Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 Taejang Sep 26, 2014 7:55:08	I'm new to DMing and am utterly confused about calculating encounter difficulty. I am comparing the starter campaign, Lost Mine of Phandelver, to the challenge descriptions given in the DM pdf (pg 57) and they don't match up. Spoilers ahead.   The campaign is designed for beginning level adventurers. Going through the first goblin area brings players up to level 2. During the second part, in the Redbrand hideout beneath Tresendar Manor, there is an encounter with three bugbears. A bugbear is worth 200xp. Following the encounter difficulty instructions, that is 200 x 3 = 600 x 2 (because of numbers) = 1200 difficulty. At level 2, a 200 is considered "deadly". With a party of four players, that means 200 x 4 = 800.   Which means the three bugbears are 400 points above deadly. At level 2 and with 4 characters, each difficulty "rank" is 200 points above the previous, so a 400 point jump puts this encounter past deadly into "a character should die" rank and then past that into "we are lucky if a single character survives at all." </made up difficulty names>   Does that seem right? Which is out of whack, the difficulty calculation or the campaign design? Or did I miss something?
#2 bawylie Sep 26, 2014 8:16:55	The adventure's encounters are out of whack, but still fun.    These XP budgets help you check your encounter-design work.    We're all gonna need some time and some double-checking before we can eyeball it. (Unless you design encounters w/O regard to difficulty).
#3 Tsulia Sep 26, 2014 8:28:17	As the DM; ignore that for now. If you find an encounter you dislike, downgrade 1 or more of the monsters if you know the players can't handle it.  A good avenue might be to change the other 2 Bugbears into cubs or some kind of Goblin/Kobold (refluffed into area/zone approriate) At the end of the day - if your playerparty can handle "deadly" encounters (usually because at level 3, you start getting magic items that boost you nicely) and aren't spending more time messing around or gelling combo's to down stronger targets etc; then you don't need to worry. For example... I have learned that a "Bugbear Lurker" is remarkably evil with it's grapple and drag tactic - in those cases, I change it to another type of Bugbear.
#4 Taejang Sep 26, 2014 9:20:12	Tsulia wrote:
#5 iserith Sep 26, 2014 9:31:11	Taejang wrote:
#6 Taejang Sep 26, 2014 10:05:38	iserith wrote:
#7 iserith Sep 26, 2014 10:25:26	Taejang wrote:
#8 Taejang Sep 26, 2014 10:41:39	iserith wrote:
#9 iserith Sep 26, 2014 11:03:35	Taejang wrote:
#10 sleypy Sep 26, 2014 14:22:37	Taejang wrote: