I've been running 5E for some friends, and after probably 10 or so sessions, we have yet to level from 5th to 6th (we started at 5th). I'm seriously considering just switching over to "Leveling when thematically appropriate" as the easiest solution, but it still seems weird that even after 10+ encounters (we average one a session) that they still haven't leveled up.
Is there some aspect of calculating XP that I'm missing for encounters? My understanding is that while there are multipliers to calculate difficulty, when calculating for XP reward, it's just the sum of all enemy XP.
Best Answer
About 17 On-Level Encounters
It takes 7,500 XP to progress from 5th to 6th level. A challenge rating 5 monster is worth 1,800 XP. That's an on-level encounter for a party of 4.
1,800 XP / 4 characters = 450 XP / character per encounter. At that rate is takes 16 2/3 encounters to reach 6th level.
A highly skilled party might be able to defeat stronger monsters.
(It's worth noting that in 5E, the first few level-ups come very quickly, and are a neat way to "flesh out" characters in the midsts of play.)