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<blockquote data-quote="Hussar" data-source="post: 8832446" data-attributes="member: 22779">When I ran my no caster campaign a few years ago (by no caster, I mean no class that has a cantrip - half casters were an option, so, yes to paladin and ranger, but, no to bard or druid), I discovered that HP works incredibly well for encounter balancing.&nbsp; The characters after 5th level (until about 10th when the campaign ended) averaged about 20-25 points/character/round.&nbsp; Pretty much like clockwork.&nbsp; The 5 PC group did 100-125 points of damage/round.&nbsp; Because of that, I could very easily change the difficulty of encounters.&nbsp; Simply make sure that the encounter had X HP to last Y rounds and that meant that I got a difficulty that I wanted.&nbsp; A very hard encounter had to last at least 3 rounds, and preferably 4 or 5 if I wanted the party to get very scared.&nbsp; Now that I have an all caster party, those calculations get SO much harder, simply because of the enormous amount of options the group has.&nbsp; There are so many encounter ending spells - the group warlock drops Banishment on something, and, being higher level, means that he's removing two, sometimes three baddies from the encounter.&nbsp; The party mops up the remainders and then effectively gains a surprise round on the baddies when they come back (if they come back - being higher level means that lots of baddies get Banished back to a home plane).&nbsp; The idea that the game is based around HP is true, but, only insofar as the group make up presumptions are followed - 4-5 PC's, and only 2 core casters.&nbsp; Add to this the number of new spells and whatnot that casters have gotten over the years - while modest compared to other editions, are not insignificant, and encounter balance goes straight out the window for groups that really dive deep into the magic system.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Hussar, post: 8832446, member: 22779"] When I ran my no caster campaign a few years ago (by no caster, I mean no class that has a cantrip - half casters were an option, so, yes to paladin and ranger, but, no to bard or druid), I discovered that HP works incredibly well for encounter balancing. The characters after 5th level (until about 10th when the campaign ended) averaged about 20-25 points/character/round. Pretty much like clockwork. The 5 PC group did 100-125 points of damage/round. Because of that, I could very easily change the difficulty of encounters. Simply make sure that the encounter had X HP to last Y rounds and that meant that I got a difficulty that I wanted. A very hard encounter had to last at least 3 rounds, and preferably 4 or 5 if I wanted the party to get very scared. Now that I have an all caster party, those calculations get SO much harder, simply because of the enormous amount of options the group has. There are so many encounter ending spells - the group warlock drops Banishment on something, and, being higher level, means that he's removing two, sometimes three baddies from the encounter. The party mops up the remainders and then effectively gains a surprise round on the baddies when they come back (if they come back - being higher level means that lots of baddies get Banished back to a home plane). The idea that the game is based around HP is true, but, only insofar as the group make up presumptions are followed - 4-5 PC's, and only 2 core casters. Add to this the number of new spells and whatnot that casters have gotten over the years - while modest compared to other editions, are not insignificant, and encounter balance goes straight out the window for groups that really dive deep into the magic system. [/QUOTE]

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