Looking over the Monster and Hazard Creation PDF, I came to the "Damage of Abilities" section. While it calls out area effects as generally requiring basic saving throws, it gives no guidance on how to set the DCs of these abilities. In fact, only auras are given DC guidelines, but none of the other abilities mentioned.
It's easy enough to reverse-engineer the process by looking at examples in the Bestiary, but having no guidelines within the Monster Creation rules themselves seems like a bit of an oversight.
It's not just the DC-by-level of CRB Table 10-5? What process did reverse-engineering from the Bestiary produce?
It's not just the DC-by-level of CRB Table 10-5? What process did reverse-engineering from the Bestiary produce?
Most abilities are just the hard DC for their level (which is the same as the High Spell DC), that is, normal DC + 2. Once you figure it out, the pattern is very consistent. It just seems odd that the rules don't spell out that guideline.
I've just been using the DCs from the spell DC chart.
Just made an errata thread for the document; you could report it there.