Hi guys,
I’ll start by saying that I’m not posting this to ask for basic balancing tips, as I’ve that down already. I can create encounters that are mathematically aimed towards a specific difficulty level, as long as they are creative but not insanely complex. Big action oriented guy, minions, multiple medium guys, spicy terrain, simple lair actions, sure.
Now, I love actual plays (D20 veteran), but how dahell do DMs like Brennan and Matt balance their insanely creative final bosses? This fights have VERY swingy terrain features that can straight up murder you, powerful lair actions, powerful spellcasters (a personal bane to balance i have no idea) AND change something basically every turn.
I really wouldn’t know where to start to put down the actual numbers for anything here, there are so many variables opposed to a couple damage variables you can average to make a very educated guess on the actual difficulty it will pose. These fights come up very swingy thanks to all these impediments, without really giving you the chance to average down any expected DPS by the party, and that’s just to decide the enemies’ HP…
How do you put the numbers down on sheets here?
In D20, every fight is cinematic. If you give them the same feel in your game and have an end goal separate from killing monsters, a huge 3d environment and a ticking clock of tension then you’re emulating it perfectly.
I may have not explained myself properly. I understand those are the key “items” to make a very creative and dynamic encounter. My question was, once you have all the ideas and mechanics in mind, how do you go about putting NUMBERS down on enemy sheets, cause it’s not as simple as doing it in an “empty room” environment, where you can average rolls and mathematically pin-point the difficulty of the encounter.