D&D General D&D Editions: Anybody Else Feel Like They Don't Fit In?

[Zardnaar]

Start at 8s with 25 points. 9-13 = 1 point each, 14-16 = 2 points each, 17-18 = 3 points each. Standard PC array fits in standard point buy (15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8 arrange to taste).

3.0 DMG pages 19 & 20:
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My games had started at a higher heroic point buy as well though. 32 point buy for my swashbucklery themed high skill low armor Death in Freeport game and 48 point buy for my very high-powered Wildwood Red in Tooth and Claw game. I can't remember what point buy I did for my in person campaigns, I remember having an inquisitor/fighter, a rogue/sorcerer and I can't remember if a third was a magus with a witch archetype or a witch with a magus black sword archetype/warrior gestalt all in my Pathfinder Reign of Winter AP campaign alongside single classed bard and paladin and a multiclassed but non-gestalt barbarian sorcerer dragon whatever prestige class.

A friend of mine ran a pathfinder game for the mythic rules demon fighting adventure path he ran and adopted my point buy gestalt option for his game but made it a lower (four point?) point buy cost to fully gestalt and an option to triple gestalt. I chose to triple gestalt fighter/wizard/custom martial artist with my highest starting point buy stat at a 13 or 14 IIRC for a concept of mage who punches demons in the face concept. I think everyone else chose to more efficiently focus fire their concepts and max out their stats for one class.

Ouch. Yeah not gestalting maybe Fighter/expert or warrior/wizard.

Not a bad table

 

[Lanefan]

Lanefan, get out of here. YOU'RE DEAD! You don't exist any more.

Not yet I ain't - 76 sessions in and still rockin'

 

[Lanefan]

Actually, with 4e, it's not as different as you allege from the original. At the extreme ends, naturally, things are liable to go pear-shaped faster because that's how things work in basically every edition. But if we bump that up to even 2-4 or 3-5, it's actually completely on-math to do that adventure at any level between level 1 (where the party will level quickly) and level 6 (where the party will level slowly, but have an easy time of things).

I used the 4e example because I own and ran (converted) the adventure it comes from, namely Keep on the Shadowfell. For the 2-4 example I was thinking of L1 Secret of Bone Hill.

In KotS it's assumed a) that the PCs will all be 1st level at the start and b) that you'll bump them when the module tells you to, which it does at one point I remember clearly and maybe a second point that I don't remember as well.

This rather starkly brought home to me the power-curve steepness in 4e. Characters in my game don't bump nearly as fast and bump on their own schedules based on how many xp each one amasses. They were in the 1st-2nd range going in and still pretty much there when they finished; and while the rough degree of challenge at the start was OK, by the time they got near the end (where the module expects them to be 3rd level) the place was hell on wheels for them - they did really well to get through without a TPK.

Some folks have a tendency to significantly over-state how sensitive 4e is to level differences. The encounter-building rules explicitly say that things up to level+4 (so if you're level 1, a level 5 combat) are fine, albeit dangerous/challenging. The text also repeatedly recommends including some clearly low-level combats, both because variety is important, and because those are a good way for players to feel the progress they've made. It does note that over-use of either end, whether extremely high- or extremely low-level combats relative to the party, usually results in a not very fun experience, though, unless you handle the combats differently. IIRC, I think it uses an example of a level+8 encounter where the players are expected to run away or find an advantage that tilts things more in their favor?

What you say is true, however the level of an encounter vs the level of a party isn't what I'm looking at here. I'm talking about characters within the party being themselves of different levels e.g. a 4e party consisting of a Rogue-6, a Fighter-5, a Wizard-4, a Cleric-5, and a Warlord-3 (I'm going to do us all a favour and ignore multiclassing for these purposes). For 1e, that's a snap - change the Warlord to a Paladin because Warlords weren't a thing in 1e and that's a very typical group. For 3e it'd be a disaster and I'm not sure 4e would like it very much either. From all I can gather, 5e would do better with it vs WotC's previous two editions, but still not as seamlessly as the TSR editions.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I used the 4e example because I own and ran (converted) the adventure it comes from, namely Keep on the Shadowfell. For the 2-4 example I was thinking of L1 Secret of Bone Hill.

In KotS it's assumed a) that the PCs will all be 1st level at the start and b) that you'll bump them when the module tells you to, which it does at one point I remember clearly and maybe a second point that I don't remember as well.

You may or may not be surprised to learn that Keep on the Shadowfell is considered one of the worst adventures ever written for 4e--and, indeed, among the worst adventures ever written for D&D in general--by those who do actually play 4e.

Imagine someone coming to you and complaining about B/X, or whichever edition you like instead, by using as their example an adventure frequently cited by fans of B/X(/whichever edition you like) as an absolutely awful adventure. Would you consider the conclusions drawn from that adventure unrepresentative?

You may or may not also be surprised to learn that both Keep on the Shadowfell and Pyramid of Shadows, which are both considered highly execrable by fans of 4e, were the primary contributions to early 4e by a certain Mr. Mearls. They're the only early-4e books that have his name on the front cover, IIRC. No few 4e fans blame Mearls for a small part of the hatred 4e got at its launch specifically because the adventures bearing his name were SO bad.

This rather starkly brought home to me the power-curve steepness in 4e. Characters in my game don't bump nearly as fast and bump on their own schedules based on how many xp each one amasses. They were in the 1st-2nd range going in and still pretty much there when they finished; and while the rough degree of challenge at the start was OK, by the time they got near the end (where the module expects them to be 3rd level) the place was hell on wheels for them - they did really well to get through without a TPK.

I'm quite well aware that your preference is only a few levels per year of weekly adventures. That gap will never be bridged; it's simply not how most people do play, and what minimal evidence we have suggests that most players find your preferred pace of growth glacially slow and thus lose interest in playing at such a pace.

And, again, you're talking about the absolute lowest levels of the game, which I specifically said always have this kind of problem. Every edition--including whichever is your favorite--has issues with throwing 1st-level characters at higher-level stuff. Because 1st level is the lowest possible low, there isn't any lower you can go (though I personally would like there to be so, as I have said elsewhere). It's extremely likely that 1st-level characters in B/X are going to get utterly shredded by an adventure intended for 3rd+ level characters.

What you say is true, however the level of an encounter vs the level of a party isn't what I'm looking at here. I'm talking about characters within the party being themselves of different levels e.g. a 4e party consisting of a Rogue-6, a Fighter-5, a Wizard-4, a Cleric-5, and a Warlord-3 (I'm going to do us all a favour and ignore multiclassing for these purposes). For 1e, that's a snap - change the Warlord to a Paladin because Warlords weren't a thing in 1e and that's a very typical group. For 3e it'd be a disaster and I'm not sure 4e would like it very much either. From all I can gather, 5e would do better with it vs WotC's previous two editions, but still not as seamlessly as the TSR editions.

My point generalizes to that too. If combats up to a common party level +4 are acceptable, then it shouldn't be a problem to go for a spread of roughly +5 above the lowest-level character or -5 below the highest-level one, where the PCs are within roughly 4 levels of each other (which you have quite handily done here) should do just fine. Average party level is 4.6, minimum 3. So fights up to level 7 should be perfectly doable, and the Warlord will level up faster because you need less XP to gain levels when you're low level yourself.

A fight of roughly level 4-5 would be perfectly fine for this group; anything from level 2 (an easy fight for this group) to level 7 (a tough fight, where the warlord will have to be careful) should work just fine. It's never been true that 4e characters could just throw themselves at stuff--teamwork has always been essential--so yeah, in a level 7 fight the Warlord should probably be very cautious or rely on ranged attacks and the like, or focus on things that help their allies rather than things that directly push the fight forward. Likewise, with a level 2 fight, that Rogue is gonna be pumping out the damage, but that's fine--some fights should be easy and some should be rough, beyond just the chance that the dice go awry.

 

[Zardnaar]

You may or may not be surprised to learn that Keep on the Shadowfell is considered one of the worst adventures ever written for 4e--and, indeed, among the worst adventures ever written for D&D in general--by those who do actually play 4e.

Imagine someone coming to you and complaining about B/X, or whichever edition you like instead, by using as their example an adventure frequently cited by fans of B/X(/whichever edition you like) as an absolutely awful adventure. Would you consider the conclusions drawn from that adventure unrepresentative?

You may or may not also be surprised to learn that both Keep on the Shadowfell and Pyramid of Shadows, which are both considered highly execrable by fans of 4e, were the primary contributions to early 4e by a certain Mr. Mearls. They're the only early-4e books that have his name on the front cover, IIRC. No few 4e fans blame Mearls for a small part of the hatred 4e got at its launch specifically because the adventures bearing his name were SO bad.


I'm quite well aware that your preference is only a few levels per year of weekly adventures. That gap will never be bridged; it's simply not how most people do play, and what minimal evidence we have suggests that most players find your preferred pace of growth glacially slow and thus lose interest in playing at such a pace.

And, again, you're talking about the absolute lowest levels of the game, which I specifically said always have this kind of problem. Every edition--including whichever is your favorite--has issues with throwing 1st-level characters at higher-level stuff. Because 1st level is the lowest possible low, there isn't any lower you can go (though I personally would like there to be so, as I have said elsewhere). It's extremely likely that 1st-level characters in B/X are going to get utterly shredded by an adventure intended for 3rd+ level characters.


My point generalizes to that too. If combats up to a common party level +4 are acceptable, then it shouldn't be a problem to go for a spread of roughly +5 above the lowest-level character or -5 below the highest-level one, where the PCs are within roughly 4 levels of each other (which you have quite handily done here) should do just fine. Average party level is 4.6, minimum 3. So fights up to level 7 should be perfectly doable, and the Warlord will level up faster because you need less XP to gain levels when you're low level yourself.

A fight of roughly level 4-5 would be perfectly fine for this group; anything from level 2 (an easy fight for this group) to level 7 (a tough fight, where the warlord will have to be careful) should work just fine. It's never been true that 4e characters could just throw themselves at stuff--teamwork has always been essential--so yeah, in a level 7 fight the Warlord should probably be very cautious or rely on ranged attacks and the like, or focus on things that help their allies rather than things that directly push the fight forward. Likewise, with a level 2 fight, that Rogue is gonna be pumping out the damage, but that's fine--some fights should be easy and some should be rough, beyond just the chance that the dice go awry.

Thise adventures are bad but I never saw them.

I blamed 4E all on the merits of its PHB for the most part.

If I'm blaming anyone it's Slaviksek and to lesser extent Tweet and the other guy.

They all got fired.
. Mearls wasn't in the drivers seat hard to write a goid adventure when 4E nuked all the institutional knowledge on how to do so.

I remember Mearls from a 2000 or 2001 Dragon interview.

Nuking Dungeon for example was a huge liss of institutional knowledge for exampke. Paizo inherited that.

Kobold Press? Wolfgang was a Dungeon contributer.

I don't recall to many products Tweet did I liked. I can remember Eric Boyd, Cook or Wolfgang and Perkins pre 3.0. Sean Reynolds as well.

So not only did 4E suck for me there were no names I cared about left. 5.5 kinda has this problem now as well.

 

[Nightfly]

Not yet I ain't - 76 sessions in and still rockin'

I think it's time you learned to really cast spells. You have the personality for it, now.
( Why yes I do intend to flog this joke to death)

I used the 4e example because I own and ran (converted) the adventure it comes from, namely Keep on the Shadowfell.

Out of curiosity, converted it to what? And why? Keep on the Shadowfell is widely regarded as mediocre at best, so I'm surprised someone would want to run it in a format other than 4e.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Death isn't that common in older D&D.

At lower levels, it absolutely was back in the day. OD&D characters were remarkably brittle for the first couple levels, to the degree that in many cases a single hit could do the job with common opponents or fairly minimalist traps.

 

[Voadam]

I think it's time you learned to really cast spells. You have the personality for it, now.
( Why yes I do intend to flog this joke to death)

Out of curiosity, converted it to what? And why? Keep on the Shadowfell is widely regarded as mediocre at best, so I'm surprised someone would want to run it in a format other than 4e.

Its considered a module designed in older style adventuring and a poor mismatch for 4e. It is considered poor for 4e as it is not designed for a lot of the strengths and pacing of 4e with grand set piece battles but more for an OSR style dungeon crawl by someone who did a lot of 3e back to the dungeon style adventures who grew up on AD&D.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Its considered a module designed in older style adventuring and a poor mismatch for 4e. It is considered poor for 4e as it is not designed for a lot of the strengths and pacing of 4e with grand set piece battles but more for an OSR style dungeon crawl by someone who did a lot of 3e back to the dungeon style adventures who grew up on AD&D.

As I've noted, this is a common problem where the first module or two for a new edition of a D&D style game is, essentially, fighting the last war. You saw it in some early D&D3e modules too, and far as that goes, some PF2e early adventure paths.

 

[Zardnaar]

As I've noted, this is a common problem where the first module or two for a new edition of a D&D style game is, essentially, fighting the last war. You saw it in some early D&D3e modules too, and far as that goes, some PF2e early adventure paths.

Makes sense though.

Late 2E had good modules though. Proto modern adventures turned up then.