PFRPG2 GM Enhancement extension

[MaxAstro]

FWIW, the Paizo forums can't seem to agree either. XD Everyone agrees that an exactly on-budget Severe encounter is worth 120XP no matter how many players are in the party. But so far there doesn't seem to be consensus on what encounters that don't land right on budget are worth.

[Montis]

If there are more or less than 4 players you could display two XP numbers: "XP budget" and "XP awarded". The XP awarded would be recalculated based on the number of players. And as the encounter budget per player is linear, just use:

XP x 4 / [number of players]

After that you match this number with the closest threat level and you should be good to go.

(I'm sorry if my thinking is incorrect or I'm explaining this badly, a bit sleep deprived at the moment )

[Trenloe]

What about extreme+ XP? Should we keep reward XP capped to 160?

I wouldn't artificially set a cap - then you're restricting people. As I mentioned in post #157 the Core Rules state "each character gains XP equal to the total XP of the creatures and hazards in the encounter (this excludes XP adjustments for different party sizes...)" so it's possible that a GM could create a very extreme encounter with a total XP award of more than 160xp.

[dsaraujo]

I mean for the award, not the budget. How much should we award for a 4PCs party of level 1 fighting 10 L1 goblins? 160, due to an extreme encounter, or 400, due to 10 goblins at L+0?

[Trenloe]

I mean for the award, not the budget. How much should we award for a 4PCs party of level 1 fighting 10 L1 goblins? 160, due to an extreme encounter, or 400, due to 10 goblins at L+0?

"each character gains XP equal to the total XP of the creatures and hazards in the encounter (this excludes XP adjustments for different party sizes...)"

So, yes, 10 Party Level goblins would be 400xp.

The threat level is just the guidelines that give a rough structure to work within and also the character adjustment for a party of other than 4 PCs.

[MaxAstro]

If it helps, my post on the Paizo forums got a pretty detailed reply from Mathmuse breaking down the math of encounters and how he handles it.

pf2math.png

If I'm reading that correctly, it kind of sounds like you can calculate the XP award from the budget by multiplying by 4/number of players. So for example, a Severe encounter for 6 players has a budget of 180XP. 180 * (4/6) = 120, which is the correct XP award.

So mathematically, that would mean that for example, an encounter for 6 players that has a budget of 400 XP (that's a crazy encounter!) would award 266.666... XP. Which isn't very clean, but maybe "round to the closest 5 XP" could be applied. Either way "multiply by 4 and divide by number of players" should be a vastly easier way to calculate the XP award from the budget.

[Montis]

If I'm reading that correctly, it kind of sounds like you can calculate the XP award from the budget by multiplying by 4/number of players. So for example, a Severe encounter for 6 players has a budget of 180XP. 180 * (4/6) = 120, which is the correct XP award.

Pretty much exactly what I wrote above
Good that someone could confirm it

[dsaraujo]

Here is what my approach will be:

1. I will add a separate field for budget XP. This is calculated based on the total creatures added to the encounter, based only on the party level (i.e., assumes 4PCs for calculating it).
2. If you press a button, the extension will calculate the threat of the encounter based on the party size, and set the award XP to 4/party size for party sizes over or under 4, with no cap.
3. If you change values, you'll need to press the button to get updates values, it won't automatically do it as before. This is important to not override values from modules, and to pre-prepare encounters from different levels. I could "auto-press" then button when Party Size or Levels were edited, by I felt it was confusing. I'll sacrifice speed for simplicity, let me know your opinions.

Notes:

• All fields will be editable now (if the record is not locked). This means you can adjust the award XP and Threat manually if you have an encounter in a particular different situation (advantageous terrain, for example). Pressing the recalc button will override your manual edits.
• I will only calculate fields if you press the button. This is to not automatically change the intended threat of encounters from published modules if you open them for the fist time with no values for party size and level (especially if you are checking them in advance, or if you stop using my module). So, if you open an encounter from an AP, it will show incorrect values for your party unless you force the calculation.
• I discover another bug where I didn't exclude neutral or allied faction NPCs. I fixed this (only hostile creatures will be part of budget) too.
• I've updated the Random Encounter Generator appropriately (and noticed due to the changes that sometimes the generated encounter will "low-ball" an encounter, generating a Low encounter even when a Moderate was asked. Seems fine by me, as I prefer to err on the easy side, you can always adjust).

Below is how it looks with many examples, let me know if anyone have any feedback before I push this to live.

XP Examples.png

[MaxAstro]

The only suggestion I might make is to consider any amount above the normal trivial cap "low" instead of trivial, since a) the trivial category specifically says "40 or less" and b) the special rule about trivial encounters not typically awarding XP at all. A 50 XP encounter is probably close enough to "low" that it should be worth XP.

[Montis]

I'd name it "XP award" and "XP budget". And for usability / readability I'd move the things around a bit:

top left: Party Size
top right: Party Level
center left: XP budget
center right: threat level
bottom left: xp award (plus recalculate button)

and maybe make the party size and party level fields, as well as the numbers field a bit different so people know they can enter their own values there. it's usually gray background for fields that can receive an input and white-ish background for fields that don't.

something like this: encounter_XP.jpg

also make sure to test it with 1, 2 and 3 players


edit: I also just found a bug!
when you add a level 0 creature and then afterwards add a different level creature, the level 0 creature's level will be changed to the same level as the new creature.
see here: encounter_bug.jpg