D&D 5E Encounter Building with a 7 player party

[JiffyPopTart]

Due to the mysteries of the warp our group went from 4 to 7 players in just a couple months. Coincidentally, it was during these couple months we quit our 13th Age campaign and decided to transition to a new 5e campaign.

7 players is a LOT of players. More than I am used to GMing for. On top of this hurdle, since 5e is brand new I don't have any experience yet designing balanced combats for any number of players.

According to the DMG Basic Rulebook, encounter design follows these steps...
1. Choose if the encounter is Easy, Medium, Hard, or Deadly (Medium for this example)
2. Add up the XP from all the characters to determine your encounter budget (7 2nd level PC's = 700XP)
3. Spend the XP on creatures, sticking to CR ratings not much higher than the average PC level (CR 2 in my case)
4. Multiply the XP value of the creatures by a multiple that changes as you choose more monsters (This is where it gets annoying as removing a creature drops the multiplier, which then frees up some cap room, which then you pick a slightly cheaper creature to fill up hoping it doesn't push you past the cap when you once again change your multiplier)

My actual question is this: Since the party is so large (7 PCs) do you think my encounters would be better balanced by adjusting the modifiers in step 4 down to allow for larger monster groups? I am thinking of shifting the existing multipliers down one category and adding a X -.5 for a single monster.

We are planning a shake-out cruise first adventure with no penalty for dying while I try out various power levels to try to get things dialed in correctly. The reason the suggestions seem to not work correctly is that according to the design a "medium" encounter for 7 second level PCs is 4 hobgoblins. It doesn't seem like 4 hobgoblins would be much of a speedbump for 7 PCs. They have a great AC and can dish some damage (perhaps piling on enough damage to KO the druidbear), but have so few HP that the wizard/bard/druid/cleric are going to eat them for breakfast.

 

[JiffyPopTart]

Oops! I had been working off of a printout. I just checked the electronic file and saw the last page detailing how to accommodate larger parties in the math.

It turns out my gut feeling was right, they suggested shifting for a party of 6-8. I should trust my eye and experience.

Please add your large party balance experience though. I can always use advice!

 

[Tormyr]

I have 7 players in my 3.5 adventure path conversion. Single enemies go down quickly. Always throw in a couple of minions to up the difficulty on a boss fight so the boss does not go down too quickly. Follow the encounter building guidelines until you have a good feel for the difficulty and danger of encounters. Single creatures of a CR equal to the party level can still take someone down if they have surprise.

If you are unsure about the difficulty of an encounter. Only place 2/3 of the creatures. If it looks like the party will wrap things up too quickly, bring in the other 1/3 quickly as reinforcements.

Long story short, follow the encounter building guidelines until you have a feel for what you are doing, and stretch the party by increasing the number of encounters before they get a long rest. Frequently my party is out of spells by the time they get to a long rest.

 

[Falcon10275]

how the heck do you guys get 7 players to play? My friend and I can basically only get him and I to actually show up regularly to play. I am very jealous of all you guys that have these huge groups. It sounds like a ton of fun.

 

[The_Gneech]

At seven players, you're getting dangerously close to "split into two table and elect callers" territory; I can't imagine any given player getting satisfactory spotlight time. With that many players, you might want to switch to an open table setup, a la The West Marches.

In any case I wish you luck with it! It's going to be a challenge.

-The Gneech

 

[Tormyr]

how the heck do you guys get 7 players to play? My friend and I can basically only get him and I to actually show up regularly to play. I am very jealous of all you guys that have these huge groups. It sounds like a ton of fun.

We have been very fortunate to have a group that sticks together. Encounters fell apart at our store at the end of Murder in Baldur's Gate and partway into Legacy of the Crystal Shard. I offered to take over as DM (Our current DM was unhappy with the new Encounters format, and we spent 4 sessions and had not made it to Icewind Dale yet) and started at the beginning of January. We got to Icewind Dale and did as much as we could.

At this point, the other two tables were going through lots of upheaval. They had started running Age of Worms under the play test rules, but the attendance was fickle. Sometimes DMs did not show up, sometimes players did not show up. Meanwhile, I could see that everyone was unhappy continually starting over with new characters in new Encounters seasons. So we decided to play Age of Worms as well, but we agreed to start later so that we would only have to run the first couple chapters under the play test rules. We ran Mines of Madness for a couple of months as filler. In the meantime, I prepped for the first chapter of Age of Worms. This would be my first adventure path, and I wanted to be prepared. I made terrain like DMScotty, including LED lights for the lanterns in the first dungeon, and spent a long time converting creatures to D&D next. By the time we started, the players loved the visual appeal and the interesting creatures, but more importantly, the had played weekly together for several months and liked the thought of setting out on a new campaign.

Okay. So now that I got all that info out of my head, I think I can actually answer your question. Public play gave the opportunities to meet new people, and playing on a weekly basis with people who honored the social contract allowed the group to gel. We have a lot of fun too. People rarely if ever miss a session. I have missed 2 Wednesdays since the start of the year. After every chapter, we take a break for 1 session and get together to play a board game like Formula De or X-Wing Miniatures.

 

[Tormyr]

At seven players, you're getting dangerously close to "split into two table and elect callers" territory; I can't imagine any given player getting satisfactory spotlight time. With that many players, you might want to switch to an open table setup, a la The West Marches.

In any case I wish you luck with it! It's going to be a challenge.

-The Gneech

5 to 6 people is my preference. Because we were the only thing going at our store for a while, I would let anyone join and then funnel them into another group the following week. Most of the time we have actually been at 6 people because one guy with the Air Force has been on deployment since April. He returned last week and we had a recap episode. Another player had to be off to Mexico for a few weeks because he had to renew his visa. He is finally returning next week.

We do several things to keep people engaged. One, we have a small white board that has everyone's names on white board magnets. A player on the other end of the table writes down everyone's initiative on the magnets and rearranges them in order. That way, everyone knows when they come up in the initiative order. We roll damage with the d20 to save time. And there is lots of banter to keep everyone in a good mood. Thankfully, the game store has large tables. We can fit the DM at one end, two players at the other, and 3 players on each side.

Everyone contributes. I am amazed that you can have a halfling rogue/monk or a half gnoll paladin with 9 Charisma and they all still work. Spotlight is more of an issue, but in the first two chapters, we have had significant story elements with the Tiefling Wizard who weaves magic into the food he cooks, the human cleric who is secretly the bastard son of the corrupt mine manager of the town, the low charisma paladin who succeeds on every persuasion roll and who will eventually have a vision of Heironeous and become a chosen of Heironeous, the halfling rogue/monk who was 1 shotted at level 1 but was brought back to life by a strange infernal relic she possessed, the monk who is seeking revenge for the loss of his sailor crew, the deranged elf eldritch knight who likes to stab stuff and found a sentient sword that mirrors her personality (and when the party is betrayed this week, she will have to resist killing the betrayer while the sword commands her to execute him), and the dragonborn wizard spy who was on a secret mission (player was on air force deployment) and just rejoined the party.

I explained at the beginning that with our larger table, I would strive to make sure that everyone was able to contribute, but I also explained that there would be a roving spotlight. Some story elements would work into certain characters, and the other players would have to wait for plot elements to be wound into their stories. So far, everyone bar the dragonborn have had significant events, and they are having fun (which is the best part, because so am I).

But, yeah, 8 people is my absolute limit and I prefer no more than 6.

 

[trentonjoe]

I run a 7 player game. I use the rules for encounter building, the fights are a little soft but not a lot.

 

[PeelSeel2]

6 Players would be awesome. Typically we have 8-10 players. Encounter planning can be difficult. So far trying it 5e's method has given satisfactory results. More experience with 5e is required to really dial it in. I was surprised 5e works with a larger group, but it does nicely.

 

[Nemio]

Perhaps you can check out the Encounter Builder from Asmor on the DnD reddit.
http://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/2hen4a/if_youre_interested_in_my_encounter_builder/

Do you get the same results then?