"Very Challenging" encounters. Over CR to compensate for no resource depletion?

[Zancloufer]

Simple point: The CR system is broken, but even more so it assumes that <50% of the fights are cakewalks. I mean a party of four is expected to face an equal CR challenge more times than not. Fighting 4 monsters with a CR equal to the parties average level is considered "Very Difficult". More so as the CR encounter system assumes the party will "Use Resources" in each fight, making even the little enemies pile up.

What if the party DOESN'T?

There are numerous ways that D&D parties can face each fight essentially at full strength. Rope Trick, Demi-Planes and classes that have all abilities that refresh every encounter come to mind off the top of my head.

So what CR or "Encounter Difficulty" would be considered fair if the party can be assumed to be at (almost) full strength every fight? Assume the party's tier averages around 3. Would throwing Encounter's who's 'level' is 3-4 above the party regularly seem unfair in these cases?

[ryu]

Simple point: The CR system is broken, but even more so it assumes that <50% of the fights are cakewalks. I mean a party of four is expected to face an equal CR challenge more times than not. Fighting 4 monsters with a CR equal to the parties average level is considered "Very Difficult". More so as the CR encounter system assumes the party will "Use Resources" in each fight, making even the little enemies pile up.

What if the party DOESN'T?

There are numerous ways that D&D parties can face each fight essentially at full strength. Rope Trick, Demi-Planes and classes that have all abilities that refresh every encounter come to mind off the top of my head.

So what CR or "Encounter Difficulty" would be considered fair if the party can be assumed to be at (almost) full strength every fight? Assume the party's tier averages around 3. Would throwing Encounter's who's 'level' is 3-4 above the party regularly seem unfair in these cases?

The entire CR system is a joke on a basic level. The correct way to judge the difficulty of an encounter is to examine individual statlines, tactics, and resources used in the enemy encounter and judge how actually challenging they are to the party in question. If you don't do that you wind up with a chance of either drastically underperforming challenges or total party kills. I would also think very carefully about how often you want a character to die when considering encounter difficulty if I were you.

[Curmudgeon]

This is way too vague a question to get a precise answer. Are you ruling out all use of consumable resources? That would include things like arrows, splash weapons, wands, and so on. Also "Tier 3-4" is just an indicator of relative power within a party. Optimization within a tier makes a difference, independent of use of consumables.

[Novawurmson]

As someone who has GMed for a group that strongly prefers one combat encounter per session, the best way to do it is to sneak multiple combats into one - i.e. break into the final boss' room, boss is surrounded by guards, guards pour in through the doors, and the boss "summons" a powerful demon. Have some enemies trying to accomplish non-damage related goals - running to hit a level to slam the trap door, grabbing the hostages and fleeing, setting important documents on fire, buffing, healing, moving into flanking positions, feverishly finishing a dark ritual - they're participating in the combat and will draw the player's actions and resources, but the players have some say in which ones they'll engage in a true fight first.

Make the combat big, exciting, engaging, and varied. Make the players feel like they've accomplished an amazing feat, rather than walked into 4 rooms that each contained one appropriate encounter. Ultimately, the combat might actually be 4 or 5 encounters that are each CR+2 to CR+4 on their own, but they're done together to keep interest and avoid metagaming.

[Fizban]

Well yes, fighting four monsters with CR equal to the party level is very difficult, it's an even fight which should have a 50/50 chance of either side winning. If the monsters are properly calibrated to the party.

If the party is full up on spell slots for every fight, well that still doesn't mean much unless we know the exact party makeup. I can never really remember what classes are supposed to be tier 3, but if they don't have raw T2 power or T1 versatility they probably won't be able to take anything stronger than normal. They have a full day's resources but not necessarily the ability to apply those resources fast enough/simultaneously to increase their effectiveness. Which means you want to do like Novawurmson said and take your day's worth of four encounters, and string them together into one multi-wave fight. You can't use them all simultaneously because the PCs will be crushed under action advantage, unless they have the right AoE spells in which case they'll win even easier than before.

[Novawurmson]

Well yes, fighting four monsters with CR equal to the party level is very difficult, it's an even fight which should have a 50/50 chance of either side winning. If the monsters are properly calibrated to the party.

If the party is full up on spell slots for every fight, well that still doesn't mean much unless we know the exact party makeup. I can never really remember what classes are supposed to be tier 3, but if they don't have raw T2 power or T1 versatility they probably won't be able to take anything stronger than normal. They have a full day's resources but not necessarily the ability to apply those resources fast enough/simultaneously to increase their effectiveness. Which means you want to do like Novawurmson said and take your day's worth of four encounters, and string them together into one multi-wave fight. You can't use them all simultaneously because the PCs will be crushed under action advantage, unless they have the right AoE spells in which case they'll win even easier than before.

Party composition and encounter layout both play a huge role in this, great points.

The party in question I'm talking about consists of a Battle Medic Tactician, a Stalker, a Warlord, and a Metaforge (can you tell we like 3rd party material?). The tactician is a GMPC who mostly heals or uses fold space and psychokinetic charge to reposition the party. The stalker is a tank with an insanely high AC who teleports around using Veiled Moon maneuvers and a homebrew feat to force targets to attack him. The warlord supports with Golden Lion maneuvers and is good at fighting large numbers of opponents. The metaforge deals insanely high damage when he's allowed to charge+pounce around the room.

If you put one enemy against this party, they will lose. The stalker takes aggro and is mostly unhittable by the majority of opponents, the tactician heals whatever damage he takes easily, the metaforge goes to town, and the warlord kind of rethinks her build decisions because just copying the metaforge would be infinitely better if every fight in the campaign is going to work like this.

Spreading enemies around and establishing multiple objects leads to much more interesting scenarios. Ok, the big ice troll guy over there could probably do a number on most of the party, so the stalker should make that a priority, but there's archers up on a ledge over there. The metaforge could charge an archer and take him out immediately, but that's probably left up to the warlord. Well, somebody needs to deal with the Lovecraftian horror that's starting to hatch out of that horrible shell - can the tactician throw a wall of ectoplasm around it to buy a few rounds, or should she deal some fire damage to break the ice troll's regeneration?

Because everyone is tier 3-4, everyone has multiple ways to contribute to each encounter, but nobody is really capable of pulling out the solution to every problem every time.

[Florian]

First of, I do think there is a slight misconception of what the CR system in itself is. That's not only a tool to determine difficulty, it and its sisters, the encounter budget and the adventuring day are also a set of rules governing how this game is played.
I think it's fair to say that it'll happen to every group at some point: Someone will come up with the notion that it's only "logical" or "intelligent" or "sound tactics" to act in the manner described by the OP we I think we all know in what direction that leads, 15 minutes adventuring day and all that.
But basically, what it is, is breaking the rules what the games is about and what everyone agreed on.

At that point, I tend to congratulate the player on his advances in tactical thinking, then offer a simple choice: Either they drop that notions and we stick to the rules of the game, or we change what the game is all about and switch to playing a pure test of spite.

[Zancloufer]

The waves idea might have some merit for the more major fights, but not for everyday encounters. Could spread out the enemies a little more for some encounters.

Exact party composition? Tome of Radiance (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?258654-Tome-of-Radiance-Mastering-the-Power-of-Love-and-Justice), at level 5 atm. Usually get 4-6 people per session. For those not familiar with it :
All of the classes can use ~80% of their abilities at-will and only have a few things that would be per/between encounters.
Essentially the Stargazer is closest to the Warlock with twice as many powers (and powers being easily twice as powerful) though their powers don't last as long.
Champion is a gish that works. d10 HP, full BaB, almost the same powers as the Stargazer, except about half as many known and needs feats to gain access to some of the more niche/powerful ones (Mines, Concealment, AMFs, SR etc)
Empath lands somewhere in the middle. Depending on how it's built and what persona it's fronting it can land close to either class, but not quite get there.


Consumables might come up in the future, but I don't think it's going to be a big issue. Mostly wondering what people here would consider a 'fair' CR if the party has some optimization, multiple effective ways of dealing with encounters (but never instantly breaking. Unless it's a big tanky thing. Then you might want a refund from the DMart), and no major resource drain between fights.

[Florian]

@Zancloufer:

Sorry to say it, but you managed to let yourself get pushed in the situation that there _are_ only major encounters, as anything else is uninteresting and only going through the motions. Do skip the small change type of stuff, as its only providing free XP without being a challenge and switch over to just provide engaging set piece battles.

[Beheld]

Simple point: The CR system is broken, but even more so it assumes that <50% of the fights are cakewalks. I mean a party of four is expected to face an equal CR challenge more times than not. Fighting 4 monsters with a CR equal to the parties average level is considered "Very Difficult". More so as the CR encounter system assumes the party will "Use Resources" in each fight, making even the little enemies pile up.

If 50% of the fights are cakewalks, you are doing it wrong. 10% are supposed to be cakewalks. 20% are supposed to be puzzle encounters. 50% are EL = Party level. These combats should not be cakewalks, and if you are doing it that way, you are playing the monsters wrong.

I've seen a lot of talk about how easy EL = Party level encounters are, and almost without fail I've seen those same people complain that a bunch of monsters are overpowered for their CR, or that many tactics are unfair to the players. I would suggest that these two problems cancel out. Intelligently played monster acting in accordance with their strengths and abilities, in the environment they are expected should be challenging all but the cheesiest of parties.

To say nothing of the 15% very difficult fights.


What if the party DOESN'T?

You should be very careful about using higher encounter levels. EL 5 over party level would be a 50% chance of TPK (or at least, monster victory, at low levels that is a TPK, maybe later your party will be capable of running away with Teleport or similar). If your party doesn't have any expendable resources, then it probably is weaker than a party that does, and even more subject to TPK. You arguably can get by with having the monsters play like idiot, but you should probably ask yourself if you want to.


There are numerous ways that D&D parties can face each fight essentially at full strength. Rope Trick, Demi-Planes and classes that have all abilities that refresh every encounter come to mind off the top of my head.

Demiplanes should never be allowed, Rope Trick gives the opposition time to set up traps and ambushes, and encounter reset classes are weaker, and you shouldn't have a problem challenging them as is.


So what CR or "Encounter Difficulty" would be considered fair if the party can be assumed to be at (almost) full strength every fight? Assume the party's tier averages around 3. Would throwing Encounter's who's 'level' is 3-4 above the party regularly seem unfair in these cases?

The "Tier System" does little to nothing to actually tell you how strong your characters actually are. A Dread Necromancer can have an infinite undead army of skeletons and zombies that are individually as strong or stronger than the biggest strongest monsters of his CR in addition to having 14 Glabrezu's acting as his cohorts when he is level 12. That is in addition to his casting save or dies every round.

Meanwhile a Binder is at best some kind of moderately acceptable beatstick with some minor utility.


Exact party composition? Tome of Radiance (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?258654-Tome-of-Radiance-Mastering-the-Power-of-Love-and-Justice), at level 5 atm. Usually get 4-6 people per session. For those not familiar with it :
All of the classes can use ~80% of their abilities at-will and only have a few things that would be per/between encounters.
Essentially the Stargazer is closest to the Warlock with twice as many powers (and powers being easily twice as powerful) though their powers don't last as long.
Champion is a gish that works. d10 HP, full BaB, almost the same powers as the Stargazer, except about half as many known and needs feats to gain access to some of the more niche/powerful ones (Mines, Concealment, AMFs, SR etc)
Empath lands somewhere in the middle. Depending on how it's built and what persona it's fronting it can land close to either class, but not quite get there.


Unfortunately, like most Gitp homebrew, that is a whole lot of fiddly bits and reading to figure out what classes are actually capable of, so in the interest of providing you with any advice at all before Fallout 4 comes out and I stop posting for a month, I will just have to try to help without knowing specifically what classes do.


Consumables might come up in the future, but I don't think it's going to be a big issue. Mostly wondering what people here would consider a 'fair' CR if the party has some optimization, multiple effective ways of dealing with encounters (but never instantly breaking. Unless it's a big tanky thing. Then you might want a refund from the DMart), and no major resource drain between fights.

So you have a level 5 party apparently. Here are some EL 5 encounters. Tell me how unchallenging these would be that you need to deviate.

A Ravid flying around the castle animating everything in it's wake and the party has to find it and stop it before everyone in the castle dies. Probably also have to deal with a bunch of animated creatures attacking them in the process.

A basilisk deep inside a burrow nest, presumably with something the party needs inside.

A Large Earth Elemental punching out of the walls and floor of the castle/cave.

A Manticore assaults them from a distance while they are travelling overland.

A mummy lurches out of an alcove in the room they are searching.

A troll is in a closet. When you open the door, the Troll acts like a Troll in a closet.

A Howler and an Allip, the Howler is in a mazelike complex, with multiple paths everywhere, and the Howler runs around howling trying to avoid being found by the party, while the Allip floats along underground or in the walls, hitting them out of the walls periodically.

There is a pit trap, and at the bottom are a bunch of Medium Monstrous Scorpions that attack anything that drops into the pit.

Deep in a cave complex, there are 5 regular grimlocks with Composite Bows scattered around in the darkness on ledges and behind outcroppings, waiting to ambush the party, there is also one Grimlock Wizard who will cast Obscuring Mist to fill the room. At some point, if they believe it is in their favor to do so, the Grimlocks drop bows, and pull our Battle Axes, and then charge the party inside the mist. The Wizard at this time Color Sprays with impunity.

A level 5 Cleric of Hextor is in his desecrated temple deep underground with his two zombie hydras. or his 5 skeleton Deinonychuses, or his two Ettin Skeletons.

A harpy lives on a Mountain and when the party attempts to use the trail, she sings for a bit, and from high in the air tries to lead them off the cliff. If they all make their saves (or their second saves) she probably just returns home and waits for easier prey, but she might have a Bow and plink at them a bit to show she is annoyed that no one fell.

A Sea Hag and her Shark pet inhabit the local Large River/Lake/Ocean. When the party attempts to cross to get to an island in the middle, or to get somewhere else, the Sea Hag swims underneath and punches holes in the boat, getting it to sink. Once the boat is pretty clearly sinking she reveals herself and uses her Evil Eye and Horrific Appearance to cripple the party as much as possible in preparation for the feast that should await them from snacking on the party when they drown. For added difficulty, there is at least one, and maybe a few other people on the boat that the PCs want to save.

A Very Young Red Dragon prowls the plains, if the PCs travel across them, it flies by doing strafing runs with flyby attack and it's breath weapon until the party does significant damage or hides somewhere. It might continue to look for them and perhaps use locate object to find them, or it might head off in search of easier prey. If it feels genuinely threatened, it will probably just fly off.

A huge cathedral is "Haunted" each night things are destroyed, and occasionally people are found dead in the morning. When the party tries to wait out the first night, relatively harmless objects are dropped on the from the rafters. When PCs lose track of a light source like a torch or lantern, it goes out, other light sources just disappear entirely. If the PCs try to climb up into the rafters of the church, perhaps on the first night they find nothing, perhaps they are attacked in full force while climbing up. If the PCs wait two consecutive nights in the Cathedral, they are shot with arrows from the rafters at some point, or when they start to climb up, but when they get there, they still can't find anything, and they are harassed as much as possible.

The culprit is a Babau who teleports in at night to wreck the place and occasionally kill people. He carries a Composite Bow, and uses it to harass the party when he isn't dropping objects or even "ectoplasm" his protective slime, on the party or anyone else there. He never engages the party head on, each night he attempts to summon another Babau, and if he succeeds, they fires arrows at the party from above. In any case, he always chooses retreat over confrontation, though if the party knows what they are facing, he leaves his summon to attack them head on.

[flamewolf393]

It also depends heavily on the party level. A 1st level party, no matter how well optimized, can be tpk'd by a lucky CR 2 creature. But once you start getting into double digits all bets are off. Im used to my level 10 parties taking on boss fights that are at least 5 levels above them in CR. I remember we took out a level 20 demigod with a level 10 party once.

CR is a joke. Look at the tarrasque, it is seriously underpowered for its CR, and a well played kobold troop is way over powered for its CR. It comes down to how good the player is, not just the book stats.

[LudicSavant]

A fight with an EL equal to the level of a single member of the party is not a fair fight, it's a speed bump.

A fair fight (e.g. one where each side is supposed to have a 50% chance of winning) is one where both sides are of equal CR. So, for example, a single level 5 character vs 20 skeletal orcs with armor and falchions.

Mind, if you actually are throwing fair fights at your players, they're going to die unless they are high skill players (or the DM is not playing monsters in a way that takes advantage of their abilities). A fair fight suggests a 50% chance of the enemy team wiping them.

While there are some CRs that are rather obviously off the mark, it's not so awful that it's useless. Same Game Test is a pretty reasonable measure of party power, for instance. Just be aware of things with the hidden Awesome creature type (where the creators decided it was a "boss monster" and reduced the CR). Or things that are only worth their CR in specific circumstances. Or things that are just plain wimpy.

[Beheld]

A fight with an EL equal to the level of a single member of the party is not a fair fight, it's a speed bump.

I think the point of the OP, and certainly myself was referring to "fair" as "Fair to set the party up against" not "Equal chance of winning for each side." However, for the reasons I presented above, I don't think it is at all accurate to say that EL = Party level encounters are a "speed bumb" even if the party is expected to win, they can be a lot more like a stop sign or stoplight.

[LudicSavant]

I think the point of the OP, and certainly myself was referring to "fair" as "Fair to set the party up against"

What does "fair to set the party up against" mean? Combat as sport?



Combat as Sport: the PCs approach the bees and engage them in combat using the terrain to their advantage, using their abilities intelligently and having good teamwork. The fighter chooses the right position to be able to cleave into the bees while staying outside the radius of the wizard’s area effect spell, the cleric keeps the wizard from going down to bee venom and the rogue sneaks up and kills the bee queen. These good tactics lead to the PCs prevailing against the bees and getting the honey. The DM congratulates them on a well-fought fight.

Combat as War: the PCs approach the bees but there’s BEES EVERYWHERE! GIANT BEES! With nasty poison saves! The PCs run for their lives since they don’t stand a chance against the bees in a fair fight. But the bees are too fast! So the party Wizard uses magic to set part of the forest on fire in order to provide enough smoke (bees hate smoke, right?) to cover their escape. Then the PCs regroup and swear bloody vengeance against the damn bees. They think about just burning everything as usual, but decide that that might destroy the value of the honey. So they make a plan: the bulk of the party will hide out in trees at the edge of the bee’s territory and set up piles of oil soaked brush to light if the bees some after them and some buckets of mud. Meanwhile, the party monk will put on a couple layers of clothing, go to the owl bear den and throw rocks at it until it chases him. He’ll then run, owl bear chasing him, back to where the party is waiting where they’ll dump fresh mud on him (thick mud on thick clothes keeps bees off, right?) and the cleric will cast an anti-poison spell on him. As soon as the owl bear engages the bees (bears love honey right?) the monk will run like hell out of the area. Hopefully the owl bear and the bees will kill each other or the owl bear will flee and lead the bees away from their nest, leaving the PCs able to easily mop up any remaining bees, take the honey and get the hell out of there. They declare that nothing could possibly go wrong as the DM grins ghoulishly.

Personally, I happen to think that it's perfectly fair to set the party against a world that isn't tailored so that all that they encounter is just tall enough for them to knock out in an old school western fistfight where each side just exchanges blows until one side falls over. As long as there is an opportunity for counterplay, it's all good in my book.

[Beheld]

What does "fair to set the party up against" mean? Combat as sport?

I mean that you are playing a game, so having the level 1 party face a Sea Hag that tries to drown then by breaking their boat is fair, and having a Balor blow them up with a Fireball is not.

If you think you are building the world to be a true realistic world, that is fine, as long as your true realistic world only pits the PCs against level appropriate encounters. You could easily imagine a true realistic World in which the Evil Lich King uses Contact Other Plane to find out which level 1 PCs are going to foil his plans in 4 months, and then murder them, but that wouldn't be fair. So instead, you had better imagine a true realistic world in which Lich kings don't do that.

I mean, if you are questioning my playstyle you could read the 10-15 EL 5 encounters I just posted in this thread, that would probably give you an answer.

[LudicSavant]

I mean that you are playing a game

That really doesn't answer the question I asked you.



If you think you are building the world to be a true realistic world, that is fine, as long as your true realistic world only pits the PCs against level appropriate encounters. You could easily imagine a true realistic World in which the Evil Lich King uses Contact Other Plane to find out which level 1 PCs are going to foil his plans in 4 months, and then murder them, but that wouldn't be fair. So instead, you had better imagine a true realistic world in which Lich kinds don't do that.

...Kay. So, just in case you missed it:

As long as there is an opportunity for counterplay, it's all good in my book.

Obviously if Elmonster the Lich is scry and dying your level 1 party, there's not an opportunity for counterplay.


If you think you are building the world to be a true realistic world

if you are questioning my playstyle

You seem to make a lot of assumptions about the motivations behind people asking for clarification.

[Beheld]

You seem to make a lot of assumptions about the motivations behind people asking for clarification.

I wasn't making any assumptions, I was answering your question, you asked what I meant by fair, I told you.

Since you then followed up by two different claims of playstyle, it wasn't unreasonable to think you were asking what kind of playstyle I used.


That really doesn't answer the question I asked you.

Yes it does, you asked what I mean by fair, I'm pretty sure explaining the concept of a game, and CR, and how DMs should make sure their encounters conform to those answers the question about what I mean by fair.

[Fizban]

Exact party composition? Tome of Radiance (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?258654-Tome-of-Radiance-Mastering-the-Power-of-Love-and-Justice), at level 5 atm. Usually get 4-6 people per session.
*General advice first, specific monster ideas later.
Ooh, I just refamiliarized myself with ToR. Unfortunately it does have that effect, ToR characters simply do not lose battles of attrition, especially if you're running Protection Surges without a nerf (seriously, any hp damage foe is all but stonewalled by that, and it always works). They function as a party of double-strength warlocks in that every member is contributing constant nigh-unavoidable damage in every fight. You also have a very large party: a ToR group could probably do just fine with only 3, but you average 5 people with constant DPS, which means unless you've tuned the whole battle very carefully you probably just want twice as many monsters as you'd normally expect (which results in EL+2 above normal). In thinking about how to challenge them aside from simply more powerful monsters, it's that you have to either press them at all angles or present problems they cannot solve via illuminations. (It should go without saying that you'll need to use indoors most of the time to avoid everything being shot to death from long range-unless you're using Long range spells or people with Longbows+Guided Shot, as ToR has a very finite range limit on everything but Bolt devices).

The basic limit for everyone is 2m/level/turn, but that has to be split between three different possible surges as well as armament effects. So build encounters where they need to keep certain armament effects running, such as a room shaped so that everyone must be flying at all times. Try foes that basically negate their illumination economy, either with tremendous fast healing/heal-bot support to deal with the 4x blasting, or which have their own auras that hit everyone for constant damage and force extra mote expenditure to maintain defenses. I'd suggest a ruling that Golem style magic immunity does in fact apply to supernatural abilities, which combined with their high DR and various methods of fast recovery (Stone Golem+Mud to Rock trap, Iron Golem in Fireball room, etc) should let you force a grinder every once in a while. You could also allow DR vs untyped and Forged blasts, but that is a straight nerf you'll want to ask your players about before considering. You might think dragons would be good, but anything with a cooldown is toast.

The reason ToR doesn't consider itself very high tier is that most of it's obvious ability is in simple damage/hp defense, and conventional wisdom says damage is just damage. You can also just stop playing the damage game: use monsters with gaze attacks and save or X abilities and hp defenses no longer matter. Use a bunch of smaller monsters in a hive with flyby attack to avoid leaving any groups exposed, and the PCs can't kill more than 4 per turn (incorporeal and burrowing creatures especially). Remember that being blinded prevents one from targeting ranged AoEs (potentially even lines/cones if you're mean), and use it aggressively with Glitterdust, Pyrotechnics, thick fogs of any sort, and creatures with blinding abilities.

The illumination component lists are limited, that is, conspicuously lacking in many spells that interact with specific DnD challenges. No Disintegrate means no removal of Force effects. No ability to permanently cure diseases, curses, petrification, permanent ability drain, negative levels, or other effects. No planar travel means no ability to chase or interfere with Phase Spiders or Ethereal whatevers. No short-term mind control for interrogation. No Force blasts means incorporeal creatures have a flat 50% evasion against everything except Ghost Touch devices. No [spread] effects means they can't napalm/bug bomb a twisty corridor. No See Invisibility if I remember right, and so on. There is a slight problem that Demolition blasts can just let you literally go through the walls, but if those walls are filled with lava or poisonous gas because it's a volcano that might not be such a good idea.

You can also try the occasional specialized NPC. Tome of Magic has a feat that allows AoOs on supernatural abilities which might make a nasty surprise, as well as a PrC that can kinda single-target AMF 1/day (it's not very good, but that just means you don't have to feel guilty using lots of them). The 4th level spell Ray Deflection 100% negates all ranged touch attacks, while any source of Evasion (including the 4th level Ruin Delver's Fortune) will severely hinder AoE blasts, and we already know ToR doesn't have answers for a lot of nasty spells, so the right builds/spellcaster builds should still be a threat. And of course, the easiest way to challenge a party is throw their copies back at them: group of dark illuminators can match them blow for blow. Any NPC mooks they fight should be at least as powerful as them, either dark illuminators or Warmages- who can use metamagic, sudden metamagic, and metamagic rods. Also note that an NPC (epecially with NPC gear) isn't really at CR=level, Pathfinder has made a nod to this and give them CR=level-1. If your NPCs aren't strong enough toss them a free level and see if it helps.

The usual DnD dynamic is a group of PCs with limited resources strike as one against an encounter that's deadly at all times. They weather the storm long enough to beat down their foes or retreat if they can't do it in time. ToR reverses this: the PCs are deadly at all times (much moreso than say, dragons with breath weapon cooldowns), so their foes must be capable of spiking resources at them and/or retreating. The problem is that most monsters in the game are designed for the former, and resource spike monsters are much less tough, so the PCs already solid DPS will crush normal resource spike monsters unless you rebuild/advance/add character levels until they're good enough. Otherwise, you'll want to use only the best from later monster books (MM3-5, Fiendish Codex 1-2, choice picks from other books), where many monsters are equivalent to an MM1 guy with a bunch of extra supernatural or SLAs. If a monster looks like it has an unfair amount of hp to go with it's special abilities, it's probably just right. The catch is not to combine too many advantages: if you're using tactics and terrain and hammering save or lose, don't combine it with high performance monsters unless you have high performance players.

The thing I would recommend most is to forget the idea of an adventuring day. If no one has daily resources then yes, there is no reason for them to rest, and that's fine. A gang of Warlocks and ToBers with an infinite healing source wouldn't stop to rest either. You can still keep a gap between encounters simply through distance: ToR classes don't have teleport, and even Barrier: Zone/Dominion/Return is only about 5mph per level past 2nd. Intelligent recurring foes will realize this and leverage teleportation and long-range communication against the PCs, spreading out their operations and forcing the PCs to use other means to discover and target only the most important nodes, or find their own teleport buddies. ToR does not mesh with the normal CR/daily encounter system- it has too much zero-cost DPS, so you'll have to attack along other less noble lines or shift the challenges to puzzles, mysteries, information, moral dilemmas, travel problems, basically anything that ToR doesn't give you for free.

On the other hand, it does enable the mowing down of hordes of mooks and even medium not-so-mooks in a single day, a staple of many genres and normally impossible in DnD. Since those foes provide no real challenge, you are not required to give out xp for them: combat does not equal xp, accomplishin goals equals xp. If the PCs mow down 20 medium whatevers on their way in without any danger, cool, they could have snuck in or something else but that works. The real challenge is the Golem guarding the door behind which the princess is being held in a room surrounded by lava, or hunting down and stopping the horrible monster that's killing people and won't stay dead.

*Okay, so what sorts of monsters can I find that actually fit the bill around level 5? First some benchmarks: blasts are 5d6, up to 5d6+5 with Primal costume, not counting Assault blasts. That's 17.5-22.5 damage, with a party of 4-6 people firing every turn. Most monsters must begin from ambush, win initiative, or both in order to even get a round of actions against that much damage, since they'll fall in a single volley. This means you need monsters in at least pairs, spread out so they can't be AoE'd, and with abilities that hit the whole party or stick like glue if they hit. Also remember the flow of information: a lot of standard monsters rely on defenses that are negated if the PCs know about them, so if you have a veteran group you may need to obfuscate or switch damage types to avoid this. And remember we're just aiming in the CR 3-8 range

Basilisks and Mummies come to mind at CR5. Both have abilities that hit the whole party and can stick in a nasty way. Fighting through multiples will require luck or puzzling tactics. Note that gaze attacks trigger at the start of the target's turn, so rounding a corner into a Basilisk gives you room to close your eyes, but the Mummy's Despair triggers as soon as you see it. Bodaks are your CR8 upgrade, with more DR to further slow attempts at fighting them blind with weapons. A gang of Cockatrices with Flyby Attack in a hive are similar but won't do the job nearly as well. Remember to keep rooms and hallways small enough that gaze attacks are always effective.
Nymphs at CR7 also blind people on sight.
Chain Devils at CR6 are good. Their offensive ability is up for debate (full attack: 2 Chains, Su ability: control four chains that attack "as effectively as the devil itself", which could mean 2 or 4 or 8 attacks), but they can unquestionably use it from behind arrow slits and murder holes, and even if cornered their regeneration must be overcome or bypassed to finish the job.
Green Hags and Sea Hags have sticky abilities, but not as good as gaze attacks and with low DCs.
Ghosts are a good option, hard to kill and harder to keep dead with options from lots of books for hurting in various ways. A ghost is a plot monster that requires the PCs to solve a different problem, often after they've already fought the ghost once.
Mimics/advanced Mimics can Adhesive melee devices, and ranged attacks/effects launched into grapple have an equal chance of hitting the Mimic or it's grappled target. Fill them with acid for a splash of extra damage, fill the room with acid, fill the room with Acid Fog, etc.
Tendriculi are nice: as long as no one's main weapon is blunt, have them play dead until fully regenerated.
Shadows and Allips (and Wraiths) are horrible as ever.
A gang of Ethereal Filchers could severely annoy the group by stealing several items and leaving them on the ethereal plane before getting killed. "Winning" would require taking at least one alive and convincing it to bring their stuff back.
A full 12+colony of Shocker Lizards is imposing. They'd hide in cubbies underwater (which blocks line of effect) and blast the heck out of anyone that enters. Killing them requires surviving the initial blast and sniping them one by one out of their maze of bolt holes, and naturally the PCs goal is under the water. And the lizards are just protecting their nest.
Spider Eaters have a hilarious DC17 poison that paralyzes for 1d8+5 weeks, just suicide charge a few in and hope someone fails a save. Or send one while the party is distracted fighting Giant Spiders that weren't worth xp anyway.
Finally, Wyverns also have a nice poison if you can ambush/charge a couple through to land hits.
Wights would require too large a group to be fair, but energy drain (negative levels) are stupid evil.




I've left out MM2 and Fiend Folio because they have some wonky stuff and I didn't feel like going through it.
MM3: Skullcrusher Orges (CR5) with Brutal Throw are a nice solid beater/thrower, but still can't outperform the PCs at range without superior numbers. Gloom Golems (CR7) have permanent cha drain and save every round vs Crushing Despair that lasts until it's destroyed. Web Golems (CR7) can climb up and hide in the walls while fast healing, trap anyone who chases them alone in a pile of Webs and beat them down. Drowned are ridiculous, even at CR8.
MM4: Bloodhulks (CR4-8) have the hp neccesary to survive a few rounds of blasting. Joystealers (CR5) are incorporeal fey that deal cha damage and remove joy from the world, with their own tragic backstory, but they'll die really fast. Tomb Spider+related might be interesting but lack some punch. Zern and Zern Experiments (CR6, with 7 and 4) are perfect: Zern can almost match the blast damage, have 1/day Baleful Polymorph to SoL, fast heal 5, and have good escape abilities. An Arcanovore should be able to absorb or negate at least a round or two of illuminations, and Blade Thralls make for decent cleanup. The fluff that their experiments are captured and mutated people should be plenty motivating. Rune Hounds (MM3, CR3) also go well with Zern.
MM5: Burrow Root (CR8) is tough and evasive enough to last a few rounds. Gadacro (CR3) have some blinding abilities. Graveyard Sludges are nice but don't really challenge ToR in a way that they don't already to do everyone.
Sandstorm: Brine Ooze (CR6) has a ton of hp, deals damage that's a bit harder to heal, and splits for hilarity. Marruspawn are CR 4/5/5 and built for this sort of thing: free action AoEs along with a death attacker, bruiser, and wizard for fighting in groups. Their hp isn't great and their howls are 1/day, but they'll put up a serious fight for a few rounds, more or less depending on your group's AoE setup.
Frostburn: Quirrash Genies (CR6) have an absurd CL 14 Cone of Cold 3/day if you want sheer intimidation. Spirit Animals become incorporeal fey that can pounce out of walls and will last twice long as normal with that 50% miss chance.
Tome of Battle: Reth Dekala have a solid melee attack, constant aura damage, and a ranged touch attack, all of which are fire+acid so they're hard to completely negate. Start with a couple for EL6, then add a couple more to account for oversized party, then build the terrain so they can swarm one person at a time without reprisal (assume at least one party member will get behind their lines anyway).
Fiendish Codex 1: Narbassu (CR5) have a negative level gaze, sneak attack, hide bonus, Obscuring Mist, and should not be left running amok due to their Feed ability. Ekolid (CR 4) give a minor but difficult to remove madness curse and can overrun the material plane faster than any Wightocalypse, but aren't a challenge to ToR chars. Dybbuk (CR 8) played well would probably be too mean. A Broodswarm (CR 6) could potentially stitch someone out of commission. Bar-Lgura (CR5) can abduct people via Greater Teleport to literally anywhere and then solo them to death.
Fiendish Codex 2: Abishai (CR 4-8) have hard to beat regeneration and various save or lose abilities, and Amnizu (CR 7) have similar regen while dealing int damage. Steel Devils (CR6) have the very strong Greater Command at-will in addition to high AC, decent melee attacks, and Formation Fighting in groups.
Lords of Madness: the Eye of the Deep (CR8) has blind and stun every round at a good DC in a 60' cone, with some extras. An Elder Eidolon of a smaller creature could be quite disruptive, they have reasonable touch AC and Golem style magic immunity to go with their Confuse aura.


Beheld made some nice specific examples. Tactics like the Grimlocks which target vulnerabilities in the ToR classes should work fine, as should anything that involves a foe with superior mobility attacking things that are not the PCs, but basically any single monster the PCs can take a shot at will be toast (unless the whole party fails saves against helpless when it jumps out of the closet). Most of my suggestions have either gaze attacks/mass lockdown, regeneration and the assumption they'll attack again, or 100+hp. Those that don't are assumed to be used with maximum tactics.