Encounter balancer
Add your table and the fight, and see how hard it really lands. The same math Six Axes uses in-app.
Who's at the table
In Six Axes this fills in automatically from your players' characters. Here, add them by hand.
The fight
Add monsters by challenge rating. Numbers use the 2024 DMG method.
2024 method: no encounter multiplier, so ten monsters count as ten monsters.
How the encounter balancer works
Encounter math is different in every system, and the published guidelines rarely match what actually happens at the table. This tool does the real per-system arithmetic: enter your party and the monsters, and it tells you where the fight lands — trivial, easy, hard, or deadly — before anyone rolls initiative.
It runs the same calculations Six Axes uses in-app, so the numbers are the ones the system's own design points to, not a rough rule of thumb.
How to use it
- Pick your system — D&D 5e (2014 or 2024), Pathfinder 2e, Draw Steel, or Daggerheart.
- Add your party: how many characters, and their levels.
- Add the monsters or threats in the encounter.
- Read the difficulty band, and adjust the fight until it lands where you want it.
Why per-system math matters
5e 2014 and 2024 use different XP budgets and multipliers; Pathfinder 2e uses a level-based threat budget; Draw Steel and Daggerheart don't use XP at all. A generic 'CR calculator' quietly assumes 5e and gets the others wrong. This applies each system's own model, so a Moderate fight reads as Moderate in the system you're actually running.
Common questions
Is the encounter balancer free?
Yes — free, no login, and nothing is saved. Use it as much as you like.
Which systems does it support?
D&D 5e (2014 and 2024), Pathfinder 2e, Draw Steel, and Daggerheart, each with its own difficulty math.
Does it account for party size and level?
Yes. Both change the thresholds, which is exactly where the published quick-rules tend to mislead you.
Related tools: Party coverage check · Session pacing · Dice roller
These tools come from Six Axes, which sits in your session and records the table, writes the recap, and builds the campaign wiki automatically. See what it does or join the pilot.
These tools run on a slice of what Six Axes does at the table.
The full product records your session, writes the recap, keeps the campaign wiki, and reads how your table actually plays, across whatever system you run. It is in free pilot now.