Pyramid's Combat Effectiveness Rating for Foes

[Jürgen Hubert]

Another thought:

The article also defines the monster rating terms "Nuisance", "Fodder", "Worthy", "Boss", and "Epic". These depend on the ratio of the party's CER to the monster's CER.

However, since it is not always practicable to keep track of the party's CER, I suggest we figure out the CER of a typical party of delvers. The first step would be to write up fairly optimized characters using the Dungeon Fantasy templates, as Dungeon Fantasy stat blocks. I suggest starting with the traditional Knight, Cleric, Thief, and Wizard as the "default party".

Then we can calculate the CER for these, and then we can determine which monsters would rate as "Nuisance", "Fodder", etc for this party. This should serve as a useful benchmark for GMs who also run Dungeon Fantasy games...

[Christopher R. Rice]

Originally Posted by Jürgen Hubert

Another thought:

The article also defines the monster rating terms "Nuisance", "Fodder", "Worthy", "Boss", and "Epic". These depend on the ratio of the party's CER to the monster's CER.

However, since it is not always practicable to keep track of the party's CER, I suggest we figure out the CER of a typical party of delvers. The first step would be to write up fairly optimized characters using the Dungeon Fantasy templates, as Dungeon Fantasy stat blocks. I suggest starting with the traditional Knight, Cleric, Thief, and Wizard as the "default party".

Then we can calculate the CER for these, and then we can determine which monsters would rate as "Nuisance", "Fodder", etc for this party. This should serve as a useful benchmark for GMs who also run Dungeon Fantasy games...

When I wrote "It's a Threat!" this was something that was a part of my original goals, but after realizing that there was no such thing as a "default party," I gave up. You simply cannot account for every bit of equipment or trait choice there is and expect to be sane by the end of it. If I were you, I would organize them in blocks of CER. Say, 1-25, 26-50, 51-75, and so on. This way you don't use definitions that are by their vary nature going to change depending on the GM's campaign.

[Jürgen Hubert]

Originally Posted by Ghostdancer

When I wrote "It's a Threat!" this was something that was a part of my original goals, but after realizing that there was no such thing as a "default party," I gave up. You simply cannot account for every bit of equipment or trait choice there is and expect to be sane by the end of it. If I were you, I would organize them in blocks of CER. Say, 1-25, 26-50, 51-75, and so on. This way you don't use definitions that are by their vary nature going to change depending on the GM's campaign.

Of course - every campaign is different.

Still, since these stat blocks were originally for Dungeon Fantasy, it might be a useful exercise to figure out a sample "default party" based on the templates of the line. And "Warrior (Knight)", "Cleric", "Rogue (Thief)", and "Wizard" are the "default party" for D&D, which inspired GURPS Dungeon Fantasy.

[Christopher R. Rice]

Originally Posted by Jürgen Hubert

Of course - every campaign is different.

Still, since these stat blocks were originally for Dungeon Fantasy, it might be a useful exercise to figure out a sample "default party" based on the templates of the line. And "Warrior (Knight)", "Cleric", "Rogue (Thief)", and "Wizard" are the "default party" for D&D, which inspired GURPS Dungeon Fantasy.

While I wouldn't dream of telling you how to set up your website (or run your games!), your "default party" has a few problems:

1. What your "default" is for "warrior," "cleric," "rogue," and "wizard" are not going to be the same for everyone. This is why I ultimately left it out because I knew that it was going to be basically a waste of space I could put things in that WOULD be useful (like tables with tallied CERs).
   
2. Even if you come up with default archetypes how will you account for equipment? Even using the loadouts from DF 13 is going to be challenging because players aren't going to use just those alone.
   
3. Assuming you do get the above issues solved, how will you account for advantage and skill choices for archetypes? Especially the spellcasting ones or templates with lots of points for choices like the Knight? There are going to be hundreds of combinations and what you consider the "best" traits will not be what someone else will think.

Again, instead of assembling a default party just put them in clear groupings of CER totals. This is going to making it easy for GMs because they can easily go down the list "Oh, my delvers' party has CER 300 so 6 or 7 Waldorian Spike Rats ought to do the trick since they each have a CER of 25."

[Langy]

Originally Posted by Ghostdancer

While I wouldn't dream of telling you how to set up your website (or run your games!), your "default party" has a few problems:

1. What your "default" is for "warrior," "cleric," "rogue," and "wizard" are not going to be the same for everyone. This is why I ultimately left it out because I knew that it was going to be basically a waste of space I could put things in that WOULD be useful (like tables with tallied CERs).
   
2. Even if you come up with default archetypes how will you account for equipment? Even using the loadouts from DF 13 is going to be challenging because players aren't going to use just those alone.
   
3. Assuming you do get the above issues solved, how will you account for advantage and skill choices for archetypes? Especially the spellcasting ones or templates with lots of points for choices like the Knight? There are going to be hundreds of combinations and what you consider the "best" traits will not be what someone else will think.

Again, instead of assembling a default party just put them in clear groupings of CER totals. This is going to making it easy for GMs because they can easily go down the list "Oh, my delvers' party has CER 300 so 6 or 7 Waldorian Spike Rats ought to do the trick since they each have a CER of 25."

How high is the CER variance within a DF party of four built strictly to the templates and loadouts, though? Is it actually going to be enough to matter?

[Nymdok]

Originally Posted by Ghostdancer

When I wrote "It's a Threat!" this was something that was a part of my original goals, but after realizing that there was no such thing as a "default party," I gave up. You simply cannot account for every bit of equipment or trait choice there is and expect to be sane by the end of it. If I were you, I would organize them in blocks of CER. Say, 1-25, 26-50, 51-75, and so on. This way you don't use definitions that are by their vary nature going to change depending on the GM's campaign.

Originally Posted by Jürgen Hubert

Another thought:

The article also defines the monster rating terms "Nuisance", "Fodder", "Worthy", "Boss", and "Epic". These depend on the ratio of the party's CER to the monster's CER.

However, since it is not always practicable to keep track of the party's CER, I suggest we figure out the CER of a typical party of delvers. The first step would be to write up fairly optimized characters using the Dungeon Fantasy templates, as Dungeon Fantasy stat blocks. I suggest starting with the traditional Knight, Cleric, Thief, and Wizard as the "default party".

Then we can calculate the CER for these, and then we can determine which monsters would rate as "Nuisance", "Fodder", etc for this party. This should serve as a useful benchmark for GMs who also run Dungeon Fantasy games...

Honestly Gents, I dont think its going to matter. My advice is pick a set of average stats and compare to those for consistency with the caveat that everyone will understand the comparrison to those.

My advice is use these:

Attack : 16
DMG : 1d+3
DR : 3
AD : 14
HT: 12
HP : 13
FP : 13

This is, based on DF1, a slightly less than average DF adventurer. Note that it doesnt include templates past DF1 which would adjust these numbers.

Compare, as you like, to whatever starting set of stats you settle on all the way up the scale, similar to clothing sizes.

Epic
E2
E3
E4
E5
and so on and so on and so on.....


YOu see at the end of the day, the specifics of the numbers doesnt matter as much as they first appear. What DOES matter is that the GM has a reliable estimate for a monster X, and some knowledge of how the party did last time vs Y so that he can then make convenient and educated decisions about upcomming encounter Z.

You see some players are just tactically minded and love the 'game' part of the game and those groups will have a slight advantage that you simply cant account for by looking at either monsters or templates. Some players are fiercely resourceful and inventive and they will have an advantage as well. Some ARENT and they will be a slight disadvantage REGARDLESS of what the numbers on the CharSheet/StatBlock say.

Being able to make differential arguments against standardized evaluations is still EXTREMELY USEFUL!

Examples:

We did Fodder last time and that was tougher than I thought it would be but not a TPK. Lets stick with Fodder till they get a chance to 'level up'.

Well last time we did Worthies and it was a cake walk, but the crits rained down in a deluge, so we should hold it here.

Well we did Epic last time and I knew that was going to be difficult but DANG they barely made it out alive and they're still scraping together money to Rez the Elf. Maybe well dial it down a bit.

JUST using these as comparators it allows you to make adjustments regardless of what the numeric values of the CERs are for the party. As long as the party doesnt change, what youre looking at is the CER of the monsters.

Does that make sense?

See as long as we stick to Ghostdancer's system consistently theres nothing really to fear. Well all, even though we have vastly different parties, are going to evaluate monsters more or less the same way. There is going to be some variance in that surely but not as much as you might think, especially in DF.

So we might not all agree on what makes a party for any given table, but if we all agree what Troll from DFM:1 is and what its CER value is, then we can make OUR OWN estimates, based on the abilites of the parties in our group (AND THE TACTICAL ABILITIES OF THE PLAYERS THEMSELVES).


Nymdok

Did that come off as ranty? it felt ranty....I didnt mean for it to be ranty.....

[Rasputin]

Go with broad ranges, like by 50. I did go through DFA1, found that the average CER of the sample characters therein scaled down to 250 points was 150 for four, and that it varies wildly. It doesn't even have a strong correlation with character points. Ghostdancer has a point: different campaigns will have different results.

[Christopher R. Rice]

Originally Posted by Langy

How high is the CER variance within a DF party of four built strictly to the templates and loadouts, though? Is it actually going to be enough to matter?

Enough that if done using all the templates in the core Dungeon Fantasy books, using the core gear load outs, and a rule for guesstimating the effectiveness of optional trait choices (which, by the way, did not work!) produced gobbledy**** that was just not useful.

Originally Posted by Nymdok

...snip...

Yeah, this is something I couldn't cover in much detail but falls under the heading "Gamemasters, know thy players!" For my games, all characters are "created equal" in that they are optimized to whatever concept the player wanted. But having a player know the rules for combat, magic, whatever acts as a force multiplier for that player's character - they are far more effective than their character would otherwise indicated because they know the system. Let's also not forget the player who has awesome dice rolls. I have tow such players in my group - one whose "luck" (or however you wish to call it) is not so constant, but enough that it's noticeable and the other whose luck is constant. She regularly rolls a 3 or 4 every session, crits between 5 to 10 times, and almost never fumbles. She's been accused of using loaded dice - but she usually replies by rolling the accuser's dice to the same effect. This works regardless of system, die types, resolution, etc. - if their is a measure of probability involved (dice, cards, whatever) she'll get the best results often enough that it seems nearly impossible. Basically, I don't play games of chance with my other half - I never win - especially poker.

Originally Posted by Rasputin

Go with broad ranges, like by 50. I did go through DFA1, found that the average CER of the sample characters therein scaled down to 250 points was 150 for four, and that it varies wildly. It doesn't even have a strong correlation with character points. Ghostdancer has a point: different campaigns will have different results.

I specifically did not scale it to points because as we all know, points do not act as a measure of power.

Again, as a game designer the first thing I think of when writing is "How useful is this to other GMs/players?" or "Can I make it more generic?" If you are assigning your monsters to CERs that aren't going to be used anyways because of the very nature of the system you're deriving the label from, how can that be helpful? It's literally going to vary from group to group so all you are doing is creating a artificial construct that no one will use in the first place. I think part of the problem here is that the previous categories used the Fodder/Worthy/Boss model. I kept that model, but used it differently. If you're going to use CERs, then use the same model - group them by their rating and then move on. That's the easiest way to help the most people in my opinion. I know I'm going to go back and update all my Triple Threat monsters to use a CER too (I'm just going to shove it on a stat line though.

[Christopher R. Rice]

As an aside, can I get one or two folks to double check for errata for this article? I'm going to send some in, and I want to make sure I got it all.

• (p. 31) "Add 1 per 5 character points (rounded up) for traits like Rapid Healing, Recovery, Regeneration, etc." Recovery should be Regrowth.
• (p. 34) The peshkali's OR should be 33 in the table. Total CER 137.
• (p. 30) "Lady Ion has Dodge 9 and Broadsword Parry 12, so 2 ¥ (9 - 8) = 2 ¥ 1 = 2 and 12 - 8 = 4. Since her Parry is higher, we use that." should be Lady Ion has Dodge 9 and Broadsword Parry 12, so 2 ¥ (9 - 8) = 2 and 12 - 8 = 4.. Since her Parry is higher, we use that."

[Langy]

Enough that if done using all the templates in the core Dungeon Fantasy books, using the core gear load outs, and a rule for guesstimating the effectiveness of optional trait choices (which, by the way, did not work!) produced gobbledy**** that was just not useful.

Can you give a quantitative description of 'gobbledy****'? Are we talking 'one build of four reasonable starting DF characters had a total 100 CER, while another had a total of 400 CER', or more along the lines of '100 to 150' or even '100 to 200'?

Really, just an 'Iconic Party' would be helpful even if they aren't perfectly generic.