Highest level you've played

[William Ronald]

The highest level character I regularly played was Emrys Kenelm, a human wizard who finally reached 35th level in 2003. I had played the character on and off for years, as he was tied into the campaign setting's history, knew a lot of the other principal characters, and had tons of knowledge.

The challenges at that level included foiling the parts of the servants of Asmodeus (including a band of very powerful wizards), dealing with barbarian hordes and their backers, eldritch horrors older than humanity, and dealing with many other powerful threats. Politics also was a key source of adventures, as sometimes I found my character playing diplomat or trying to uncover various intrigues. So, there were challenges - as well as roleplaying.

However, I think Edena of Neith will testify that Archcleric Hazen of Veluna in the 3rd IR was likely more powerful than Emrys. And I think that Al'Akbar in the short lived 5th IR was indeed more powerful.

 

[Achan hiArusa]

The Highest level PC I've ever seen with my own eyes was 25th (2e) and heard of was 30th (3e). I can't imagine what you do at these levels for challenges. Armies of balors? 1d8+1 wandering tarrasques? Or do you open up the deities and demigods and wipe out one pantheon at a time?

How do you challenge someone that high?

Sorry about the double post. The 1e/2e game I played in, the DM ran basically an all story game with some combat. We were on a hunt for the greatest of all bounty hunters, a 50th level ranger/50th level thief/15th level assassin named Brillant who had two 50th level fighters as bodyguards. He had decided to retire after a reneging on a contract and he held clues as to why psionics had disappeared (this is why we banned a 30th level Athasian Dragon from playing in the game, plus there were too many NPC treehuggers in the campaign). One of our major NPCs was an Oinodaemon named Kharaksas who was also a 50th level wizard. It was basically like playing in a vampire game. We were major league on our homeworlds, but now we were playing in the planes and we were small fry again.

As for my game, at high level, I just used abusive comboes of Gestalted Githyanki (17th barbarian/dragon shamans and 17th fighter/warblades) and a max hit dice, max hit points Aboleth that was a 20th/20th cleric/wizard in a turned up version of Night Below.

And with gods, I just use all their 1e/2e/3e class levels, add them together, and then drop their 3e divine ranks on them.

 

[mach1.9pants]

Mmmm...stretches the limit of memory...

Played
BECMI: 3rd

sigh....
DM'd
BECMI: into the immortals
ADnD: mid teens IIRC
2E: 17th
3/3.5E: Campaigns always ended at 12th...the law after we tried a one off at 20th ... high level 3E sux IMO.
4E: Currently 7th and about to go 8th

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

1Ed/2Ed hybrid campaign dating back to 1985 or so: several different PCs (played in rotation) equivalent in XP to the 31st level single classed Mage who was the "central" PC in the campaign.

3.X Ed: 11th level.

 

[Lanefan]

Played:
1e campaign - 11th Cleric (started at 1st, died one time too many, stayed dead)
1e one-shot - 14th Cleric (a pre-gen from Tomb of Horrors, survived it)
2e - none
3e campaign - 11th Wizard-Illusionist (started at 1st, killed by own party)
4e - none

DMed:
1e campaign - 12th Fighter and 12th Thief (both started at 3rd, both still going at campaign end)

Heard of:
1024th in this thread (is that otherwise known as 1Klevel?)

Lane-"10th and very slowly counting"-fan

 

[genshou]

1e: 6th
2e: 2nd
3.0: ECL 30 (that was a blast)
3.5: 1st. I mostly DM, and no one else ever has a game that gets very far. Maybe that's why I'm usually the DM.
4e: Haven't played.

You can't, not in the normal sense. The game mechanics break down.

Consider Waldorf. He appeared in Dragon Magazine, and he claimed to have nuked the world of Oerth (the Greyhawk Setting), rendering it lifeless outside of his own castle, and having imprisoned the dieties in a mine under his castle.
This, obviously, is outside of the normal game mechanics or typical gaming situations.

The responses, from a variety of people who send letters in, all declared hostilities to Waldorf using non-conventional methodology.
The methodology by which Waldorf was finally defeated, ramming a Spelljammer at near light speed into Waldorf's castle, filled with nilbogs, was a very unconventional answer to Waldorf's unconventional situation.

There's another analogy. Consider the nymph. In the old days, in 1E and 2E, a nymph blinded all onlookers who failed their save versus magic (which was a long shot, even then, to make for most PCs, NPCs, and monsters.)
If the nymph was nude or disrobed, a failed save meant death. Instant death.

So imagine the Morgul Host attacking Minas Tirith, and lo and behold, a nymph stands on the walls and disrobes.
Since those orcs all need an 18 to save, and the effect is Line of Sight out to infinity or the visual capabilities of those looking, we are talking about thousands of orcs instantly killed.

So the Morgul Lord, reasonably angered by this, throws Shape Change, 1E.
Remember that spell? Remember what it could do? Any 18th level wizard could have it, and the Morgul Lord could easily have been one, so ... he turns into a balrog, and proceeds to level Minas Tirith single-handedly.
Until, of course, Gandalf uses his own Shapechange to turn into a Solar, and we have a battle worthy of the Last Alliance, at the Gate of Gondor.

So much for any sort of conventional battle.

The same thing happened with the other classes.
With the cleric, Heal/Harm and Resurrection (NO save, MR useless, in 1E, against any of these) Or, maybe, the Super Plague of Spectres?
With the thief, Hide in Shadows 100% and Backstab times multiple weapons (all covered with Instant Death, No Save Poison, or better yet, Morganti Death Magic.)
With the fighter, Haste + Something Else + 2 (or 2+) Vorpal Swords + Girdle of Giant Strength + Gauntlets of Ogre Power + A Ring of Vampiric Regeneration (he does 200 hit points of damage, regenerates 100 hit points from this alone.)

As you said, 1d8 + 1 tarrasques.

Of course, high level characters will presume to *tame* said tarrasques, so they can have them as their *personal mounts*, and if the tarrasques get out of line, just whack them in the head again, and ...

I think the fun was primarily in the Getting There. Once You're There, where to go next?
When you're at the Top of the Mountain, how do you climb higher?

Good read as always, Edena_of_Neith. I think 3.0 did a better job of attempting to create epic-level challenges; unbalanced though it might have been. When I was getting up to ECL 30, I was regularly dealing with an extraplanar threat to Faerun in the form of massive constructs designed long ago by Ao to obliterate anyone who started to grow too powerful for the world of Aber-Toril. Sadly, they had lost the ability to discern the appropriate target for their obliteration. Knowing you are personally responsible for several massive magical constructs laying waste to cities all over Faerun can really give you a sense of responsibility and duty.

 

[DeusExMachina]

In 2nd edition I never got beyond my level 8 rogue...

In 3rd edition my highest character was a level 46 githyanki psychic warrior...
As a DM I never have gone beyond level 10 I think though...

Now in 4th we made our way to level 7 in the campaign I play and level 3 in the campaign I DM...

 

[Zsig]

Played:
AD&D (2e) - 9th level.
3.0/3.5 - ~13th level (starting from 1st); 20th level (one-shot)
4e - 1st level; 5th level (one-shot)

DMed:
AD&D (2e) - ~5th level
3.0/3.5 - 19th level (starting from 1st)
4e - So far I had two campaigns to reach 7th level (starting from 1st)

 

[Carpe DM]

Interesting phenomenon: a lot of GMs who don't get to play much. I'm one of them.

Played:

BECMI: 10th level thief.
1E: 15th level cleric.
2E: 17th Bard / 17 Wizard
3E: 7th Fighter
3.5E: 6th Paladin; 6th Hunter of the Dead
4E: 2d Paladin

DMd:

BECMI: 10th level. Yes, it was one of *those* games.
1E: 15th level. Yup. DMPC for the win.
2E: 19th level.
3 / 3.5E: 17th level. Three times, three separate campaigns. Current campaign is 18th level and ongoing.
4E: Stayed out of it.

 

[Calico_Jack73]

Played: Level 20 D&D 3.0

That was during my year in South Korea and we played every Saturday & Sunday for at least 12 hours straight each day (that works out to 1248 playing hours). Our last adventure was A Paladin in Hell (the DM converted it for 3E) and my character started that at 18th level but was 20th by the end of it. I played a Human Fighter/Master Samurai/Paladin of Hachiman though that was not my first character in the whole campaign. We started with 1st level characters in Sunless Citadel and my very first 3E PC was a Human Monk but once I realized how boring it was (the other PCs were getting magical weapons and items that really didn't work for the monk) I switched to a different character. I played a Human Necromancer for the bulk of the campaign until he was abducted by demons (thanks to a Six Demon Bag) and taken to the Abyss. After that I went with the Asian Fighter/Master Samurai and took a couple of levels of Paladin before starting the last adventure. One long campaign that I played three characters through... does that count?