D&D 5E Favourite Tiers of Play?

[Ath'kethin]

"In the first tier (levels 1-4), characters are effectively apprentice adventurers." Not the emphasis. The book itself calls level 1 pcs apprentices. The book goes on to say that you're still learning the most basic skills of your profession. I don't really care about trying to say that someone is better than a commoner, or whatever. You're still learning. To me, that implies teachers and people who make sure you survive long enough to be a return on the time and energy spent training you. It just doesn't make sense to me to send someone still learning basics into life-and-death situations without some oversight from someone more experienced.

Sure. Whatever works for you and your group. It's your game.

To my mind, reducing the D&D level system to effectively levels 3-20 (or, if we're being honest about likely play, levels 3-15 or so) only compounds the rocket-fast leveling that is the 5e default. I see that as more of an issue myself.

YMMV, obviously.

 

[Mephista]

I don't use monster xp in the first place, but story milestones. So "rocket leveling" is not an issue since I determine when that happens in the first place.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Let's break this down BECMI style:

Basic - weak dungeon-crawlers (5e Tier I)
Expert - tough wilderness explorers and keep builders (5e Tier II) (4e Heroic)
Companion - lords of war, rulers of nations (5e Tier III) (4e Paragon)
Masters - interplanar Epic heroes (5e Tier IV) (4e Epic)
Immortals - gods

Using the above metrics, what Tiers of play do you most enjoy GMing for and playing? Why?

This is a 5e forum, so that's a slightly odd way to break it down, but the answer really works for most eds.

5e, like AD&D, has a pronounced 'sweet spot' at mid levels where it works really well, that corresponds to your Expert/Tier 2. In the classic game (to me, mostly 1e AD&D, but all the TSR era, really), the game was most functional from level 3 through to 'name' level (which might be as early as 8th or 9th depending on class). In 3e, the lowest levels worked a bit better, and E6, though technically a variant, might be called the sweet spot. That'd be the first two tiers you posit.

The big difference with 5e is that it's experience chart pushes you quickly through the frustrating first Tier, then lingers over the 2nd-Tier 5th-11th sweet spot, before speeding up again to get less functional high level pay over with. In the classic game, the lowest and highest levels could be a real slog, while the sweet spot could just fly by.

 

[S'mon]

This is a 5e forum, so that's a slightly odd way to break it down, but the answer really works for most eds.

Yeah, I thought about that, but I was mostly interested in looking at it from a current-edition perspective for purposes of this discussion. The other forum I thought discussion would likely be dominated by
3e vs 4e, since ENW does not have a big OSR presence. Also I think 5e does its 4 Tiers well (as
BECMI did its equivalent 4 Tiers, I hear Immortals was maybe wonky) so mechanical problems
would be less likely to skew discussion & voting than with 3e. From what I can tell, 5e Tier IV is
eminently playable, and if there is not much demand for Epic play that seems significant and arguably supports the WoTC strategy of keeping adventures in the 1-15 range (also the typical Pathfinder AP range).

 

[S'mon]

In the classic game, the lowest and highest levels could be a real slog, while the sweet spot could just fly by.

I don't recall that being a big issue in 1e or Classic, but it certainly was a huge issue when I ran 3e ca 2000-2004 and Pathfinder 2015-16 - PCs would speed through levels 4-8 out of the Sweet Spot, then slow down around 11-12 where the game became less fun. The 3e campaigns where I used half XP and capped at 8th, or my Pathfinder Beginner Box 1-4 campaign, went better.

The 5e XP chart looks really weird and unintiuitive, but in play I find works very well - like a lot of things about 5e (I've had to progressively reduce my house rules over time) - a sign of a well-playtested game, I think.

 

[guachi]

I find it rather fitting that the 5e Tiers of play match as well as they do with BECMI Tiers. The levels, obviously, don't exactly match but the types of adventures one can handle do.

BECMI, with separate boxes for each tier, more explicitly separated the tiers than any edition before or since. I use the B/X - BECMI line of modules as inspiration for the types of challenges I want my players to face in their current campaign.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I don't recall that being a big issue in 1e or Classic, but it certainly was a huge issue when I ran 3e ca 2000-2004 and Pathfinder 2015-16 - PCs would speed through levels 4-8 out of the Sweet Spot, then slow down around 11-12 where the game became less fun.

The exp charts were about the same through the TSR era, IIRC. The lion's share of my experience was with 1e AD&D, and, at 1st level it was hard to take on enough of anything to scrape together the exp to level in a reasonable time, while at high (name) levels, the exp/level got huge and it was hard to find enough of anything worth that much exp. So, very slow advancement at low & high levels, the levels that also just didn't work that well in a lot of ways. 3e, IMX, didn't have it quite as bad. 1st level characters were a bit tougher with more spells/day and could take on enough challenges to level in a more reasonable time, and there were ample high-level challenges to harvest exp from.

 

[Mercule]

I don't use monster xp in the first place, but story milestones. So "rocket leveling" is not an issue since I determine when that happens in the first place.

I've also moved to milestones. It feels a bit odd to do D&D that way, but almost every other game I've played uses something similar, even if it's just "hand out a couple karma every session, then hand out a couple extra when the PCs hit a goal." It's really the grind factor of D&D that makes it feel odd -- that and the fact that you get better at fighting, even if all your XP comes from talking your way out of things (milestones) or vice versa.

If I ever go back to using the XP tables, I'll probably just half the XP awards, with the intent of making each level last longer.

I suppose another option would be to replace the existing XP tables with something scaled to single point awards. Something like:
- Cost to advance = next level * 2
- Each session award 1 point automatically (marathon sessions could be considered multiple sessions at DMO)
- Award 1 extra point for an exceptionally exciting/dangerous/well-played session
- Award 1 point for a chapter-level goal (defeat an elemental prophet, etc.)
- Award 1 extra point for a story-level goal (vanquish the ToEE)

For CoS, in addition to using milestone awards, I also started the PCs at 3rd level. I highly, highly recommend this for 5E, BTW, unless you like the apprentice feel. The hardest part about starting at 3rd level was getting the players to understand that they weren't required to be experienced adventurers. They kept asking how long they'd been adventuring together or how long it took their characters to get to 3rd level. To which I'd generally respond with some variation of "however long your backstory says" or "What makes you think you were every 1st level? Maybe you're just that gifted." They were just 3rd level, period.

 

[Sadras]

Our group is 10th level. I'm really starting to enjoy it as threads are being connected, character goals are being driven/pushed and their world view of the setting is taking shape. We have hit a sweet spot in the storyline and I have an idea of how to merge the character's backgrounds into the main narrative in a way I know my players will like (in our upcoming session).

So, this is not a fakeout, but honestly the best tier of play for me is when I got my s#%! together as DM

 

[Mephista]

I've also noticed that, moving from milestones away from monster xp, its created a different mindset in the players. They don't really care about killing monsters as much if there's not a reward for it. There's been a notable shift away from combat if they can help it. Which really changes how the game shapes out, I find.