how Epic do you like it?

[AeroDm]

In general I'd say not that epic and for two reasons.

First, I derive a lot of RP potential out of immersion. It is hard enough being an elf that tosses fireballs, if we also lose the idea of being bothered by things like the space time continuum I find it even harder to relate. I also enjoy the idea of an adventurer emerging from a dungeon bloodied and dirty and optimistic about headed back to town to convert treasure to gold. That image doesn't overlay on epic play as well in my mind.

Second, most people agree that epic should *feel* epic and that tends to mean the rules need to participate in the conveyance of that vibe. Most epic rules I've encountered tend to slow down play at best and ruin fun at worst.

 

[Ahnehnois]

If the game isn't about something important, I'm hard pressed to say why I'd spend four hours playing it.

All my campaigns have some big philosophical ideas at play, and most of them have some scale and grandeur in how they're presented as well. Most of my players' characters are assumed to be legendary. So all in all, I'd say epic.

 

[Agamon]

So... Is anyone already sick of the word epic after reading through this thread?

Before, even.

Besides the overuse of that word, though, I'm not big on those kinds of games. I find them tough to run without the GM having to protect his story and characters from the players. I'm more of a let-the-players-loose kinda GM.

 

[Votan]

I tend to prefer D&D in the 1-14 range (or thereabouts), where levels 9-11 are the start of "high level," and few people in the world are at those levels. My level scale is something like this:

• 0-level: Common men of all sorts. Even typical career mercenaries may be 0-level fighters.
• 1st level: Talented Veterans. Grizzled sergeants. Gifted youth with the potential for greatness.
• 4th level: Local Hero. Famous captains. People know your name.
• 8th level: Superhero. Fame is spread far and wide, and there are stories and maybe some songs about you. You're edging into Conan/Amra or John Carter territory.
• 9th level +: Lord among men. Your fame is such that you've attracted followers and could set up your own domain or holding.
• 15th level +: You're reaching heights that few men ever do. At this point, you're truly legendary, and might even be a candidate for some sort of demigod status. Mortals seldom reach these levels without some sort of magical or supernatural aid, and that often comes with a price. That's why so many archmages in the tales are insane, or demon-ridden, or turn to lichdom. And why so many legendary heroes seem doomed, or bear a artifact that gives them power at a terrible price, et cetera.

I liked this list a lot. I presume that it refers to AD&D (1st/2nd edition) and not 3rd or 4th edition?

In AD&D I noticed that the game seemed to work better below 500K/ 1 million experience points than above that threshold.

 

[Naoki00_]

Before, even.

Besides the overuse of that word, though, I'm not big on those kinds of games. I find them tough to run without the GM having to protect his story and characters from the players. I'm more of a let-the-players-loose kinda GM.

I'm a big user of this too, though other then things that are established as "you shouldn't mess with or suffer the consequences" I don't have much trouble running a grand scaled game, the scene just tends to evolve with the players, not the other way around and I like that.

 

[Philotomy Jurament]

I liked this list a lot. I presume that it refers to AD&D (1st/2nd edition) and not 3rd or 4th edition?

Yes, it does. (Sorry, I often forget to qualify which D&D I'm talking about.)

 

[Dan23]

I like my games so epic that everyone speaks in iambic pentameter couplets.

 

[Stormonu]

I'm not much for epic, level or story-wise. I guess I tend to like heroes I can feel a kinship to, and that tends to mean a more gritty, down-to-earth feel to the abilities and powers they wield.

As far as levels go, I'm not fond of the D&D game (any edition) much beyond 9th level. 15th level is about as far as I can strain my brain before I start being at a loss as to what sort of adventures would challenge the PCs. Yeah, I can throw bigger, badder monsters at the PCs, but an overall plot beyond "let's save the world from some power-mad villain - again" tends to be all I can think of.

 

[TarionzCousin]

Very.

I ran and played in a Planescape Gestalt. At level 18, the level 30 dungeon from Dungeon magazine was too easy.

 

[KidSnide]

I generally prefer heroic gameplay. I don't want to play schmoes, but I prefer interacting with the world as a regular person with some extraordinary abilities.

That having been said, I'm not sure 4e supports the sort of epic play I'd be interested in. I think truly epic play is best suited for one-off games, and the 4e epic characters are way too complicated to enjoy for an afternoon. In any case, epic play in 4e still focuses on small tactical combats. How epic is that? Where are the massive armies and the city-sized monsters? It's like they took heroic dungeon crawls and increased all the numbers.

I think the most revealing comment was in the podcast where one of the WotC designers was explaining why they reduced the ranges on the clerical spells. He said that WotC originally expected epic level play to involve larger areas and bigger scenarios, but found that the size of our dining room tables didn't increase when our characters went up with level. That's a correct observation, but the wrong answer. The solution isn't to give 27th level powers the same range as 3rd level powers. The solution is to change the scale of the map. When I was running 3.x and my PCs leveled into the teens, we handled large battles by using a battlemap with 1/4 inch squares that each represented 10 feet. Positioning was less specific (and the attacks of the hundreds of allied and enemy minions were handled by semi-handwaved contested d20 rolls), but you got the sense that you were participating in a major paragon/epic style engagement.

There's nothing wrong with having a dungeon crawl at paragon or epic levels, but a real paragon or epic level game needs to support gameplay that substantially different from the type of gameplay that makes up the core of the heroic game.

-KS