Let's see if we can find some consensusby using some examples from Star Wars, The Lord of the Rings, and Saving Private Ryan:
Luke Skywalker, Frodo, Corporal Upham: First level. Some minimal training, but no real combat experience.
Han Solo, Captain Miller, Boromir, Gimli: Fifth level. Capable veterans of their professions. Can handle most challenges with style.
Darth Vader, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Aragorn: Tenth level. Pretty dang impressive, with a major rep for awesome.
The Emperor, Gandalf the Grey: Fifteenth level. Major heavy hitters, capable of pretty miraculous feats.
Nice. The examples of Level 1 are interesting because while they are still “in training”, they have achieved enough to define them as clearly competent. Luke is ready and willing to leap into adventure, even if the loss of his family forces the timing.
Incidentally, the choice of levels corresponds well to medieval titles:
Me personally, I think the game is more fun when you start out inexperiened and weak and develop your character and get stronger as you level up, overcoming challanges and dangerous obstacles despite your weaknesses. If your group doesn`t like that, why not start out at a higher level?
So, what do you think? How powerful should a first level and early levels character feel, and is Next doing it "right"?
I'm a big fan of wimpy 1st level characters that earn their power. But I also think it should be easy to start at 3rd or 5th level. And I think there should be a "heroic" module (much like Pathfinder's Mythic Adventures) where you can add on HD and damage to make your level 1 character face the challenges of a higher level character.
Before posting, ask yourself WWWS: What Would Wrecan Say?
Cats are harmless because they don't attack people, not because of their size.
No, cats are harmless because of their size. Housecats cannot kill people. They cannot kill children. They can't even kill your 80-year old grandmother unless she's in a coma. Cat claws cannot inflict more than minor lacerrations on the skin.
Cats evolved to hunt mice and birds and they are very very effective at that and completely ineffective at hunting anything their size or larger.
This issue was hashed out ad nauseum during Third Edition where a housecat was, under the game rules, a serious threat to a first level wizard or commoner. (And not the frail 80-year old commoner, but the healthy 20-year old commoner armed with a kitchen knife.)
I imagine what an 80 year old grandmother would do if a feral cat really attacked her and tried to kill her, and I could easily picture the cat succeeding.
Your imagination does not resemble reality.
Yup ... reality is sometimes unrealistic "but not this time".
I wanna feel at most like a farmer or other average joe with only the barest of skillsets. A back woods peasent, street urchin, blacksmith apprentice, etc.
However, I want others to be able to feel like they want as well...so long as it doesn't infringe my own playtstyle.
I agree! I enjoy starting out low too, I think that`s the most fun. I`m not talking game mechanics, difficulty or crunch at all, I`m talking about how my character feels in the game world, narratively and roleplaying-wise, but I`m afraid the game is getting more and more rules obsessed and crunch-focused
I think it should be set up with definite tiers of growth to allow tables to approach it their own way, but with solid guidelines.
A possible system:
Levels 1-3: In this tier, you are going from barely a cut above normal to a true badass. At level 1, you are not very good at what your class does. The wizard doesn't cast many spells, the fighter isn't all that tough yet. You are discovering your specialization in this tier.
Level 4: At level 4, you finish getting all your major features, and you are fully specialized. This level would be equivalent to a level 1 character in 4e. Also, the books would highly recommend that beginning players start at level 4, and the basic character creation guides would be designed around starting here. Alternatively, this could be called level 1, and the first three levels could be called apprenticeship levels or something.
Levels 4-10 would be the heroic tier, then paragon and epic at higher levels.
"So shall it be! Dear-bought those songs shall be be accounted, and yet shall be well-bought. For the price could be no other. Thus even as Eru spoke to us shall beauty not before conceived be brought into Eä, and evil yet be good to have been."
Level one is, by definition, where you're just starting out: it's the realm of callow youths, apprentice wizards, and the like. What differintiates them from the masses is will, not ability
That perception of being the smallest fish should end pretty quickly though -- by 3rd level, PCs are now seasoned, and a decided cut above your average person. If most people are first level equivalent (1hd commoners) , you are now triple their ability. You're probably not out of the range of NPC achievement. The duty-bound captain of the guard or such may be playing on your level... and monsters and notable villians certainly pose a deadly threat.
From here, relative power increases slowly. As you gain levels, you mookify further monsters and begin to outclass the 3rd-5th level "Competant" NPCs, first by a margin and then finally fully surpassing their sort. at 10th level, they're in the same place commoners were at 3rd, and you've entered the land of elite.
Being Elite, you are now recognized as a badass. Are you the only ones of your caliber? Probably not, but by now you are absolutley a rare breed unknown to common men, standing toe-to-toe with people who can without bosting call themselves the best in something. You begin to face and overcome truly threatening foes like Liches towards the start of this range, and are taking on dragons near the end. Where is this end, you may ask? In my opinion, 20th level.
When you cross the boundry of 20th level, you are now properly Epic -- the best in the world, possibly for generations. Your foes are the mightiest monsters (Like high-end dragons), big fish from bigger ponds than 'the world' (High-end demons/devils), and perhaps some other remarkable, rare individuals like yourselves (NPC Big Bads).
Of course, once you hit "epic" the game starts to break down. No matter how solid your math is, you will reach the point in an unbounded progression where it starts begging for mercy, and I think 20 is around the number of levels you can and should get in before that begins. It's why I think release should stop at 20, and handle 21+ (or 21-30, if you must) in a seperate suppliment.
In short, I see PCs starting as devoted normals at 1st level, and each time they hit a multiple of the starting level of the former tier, having achieved a new tier of power, thematically. At triple first (3rd), you're good, at three times that (rounding to 10th) you're elite/rare and special, and at double that (20th) you're epic
"Enjoy your screams, Sarpadia - they will soon be muffled beneath snow and ice." THE COALITION WAR GAME -Phyrexian Praetor Round 1: (4-1-2, 1 kill) Round 2: (16-8-2, 4 kills) Round 3: (18-9-2, 1 kill) Round 4: (22-10-0, 2 kills) Round 5: (56-16-3, 9 kills) Round 6: (8-7-1) [current round]
I imagine what an 80 year old grandmother would do if a feral cat really attacked her and tried to kill her, and I could easily picture the cat succeeding.
Alternatively, this could be called level 1, and the first three levels could be called apprenticeship levels or something.
This is where I think we should head, because like I've said before it will make more sense to new players, player we generally want to simplify the game for and player we generally want to be playing from those levels. This also works to allow us to fix the front loading in multiclassing by splitting those 1st level abilities across the apprenticeship levels. Finally this also more closely matches the idea of the starting off as a farmer with an axe since it would make sense that he does not yet know anything specialized. With a couple apprentice levels we can have more fine grained control over how we want to start off our characters. This would also remove the mental barrier of starting at later levels as the apprentice levels would be seen as optional rather then lost content.
Alternatively, this could be called level 1, and the first three levels could be called apprenticeship levels or something.
This is where I think we should head, because like I've said before it will make more sense to new players, player we generally want to simplify the game for and player we generally want to be playing from those levels. This also works to allow us to fix the front loading in multiclassing by splitting those 1st level abilities across the apprenticeship levels. Finally this also more closely matches the idea of the starting off as a farmer with an axe since it would make sense that he does not yet know anything specialized. With a couple apprentice levels we can have more fine grained control over how we want to start off our characters. This would also remove the mental barrier of starting at later levels as the apprentice levels would be seen as optional rather then lost content.
I agree, I think this is the better option. I hadn't thought about the multiclass thing, but that does actually help it a lot. It lets you start the game with a fair amount of specialization, without breaking a 3e style multiclass system.
The big thing I want to emphasize too is that there should be a set point where everybody has the abilities that are really iconic to what their class does. At that level, wizards can throw fireballs, fighters can tank a lot of damage, rogues can sneak attack for serious damage, and clerics pack some real healing power. It's better to set a specific spot as your benchmark for that than it is to let every class do its own thing, meaning different characters will come into their own at different levels.
"So shall it be! Dear-bought those songs shall be be accounted, and yet shall be well-bought. For the price could be no other. Thus even as Eru spoke to us shall beauty not before conceived be brought into Eä, and evil yet be good to have been."
I think it should be set up with definite tiers of growth to allow tables to approach it their own way, but with solid guidelines.
A possible system:
Levels 1-3: In this tier, you are going from barely a cut above normal to a true badass. At level 1, you are not very good at what your class does. The wizard doesn't cast many spells, the fighter isn't all that tough yet. You are discovering your specialization in this tier.
Level 4: At level 4, you finish getting all your major features, and you are fully specialized. This level would be equivalent to a level 1 character in 4e. Also, the books would highly recommend that beginning players start at level 4, and the basic character creation guides would be designed around starting here. Alternatively, this could be called level 1, and the first three levels could be called apprenticeship levels or something.
Levels 4-10 would be the heroic tier, then paragon and epic at higher levels.
I agree with this assessment. I still see all of these levels, 0-4, as “apprenticeship”, but becoming fully specialized at level 4 makes sense. During these five levels (0-4), the “students” are still in training, still checking in with their teachers or contacts, probably still in the same town or region where they grew up (albeit there are exceptions).
For me level 5 defines the heroic level with an independent sense of expertise. This is when the Wizard becomes able to cast a Fireball. For me this is the definitive threshold. The fireballing Wizard is truly scary. It is a rite of passage. By extension, I use this Level 5 Wizard as a measure for other classes at level 5.
