Balancing Gestalt Encounters and Enemy CR's [Archive] - Wizards Community

Balancing Gestalt Encounters and Enemy CR's [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Harkle
02-08-07, 12:16 PM So I'm considering running a Gestalt campaign soon, because it's been a long time since my group has had any high power fun and Gestalt looks like a great way to build some really creative character concepts.

But I'm having a hard time figuring out how to build a balanced encounter for the group to go against, and Gestalt really seems to throw traditional CR calculations out the window. UA covers how to handle calculate the CR of a regular monster in a Gestalt campaign, and I think a regular NPC build with Gestalt the CR would the same as if it was build the same level in a non-gestalt game. Things get complicated when I want to add levels to monsters to make them more interesting.

For leveling up monsters I have a couple options and I can't really figure out how to handle the CR for any of them.
First I could take the monster and just start adding non-gestalt levels regularly on top of what is already there I might be able to take this calculate the CR then use the advice in UA to adjust the CR.
Second I could take the monster and add Gestalt Levels on top of the regular monster, I can't really figure out how I would calculate the CR on this.
and third I could take the monsters Hit Dice and use them as one side of the Gestalt build and add levels in whatever on the otherside. This one looks really complicated, but seems like it would be really good for adding some flavor to a monster without making it rediculously high level.

So how do people with experaince with Gestalt campaigns handle thier CR calculations?
Cyanide300
02-09-07, 12:13 AM I've only played one gestalt campaign, and it was sort of a crapshoot with the CRs. The thing about gestalt is that while it makes your characters more offensively powerful, it doesn't really do a lot for defenses, aside from usually making your saves better and giving you a few extra HP. Like the book says, keep in mind that the number of actions per round does not change because of gestalt, nor does the number of places the characters can be at once.

I found that a reasonable way to handle things was to bump up the saves, attack bonus, and HP of the monsters, to counteract the things that gestalt does for the players. This works better than simply throwing more monsters at them, because then you get situations where the players are swarmed and they just can't do damage fast enough because they can only hit so many targets in a round. Throwing higher CR monsters at them has a tendancy to introduce monster abilities that the PCs still can't deal with so well. For example, a monster with DR/magic often assumes the PCs are likely to have a couple magic weapons by the time they match that CR, but with gestalt characters that may not be the case.

You sort of just have to play around with the amount of damage per round your monsters could do vs how many HP your PCs average. Then play that against how much damage your PCs can do in a round vs the monster's HP average. For a challenging encounter, you'd want to keep those things fairly balanced against each other.

You'll probably just have to do some play testing and find out what works best for your particular party.
Harkle
02-09-07, 01:19 AM Was afraid of that.

I look forward to the options Gestalt gives me, I'm not looking forward to eyeballing CRs.

I guess if something proves to be to powerful I can tone it down mid fight by cutting HP and fudging rolls, and if it proves to weak and can throw on some extra HP and use some easy abilities to power it up (who says a monster doesn't have rage, especially is a gestalt campaign)
FoxmanFX
02-12-07, 12:51 PM I've been running a gestalt campaign for 3 years now. The players have been run from level 1 to level 15 (Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil - started with 3 players, was trying to fill multiple roles).

Here are a few words of advice...

1) The PC's HP's cannot survive higher level creatures damage output.
2) The number of flanks and manouvors PC's can make is still the same as a normal sized party.
3) A sorcerer/Fighter is filling TWO roles - but they can only do ONE role at a time. Sure they can throw a fireball, but that means not attacking with thier sword... This of course doesnt apply to the Sor/Wiz combo and the Ftr/Rog combo. If everybody is in a single roles its not to bad, but if they split roles (Caster vs. attacker) it somewhat reduces their effictiveness.

If your looking for a simple rule of thumb, treat the party as one level higher for everything (except at maybe levels 1-3, in that range maybe a half a level higher for CR's, but XP is still one level lower), for XP/CR/EL.
At low levels (1-5) instead of putting them against higher level opponents, just add more mooks (6 zombies instead of 4).

For my campaign I stated that NOTHING stacked. That means if you take mystic thurge the spell level you got from the one spellcaster side doesnt stack with the spell caster level from the other side... (Mystic thurge gives +1 arcane/+1 Divine casting ability - if you dropped your sorc and kept your cleric - the cleric spellcasting ability doest stack with the thurge +1 divine casting ability).
Harkle
02-12-07, 04:09 PM So do you ever build monsters as Gestalt characters with all thier hit dice and abilities on one side and some levels in a class the other side?

I was thinking of going this to give some monsters an interesting twist and some nice suprises, but I can't figure out how to balance the CR on a monster like that.
FoxmanFX
02-12-07, 04:28 PM I am planning on running a "monster" campaign in the near future and have been giving some thought to it.

For the record when I gestult PC's in my game I play up the "best of the best of the best" angle - that is that these are 'special' and 'above normal' people.

I also never have run gestulted opponents against the PC's - I just played them against prebuilt encounters.

If I were to gestult NPC's/bad guys keep in mind fighter/rogues are more poweful than fighter/sorcerers - some classes compliment each other.

For my monster campaign I was going to gestult the LA as a level and each of the monster HD as a level.

So an Ogre has +2 LA and and 4 racial HD. That would be 6 levels down one side, add maybe 6 levels down the other side of fighter, or ranger or barbarian.

Of course one other option is to NOT take racial HD - and substitue class HD - this of course makes them more poweful

So a regular ogre with a +2 LA and 4 levels of barbarian is stronger than an oger with a +2 LA and 4 racial HD.

YMMV...
Harkle
02-12-07, 04:37 PM I am planning on running a "monster" campaign in the near future and have been giving some thought to it.

For the record when I gestult PC's in my game I play up the "best of the best of the best" angle - that is that these are 'special' and 'above normal' people.

I also never have run gestulted opponents against the PC's - I just played them against prebuilt encounters.

If I were to gestult NPC's/bad guys keep in mind fighter/rogues are more poweful than fighter/sorcerers - some classes compliment each other.

For my monster campaign I was going to gestult the LA as a level and each of the monster HD as a level.

So an Ogre has +2 LA and and 4 racial HD. That would be 6 levels down one side, add maybe 6 levels down the other side of fighter, or ranger or barbarian.

Of course one other option is to NOT take racial HD - and substitue class HD - this of course makes them more poweful

So a regular ogre with a +2 LA and 4 levels of barbarian is stronger than an oger with a +2 LA and 4 racial HD.

YMMV...

My campaign I'm setting up I'm allowing players to play as some monsters, I make the HD and LA count as levels. For simplicity I give them all thier Racial Hit Dice first and all LA counts as empty levels afterwards.

I only had one player actually choose a race with hit dice and ha complained because the class he chose made the racial Hitdice pretty much useless.
Mitsukai_sama
02-12-07, 08:13 PM Generally, I find that an appropriate EL is equal to the party level + 2. Exceptions abound; the HP, damage output, saves... everything about the PCs is likely to be much better on average than normal. This renders some niche monsters that rely on exploiting weaknesses somewhat less effective, as its much easier to min/max those weaknesses away. Remember, you can give monsters class levels too (and even Gestalt them), if you're looking for a unique challenge to throw at the party. Moderately (or more) important NPCs and their elite henchmen, I always Gestalt (compute EL as normal).

Hope this helps.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Harkle 02-08-07, 12:16 PM	So I'm considering running a Gestalt campaign soon, because it's been a long time since my group has had any high power fun and Gestalt looks like a great way to build some really creative character concepts. But I'm having a hard time figuring out how to build a balanced encounter for the group to go against, and Gestalt really seems to throw traditional CR calculations out the window. UA covers how to handle calculate the CR of a regular monster in a Gestalt campaign, and I think a regular NPC build with Gestalt the CR would the same as if it was build the same level in a non-gestalt game. Things get complicated when I want to add levels to monsters to make them more interesting. For leveling up monsters I have a couple options and I can't really figure out how to handle the CR for any of them. First I could take the monster and just start adding non-gestalt levels regularly on top of what is already there I might be able to take this calculate the CR then use the advice in UA to adjust the CR. Second I could take the monster and add Gestalt Levels on top of the regular monster, I can't really figure out how I would calculate the CR on this. and third I could take the monsters Hit Dice and use them as one side of the Gestalt build and add levels in whatever on the otherside. This one looks really complicated, but seems like it would be really good for adding some flavor to a monster without making it rediculously high level. So how do people with experaince with Gestalt campaigns handle thier CR calculations?
Cyanide300 02-09-07, 12:13 AM	I've only played one gestalt campaign, and it was sort of a crapshoot with the CRs. The thing about gestalt is that while it makes your characters more offensively powerful, it doesn't really do a lot for defenses, aside from usually making your saves better and giving you a few extra HP. Like the book says, keep in mind that the number of actions per round does not change because of gestalt, nor does the number of places the characters can be at once. I found that a reasonable way to handle things was to bump up the saves, attack bonus, and HP of the monsters, to counteract the things that gestalt does for the players. This works better than simply throwing more monsters at them, because then you get situations where the players are swarmed and they just can't do damage fast enough because they can only hit so many targets in a round. Throwing higher CR monsters at them has a tendancy to introduce monster abilities that the PCs still can't deal with so well. For example, a monster with DR/magic often assumes the PCs are likely to have a couple magic weapons by the time they match that CR, but with gestalt characters that may not be the case. You sort of just have to play around with the amount of damage per round your monsters could do vs how many HP your PCs average. Then play that against how much damage your PCs can do in a round vs the monster's HP average. For a challenging encounter, you'd want to keep those things fairly balanced against each other. You'll probably just have to do some play testing and find out what works best for your particular party.
Harkle 02-09-07, 01:19 AM	Was afraid of that. I look forward to the options Gestalt gives me, I'm not looking forward to eyeballing CRs. I guess if something proves to be to powerful I can tone it down mid fight by cutting HP and fudging rolls, and if it proves to weak and can throw on some extra HP and use some easy abilities to power it up (who says a monster doesn't have rage, especially is a gestalt campaign)
FoxmanFX 02-12-07, 12:51 PM	I've been running a gestalt campaign for 3 years now. The players have been run from level 1 to level 15 (Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil - started with 3 players, was trying to fill multiple roles). Here are a few words of advice... 1) The PC's HP's cannot survive higher level creatures damage output. 2) The number of flanks and manouvors PC's can make is still the same as a normal sized party. 3) A sorcerer/Fighter is filling TWO roles - but they can only do ONE role at a time. Sure they can throw a fireball, but that means not attacking with thier sword... This of course doesnt apply to the Sor/Wiz combo and the Ftr/Rog combo. If everybody is in a single roles its not to bad, but if they split roles (Caster vs. attacker) it somewhat reduces their effictiveness. If your looking for a simple rule of thumb, treat the party as one level higher for everything (except at maybe levels 1-3, in that range maybe a half a level higher for CR's, but XP is still one level lower), for XP/CR/EL. At low levels (1-5) instead of putting them against higher level opponents, just add more mooks (6 zombies instead of 4). For my campaign I stated that NOTHING stacked. That means if you take mystic thurge the spell level you got from the one spellcaster side doesnt stack with the spell caster level from the other side... (Mystic thurge gives +1 arcane/+1 Divine casting ability - if you dropped your sorc and kept your cleric - the cleric spellcasting ability doest stack with the thurge +1 divine casting ability).
Harkle 02-12-07, 04:09 PM	So do you ever build monsters as Gestalt characters with all thier hit dice and abilities on one side and some levels in a class the other side? I was thinking of going this to give some monsters an interesting twist and some nice suprises, but I can't figure out how to balance the CR on a monster like that.
FoxmanFX 02-12-07, 04:28 PM	I am planning on running a "monster" campaign in the near future and have been giving some thought to it. For the record when I gestult PC's in my game I play up the "best of the best of the best" angle - that is that these are 'special' and 'above normal' people. I also never have run gestulted opponents against the PC's - I just played them against prebuilt encounters. If I were to gestult NPC's/bad guys keep in mind fighter/rogues are more poweful than fighter/sorcerers - some classes compliment each other. For my monster campaign I was going to gestult the LA as a level and each of the monster HD as a level. So an Ogre has +2 LA and and 4 racial HD. That would be 6 levels down one side, add maybe 6 levels down the other side of fighter, or ranger or barbarian. Of course one other option is to NOT take racial HD - and substitue class HD - this of course makes them more poweful So a regular ogre with a +2 LA and 4 levels of barbarian is stronger than an oger with a +2 LA and 4 racial HD. YMMV...
Harkle 02-12-07, 04:37 PM	I am planning on running a "monster" campaign in the near future and have been giving some thought to it. For the record when I gestult PC's in my game I play up the "best of the best of the best" angle - that is that these are 'special' and 'above normal' people. I also never have run gestulted opponents against the PC's - I just played them against prebuilt encounters. If I were to gestult NPC's/bad guys keep in mind fighter/rogues are more poweful than fighter/sorcerers - some classes compliment each other. For my monster campaign I was going to gestult the LA as a level and each of the monster HD as a level. So an Ogre has +2 LA and and 4 racial HD. That would be 6 levels down one side, add maybe 6 levels down the other side of fighter, or ranger or barbarian. Of course one other option is to NOT take racial HD - and substitue class HD - this of course makes them more poweful So a regular ogre with a +2 LA and 4 levels of barbarian is stronger than an oger with a +2 LA and 4 racial HD. YMMV... My campaign I'm setting up I'm allowing players to play as some monsters, I make the HD and LA count as levels. For simplicity I give them all thier Racial Hit Dice first and all LA counts as empty levels afterwards. I only had one player actually choose a race with hit dice and ha complained because the class he chose made the racial Hitdice pretty much useless.
Mitsukai_sama 02-12-07, 08:13 PM	Generally, I find that an appropriate EL is equal to the party level + 2. Exceptions abound; the HP, damage output, saves... everything about the PCs is likely to be much better on average than normal. This renders some niche monsters that rely on exploiting weaknesses somewhat less effective, as its much easier to min/max those weaknesses away. Remember, you can give monsters class levels too (and even Gestalt them), if you're looking for a unique challenge to throw at the party. Moderately (or more) important NPCs and their elite henchmen, I always Gestalt (compute EL as normal). Hope this helps.