Twitch ▶▶ www.twitch.tv/thedmlair The DM Lair Streams ▶▶ th-cam.com/users/thedmlairstreams 𝐏𝐀𝐓𝐑𝐄𝐎𝐍 - Monthly high-quality D&D 5e adventures and DM resources ▶▶ www.patreon.com/thedmlair 𝐊𝐈𝐂𝐊𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐑𝐓𝐄𝐑 - Pre-Order my level 1 to 5 adventure module, Into the Fey, here ▶▶ www.kickstarter.com/projects/thedmlair/into-the-fey
SOLUTION: Stop preaching the base rules in the DMG that DON'T WORK!!!! AKA, anything that relies on the CR system! I get it, you want you point to official rules, but when that devolves into "just guess" or "make it up as you go along" whats the point? So much for "Practical DM Advice that you can use at your Table!!"
My rule of thumb for crowd control spells is to take the level of the spell and multiply it by 10 and include that as one round of damage. For AoE crowd control, like Hypnotic Pattern, I modify it by the same number as a damaging spell.
@@alecdickens1042 he has a bit that he does every single session AND he had to thank his patreons. What were you expecting? It's not like you can just skip the video...
I say the fighter goes on vacation. Then Gary and the Rogue are sitting next to each other. A challenge for they are both voiced similar. Future videos could include skits and topics on PvP, how to handle problem players, and copycats and such. Let Gary the Intern have his revenge by quoting the rogue at the same time and then, "JINX!" Now the rogue is silent... until the Barbarian ruins it 20 seconds later.
My first thought was also that Gary should DM! Show those newbie players that they can DM if they want to, and give the "forever DMs" a chance to play!
With all the chaos going on, I think the Wizard needs a vacation. (Also imagine the pizza fire gif upon his return as the only person with logic is gone for a while)
Luke, you just saved my life. I was having a hard time calculating the DPR for a Homebrewed Archmage, which is the right hand man for the BBEG of the campaign. He is a level 18 Spellcaster (pretty much like the one we have at the MM), but with a totally necromantic focused spell list and a couple of different ones for defence or crowd control.
I am voting not for an individual to take a holiday, but for a rotation. Each character takes a skit off , and Gary will take their space for that skit, then the next skit the one on holiday rotates clockwise.
This is great, I love that section of the book, it helps me know how other monsters are balanced. It does work overall, there’s just some abilities that affect CR in weird ways.
0:40 this is why I made it so my group meets up and plays for the entire day. Usually something along the lines of 14-15 untill midnight. The first 3 hours are always a bit muddled between DnD, side convercations and general baffle so that we can really get into it at night.
If you want to create a strong boss monster, took inspiration from the feautures of classes. I made a cr30 monster for a lvl20 campaign. It was a 60 meters tall aberration similar to shub niggurath, it was a very defensive monster because of these abilities: - like the heavy armor master feat, this monster could reduce the damage taken by 30 (for every attack) - like the 14th level of warlock hexblade, this monster (for every attack) could roll a d6, if the result is 1 to 3, nothing happens, if the result is 4 to 6 the damage is nullified, also if the dice got a 6 the monster get an opportunity attack ignoring the distance between the character and him. (I used to roll this dice in public because it is a very powerful feature) So this monster was very hard to kill but it didn't do a lot of damage, but every 3rd round the monster loses control of itself and became more vulnerable, but it's offence ability increased a lot. Like the beholder he uses some random rays attacks, but the players must make 4 saving throw, the more they fail, the more damage are gonna take. Players have to defend theirself and do all the damage in this turn while the monster is really vulnerable.
I'm all for Gary replacing the dm's heroquest screen or he can replace fat cat and sit on druid's lap. But if not those then let's send fighter out for now.
That sorcerer must have pet the cat so much, it petrified. Also if you release any books, the art you commission should be all your characters mid adventure.
I'm gonna repeat myself once again, but Giffyglyph got you covered with their Monster Maker for all your homebrew monsters' needs. I even use it to rebalance existing 5e monsters.
I use a system very similar to this for creating monsters for BECMI. I still use that systems rules for assigning XP values to monsters, but I use a system like this for deciding which dungeon level those monsters belong on, and what its number appearing should be for a fair fight.
This video is 2 years old but I wanted to comment since I just found it. First, it's an awesome video. Second, a Saturn Mad Bomber is a cool concept and reminds me of the Spider-Man villain the Green Goblin. Frickin' cool.
One of my favorite monsters I created were groves of trees with glowing and pulsating ‘fruit sacks’. The trees would emit strong smells of citrus like (lemon) with a hint of sweet like a merengue pie. When pc’s got close the ‘fruit sacks’ would fall releasing zombie babies that would pull themselves towards you with their little baby arms. There was a slight chance (don’t have the sheet In front of me) to be enticed towards the tree until the ZB bit you, there was also a possibility of tripping. Remain on your feet and you get away easily. Unless a baby finds you in your sleep then ‘nom, nom, nom’
Hey Luke. Awesome video on some of the more important issues of being a DM. There are several people that tried to come up with easier systems to determine monster stat blocks. For example Giffyglyph's Monster Maker, Song of the Blade or the "Monster Manual on a Business Card" by Blog of Holding. Do you have experience using one of those? I think they pretty much show that there exist easier and more satisfying ways to come up with stat blocks. Thanks for the video!
The start is so similar to my sessions. We usually play a two hour session once a week, some of the players are usually late by 15-30 minutes, then we speak random stuff with our DM and then play for just an hour.
I would say for crowd control spells, you can make it be a round where the creature doesn't do damage (with its action) and then you calculate the damage over 3 rounds with that, but then when calculating difficulty for the encounter, you can use the rule for terrain advantages, making the difficulty of the encounter increase one (say from medium to hard).
My group was walking through some bat guano when I realized that feces was once (mostly) living things & due to this theoretically a necromancer could turn it into some sort of undead.
I don't know if it's a better way, but when I try and calculate the offensive power of CC spells I normally find a similar damage dealing spell of the same level and and use that in my offensive calculations. For example if your spellcaster has Hold Person, you might equate that to Dragon's Breath (same level spell, same duration, requires save and concentration) which might do 20 damage per round and use that in your offensive CR calculations. That's how I do it anyway.
Determining homebrew monster CR is almost like an artform, there is no shortcut, you have to do it and keep doing it until you find a feel for it. Making new monsters is one of the things I enjoy the most about being a DM and I've made something around 3000 new monsters, and I won't lie, about 2000 of those monsters I had to tweak after playtesting them.
As for adjusting CR for non damaging spells or abilities if the creature has crowd control but only uses it for protection such as splitting the party to fight fewer at a time I would up the CR a little. However if the creature uses the crowd control to trigger a combination that would give it a powerful special attack or something of that nature then I would increase the CR more based on what it would gain or how brutal the attack would be. Everything can be measured in gains and losses, the creature doesn't just have hp. It can gain or lose advantage, action economy, surprise, or a variety of effects. Maybe the creature cast darkness so it can use a bonus action to gain regeneration then use an attack action to paralyze a target. The more it gains or loses the more the CR can change.
Starting with stats and trying to calculate the CR is all well and good for creativity, and is the method recommended in the DMG, but it is often more useful or easier to start with the CR and work out the stats that give that CR. For example, if you want to create a glass cannon encounter for your 2nd level party, you might find the defensive stats for CR 1, and the offensive stats for CR 3, and work out a good die combo to give those stats. Benefits are you already have the proficiency bonus given to you, the hardest part to work out if you follow the conventional method of monster creation, and you already have an idea how the monster will fare against your party, so you know when to use it. You are creating a monster for a purpose, rather than having to find a purpose for the monster you have created.
with regards to adjusting CR for crowd control spells, I've never done it before, but... You could perhaps pro-rate the CR and damage output of the monster to account for casting their Hold Person (for example). i.e. they cast Hold Person, assume it removes one of the typical 4 party members from combat for 3 turns (assuming they fail a couple of saving throws). so in this example it costs the monster one action\attack to reduce the party size by 25% for three rounds. so if it's monster without multiple attacks, its damage output is reduced by 1/3. then calculate the monster's CR. then proportion the CR to account for the "reduced party size", i.e. divide by 3/4. So the [CR including "crowd control"] = [CR with 2/3 damage output] / [3/4 ] ...or something like that? Considering Luke's method is "take a guess", this probably isn't terrible, as a starting point, however I haven't tested it... yet...
Estimating non-damaging spells for CR If a monster/npc is likely to use a spell that doesn't deal damage, I use the chart on page 284 of the DMG to estimate how much damage that spell is worth, and then use the estimated damage to calculate the CR.
Can someone explain to me how the 5e CR table makes sense? A CR 1 monster does 9-14 damage, which would one- or two-shot any level 1 player. How does this make sense?
Actually on the note of the Dragon breathing down: how do you go about determining the area of the breath? do you just se the normal size of the cone as the radius? IS 45ft cone = 45ft radius?
When adjucating spell effects that don't do damage for calculating CR I like to reference the "creating spells" section of the DMG. In it it gives damage thresholds based on spell level for the purpose of balancing spell effects. From there I just look up the relevant spell's level and see what the table thinks a spell of that level is worth in damage.
That's interesting. I'll think about it a little bit more. The first thing that comes to my mind though is that you can have a pretty high-level spell like major image that is arguing often very effective in combat that all but since it's a high-level spell it would equate to high damage on that chart and those increase the challenge rating of a monster by quite a bit. Even though illusion spells and 5th edition are usually kind of crappy.
@@theDMLair Yeah, it's nowhere near a perfect system and I'm kind of grasping as straws lol. But it's the best I can think of and WotC supposedly says you should balance spells against ones of the same level so surely it can't be too bad of a solution, right?
Late to the party, but I've heard Jeremy Crawford say he balances non-damage-dealing spells by substituting them for their level's premier damage dealing spell just for the calculation. For example, a homebrew monster has Hold Person so you'd substitute in Scorching Ray for the DPR calc.
What about making homebrew races? I designed two races, both inspired from Greek mythos like creation. How would you make them strong but balanced within their theming?
I'm probably a very, very weird person, but making a monster from scratch and doing all the math is a fun pass time for me. I save thousands of images of pinterest, and when i'm in the mood i'll find one that sparks imagination and go! I use the DMG heavily for calculating final CR, which i understand is not perfect but I'd rather than a CR and adjust it based on knowing what my party can do than not have one at all.
First question is "Why am I creating this monster" if the answer is to create a new challenge for my powerful party, CR shouldn't be much of an issue... you are making it specifically for them so if YOU can't balance it against them, then not much will help. If you have a cool idea you want to drop in, then C&P bits from existing stat-blocks is the way to go. Tweak what you need and of you go. But remember, don't just come up with an existing critter in a wig. If you are going to go to the trouble of creating a new monster you will feel just a little deflated if a player says, "So... essentially it's a Troll, but with Crab claws...OK..." It's not the stats that are important it's what the creature IS, what it can do and what it represents to the players. I've created dozens over the years, and most have come and gone with little recognition from the players. But the race they do remember, and I only used ONCE are the "Scaith". Female Scaith are small, about the size of a weasel, and look like long scaly rats with a scorpion type tail. That tail is their main attack as their claws and teeth won't get through even leather armour, but it ain't no venom stinger... it's how they lay their eggs into hosts. It's not poison... It's not a disease... and they sneak up to sleeping mammals larger than a dog and inject them. After a day or so, the victim starts to sweat, giving off a peculiar, sweet smell. That's when the males get involved... that scent is what drives their mating imperative. A Horde of Males will charge through fire to get a chance to fertilise the eggs. And did I mention that the males are about the size of a Pony? And their stinger will pierce steel plate? The eggs don't need a live host. The embryos feed off the rotting nutrients of the dead host, and after about a week roughly 2 dozen baby Scaiths pour out of the carcass... Any time my players go back anywhere near that Forest where their predecessors encountered the Scaith, they go prepared... VERY prepared... I used them once, over a decade ago, and they are still terrifying players to this day.
ive made around 23 monsters from scratch all of them different (mostly) and its been fun however i am running out of ideas so i might very welluse some of the tips from this. Thanks
A shot in the dark concerning crowd control, that might be a little hard to determine but... anyway Consider what effects a spell like "hold person" has: gives advantage, increases damage and reduces incoming damage. Now if you could find a rough estimate of a PC's damage output at a given level around where you might use it (look at levels 2, 5, 10, 17 and 20 maybe, so you don't have to needlessly calculate/estimate any particular level), you could consider the disabling part as a healing spell and the restraining part as additional damage. Add it into the formula and you might get a decent result. You might. I don't know. I haven't tried it
I personally never had issues making stat blocks completely from scratch.. i even Roll for Stats for the Monsters I homebrew, to give it an even more unique vibe. I can get monsters made in a few minutes like this.. but I have homebrewed a plethora or two of Monsters, so i am already use to homebrewing them and it comes easy to me.. And my Rule of thumb for making Casters or creatures that have innate abilities like Hold Person is; I make them at least the same CR as the Player level has to be to get the same spell. so, for a Monster that uses Hold person, they would at least be CR 3; since at 3rd level is where you get your 2nd level spell slots it seems to work pretty well, though still flawed, it works better than not doing it this way in my experience.
I have in my life never played d&d and me and my friends (who also never played) want to play together and figure it out along the way and we decided I'd be the dungeon master and the more I learn about monsters, creating them, spells, attacks etc the more I regret my decion on being the DM because holy shit, it's so much
You guys don't see it. The Druid has been the Warlock this whole time. He has been using Mask of Many Faces and Voice of the Chain Master. Through Fat Cat. His pack of the chain familiar. Duh! I can't belive I'm the only one who noticed this.
I have a technique for compare non damaging spells. I make a rank of the best spells and abilities from a circle and compare their impact on a team on an optmized use. This isn't rocket science but is kinda harsh sometimes. If a CC spell is good as a fireball, Ill use the fireball damage as a damage output for the spell.
For crowd control spells, why not take the average of the damage that the typical number of controlled players can output with an attack? Doubling it if they are say, fully mind controlled and now attacking the party (for both the loss of damage to the enemy and now the damage the puppet is doing to the party, or using a 1.5 multiplier if it's uses a fear ability since it makes it harder to hit the enemy?
My campaign has a homebrew monster that ends up having various equally homebrewed templates applied to it to create a ridiculous variety of creatures. At some point (read: five minutes into campaign planning, most likely) I had to just start eyeballing the challenge ratings for various combinations of traits these creatures could have. The campaign is nearly over, with two of four players having reached level 20, and it's worked out decently.
Guessing is a perfectly reasonable approach to adjusting CR for control spells, but a mathematical method could be to calculate the reduction in damage for a CR appropriate opponent and consider it as additional HP.
I’m running a curse of Strahd campaign and a little while ago one of my players had to move so his character disappeared and the players don’t know what happened to him. But I’m going to have his character be affected by the dark powers greatly and he will be a potential enemy for them to fight. Last time the players saw this character they did not leave on good terms
I've been getting into making stat blocks for villains on Regular Show. 🤣 I haven't even looked in the DMG yet, that would have been useful. I was using the monster manual and PHB and trying to reverse engineer them. Had some pretty good challenges anyway. Party has defeated the British Taxi, Snowballs the Ice Monster (on Mt. Ghakis no less), Death Bear, and the Coffee Coffee guy. I have a Garret Bobby Ferguson ready to go. I want to make the Night Owl next, I'll try the DMG way. I have just been using average ability scores of monsters that are the same CR I want, picking higher or lower as it makes sense, and then choosing damage for attacks the same way. It's grueling. Do we want 3d10 or 2d12?
Interesting for those that still play 5th edition, a somewhat similar approach could be used for AD&D as well, except for the challenge rating bit (the most annoying one, to be fair).
Twitch ▶▶ www.twitch.tv/thedmlair
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𝐏𝐀𝐓𝐑𝐄𝐎𝐍 - Monthly high-quality D&D 5e adventures and DM resources ▶▶ www.patreon.com/thedmlair
𝐊𝐈𝐂𝐊𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐑𝐓𝐄𝐑 - Pre-Order my level 1 to 5 adventure module, Into the Fey, here ▶▶ www.kickstarter.com/projects/thedmlair/into-the-fey
toss that druid
Delete the rouge
Get rid of the fighter
Drop the rougue.
SOLUTION: Stop preaching the base rules in the DMG that DON'T WORK!!!! AKA, anything that relies on the CR system! I get it, you want you point to official rules, but when that devolves into "just guess" or "make it up as you go along" whats the point? So much for "Practical DM Advice that you can use at your Table!!"
The DM should absolutely go on holiday. Let the intern guide the company for a couple of months.
Yes this!
I am just imagining Gary going over the corporate policy as a DM 🤣🤣🤣
Gary for DM!
I'm voting Luke out. Gary is the new DM!
I'll dig that! Let the intern finally be a dm and take revenge on the rogue!
Have a +1 on your next roll.
This is exactly what I was going to post. Hail to the new DM, Gary!!
I laughed so hard i choked.
Wish granted lol
My rule of thumb for crowd control spells is to take the level of the spell and multiply it by 10 and include that as one round of damage. For AoE crowd control, like Hypnotic Pattern, I modify it by the same number as a damaging spell.
The tutorial starts at 4:30 in case anyone was trying to find this
That's atrocious. I just got into trying to DM, I expected a channel called "The DM Lair" to be more informative much quicker.
Can't wait to stumble into more DM youtubers whose intros are all variations of "Okay, so we meet up in a tavern-" [title card]
@@alecdickens1042 he has a bit that he does every single session AND he had to thank his patreons. What were you expecting? It's not like you can just skip the video...
@@lordgrub12345 I was expecting a tutorial video not to waste four and a half minutes getting to the point.
@@alecdickens1042 again, there is a skip function for a reason. IF you don't care for the skit and you aren't a patreon, just skip it.
I say the fighter goes on vacation. Then Gary and the Rogue are sitting next to each other. A challenge for they are both voiced similar. Future videos could include skits and topics on PvP, how to handle problem players, and copycats and such. Let Gary the Intern have his revenge by quoting the rogue at the same time and then, "JINX!" Now the rogue is silent... until the Barbarian ruins it 20 seconds later.
This!
If the rogue + Gary can be sitting next to each other in future skits that would be amusing.
My first thought was also that Gary should DM! Show those newbie players that they can DM if they want to, and give the "forever DMs" a chance to play!
With all the chaos going on, I think the Wizard needs a vacation. (Also imagine the pizza fire gif upon his return as the only person with logic is gone for a while)
Timestamps! :)
Intro Skit: 0:00 - 2:10
Actual Inrto: 2:10 - 3:22
Patreon: 3:22 - 4:28
Step 1 (Create Your Monster Concept): 4:30 - 5:32
Step 2 (Find an Existing Stat Block that is Similar): 5:33 - 6:16
Step 3 (Change the Stat Block to Represent your Monster): 6:16 - 7:15
Kickstarter Hombrew Fey DnD Module: 7:15 - 7:30
Step 4 (Calculate the Challenge Rating): 7:30 - 14:25
Not all heroes wear capes 😊
Luke, you just saved my life. I was having a hard time calculating the DPR for a Homebrewed Archmage, which is the right hand man for the BBEG of the campaign. He is a level 18 Spellcaster (pretty much like the one we have at the MM), but with a totally necromantic focused spell list and a couple of different ones for defence or crowd control.
Happy to help!
The DM is out, Gary is the master of the table now
I am voting not for an individual to take a holiday, but for a rotation. Each character takes a skit off , and Gary will take their space for that skit, then the next skit the one on holiday rotates clockwise.
This is a great idea
I concur.. that's a good way to work in Gary.. he can fill in for whoever is on 'vacation' that week.
This is great, I love that section of the book, it helps me know how other monsters are balanced. It does work overall, there’s just some abilities that affect CR in weird ways.
Yeah I agreed there is some things that are really hard to account for in the CR system.
Dm goes on vacation and Gary leads the game.
No shortage of office space quotes on this channel I love it.
I’m fine with any character getting a vacation as long as fat cat remains
0:40 this is why I made it so my group meets up and plays for the entire day. Usually something along the lines of 14-15 untill midnight. The first 3 hours are always a bit muddled between DnD, side convercations and general baffle so that we can really get into it at night.
If you want to create a strong boss monster, took inspiration from the feautures of classes.
I made a cr30 monster for a lvl20 campaign.
It was a 60 meters tall aberration similar to shub niggurath, it was a very defensive monster because of these abilities:
- like the heavy armor master feat, this monster could reduce the damage taken by 30 (for every attack)
- like the 14th level of warlock hexblade, this monster (for every attack) could roll a d6, if the result is 1 to 3, nothing happens, if the result is 4 to 6 the damage is nullified, also if the dice got a 6 the monster get an opportunity attack ignoring the distance between the character and him. (I used to roll this dice in public because it is a very powerful feature)
So this monster was very hard to kill but it didn't do a lot of damage, but every 3rd round the monster loses control of itself and became more vulnerable, but it's offence ability increased a lot.
Like the beholder he uses some random rays attacks, but the players must make 4 saving throw, the more they fail, the more damage are gonna take.
Players have to defend theirself and do all the damage in this turn while the monster is really vulnerable.
This man spent 4:30 to start teaching us what we came here to be thought
Fighter is going on vacation, he deserves it, he's smart, fun, and hard working. He also never causes an uproar at the table.
I'm all for Gary replacing the dm's heroquest screen or he can replace fat cat and sit on druid's lap. But if not those then let's send fighter out for now.
That sorcerer must have pet the cat so much, it petrified. Also if you release any books, the art you commission should be all your characters mid adventure.
The Druid can get the boot, IMO. I miss the Warlock.
The Warlock. The easiest player of mine to role-play. LOL
I miss the Warlock too. Not a fan of the Druid.
The Warlock's snarky whiteboard was far more entertaining than the Druid and his obnoxious Fat Cat obsession.
@@theDMLair tbt, I'm still surprised The Warlock isn't The Editor as a sort of side gag.
BUT LUUUUUKE!!!
Creating statblocks from scratch is absolutely one of my favorite things to do! The crunchy numbers are fun.
I made the mistake of building all my NPCs from the ground up when I started DMing.
Now I edit statblocks whenever I can.
I just snatch stat blocks other people made. I mean, that is why people put them online.
I'm gonna repeat myself once again, but Giffyglyph got you covered with their Monster Maker for all your homebrew monsters' needs.
I even use it to rebalance existing 5e monsters.
"You better ask my mama how to make a monster!" --The Cramps, "The Creature from the Black Leather Lagoon"
I use a system very similar to this for creating monsters for BECMI. I still use that systems rules for assigning XP values to monsters, but I use a system like this for deciding which dungeon level those monsters belong on, and what its number appearing should be for a fair fight.
Bye bye druid.
Love the video thougj. I always wanna homebrew monsters but find it difficult to not make them too weak.
This video is 2 years old but I wanted to comment since I just found it. First, it's an awesome video. Second, a Saturn Mad Bomber is a cool concept and reminds me of the Spider-Man villain the Green Goblin. Frickin' cool.
One of my favorite monsters I created were groves of trees with glowing and pulsating ‘fruit sacks’. The trees would emit strong smells of citrus like (lemon) with a hint of sweet like a merengue pie. When pc’s got close the ‘fruit sacks’ would fall releasing zombie babies that would pull themselves towards you with their little baby arms. There was a slight chance (don’t have the sheet In front of me) to be enticed towards the tree until the ZB bit you, there was also a possibility of tripping. Remain on your feet and you get away easily. Unless a baby finds you in your sleep then ‘nom, nom, nom’
Hey Luke. Awesome video on some of the more important issues of being a DM. There are several people that tried to come up with easier systems to determine monster stat blocks. For example Giffyglyph's Monster Maker, Song of the Blade or the "Monster Manual on a Business Card" by Blog of Holding. Do you have experience using one of those? I think they pretty much show that there exist easier and more satisfying ways to come up with stat blocks.
Thanks for the video!
The start is so similar to my sessions. We usually play a two hour session once a week, some of the players are usually late by 15-30 minutes, then we speak random stuff with our DM and then play for just an hour.
Bye bye Barbarian! Just to see how they'll hold up as a group without the Heart!
I would say for crowd control spells, you can make it be a round where the creature doesn't do damage (with its action) and then you calculate the damage over 3 rounds with that, but then when calculating difficulty for the encounter, you can use the rule for terrain advantages, making the difficulty of the encounter increase one (say from medium to hard).
I just wing my cr’s giving them the PB they need, hoping it’s not too far off
My group was walking through some bat guano when I realized that feces was once (mostly) living things & due to this theoretically a necromancer could turn it into some sort of undead.
I don't know if it's a better way, but when I try and calculate the offensive power of CC spells I normally find a similar damage dealing spell of the same level and and use that in my offensive calculations. For example if your spellcaster has Hold Person, you might equate that to Dragon's Breath (same level spell, same duration, requires save and concentration) which might do 20 damage per round and use that in your offensive CR calculations. That's how I do it anyway.
I vote for Fighter. Seeing Gary right next to Rogue would be great.
Currently writing an adventure which had a custom hag. This is perfect. Thankyou
Great content here. Thanks for the info on online CR calculators
Determining homebrew monster CR is almost like an artform, there is no shortcut, you have to do it and keep doing it until you find a feel for it. Making new monsters is one of the things I enjoy the most about being a DM and I've made something around 3000 new monsters, and I won't lie, about 2000 of those monsters I had to tweak after playtesting them.
As for adjusting CR for non damaging spells or abilities if the creature has crowd control but only uses it for protection such as splitting the party to fight fewer at a time I would up the CR a little. However if the creature uses the crowd control to trigger a combination that would give it a powerful special attack or something of that nature then I would increase the CR more based on what it would gain or how brutal the attack would be. Everything can be measured in gains and losses, the creature doesn't just have hp. It can gain or lose advantage, action economy, surprise, or a variety of effects. Maybe the creature cast darkness so it can use a bonus action to gain regeneration then use an attack action to paralyze a target. The more it gains or loses the more the CR can change.
Out with the fighter and in with Garry. Also thanks for the great videos. Definitely helped me step up my DM game
Thanks so much for the cr calculator tool tip!
Starting with stats and trying to calculate the CR is all well and good for creativity, and is the method recommended in the DMG, but it is often more useful or easier to start with the CR and work out the stats that give that CR.
For example, if you want to create a glass cannon encounter for your 2nd level party, you might find the defensive stats for CR 1, and the offensive stats for CR 3, and work out a good die combo to give those stats.
Benefits are you already have the proficiency bonus given to you, the hardest part to work out if you follow the conventional method of monster creation, and you already have an idea how the monster will fare against your party, so you know when to use it. You are creating a monster for a purpose, rather than having to find a purpose for the monster you have created.
Let the rogue sit it out :)
with regards to adjusting CR for crowd control spells, I've never done it before, but...
You could perhaps pro-rate the CR and damage output of the monster to account for casting their Hold Person (for example). i.e. they cast Hold Person, assume it removes one of the typical 4 party members from combat for 3 turns (assuming they fail a couple of saving throws). so in this example it costs the monster one action\attack to reduce the party size by 25% for three rounds. so if it's monster without multiple attacks, its damage output is reduced by 1/3. then calculate the monster's CR. then proportion the CR to account for the "reduced party size", i.e. divide by 3/4.
So the [CR including "crowd control"] = [CR with 2/3 damage output] / [3/4 ]
...or something like that?
Considering Luke's method is "take a guess", this probably isn't terrible, as a starting point, however I haven't tested it... yet...
Let the DM sit it out. Welcome Gary the DM
The Rouge should go on vacation so Garry can join
Estimating non-damaging spells for CR
If a monster/npc is likely to use a spell that doesn't deal damage, I use the chart on page 284 of the DMG to estimate how much damage that spell is worth, and then use the estimated damage to calculate the CR.
Can someone explain to me how the 5e CR table makes sense? A CR 1 monster does 9-14 damage, which would one- or two-shot any level 1 player. How does this make sense?
Gary could sit on the Rogue's knee, that could be a great compromise - then we can know for a fact that the rogue isn't impersonating him again...
Unless he's just a giant puppet.
Actually on the note of the Dragon breathing down: how do you go about determining the area of the breath? do you just se the normal size of the cone as the radius? IS 45ft cone = 45ft radius?
When adjucating spell effects that don't do damage for calculating CR I like to reference the "creating spells" section of the DMG. In it it gives damage thresholds based on spell level for the purpose of balancing spell effects. From there I just look up the relevant spell's level and see what the table thinks a spell of that level is worth in damage.
Also, my vote is for Fat Cat. Dude steals too many scenes and is really taking away from the other characters' chance to shine.
Came here to say this. Same method I use.
That's interesting. I'll think about it a little bit more. The first thing that comes to my mind though is that you can have a pretty high-level spell like major image that is arguing often very effective in combat that all but since it's a high-level spell it would equate to high damage on that chart and those increase the challenge rating of a monster by quite a bit. Even though illusion spells and 5th edition are usually kind of crappy.
@@theDMLair definitely requires judgement on whether or not the spell is likely to sway the combat in a meaningful way.
@@theDMLair Yeah, it's nowhere near a perfect system and I'm kind of grasping as straws lol. But it's the best I can think of and WotC supposedly says you should balance spells against ones of the same level so surely it can't be too bad of a solution, right?
Late to the party, but I've heard Jeremy Crawford say he balances non-damage-dealing spells by substituting them for their level's premier damage dealing spell just for the calculation. For example, a homebrew monster has Hold Person so you'd substitute in Scorching Ray for the DPR calc.
What about making homebrew races?
I designed two races, both inspired from Greek mythos like creation. How would you make them strong but balanced within their theming?
I'm probably a very, very weird person, but making a monster from scratch and doing all the math is a fun pass time for me. I save thousands of images of pinterest, and when i'm in the mood i'll find one that sparks imagination and go! I use the DMG heavily for calculating final CR, which i understand is not perfect but I'd rather than a CR and adjust it based on knowing what my party can do than not have one at all.
I thought this was about how I can come up with ideas, which is what I need.
How much will the CR increase if I would give a monster 9th level spell wish (cast at will) 😅
As I fell the Rouge's blade on my back poke once again I yell fear in my voice "The DM should take a break and let Gary be Dungeon Mastet!"
First question is "Why am I creating this monster" if the answer is to create a new challenge for my powerful party, CR shouldn't be much of an issue... you are making it specifically for them so if YOU can't balance it against them, then not much will help.
If you have a cool idea you want to drop in, then C&P bits from existing stat-blocks is the way to go. Tweak what you need and of you go.
But remember, don't just come up with an existing critter in a wig. If you are going to go to the trouble of creating a new monster you will feel just a little deflated if a player says, "So... essentially it's a Troll, but with Crab claws...OK..."
It's not the stats that are important it's what the creature IS, what it can do and what it represents to the players.
I've created dozens over the years, and most have come and gone with little recognition from the players. But the race they do remember, and I only used ONCE are the "Scaith".
Female Scaith are small, about the size of a weasel, and look like long scaly rats with a scorpion type tail. That tail is their main attack as their claws and teeth won't get through even leather armour, but it ain't no venom stinger... it's how they lay their eggs into hosts. It's not poison... It's not a disease... and they sneak up to sleeping mammals larger than a dog and inject them. After a day or so, the victim starts to sweat, giving off a peculiar, sweet smell. That's when the males get involved... that scent is what drives their mating imperative. A Horde of Males will charge through fire to get a chance to fertilise the eggs. And did I mention that the males are about the size of a Pony? And their stinger will pierce steel plate? The eggs don't need a live host. The embryos feed off the rotting nutrients of the dead host, and after about a week roughly 2 dozen baby Scaiths pour out of the carcass...
Any time my players go back anywhere near that Forest where their predecessors encountered the Scaith, they go prepared... VERY prepared... I used them once, over a decade ago, and they are still terrifying players to this day.
Is that the DM screen from Hero's Quest?
ive made around 23 monsters from scratch all of them different (mostly) and its been fun however i am running out of ideas so i might very welluse some of the tips from this. Thanks
A shot in the dark concerning crowd control, that might be a little hard to determine but... anyway
Consider what effects a spell like "hold person" has: gives advantage, increases damage and reduces incoming damage. Now if you could find a rough estimate of a PC's damage output at a given level around where you might use it (look at levels 2, 5, 10, 17 and 20 maybe, so you don't have to needlessly calculate/estimate any particular level), you could consider the disabling part as a healing spell and the restraining part as additional damage.
Add it into the formula and you might get a decent result. You might. I don't know. I haven't tried it
Damn, I was just searching around for videos like this an hour before this came out.
Well you found it now. :-)
I personally never had issues making stat blocks completely from scratch.. i even Roll for Stats for the Monsters I homebrew, to give it an even more unique vibe. I can get monsters made in a few minutes like this.. but I have homebrewed a plethora or two of Monsters, so i am already use to homebrewing them and it comes easy to me..
And my Rule of thumb for making Casters or creatures that have innate abilities like Hold Person is; I make them at least the same CR as the Player level has to be to get the same spell. so, for a Monster that uses Hold person, they would at least be CR 3; since at 3rd level is where you get your 2nd level spell slots it seems to work pretty well, though still flawed, it works better than not doing it this way in my experience.
Where can you find the stat blocks for the monsters?
I have in my life never played d&d and me and my friends (who also never played) want to play together and figure it out along the way and we decided I'd be the dungeon master and the more I learn about monsters, creating them, spells, attacks etc the more I regret my decion on being the DM because holy shit, it's so much
I say let the Druid take a vacation. But fat cat will be missed... I love all your characters too much!
Maybe the Druid will leave but fat cat will stay? :-)
You guys don't see it. The Druid has been the Warlock this whole time. He has been using Mask of Many Faces and Voice of the Chain Master. Through Fat Cat. His pack of the chain familiar. Duh! I can't belive I'm the only one who noticed this.
I have a technique for compare non damaging spells. I make a rank of the best spells and abilities from a circle and compare their impact on a team on an optmized use. This isn't rocket science but is kinda harsh sometimes. If a CC spell is good as a fireball, Ill use the fireball damage as a damage output for the spell.
cheers Luke this was a great video and heaps useful.
For crowd control spells, why not take the average of the damage that the typical number of controlled players can output with an attack?
Doubling it if they are say, fully mind controlled and now attacking the party (for both the loss of damage to the enemy and now the damage the puppet is doing to the party, or using a 1.5 multiplier if it's uses a fear ability since it makes it harder to hit the enemy?
This might be a dumb question: how do I find stat blocks?
Drunken Boxing Satyr is cool AF LMAO
Is there ANY use for CR if you aren’t playing with XP?
great advice as always. I'm just here for the algorithm.
Love the video, only recommendation is to save the weird banter stuff at the beginning for the middle or end not the beginning
Wizard needs to go on vacation, he needs it. Look how he pulls on that pipe!
I usually just make my players aware they are going against something big and dangerous, giving them ominous vibes of how much hope they have to win.
My campaign has a homebrew monster that ends up having various equally homebrewed templates applied to it to create a ridiculous variety of creatures. At some point (read: five minutes into campaign planning, most likely) I had to just start eyeballing the challenge ratings for various combinations of traits these creatures could have. The campaign is nearly over, with two of four players having reached level 20, and it's worked out decently.
The Druid could leave, but Fat Cat should stay. We all know the fan favorite of that duo.
That's a great point. LOL
Thx! Amazing work🎉
Guessing is a perfectly reasonable approach to adjusting CR for control spells, but a mathematical method could be to calculate the reduction in damage for a CR appropriate opponent and consider it as additional HP.
I’m running a curse of Strahd campaign and a little while ago one of my players had to move so his character disappeared and the players don’t know what happened to him. But I’m going to have his character be affected by the dark powers greatly and he will be a potential enemy for them to fight. Last time the players saw this character they did not leave on good terms
This is a lot to follow. I need to re watch this
Can anyone tell me where that thumbnail picture of the brain overlord thing cane from?
sorry Luke, but I have a doubt. If my monster has a feature that makes it deal extra damage with a critical hit. How does it affect its offensive CR?
I was so waiting you to show us how you built that video thumbnail's monster's stats...
This has always been a difficulty with 5th edition trying to set up encounters. 4th edition was a dm's dream
Great infornation. It was helpful.
Great stuff. TY Luke
My pleasure!
Great video today Luke
Monsters that explode upon death if killed with fire damage is pretty smart to make the most prevelant damage type in magic much more risky
Either the DM or the Fighter, for Gary.
I've been getting into making stat blocks for villains on Regular Show. 🤣 I haven't even looked in the DMG yet, that would have been useful. I was using the monster manual and PHB and trying to reverse engineer them. Had some pretty good challenges anyway. Party has defeated the British Taxi, Snowballs the Ice Monster (on Mt. Ghakis no less), Death Bear, and the Coffee Coffee guy. I have a Garret Bobby Ferguson ready to go. I want to make the Night Owl next, I'll try the DMG way.
I have just been using average ability scores of monsters that are the same CR I want, picking higher or lower as it makes sense, and then choosing damage for attacks the same way. It's grueling. Do we want 3d10 or 2d12?
Definitely the fighter!
Interesting for those that still play 5th edition, a somewhat similar approach could be used for AD&D as well, except for the challenge rating bit (the most annoying one, to be fair).
This guy doesnt suck! mind you, youtube!