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Playing Devil's Advocate: How does it hurt you if someone else plays a character that they didn't actually play to the required level (assuming that the character is otherwise legal?


Personally, I knew that this would be a problem as soon as the strict level band system was announced because they are taking money from the players up front and and actually setting up a system to handle players who walk up to the table without a legitimate character was more hassle than it was worth.

The only solution (in as far as there is a solution) is the approach they took with the Special and ADCP as this allows them to filter the players and send them to a lower level table if they lack an appropriate character. This is really the ONLY way to attempt to place any restrictions - and even then it is an illusion as they are not mindreaders and certainly can't afford the time for an indepth interview to determine legitimacy.

Even if that was somehow necessary to preserve your experience.

Personally, I hope that they do more and more adventures this way - it makes it easier for me find adventures appropriate for my character regardless of his current level. I'd even settle for fewer releases if the range of levels each could be played at were broadened or the overlap increased.

And, no, it wasn't "just the same" in Living Greyhawk. For two very significant reasons: 1) The level range over which any given adventure could be played was three or four times the level range for any LFR adventure and 2) It was possible to play a character outside of the level range (although with a penalty in experience). The change to LFR means that I had to play at least two characters (a sixth who ended up eighth and a paragon).

Of course, I didn't even try to play anything at 1-4 this year and I was lucky that my primary character happened to be at the perfect level (sixth). If I had been seventh, I would have leveled after only one or two adventures and if I had been fifth I might not have leveled enough to play in others. Or rather, I would not have been able to play my primary character and instead had to dig out some other character I've abandoned due to lack of interest just to be 'legit'. So I was lucky. And even then, I was unable to play Impi (too high level) and sold the ticket and played some delves instead. Oddly enough, under LG I was typically able to play more adventures at GenCon, despite having only one 1st level character. Hmm...

(And, ironically, I believe that it is actually easier to scale adventures in 4E than it was in 3.x).

But I've had my say elsewhere about why I think that they should allow those who want to take the risk to play up into the next level band (while restricting them to level-appropriate gold/XP and no bundles to prevent abuse).


Regardless - How does it harm your gaming experience to have someone else play a character they didn't 'earn'? Why is this an issue for you? Sure - it is better for your survival if they know how to play their character - that is a minor point. But poor players are just part of the mix and even if there was a way of ensuring 'legitimacy' there are still going to be incompetant players (or even just players who are playing long abandoned characters because their current primary character just isn't the right level). (And conversely I suspect you would be equally incensed at someone who didn't 'earn' their level even if they were supremely qualified to play that character).
So competance isn't really the issue.

Speaking for myself, I really don't care. All I care about is whether I (and the others at the table) have a good time playing the game. Where those characters came from isn't the point and, to be honest, I'd even support fast play characters. I'm not there to compete with anyone else, I'm there to play my own character.



Carl

This is inevitable when there are rules that cannot and/or will not be enforced. The best bet is to meet people you trust and play with them. At a specific event with this circumstance where you have incontrovertible proof that someone is playing an illegal character (as in they say, "I just made this 6th level charater on the CB, and this is my 1st LFR game!" or they table a Bugbear with oversized weapons that has three magic items at level 1...) and the DM is going to allow it, you should definitely escalate the matter, but be prepared to be told that they are going to allow it due to some extenuating circumstance, and live with it. There's no reason to just take it, but you can certainly avoid that player/DM in the future. It isn't such a big deal to me, but I play with some incompetent players because they are fun people. You could always demand your money back as well, though I'm not sure how far you'd get with that.

A slightly different case happened at our table, a player with a level 5 PC came up after being marshalled to our table of a 7-10 game ... and was sent to a different mod by the GM. The player had clearly played LFR before.

And that is the way it should be.

But even for a bunch of new players, why not send them over to a level 1-4 game and let them use their tickets for that? It seemed like they were real tight on judges this year (that's new) but I saw a few judges running around (probably on break) that could have been begged for a game.

So while I'm not necessarily for being a hard ass, it seems like this could have been dealt with without breaking the rules. Would that have made it all better? I dunno.

Worse: it seems different marshalls and DMs were operating with different standards. I was told to send people away to HQ were they would do their utmost best to get them seated at an adventure for level 1 to 4 PCs. I have done so. I have also got people at my table at the special that were similarly send away from LURU1-5 for the same reason.

I have offered to set up an intro to LFR section for these people at next year's Gencon. Send them over to the set up area, we can get them into a legal character, explain how the campaign works and run them through a fun 1-4. Probably wouldn't need it on Thursday, but have it running straight through Friday and Saturday. I think a quick induction to the campaign is a better start than just pitching them at a 1-4, LFR can be a bit wonky, we can de-wonk for new players pretty quickly.