Dragonlance "You walk down the road, party is now level 2."

[el-remmen]

If you are playing with XP, the DM decides when he awards XP (for example, I award it between adventures or during other downtime). This means PCs advance in level as fast or as slow as makes sense for the setting, the narrative, and your tastes.

For me the question is not how many sessions does it take to advance to 2nd level, but how many sessions does it take for them to complete their first adventure? For my groups anywhere from 2 to 4 (with 3 being most common) by then they have usually earned enough XP to get to 2nd and halfway to 3rd.

 

[DarkCrisis]

Yep, these threads where people come back to D&D to play 2024 5e games and are somehow shocked the game WotC has gone out of their way to say is still basically the same game is actually still basically the same game is something. Has there been a single published 5e adventure where the PCs don't have the ability to get to level 2 in the first session? I certainly haven't played them all, but the ones I have it was certainly possible. I'm pretty sure we went from 1 to 3 in a single session for Curse of Strahd in the Death House.

Also OP is giving a very poor summary of level 1 to 2 in the Dragonlance adventure. There's 3 mini scenarios to play out, one where a PC with powers derived from a deity reconnects with their deity, another for a spellcaster belonging to the Order of High Sorcery to introduce that concept, and then the introduction of draconians in a short combat. Presumably some parties won't go through all 3 and maybe you only run 2 depending on your group, but the material is there. I'm not sure how that's "just walking down the road", but I guess you could certainly just ignore all that stuff and have your PCs walk down a road and level up.

Even doing all 3 with the whole group together is basically walking and talking until you get to the overturned cart where you have a fight. It could all be done on one road as you get to the first town.

Walk
Divine character have a vision and get their powers!
Walk
Arcane PCs meet a real Tower Wizard and do a simple test!
Walk
Fight!
Walk
Enter Town.


2 of the 3 Prelude is just talking and making a check or 2.

Which is fine but that's all they do for 1 whole level. And Level 2 is basically the same thing but set in town instead of on a road.

Again, that's fine. It just feels really cheap and for me feels like I'm shorting my players of an experience.

The adventure could have just started in the town and it gets attacked. Make level 3 characters. And yeah as a DM i can do that. but I paid for the whole adventure.

It just feels cheap to not have the real adventure start until like level 5.

Maybe it's great for groups that like to do "shopping episodes" for a whole a session but I'm here to save the world.

IDK

 

[DEFCON 1]

You bought what was printed within the pages of the book, not for the numbers on the outside that estimate the power levels of the characters doing it.

If the adventure as written is not worth $50 to you, then return it.

 

[Lanefan]

sure, and unfortunately in that case PC early leveling just does not make sense. that's why in those cases I think its better to just have the pcs start at higher levels. then they obtained those levels through the entirety of their backstory, not because they got some milk at the supermarket.

Or spin the lower levels out longer such that getting to 2nd, and then to 3rd, becomes something of an achievement.

 

[Lanefan]

Nah.

It doesn't either way. It's such a short step to L2 and relatively short to L3 that huge numbers of NPCs, including pretty much anyone who has even been in a war, or acted as a peace officer/sherrif/bandit/anything like that should be at a minimum level 3 unless they're green as grass. And there should be a lot more NPCs of like "moderate" levels.

Agreed, which is why there needs to be a lot more "meat" to those first few levels.

What you point out here is nothing more than a design flaw in 5e that, while getting play to the "sweet spot" faster, really does mess with believable worldbuilding in the process. It's kind of a carry-over from 4e which (in a different form of poor-for-worldbuilding design) had its PCs start with nearly-3rd-level abilities right from the hop and left a huge gap between commoner and 1st-level PC.

I mean, I've no problem with there being lots of 0th and 1st and even 2nd level types in the setting provided the progression is reasonably consistent - soldiers, street thieves, etc. who have built up over some years a degree of experience that adventurers tend to get in a few weeks - and my take is that anyone in the setting can earn xp if they try to. It's just that most either don't try (a typical baker or farmer), or don't realize they're very slowly earning xp as they go along (cloistered cleric, street thief, etc.).

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

I can never except the, "PCs are somehow in the setting different from NPCs of the same circumstances". To me they will always just be the folks the camera is pointed at.

But why is the camera focused on them?

 

[Lanefan]

maybe this was why the vikings were so successful? They were just higher level than the rest of Europe because they got XP for all the gold they were nicking?

Best line of the week, this!

 

[Lanefan]

But why is the camera focused on them?

Ever watch a televised golf tournament where, despite the fact there's 30 groups on the course, the camera stays glued to mostly just one or two of those groups?

To me it's the same principle. There's loads of adventurers out there, we just happen to be looking at one (or, in some campaigns, two or three) of those groups and detailing what they do.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

What you point out here is nothing more than a design flaw in 5e

I don't think it is, though, I think it's one of those things that's a very much intentionally designed feature that just doesn't work for some people because they want to use the product in a manner different to what is intended.

really does mess with believable worldbuilding in the process

D&D has always been bottom of the barrel for RPGs where the mechanics fit "believable worldbuilding" though, hasn't it? Levels alone take a giant dump on "believable worldbuilding", because there is no believable world where one fit adult human can take 10x as much punishment as another with similar characteristics but who has been in less fights (if anything the opposite is true - people get worn down). Even if we say they aren't "meat points", it just doesn't work, the insane growth in potential and power, not for believable worlds. And the fact that many NPCs/virtually all monsters don't have levels just muddies the waters further.

Again, you want mechanics that marry well to "believable worldbuilding", Heroquest or something like that is the answer.

Even something like Shadowrun has mechanics vastly better suited to the worldbuilding than even 1E or 2E D&D.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

Ever watch a televised golf tournament where, despite the fact there's 30 groups on the course, the camera stays glued to mostly just one or two of those groups?

To me it's the same principle. There's loads of adventurers out there, we just happen to be looking at one (or, in some campaigns, two or three) of those groups and detailing what they do.

I have not, but I also reject the comparison. A D&D campaign isn’t comparable to a golf tournament. The camera is on the party because they’re special and doing the cool things. They’re adventurers. 90% of NPCs are commoners with jobs. Maybe the PCs are just uniquely skilled, or there could be some prophecy that says their special, or they have some supernatural reason for being more powerful than the average peasant. But the game happens because the party stands out amongst a sea of ordinary people. If anyone could level up by killing creatures, butchers and serial killers would be pretty high level.