Sorry for the delay getting to this one… Germany was excellent. Anyway, the Category system employed in The Encountered will definitely help balance creature encounters. We haven’t quite made it to that degree of refinement on the NWSEC Collaborative Workspace, but it will come. A straight CDP conversion for creatures is pretty difficult in AO, mostly because skills and special attacks for creatures are not tied directly to CDP, but that is certainly something we’ll consider. Nonetheless, I think you’ll find the category 1-10 model speeds GM planning and helps balance random encounters with creatures. You can also apply creature templates to expand the useability of creatures, beefing up low category creatures or softening up high category creatures.
Let’s not forget to rejoice in a system which doesn’t tie “experience points” to hacking up monsters! I much prefer it the current way - many new possibilities, and since player *know* that they do not gain CDP by killing monsters, they’re less prone to blindly do so. They try to solve the puzzle.
Earl: We can do splendid category stuff on NWSEC, but that’s another discussion 
(use the colors in the book and such)
