Having read a few threads about how optimized characters can do so much damage that combats only last a few turns and how a well designed character can take out high cr monsters by themselves
I was thinking is the cr system up to scratch as it seems that characters are able to dispatch foes well above there APL with little problem does it need an overhaul to bring it in line with character abilities ?
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The CR system has always been more art than science. The truth is no simple formula, like the CR system, can make balanced Pathfinder encounters. The CR system is one of many tools you use to make an encounter fun and challenging. If your players are big optimizers you might need to do a little optimizing of the monsters to reflect that. As always it is a balancing act between challenge and killing the party and finding that sweet spot between the two is unique to each group. I take the CR system for what it is, a useful guideline of how the numbers relate to each other so that I can easily eyeball what group of potential monsters to have in the encounter.
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Beyond what BiggDawg has said, whenever you're reading things on the boards its not usually something like "Here's this character as is, I won't change him" it is or becomes "Here's what I'm trying to do, how do I do it?" and then everything becomes about optimization and figuring out how to do things at the very peak of whatever it was they were trying to do. The boards, in comparison to everyone, is a very small sample of those who play the game and should not really be looked at as "Typical" play.
My 2cp
~NPEH
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It took me a very long time to understand how the CR system worked and even now I very much disagree with how it works. With that I said I have a work around for it.
1: For every participant in a battle raise APL appropriately. This especially includes NPCS, animal companions and eidolons (who are ignored by current CR counts)
2: A CR +4 is statistically an even fight between the party.
3: Never have bosses by themselves, unless they have a special terrain advantage.
4: You goal is to challenge, not kill your players.
The higher level your game goes the wider disparity between a CR's theoretical challenge to a party and its actual challenge, either too easy or too hard.
A high level party will blow through your BBEG in 1 round pretty much every time in a straight up numbers game. Creating challenging encounters is more about enemy troop composition and tactics than the power of the enemies in CR.
Things like the CR system are no more than guidelines; they'll never substitute for a real person deciding how difficult a given encounter is for their particular table.
An encounter that might be a cakewalk for one party might end up being a TPK for another; it all depends on abilities, etc.
In short, CR is a guideline for the inexperienced, not a hard-and-fast rule for the experienced. As you've already noted with the large earth elemental :)
I think the CR is fine as it is. There are some hiccups here and there but that's just part of the Pathfinder charm.
You have to realize that players can create characters that vary wildly in power, while the CR system is adjusted for certain power level and party composition.
Part of the art of GMing is finding out where your players are in comparison to expected power for their level, and then adjust CR from there.
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If I never read the word "broken" again on this board, unless I'm reading about items taking damage, I could live with it.
If I never read the word "broken" again on this board, unless I'm reading about items taking damage, I could live with it.
You and me both, brother.
To be honest while there are issues with the cr system, I think optimization is the issue. The writers have no idea what the power level of a given group is.
For the record I know of two groups in my area that use 15pt buy. One is struggling with rise of the runelords the other is not. My own group uses 20 pt buy and struggles with some encounters. One of the impressions I have gotten is the level of optimization for a lot of games seems to vary a fair bit and be lower than the boards seem to imply.
There are ways to break the limits of CR from the GM side too. Templates that don't add much or anything to the CR of the monster on specific creatures can make PC shredding machines very easily (fast zombie owlbears). Abusing NPC classes like adept and warrior can deliver a surprisingly potent challenge too (budget lightning bolts and powerful archers with low CR).
Some of the "weaker" monsters in combat are often being used outside their intended purpose too. Some are meant to be adds to larger encounters where they give a boost to the challenge, or meant to be annoying distractions that eat up more resources then they should (like fey). Some are meant to be nearly mindless brutes that are easily solved with the right answer, better have the right answer. An example of annoying would be the humble pugwumpi. Yes, players hate these things for good reason, they are far more annoying to deal with than their CR says, but they are still pretty weak. Pair them up with Gnolls, another weak creature for CR, and suddenly you are looking at a dangerous encounter since gnolls are immune to pugwumpis, but PCs often are not. Give some proper class levels to the Gnolls (warriors for the mooks, maybe a ranger for the leader, and an adept spell support) and you are looking at a downright scary encounter without breaking the CR budget for the encounter. You also turned some of the weaker monsters into a good encounter, and even used weak NPC classes to do it.
Getting the most out of the CR system is using the right monster for the right job, and building the encounter in a way that it challenges the PC in ways that keeps them honest (so they don't make the mono purpose hammers that you see so frequently). Last session I did some custom dungeon building as a break from the AP we were playing, and one of the players over specialized in fire damage to the point that he had to effectively sit out 2 out of 5 encounters (immune to fire summons, resist 20 guardian creatures).
Ambush predators are particularly nasty too, often having CRs far too low for their player killing potential. But they tend to be pretty low mobility, so once they are discovered are often quickly dispatched or avoided.
There are ways to break the limits of CR from the GM side too. Templates that don't add much or anything to the CR of the monster on specific creatures can make PC shredding machines very easily (fast zombie owlbears). Abusing NPC classes like adept and warrior can deliver a surprisingly potent challenge too (budget lightning bolts and powerful archers with low CR).
Some of the "weaker" monsters in combat are often being used outside their intended purpose too. Some are meant to be adds to larger encounters where they give a boost to the challenge, or meant to be annoying distractions that eat up more resources then they should (like fey). Some are meant to be nearly mindless brutes that are easily solved with the right answer, better have the right answer. An example of annoying would be the humble pugwumpi. Yes, players hate these things for good reason, they are far more annoying to deal with than their CR says, but they are still pretty weak. Pair them up with Gnolls, another weak creature for CR, and suddenly you are looking at a dangerous encounter since gnolls are immune to pugwumpis, but PCs often are not. Give some proper class levels to the Gnolls (warriors for the mooks, maybe a ranger for the leader, and an adept spell support) and you are looking at a downright scary encounter without breaking the CR budget for the encounter. You also turned some of the weaker monsters into a good encounter, and even used weak NPC classes to do it.
Getting the most out of the CR system is using the right monster for the right job, and building the encounter in a way that it challenges the PC in ways that keeps them honest (so they don't make the mono purpose hammers that you see so frequently). Last session I did some custom dungeon building as a break from the AP we were playing, and one of the players over specialized in fire damage to the point that he had to effectively sit out 2 out of 5 encounters (immune to fire summons, resist 20 guardian creatures).
Ambush predators are particularly...
On breaking the limits of CR,
How do other GMs account for players being afflicted by all hosts of problems such as under geared or level/ability drain/damage?
I find it more and more difficult to balance encounters without a way of taking these things into account. Or the numerous foes who auto shaken you.
I find Ghosts to break the CR system at pretty much any level since you can add on the magic jar effect for free.
One creature I actively despise are Ghouls. They can be taken on by a low level party but man once those fort saves begin to fail they tend to spell a recipe for TPK.
The main thing for GMs is WBL is their core responsibility. If they players are under geared because lack of wealth or chances to gear up its on the GM to remedy that. Ability damage is something that a mid to high level party should be prepared for, and have ways to get rid of qucikly. See WBL issues. IF they have the proper resouces and decided to buy that shiny sword instead of the restore potions/wands, let them suffer for it.
Shaken isn't that big a debuff, the monsters that have it already have lower other stuff to make up for it.
Yeah, Ghouls and Ghosts are nasty. Esp hard video games too.
Another thing I would bring up, party composition and abilities can make a big difference on how tough a given encounter will be. A party without much in the way of ranged combat or access to flight is gonna have a much harder time with flying enemies, a party whose melee relies on crits and sneak attacks will be at a disadvantage against oozes, etc.
There's also the luck factor, when it comes to encounter balance. A low-CR encounter can turn nasty very quickly if one of the enemies is using an x4 crit weapon and gets a lucky roll, or the party is having one of those nights when nobody can roll higher than a 5 on the d20.
At the end of the day, the CR system is based on an average party of average composition using average builds and getting average rolls with normal tactics. That's not going to be the case at most tables, so the CR system is more like a guideline than an ironclad rule.
Another thing about the CR system is that you can't choose any group of monsters and get the same challenge. You have to tailor the encounter to your group. Incoporeal creatures are annoying, and earth elementals hit hard for their CR, but if you can keep them far enough away ranged attacks can wear them down eventually. Flying helps. :)
A ghost's possession via Magic Jar is really really easy to defeat. My PCs always carry a potion of PFE. By the time you start facing Ghosts most clerics should have at least a scroll of Magic Circle against Evil on hand.
- Gauss
CR is about the level of a pc that a monster or group of monsters is supposed to be equal in power to. The thing with this is that equal level of power does not mean equal chances of winning in an encounter. Just like a lvl 5 wizard with the fly spell will probably completely dominate a level 5 melee fighter, so will a Level 5 melee fighter completely dominate a CR 5 monster that brings mostly anti-caster abilities to the table, while a CR 5 diminutive creature swarm will probably beat both of these. There is a certain rock-paper-scissors-lizard-spock element to combat encounters that CR doesn't accommodate (neither does it aim to, this is part of the GM's discretion)
Another part of this is, that CR is aimed towards moderately optimized/unoptimized characters, if your players make clearly bad character builds, they will bemuch weaker than CR expects them to. If they go for full optimization, they will easily need a few points higher CRs to actually pose a challenge.
As others have said, CR isnt really a rule, its a guideline. There are so, so many different elements that can go into how 'difficult' an encounter is that making a pure numerical representation of that that always works is pretty close to impossible.
The base game is set around the following parameters: 15 point buy, humanoid characters who have 2 arms and 2 legs. With a party composition of a guy who hits stuff and gets hit (fighter), a guy who sort of hits stuff and has lots of skills (rogue), a guy who sort of hits stuff and casts divine spells (cleric) and a wizard who does everything else. I've asked the design team on various occasions and they have responded (particularly Jason) that they still have that original party composition in mind when they create content for this game.
But as we all know, the game has expanded, and the concept of 'balance' between the classes is about as clear as mud. For the most part again, the designers are concerned with balance as a function of time in the spotlight, and not in terms of numbers.
So a party(lets call it party 1) of a 2hander barbarian, a blasty sorceror, a bomber alchemist, and an archer inquisitor, might be tangentially similar to the fighter/wizard/cleric/rogue, but there are some signficant differences in terms of their combat potential (and in particular their damage).
Even if you keep the classes close to the original, there can still be differences. Lets say we have a reach weapon combat manuever based Lore Warden, a Controller wizard, a ninja who specializes in stealth, and a summoning specialist cleric (party 2). Here you have most of hte damage coming from the ninja and the cleric's summons, instead of from the fighter, while the fighter and the wizard work to control, contain and limit the enemies instead of directly injuring them.
Party 1 is going to play lots of rocket tag. They do lots of damage, but dont have alot of ability to recover from it quickly or prevent it. Party 2 has the fighter and wizard in delay/control roles, and thus will do less damage per round, but also (most of the time) take less damage per round due to the cotrolling effects of the fighter and the wizard.
Here you have 2 parties, filling out the 4 'roles' of the original 4 classes, but they are very different in their capability. No one monster can measure up precisely the same against both of these parties. And there in lies the challenge of the CR system. And at least as long as the abilities in the game are as varied as they are now, it isnt fixable (in my mind). DMs need to know their parties and what they are capable of.
A ghost's possession via Magic Jar is really really easy to defeat. My PCs always carry a potion of PFE. By the time you start facing Ghosts most clerics should have at least a scroll of Magic Circle against Evil on hand.
- Gauss
While preemptive measures are handy, what happens if you get jumped by said ghost. PFE only gives a second save, and even then doesn't expel a possessive life force.
Beat the crap out of the guy who just got possessed, hit him with PFE after the ghost leaves him, heal him up, then destroy the ghost.
After all, the ghost just made itself a pretty good target by jumping into a flesh suit.
Alternately, Magic Circle against Evil lasts for about an hour minimum. Use Rod of Extend to double that. Many dungeon areas require less than an hour to explore.
Ghosts are not that hard to deal with even if it does drop one of your players out of the combat.
- Gauss
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CR is a great way to measure the comparative power of monsters. It has some "shortcomings", but since there is never going to be a perfect system for building encounters, a big dose of GM investment is warranted.
It's easy for an expert party to trivialize monsters of appropriate CR, and it's easy for GMs to "game" CRs to be much lower than the actual threat merits. These both miss the point of CR.
It's a tool. Putting a laser sight on your rifle helps you hit the mark, it doesn't let you shoot with your eyes closed. CR helps you hone in on the appropriate encounter, but you can't just forget about the party and the players in the equation.
My group takes on challenges of APL+2 as an average encounter, and boss fights from APL +3 and APL+5. This is mostly due to system mastery, but also it's just the way we like the game paced.
Does this mean that I'm agitating for the rules to adjust all CRs upward by two? Hardly. CR is just a scale for comparison.
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CR works fine, especially in PF where we don't have That Damn Crab and similar mistakes.
But to use it effectively you must know the assumptions that went into that number. Not just how many players you have, but what their capabilities were expected to be. There are not one, but TWO T1 classes in the basic CR calculation, and between them they can handle every defense, debuff, and otherwise deleterious effect in the game, while the remaining two pile on the damage. If you mess up the math on this, you will think the system is broken.
Fortunately there are guides to help with that.
Im a 40+ year gamer and only returning to the D&D system after a very long break (20 years!) but I use the CR as a tool but not a hard and fast rule.
I tend to design my world as is, without the player's experience in mind. What they get is what they get. I mean, logically if a certain ruin is inhabited by a bunch of level 10 baddies, a fresh and inexperienced group should figure out pretty quick they shouldnt be there. They might even gather that from rumors and such before they ever go. Similarly if they encounter a band of high level bandits on the road, they should probably consider running, or maybe even handing over their coin pouches rather than risk death.
How they play it is their business but I find it kind of silly that heroes run around in this kind of "managed risk" bubble where ever they go.