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<blockquote data-quote="Kzach" data-source="post: 4485181" data-attributes="member: 56189">I'm running a campaign for four players at the moment and I'm finding that ten encounters per level is way off the mark.So far I've run two combat encounters, a skill challenge, and two traps and the PC's are half-way to level 2. The next two combats I have planned will just about give them 2nd level.The skill challenge and traps I really don't consider encounters. Maybe I'm doing skill challenges wrong but they just don't feel like encounters and certainly don't last as long as encounters.So four combats and they get a level. Sure, if you add in the skill challenge and traps then it's seven, but even that is three below the supposed average.What I'm finding is that a fairly intelligent group of players will generally handle combats much more tactically and will therefore do much better. This is not necessarily a bad thing, however it means upping the ante in combat scenarios and therefore XP.Both fights I've put the players through so far have been 700xp encounters with pretty smart foes using solid tactics. That's almost double the 'challenging' encounter XP value for their level. And so far, I've only had one PC go down (the wizard, due mainly to bad positioning when the combat started) and only one PC use a daily.How are other DM's finding it?</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Kzach, post: 4485181, member: 56189"] I'm running a campaign for four players at the moment and I'm finding that ten encounters per level is way off the mark. So far I've run two combat encounters, a skill challenge, and two traps and the PC's are half-way to level 2. The next two combats I have planned will just about give them 2nd level. The skill challenge and traps I really don't consider encounters. Maybe I'm doing skill challenges wrong but they just don't feel like encounters and certainly don't last as long as encounters. So four combats and they get a level. Sure, if you add in the skill challenge and traps then it's seven, but even that is three below the supposed average. What I'm finding is that a fairly intelligent group of players will generally handle combats much more tactically and will therefore do much better. This is not necessarily a bad thing, however it means upping the ante in combat scenarios and therefore XP. Both fights I've put the players through so far have been 700xp encounters with pretty smart foes using solid tactics. That's almost double the 'challenging' encounter XP value for their level. And so far, I've only had one PC go down (the wizard, due mainly to bad positioning when the combat started) and only one PC use a daily. How are other DM's finding it? [/QUOTE]

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