Advice on running high level adventures

[Rafael Ceurdepyr]

In my current campaign, my players have progressed from 1st level up through 9th, which is an amazing occurrence for us. I can already tell that running a 9th level game is different from lower levels. (I know, duh, Raef, but those of you who've done it know what I mean.)

I'd like some advice from those of you who have run both types of games. I've looked at some good threads here: http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=196244 and http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=192739 (I especially like Odhanan's idea of a high level campaign guide.)

Now, I'm not talking about epic level, but 9th-12th level would be a good start. Any advice would be great. Bear in mind we've never played above 9th level, except maybe once (and that was modded and low magic and such.)

 

[Zad]

I think there's something of an irrational fear of "higher" level games out there. Exactly what "higher" means varies from person to person. For instance, I'd call 9-12 mid level personally.

I'm not a DM but have played in some longstanding campaigns (see sig for story hour links) including one six year number that started at level 1 and went to epic levels. Here's some of my initial thoughts:

First, your PCs are getting a little more power. That's just fine - don't be scared of it. Fighters are going to start getting lucky and laying down powerful attack sequences. Spells start flying, and things generally can get a bit more extreme. Don't be afraid of it. Some DM's or some modules respond to this by neutralizing some of the more powerful options - like traveling to a plane where no spell over 3rd level works, etc. Don't do this - all you're doing is making your players feel weak and denied. You just have to be more ready for it.

One foe is generally easier for PCs to deal with than lots of foes. For one big dragon, you can concentrate your fire. For lots of giants, it gets a little harder.

Personally, spell-like abilities scare me a lot - save-or-die stuff espcially. Anyone can roll a 1. You can use this carefully to create some fear and hence excitement.

Roll with it - just like at lower levels, if the PCs use some ability and come up with a brilliant counter to the whole module you wrote, then good for them. Roll with it rather than looking for ways to shut them down.

Divinations - they become a more significant part of a game starting at these levels. And they can seem powerful. But the problem is knowing the right questions to ask, and often the PCs won't know that. BBEGs will not disclose their entire evil plan to a low-level lacky, so interrogating him won't help much. They use buffers, go-betweens, and minions both knowing and unknowing. All of this can help confound divination attempts. And there are several readily available countermeasures which smart bad-guys will use.

Be ready to let the little things go. When the party gets to 10th level, it's probably time to stop asking "So how are you going to light the torch?" We call these "torch-lighting issues" in honor of Wulf Ratbane's game/group. It's things that just aren't as important any more. Some routine travel can be hand-waved, and other little things like that. There are new concerns to replace it trust me. At the late teens with teleportation etc. you can begin to hand-wave travel to known destinations almost entirely.

PCs are better, but so are the bad guys. They're going to have counters to common things like invisibility, and so on. Don't be afraid to use them but not so much they completely negate the value of the spell/item/whatever.

Lastly, as PCs gain levels, you want them to feel more powerful. A big part has nothing to do with spells and feats but is about how they are treated by the people in your world. They should be shown respect by more people. They get included, told more, etc. They are asked to do something, rather than ordered. Treating them as persons of note will enhance the achievement that they feel.

That's really the tip of the iceberg - I think I had some other stuff at the end of our completed story hour. Hope it helps.

 

[Stalker0]

Question: What classes do you have in the party. Do you have a full wizard and cleric?

I can tell you right now its the spellcasters that make the game "different" at high levels. I mean sure a high level fighter will trounce low levels monsters, but the style of the game doesn't change too much. He might develop some new techniques, but he's still swinging the big sword for big damage. Its things like teleport, commune, etc that start causing a dm to change his game plan.

 

[Rafael Ceurdepyr]

Question: What classes do you have in the party. Do you have a full wizard and cleric?

We have a battle sorcerer, a cleric, a battledancer and a rogue (skirmisher) in our current party.

 

[Li Shenron]

Throw a series of low-EL encounters against the PCs first, without letting them know they are easy, just to test their spells without having them advance in xp much. See what they can do with their new powers, and in the meantime fix your BBEG so that it won't last 1 round

 

[Eldragon]

Zad pretty much nailed everything I was going to say, but I'll put some words down anyway. Being a DM starting at this level seems to get much harder (and more fun) for me.

0) DM's motto: "Anything you can do, I can do better". After level 9 or so, PCs can do some pretty crazy things with spells/feats/class features. I like to make it clear to my PCs that any crazy tactic they do, I can turn it right back on them.

1) Lets your players mow through things with their excellent tactics... but just once or twice. After that, your BBEG needs to adapt to PC tactics. Eventually area villains know what the local heroes can do, and plan for it. Its more fun for the PCs (at least it is for me) if every session is a little different as well. e.g. A Summoned Earth elemental can just walk through a castle, so your defensive strategies need to change if the BBEG knows the PCs like to summon them.

2) Know what spells the PCs will be casting, know them well, and plan on them being used. Having the PCs use a couple of spells to bypass 1/2 the module sucks when you don't have a backup plan. e.g. If the PCs Shadowwalk past an important encounter on their way to the castle, plan the encounter to take place on the plane of shadow (With shadow versions of the same creatures). I ask my players to spell out their PC tactics to me ahead of time.

 

[BiggusGeekus]

We have a battle sorcerer, a cleric, a battledancer and a rogue (skirmisher) in our current party.

Oh, dude. No worries.

The Battle Sorc has a slow and limited spell progression. So you mostly just have to worry about the big, popular spells like teleport. The cleric will be eliminating the death penalty soon, so if you accidentally kill off a PC, it's less of a big deal. The battledancer .... I'm not really familiar with, but it sounds like a fighter/rogue. Not much to concern yourself with other than he'll be hitting most of your bad guy's AC. The rogue will either be making every skill check or not having the skill to deal with something at all, so less wiggle room there.

But the bottom line is that you don't have to worry about the wizard's huge grab bag of weird spells. The cleric still has his god's number on speed dial, but the Rules As Written allow you some flexibility with the answers. Unless you've been running a lot of murder mysteries, I don't see how this group is going to be as hard to deal with as you fear.

That said, thematically the game is about to change. It'll be less gritty and more high adventure. You may as well embrace it. Have a few fights on flying griffons or throw 'em underwater. There's a lot of aquatic monsters at the CR 7 range in the monster manual, so you can take advantage of that. Hold off on the party going to the planes. Save that until level 14 or 15 and you find yourself wanting to change the rules of the game.

If you're still worried, remember that the game is balanced on the PCs going through four or five "encounters" before resting. You can still throw single encounters at them, just use a higher CR. That will allow you to evaluate each encounter a little more easily.

Look for simple monsters. The Tarressque is an example. Big T doesn't have a lot of zany abilities, so he's easy to DM. Compare him to a level 20 wizard. A level 20 wizard has a huge number of spells and magic items and that's a lot to keep track of. My preference is for one or two cool powers, enough to surprise the party, but not so many that I forget about them at 11pm at night when I'm wired up on Mountain Dew.

You'll be fine.


Happy gaming!

 

[shilsen]

Lots of good advice already, but I'll add/emphasize one bit:

Your PCs have (especially by the standards of you and your group, it seems) a lot of power and special abilities. Embrace that. Don't look for ways to negate their power/abilities but rather find ways for the PCs to utilize them. In fact, make it essential that the PCs use them if they are to succeed in achieving their goals. Make it so that they need access to a 5th lvl clerical spell, to someone able to take 70 pts of damage in order to reach a magical door, and so on.

There are multiple advantages to such an approach. The players enjoy having their PCs strut their stuff, the PCs feel special for being able to do what others cannot, and you're not caught off-guard because you're planning for the sort of things PCs bring to the table at 5th level.

Also, it wouldn't hurt to talk to your group about the fact that you're in virgin territory here and it'll be a bit of a learning experience, so they should be prepared to cut you some slack if a couple of small road bumps appear.

And most of all, don't worry about it. As BiggusGeekus said, you'll be fine.

 

[IanB]

My one piece of key advice is, steal/use stat blocks from existing adventures/products as much as you possibly can. The single most time consuming aspect of running a high level game is NPC creation, and it gets worse and worse as the game gets higher in level. The more pre-existing stat blocks you have to draw from, the less time you have to burn on that and the more time you can spend on doing things like earning a paycheck and playing computer games.

Re-use everything you can, too. You'd be surprised what just changing the appearance/gender/main weapon of a villain can do as far as fooling players into thinking they're seeing something new.

 

[ashockney]

http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?p=2142377#post2142377

http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=93424&page=1&pp=40

These are a couple of links to other "collected works" of dealing with high level combat. You have to sort through them a bit, but there's plenty of good stuff in there.