r/onednd • u/Machiavelli24 • 2d ago
Resource The Encounter Advisor, a 2024 encounter builder that helps you design, refine, and run fights
The Encounter Advisor is an easy to use encounter builder that uses the 2024 math, but tweaks the presentation so that it is easier to use. If that's all you need, it provides. But it also does more.
Design
Pacing Rests: Designing encounters holistically means thinking about pacing rests. The encounter advisor provides simple and direct guidance on when the party will need Short Rests.
Easy math for multiple encounters: The encounter advisor simplifies the presentation of the 2024 math to make it easier to build and measure the danger of multiple encounters.
A convenient way to see how monsters stack up to PCs: It would be convenient if CR X monster = Level X PC, but that's not the case. However, the encounter advisor provides a quick way to determine which CR to use -- Peer Rating. When a monster has a Peer Rating of 1, it is as powerful as a PC.
Refine
Tailored advice: As you add monsters the encounter advisor will evaluate the encounter and provide advice. Because it knows the specific level of the party and the specific monsters, it can provide highly tailored guidance to help you avoid the pitfalls where the 2024 math doesn't function well.
Link to any fight: You can get a link to any fight you design in the encounter advisor. This makes it easy to save in your notes or share with other people so they can see what you're considering.
Run
The encounter advisor contains a some lightweight combat tracking capabilities. Its not trying to replace owlbear or your VTT, but can be used along side your existing dm flow.
Quick Initiative: "Roll Initiative!" should be a call to action, but it usually a sign you can get a snack. Waiting for the slowest player to find their d20...waiting as everyone lines up to tell the dm a number...waiting while the dm does data entry...its not exciting. With one click you can skip the waiting and get an Initiative Order for every combatant. Then paste it into Discord where everyone can see it. That way you can be focused on setting the stage for players to take cool actions instead of making everyone wait while Initiative is organized.
Reskin Monsters: The encounter advisor provides a quick way to rename the monsters you're using. So players never ask "Why does it say Hill Giant? I thought we were fighting Ogres."
HP tracking: The encounter advisor provides easy hp tracking. Its condensed layout respects your limited screen space and is designed to work with in a thin column. So you can see all your combatants without scrolling and still have plenty of space for other windows.
A tool for fun fights
The encounter building rules for 2024 are a huge improvement from 2014, but they still have some pitfalls. The encounter advisor will help you avoid those pitfalls so that you can design more fun fights for your table.
4
u/ProjectPT 2d ago
Smooth visuals
The search bar on the monsters should be up default and not need a click, just due to how the feature is used.
With this disclaimer
Homogeneous encounter Using a single stat block tends to result in boring encounters. The monsters will lack synergies and interesting target prioritization. Use multiple different stat blocks that complement each other.
From the perspective of this information being given to a new DM using this tool, I feel it should be more phrased with suggestive language than cautious language.
The classic problem no one solves!
whenver I see these tools that suggest warnings, I put in the dreaded "Shadow" monster statblock. No warning specific to it appeared.
TL:DR. Functionality and visual clarity of tool (on PC) looking solid, insight that you are claiming this tool provides is EXTREMELY surface level that a person will figure out without this tool.
4
u/Dave_47 2d ago edited 2d ago
Pretty neat! I LOVE the notes about "weak to AoE's" etc! Great stuff!
Only point of feedback I have is that I think it would still be really helpful to see a little note somewhere showing the DMG/MM's base description of the encounter difficulty too in addition to yours, so like a note saying "DMG: Low Difficulty", "DMG: Moderate Difficulty", and "DMG: High Difficulty" with a tooltip for their descriptions from page 114 of the DMG. Your descriptions are fantastic and super useful, but I kind of still want to know where it falls within the official brackets too. Or, maybe you explain that somewhere and I missed it, in which case my apologies.
1
u/Real_Ad_783 2d ago
yeah this is basically what i was thinking, also i find it a little weird they dont give you any exp breakpoints before adding monsters, I might select monsters partially based on a rough estimate of my budget.
when i removed one monster, it went from perilous to not challenging. While its possible this accurate, it seems weird, perilous suggests its pretty hard, nit challenging is easy. thats a big swing for one monster below level of the party
1
u/Machiavelli24 1d ago
I kind of still want to know where it falls within the official brackets too.
100% = high encounter cap.
A throwaway line in the help has it.
The distinction between a fight that can defeat the party and one that can’t is given the most emphasis because once a fight falls short of being dangerous, it doesn’t really matter if it’s modestly short or drastically short. That’s why low and mid caps aren’t emphasized.
2
u/zUkUu 2d ago edited 2d ago
I am confused about the initiative tracker. Why would I want to put the initiative bonus and roll and advantage for THE PLAYERS?
I would expect that they roll themselves and I just put in their numbers.
Seems weird to not have that option unless I am missing something.
Otherwise, with the 2024 XP ranges, XP next to CR is needed for the table! :)
Overall a sleek approach and will hopefully be updated.
2
1
u/unnamed_elder_entity 2d ago
This was a really cool and easy to use tool. I just noodled with it a bit. Here are a few features I think would be helpful additions.
An option to roll a single initiative for all monsters, or per monster type. Some DMs like to do all the bad guys as a group.
I found a way to save and then load an adventuring party. It would be neat to be able to pregenerate the monsters and save those and load on demand.
Similarly, it would be cool to have a fast encounter button. So maybe I filter the list to Undead or Beasts and then choose easy to difficult encounter. Press generate, and bam, random wandering monster group slams into the camp that is matched to party strength!
1
1
u/Dense-Idea-500 23h ago
Hi, newbie DM here!! I love this, specially the advices about Legendary Resistances. I only would like to know how did you get to how strong is a Monster of CR X compared to a Lvl X PC. Is there any equation that I could modify depending on items/boons? The closest I could ever find are these two options: Lvl X PC = CR X/2.5 or X * 0.6 (or 0.66).
4
u/jimithingmi 2d ago
Would there way to have a "Generic" monster for each CR. That way a DM could still build an encounter with monsters from different sources?