Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="Blue" data-source="post: 3585957" data-attributes="member: 20564">One point people are making with the &quot;1st level characters are wimps&quot; is that any encounter balancing system needs to be careful at low level - a bit of variation swings it greatly, and die rolls are nothing but variation.I'm sure an iconic four 7th level characters vs. an CR 8 encounter would have a different balance - tough but winnable using resources.An ogre - which as everyone mentions is mis-labelled in terms of CR - also hits hard enough that most 1st level character go down in 1-2 hits.&nbsp; Throw in a critical and it's all over.I applaud that you tried it several times to get a feel with different tactics, rolls, and ultimately characters, but to get a more complete feel for the CR system, also try at different points during it.(BTW, I'm not being a &quot;EL apologist&quot;.&nbsp; <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile&nbsp; &nbsp; :)"&nbsp; data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />&nbsp; I find it a useful tool to get a rough idea that I then need to balance to the party.&nbsp; There are a lot of things it (rightly) doesn't try to take into consideration, but the DM needs to - if the environment favors one side, previous encounters that day, level of equipment (high magic vs. low wealth), specific strengths or weaknesses (like low level flyers vs. ranged-poor PCs).&nbsp; I find it a reasonable start point.Good luck,=Blue</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Blue, post: 3585957, member: 20564"] One point people are making with the "1st level characters are wimps" is that any encounter balancing system needs to be careful at low level - a bit of variation swings it greatly, and die rolls are nothing but variation. I'm sure an iconic four 7th level characters vs. an CR 8 encounter would have a different balance - tough but winnable using resources. An ogre - which as everyone mentions is mis-labelled in terms of CR - also hits hard enough that most 1st level character go down in 1-2 hits. Throw in a critical and it's all over. I applaud that you tried it several times to get a feel with different tactics, rolls, and ultimately characters, but to get a more complete feel for the CR system, also try at different points during it. (BTW, I'm not being a "EL apologist". :) I find it a useful tool to get a rough idea that I then need to balance to the party. There are a lot of things it (rightly) doesn't try to take into consideration, but the DM needs to - if the environment favors one side, previous encounters that day, level of equipment (high magic vs. low wealth), specific strengths or weaknesses (like low level flyers vs. ranged-poor PCs). I find it a reasonable start point. Good luck, =Blue [/QUOTE]

Verification