D&D General Wishing Away The Adventure

[Reynard]

Also I'd like to point out that all these issues are about magic, no martial class has the ability to completely restructure what the game is about, and most of the suggested counters are about magic too. So the end game is about mages warping reality and the other mages devising magical countermeasures. Might make the martials feel a bit like sidekicks, no?


Case in point. To be an effective assassin, a rogue will not do, you actually need to be a caster.

Rogue's can't read scrolls?

See, here's what I don't understand: why are we trying to pretend the characters don't live in a magical world full of demi-god level characters who can warp reality, change shape, turn invisible, wrestle giants or slay dragons? Why are we trying to demand that an episode of Murder She Wrote be a viable experience in such a setting?

But I'll bite. So the 5 hp noble gets ganked in his sleep and the high level PCs are called in to help find the killer. What are they going to do? Raise him and ask him who killed him? How would he know. he was sleeping at the time. "Who are your enemies?" Here's a list of 100 of them -- he's a noble. Their level doesn't mean they can snap their fingers and solve the mystery.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Also I'd like to point out that all these issues are about magic, no martial class has the ability to completely restructure what the game is about, and most of the suggested counters are about magic too. So the end game is about mages warping reality and the other mages devising magical countermeasures. Might make the martials feel a bit like sidekicks, no?


Case in point. To be an effective assassin, a rogue will not do, you actually need to be a caster.

This leads to the conclusion I found a while back: pure martials, in the context of WotC 5e, simply aren't equal to spellcasters at high levels when the game is played as written, not if you want high level play to feel different than low level play. This to me is ok. Martials aren't really appropriate at those levels for that versions of D&D. They need a supernatural edge.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Rogue's can't read scrolls?

See, here's what I don't understand: why are we trying to pretend the characters don't live in a magical world full of demi-god level characters who can warp reality, change shape, turn invisible, wrestle giants or slay dragons? Why are we trying to demand that an episode of Murder She Wrote be a viable experience in such a setting?

But I'll bite. So the 5 hp noble gets ganked in his sleep and the high level PCs are called in to help find the killer. What are they going to do? Raise him and ask him who killed him? How would he know. he was sleeping at the time. "Who are your enemies?" Here's a list of 100 of them -- he's a noble. Their level doesn't mean they can snap their fingers and solve the mystery.

Is the world really full of demigods though? How common are high level characters? This is an important setting question.

 

[Mort]

Rogue's can't read scrolls?

See, here's what I don't understand: why are we trying to pretend the characters don't live in a magical world full of demi-god level characters who can warp reality, change shape, turn invisible, wrestle giants or slay dragons? Why are we trying to demand that an episode of Murder She Wrote be a viable experience in such a setting?

But I'll bite. So the 5 hp noble gets ganked in his sleep and the high level PCs are called in to help find the killer. What are they going to do? Raise him and ask him who killed him? How would he know. he was sleeping at the time. "Who are your enemies?" Here's a list of 100 of them -- he's a noble. Their level doesn't mean they can snap their fingers and solve the mystery.

The first season of Altered Carbon (Netflix, or read the even better book) has a great take on this. Murder mystery where the client essentially can't die - but there is some missing time when he was "killed" and he wants to know who did it.

 

[Reynard]

Is the world really full of demigods though? How common are high level characters? This is an important setting question.

It is an important question. It essentially changes everything if the PCs are the only high level characters in the world -- and not in a good way, IMO. The contortions you have to go through to give them something to do are too much.

 

[Shardstone]

Obviously. But ultimately what certain sort of powerful magic does, is greatly limit what sort of interesting stuff we can have. No travel adventures, no murder mysteries, no threat or death nor drama because someone died etc.

I'm not seeing a limit at all. You can have all these things, you just need to adjust the actual idea to respond to the players. If people live in a world with divination magic, it is only logical but obvious that a high-level murder mystery involves interfering with divination magic. If you live in a world where people can be ressurected, it makes sense that doing so would either be exploited or lead to consequences down the road.

People love to make these arguments that these things don't exist at high level, but it doesn't hold true. And usually when my specific rebuttal is brought up, people act like it's unfair, like I'm suggesting you cheat the players or make all their toys not work. What I'm actually suggesting is that if you live in a magical world, and you want a high-powered story, you need to use magical means to achieve things you otherwise no longer can.

Anime and Manga have been doing this forever. Jujutsu Kaisen has a villain in it who has been doing intrigue and mysteries for a thousand years using extremely high intelligence, and its a world with a power level that IMO exceeds high level D&D in a few key ways. Countless other examples exist. You even have Invincible, here in the West, whose first season is literally a superhero murder mystery with the strongest living being on the planet as the main suspect. It even involves a demon/devil from Hell trying to trick him into giving himself up.

Expand your literary horizons if you want to tell a murder mystery at high level. Assuming you can't do it is a fixed mindset that is provably untrue.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Prompted by these posts - one solution seems to be to not play a railroad-y game.

Then we don't have things required by "the fiction"; nor content that gets "skipped".

Frankly, this seems to be missing the point.

Because by this definition, any game that features survival mechanics is "a railroad-y game." Because that's literally one of the most common "nope, we're nixing that 100%, that won't happen to us at all ever" spell problems. It can happen literally from level 1 (goodberry, create or destroy water, and purify food and drink are all 1st-level spells obviating the "can you find food/water" angle), and becomes fully, unequivocally operational at level 5 (create food and water and Leomund's tiny hut, the latter of which is a ritual so it doesn't even cost a spell slot.) With but one Cleric and one Bard or Wizard, you can--by spending no more than two spell slots--completely eliminate an entire swathe of concerns. And not just for the party! You get enough food and water from create food and water to feed fifteen people or five steeds (so, presumably, you could choose to feed, say, six people and three steeds), and while the food only lasts 24 hours, the water is permanent.

I still maintain that the core problem is a failure to actually link tasks--meant to be enjoyable challenges to overcome--with the outcomes the game tells you are worth pursuing. Substitute tasks, which are usually much less interesting and rewarding to play through, are thus endured (even if the player or players explicitly recognize that it's less fun to do it that way!) because the substitute tasks are simply better at reaching the desirable outcomes.

Those outcomes don't have to come from any specific source. They can be selected purely by the players.

 

[MNblockhead]

If there is a spell that needs to go away...

I was bothered by it at first, but it hasn't ruined my current campaign. But at high level D&D, things are just gonzo. If the enemy has powerful, intelligent spell casters, none of this stuff is game breaking, but high level D&D is a different game than low level D&D. And that's okay, both can be fun. I would like to see the DMG have a section that goes into detail on different play styles and themes with more concrete examples and recommendations, including which spells to you may want to remove.

Actually, what has been more of culture shock for me DMing 5e is several of my players complain about how much 5e has nerfed magic. They are long-time gamers. I have a gaming gap of over two decades. Before 5e, the last fantasy TTRPGs I played were 1e and Warhammer. If they think 5e magic is gimped, I can't image what 3e and PF1 are like (which they played a lot of).

I listened to the entire first adventure path of the Glass Cannon Podcast, a live play of Paizo's Giantslayer adventure path. I enjoyed it, because the DM and players are all great improvisers and some are professional comedians and actors. But, man, I would be exhausted having DM high-level Pathfinder. Even combat at the lower levels seemed very complicated to run.

 

[Alzrius]

I was bothered by it at first, but it hasn't ruined my current campaign. But at high level D&D, things are just gonzo. If the enemy has powerful, intelligent spell casters, none of this stuff is game breaking, but high level D&D is a different game than low level D&D. And that's okay, both can be fun. I would like to see the DMG have a section that goes into detail on different play styles and themes with more concrete examples and recommendations, including which spells to you may want to remove.

Actually, what has been more of culture shock for me DMing 5e is several of my players complain about how much 5e has nerfed magic. They are long-time gamers. I have a gaming gap of over two decades. Before 5e, the last fantasy TTRPGs I played were 1e and Warhammer. If they think 5e magic is gimped, I can't image what 3e and PF1 are like (which they played a lot of).

I listened to the entire first adventure path of the Glass Cannon Podcast, a live play of Paizo's Giantslayer adventure path. I enjoyed it, because the DM and players are all great improvisers and some are professional comedians and actors. But, man, I would be exhausted having DM high-level Pathfinder. Even combat at the lower levels seemed very complicated to run.

One of the best uber-high level adventures I've seen (but not had a chance to run, yet) for PF1 is Sentence of the Sinlord (affiliate link), which was written for 20th(!) level characters that have three to five mythic tiers. It's absolutely insane how over-the-top it is, and I mean that in the best possible way. If nothing else, reading the review on the sales page should help drive home what it's like to run a game at that level.

 

[Pedantic]

I really am not fan of this sort of magical countermeasures game. It requires any high level treat to have access to counter magic, and as GM can just decide that they do, this basically results GM making up excuses why you cant use your powers. I much rather just remove the problematic spells, so that whatever spells the players get to choose they actually can use.

That's basically just the definition of "high level." I think there's a routine mistake made that casts high level as an aesthetic, like your point earlier about "navigating your flying ship through the Nine Hells." That isn't a high level adventure, and the game should make it clear that's the case. Asking for that to be a high level thing, is asking for the extension of the so-called "sweet spot" to a larger progression range, which arguably has been a goal to varying degrees in 4e and 5e for a while now.

High levels are defined by the limited obstacles that are still available, and the proactivity of everyone involved, trading appropriate countermeasures and prodding for weaknesses in the opponent's planning. Characters don't get into fights unless they've been outmaneuvered, or they've instigated them. The available problems that can challenge them are so thin on the ground they tend to need a reason to go seek them out, instead of encountering them in the world at large.

I keep arguing the game needs to be very clear about where specific narratives/challenges fit into the level progression, how the gameplay loop will change, and very specifically to offer space for the game to keep being played at the desired range if the group wants to do things that fit there. E6esque progression systems should be official, and we should have rules and subsystems that are designed for use in specific ranges.