D&D 5E 5E demographics

[MasterTrancer]

Greetings all. For some time now I had some curiosity about the actual density of high-level characters (either PCs and NPCs) in a setting; starting from an entry in the DM Options: High-Level Play from 2E, I jotted down some calculations, and came up with some interesting numbers, which I wanted to discuss with you. Please bear in mind that any assumption on the frequency of a score is based for ease on a 3d6 generation method; note also that there is no default assignation of the scores to the characteristics (so an 18 INT is treated the same as an 18 STR).

A basic character which has AT LEAST 10 in every score (so, no maluses) has a little less than 6% chance to be rolled, and that means that for every million persons, there will be about 60 thousands people with these scores.

If we raise the bar, and look at the PHB's standard scores (i.e.: 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8) we see that a (N)PC with AT LEAST this scores is much rarer: only 764 of these persons exist out of every million computed.

Since we're debating of the chance of being born with these values, we're focusing only on 0th or 1st level chars.

What are the odds of leveling up in this edition? Not only considering deaths, but also retirements? Say one-in-two (so as to also preserve the assumptions in the original paper and eventually compare the numbers)?

Halving each population as the levels increase, we have 1 20th level PC with at least the standard scores (however mixed) for every BILLION people in the world (actually 1,46, since the numbers get rounded, but I prefer integers for this calculation).

So, to recap the assumptions:

• standard scores (as found in PHB)
• values mixed as preferred
• statistical frequency of the scores based on the 3d6 distribution
• at every level 1 (N)PC levels up and 1(N)PC retires (or dies)

And the results:

• for every million people in an area, only 764 will be eligible
• for every billion people in a world, only 1 will reach 20th level

That says much about the abundance of high-level (N)PCs in a fantasy world.

Frankly, I was a little surprised with these numbers; what do you think? Do you hold true the assumptions, or would you modify them in some ways?

 

[goldwyrm]

Interesting analysis. I do generally run campaigns where high level (10+) is rare. If you'll forgive a little tongue in cheek response on the billions- The numbers of exceptional stat line powerful people vs. the average 10's is more than covered by HFIMR (high fantasy infant mortality rate). The billions of straight tens are born, but few make it to adulthood or adventuring age. Every time a charismatic fertile barbarian "hero of the people" is passing through villages and meeting the ladies, a subsequent lack of medical care, education, and malnutrition levels the population out to the disparity seen in the classic High Fantasy setting. This is all behind the scenes of course and I don't traumatize the players with this knowledge, as they are already dealing with the incalculable village razings of most of the adult age 10's by monsters, wars, plagues, and pestilence.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I normally go with a set of numbers I came up with in 2e in response to being asked by a player how likely It is to run into a high level character in one of my worlds... I don't remember how I came up with it though.
there are active at any time about 100 groups of adventures, and half of them are levels 1-7. the next group of half the remaining are between 8-11 (I remember 12 being the legend lore level) and half of the remaining are level 12 exactly... the last 12 sets are 1/2 13th level and so on...

so 50 1-7, 25 8-11. 13 12th level, 6 13th level, 3 14th level, 1 15th level, 1 16th level, 1 17th level...

those are in the entire campaign, so as you level you are less and less likely to run into people higher level then you, and odds of running into someone able to cast an 7th or 8th level spell is almost unheard of...

 

[the Jester]

A basic character which has AT LEAST 10 in every score (so, no maluses) has a little less than 6% chance to be rolled, and that means that for every million persons, there will be about 60 thousands people with these scores.

Why do you make this assertion? There are plenty of npcs, not to mention pcs, with scores below 10.

 

[Wolfskin]

In my games, the only people with levels on the gaming world are the PCs. For the rest, I strictly use monster stats (with Challenge rating being an approximate of "level"), and though some NPCs have class features -such as spellcasting- I only worry about how they make sense in the story and interact with the players.

That aside, I do think that Level (or Challgenge) 20 NPCs should be extremely rare and fulfill very specific niches in the gaming world, such as Icons in 13th Age, with the overall majority of the population being below Level 4.

 

[MasterTrancer]

Why do you make this assertion? There are plenty of npcs, not to mention pcs, with scores below 10.

For ease of calculus, and because I assume successful PCs have overall better stata than the norm, especially if they are to reach higher levels.

I wanted to get myself a clearer picture, increasing the fit population tenfold still gives extremely low figures for high levels.

 

[MasterTrancer]

In my games, the only people with levels on the gaming world are the PCs. For the rest, I strictly use monster stats (with Challenge rating being an approximate of "level"), and though some NPCs have class features -such as spellcasting- I only worry about how they make sense in the story and interact with the players.

That aside, I do think that Level (or Challgenge) 20 NPCs should be extremely rare and fulfill very specific niches in the gaming world, such as Icons in 13th Age, with the overall majority of the population being below Level 4.

I can see your point, but they should have been given birth at some point, if they are "people" like PCs to start with.

 

[Mercurius]

I don't really understand the connection between ability scores and level demographics, but it seems to me that you should focus more on average ability score rather than an array. If you take the idea that the average human averages 10 in each ability score, then you'll get a bell curve from 3-18 (I have no idea about how it would actually look statistically, but hope someone can calculate it for us).

But my main issue with your calculations is that they are just that...calculations. In an actual campaign world, they could be used as guidelines but probably wouldn't be taken too seriously.

Also, demographics get really tricky because it depends upon the region. A frontier/wilderness region would likely have a higher percentage of levelled (N)PCs because of it being a more hostile environment. Also, consider that higher level (N)PCs are higher level for a reason: they survived lower levels. So the die-off rate would be much slower, meaning that higher level (N)PCs would accumulate.

I haven't really figured it out yet, but in the campaign I'm setting up, the location is a frontier region roughly 150 x 200 miles, or ~30,000 square miles. Using this calculator, if I enter in "Arid" for population density I come up with a population of 600,000. That seems a bit high to me, so I'll lower it to 500,000. Of course 500,000, I'd posit the following, using 5E's tiers of play:

100,000 children (no levels)
350,000 commoners ("0-level")
~40,000 tier one (1-4)
~1,000 tier two (5-10)
~100 tier three (11-16)
~10 tier four (17-20)

Or something like that. So that means about one in ten people have a level of some kind, which is quite high, but makes sense given that it is a frontier and draws adventuring types, and also many of the people living there might have enough training to be considered 1st level.

Now in a more civilized region, the percentage of levelled characters would be much lower - maybe 1 in 100 or 1 in 1,000, depending.

 

[Joe Liker]

For ease of calculus, and because I assume successful PCs have overall better stata than the norm, especially if they are to reach higher levels.

I wanted to get myself a clearer picture, increasing the fit population tenfold still gives extremely low figures for high levels.

Well, for accuracy, you should probably open up the fit population to include everyone ever born. There's no rule tethering level-up to ability scores. There's not even a rule that keeps you from taking a class. The only thing that's restricted by ability score is multiclassing.

Further, remember that killing monsters is not the only way to earn XP. If a humble villager fulfills a lot of noncombat quests, he or she might easily gain a few levels. So I really don't understand the assertion that only half the people manage to gain a level. It seems to have been pulled from the aether, completely lacking in substance.

That said, it makes sense that there should be very few people who ever manage to climb to 20. Monsters at CR 20 are generally on par with demigods, and PCs who reach such lofty heights are flirting with godhood themselves.

 

[the Jester]

For ease of calculus, and because I assume successful PCs have overall better stata than the norm, especially if they are to reach higher levels.

I think this is a pretty fatal flaw in your assumptions. It might be better to simply assume that those individuals with high ability score averages are disproportionately likely to be higher level.

I mean, I've seen (and played) pcs in the mid-teens with stats of 3 (or even lower; one kobold pc in my 3e campaign never got his strength above a 2).

I wanted to get myself a clearer picture, increasing the fit population tenfold still gives extremely low figures for high levels.

Yes, this is very true.