Calculating encounters for bigger parties.

[Guran]

Hello all,

A few months back I started Dm-ing in our local gamestore. The shopkeeper wanted to organise D&D every other week and somehow I became the DM. Still not sure how that happened as I did not have that much experience Dm-ing, but that is kinda beside the point. You see, the format was kinda like: Everyone is free to walk in and join a D&D night as they please. We started out with four people, then spmeone else joined and then things kinda exploded with sometimes 9-10 people attending. Now this leaves me with mixed feelings. On one side I am happy that people are coming back and that I am probably doing something right - and lets be honest; the D&D evenings are loads of fun. On the other hand it makes planning out challenges and combat all the more tedious.

Now if I understand the Monster manual correctly, the challenge rating of a monster must be equal to a 4 man party. Now I rarely have a four man party. It averages out around 8 players, varying from people who only just started and are currently playing their first ever character and people who have been playing for years. So the big question of the hour is: What is the challenge rating for a party like this. Do I just double it? Instead of two orcs for the party (They are level 4) I use four orcs? Could anyone please give me a guideline on this?

[Madfellow]

Here's how it works:

1) You find out what your XP Budget is for your party (the DM's Guide tells you how to do this).
2) You pick a monster or multiple monsters with a Challenge Rating UP TO the party's level.
3) You add up the XP values for each monster, apply a multiplier based on the number of monsters, and compare that to your XP Budget.
4) Adjust as necessary.

Hope this helps.

[Demonic Spoon]

Madfellow is correct. Challenge rating has nothing to do with encounter balance in 5e other than as a grouper for monsters with similar power levels and XP values. Look in the DM basic rules (if you don't have the DMG) for the rules for creating encounters.

Those rules assign a per-person XP 'value' for an encounter, the sum of which is used to determine how many XP worth of monsters the party should face. Additionally, there are rules for modifying that for large numbers of monsters which account for parties larger than 5 members.

[Selkirk]

yeah it gets confusing (might want to split groups :D). but dmg has a table with modifiers for larger parties.

trying to write a table ^^;

party of 3-5
no. of monsters --------------------- multiplier
1 -------------------- x1
2 ---------------- x1.5
3-6 -------------------------- x2
7-10 ---------------------- x2.5
11-14 ----------------------- x3
15 or more -------------------- x4

so for parties that are smaller go up the multiplier scale. for larger parties (6 or more) go down the multiplier scale. for instance, a party of 7 fighting 9 bugbears would be at x2 versus the ordinary x2.5.

[MaxWilson]

Now if I understand the Monster manual correctly, the challenge rating of a monster must be equal to a 4 man party. Now I rarely have a four man party. It averages out around 8 players, varying from people who only just started and are currently playing their first ever character and people who have been playing for years. So the big question of the hour is: What is the challenge rating for a party like this. Do I just double it? Instead of two orcs for the party (They are level 4) I use four orcs? Could anyone please give me a guideline on this?

This isn't exactly what you were asking about, but yes, I would just double the number of the opposition. That will actually make it slightly stronger than double strength (because the orcs will sometimes end up targeting weak points, e.g. 1 low-level wizard can maybe survive 1 round of attention from 4 orcs but cannot easily survive 1 round of attention from 8 orcs, even if there are 7 other PCs there) but that's probably okay. The reason I say that is that deadly play is exciting for new players: it is quite simply more awesome to almost die and then still triumph through luck than to methodically mow down opposition which is perfectly calibrated to lose to the PCs.

But do allow them a long rest to regain consciousness after a deadly fight, because sitting around doing nothing while everyone else roleplays is boring. (Alternately, make sure at least one of the more-experienced PCs takes Healing Word or the Healer feat, so you can revive people and let them stumble along with their little 4 HP, still contributing.)

[JoeJ]

This isn't exactly what you were asking about, but yes, I would just double the number of the opposition. That will actually make it slightly stronger than double strength (because the orcs will sometimes end up targeting weak points, e.g. 1 low-level wizard can maybe survive 1 round of attention from 4 orcs but cannot easily survive 1 round of attention from 8 orcs, even if there are 7 other PCs there) but that's probably okay. The reason I say that is that deadly play is exciting for new players: it is quite simply more awesome to almost die and then still triumph through luck than to methodically mow down opposition which is perfectly calibrated to lose to the PCs.

But do allow them a long rest to regain consciousness after a deadly fight, because sitting around doing nothing while everyone else roleplays is boring. (Alternately, make sure at least one of the more-experienced PCs takes Healing Word or the Healer feat, so you can revive people and let them stumble along with their little 4 HP, still contributing.)

That works because doubling the size of the party also makes it slightly stronger than double strength. Increasing the size of the party also makes it more likely that someone will be available to tend to a party member who drops to 0 hp.

[Madfellow]

yeah it gets confusing (might want to split groups :D).

I'll second the suggestion that it might be easier if the current group splits up into two, preferably with a separate GM for the second group.

[MaxWilson]

I'll second the suggestion that it might be easier if the current group splits up into two, preferably with a separate GM for the second group.

Alternately, enlist some of the players as assistant GMs. They can run monsters during fights instead of PCs.

[mr_odd]

Alternately, enlist some of the players as assistant GMs. They can run monsters during fights instead of PCs.

I have done this before, and it creates a different mind set to the game. As a DM, you are 51% on the players' side. While it could still end in a TPK, you aren't gunning for them. Having players run monsters changes this mind set into more of a pvp.

[MaxWilson]

I have done this before, and it creates a different mind set to the game. As a DM, you are 51% on the players' side. While it could still end in a TPK, you aren't gunning for them. Having players run monsters changes this mind set into more of a pvp.

I have a different perspective. As a DM, I'm on the players' side while designing the encounter, but I'm on "my own side" while roleplaying the encounter. If there are six ghouls that might mean that each ghoul is mostly concerned with grabbing a bite to eat and then leaving, regardless of what is happening to the other ghouls; if it's a cooperative group of hobgoblins that might mean that each hobgoblin is (mostly) looking out for the team, until things start to go sour enough that they bail; if there are two opposing groups of monsters (giant spiders and quaggoths at the same time) it might mean we have a three-way fight.

In short, if you're going to have players run the monsters, be explicit in your instructions to them about what their motivations as monsters are ("you're attacking because you're hungry/defending your eggs"), and build the encounter carefully. You should do this anyway even if you're planning to run the encounter yourself.

[Guran]

Thank you for the response, people.


Here's how it works:

1) You find out what your XP Budget is for your party (the DM's Guide tells you how to do this).
2) You pick a monster or multiple monsters with a Challenge Rating UP TO the party's level.
3) You add up the XP values for each monster, apply a multiplier based on the number of monsters, and compare that to your XP Budget.
4) Adjust as necessary.

Hope this helps.

So thats the trick. I usually ignore the exp part as we do milestone levelling.



yeah it gets confusing (might want to split groups :D). but dmg has a table with modifiers for larger parties.


I have indeed considered splitting the groups. Yet there are other problems that will rear their head at that point. Not every experienced player in the group has enough time to attend to every D&D evening and if there is an evening with a low number of people turning up for whatever reason, then we may have story inconsistencies because not everyone in the party has seen the events unfold in the same manner.

[DanyBallon]

Here's how it works:

1) You find out what your XP Budget is for your party (the DM's Guide tells you how to do this).
2) You pick a monster or multiple monsters with a Challenge Rating UP TO the party's level.
3) You add up the XP values for each monster, apply a multiplier based on the number of monsters, and compare that to your XP Budget.
4) Adjust as necessary.

Hope this helps.

Madfellow is almost right, in the Dungeon master basic rules there's a paragraph about smaller and larger parties (don't have my DMG at hand to check if it's in there as well), where it says that for a party from 6-8, you select the multiplier one category lower. Small parties increase the multiplier by one category.