CR question

[Piece]

Eric and others stop reading now!

So party is, Monk lvl 11, Cleric 11, Fighter 10, Witch 10, Rogue 9, Barb 9, Inq 9.

Monsters 1 CR13, 1 CR12, 1 CR7, 4 CR4

I have it as a APL +4 or 5. Am I right or way off?
By the way this as a campaign ending fight and the party will be fresh.

[Piece]

Old white dragon cr 13
Homebrew monster cr 12
Frost drake cr 7
Harpy x4 cr 4

[Ian Bell]

It's more like APL +2.5 or so because the party is so large. Will still be likely to kill some people because of the big difference between the level 9 guys and the CR 13 dragon.

[KainPen]

Make it CR 15 dragon by add a half fiend template to it. keep to them ignore harpy's waste of time they will be push overs. Add 3 frost drakes with fiendish template.

the homebew monster is going to really through a wrench in to the mix as their is no way to really tell if it truly a cr 12 monsters.

environment also play into the encounter, and it's effectiveness of the monster.

ignore CR's they are a waste of time since they fall apart when you have large parties because treasure gets divided way to many times, characters end up behind on gear or even xp.

your guys are all over the place in level. when you have this many player best to ignore xp all together, and just level at set points in your story. Then you don't end up with this odd number as everyone is the same level. It a bit easier to find encounters for them.

It is the last fight go big or go home lol. If they die if they win then and it easy does not matter more power to them.

real question is that the encounter you want to run?

[Malag]

According to Gamemastering Guidelines, the APL of entire party is ~11. Their average encounter is CR 11, challenging encounter is CR 12 and most epic encounter is CR 14.

According to my personal guidelines, the most epic, yet fair enough encounter that party can defeat, is between CR 15 to CR 16, so I would probably use CR 12 to CR 13 as regular challenging encounter. I usually calculate the CR of PCs and add it all together in order to reach maximum epic encounter that they can encounter.

Your encounter is around ~CR 15, which according to Gamemastering Guidelines is APL +4 I believe.

Adam

[Piece]

Thanks for the quick responses guys! The reason for lvl difference is do to character deaths. I would have them a level behind with new characters. Another player joined half way in and had him start behind also, but maybe I'll change that rule next time for simplicity.

[Malag]

I had the similar rule before, but it pretty much becomes a burden to both GM and a player. Now, every new character starts at the same level, but I usually control a bit what they can buy so that new characters do not start stronger then the current ones.

Adam

[KainPen]

I cannot 2nd what Malag said enough.

Character death's should not have effective them. Dying does not actual take away a level any more like it did in 3.0 D&D. it just grants negative level based on how they where raised. which is a status just - 1 to all skill checks, attacks, saves, abilities function as one level lower and -5 hp per negative level. you don't actual lose the levels. So you may owe those guys their levels back lol.

I think pathfinder changed that so people would not just said screw it and make a new character and start at the same level as the rest of the party. Because of that in the past I used do what where doing Piece make them start new characters at 1 level lower then rest of the party and same for new players. to make it fair for those that did not die or have been playing longer then other. I find since that rule change I actual have players swapping characters less and actual seeking restoration to get rid of negative levels.

but keeping everyone the same level and ignoring xp and only really having to monitor treasure of people that make new characters. Is really useful and saves so much time on the GM side. I don't even worry about wealth by level any more, I just run the encounters I want to run. If my group is large and I am running a AP or prewritten game. I just had a few more monsters and adjust said treasure to adjust for the number of players. it tend to balance it self out that way.