Challenge rating

[Skarg]

Originally Posted by JohnPaulB

I wanted a rough way to let the potential player know how hard the ITL "dungeon" or scenario will be. How about this?

• 0 Level Dungeon: No real fighting expected unless the players do something really stupid. Or fighting is against a few, 'under 32 point' characters.
  
  
• 1st Level Dungeon: Fighting is against 32 - 33 point characters or simple monsters.
  
  
• 2nd Level Dungeon: Fighting is against mostly 32 - 33 point characters, with some 34 - 36 point characters or simple monsters with one or two complex monsters or simple traps.
  
  
• 3rd Level Dungeon: Fighting is against mostly 34 - 36 point characters, with some 37 - 38 point characters or several complex monsters or some complex traps.
  
  
• 4th Level Dungeon: Fighting is against mostly 38+ point characters, with some 40 point characters or difficult monsters or difficult traps.
  
  
• 5th Level Dungeon: Fighting is against mostly 40 point characters, monsters and traps difficult and constant.

Doesn't have to be this nomenclature. Could be:
Easy; Beginner; Average; Hard; Very Hard; Killer.

I think there's a fundamental issue with framing what's in a game world based on difficulty level. It tends to lead to the difficulty framework actually being a primary cause of what is and isn't in the world, where things are, etc.

Difficulty is important to be able to assess so that characters can have an idea who is likely to kill them in a fight, and to award appropriate experience. We developed our alternate experience awards system because we noticed it was vastly more efficient (in terms of EP for risk) to slaughter nearly-harmless shadowights or untrained hobgoblins than it was to defeat someone more formidable than you were, which was clearly very backwards/wrong/unfun.

I think it's far more interesting and immersive if a GM plots out what is where in their gameworld based on what makes sense to be where, and then later observes how dangerous places are, than if he places threats based on an idea that there should be places which have certain strengths of opponents because they are supposed to be a certain level of difficulty.

In particular, looking at the above categories, it might or might not be literally what you meant, but I'm worried by the wording that there would be only five categories of place, and that several of them say that "most" people in them would be outside the most common normal categories (i.e. 28-33 points). That is, I would not expect that many of even the most dangerous adventure locations would have a majority of exceptionally skilled people, unless it's the stronghold of some elite group.

And of course, in TFT the situation tends to be even more important that the point totals. Not just in terms of characters' talents and equipment, but in terms of what ends up happening, how many foes get met at once, and in what layout, how the foes behave and what tactics they use, etc.