How does everyone gauge the challenge to a party that an NPC villain pose that is a playable class?
For example, I have a party of 5 level 4 PC's. I'm thinking of throwing them up against a Cleric lvl 6, Warlock level 5, and a few low CR "temple guards". Should I expect a good tier 1 set piece from this or does the cleric need to be higher level?
How do you gauge the challenge of a villain that is a playable class? Thanks for the input ahead of time.
Yes. I've also heard that even the folks at WotC say the CR rating is real sketchy so I'm hoping to see if the DM's out here have had any hands on experience. I have personally had characters put into a deadly encounter scenario, according to challenge rating rules, absolutely handle the encounter with no fear.
Challenge Rating is a bit wonky. The entire encounter based system is set up for 6 encounters per day. If you lower the number, then you make the encounters easier then they need to be. Next, the number of monsters in the encounter influences how challenging the encounter is. Less monsters means their CRs can potentially be higher than the PCs Level. But you have to keep track of special abilities of the monsters.
I think you can still say that the PCs level equals their CR. But I'm not sure if 5th keeps that very accurate.
If you like an approximate rule, a CR 1/4 (Goblin) is equivalent to a 1st level character. So basically so can add to the CR the 75 % of its value to get an equivalent character level.
But remember it is an approximate rule. Monsters and character do not have the same mechanics.
When I wanted to see what a monk villain would look like CR-wise, I just looked for the monster versions of it up in the Monster Manual. The Githyanki have two monk-type monsters listed at CR 3 and CR 9. You can do the same for the classes you want to use and then convert from there.
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"The mongoose blew out its candle and was asleep in bed before the room went dark." —Llanowar fable
No, but in the NPC Appendix of the Monster Manual there are stat blocks for a CR 2 Priest and a CR 6 Mage. The NPC Appendix in Volo's Guide to Monsters has a CR 5 Kraken Priest, a CR 9 War Priest, and CR 4, 6, and 7 Warlocks of various pacts. Could none of them be tweaked and flavored instead of building a whole party of character classes and trying to balance it out against a party?
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"The mongoose blew out its candle and was asleep in bed before the room went dark." —Llanowar fable
Right, but they don't need to. It's a party of five level 4 players going up against a strong Cleric monster, his mid-sized Warlock monster assistant, as a handful of chump "Temple Guard" monsters for fodder. What I'm saying is that it doesn't have to be exact class mach-ups for the two named classes. Just find their monster stat blocks and then flavor to taste.
Yeah but some people actually enjoy the PCs going up against Monsters that share their class abilities instead of being completely different. Its more unique when you come across another fighter who can go toe to toe with you rather than just a monster that is going to hit three times and do x ability once or twice.
The key to remember is that a Fighter 5 vs a Fighter 5 with all the same options pretty much comes down to dice rolls and player experience and luck. So you do not want your PCs to face off with the exact same number of pc Characters of the exact same type or who wins would be entirely up in the air. Having them a couple levels lower is a good way to go, and perhaps not having them exactly even with the PCs.
Of course if its a battle the PCs aren't suppose to win, that would be a different story.
A party vs a single pc class villain, is going to wipe the floor with him, even if he is significantly higher level, baring the exception of certain spells. Really D&D is just horrible with solo bosses, and they should be avoided, unless you have expertly weakend the PCs and their resources before they get to the villain.
so my party just faced a John wick style build as a random villain that they had to encounter the easiest thing I did was find the challenge rating I wanted against them in this case it was 16 and found what hp I should have her at with the party it was a level 20 with hp of 180-270 because the monster I used as reference hp was 18d10 +90 I thought that it would be easy for them but really it wasn't they could hit her but it was like fighting a monster with hard cr in the end she downed 3 players and walked away she was at 50 hp but they will never know that.
How does everyone gauge the challenge to a party that an NPC villain pose that is a playable class?
For example, I have a party of 5 level 4 PC's. I'm thinking of throwing them up against a Cleric lvl 6, Warlock level 5, and a few low CR "temple guards". Should I expect a good tier 1 set piece from this or does the cleric need to be higher level?
How do you gauge the challenge of a villain that is a playable class? Thanks for the input ahead of time.
Sergenthude, The Daedric Pilgrim
There's a CR calculator in the DM's Guide.
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
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Yes. I've also heard that even the folks at WotC say the CR rating is real sketchy so I'm hoping to see if the DM's out here have had any hands on experience. I have personally had characters put into a deadly encounter scenario, according to challenge rating rules, absolutely handle the encounter with no fear.
Sergenthude, The Daedric Pilgrim
Challenge Rating is a bit wonky. The entire encounter based system is set up for 6 encounters per day. If you lower the number, then you make the encounters easier then they need to be. Next, the number of monsters in the encounter influences how challenging the encounter is. Less monsters means their CRs can potentially be higher than the PCs Level. But you have to keep track of special abilities of the monsters.
I think you can still say that the PCs level equals their CR. But I'm not sure if 5th keeps that very accurate.
If you like an approximate rule, a CR 1/4 (Goblin) is equivalent to a 1st level character. So basically so can add to the CR the 75 % of its value to get an equivalent character level.
But remember it is an approximate rule. Monsters and character do not have the same mechanics.
When I wanted to see what a monk villain would look like CR-wise, I just looked for the monster versions of it up in the Monster Manual. The Githyanki have two monk-type monsters listed at CR 3 and CR 9. You can do the same for the classes you want to use and then convert from there.
A goblin isn't really equal to a PC class because it lacks the additional features and resources that the PC class has.
No, but in the NPC Appendix of the Monster Manual there are stat blocks for a CR 2 Priest and a CR 6 Mage. The NPC Appendix in Volo's Guide to Monsters has a CR 5 Kraken Priest, a CR 9 War Priest, and CR 4, 6, and 7 Warlocks of various pacts. Could none of them be tweaked and flavored instead of building a whole party of character classes and trying to balance it out against a party?
Neither those NPC (mage, archmage, druid, archdruid, knight, warlocks...) have the same mechanics as the characters do.
Right, but they don't need to. It's a party of five level 4 players going up against a strong Cleric monster, his mid-sized Warlock monster assistant, as a handful of chump "Temple Guard" monsters for fodder. What I'm saying is that it doesn't have to be exact class mach-ups for the two named classes. Just find their monster stat blocks and then flavor to taste.
Yeah but some people actually enjoy the PCs going up against Monsters that share their class abilities instead of being completely different. Its more unique when you come across another fighter who can go toe to toe with you rather than just a monster that is going to hit three times and do x ability once or twice.
The key to remember is that a Fighter 5 vs a Fighter 5 with all the same options pretty much comes down to dice rolls and player experience and luck. So you do not want your PCs to face off with the exact same number of pc Characters of the exact same type or who wins would be entirely up in the air. Having them a couple levels lower is a good way to go, and perhaps not having them exactly even with the PCs.
Of course if its a battle the PCs aren't suppose to win, that would be a different story.
A party vs a single pc class villain, is going to wipe the floor with him, even if he is significantly higher level, baring the exception of certain spells. Really D&D is just horrible with solo bosses, and they should be avoided, unless you have expertly weakend the PCs and their resources before they get to the villain.
so my party just faced a John wick style build as a random villain that they had to encounter the easiest thing I did was find the challenge rating I wanted against them in this case it was 16 and found what hp I should have her at with the party it was a level 20 with hp of 180-270 because the monster I used as reference hp was 18d10 +90 I thought that it would be easy for them but really it wasn't they could hit her but it was like fighting a monster with hard cr in the end she downed 3 players and walked away she was at 50 hp but they will never know that.