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Message: <blockquote data-quote="paradox42" data-source="post: 3171509" data-attributes="member: 29746">SHARK! is a poster who's been around since the beginning of ENWorld AFAIK, who's known for running stunningly large-scale, Epic-with-a-capital-E games. He doesn't post often anymore, but within the last few months I know he's posted his philosophy of world-building at least twice. Before I get into that, I'll note that in context, HL should mean "High Level" since SHARK! was mentioned. I'll also apologize in advance if I get any of this wrong; I have great respect for SHARK! and his opinions, but I haven't got them saved to my HD or anything, so I'm going on memory here.Briefly, SHARK!'s philosophy of world-building is that the D&D core rules have bad assumptions regarding what a typical adult human is capable of. SHARK! either is currently or once was a U.S. Marine, and during his stations he met a lot of people with very diverse backgrounds and skillsets. Examining them with an eye towards adapting friends as NPCs in game (I presume), SHARK! estimated that the skills he was seeing "average" Marines display would require several character levels in D&D terms to properly explain. Examining military history with a similar eye towards gaming, SHARK! estimated that the maneuvers employed in an average Roman Legionnaire's fighting day would require a character of (I think) no less than 8th level by D&D rules to pull off.Therefore, SHARK! reasoned, the core-rules assumption that low-level people are the majority of the world's population, is bunk. By the time a warrior can be properly called a warrior, he has to be at least mid-level, if not high. And thus, SHARK!'s game world scales very differently in the level curve- high level people are not only not terribly uncommon, but they make up the bulk of the 'skilled professionals' of the setting. The actual rulers, of course, are Epic, often (for a large city-state or nation) in the 40s or 50s if I interpret some other posts he's made correctly.Basically, it comes down to a question of scale, I suppose. The SHARK! method is about re-scaling the world so as to take Epic beings into account from the get-go, rather than assuming that it's something so unusual in the history of the world as to be unique (or close to it) which is what the core rules seem to imply. SHARK! gave an example of a conquering army attacking a city that's made up, not of mere orcs riding worgs led by some Barbarian chieftain, but instead of fire giant knights decked out in golden armor and cavalry riding dragons. Something, in other words, which could actually threaten a city of mid-level or high-level people.</blockquote>

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