Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="dave2008" data-source="post: 8554490" data-attributes="member: 83242">Not if your looking for a challenge IMO. If an encounter &quot;could be lethal for one or more players...&quot; that doesn't sound like a challenge to me. But I understand everyone is different. To me a challenge (or hard) encounter would be an even match, one where every player has a 50% chance of dying.&nbsp; That is not an encounter difficulty described in the DMG IMO. So using the DMG parlance I would describe a challenging encounter like:A harrowing encounter is likely to be lethal for half or more player characters. Survival often requires good tactics and quick thinking, and the party risks complete defeat or death.So, IMO, the DMG never describes a truly challenging / hard encounter in its tables and descriptions.&nbsp; However, it does give you the tools to build such an encounter.But I agree the default advice in the DMG is indeed easier, which I understand, but I also feel like it tells you that. Unfortunately it is obscure behind language like &quot;hard&quot; and &quot;deadly.&quot; I just also think the existing math of the game and RAW &quot;dials&quot; as you say allow for the game to much more challenging. Hard mode, if you will, is built right into the game.What the DMG does fail to do, IMO, is help DMs adjust the encounter guide for different types / skills of players. The game allows for it, and to me it is easy to see how to do that, but I can also see how that could be difficult for inexperienced DMs.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="dave2008, post: 8554490, member: 83242"] Not if your looking for a challenge IMO. If an encounter "[B]could[/B] be lethal for [B]one[/B] or more players..." that doesn't sound like a challenge to me. But I understand everyone is different. To me a challenge (or hard) encounter would be an even match, one where every player has a 50% chance of dying. That is not an encounter difficulty described in the DMG IMO. So using the DMG parlance I would describe a challenging encounter like: [B][I]A harrowing[/I][/B][I] encounter [B]is likely to [/B]be lethal for [B]half[/B] or more player characters. Survival often requires good tactics and quick thinking, and the party risks [B]complete[/B] defeat or [B]death[/B].[/I] So, IMO, the DMG never describes a truly challenging / hard encounter in its tables and descriptions. However, it does give you the tools to build such an encounter. But I agree the default advice in the DMG is indeed easier, which I understand, but I also feel like it tells you that. Unfortunately it is obscure behind language like "hard" and "deadly." I just also think the existing math of the game and RAW "dials" as you say allow for the game to much more challenging. Hard mode, if you will, is built right into the game. What the DMG does fail to do, IMO, is help DMs adjust the encounter guide for different types / skills of players. The game allows for it, and to me it is easy to see how to do that, but I can also see how that could be difficult for inexperienced DMs. [/QUOTE]

Verification