How much of a CR adjustment should be made for monsters with half of their normal XP?
(Assuming all other statistics remain the same.)
Yeah... Those aren't issues I see at my table, much.
I'm interested in being able to decrease the hit points of creatures to make them easier to kill, but possibly increase the number of creatures to increase their portion of the action economy.
Sorry... Meant to say HP, not XP...
Here's the revised version...
How much of a CR adjustment should be made for monsters with half of their normal HP?
(Assuming all other statistics remain the same.)
i usually try to reward players where i can, i can see thinking up a CR adjustment for fighting a wounded foe akin to prebuffing, using excessive volume of consumables, or presummoning before the fight, a cheap way to cheat players out of XP or treasure
Valid by RAW, but doesn't change the fact it is cheap
now, letting monsters use the wealth in their possession to better gear themselves with stuff they can reliably use, i understand. such as using some of an Ogre Magi's Excess wealth to make it's bow masterwork or equip it with a longspear instead of a greatsword, or swapping out a monsters feats and prepared or known spells (or SLAS) within reason, i don't have an issue with
but if you apply Ad-Hoc CR adjustments for monsters whom expended resources they lack the ability to currently use, i would recommend doing the same for the APL of PCs in a similar scenario
i agree that a wizard low on spells isn't as challenging as a wizard whom just awakened and finished preparing his spells, but if one wizard gets an adjustment like that, they all should, PC and NPC alike
a wounded opponent is easier, but i think the whole reason the OP wants to include wounded opponents is so he can increase the action economy. a wounded foe does not balance the action economy that bringing a second foe entails, a monster deals the same damage whether he only has 1 hit point, or a million hit points, and hit points are an irrelevant resource to creatures with regeneration, a massive amount of defenses, resistances and immunities, fast healing, or at will/spammable healing spells, creatures whom specialized in ranged spellcasting, creatures whom negate lotsa attacks, or something similar
Thank you for the perspective.
I did notice that there were a few places in published (3.5) adventures where CRs were lowered because a monster was inadequately equipped or deliberately made weaker than the standard version in order to hit a desired CR.
I was hoping that by decreasing monster hit points by 50%, that I could at least drop the CR by 1 (if not 2).
And, this wouldn't be a wounded hit point total. It would be the creature's new fully healed total.
Thank you for the perspective.
I did notice that there were a few places in published (3.5) adventures where CRs were lowered because a monster was inadequately equipped or deliberately made weaker than the standard version in order to hit a desired CR.
I was hoping that by decreasing monster hit points by 50%, that I could at least drop the CR by 1 (if not 2).
And, this wouldn't be a wounded hit point total. It would be the creature's new fully healed total.
look at the monster creation charts in the back of the bestiary as a guideline
it takes a weakening of more than just hit points, you have to affect spells, defenses, DCs, attributes and other numbers to balance it for the new CR.
simply halving hit points and reducing the CR by 1 isn't a good idea. you have to reduce a lot more than just hit points
the weakened monsters do little to compensate for the increased action economy. but the impact of Gear is irrelevent for specific monsters that are so powerful as not to need it. a T-rex in full plate would be OP, though it is legit if owned by another intelligent owner.
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While reducing the creature's hit points certainly make it faster to slay (if your party can hurt it) the way the game works that doesn't actually make it any less effective at what it does.
It would really be dependent on your group.
Reduced hit points for a monster without a very high armor class versus a low level party that say, has a barbarian with a greatsword is could be a fair 1 CR reduction. Or against a higher level party that has a wizard that loves to use the Power Word spells, making the creature easier to affect could make it easy enough too.
Umbriere is really right though. Without a lot more information of the kind of monster/your party/etc just flat out reduction of hit points doesn't really warrant it.
The quick young template is a good method. Just tossing -2 to the dice roles and reducing 2 hit points a hit die certainly would be a fair -1 CR.
Thank you, both, for the input.
Much appreciated.