Flamestrike
Legend
Hey there Flamestrike,
I don't understand your confusion here. If a monster is worth 33,000 XP then its classified as a Challenge Rating 21 monster.
Three Fire Giants are 15,000 XP multiplied by 2 because there is 3-6 of them. That's 30,000 XP.
That's basically the same as a CR 21 monster ( 30,000 is closer to CR 21 than CR 20 ).
No, it's not basically the same thing. Encounter XP budgets are not the same thing as CR ratings for individual monsters. There is nothing in the rules to suggest this is the case either.
CR is just a rough approximation of the general challenge level of an individual monster compared to a PC of X level. Roughly gauged by damage output. You can't assign a multi monster encounter a 'CR' for the encounter because that's not how it works or an accurate representation of the challenge (that's to be found in the XP budget)