Encounter building questions.

[Azazel_Unbound]

Second time coming around and asking questions lately. Not sure how I feel about that, but I'm running a higher level campaign and I need a bit of advice. What CR ranges should I be using around 3 lvl 17 players?

Their party consists of:
A lore(UA) wizard
A BM ranger (probably UA revision)
A assassin rogue
and one undetermined new member who'll have the information to me by the one shot. (which is okay, probably wont be too much an issue).

[DragonSorcererX]

and one undetermined new member who'll have the information to me by the one shot. (which is okay, probably wont be too much an issue).

Ha! I want to see your face when that Pureblood Yuan-ti Bearbarian comes around...


Second time coming around and asking questions lately. Not sure how I feel about that, but I'm running a higher level campaign and I need a bit of advice. What CR ranges should I be using around 3 lvl 17 players?

If CR and Math is the only concern you have, I suggest that you check this site: http://kobold.club

[DivisibleByZero]

Ha! I want to see your face when that Pureblood Yuan-ti Bearbarian comes around...

Doesn't matter. He already has a Lore Wizard from UA. Balance is already FUBAR.

Incidentally, this same response also answers your question regarding CR.

[DragonSorcererX]

Doesn't matter. He already has a Lore Wizard from UA. Balance is already FUBAR.

Oh yeah, I forgot about the Lore Wizard.

[Ninja_Prawn]

What CR ranges should I be using around 3 lvl 17 players?

Coming back to the original question, the DMG-approved range goes from CR 2 (for a mob of 8 'mooks' making an easy encounter) to CR 22 (for a solo boss that's rated as deadly).

Though if you're allowing lore wizard, I dread to think what else might be in play. You'll probably want to stick with CR 5+ even for large mobster groups.

[Azazel_Unbound]

So, im general, play higher than the recomended cr due to unbalanced classes?

Side note: Undetermined dropped out cause of life

[Ninja_Prawn]

Side note: Undetermined dropped out cause of life

That changes the maths. It's now:



Easy
Medium
Hard
Deadly


6,000
11,700
17,700
26,400


Which means you're now looking at approximately...



# Monsters
Easy
Medium
Hard
Deadly


Solo
CR 10
CR 14
CR 17
CR 21


Three
CR 4
CR 5 to 6
CR 7
CR 9


Six
CR 2
CR 4
CR 4 to 5
CR 6


Though you can afford to go a bit higher, probably.

[DragonSorcererX]

Side note: Undetermined dropped out cause of life

Yeah, life is a bitch! Where is my giant meteor? :smallmad:

[MrStabby]

Also play higher than advertised CR if the party has advantages - expecting them to have surprise or access to magic items.

[Malifice]

Second time coming around and asking questions lately. Not sure how I feel about that, but I'm running a higher level campaign and I need a bit of advice. What CR ranges should I be using around 3 lvl 17 players?

Their party consists of:
A lore(UA) wizard
A BM ranger (probably UA revision)
A assassin rogue
and one undetermined new member who'll have the information to me by the one shot. (which is okay, probably wont be too much an issue).

CR isnt really relevant. You design encounters by XP budget.

3 X 17th level PCs (no magic items, that bumps it up a bit) have an encounter budget of:

Easy: 6000 XP
Medium: 11700 XP
Hard: 17700 XP
Deadly: 26400 XP

Bearing in mind the above numbers assume a standard 6-8 encounter/ 2-3 short rest adventuring day (the time between long rests). If you're running less encounters between long rests, then they'll be able to dump more resources into them and steamroll them fast (so you'll need to up the encounter difficulty). If you're pushing more encounters on them between long rests you'll need to tone down the encounters.

The expectation is that your 3 PCs can handle around 7 encounters, each budgeted at between 11,700 to 26,399 XP (getting 2-3 short rests in there).

So an adventuring day of:

[long rest]
1 x Balor CR 19 (22,000 xp)
1 x Death Knight and 4 x Banshees (22,200)
3 x Mind FLayer Arcanists (23,400)
1 x Marilith, and 10 x Berzerkers (19,500)
1 x Adult Blue Dracolich (18,000)
1 x Glabrezu and 1 x Nalafshee (22, 500)
1 x Archmage, 1 x Shield guardian and 6 x Orog minions (around 20,000)
[long rest]

Should be around right. They'll need 2-3 short rests in there to heal up (none of them have resources that recover on a short rest).

Use this site to help you:

http://dhmstark.co.uk/rpgs/encounter-calculator-5th/

Make sure you run surprise correct with the assasin. There is no such thing as a surprise round in 5E.