Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
The
VOIDRUNNER'S CODEX
is LIVE! Explore new worlds, fight oppressive empires, fend off fearsome aliens, and wield deadly psionics with this comprehensive boxed set expansion for 5E and A5E!
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
Why does epic level play entail treating death as a "speed bump"?
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="DM_Blake" data-source="post: 4170110" data-attributes="member: 57267"><p>Let's break it down logically, from a game play point of view:</p><p></p><p>In low levels, you basically hit stuff with your sword, and they hit you with their claws and teeth or their swords. Maybe some spellcasters hit things with spells, but those don't do much more damage than hitting things with swords or teeth.</p><p></p><p>That's fine for low levels, but as you move up to intermediate levels, you probably expect more fireworks. </p><p></p><p>What you don't want, from a game design, is that your intermediate levels mean hitting tougher stuff with your same old sword, same old spells. No new tricks or items or feats or powers for you. The stuff you fight is tougher, so all you have to do is hit it lots more times. That's no fun. D&D isn't designed to do this.</p><p></p><p>In D&D intermediate levels, you hit stuff with a really uber sword that does neat stuff, and you wield that sword with nifty feats and powers to make it truly magnificent to behold. And your spellcaster friends hit stuff with really awesome spells, fireworks galore, special effects and body parts flying all over the battlefield. </p><p></p><p>In return, the stuff you're fighting hits you pretty dang hard too. They have their own special effects and neato powers that would annhilate low-level heroes. But you're not low level, so you survive all this awesome damage in heroic ways.</p><p></p><p>That's all fine for intermediate levels, but now you move up to top levels, epic levels. </p><p></p><p>Again, the design could be that you fight bigger and tougher foes, but you just use your same old rusty intermediate powers to hit them a lot more times.</p><p></p><p>But, D&D doesn't do that. It gives you new powers that are far superior to the stuff you could do before. You go from fireworks to mushroom clouds, from magical swords and platemail to miniguns, canons, and tanks (figuratively speaking). In return, the baddies you fight have their own tricks and powers that can rattle continental shelves off their plates.</p><p></p><p>OK, that may be a bit overstated, but you get my meaning.</p><p></p><p>Now, with all these bad guys tossing around that kind of firepower, death is going to happen.</p><p></p><p>Why?</p><p></p><p><em>Here's the important part: </em> <strong>the outcomes are decided by rolling dice. </strong> </p><p></p><p><em>And here's the next most important part:</em> <strong>Each monster you fight only has to roll a few dice in its lifetime (from the moment you meat it to the moment you defeat it), but your heroes have to roll thousands of dice in your lifetime. <em>Sooner or later those dice will betray you, unless you cheat</em>.</strong></p><p></p><p>Given all that, any game like D&D absolutely needs a "get out of death free" card, in the form of resurrection (et. al.) because you will, absolutely, without fail, be betrayed by dice if you play long enough at those levels facing those kinds of destructive forces.</p><p></p><p>The only alternative is to give all characters all kinds of abilities to avoid death. "Oh, crud, I rolled a 1 on my save. But, I still have my Omega 13 power, so I use it to reverse that save so I don't die". </p><p></p><p>Which is fine, but ultimately, this means players are invincible. "Hey, let's go attack that army of dragons. What do you mean we will die? Don't you all have your Omega 13 powers ready to activate? And your Omega 14, Omega 15, and Omega 16? There's no way we can die. Attaaaaaack!"</p><p></p><p>That's not really a better solution.</p><p></p><p>At least the D&D solution allows the PCs to fail, but recover from their failure, where the Omega 13 solution guarantees no chance of failure.</p><p></p><p>And choosing neither option, no way to avoid failure from bad dice, and no way to resurrect or recover, simply means epic characters are doomed to sudden and unpredictable deaths.</p><p></p><p>Seems to me that resurrection is the lesser of three evils, here - from a game design point of view.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="DM_Blake, post: 4170110, member: 57267"] Let's break it down logically, from a game play point of view: In low levels, you basically hit stuff with your sword, and they hit you with their claws and teeth or their swords. Maybe some spellcasters hit things with spells, but those don't do much more damage than hitting things with swords or teeth. That's fine for low levels, but as you move up to intermediate levels, you probably expect more fireworks. What you don't want, from a game design, is that your intermediate levels mean hitting tougher stuff with your same old sword, same old spells. No new tricks or items or feats or powers for you. The stuff you fight is tougher, so all you have to do is hit it lots more times. That's no fun. D&D isn't designed to do this. In D&D intermediate levels, you hit stuff with a really uber sword that does neat stuff, and you wield that sword with nifty feats and powers to make it truly magnificent to behold. And your spellcaster friends hit stuff with really awesome spells, fireworks galore, special effects and body parts flying all over the battlefield. In return, the stuff you're fighting hits you pretty dang hard too. They have their own special effects and neato powers that would annhilate low-level heroes. But you're not low level, so you survive all this awesome damage in heroic ways. That's all fine for intermediate levels, but now you move up to top levels, epic levels. Again, the design could be that you fight bigger and tougher foes, but you just use your same old rusty intermediate powers to hit them a lot more times. But, D&D doesn't do that. It gives you new powers that are far superior to the stuff you could do before. You go from fireworks to mushroom clouds, from magical swords and platemail to miniguns, canons, and tanks (figuratively speaking). In return, the baddies you fight have their own tricks and powers that can rattle continental shelves off their plates. OK, that may be a bit overstated, but you get my meaning. Now, with all these bad guys tossing around that kind of firepower, death is going to happen. Why? [I]Here's the important part: [/I] [B]the outcomes are decided by rolling dice. [/B] [I]And here's the next most important part:[/I] [B]Each monster you fight only has to roll a few dice in its lifetime (from the moment you meat it to the moment you defeat it), but your heroes have to roll thousands of dice in your lifetime. [I]Sooner or later those dice will betray you, unless you cheat[/I].[/B] Given all that, any game like D&D absolutely needs a "get out of death free" card, in the form of resurrection (et. al.) because you will, absolutely, without fail, be betrayed by dice if you play long enough at those levels facing those kinds of destructive forces. The only alternative is to give all characters all kinds of abilities to avoid death. "Oh, crud, I rolled a 1 on my save. But, I still have my Omega 13 power, so I use it to reverse that save so I don't die". Which is fine, but ultimately, this means players are invincible. "Hey, let's go attack that army of dragons. What do you mean we will die? Don't you all have your Omega 13 powers ready to activate? And your Omega 14, Omega 15, and Omega 16? There's no way we can die. Attaaaaaack!" That's not really a better solution. At least the D&D solution allows the PCs to fail, but recover from their failure, where the Omega 13 solution guarantees no chance of failure. And choosing neither option, no way to avoid failure from bad dice, and no way to resurrect or recover, simply means epic characters are doomed to sudden and unpredictable deaths. Seems to me that resurrection is the lesser of three evils, here - from a game design point of view. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
Why does epic level play entail treating death as a "speed bump"?
Top