D&D 5E End-game gimmicks: the problem with 5e meta-plots

[Guest 6801328]

On a related note, I don't like the warp speed with which characters level in 5e. I'm nostalgic for the days when a level 8 character represented a year of effort, and each level felt exponentially harder. I felt invested in my character. Now they feel disposable.

 

[ad_hoc]

If you have a bunch of level 20 adventurers running around in your world, then yeah, there are going to be weird situations resulting from that. That was standard in 3e (every town/city/region/etc. had assumed NPC levels/numbers based on population) but not in 5e.

Also, level 11-16 is the appropriate level for threats to the world/plane. Levels 17+ are for threats to the entire multiverse. It is perfectly fitting then to have these campaigns end in tier 3 as the threats are to the world, not all or many of the planes of existence.

5e and 3e both have 20 levels, but they mean different things.

 

[FrogReaver]

On a related note, I don't like the warp speed with which characters level in 5e. I'm nostalgic for the days when a level 8 character represented a year of effort, and each level felt exponentially harder. I felt invested in my character. Now they feel disposable.

I like level 3+ in 5e. But I play levels 1 and 2 because you go through them so fast but I don't really like them.

I do think a slower progression would be good for most groups. I think adventure league needs the faster progression though (not that I play AL)

Halving the XP gained from everything always seemed like a good starting point for doing that.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

This does bother me about this particular adventure. Why are they sending low-level novices instead of well proven, hardened problem solvers?

If there were experienced adventurers around, there wouldn't be a quest for the PCs, and we wouldn't care about this incident. The only reason this one incident is exciting enough to warrant playing out is that there are no such experts available.

Personally, this is one of my big gripes about the Forgotten Realms in general: There are too many world-ending threats, and too many powerful NPCs.

 

[robus]

While I’m sympathetic to the OPs complaint, I think OotA is the main offender, but ToA is a little cheeky too. I’m not thrilled with how ToA ends and would definitely rework it to suit my grouos preferences.

As for OotA we’ve just started my high level reworking with the PCs at level 15. They will fight various demon lords in the different settings on their way to a final showdown against 3 simultaneously at level 20 (if they make it).

 

[Eltab]

I never completed Dragon Queen / Tiamat; I played the later 2/3 of HotDQ and DM'ed the first half of RoT.
As DM I was planning some of the 'weaken Tiamat' options, using my retired-PC as the head of a Manhattan Project (or two). I was going to have him explain to the group what needed done and why. I also was considering how to bring them up to L20 before facing Tiamat - using every included side quest along the way so it wouldn't look like a 5-level 'gift'.

None of these are 'gimmicks', they are the things responsible leaders try to create when preparing to win a war - either against another nation or against a group of extra-national cultists.

 

[hawkeyefan]

On a related note, I don't like the warp speed with which characters level in 5e. I'm nostalgic for the days when a level 8 character represented a year of effort, and each level felt exponentially harder. I felt invested in my character. Now they feel disposable.

I agree. I’ve drastically slowed down the level progression for my 5E campaign. I like the idea of long adventuring careers that include multiple quests and tasks rather than one long adventure that spans all levels. I’ve pretty much abandoned the XP system entirely and I grant levels when it seems appropriate.

My 5E group has played through the following:
- Lost Mines of Phandelver (levels 1-4)
- A couple of homebrew modules (4-5)
- Princes of the Apocalypse- the Haunted Keeps and the Air Temple only (level 5)
- The 2E Planescape module Dead Gods (5-6, modified significantly)
- Homebrew module involving the City of Shade and the City of Brass (6-7)
- Curse of Strahd (8-9)
- More Homebrew and some of the higher level stuff from Princes (9-10)
- Currently just starting Tomb of Annihilation (Level 11 to probably 12)

And I still have plenty planned. J have a major overarching atory that toes most of the above together. If I played with XP and levels as expected, I feel like my PCs would never be the right level for what I want, and their career would be far too short.

So the fact that some of the high level threats in the published material requires “cheats” for the PCs to be victorious doesn’t bother me at all. It gives the option of using the material as presented, or using it as high level content without the “cheats”.

 

[Ancalagon]

Because people like adventures starting at first level?


Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app

That's a reaaaaly bad way to run an adventure/story. Say you have a movie, and there is need for a hero. The world is in danger? They send James Bond, not private dimwit who's never fired a gun and *might* turn out to be great, we don't know, but hey let's give him a chance!

You send low level people when the threat doesn't seem too bad (it might be dire, but no one has realized this yet) OR there is no one else to send. In this case the threat is very serious from the get go, and there are better people.

If there were experienced adventurers around, there wouldn't be a quest for the PCs, and we wouldn't care about this incident. The only reason this one incident is exciting enough to warrant playing out is that there are no such experts available.

Personally, this is one of my big gripes about the Forgotten Realms in general: There are too many world-ending threats, and too many powerful NPCs.

But are there no such experts in FR?! I highly doubt it.

This is addressed in the adventure in a few ways. I won’t go into deatils for fear of spoiling things.

Huh. I've been playing it as a play by post, and by level 2 it's bloody obvious that the powers that be need to send highly qualified people prompto and not just a bunch of noobs. Sure eventually we'll be high enough level and triumph, but that's metagaming.

 

[hawkeyefan]

That's a reaaaaly bad way to run an adventure/story. Say you have a movie, and there is need for a hero. The world is in danger? They send James Bond, not private dimwit who's never fired a gun and *might* turn out to be great, we don't know, but hey let's give him a chance!

You send low level people when the threat doesn't seem too bad (it might be dire, but no one has realized this yet) OR there is no one else to send. In this case the threat is very serious from the get go, and there are better people.



But are there no such experts in FR?! I highly doubt it.



Huh. I've been playing it as a play by post, and by level 2 it's bloody obvious that the powers that be need to send highly qualified people prompto and not just a bunch of noobs. Sure eventually we'll be high enough level and triumph, but that's metagaming.

You’re playing through it, so I’m glad I dodn’t say anything. And maybe your DM won’t address it directly, but it’s definitely mentioned in the book.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

But are there no such experts in FR?! I highly doubt it.

There are no such experts available in this one particular instance, is what I was going at. Normally, you can't walk down a street in the Realms without tripping over epic level characters, but this one day is different. We don't bother to play through the millions of other potentially-epic campaign hooks that are foiled at stage one by Elminster and Drizzt or Epic Wizard #8675309, but this one is worth playing through because they aren't around right now.

It does stretch plausibility a bit.