Plan a balanced encounter

Check whether a fight favours the party or the enemies before anyone rolls, and put one together from the creature library with the Encounter Planner.

For: Game Masters · Plan: Free · 16 minutes · What it's for: Combat tracker

A fight that's far too easy is over in a round, and one that's far too hard can end a campaign. In a 5e or 5.5e game, RollQuest weighs the two sides for you, the Game Master (GM), the person running the game: it adds up what the enemies are worth, compares that with what the party can take on, and says which way the fight leans. This read is called Encounter balance. You see it in Battle Setup, right before you start a battle, and in the Encounter Planner, a panel for putting a fight together before it happens. Only you see either.

The numbers are the rules' own. Every monster has a challenge rating (CR), the rules' measure of how dangerous it is, and each CR is worth a number of experience points (XP): a CR 1/4 goblin is worth 50 XP, a CR 2 ogre 450 XP. Each character has an XP budget, the XP worth of enemies they can face, which grows with their level and comes in three sizes: Low, Moderate and High. A fight is balanced when the enemies' XP reaches the party's Moderate budget but stays under its High one. It's a guide, not a rule: nothing stops you starting a fight it calls lopsided.

Which games have it

Encounter balance needs a game system that says what a fight costs. 5e Compatible and 5.5e Compatible do, and both use the XP budget table from the System Reference Document 5.2.1, the 2024 rules: the 2014 rules' SRD 5.1 has no such table. (A System Reference Document, or SRD, is the part of a game's rules its publisher releases for anyone to use.)

In an Ashfall, Brightline, Drownwake or Ninefold game, or a game with no system, there's no Plan encounter button, and Battle Setup shows no balance: it works as it always has. A game system of your own can declare its own costs and budgets, and then its games have both.

Check the balance before a battle

1. Hover over the Mode menu, the tab at the top of the board, and click Battle. Battle Setup opens.
2. Tick who's in the fight (see Start a battle). The Encounter balance block under the list reads Reading the party and the enemies... for a moment, then gives its verdict.
3. Read the verdict, such as Favours the party, and the meter under it. They change as soon as you tick or untick anyone.
4. Take the block's offer to even the fight out (below), if it makes one and you want it.
5. Click Start Battle.

The balance reads levels, hit points and stat blocks when the panel opens (the Encounter Planner reads them again after Place on board). If one changes while the panel is open, such as a character being healed, close it and open it again to see the change counted.

Even out a fight

When the verdict isn't Balanced, the block makes one offer, with a line that says what it would do, such as To even it out, leave out Ogre. That makes it balanced. The end of the line is the verdict you'd get.

When the fight favours the enemies, the offer is to leave some out:

• Leave out of the fight unticks the enemies it names. Their tokens stay on the map.
• Take off the map (Battle Setup only; hover: Leave them out and take them off the map. They stay in the enemy list.) unticks them and takes their tokens off the board, for everyone. A message says so, such as Ogre taken off the map. They stay in the Enemies panel, marked off map, so you can drag one back later (see Enemies and the creature library), and in Battle Setup's list, unticked.

RollQuest picks who to leave out one at a time: each time, the enemy that, left out, brings the total nearest the middle of the balanced band, halfway between the party's Moderate and High budgets. It stops once the fight is balanced, or when leaving out anyone else wouldn't bring it nearer, and it never leaves out the last enemy that counts. Several of the same creature are named together, such as Goblin x2.

When the fight favours the party, the offer is to add more of an enemy that's already in it:

• Add to the board (Battle Setup) puts the copies on the board and ticks them. A message says so, such as Goblin x2 added to the board.
• Add to the plan (Encounter Planner) adds them under Planned, for you to place when you're ready. They're placed fresh from the stat block, not copied from a token.

The offer is one kind of creature, in the fewest copies that make the fight balanced without tipping it the other way, and never more than 8: another Ogre rather than Goblin x14. When two kinds need the same number, the one that lands nearer the middle of the band wins. Only an enemy whose stat block has a CR can be offered.

Copies made in Battle Setup are clones of the first ticked enemy of that kind, like the token menu's Clone. They land beside it, up to four in a row to its right, then the next row down. Each takes the stat block's name and the next free number: with Goblin and Goblin 2 on the board, two copies are Goblin 3 and Goblin 4. A copy keeps the original's stat block, picture, size, vision, whether players can see it, and its hit points as they are now, and starts without conditions.

When no offer would work, the block says so instead:

• Nothing to leave out would balance it without emptying the fight. Usually only one enemy counts, and even it is too much for this party, such as a dragon against first-level characters.
• No enemy in the fight balances it with a few copies. It would take more than 8 of anything that's in the fight. Battle Setup adds Add a creature from the library in the Encounter Planner., and the planner adds Plan a bigger creature from the library above.

Plan an encounter

The Encounter Planner gives the same read outside a battle, and weighs creatures that aren't on the board yet. Use it while you prepare a session, or when the party is about to open the next door.

1. Hover over the Mode menu and click Plan encounter, under Battle (hover: Plan an encounter: is the fight balanced?). The Encounter Planner opens on the right. The button is there only while no battle is on.
2. Under Party, untick any character who won't be in the fight. The whole party starts ticked.
3. Under Enemies on the map, untick any enemy that won't join in. Every enemy on the map starts ticked, with its CR beside its name.
4. Type in Add a creature from the library, such as ogre, and click the creature in the list. It's added under Planned, with a count of 1.
5. Click + or − beside it to change how many.
6. Read Encounter balance under the lists, and take its offer if you like.
7. Click Place on board to put the planned creatures on the map.
8. Click Set up battle. Battle Setup opens with the same characters and enemies ticked, ready for Start Battle.

New creatures are visible to players at once, like any new enemy. For an ambush, place them before the players arrive, or hide each one with Hide Token straight away (see The token menu).

Choose who's in it

• Deselect all beside a group's name unticks everyone in that group, and then reads Select all, which ticks them all again. It only touches its own group: clearing the enemies leaves the party ticked.
• Monsters (N) beside Enemies on the map ticks every enemy players can see, as in Battle Setup: N counts the enemies not hidden with Hide Token. It only adds ticks, so Deselect all then Monsters leaves exactly the enemies the players can see.
• Enemies you've taken off the map aren't listed, and nor are NPCs (non-player characters you play, such as a shopkeeper): NPCs never count in the balance.

Plan creatures from the library

The search works like the one in Add New Enemy: each word you type must appear in the creature's name, the name of the content pack it comes from, or its notes. It shows up to 8 matches, your own creatures first, each with its CR where it has one. Clicking a creature that's already planned adds one more to its count.

Planned creatures count in the balance as if they were on the board. Clicking − on a count of 1 takes the creature out of the plan.

Place them on the board

Place on board makes each planned creature an enemy with its stat block attached, as From the library in Add New Enemy does: it has the hit points the stat block prints and the creature's senses, and it's one grid square across. The tokens are set out in rows of four from the middle of your view, a short step apart, so they don't land in a pile. The first of a kind takes the creature's name and the rest are numbered on, such as Goblin, Goblin 2 and Goblin 3; if an enemy of that name is already in the scene, the numbers carry on from the highest.

A message says how many were placed, such as 5 creatures placed on the board. The new tokens join Enemies on the map, ticked, anyone you'd unticked stays unticked, and the plan empties.

If a stat block can't be attached, you see, for example, 1 could not be given their stat block: bind it from the token's Stat block menu. Right-click that token, choose Stat block and pick the creature again.

Set up the battle

Set up battle closes the planner and opens Battle Setup with exactly the planner's ticks: the characters and enemies you ticked, and no NPCs. It's greyed out while anything is still planned (hover: Place the planned creatures on the board first, so they can join the battle), because only tokens on the board can fight.

The planner keeps nothing: close it and open it again, and it starts over, with an empty plan and everyone ticked. Starting a battle closes it.

How the balance is worked out

What the party can take on

For each ticked character, RollQuest reads their level from their character sheet and looks up their Low, Moderate and High budgets for that level. (A level above 20 uses level 20's budgets.) It then counts each budget by how ready the character is for a fight:

• A character at full hit points with nothing spent counts their whole budget.
• A character who is down, at 0 hit points or fewer, counts nothing.
• Anyone in between counts at least half: half their budget, plus half again times their readiness.

Readiness is their hit points now as a share of their maximum; temporary hit points don't count. If their sheet tracks pools of uses, such as spell slots, readiness is 70% hit points and 30% the share of uses they have left, where a higher-level slot counts for more: a 3rd-level slot weighs three times a 1st-level one. Every pool on the sheet counts, ammunition and an item's charges included. A character with no hit points recorded on their sheet or token counts as unhurt.

For example, a level 3 character at 9 of 30 hit points, with no spell slots, has a readiness of 30%, so they count 65% of their budget: half, plus half of 30%.

The party's budgets are these added together. The strength on the Party line is the party's Moderate budget as a share of what the same characters would bring fresh.

What the enemies cost

Each ticked enemy costs the XP its CR is worth, from 10 XP at CR 0 to 155,000 XP at CR 30, and the costs are added together. Numbers don't cost extra: six goblins cost six times one goblin, as in the 2024 rules.

The verdict

The enemies' XP is	Verdict	Shown beside it
Under the party's Low budget	Heavily favours the party	Nothing
Low or more, under Moderate	Favours the party	Low
Moderate or more, under High	Balanced	Moderate
High or more, under twice High	Favours the enemies	High
Twice High or more	Heavily favours the enemies	High

Who counts

• Characters: ticked player characters whose sheet gives a level of 1 or more. A player token with no character sheet has no level, so it's left out, and the block names it.
• Enemies: ticked enemies whose stat block has a CR. An enemy made from scratch (no stat block), one using a stat block you wrote yourself (yours have no CR) or one whose stat block was deleted is left out, and the block names it. An enemy hidden from players, or off the map, counts if it's ticked.
• NPCs never count, on either side, even when ticked: they're bystanders or allies more often than foes. The block doesn't mention them.

A worked example

Four level 1 characters, all unhurt, have budgets of Low 200, Moderate 300 and High 400 XP. Against goblins, at 50 XP each:

Goblins	XP	Verdict	Offer
3	150	Heavily favours the party	Add Goblin x3
4	200	Favours the party, Low	Add Goblin x2
6	300	Balanced, Moderate	None
8	400	Favours the enemies, High	Leave out Goblin
16	800	Heavily favours the enemies, High	Leave out Goblin x9

The Encounter balance block, part by part

The block sits under the lists: above Start Battle in Battle Setup, and above Place on board in the planner.

Part	What it shows
Encounter balance	The block's heading.
Verdict	One of the five verdicts: green when it favours the party, teal when it's balanced, red when it favours the enemies. Beside it, in grey, the highest budget the enemies' XP reaches: Low, Moderate or High.
Meter	A bar in five equal parts. From left to right: under Low, Low, Moderate, High, and twice High or more. The parts that favour the party are green, the balanced part teal and the parts that favour the enemies red, with the two outer parts stronger. Low, Moderate and High are written under their parts. A marker shows where the fight sits, as far along its part as the enemies' XP is between the two budgets.
Party	How many characters count, their levels and, when the party is below full strength, its strength, such as 4 characters, level 3, at 63% strength, or levels 3-4 when their levels differ.
The line under Party	In amber, anyone not fresh: is down (0 hit points or fewer), is at 30% HP (under half their hit points), or has 25% of their resources left (under half their uses, with at least half their hit points). For example, Brin is down. Cass is at 30% HP.
Enemies	How many enemies count and what they cost, such as 6 enemies, 300 XP.
Budgets	The party's three budgets, after readiness, such as Low 381 · Moderate 571 · High 1,015.
Left out	Who isn't counted, such as Goblin Boss has no CR and is not counted. or Mira has no level and is not counted.
Offer	The offer to even the fight out, with its buttons (see Even out a fight).

Until it can judge the fight, the block shows one line instead, with any left-out names under it:

• Reading the party and the enemies... while it reads the sheets and stat blocks.
• Tick at least one character with a level to judge the fight. No ticked character has a level.
• Tick enemies with a CR to judge the fight. No ticked enemy has a CR.

The Encounter Planner, field by field

The planner opens on the right of the screen. Only you have it. Under its title it says Who is in the fight, and is it fair? Tick who takes part and plan creatures that are not on the board yet.

Control	What it does	Default and limits
Party	Every player character in the game, each with a tick box.	All ticked. No player tokens in this game. when there are none.
Enemies on the map	Every enemy on the board, each with a tick box and its CR, such as CR 1/4, when its stat block has one.	All ticked. No enemies on the map. when there are none.
Monsters (N) (beside Enemies on the map)	Ticks every enemy players can see; N is how many. It only adds ticks. Hover over it to see Tick every monster on the map that players can see.	Greyed out, with No monsters on the map are visible to players, when N is 0.
Select all / Deselect all (beside each group)	Ticks, or unticks, everyone in that group only.	Deselect all while the whole group is ticked.
Planned	The creatures you've planned, with how many in brackets, such as Planned (5). Each row has the creature's name, its CR, and − and + round the count (a screen reader names them One fewer Goblin and One more Goblin).	Empty when the planner opens.
Add a creature from the library	Search the creature library. Click a match to plan one. The search empties after each pick.	Up to 8 matches. No creature in the library matches. when there are none.
Encounter balance	The balance read (above), counting the ticked rows and everything planned. Add to the plan adds planned creatures; there's no Take off the map here.
Place on board (N)	Puts every planned creature on the board as an enemy with its stat block.	Greyed out until something is planned, and while it's placing.
Set up battle	Closes the planner and opens Battle Setup with these ticks. Hover over it to see Open Battle Setup with these ticked.	Greyed out while anything is planned.
Close (the X at the top)	Closes the planner. So do Esc and a click outside it. Nothing is kept.

If the planner says This game's system declares no encounter rules, so the fight cannot be judged., the game's system has no costs or budgets to weigh the fight with (see Which games have it).

Related

Start a battle · Enemies and the creature library · Running turns and rounds · Game systems