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4 months ago ::
Jan 20, 2013 - 5:26PM
#21
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Why does the game have levels at all?
Think about it. It would be tremendously easier to just design a game where everybody is 5th level. Leveling up characters is also a lot of work. Why do we do that?
The answer is that D&D has always been based on the idea that the player wants rewards, which means higher levels and greater powers. That in turn means that starting at higher levels means you cant't improve as much. In effect, if you start at 5th level, you play 25 levels instead of 30, thus reducing your total play.
More important, you spend your entire career fighting orcs , or fighting giants. It's the same thing since you still have the same challenge week after week. No matter how much fun the first fight is, the 100th is going to get rather dull. You need that new thrill of fighting hobgoblins instead of ors, and then orges, and then trolls... You just keep on playing longer.
You may say "I just don't want to fight kobolds and goblins." but you are still causing a net reduction in play, which we of course don't want to cause. So the official rules need to argue for starting at 1st level. There will be the exceptions of course, but the whole design of D&D, and all of its clones, is based on starting at 1st level.
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4 months ago ::
Jan 20, 2013 - 6:22PM
#22
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Date Joined:
Jan 30, 2007
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Why does the game have levels at all?
Think about it. It would be tremendously easier to just design a game where everybody is 5th level. Leveling up characters is also a lot of work. Why do we do that?
The answer is that D&D has always been based on the idea that the player wants rewards, which means higher levels and greater powers. That in turn means that starting at higher levels means you cant't improve as much. In effect, if you start at 5th level, you play 25 levels instead of 30, thus reducing your total play.
More important, you spend your entire career fighting orcs , or fighting giants. It's the same thing since you still have the same challenge week after week. No matter how much fun the first fight is, the 100th is going to get rather dull. You need that new thrill of fighting hobgoblins instead of ors, and then orges, and then trolls... You just keep on playing longer.
You may say "I just don't want to fight kobolds and goblins." but you are still causing a net reduction in play, which we of course don't want to cause. So the official rules need to argue for starting at 1st level. There will be the exceptions of course, but the whole design of D&D, and all of its clones, is based on starting at 1st level.
I will counter with this:
Say I move to a new area, and I find people who are playing Next... but the campaign has made them get to level 12 already.
Not wanting to make me struggle, the DM allows me to roll a level 12 character... how much gold does that character have? What gear? How many magical items? How are magical items determined?
You could give the hardcore answer of "you start at first level", but seriously, dude, it's not fun to be a level 1 fighter when the Wizard is throwing Lightning bolts around and the other fighter is a damage sponge of doom.
I just ran an 8th level playtest today, and I had the players come with 900 gold for gear, and I then rolled 8 random magical items because I wanted them to feel like they've been adventuring for, well, 8 levels. 1-7, uncommon thing, 8, increase rarity by a level and re-roll.
As it stands, Next has no guidelines for "if you want to start at this level, do this". Now, it's a playtest. But if you want to, say, run the Mud Sorcerer, it's silly to have no rules, or even guidelines, for character creation beyond 1st level.
Salla, on minions: I typically use them as encounter filler. 'I didn't quite fill out the XP budget, not enough room left for a decent near-level monster ... sprinkle in a few minions'. Kind of like monster styrofoam packing peanuts.
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4 months ago ::
Jan 20, 2013 - 6:33PM
#23
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Date Joined:
Nov 17, 2003
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There's no expectations of magic items, so it's literally just whatever the DM thinks is appropriate - some DMs like to hand out +3 swords to everyone, and some of them don't want anyone to have a magic item without having gone on an epic quest for it.
I've been known to give +3 swords to starting 1st level characters before. Just depends on what type of campaign one wants to run.
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4 months ago ::
Jan 20, 2013 - 6:36PM
#24
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Date Joined:
May 27, 2012
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Say I move to a new area, and I find people who are playing Next... but the campaign has made them get to level 12 already.
Not wanting to make me struggle, the DM allows me to roll a level 12 character... how much gold does that character have? What gear? How many magical items? How are magical items determined?
The answer is... whatever the DM thinks is appropriate. How did the other level 12 characters get their magic items? Did they just manage to find a few trinkets during their adventures, and now the fighter has a +1 sword? If so, then maybe the new character also has a +1 weapon. Did the rest of the party each get a wondrous item of useful properties, specifically tied to what would be useful for that character? If so, then give the new character one of those. Is everyone else loaded down with +3 rings and dancing shields?
They can't write down guidelines without invalidating the existing characters. If they say that a new level 12 character should have a +1 weapon and one other uncommon item, then that's not fair to any other characters who have survived that far through actual play and hadn't found any magical loot at all.
The metagame is not the game.
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4 months ago ::
Jan 20, 2013 - 6:38PM
#25
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For me it always depended on the adventure, as Knights we started at 0lvl at times. But we always filled non game weekends with making characters, so we always had three or four to chose from.
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4 months ago ::
Jan 20, 2013 - 7:16PM
#26
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Date Joined:
Aug 31, 2007
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1. Is this an issue for anyone else than me?
Depending on the campaign, I might start at higher then 1st. However, most of my campaigns are low level and in most editions I enjoy levels 1-5 most as both player and DM, so I rarely do it. It makes more sense for short tightly ploted campaigns that will only cover a few levels.
2. Does it "break the spirit" of D&D not to endure the leveling up from level 1?
It shouldn't but there is a certain subset of people who hate to start at anything other then 1st. At some level they think of playing D&D as something you win by playing a character from 1st to max level, so starting at higher then 1st or ending early is cheating. The game designers also need to avoid setting the 1st level too low because groups of new players don't understand how to handle those situations.
3. What can be done, and what support/rules are needed to start at higher levels?
Other then the PHB and pointing out that you can start above 1st and the DMG explaining when it is a good idea, along with some guidelines for new characters above 1st level, there isn't much to do. However, one radical suggestion that has been put forth multiple times was to set the default starting level at 3rd-5th level and build the PHB rules about starting characters at that level. Then campaigns that wanted to start at very low power level could adjust down and a lot of multi-classing problems would go away.
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4 months ago ::
Jan 20, 2013 - 7:46PM
#27
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1. Is this an issue for anyone else than me?
My group has pretty much always done that 70% of the time with D&D. The only reason we don't do that very often for other systems is because we usually just one off other systems and go lvl 1 for training purposes. Not an issue, just our style.
2. Does it "break the spirit" of D&D not to endure the leveling up from level 1?
I don't care if it does.
3. What can be done, and what support/rules are needed to start at higher levels?
Make it so we don't have to pull out a calculator to math out wealth by level + pick a tidal wave of starting equipment? Oh wait, if equipment isn't expected by the system balance, then I can just DM say "basics only." I guess my main problem is taken care of.
What I think the Wilder Design Goals should be. Psionic Homebrew Mk2! Changed core, Focus Points, Psionic Potentials, stuff! Very basic core stuff. :P Homebrew Psionics blog posts archive: Spoiler:
Show
UPDATED Dec/18/2012: BAMN! Random update with a modest amount of hard rules for Animal Affinity, Telepathy, and Telekinesis. ADDED: Discipline Burn and more "soft" ideas.
Dec/13/2012: Small Psionics Homebrew Update, now that I'm done with Finals.
Really old.
Nov/02/2012:
I'm working on a homebrew Wilder, and so a homebrew Psionics system. Here's a 3 part post with info on where I am in the design process.
Part 1, Hard rules/example soulknife discipline: Link.
Part 2, Basic ideas/goals on basic numbers and classes: Link.
Part 3, Direction/ideas I want to take with specific disciplines: Link.:3
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4 months ago ::
Jan 20, 2013 - 8:05PM
#28
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I play with a lot of new players a lot of the time, and thus start at level 1 more than I otherwise would. D&D isn't great at it, but it does an okay-ish job of sort of introducing things a bit at a time and ramping up complexity as you go, and so it's just a lot easier for new players if we start at level 1, plus new players aren't already jaded of the first few levels of play. (Because campaigns have lifespans, most people have spent significantly more time with early levels than with later levels.) It's also easy to forget, but even for somewhat experienced ones, putting together a level five character (at least in 3.5/PF) is a bit daunting for people who don't really have system-head.
For PF with experienced players, I've started at level 3 a few times. Things just "kick in" a little more there.
Starting at higher levels is usually reserved for one-shots.
Dwarves invented beer so they could toast to their axes. Dwarves invented axes to kill people and take their beer.
"Feel free to claim I said anything you like. How's someone going to call you out on it? Are they going to be all like, 'I know all of the things that Gary said, and that's not one of them?'"
- Gary Gygax
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4 months ago ::
Jan 20, 2013 - 8:15PM
#29
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Date Joined:
May 18, 2002
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The only real downside is that most editions simply fall apart around level 12. Thus, starting at level 6 means you've cut out about half of the useful lifetime out of a campaign.
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4 months ago ::
Jan 20, 2013 - 8:22PM
#30
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Date Joined:
Dec 12, 2009
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Back when I played 3.5 I started my players at third almost all the time. In 4E the players nearly always start at 1st. Unless its a one-shot and then I ussually roll a d20 to determine starting level.
I would like to see advice on starting at higher levels without outright saying exactly what your supposed to have. A single page that detailed the guidelines that you should look at in your own game when making a character above 1st. For example, if the world is a high fantasy setting then perhaps giving the players all a few magic items would be in order. If the players are starting in a gladiator's arena then perhaps all they have is basic weapons and armor, if that.
Basically if they can give advice on what you need to keep in mind for characters starting above 1st they don't need to give hard and fast lists, and that, to me, is a suitable middle ground.
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