D&D 5E Relative Difficulties of Advancing in 5e

[R_J_K75]

Or, if they did want that, they did a poor job of designing it to that end. So from a pragmatic standpoint, preparing one's game according to how the game actually runs in the context of the table is the better option.

Yep, this is true.

 

[Bacon Bits]

prior to covid killing the game around level 12 or so a game where players were a bit over a year in & spent roughly the first 3 months going from level zero to level one. Everyone had fun the whole time so both tried to convince me to keep running it after I recovered from it in feb & convince me to run a new one now that things are as they are.

Depends on playstyle & gm style. I find 0-5 & low to mid teens more suitable to in depth adventuring in a vibrant well built world.

Yes but that's largely because of certain design decisions baked into 5e in a fruitless pursuit of bounded accuracy along with "feats are optional" & "magic items are optional"

Most of my 5e campaigns went to 16 or so & spend about half the game in 11-16 if not more.

Some of us did

Look, I'm sorry, I can't really respond to quote shredding like that. It's too difficult to follow your train of thought so I can't really understand you. I find that this style of response too easily leads to disingenuous arguments, bickering, or needless point-scoring instead of genuine discussion. My post was intended to be a cohesive argument. Yes, it's more difficult to consolidate your response into something cohesive and concrete, but if you don't care enough to do that then why would I bother?

All I can honestly get out of what you've said is that your table has fun at levels well over level 13. Great! That puts you in the minority. However, since my point was to discuss why the designers made the XP table the way they did -- which is to say they want high level to go by quickly because they know the game is badly designed at those levels and proportionally few people play them anyways -- that doesn't really seem to challenge that assertion.

 

[Charlaquin]

I came across some of the old playtest documents not long ago, browsed through them but don't remember much myself other than there were things that were proposed that I liked then removed.

Yeah, I don’t think they specifically playtested a version that only went to 10th. I mean, some early versions of classes only went up to certain levels, but I don’t remember level cap ever being a thing they polled us about or said they were trying. I think it was probably something they discussed behind the scenes early on and internally decided to kill without even presenting for feedback. But like I said, I distinctly remember one of them saying after the fact that they had considered it, but ended up deciding that they should provide the option to go as high as 20th for those who wanted it (it being too big of a risk was speculation on my part.)

 

[R_J_K75]

Yeah, I don’t think they specifically playtested a version that only went to 10th. I mean, some early versions of classes only went up to certain levels, but I don’t remember level cap ever being a thing they polled us about or said they were trying. I think it was probably something they discussed behind the scenes early on and internally decided to kill without even presenting for feedback. But like I said, I distinctly remember one of them saying after the fact that they had considered it, it ended up deciding that they should provide the option to go as high as 20th for those who wanted it (it being too big of a risk was speculation on my part.)

From what I remember of the playtest which isnt a whole lot, besides a few odds and ends the end result was close to the overall playtest.

 

[Charlaquin]

From what I remember of the playtest which isnt a whole lot, besides a few odds and ends the end result was close to the overall playtest.

Pretty close. You can find some differences, but you can also kind of see the path they took to get from A to B.

 

[Asisreo]

Or, if they did want that, they did a poor job of designing it to that end. So from a pragmatic standpoint, preparing one's game according to how the game actually runs in the context of the table is the better option.

How so?

Do the liches not lich enough or the dragons not breathe hard enough?

When it comes to encounters, there's a spectrum between having hard rules and having a dynamic set of encounters.

If every enemy had to have this much HP and damage output by this level and can only be faced in this order, the players could easily predict that these goblins are stronger than those goblins because those goblins were encountered at level 1.

In contrast, too dynamic and the encounter designs can be pure chaos with a DM not having any real sense of what is right and wrong. How do you compare a 1hp, 1AC creature with PWK against a creature that has over a million HP but does 1 damage every 100 turns?

WoTC is more on the dynamic spectrum than static spectrum. They don't want the game to feel mechanical in that everything the party faces is catered to them and the DM isn't allowed to put ancient dragons in their world until the players themselves reach tier 4. Of course, the dynamics might not be to everyone's liking but calling it bad design is different from calling it a design you in particular don't like.

I enjoy that a lich, a vampire, and a mummy lord have distinct ways to fight. They didn't have to make them like so, but they did and it allows me as a DM to continuously switch up the combats against being meatstick matches or counterspell contests.

 

[tetrasodium]

Look, I'm sorry, I can't really respond to quote shredding like that. It's too difficult to follow your train of thought so I can't really understand you. I find that this style of response too easily leads to disingenuous arguments, bickering, or needless point-scoring instead of genuine discussion. My post was intended to be a cohesive argument. Yes, it's more difficult to consolidate your response into something cohesive and concrete, but if you don't care enough to do that then why would I bother?

All I can honestly get out of what you've said is that your table has fun at levels well over level 13. Great! That puts you in the minority. However, since my point was to discuss why the designers made the XP table the way they did -- which is to say they want high level to go by quickly because they know the game is badly designed at those levels and proportionally few people play them anyways -- that doesn't really seem to challenge that assertion.

Your previous post that I was responding to can pretty much be summed up with "all of the problems people are voicing about 5e's design cater to my particular playstyle and the only reason some folks feel there is poor design or elements that make no sense is because they are playing it wrong expecting to enjoy something nobody likes." That bolded section is you doubling down on that sentiment. The designers knowing that choices made elsewhere cause some elements of 5e to be "badly designed" as you yourself put it and choosing to double down on bad design by designing yet another element so it tries to cover up the design rather than doing anything to address the badly designed areas being papered over isn't "good design" as you put forth.

 

[iserith]

How so?

Do the liches not lich enough or the dragons not breathe hard enough?

When it comes to encounters, there's a spectrum between having hard rules and having a dynamic set of encounters.

If every enemy had to have this much HP and damage output by this level and can only be faced in this order, the players could easily predict that these goblins are stronger than those goblins because those goblins were encountered at level 1.

In contrast, too dynamic and the encounter designs can be pure chaos with a DM not having any real sense of what is right and wrong. How do you compare a 1hp, 1AC creature with PWK against a creature that has over a million HP but does 1 damage every 100 turns?

WoTC is more on the dynamic spectrum than static spectrum. They don't want the game to feel mechanical in that everything the party faces is catered to them and the DM isn't allowed to put ancient dragons in their world until the players themselves reach tier 4. Of course, the dynamics might not be to everyone's liking but calling it bad design is different from calling it a design you in particular don't like.

I enjoy that a lich, a vampire, and a mummy lord have distinct ways to fight. They didn't have to make them like so, but they did and it allows me as a DM to continuously switch up the combats against being meatstick matches or counterspell contests.

Perhaps it wasn't clear that I was agreeing with you that the DM is better served by presenting an "organic" fantasy setting and not worrying too much about over-engineered encounters.

 

[Ace]

Nobody plays past level 10, so we didn't bother to design it well.

That's what we call a self-fulfilling prophesy.

More accurately "Reality Bites"

Ignoring COVID 19 here between real life and computer games/Internet distractions , attention spans and a hundred other things its increasingly hard to get a steady group together to play for long periods of time. Up until maybe the 90's it wasn't uncommon to have games that went on for years with the same group or sometimes the same characters. This type of gaming is far from default.

Truth is B/X's Level 14 or maybe Level 12 like first editions Castles and Crusades is about all the game needs for actual use . Problem is those limits are for games with constrained options.

Game options are important as they are something the player base will spend money even if they don't use them. For that you need more levels . Adapting to a world where actual play is often shorter and those long games no longer occur to enable the games options to be used is very good design.

 

[robus]

WotC's designers hardly ever follow their own rules when it comes to adventures.

This was quite a shocking revelation for me when I had it! Made me stop worrying and just let the bon temps roulez...