to even the score as a bonus for engaging in the exploration or social interaction pillars of the game. As an example, in <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?465060-Monkey-Business" target="_blank">Monkey Business</a>, I wanted to present a scene where two beasts were rampaging around fighting each other while the PCs did something else (rescue an NPC). The adjusted experience is 10,200 XP - about five times higher than &quot;Deadly&quot; for 4th-level PCs strictly by the numbers. However, since they are attacking each other and the PCs can &quot;win&quot; the scene simply by making away with the NPC, those numbers don't mean much. I also included a way to engage in exploration to gain an advantage over one of the monsters. The other monster can potentially be dealt with via social interaction. This all depends on how the players choose to deal with the challenge, of course. One never knows!</blockquote>

[QUOTE="iserith, post: 6661153, member: 97077"] Though I will "check my work" with the DM guidelines after the fact just to see where the encounter difficulty has fallen, I chose "through some combo of DM intuition and feel." I imagine the scene first and worry about the numbers later. If I find that the numbers make the scene a difficult battle, then I create goals for the monster or PCs that do not require a fight to the death. In addition, I might add a couple ways to even the score as a bonus for engaging in the exploration or social interaction pillars of the game. As an example, in [URL="http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?465060-Monkey-Business"]Monkey Business[/URL], I wanted to present a scene where two beasts were rampaging around fighting each other while the PCs did something else (rescue an NPC). The adjusted experience is 10,200 XP - about five times higher than "Deadly" for 4th-level PCs strictly by the numbers. However, since they are attacking each other and the PCs can "win" the scene simply by making away with the NPC, those numbers don't mean much. I also included a way to engage in exploration to gain an advantage over one of the monsters. The other monster can potentially be dealt with via social interaction. This all depends on how the players choose to deal with the challenge, of course. One never knows! [/QUOTE]

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