Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ahnehnois" data-source="post: 6050008" data-attributes="member: 17106">Still missing the point. An "epic clash" between "approximate equals" is not what happens when you use D&D's encounter building guidelines. The baseline 3e assumption is that a "challenging encounter" is four characters of a certain level against one character of the same level. That's actually closer to your second option; a ludicrously unfair, even rigged situation. The one opponent would, in most circumstances, run away or surrender. It's a ridiculous baseline, and the entire system of CRs, ELs, LAs, XP, and so on that derives from it is influenced by it. The other major assumption, that a challenging encounter under this definition drains 20% of the party's replenishable resources, is no less problematic.More fundamentally, the notion of encounters is inherently combat oriented, and particularly ties character design and character advancement to the baseline assumptions, which is a whole nother can of worms.That's why the encounter building guidelines suck. That's why they're best ignored, and why the game would be better without them, replacing their basic function (DM training) through some other venue.I don't see what "balanced math" has to do with encounter building guidelines. If anything, you appear to be making the point that good class and monster design allows the DM to build situations easily without an added encounter building XP budget/EL/etc. system, which has been and is still the point I'm making.</blockquote>

Verification