Hi guy's I will be running DragonLance Shadow of the Dragon Queen soon and I have the above PCs I really need some advice on making balanced encounters any help will be greatly appreciated 😊
What is the purpose of the encounters you want to create?
Granted I come from a storytelling background rather than hack and slash background, so I'm often looking for the story reason behind stuff. That said, there are any number of cool enemies one could encounter. It would really help me if you could guide what you're looking for with the reason for some of the encounters.
For example, a recent encounter for my group was at a carnival/circus. My players could have taken on all the guards and stall holders, they could have released and then fought all the creatures in the menagerie, or they could have found out through some sneaky means that the reason all the games were rigged was to get ordinary people into debt and force them to accept a deal with the fiend who actually owns and controls the circus. Each options leads to some storytelling around and throughout. Are they going to make a big noise and publicly challenge the circus and it's bent games? Fine they'll have to deal with the stall holders and guards. Does the ranger or druid want to free the animals in the menagerie? Great, now the guards are going to get involved, but the creatures don't know friend from foe and will attack indiscriminately because all humanoids keep creatures in cages. Do the party see someone being dragged off to a fancy carriage at the back or in the hidden areas of the circus? Cool they might get the chance to overhear the fiend forcing a poor dwarf labourer into a devil's deal.
The potential encounters serve story for me, so if you've got some ideas of what types of story you're most attracted to that might help.
I'm with Helmut_McQuack, the pre-written encounters should have everything needed to get you started. Most of those should be balanced for a party of 4-6 PCs, and the book gives some suggestions on what level the PCs should be at for each chapter and this in turn could give you a glimpse at what is/isn't going to work for your party size/capability.
After that, the Basic Rules and DMG have some guidelines for encounter building that could prove useful. Combat Encounter Difficulty.
From here it is likely just a matter of plugging what monsters you want to use into the Encounter Builder and adding in your terrain/obstacles to your combat notes and you're off.
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad
The gnome says "you all should have ducked." Buh dumpf pshh.
Balancing encounters takes time. Start off with easy stuff and see how the players react, see how hard they hit and how fast they accomplish the encounter. Listen to what they do after. Like a short rest or whatever.
Build from there. Learning how much damage they put out and can take is great information. Don't go by CR and the encounter builder doesn't take into consideration armor, weapons, spells and or any potions they may have.
4-5 goblins at level one could, if played correctly by the dm, tpk them easily as long as the dice roll good for the gobbies.
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Hi guy's I will be running DragonLance Shadow of the Dragon Queen soon and I have the above PCs I really need some advice on making balanced encounters any help will be greatly appreciated 😊
What is the purpose of the encounters you want to create?
Granted I come from a storytelling background rather than hack and slash background, so I'm often looking for the story reason behind stuff. That said, there are any number of cool enemies one could encounter. It would really help me if you could guide what you're looking for with the reason for some of the encounters.
For example, a recent encounter for my group was at a carnival/circus. My players could have taken on all the guards and stall holders, they could have released and then fought all the creatures in the menagerie, or they could have found out through some sneaky means that the reason all the games were rigged was to get ordinary people into debt and force them to accept a deal with the fiend who actually owns and controls the circus. Each options leads to some storytelling around and throughout. Are they going to make a big noise and publicly challenge the circus and it's bent games? Fine they'll have to deal with the stall holders and guards. Does the ranger or druid want to free the animals in the menagerie? Great, now the guards are going to get involved, but the creatures don't know friend from foe and will attack indiscriminately because all humanoids keep creatures in cages. Do the party see someone being dragged off to a fancy carriage at the back or in the hidden areas of the circus? Cool they might get the chance to overhear the fiend forcing a poor dwarf labourer into a devil's deal.
The potential encounters serve story for me, so if you've got some ideas of what types of story you're most attracted to that might help.
DM session planning template - My version of maps for 'Lost Mine of Phandelver' - Send your party to The Circus - Other DM Resources - Maps, Tokens, Quests - 'Better' Player Character Injury Tables?
Actor, Writer, Director & Teacher by day - GM/DM in my off hours.
Shouldn't the book have already-existing encounters? You can use those as at least a base for encounter balance.
Paladin main who spends most of his D&D time worldbuilding or DMing, not Paladin-ing.
I'm with Helmut_McQuack, the pre-written encounters should have everything needed to get you started. Most of those should be balanced for a party of 4-6 PCs, and the book gives some suggestions on what level the PCs should be at for each chapter and this in turn could give you a glimpse at what is/isn't going to work for your party size/capability.
After that, the Basic Rules and DMG have some guidelines for encounter building that could prove useful. Combat Encounter Difficulty.
From here it is likely just a matter of plugging what monsters you want to use into the Encounter Builder and adding in your terrain/obstacles to your combat notes and you're off.
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad
The gnome says "you all should have ducked." Buh dumpf pshh.
Balancing encounters takes time. Start off with easy stuff and see how the players react, see how hard they hit and how fast they accomplish the encounter. Listen to what they do after. Like a short rest or whatever.
Build from there. Learning how much damage they put out and can take is great information. Don't go by CR and the encounter builder doesn't take into consideration armor, weapons, spells and or any potions they may have.
4-5 goblins at level one could, if played correctly by the dm, tpk them easily as long as the dice roll good for the gobbies.