D&D 5E Why stop at Level 20?

Retreater · Aug 21, 2018

ad_hoc said:
How do you explain over 15 million people playing just fine?

Are they all doing it wrong?

Just describing my preference. I've put in a lot of work to homebrew my style of game into 5e. I've added more tactical depth and flavored some monster abilities so they didn't feel like bags of hit points that cause damage. (Taking a few notes from Matt Colville.)
Running three 5e campaigns, and maybe it's easy to see why the whole thing just seems...boring.

ad_hoc · Aug 21, 2018

Retreater said:
Just describing my preference. I've put in a lot of work to homebrew my style of game into 5e. I've added more tactical depth and flavored some monster abilities so they didn't feel like bags of hit points that cause damage. (Taking a few notes from Matt Colville.)
Running three 5e campaigns, and maybe it's easy to see why the whole thing just seems...boring.

You're playing in 3 campaigns in a game you think does a terrible job?

You should play games you enjoy.

If you're looking for something competitive don't play a cooperative game. There are a variety of games to choose from with very competent players who will challenge you. Get to the point in a competitive game where there are real stakes and you will learn a lot about strategy and competition.

Ymdar · Aug 21, 2018

Oofta said:
How many apocalypses can there be, and what happens if the group fails?

In Forgotten Realms there can be an apocalypse every week and nobody would notice. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

KahlessNestor · Aug 21, 2018

Retreater said:
I don't consider Critical Role productions to be official D&D content to show how to run an epic campaign or provide guidelines on how to do it. It's a performance.
And yeah, for me the first few levels are too deadly. Starting around level 5 the party starts getting the upper hand pretty easily. After about 10th level, the characters don't even have to bother rolling. It's basically auto success on everything (or TPK).
5E as written does a terrible job of conveying threat, challenge, and intensity in combat. I'm starting to view it as the most milquetoast edition I've ever played.

What do you mean by "official D&D content"? You mean when WOTC invites them to basically run their new product launch parties? To put together and DM official live play adventures for said products? When it actually puts their HOMEBREW CONTENT in their OFFICIAL digital toolset? When the lead story designer of WOTC actually goes and plays on said show?

Critical Role is actually more RAW now than it was in the first campaign. And certainly more RAW than a lot of the games I have seen Chris Perkins running on the "official" D&D channel.

Oofta · Aug 21, 2018

Retreater said:
I don't consider Critical Role productions to be official D&D content to show how to run an epic campaign or provide guidelines on how to do it. It's a performance.
And yeah, for me the first few levels are too deadly. Starting around level 5 the party starts getting the upper hand pretty easily. After about 10th level, the characters don't even have to bother rolling. It's basically auto success on everything (or TPK).
5E as written does a terrible job of conveying threat, challenge, and intensity in combat. I'm starting to view it as the most milquetoast edition I've ever played.

Then you're doing it wrong*. The CR guidelines are just that, guidelines. Probably based on a 4 person group that doesn't take feats, multiclass or have magic items while having 6-8 encounters between long rests. I have no problem challenging parties even at level 20 (not all the time of course, but most of the time).

Encounters need to be adjusted for your group based on your group. It's not hard to do but it is more a an art than a science.

If you want advice on how to adjust, feel free to ask. Unless of course you'd just rather complain about it.

*Just to be clear it means building appropriately challenging encounters. Sounds like the difficulty is set a "super easy" because they haven't been adjusted appropriately.

Yunru · Aug 21, 2018

Oofta said:
It's not hard to do but it is more a an art than a science.

On the contrary, you couldn't get more scientific.
You raise the challenge, note the changes, record how many players were left alive, record how many characters were left alive, then probably lower the challenge

Empirical evidence gathering at it's best. Just don't let your players know they're the experiment.

Maxperson · Aug 21, 2018

Sword of Spirit said:
So, exactly why would one need epic "levels" when there are already rules for continued advancement, including additional ASIs/Feats and Epic Boon kewl powerz right there in the Dungeon Master's Guide? Is there some reason there needs to be a "Level 21"?

People like to see the level numbers rise. It's more fun in my opinion to get those feats and stat increases along with hitting level 21 or 24, than it is to just have everyone be level 20 but with a bit more.

Oofta · Aug 21, 2018

Maxperson said:
People like to see the level numbers rise. It's more fun in my opinion to get those feats and stat increases along with hitting level 21 or 24, than it is to just have everyone be level 20 but with a bit more.

Have you actually played above level 20? I may try it now and then as short story arcs for otherwise retired characters.

I found for my 4E epic campaign that the story and setting had to change to justify the challenge, I'm curious if other people see that.

Maxperson · Aug 21, 2018

Oofta said:
Have you actually played above level 20? I may try it now and then as short story arcs for otherwise retired characters.

I found for my 4E epic campaign that the story and setting had to change to justify the challenge, I'm curious if other people see that.

In 5e, no. In 3e? Multiple times, but not past the early 20's. We would play out the campaign and sometimes meant finishing in the high teens. Sometimes at level 20. And sometimes in the low epic levels. It was all fun. I didn't pay 4e, and 1e and 2e involved too much level draining and save or die to make it that high.

Oofta · Aug 21, 2018

Maxperson said:
In 5e, no. In 3e? Multiple times, but not past the early 20's. We would play out the campaign and sometimes meant finishing in the high teens. Sometimes at level 20. And sometimes in the low epic levels. It was all fun. I didn't pay 4e, and 1e and 2e involved too much level draining and save or die to make it that high.

Thanks, I was curious. I did a 4E campaign that went to 30 which was fun in a way (would have been more fun if it hadn't been 4E but that's another story) but it's a bit weird to be jumping planes and fighting demigods. Went from a high fantasy campaign to almost a weird fantasy campaign.

If I do it in the future I agree that I'll still have people level up even if it doesn't mean as much.