Interesting article on epic/divine play

[S'mon]

My friend Upper_Krust has just posted an interesting article on the '10 Commandmants' of 'epic' (very high level) campaigning, parts of it are directed at 4e D&D Epic Tier & above, but a lot of it is more broadly applicable to eg BECMI Masters & Immortals play, as well as eg 3e Epic, or the 1e Epic we used to play. Find it here:

Article: The Ten Commandments of Epic Eternity Publishing

 

[JustKim]

Thanks! My 4E Mystara game is about to enter epic tier and I've been looking at the BECMI stuff for inspiration. I like that the advice addresses more than just combat.

 

[TarionzCousin]

A great article. I would give you XP for it, S'mon, but apparently you owe that XP to Stan Lee.

In the Epic tier you can battle golems the size of castles, primordials the size of mountains and dragons as big as planets…that sounds slightly more epic to me than monsters a few feet taller than the last tier.

 

[S'mon]

A great article. I would give you XP for it, S'mon, but apparently you owe that XP to Stan Lee.

I'm guessing that 4e 'Epic' monsters are not very big because they were designed with miniatures use in mind. But it seems to me that you could run a battle *on* a really big monster, using the battlemat as its body, as some recent computer games like 'God of War' have done.

In the article Craig talks about cut scenes with lower-level characters, I used to do this a lot in our 1e AD&D game. Some of the tests for ascension to higher divine ranks involved playing at 1st level again, having to beat tough scenarios with very limited resources. I also think that both the Worship Points system where the PC draws strength from the 'little people', and the Superhero model where the GM/writer emphasises mundane/mortal connections, help keep the epic game more grounded and more interesting.

My approach to politics has been to use it liberally, but never to obfuscate what's going on. The player only has a limited connection to the milieu, they need every opportunity to be able to grok what's going on and then to use that knowledge effectively. So I don't tend to use a lot of double-bluffs or 'gotcha' type secrets. Players will still screw up often enough on their own account, like the Chaotic Evil demigod PC Mortis who didn't realise that because his patron Graz'zt had a Norn-pact (non-aggression, mutually assured destruction pact enforced by the Fates) with LG Thrin, Mortis turning the Queen of Thrinia from LG to CE with a Helm of Opposite Alignment was *not* going to go down well...

 

[Nightson]

Cutscenes are great, but another way you can show the divide between epic and other tiers is to throw the characters into situations involving lower tier people.

That level 1-5 noble who's been siphoning gold out of the treasury. When the character makes an insight check on him they don't just see he's lying, they peel back all the layers inside him with a glance and see everything that makes him tick. When the character gets angry, the noble suddenly finds standing difficult and starts bleeding from the nose (and ears and eyes if you like). At the end of it, the character turns the noble to stone without using much more energy then an encounter power.

An epic level character could kill everyone in a normal village, not by attacking each one individually, but simply wishing it to be so. They don't just stay at an inn when in town anymore then you'd imagine a deity or a demon prince staying at an inn.

When you as the DM let them have that power they'll know the game has changed.

 

[S'mon]

An epic level character could kill everyone in a normal village, not by attacking each one individually, but simply wishing it to be so.

That sounds like a 3e Wizard!

I actually like it that 4e PCs increase in power much more slowly than in 3e, and Epic PCs can't normally obliterate a village with a thought. They're like the heroes of the Iliad, with help they can take on a god, but they won't sneeze and accidentally flatten Troy.

I'm also not averse to Epic PCs hanging around a village Inn, if that's what they want to do - like Elminster slumming it in Shadowdale, or Superman working at the Daily Planet. Again, I think the Superhero comic approach is a good one for keeping the PCs grounded in the reality of the game world. And this is a lot easier to do in 4e, where lower level non-minion NPCs won't automatically be obliterated by high level characters fighting in the vicinity. In 4e you can credibly stat the princess with enough hp that she can be rescued from the dragon without being automatically incinerated in the backwash.

Of course I'm also not averse to Epic PCs hanging round the Imperial Court, interacting with the Emperor - or being the Emperor - and ultimately hanging around Ysgard hobnobbing with Odin & Thor, or Pelor & Kord.

 

[S'mon]

Thanks! My 4E Mystara game is about to enter epic tier and I've been looking at the BECMI stuff for inspiration. I like that the advice addresses more than just combat.

I think Mystara is a fantastic setting for epic-level play, and many of the old Masters & to a lesser extent Immortals series adventures are highly useable. After Fergus, the player of Mortis Deathlord (ne Storax Brightside) had his demigod PC ganked by Graz'zt, he started a new 1st level PC Thor Sunneson, a Soderfjorder legionary in the Thyatian army, and played him up from 1st through epic wars and conquests over years of game time to become King of Soderfjord, then King of unified Soderfjord-Vestland, I think he reached quasi-deity status before joining Craig's deity PC Thrin in an ill-advised attempt to assassinate the Thyatian royal family, causing the goddess Vanya to manifest and kick their butts.

I think Fergus should have learned to avoid anything to do with Thrin...

 

[Evilhalfling]

I ran a "cut scene" game in just the opposite direction tonight -
the PCs just hit 10th. One of their earlier quests was a series of missions to recruit paragon NPCs to save the world. Tonight I gave them them the NPC paragon character sheets and told them go go kill the (low) epic villain. - It wasn't that he could destroy the world himself, but he was teaching darksun defiling magic and had founded an elite unit he was calling the Templar."

It was a terrific fight, with 2 nPCs going down and everyone going bloodied.
If I had read this article first I would have inflicted even more collateral damage. The PCs were offered the chance to come along as minions - one even accepted, but spent most of the fight waiting outside.

I set the building on fire at the end, but really it should have gone up on round 3.

We cut back to the PCs trying to take over the city after the death of its ruler, and having to take seriously the minions that survived the higher level fight. The characters also agreed to do a quest for one of the nPCs so they could get the crown the villain was wearing. One of the PCs favored allies was on the wrong side of the fight, and was killed with great reluctance by a good nPC.

One factor which made the fight lots of fun was lesser minions, who got no attack rolls, were hit automatically and posed impressively before being decimated. "Lord Grafton IV swings at you with his glowing sword - looks like he missed again"

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hey there!

Hope you all like the article.

I'm guessing that 4e 'Epic' monsters are not very big because they were designed with miniatures use in mind. But it seems to me that you could run a battle *on* a really big monster, using the battlemat as its body, as some recent computer games like 'God of War' have done.

Absolutely. I'll try and have my Super-Solo Rules for running REALLY big monsters on the website in a month or thereabouts. They are very quick and simple and should be robust enough to handle Universe sized creatures(although I'll probably stick to relatively smaller monsters for the examples).

Certainly videogames like the God of War series, Bayonetta, Castlevania: Lords of Shadow and forthcoming Asura's Wrath have all tried to add totally massive monsters and I think the fact that 4E sticks to 30 foot tall beasts is another indictment against the idea that the Epic Tier is in any way shape or form EPIC.

In the article Craig talks about cut scenes with lower-level characters, I used to do this a lot in our 1e AD&D game. Some of the tests for ascension to higher divine ranks involved playing at 1st level again, having to beat tough scenarios with very limited resources. I also think that both the Worship Points system where the PC draws strength from the 'little people', and the Superhero model where the GM/writer emphasises mundane/mortal connections, help keep the epic game more grounded and more interesting.

As well as cut scenes out of sync with the current situation I have been thinking that actually cutting to different scenes mid combat (say when the BBEG gets bloodied) could be a nice idea to build tension.

My approach to politics has been to use it liberally, but never to obfuscate what's going on. The player only has a limited connection to the milieu, they need every opportunity to be able to grok what's going on and then to use that knowledge effectively. So I don't tend to use a lot of double-bluffs or 'gotcha' type secrets. Players will still screw up often enough on their own account, like the Chaotic Evil demigod PC Mortis who didn't realise that because his patron Graz'zt had a Norn-pact (non-aggression, mutually assured destruction pact enforced by the Fates) with LG Thrin, Mortis turning the Queen of Thrinia from LG to CE with a Helm of Opposite Alignment was *not* going to go down well...

You probably want to integrate this sort of thing slowly over the Paragon Tier giving PCs more and more responsibility another reason to advocate playing characters from low level rather than simply starting at epic.

 

[Upper_Krust]

I ran a "cut scene" game in just the opposite direction tonight -
the PCs just hit 10th. One of their earlier quests was a series of missions to recruit paragon NPCs to save the world. Tonight I gave them them the NPC paragon character sheets and told them go go kill the (low) epic villain. - It wasn't that he could destroy the world himself, but he was teaching darksun defiling magic and had founded an elite unit he was calling the Templar."

It was a terrific fight, with 2 nPCs going down and everyone going bloodied.
If I had read this article first I would have inflicted even more collateral damage. The PCs were offered the chance to come along as minions - one even accepted, but spent most of the fight waiting outside.

I set the building on fire at the end, but really it should have gone up on round 3.

We cut back to the PCs trying to take over the city after the death of its ruler, and having to take seriously the minions that survived the higher level fight. The characters also agreed to do a quest for one of the nPCs so they could get the crown the villain was wearing. One of the PCs favored allies was on the wrong side of the fight, and was killed with great reluctance by a good nPC.

One factor which made the fight lots of fun was lesser minions, who got no attack rolls, were hit automatically and posed impressively before being decimated. "Lord Grafton IV swings at you with his glowing sword - looks like he missed again"

Great stuff - you have just given me the the following ideas:

#1: Future Imperfect Battle: Give the PCs the chance to (temporarily) level up a tier (10 levels) and take on the BBEG in what is esstially a premonition of future events (maybe they witness this via a crystal ball or magical scrying pool. But probably have them crushed by the BBEG either dying or forced to flee. This does a lot to establish the threat of the BBEG.

#2: Beginning of the End: Give the PCs the character sheets of the world's greatest heroes who are trying to stop [insert doomsday scenario] from beginning...again they will probably fail...meaning the events will happen and the PCs are the ones who will need to stop it.