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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Quickleaf" data-source="post: 5430716" data-attributes="member: 20323">By the numbers, yes. In play, no way. That scenario would mean your combat times would more than double, IME. In general XP as an encounter budget is useful only in the most basic sense...you can follow those guidelines to a T and still make a badly broken encounter. In play it's the encounter composition that makes a fight hard or easy.Not sure what your concern is here...why *wouldn't* the PCs take an active part in the fight?I only hand out started companion NPCs (using DMG2) when the story calls for it, and then only to experienced players good at multitasking. Doing otherwise is a serious invitation for dragging combats. Also, not every player likes the squad style of play.A last survivor from the village, not necessarily a skilled combatant? A turncoat Demogorgon follower who escaped alive?Before you start dropping started allies into the game consider why you are doing that. If the NPC is a recent introduced, has no name, or isn't intended to be recurring I've found it more effective to follow Dasuul's advice. If winging it/hand waving it doesn't work for you, try this trick:Each NPC squad provides the PCs with a bonus encounter power which can be used by any party member; this power is an abstraction of the NPCs contribution to the fight, gives the players a sense of leadership, without dragging down combat. For example, IMC the PCs were able to call on a trebuchet attack and an in-fight ritual during a siege.If a named NPC ally is important you might build them as a familiar... I did this for a squire/man- at- arms follower of a PC. This way the player has a say over how active the NPC is played and how much risk to put them in.Yes, our biggest fight had over 70 minis in play. <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    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />The final session of my campaign involved an all out war scenario. There were 6 PCs, aided by 2 statted NPC companions (each played by an experienced player), 10 archer minions (run by one player), and 4 cavalry minions (run by another player). That represented the PCs' special military unit responsible for penetrating into enemy territory to take down the BBEG.The enemies included 30+ minions, a hobgoblin phalanx unit treated as a gargantuan solo until bloodied when it became 16 hobgoblin minions and an elite warlord, a cave troll and its handlers, a dracolich and the enchantress controlling it, the enchantress' displacer beast familiar, 5 eladrin swordmages sworn to the enchantress, 12 royal guards, a doppelganger assassin, the BBEG prince and his half-Orc bodyguard, plus a magic trap. Basically, I slammed together 3 challenging encounters (L+2 to L+4) in a very large connected area and let the players decide how to tackle it. It took 6 hrs but it was a ton of fun!Good luck with your game.</blockquote>

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