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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AlViking" data-source="post: 9725779" data-attributes="member: 6906980">I assume you balance combat encounters based on the party?  Don't throw a Balor at the low level party unless there's a way to easily escape. Don't throw a lone Kobold at a high level party?That's all I'm doing, I just acknowledge that sometimes I do it during the session but before the players are aware of the encounter. For simplicity say I have a scenario where I expect the characters to confront Pirate Bob at The Leaning Tavern. When I was planning this out, I thought the characters would likely have had at most a combat encounter or two before this, maybe even a long rest after. So i wanted a pretty tough fight. So Pirate Captain and 4 thugs makes sense.Turns out though that the characters got sidetracked and into several combats and are going to meet up with good ol' Bob. They're not at full health or resources. What was a tough combat is now going to be a likely TPK, so I lower the difficulty by dropping a thug (Chuck is back on the ship up-chucking).The only thing that changes is the number of mates Bob has with him. I don't care if I made the decision to have 3 thugs instead of 4 a week or a minute before the characters entered the tavern. I don't care if you think that's blasphemy as far as you're concerned or not. As far as why I do what I do? I think that matters. What triggers the combat doesn't change. The fiction of the world doesn't change because until the encounter starts there is no established fiction. Whether or not they parlay with Bob or go in swinging is still up to the players. But if a fight does start I want it to be balanced. Meanwhile I don't have enemies pop into or out of existence once the fiction is established. Unless of course magic. P.S. I also don't have an issue with narrative style game mechanics,  they just aren't for me.</blockquote>

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