I guess Kyonshi was a victim of Google's recent shutdown of Usenet on
Google Groups. It's a shame; the recent splurge of conversation here
was very welcome.

I'm not really into the tabletop gaming community anymore to replace
Kyonshi, but here's an interesting topic of discussion:
https://www.dicebreaker.com/categories/roleplaying-game/opinion/worlds-beyond-number-slow-burn-dnd-actual-play
Essentially, it asks 'how fast should PCs level up, and argues for
slower progression.

Honestly, I'm in favor of slow leveling up. Mostly because I think D&D
really starts to break down as a system once you get past tenth level
or so. The players start becoming super-heroes in terms of ability and
the setting doesn't really support that. If there are so many monsters
that you essentially need super heroes to fight them, a) you either
have no functional civilization, or b) there are so many other 'super
heroes' in the world as to remove any sense that the PCs are in any
way special (you know, heroes).

But also, I think playing at low level is just much more fun, because
- restricted as you are by your limited abilities - you have to be
much more creative.

Also also, once even dragons stop being a threat, DMs have to start
resorting to truly ridiculous levels of threat to give the players any
challenge. Saving the world from utter destruction is exciting the
first time, but it becomes tedious if it's an every-day occurence.

Our campaign solved this issue by retiring characters once they
reached 8-12th level. They remained NPCs - and future PCs would often
interact with them - but weren't (usually) involved in the adventures.
Essentially, the players created their own future Elminsters and
Conans that helped shape the campaign world.

On 2/26/2024 4:22 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
> I guess Kyonshi was a victim of Google's recent shutdown of Usenet on
> Google Groups. It's a shame; the recent splurge of conversation here
> was very welcome.
>

Nah, it's just that my kid and me got the flu and the last few days I
spent more time either laying in bed or chasing the tyke around than
spending it in front of my computer.
But it's good to know that those were welcome.

> I'm not really into the tabletop gaming community anymore to replace
> Kyonshi, but here's an interesting topic of discussion:
> https://www.dicebreaker.com/categories/roleplaying-game/opinion/worlds-beyond-number-slow-burn-dnd-actual-play
> Essentially, it asks 'how fast should PCs level up, and argues for
> slower progression.
>
> Honestly, I'm in favor of slow leveling up. Mostly because I think D&D
> really starts to break down as a system once you get past tenth level
> or so. The players start becoming super-heroes in terms of ability and
> the setting doesn't really support that. If there are so many monsters
> that you essentially need super heroes to fight them, a) you either
> have no functional civilization, or b) there are so many other 'super
> heroes' in the world as to remove any sense that the PCs are in any
> way special (you know, heroes).
>
> But also, I think playing at low level is just much more fun, because
> - restricted as you are by your limited abilities - you have to be
> much more creative.
>
> Also also, once even dragons stop being a threat, DMs have to start
> resorting to truly ridiculous levels of threat to give the players any
> challenge. Saving the world from utter destruction is exciting the
> first time, but it becomes tedious if it's an every-day occurence.
>
> Our campaign solved this issue by retiring characters once they
> reached 8-12th level. They remained NPCs - and future PCs would often
> interact with them - but weren't (usually) involved in the adventures.
> Essentially, the players created their own future Elminsters and
> Conans that helped shape the campaign world.
>
>

Personally I am against all this level-inflation that has been happening
over time. I think that players should be able to have meaningful and
impactful adventures even at level 1. I abhor those stupid kill-the-rats
quests people foist on beginning players. It used to be that 7-9 were
high levels, but by now for people that's just barely over beginner.
Well, since 3e, which moved the whole player experience into a 20 level
format (with additional Epic levels that never made sense to me).
I think especially with the problems we all encounter with time to
actually play it makes more sense to have adventures that create a
fulfilling experience even if the characters are at level 1.

Which reminds me that one of my side-projects is trying to convert I6
Ravenloft down to low level characters because of this. I actually do
like the module a lot, much more than a lot of other Hickmann stuff, but
one thing that really bothers me is that they felt the need to
artificially bulk up the monsters just so the module appeared more
dangerous. Why use wargs if normal wolves are scary enough for example?
Have people never actually seen an actual wolf? Imagine meeting a
full-size hungry wolf in some forest during the night.

I think people focus too much on leveling. Yeah, it's part of the
system, I know, but it doesn't have to be the only measurement of
success does it? I mean Traveller doesn't have any leveling system at
all and it still works.

On 2/26/2024 4:25 AM, kyonshi wrote:
> On 2/26/2024 4:22 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
>> I guess Kyonshi was a victim of Google's recent shutdown of Usenet on
>> Google Groups. It's a shame; the recent splurge of conversation here
>> was very welcome.
>>
>> Our campaign solved this issue by retiring characters once they
>> reached 8-12th level. They remained NPCs - and future PCs would often
>> interact with them - but weren't (usually) involved in the adventures.
>> Essentially, the players created their own future Elminsters and
>> Conans that helped shape the campaign world.
>>
>>
>
> Personally I am against all this level-inflation that has been happening
> over time. I think that players should be able to have meaningful and
> impactful adventures even at level 1. I abhor those stupid kill-the-rats
> quests people foist on beginning players. It used to be that 7-9 were
> high levels, but by now for people that's just barely over beginner.
> Well, since 3e, which moved the whole player experience into a 20 level
> format (with additional Epic levels that never made sense to me).
> I think especially with the problems we all encounter with time to
> actually play it makes more sense to have adventures that create a
> fulfilling experience even if the characters are at level 1.

E6 was an interesting idea (basically 3.5e, but level 6 was highest
level, you could still get xp and broaden your skills, but no more
stacking.) But I never played it as the limit was a bit on the low side.

I like the original limit of 6th level spells, which puts us at 11th
level max, It's only really the 7th+ spells that get into world shaking
territory where I started to get into shaky territory. In fact that's
what I did with my game, URPG. However I did manage to run one 2e
campaign up to 27th level, with world shattering magic and play against
the gods themselves (using primal order so they were a bit more sturdy
than standard AD&D gods.) I averaged about a level every 2-3 6 hour
session, which seemed a good pace to me. 5e's been significantly faster
from what I've seen around 1.5, a bit too fast for my taste.

Personally I think the game opens up more after somewhere between 3rd to
7th level and while I do enjoy the lower levels, I'm glad they tend to
be shorter. These days I'm more inclined to skip 1-2, especially in old
school D&D as the characters are a bit fragile and groups too small
these days to handle any challenge at that level (except of course for 3e+)

--
-Justisaur

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