D&D 5E Nobody Is Playing High Level Characters

According to stats from D&D Beyond, above 5th level characters start to drop off sharply, and above 10th level, the figures are very low. The exception is level 20, which looks like it's probably people creating experimental 20th-level builds.

Some of them say 0%; this isn't strictly accurate, but levels 16-19 are used by an insignificant number of players. Interestingly, there are more 3rd-5th level characters than there are 1st-2nd level.

D&D Beyond has said before that under 10% of games make it past 10th level, but these figures show the break point as being bit lower than that. DDB used over 30 million characters to compile these stats.

 

[Eubani]

Higher levels would see more usage if they were better designed and supported but as they don't see much usage they don't get the effort or the support. A bit circular but it is what it is.

 

[ChaosOS]

I think at this point there's every reason to believe that most people don't play higher levels. The exact values are probably wrong in the random kind of way, but the general shape would hold. The more interesting question is why - the chicken/egg lack of support vs lack of market, poor balance vs poor visionwork, etc.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

e6?

E6: The Game Inside D&D

Note to mods: E6 was born in House Rules, but I ran the idea of posting in General past Piratecat a while ago, and it’s finally ready for the bigtime. Thanks! This is E6’s sixth major incarnation here at EN World; in this thread I hope to talk about preparing E6 games, how to talk to...

www.enworld.org

Short version: PC levels are hard-capped at 6th, but xp gained allows continued acquisition of feats. In particular this cuts 4th level and higher spells which are THE element that begins to spin what balance the game had out of control. It seems draconian but solves a great many problems people have with the game.

 

[Don Durito]

E6: The Game Inside D&D

Note to mods: E6 was born in House Rules, but I ran the idea of posting in General past Piratecat a while ago, and it’s finally ready for the bigtime. Thanks! This is E6’s sixth major incarnation here at EN World; in this thread I hope to talk about preparing E6 games, how to talk to...

www.enworld.org

Short version: PC levels are hard-capped at 6th, but xp gained allows continued acquisition of feats. In particular this cuts 4th level and higher spells which are THE element that begins to spin what balance the game had out of control. It seems draconian but solves a great many problems people have with the game.

And if you also start at 6th Level you've reverse engineered something that's a lot closer to most of the other 90s games that were around at the time 3E was being developed.

 

[tetrasodium]

]

I think at this point there's every reason to believe that most people don't play higher levels. The exact values are probably wrong in the random kind of way, but the general shape would hold. The more interesting question is why - the chicken/egg lack of support vs lack of market, poor balance vs poor visionwork, etc.

I think that it's safe to say that the problem lies more in system breakdown. I've seen more than one variant ruleset for level zero/rookie characters that don't start out at first level but then take some of their experience with them in the form of skill/equipment proficiencies, cantrips, health, etc allowing some of the flavor that comes with leveling before getting to the point where too much of that flavor combines into breakdown. The end result is that the interesting levels are extended.

 

[pemerton]

I think at this point there's every reason to believe that most people don't play higher levels. The exact values are probably wrong in the random kind of way, but the general shape would hold. The more interesting question is why - the chicken/egg lack of support vs lack of market, poor balance vs poor visionwork, etc.

Higher levels would see more usage if they were better designed and supported but as they don't see much usage they don't get the effort or the support. A bit circular but it is what it is.

I think that it's safe to say that the problem lies more in system breakdown.

I don't think it's lack of support or system breakdown. I think it's lack of interest.

D&D is a list-based game. PCs are built from lists. Monsters are built from lists and then chosen from lists. The point of gaining levels is to change the lists and increase the number of bits chosen from the lists. Higher level PCs have more moving parts. So (everything else being equal) do higher level monsters.

Even if the lists are nicely designed (on the whole) and work well together, for a lot of players there is simply not that much interest in having more complex game elements that choose more bits from more esoteric lists. This was evident in 4e - my own experience is that upper level 4e doesn't break down in any very serious way (or to put it in other terms, anyone willing to deal with the list complexity of high level 4e is going to be able to cope with the maths necessary to make it work in mechanical terms). But it was obvious that there simply weren't that many people who are interested in that level of complexity.

I've seen more than one variant ruleset for level zero/rookie characters that don't start out at first level but then take some of their experience with them in the form of skill/equipment proficiencies, cantrips, health, etc allowing some of the flavor that comes with leveling before getting to the point where too much of that flavor combines into breakdown. The end result is that the interesting levels are extended.

Too much of this, though, and then the question arises - why bother having levels at all?

If level gain isn't going to make a significant mechanical difference to the play of the game, what's it for?

 

[Lanefan]

I don't find it strange at all. Broadly speaking - you cannot please everyone.

Perhaps not, but you can at least listen to everyone.

That means companies typically have to pick the market they are going to go after. They had reasons they don't talk about in the study for that choice. We can speculate on why they made that choice, but it would be speculation.

But, overall, making a choice like this is normal.

If they'd already picked the market they were after then why do a survey one of whose goals, one would think, is to determine where and what and who the market is?

Further, just because something is normal doesn't make it right.

 

[tetrasodium]

I don't think it's lack of support or system breakdown. I think it's lack of interest.

D&D is a list-based game. PCs are built from lists. Monsters are built from lists and then chosen from lists. The point of gaining levels is to change the lists and increase the number of bits chosen from the lists. Higher level PCs have more moving parts. So (everything else being equal) do higher level monsters.

Even if the lists are nicely designed (on the whole) and work well together, for a lot of players there is simply not that much interest in having more complex game elements that choose more bits from more esoteric lists. This was evident in 4e - my own experience is that upper level 4e doesn't break down in any very serious way (or to put it in other terms, anyone willing to deal with the list complexity of high level 4e is going to be able to cope with the maths necessary to make it work in mechanical terms). But it was obvious that there simply weren't that many people who are interested in that level of complexity.

Too much of this, though, and then the question arises - why bother having levels at all?

If level gain isn't going to make a significant mechanical difference to the play of the game, what's it for?

On your last point, this is what you get going from level zero to level one in one of the more developed level zero systems I've seen

It took them 2-3 months of weekly sessions to reach first level & while that level zero experience gave them some build options that would normally require much more powerful feats & multiclassing it didn't really weight the scales too much even if you figure the equipment & wealth they built over those months of play. It makes mechanical differences but those differences are mostly lateral ones that can't happen under normal rules. That party just reached 6th or 7th before thanksgiving put things on hold for the holidays & my players are already theorizing unanswered plot threads/talking about looking forward to picking thing back up after new years. I ran fate for years & run a very narrative game even when running d&d, but eventually the power curve of PCs reaches points where mechanics just obliterate anything shy of plot armor standing in their way. Back in 3.5 that happened somewhere in/around the mid teens ime but more around 8-12ish in 5e.

 

[Don Durito]

I think at this point there's every reason to believe that most people don't play higher levels. The exact values are probably wrong in the random kind of way, but the general shape would hold. The more interesting question is why - the chicken/egg lack of support vs lack of market, poor balance vs poor visionwork, etc.

I think it's also worth asking whether, in general, there is even a problem?

Do people (in general - I don't mean specific anecdotes) want to be playing at a higher level? Do they feel that something (whether mechanical or something else) is keeping them playing at those levels which they'd like to reach?

Or are people, in general, playing for an amount of time that they're happy with, with at a level of power and mechanical complexity that they're also happy with?

 

[Lanefan]

I also said the supporting data had not been released to the public, not that the data wouldn't be released to the public. We have not done so to this point because the general audience for a Dev Update stream are not data scientists, and therefore that additional data content would be confusing to consume. Also releasing a gigantic amount of raw data while ensuring it is appropriately understood is a time-intensive process, and we would rather use our limited resources to make things.

If such a breakdown is ever done, I for one wouldn't mind seeing a summary including a) more finely-tuned numbers by level (say, to two decimal places instead of none so levels 15-19 aren't just a string of zeroes); and b) the same thing repeated except for each character class, to allow us to see whether any particular class(es) are more or less popular at any particular level or level range.

Of course cloud-yellers out there will not believe me when I say it since I don't have access to the source data, but historically, we have seen that all our major data points on DDB align with all the other feedback channels that WotC shares with us. In other words, DDB has thus far proven to be representative of the game's audience as a whole. Popular races, classes, etc. all line up.

Unfortunately, what we don't and can't know is how well (if at all) this data - both yours and WotC's - lines up with the segment that doesn't use DDB or any other online resource or feedback channel.