For DPR calculations, how many rounds should we expect between rests?

[Merudo]

It is hard to calculate DPR for classes with short rest / long rest resources. Obviously spending all such abilities on a single round can lead to very high DPR, but it is not sustainable.

To calculate DPR accurately, it is important to divide the additional damage granted by such resources by the number of rounds that these resources are to be spread over.

So, for example, if a Paladin can smite 3 times a day for 9 additional damage, this will increase DPR by 9*3/8 = 3.375 averaged over 8 rounds of combat, and by 1.6875 over 16 rounds of combat.

What is a plausible amount of combat rounds we can expect between rests? For my calculations I assume about 8 combat rounds between short rests, and about 16 combat rounds between long rests. Does this sound reasonable?

[Yunru]

I personally consider three turns per combat.
Both because the DMG also does, and because three rounds is normally all that's needed to tip the balance of the battle.

[Man_Over_Game]

It is hard to calculate DPR for classes with short rest / long rest resources. Obviously spending all such abilities on a single round can lead to very high DPR, but it is not sustainable.

To calculate DPR accurately, it is important to divide the additional damage granted by such resources by the number of rounds that these resources are to be spread over.

So, for example, if a Paladin can smite 3 times a day for 9 additional damage, this will increase DPR by 9*3/8 = 3.375 averaged over 8 rounds of combat, and by 1.6875 over 16 rounds of combat.

What is a plausible amount of combat rounds we can expect between rests? For my calculations I assume about 8 combat rounds between short rests, and about 16 combat rounds between long rests. Does this sound reasonable?

This RPG Stack Exchange question (https://rpg.stackexchange.com/q/93183/45619) asked the same, top answer replied with an average 4-5 rounds across 200 of his encounters.

However, the second answer responded with the fact that the MM seems to imply that the average is expected around 3 (based on the monster creation rules that estimate the value of certain powers over a number of rounds).

So the average of both is about 4 per encounter.


Personally, I've rarely been in too many situations where the players had encounters back-to-back without the possibility of a Short Rest, but it's still possible. Let's say there's a 50/50 chance that a party doesn't have the option of a Short Rest before an encounter.

That means that you're expected roughly 4-8 rounds of combat between each Short Rest, or an average of 6 rounds between each Short Rest.


Last step, most players that are avid about balance will say that you'd probably need 2 Short Rests with Encounters between, so roughly about 18 rounds per Long Rest. That's what I'd estimate for anyone who's crunching numbers.


That sounds a bit excessive, but that's why balance is such a touchy issue. I don't want 20 rounds of combat in a day, but I also want my players to be equals, so I have to get a little creative if I want both.


Say you want 30% of your session to be combat, and you're playing for 6 hours. So you've budged 2 hours for combat, and you're aiming for that perfect 20.

That's 6 minutes per round. That doesn't sound too bad, but you generally have 4 players, and the DM has about twice as many complexities and rolls as a player per round so he counts as 2.

That means you're looking at 1 minute per gamer turn to hit that budget, and...I dunno, that's cutting it pretty tight. Or maybe I've just been playing too long DMing for newcomers.

[Zalabim]

I usually use 20 rounds for the whole day, or 8 rounds for the period between short rests. I suppose both are slightly on the less favorable side.

For a lot of people, it never occurs to them that they don't have to fit an entire adventure into one session. That aside, 1 minute for each player turn, on average, isn't real crazy if everyone is paying attention and knows what they're doing. Or you could allow some sessions have more combat and some have less.

[heavyfuel]

3 combat rounds per rest.

Three rounds should be the average combat before it's (effectively) decided, and since the expected 8 daily encounters should in theory be divided among all 3 pillars, you should expect around 3 combats per day, so it fits nicely into on rest betweet each combat:

combat->short rest->combat->short rest->combat->long rest

There are exceptions, obviously, but they are not the rule for the average adventuring day.
- In a very combat oriented day, I'd expect two combats per rest
- Many combats will actually last longer, but these extra rounds will usually just be picking up stragglers instead of actual risky combat. Combats were you're forced to use expend resources beyond round 3 are a rare sight.

[LudicSavant]

There's an enormous practical problem with these theories, and that's the fact that the length of combat depends directly on your combat strategy, and damage output is a huge part of that. If a monster has 200 health, for example, it doesn't matter that you don't have the resources to do 200 DPR to it for more than one round, because there's only going to be one round. Assuming that the fight will take longer will make such a build look far less resource efficient than it actually is in practice.

In fact, generally speaking the faster you can end or at least lock down a combat the more resource efficient you are, because the fewer rounds Team Monster can act unimpeded the less attrition they inflict. If you can spend 3x the resources per round to end a combat in 1/3rd the time, that's almost always a fantastic deal (because 3 per round x 1 round and 1 per round x 3 round is the same cost, but if Team Monster is acting for 2 extra rounds they inflict additional costs on top of that).

Anything that tries to rate the damage output per rest of classes that uses a flat number of rounds per day is going to undervalue burst, because a large factor of what makes burst efficient is the fact that it shortens combat. Remove the fact that burst damage is shortening combat (and vice versa) and you're kind of removing a large part of the point of improving your damage.

In short, using a flat number of rounds per day is going to give you misleading results for the thing you're attempting to measure.

[Zalabim]

There's an enormous practical problem with these theories, and that's the fact that the length of combat depends directly on your combat strategy, and damage output is a huge part of that. If a monster has 200 health, for example, it doesn't matter that you don't have the resources to do 200 DPR to it for more than one round, because there's only going to be one round. Assuming that the fight will take longer will make such a build look far less resource efficient than it actually is.

...

Anything that tries to rate the damage output per rest of classes that uses a flat number of rounds per day is going to undervalue burst, because a large factor of what makes burst efficient is the fact that it shortens combat. Remove the fact that burst damage is shortening combat and you're kind of removing a large part of the point of improving your damage.
While I am intentionally undervaluing limited abilities, I am often interested in the better question: How much damage do you need to deal per day? What are the break points where increased damage reduces the number of rounds of combat?

[LudicSavant]

While I am intentionally undervaluing limited abilities, I am often interested in the better question: How much damage do you need to deal per day? What are the break points where increased damage reduces the number of rounds of combat?

How much you need to deal per day is, naturally enough, going to vary by the campaign you're playing in. But you can at least set some parameters and get a vague estimate (like "6 medium encounters a day" or some such thing).

Something like the old "Same Game Test" works well enough, I think. Except with a party rather than just one person.

[heavyfuel]

There's an enormous practical problem with these theories, and that's the fact that the length of combat depends directly on your combat strategy, and damage output is a huge part of that. If a monster has 200 health, for example, it doesn't matter that you don't have the resources to do 200 DPR to it for more than one round, because there's only going to be one round. Assuming that the fight will take longer will make such a build look far less resource efficient than it actually is in practice.

In fact, generally speaking the faster you can end or at least lock down a combat the more resource efficient you are, because the fewer rounds Team Monster can act unimpeded the less attrition they inflict. If you can spend 3x the resources per round to end a combat in 1/3rd the time, that's almost always a fantastic deal (because 3 per round x 1 round and 1 per round x 3 round is the same cost, but if Team Monster is acting for 2 extra rounds they inflict additional costs on top of that).

Anything that tries to rate the damage output per rest of classes that uses a flat number of rounds per day is going to undervalue burst, because a large factor of what makes burst efficient is the fact that it shortens combat. Remove the fact that burst damage is shortening combat (and vice versa) and you're kind of removing a large part of the point of improving your damage.

In short, using a flat number of rounds per day is going to give you misleading results for the thing you're attempting to measure.

That was brilliantly put.


While I am intentionally undervaluing limited abilities, I am often interested in the better question: How much damage do you need to deal per day? What are the break points where increased damage reduces the number of rounds of combat?

You're asking an impossible question since its answer's bound to vary from day to day, encounter to encounter.

[Merudo]

There's an enormous practical problem with these theories, and that's the fact that the length of combat depends directly on your combat strategy, and damage output is a huge part of that. If a monster has 200 health, for example, it doesn't matter that you don't have the resources to do 200 DPR to it for more than one round, because there's only going to be one round. Assuming that the fight will take longer will make such a build look far less resource efficient than it actually is in practice.


I'd agree with you if you were playing D&D solo. However in practice, you are a single PC in a party of 4-7+ party members.

So, even if you were to (say) double your DPS, it will only have a small overall impact on the time it takes to complete a battle.

Hence as a simplification, we can assume the number of rounds is fixed. This works fine for large group, but underestimate the impact of high nova classes in small groups.

Still, damage inflicted earlier in a battle is more valuable than damage inflicted later because it leads to less resources spent on healing and defense. I wonder if we could capture that in an equation?

[Merudo]

Personally, I've rarely been in too many situations where the players had encounters back-to-back without the possibility of a Short Rest, but it's still possible.



combat->short rest->combat->short rest->combat->long rest



I think 1 combat per short rest doesn't work very well for dungeons. In my experience, many DMs have the monsters stay still in their respective rooms until the PCs open the door. This leads to multiple separate encounters, in a place where short rests could be dangerous.

Other DMs will have monsters ring the alarm when the PC are detected, leading to a single massive fight because the whole complex jumps out at the party. Still, even then you'll usually have some monsters stay in their initial rooms, leading to multiple encounters.

[LudicSavant]

I'd agree with you if you were playing D&D solo. However in practice, you are a single PC in a party of 4-7+ party members.

So, even if you were to (say) double your DPS, it will only have a small overall impact on the time it takes to complete a battle.

Hence as a simplification, we can assume the number of rounds is fixed. This works fine for large group, but underestimate the impact of high nova classes in small groups.

Still, damage inflicted earlier in a battle is more valuable than damage inflicted later because it leads to less resources spent on healing and defense. I wonder if we could capture that in an equation?

It is an equally important principle whether you're solo, or in a group. If it helps your intuitions, you can think of the entire party combined as a single entity, and see that you can adjust the variables on that entity just as you can in your single character.

[heavyfuel]

So, even if you were to (say) double your DPS, it will only have a small overall impact on the time it takes to complete a battle.

Ludic's point stands even in a party scenario. Just change "your DPS" for "the party's DPS" and you're good. A party with the ability to nova will eventually save more resources than a party with a fixed DPR.


I think 1 combat per short rest doesn't work very well for dungeons. In my experience, many DMs have the monsters stay still in their respective rooms until the PCs open the door. This leads to multiple separate encounters, in a place where short rests could be dangerous.

Other DMs will have monsters ring the alarm when the PC are detected, leading to a single massive fight because the whole complex jumps out at the party. Still, even then you'll usually have some monsters stay in their initial rooms, leading to multiple encounters.

While I think the first scenario is stupid and video-gamey (I like NPCs that react to my actions, not robots that stay in their rooms waiting for a fight), dungeon crawls are indeed more combat focused. Which is one of the exceptions I mentioned.

I don't think many party's go dungeon-crawling every single adventure. Even the adventure modules I've played had very few dungeons when you consider the grand scheme of things.

[Man_Over_Game]

I'd agree with you if you were playing D&D solo. However in practice, you are a single PC in a party of 4-7+ party members.

So, even if you were to (say) double your DPS, it will only have a small overall impact on the time it takes to complete a battle.

Hence as a simplification, we can assume the number of rounds is fixed. This works fine for large group, but underestimate the impact of high nova classes in small groups.

Well said. 2d20 is incredibly random. 10d20? Not so much.


In short, using a flat number of rounds per day is going to give you misleading results for the thing you're attempting to measure.

I can see that, but what's the alternative? Rolling a d20? Or is designing an encounter in a math-based game best done without numbers?

I don't mean that to be snide, but saying "math has no value in chaos" isn't a good response. You don't need perfection for an estimate. That's why it's an estimate.

[LudicSavant]

I can see that, but what's the alternative? Rolling a d20? Or is designing an encounter in a math-based game best done without numbers?

I'm sorry, what are you talking about? I'm telling you that you cannot ignore the math that you're trying to ignore, not the other way around.

Just as you cannot ignore accuracy when doing DPR math, you cannot ignore how output affects the length of encounters when doing resource efficiency math. It's a necessary variable in order to achieve accurate results.

[Man_Over_Game]

I'm sorry, what are you talking about? I'm telling you that you cannot ignore the math that you're trying to ignore, not the other way around.

Just as you cannot ignore accuracy when doing DPR math, you cannot ignore how output affects the length of encounters when doing resource efficiency math.

My bad, misunderstood your post.

I had interpreted it as:
"There's not much point in trying to calculate the average expected number of rounds, due to the fact that the amount of burst damage changes"
Not:
"In order to calculate the average number of rounds, you need to account for burst damage"

I agree, just not sure what's the best way of doing that. Is Fireball an average burst (despite being a limited resource), or an outlier (despite being a commonly selected feature)?

[LudicSavant]

My bad, misunderstood your post.

I had interpreted it as:
"There's not much point in trying to calculate the average expected number of rounds, due to the fact that the amount of burst damage changes"
Not:
"In order to calculate the average number of rounds, you need to account for burst damage"

Cool, glad that's cleared up.

For future reference, I will never downplay the value of math, in any context, ever. That is pretty much the polar opposite of My Thing. :smallsmile:

[stoutstien]

There's an enormous practical problem with these theories, and that's the fact that the length of combat depends directly on your combat strategy, and damage output is a huge part of that. If a monster has 200 health, for example, it doesn't matter that you don't have the resources to do 200 DPR to it for more than one round, because there's only going to be one round. Assuming that the fight will take longer will make such a build look far less resource efficient than it actually is in practice.

In fact, generally speaking the faster you can end or at least lock down a combat the more resource efficient you are, because the fewer rounds Team Monster can act unimpeded the less attrition they inflict. If you can spend 3x the resources per round to end a combat in 1/3rd the time, that's almost always a fantastic deal (because 3 per round x 1 round and 1 per round x 3 round is the same cost, but if Team Monster is acting for 2 extra rounds they inflict additional costs on top of that).

Anything that tries to rate the damage output per rest of classes that uses a flat number of rounds per day is going to undervalue burst, because a large factor of what makes burst efficient is the fact that it shortens combat. Remove the fact that burst damage is shortening combat (and vice versa) and you're kind of removing a large part of the point of improving your damage.

In short, using a flat number of rounds per day is going to give you misleading results for the thing you're attempting to measure.

Brilliant as always. I think encounter tempo is something that should have been discuss more in the DMG in terms of how typical encounters play out with the first round having the highest value and quickly falling off after that.

[Zalabim]

You're asking an impossible question since its answer's bound to vary from day to day, encounter to encounter.
No more impossible than the question in the title. Just pick brains until we have something representative for each level.

[Man_Over_Game]

No more impossible than the question in the title. Just pick brains until we have something representative for each level.

Probably wouldn't have to be that hard, thinking about it. Thing is, "basic actions", like attacks and cantrips, scale.

You could probably just average their max damage with their minimal damage, and it'd probably get fairly close.

Sure, as you level, the gap between those two change a lot as you level(like Firebolt vs. Meteor Storm), but you also generally get more resources that deal roughly about the...average.

It's not perfect, but it's a hell of a lot easier than calculating the amount of damage a Wizard does on round 8 of the day, when he's level 11, has already spent his Arcane Recovery but he's keeping up an Animated Dead spell slot tax because he's tired of using his own legs to carry himself.

[Merudo]

It is an equally important principle whether you're solo, or in a group. If it helps your intuitions, you can think of the entire party combined as a single entity, and see that you can adjust the variables on that entity just as you can in your single character.

Are we optimizing the group, or a single character?

Combining the party as a single entity is improper if we are only optimizing one character. Instead, we need to hold the rest of the party constant.

[LudicSavant]

Are we optimizing the group, or a single character?

The issue applies in both cases.

If you're trying to measure the value of damage, it is important not to forget that the thing that gives damage its value is its ability to cause Team Monster to survive for fewer rounds.

[Hael]

The issue applies in both cases.

If you're trying to measure the value of damage, it is important not to forget that the thing that gives damage its value is its ability to cause Team Monster to survive for fewer rounds.

On this point, I think there was a very strange balance consideration the 5e team took. For some reason they have systematically overvalued sustained dpr relative to nova Dpr. This shows up in class features, item balance and many other places.

So when comparing eg the Paladin to the fighter champion, we get this strange dichotomy where in almost all realistic situations it feels like the Paladin out damages a class that is built to do more.

The complete lack of endurance encounters (where we get many rounds of combat with sparse short rests) seems to cause many of the more egregious balance problems, which leads me to suspect they failed to properly account for the effect you mention in their early playtest simulations.

[MaxWilson]

While I am intentionally undervaluing limited abilities, I am often interested in the better question: How much damage do you need to deal per day? What are the break points where increased damage reduces the number of rounds of combat?

It's probably better analysis to measure loss ratios instead of pure DPR, e.g. "how many HP do you lose while killing 300 HP worth of mixed hill giants and orogs, three times in the same day with short rests in between?"


I'd agree with you if you were playing D&D solo. However in practice, you are a single PC in a party of 4-7+ party members.

So, even if you were to (say) double your DPS, it will only have a small overall impact on the time it takes to complete a battle.

Hence as a simplification, we can assume the number of rounds is fixed. This works fine for large group, but underestimate the impact of high nova classes in small groups.

Still, damage inflicted earlier in a battle is more valuable than damage inflicted later because it leads to less resources spent on healing and defense. I wonder if we could capture that in an equation?

It would be a differential equation, and the simplified solution to that equation leads to Lanchester's Square Law of Combat, which is where the DMG's adjusted XP multipliers (apparently) come from.

Phrased slightly differently: the marginal value of damage/control inflicted scales linearly with the number of enemies still remaining. Taking 1 out of 3 T Rexes out of the combat via Fear is roughly twice as valuable as taking out 1 of 2 T Rexes, because 3 T Rexes have 9/4 the combat power of 2 T Rexes (in simple, non-AoE weapons combat). Casting Fear after the first two T Rexes are already dead is only 1/3 as valuable as casting it on the first T Rex immediately.

If the enemy will come back eventually (e.g. Wall of Force means you still have to kill the target later) the math is a little more complex but it doesn't really affect the results: killing 1 T Rex, then 1, then 1 is still roughly three times less painful/draining than killing them all at once, for obvious reasons.


Brilliant as always. I think encounter tempo is something that should have been discuss more in the DMG in terms of how typical encounters play out with the first round having the highest value and quickly falling off after that.

It is already built into the DMG encounter tables. That's what adjusted XP is for.

[Merudo]

The issue applies in both cases.

If you're trying to measure the value of damage, it is important not to forget that the thing that gives damage its value is its ability to cause Team Monster to survive for fewer rounds.

Agreed. My point is simply that the impact on combat length of optimizing a single character's DPR goes to zero as the party size N goes to infinity.



It would be a differential equation, and the simplified solution to that equation leads to Lanchester's Square Law of Combat, which is where the DMG's adjusted XP multipliers (apparently) come from.


Good point! The Lanchester's Square Law of Combat provides a reasonable equation approximating of how firepower diminishes over combat, at least for the enemy side when it is numerous enough.

I don't think the same equation applies to the player side, though. The PCs' "firepower" generally does not smoothly decrease as a result of enemy attacks, due to the huge sacks of HPs players get, and their access to yo-yo healing. For it to be the case, one or more PC would have to die almost every fight.

I believe a "cascading failure model" is a more satisfying analogy for what causes decreased PC firepower. Essentially, the PCs are able to avoid losses until a crucial part of the team fails - usually because of the incapacitation of the healer or the tank, or when a caster loses concentration of a key spell. The PCs suddenly become unable to cope with the opposition, leading to a cascade of failure with multiple character becoming unconscious.

[stoutstien]

I don't think adjusted EXP adequately explains encounter tempo/passing. It works okay as a adjustment tool but it doesn't help the DM who has issues with encounters being decided the first round or in a single action.
A fireball wiping out all the mooks so the party can focus on the main threat is working as intended but doesn't help if discovering that is through trial and error.

[MrStabby]

I would suggest that you start by thinking about balance.

So usually we think about balance between different PCs, different classes,races or builds.

I would suggest thinking about balance in terms of actions a player could take as well.



A character is not so interesting to a lot of people if they don't get to use their abilities - especially if it is just because some of them are not very good. If a paladin never gets to fight fiends or undead then their divine smite feature is still good enough to use; if a nature cleric only ever fights constructs, fiends and humanoids then their channel divinity will go unused - less fun.

Should a fighter grapple an enemy or hit them with a sword? Should a wizard throw a fireball or cast hypnottic pattern? Or to consider the paladin again - should they use a level 1 spell slot for bless or for smiting?

To keep the game engaging and tactically varied these options should be balanced against each other. Of course you will never get it right, but you can get it closer to right than otherwise.

So lets assume you have a DM that balances these actions against each other. That balances control against raw damage.

If they do, then we can ask how many turns should a combat last such that a player is as effective opening with hypnotic pattern as fireball? How many hitpoints should an enemy have such that a fighter is as well placed to protect someone by grappling an enemy as trying to just kill them. Most combat spells that last at all last for one minute - how many of these 10 rounds of value should a caster get out of that spell?

So for me as DM, I tend to think an average of 5 to 6 rounds per combat is good for this and tailor my encounters to deliver. This usually entails a lot of defensive abilities: spell like misty step and shield, more hitpoints but slightly weaker attacks, enemies taking cover, enemies using control abilities themselves. Essentially if people are agonising between damage and control you have the number of encounters per day/toughness right.

So who shines in a party is a function of both party composition and encounter type; if the DM doesn't run the game to let everyone shine equally then party composition dominates and number of turns is dictated more by what people play. If the DM does adjust then encounter duraton will depend a lot less on composition.

Another balance way to look at it is to do something like comparing a fighter to a wizard. A wizard is more powerful than a fighter whan casting a spell, otherwise less powerful unless the fighter uses action surge. In a balanced game a fighter should be better than a wizard as often as a wizard is better than the fighter. This means there should be as many turnsas there are twice the number of spell slots that a wizard has (I would exclude arcane recovery from this for various reasons). If you are 5th level the wizard should have 9 spell slots. As a guide assume the fighter uses action surge 3 times per day to give 6 turns where a wizard does their flashy thing unequalled. So you would look for a corresponding 6 turns for the wizard to be using a cantrip to blanace this out. So that would get you, at level 5, 15 turns of adventure in a day. At level 9 this would rise to 23 rounds of combat per day. Obviously this is just a rough guide and will also change by party composition and level.


But you want a ballpark figure? 24 rounds per day.

[Tanarii]

5-10 per short rest (most often 7-8)
15-25 per long rest (most often 21-24)

But it heavily depends on if you allow feats or not (specifically GWM, PAM, and SS), and at lower levels how martial-heavy your party is. More martials will result in quicker combats in Tier 1 and Tier 2, even without feats.

[heavyfuel]

at lower levels how martial-heavy your party is. More martials will result in quicker combats in Tier 1 and Tier 2, even without feats.

Debatable. Spellcasters have access to save or lose effects starting at level 1, which drastically quicken combat. A "standard" party auto-critting Goblins because they were put to sleep will result in a faster combat than party that swapped their arcane spellcaster for another martial.

[DarknessEternal]

Well, I play by the recommended rules, unlike seemingly anyone else, so 30-40.

[MrStabby]

Well, I play by the recommended rules, unlike seemingly anyone else, so 30-40.

Do I read into this that your combats are long? Or is it that every encounter you have is a combat encounter?

[heavyfuel]

Well, I play by the recommended rules, unlike seemingly anyone else, so 30-40.

Uhhh, where does it say that 30-40 rounds of combat per rest is the recommended?

[MaxWilson]

I don't think the same equation applies to the player side, though. The PCs' "firepower" generally does not smoothly decrease as a result of enemy attacks, due to the huge sacks of HPs players get, and their access to yo-yo healing. For it to be the case, one or more PC would have to die almost every fight.

I believe a "cascading failure model" is a more satisfying analogy for what causes decreased PC firepower. Essentially, the PCs are able to avoid losses until a crucial part of the team fails - usually because of the incapacitation of the healer or the tank, or when a caster loses concentration of a key spell. The PCs suddenly become unable to cope with the opposition, leading to a cascade of failure with multiple character becoming unconscious.

You're not wrong, but I thought we were talking about the value of damage inflicted by the PCs early vs. late in the combat, not the value of damage inflicted by the monsters. Was I mistaken or is this a new topic about optimizing monster burst damage and why monsters like Flameskulls and Star Spawn Manglers are deadlier than their CR makes them look?


I don't think adjusted EXP adequately explains encounter tempo/passing. It works okay as a adjustment tool but it doesn't help the DM who has issues with encounters being decided the first round or in a single action.
A fireball wiping out all the mooks so the party can focus on the main threat is working as intended but doesn't help if discovering that is through trial and error.

[thinks] Okay, you've convinced me: it wouldn't hurt for the DMG to have more discussion about ways to pace an encounter and what results to expect. That ship has sailed, but you're not wrong that it could be helpful to some readers.

[stoutstien]

Aye. Wishful thinking on my part. Wouldn't it be wonderful if the DMG had a PC version of the CR/NPC breakdown. A provided baseline to look at if you suspect a player fell behind or to reference if you want to see if an encounter isn't going to flop due to moderate Nova from a party.

[MaxWilson]

Aye. Wishful thinking on my part. Wouldn't it be wonderful if the DMG had a PC version of the CR/NPC breakdown. A provided baseline to look at if you suspect a player fell behind or to reference if you want to see if an encounter isn't going to flop due to moderate Nova from a party.

You'd definitely want to point out to the DM that melee monsters and ranged monsters do not scale the same way due to AoE threats. In an encounter which already has a bunch of monsters, 12 additional wolves will get off about 12 attacks before dying. 12 additional skeletons with longbows may get off 60+.

[bid]

The ultimate day ender is how much damage you can absorb.

Beside the nova round effect, you should also account for overkill. Sometimes you will do 6 damage on 5 hp, sometimes 5 damage on 6 hp and need another full hit to take care of that last hp.

The impact of that is larger than archetype variation in DPR.

[DarknessEternal]

Uhhh, where does it say that 30-40 rounds of combat per rest is the recommended?

DMG.

6-8 encounters per day, 1-2 short rests.

[heavyfuel]

DMG.

6-8 encounters per day, 1-2 short rests.

Encounters ≠ Combats

[MaxWilson]

DMG.

6-8 encounters per day, 1-2 short rests.

The DMG says fewer encounters is also fine, if they are harder--and if each encounter is lasting five rounds they probably ARE harder. If each fight is Hard you can only fit (IIRC) about four of them into the DMG daily adjusted XP budget, at most levels, giving about 20 rounds of combat (very rough estimate) in that scenario.

Of course the DMG has zero guidance on how long a fight should take, that part is just IME.

[Tanarii]

The DMG says fewer encounters is also fine, if they are harder--and if each encounter is lasting five rounds they probably ARE harder. If each fight is Hard you can only fit (IIRC) about four of them into the DMG daily adjusted XP budget, at most levels, giving about 20 rounds of combat (very rough estimate) in that scenario.

Agreed.

Generally speaking, and going completely off memory & rough judgements as opposed to carefully recording results, I've found combat lasts on average, if no special tactical nightmares are in play:
Easy 2-3
Medium 3-4
Hard 4-5
Deadly 5-6

With a tendency toward lower number.

Six medium encounters, which is the actual DMG standard by the tables for most levels of play, should if they're all combat be 18-20 rounds of combat. That's with a not incredibly optimized or tactical party, but not a thoroughly unoptimized or terrible tactics one.

Oh, also my experience is extremely biased to Tier 1 and Tier 2