I swear to god, no player in the world would come to this idea.

Quote from: SettembriniI swear to god, no player in the world would come to this idea.

Yes, the idea that low-level play is the most fun part of the game seems to be a GM thing. The only two guys in my group who hold this idea, for example, are the two guys who DM for us regularly.

If I wanted to play gritty, low-magic fantasy, I'd play Iron Heroes. It captures the feel of dangerous, magic-less combat without castrating PCs.

One of the underlying idea in this sort of thing seems to be that orcs and other basic humanoids ought to be able to kill a PC (or at least threaten them with death) with a few blows (this is the "gritty" part). My solution to this problem personally is to give those basic humanoids class levels and the corresponding abilities. With them, they very often can threaten the PCs with death, but without requiring the PCs to remain goofs.

The other one seems to be this impression that high-level characters are nightmarish for book-keeping. Having played a fully equipped 20th level character fighting similarly difficult opponents, it's not really as bad as all that. The main thing is to list, label and pre-add your bonuses and penalties so that they can be quickly consulted in play. This is an impression without any reality to it.

Having played till the mid twenties, I must say it ran as smooth as everything else. You grow into your options, and they are even easier to chose from at high levels.

And the complaints about "game-breaking" abilities is even more cheese to the whine.

I can only tell these types:
It´s D&D you knuckleheads, there´s been 32rd level Dungeon modules and Planar Warfare Diplomacy extravanaganzas since before I was born! Do some reading, lazypants.

I understand one of the gimmes on Free RPG Day was some D&D product that included Neutrino(?) Golems with d1000 Hit Dice.

Quote from: Settembrini...
I can only tell these types:
It´s D&D you knuckleheads, there´s been 32rd level Dungeon modules and Planar Warfare Diplomacy extravanaganzas since before I was born! Do some reading, lazypants.

:rolleyes:

Yes, heaven forbid that some DMs might want to modify the rules in order to better fit the kind of campaign they want to run.  And heaven forbid that some players might actually be willing to play in such a campaign.

People have been modifying the D&D rules since before you were born Settembrini.  Do some reading, lazypants.
:pundit:

Quote from: Pseudoephedrine... If I wanted to play gritty, low-magic fantasy, I'd play Iron Heroes. It captures the feel of dangerous, magic-less combat without castrating PCs...

Sure.  I'd probably play something else myself (WFRP or something).  The idea, as I understand it, was to see if some minor tweaks to the D&D core rules themselves could realize a certain style of campaign.

Quote from: Pseudoephedrine...
The other one seems to be this impression that high-level characters are nightmarish for book-keeping. Having played a fully equipped 20th level character fighting similarly difficult opponents, it's not really as bad as all that. The main thing is to list, label and pre-add your bonuses and penalties so that they can be quickly consulted in play. This is an impression without any reality to it.

It's not the players that have the problem with book keeping at that level.  It's the DM.

Quote from: obryn...
 I don't think it's a viable concept, mechanically.  Just end a campaign at level 6 if you're not happy with advancement beyond that.

-O

Well, with a wide enough range of feats, the PCs do become more diverse, can do new things, etc.  There is 'progress' but not a huge power escalation.

Anyhow, I don't even run D&D 3e anymore, but nonetheless thought that this was a rather clever tweak to realize a certain style of campaign.  Apparently it's been playtested successfully by Rycanada.  It seems to be a 'viable concept, mechanically' for some people.

But whatever.  I'm just kind of surprised at the hostile reactions ...
:raise:

QuotePeople have been modifying the D&D rules since before you were born Settembrini.  Do some reading, lazypants.

Yeah. They call it Champions or Runequest, and developed them further. Play one of their descendants instead of fucking with your players in D&D.

Cause this ain´t no D&D anymore.

It´s Peter Pan romantic swine stuff.

Soooo... what's the level cap in OD&D, again? 10?

Either E.Gary was the first Swine, or Sett suffers from 3Eism.

Please call it BECMI-ism.

I´m a Mentzer person.

Quote from: Pierce InveraritySoooo... what's the level cap in OD&D, again? 10?

Quote from: Men & Magic, page 18Levels:  There is no theoretical limit to how high a character may progress, i.e. 20th level Lord, 20th level Wizard, etc.

My copy isn't the absolute earliest version of OD&D, but I don't think this text has ever been noted as changing over the course of the various printings.

Quote from: AkrasiaSure.  I'd probably play something else myself (WFRP or something).  The idea, as I understand it, was to see if some minor tweaks to the D&D core rules themselves could realize a certain style of campaign.

I don't think the tweaks are very good though. I think you're better off switching out the mechanics rather than constraining them. There are D20 variants out there that manage gritty and low magic without blocking PC options or growth.

QuoteIt's not the players that have the problem with book keeping at that level.  It's the DM.

Our DM was surprised to find how easy it was. He expected to be overwhelmed by the experience of running four 20th level NPC opponents in an eight-man fight, but he wasn't. Once again, I'm fairly sure that most of the seeming difficulty is resolved by careful record-keeping and familiarity with the rules sets in question.

Demihumans were always capped until 3e. Humans never were. Although, the preface to Gods, Demi-Gods, and Heroes talked about the ridiculousness of (IIRC) 40th level characters, which suggests a certain practical limit.

I would put a mild protest to the effect that, while E6 is more restrictive than any published D&D to date, something in between E8 and E12, with limited feat-based advancement afterwards (and remember that toughness and extra spell can be feats here), would actually be enough like AD&D1 (where your hit dice cap between 9 and 11) and OD&D (where your spells cap at level 5 or 6, pre-Greyhawk at least) that I think you could call it 'D&D' with some justification.  

Mentzer (which I love) and I believe the RC are the only editions which ever restricted human level limits.

On the bookkeeping thing - buffing can slow things down at high levels. My higher level combats tended to feature 10-15 buffs on each side before a fight, then lots of opportunistic use of Dispel Magic and Greater Dispelling to bring them down. In this situation it doesn't matter how clearly your bonuses are marked because they're going up and down all the time. Not a dealbreaker, but it is more work.

Recordkeeping can be time consuming, but for the players it really doesn't matter - even a 20 page character sheet is not that big a deal if it's the only thing you're keeping track of. The bitch here is on the GMs side, where challenging these characters can involve making up or coming up with clever tactics for several monsters that are a couple pages long each. This is just plain a lot of prep.

(Just to be clear, since people are arguing: I do think high level 3e combat is somewhat more complicated than high level 1e combat, but not enough so that it 'breaks' play, or slows things down past the point of manageability. So there I guess I'm with Pseudophedrine. But, PREPPING good challenges for higher level 3e adventures IS a lot of work, at least if you make up a lot of your own stuff (I'm not one for strictly using things out of the book and I don't play canned worlds). A well-balanced, effective 20 hit die monster or 18th level NPC is not an easy or quick thing to do well. So there perhaps I'm more with Akrasia.)

To speed up prepping encounters, I recommend periodically recycling the mechanical structure of opponents with minor variations. Draw up a basic "20th level wizard" with a few modular components - 100,000 or so gp left over to customise items, seven or eight open slots for "signature spells" and one or two open feats. Maybe reroll his HP each time for variation. Then, whenever you need a 20th level wizard, you're fifteen minutes of work away from being done.

I recommend recycling them between campaigns as well. There's no reason that you can't reuse your Rogue 16 / Ranger 4 build two years later with a different name and different fluff. Chances are, the PCs won't even notice the mechanical similarity.

Now, if you want to create completely new types of monsters etc., well, that's less a problem with high level play than with D&D in general. But, don't forget the value of stacking templates for jacking up CR. Take a high CR creature, stack some templates that give it weird abilities, change the fluff a little and you've got a unique beast that takes maybe half an hour to whip up.

To speed things up even more, find an electronic copy of the monster's sheet if you can, import it to a word-processor, C&P the template's changes to the right spots, and print the whole thing off rather than doing it by hand.

Jeff, yes, I was thinking in terms of HD and spells/level. But unlike what I remembered they actually both progress infinitely.

I'd still be willing to bet the farm that there were vastly fewer OD&D PCs of L15+ than there are now 3E PCs, a) because of greater lethality; b) because "it wasn't done."