Character Level / World Power - Comparison

[kigmatzomat]

My NPCs advance 3-4 levels per age class, so a venerable farmer tends to be ~12th level, assuming they live that long. The bulk of the army, really a militia, are dual-classed warrior/somethings with 1-2 levels of warrior. At least 15% of the populace is or has been in the militia. IMO, someone who lives to a ripe old age probably spent some time in the militia learning the combat skills required to reach a ripe old age. So that venerable farmer is likely a warrior 3/peasant9.

I base the "well known" aspect on the types of adventures someone of that level would have had to deal with.

Which means:
1st level - potential, maybe. If they don't get killed.

4th level - professional, possibly a bit gifted depending on age. No longer hear "wet behind the ears" comments.

8th level - known regionally (meaning in the county or city). Hero worship from small children but grownups know better. The nobles are aware of you but may not be able to recognize you.

12th level - get tapped for jobs a bit too big for the local sheriff but not big enough to call in the army. Yet. Probably had dinner with the local nobles, bishops, guildmasters and has a few shiny letters of introduction. The well-connected (nobles, priests, thieves) in other cities know about you.

15th level - Has a chance of being recognized when they walk into a tavern they've never been in (but still no more than 2-3 towns from home). Probably done something that has brought you to at least the attention of the Duke, if not Royals. You start showing up as a "wild card" in reports from other kingdoms' spies.

20th level - The royal family has their information network keep tabs on you, likely so do several other kingdoms and quite a few religions. There aren't daily reports on your activities but "left town wearing his dragon-slaying armor" gets written in red ink in large script.

 

[Brother MacLaren]

That's up to you. The life of a Commoner or Expert is neither routine nor easy in a "plausible" medieval world. Plagues, crop failures, excessive taxation, fires, and more are real challenges to the lives of the NPCs.

True. I just have a hard time wrapping my brain around a power level increase being associated with facing such things. Also, overcoming a challenge is not the same as surviving it. Saving the village from a plague, leading a revolt against the taxes, rushing into the burning building to save a child - those actions earn XP. Enduring a plague, making your Fort save, and recovering should not.

If your campaign rewards only killing, and everyone is happy, fine. But it does not have to be that way. There *are* other options.

I agree entirely. I think that in a slighty majority of campaigns a slight majority of XP probably does come from killing foes, but by no means is that the only thing. However, for an NPC soldier, the most likely answer to "Why is he 3rd level?" is "He is a veteran of many campaigns." Remember, I was originally talking about NPC soldiers.

Player characters earn XP at a much faster rate. One in-game day can have 4-5 significant encounters. Three in-game days is sufficient to earn enough XP to level up (theoretically). There may be several weeks between "action days", depending on the campaign, or there may not. A villager, under SKR's model, has one such encounter per month (on average) and requires a year to gain each level.

I know. I'm okay with NPCs gaining levels at a rate 1/10 or 1/20 that of PCs. But to me, the ideal rate for PCs is about one level per in-game year (averaged). Gives time for the reputation to build appropriately. Maybe going up several levels in a year-long quest (like LOTR) followed by a period of relative inactivity (barony administration, etc.). Then, another great danger faces the land and the heroes must reuinite... I don't think the non-stop adventuring does a lot for the game.

For me, apprenticeships always stopped when you reached zero experience points.

This has always been my thought as well. Again, a holdover from previous editions, where simply being a leveled member of a PC class meant you were better than "Normal Man."

I don't know if I'll ever accept high-level "Normal Men," and I probably will be happier just giving NPC Experts (such as the master blacksmith) an alternative way to get better at their skills without giving them the attendant bonuses of high level. Maybe just arbitrary circumstance bonuses based on years at their craft rather than actual levels.

 

[Silveras]

True. I just have a hard time wrapping my brain around a power level increase being associated with facing such things. Also, overcoming a challenge is not the same as surviving it. Saving the village from a plague, leading a revolt against the taxes, rushing into the burning building to save a child - those actions earn XP. Enduring a plague, making your Fort save, and recovering should not.


I agree entirely. I think that in a slighty majority of campaigns a slight majority of XP probably does come from killing foes, but by no means is that the only thing. However, for an NPC soldier, the most likely answer to "Why is he 3rd level?" is "He is a veteran of many campaigns." Remember, I was originally talking about NPC soldiers.



I know. I'm okay with NPCs gaining levels at a rate 1/10 or 1/20 that of PCs. But to me, the ideal rate for PCs is about one level per in-game year (averaged). Gives time for the reputation to build appropriately. Maybe going up several levels in a year-long quest (like LOTR) followed by a period of relative inactivity (barony administration, etc.). Then, another great danger faces the land and the heroes must reuinite... I don't think the non-stop adventuring does a lot for the game.


This has always been my thought as well. Again, a holdover from previous editions, where simply being a leveled member of a PC class meant you were better than "Normal Man."

I don't know if I'll ever accept high-level "Normal Men," and I probably will be happier just giving NPC Experts (such as the master blacksmith) an alternative way to get better at their skills without giving them the attendant bonuses of high level. Maybe just arbitrary circumstance bonuses based on years at their craft rather than actual levels.

Actually, I think your last points undercut your first couple.

I am a veteran of 1st/2nd Edition (20+ years playing), so I understand how hard it is to get your head around the new approach. For good or ill, I had a friend in the 1st Edition days who wanted to take the current approach - he wanted to give all non-adventurers a level or two of Thief. He did not buy the "being 1st level is already special" approach, so I don't find the new approach as jarring as you might.

However, being unable to let go of "the way things used to be" makes it harder to be objective. I get the impression (though I could be wrong) that because you feel NPCs should not have classes in the first place, you are also unwilling to let them gain levels, either.

That being said, the challenges I listed were meant to be examples. Merely survivng them may not be worthy of XP. However, saving the life of one other villager during a plague (perhaps by taking a child out of a plague-infested house) might qualify as "defeating the challenge". Saving your crops during a bad season, instead of just not starving to death, might qualify for XP.

 

[Brother MacLaren]

I get the impression (though I could be wrong) that because you feel NPCs should not have classes in the first place, you are also unwilling to let them gain levels, either.

Close, but not quite. I feel that different rules should apply for PCs and NPC members of PC classes as compared to NPC members of NPC classes. I don't think the one-size-fits-all model works so well; D&D was designed originally for simulating heroic adventures and comes up lacking in some aspects of world-building.

Your basic blacksmith can be an Expert, but I think you should say one of two things: either he gets XP through practicing his craft (not through facing risk) at a very slow rate, or he gets skill bonuses divorced from level advancement. Levels bestow very powerful abilities - hit points, saving throws, and complete immunity to certain spells.

 

[Silveras]

Close, but not quite. I feel that different rules should apply for PCs and NPC members of PC classes as compared to NPC members of NPC classes. I don't think the one-size-fits-all model works so well; D&D was designed originally for simulating heroic adventures and comes up lacking in some aspects of world-building.

Oh, I can certainly agree there; there are some serious issues with plausible world-building using the Core rules to populate it.

Your basic blacksmith can be an Expert, but I think you should say one of two things: either he gets XP through practicing his craft (not through facing risk) at a very slow rate, or he gets skill bonuses divorced from level advancement. Levels bestow very powerful abilities - hit points, saving throws, and complete immunity to certain spells.

That, though, I think comes back to the "PCs are automatically better" theory. It works for some, but not for all. And it is easier to have a base system that does not make Adventurers automatically better; that way, the DM can choose to make them better if that is what s/he wishes. It is harder to take that status away if the core rules presume it is granted.

Levels bestow more than just hit points - they also bestow Feats and Skill Points, the primary mechanisms for NPCs to improve in their professions.

One aspect of the variant rules in Unearthed Arcana that I like is the Craft Points. Aside from making it easier on PCs crafting things on the road, it adds feats that are of value to NPC craftspeople. Craft Masterwork Armor, Craft Masterwork Melee Weapon, Craft Alchemical Item, and Craft Masterwork Ranged Weapon are required under that system in order to make the appropriate items. I like this, as it gives advancing NPCs worthwhile feats to take, it makes "Master craftspeople" NPCs of 5th level better defined, and it helps to separate the PCs' ability to mend or make their own equipment from the NPCs' abilities to make better (as professionals tend to be better).

[Edit: Oh, and your suggestion about the Blacksmith earning XP slowly through his craft ? That's what SKR suggests. The disconnect seems to be your idea of 'very slow' and SKR's idea of 'very slow'. SKR's is based on PC advancement in the core rules. Your idea of PC advancement 1-level-per-year is fine as long as your players are happy, but it is much slower than the core rules results in. Taking that into consideration, SKR is saying the same thing as you are, just phrased without your personal campaign's adjusted time frame.]

 

[Brother MacLaren]

Your idea of PC advancement 1-level-per-year is fine as long as your players are happy, but it is much slower than the core rules results in. Taking that into consideration, SKR is saying the same thing as you are, just phrased without your personal campaign's adjusted time frame.

I'm not sure that the core rules really result in any time frame. That is, they don't specify how much "down time" happens between adventures. Several uneventful years may pass (and be hand-waved by the DM) while the 9th-level PCs administer the finances of their baronies before they are called upon to slay Fanskar the Merciless. Several years passed for Riddick between "Pitch Black" and "Chronicles," essentially hand-waved. Same for any number of sequels, true?

I've never DM'd a full 3E campaign. In 2E or BD&D, it probably took a few years of in-game time to go from levels 1 to 7. I just imagine 15th-level heroes as being legendary figures who have built up their reputations over time, not 20-year old kids who appeared on the scene two years ago (although Dragonlance, for example, illustrates the latter path).

 

[Silveras]

I'm not sure that the core rules really result in any time frame. That is, they don't specify how much "down time" happens between adventures. Several uneventful years may pass (and be hand-waved by the DM) while the 9th-level PCs administer the finances of their baronies before they are called upon to slay Fanskar the Merciless. Several years passed for Riddick between "Pitch Black" and "Chronicles," essentially hand-waved. Same for any number of sequels, true?

I've never DM'd a full 3E campaign. In 2E or BD&D, it probably took a few years of in-game time to go from levels 1 to 7. I just imagine 15th-level heroes as being legendary figures who have built up their reputations over time, not 20-year old kids who appeared on the scene two years ago (although Dragonlance, for example, illustrates the latter path).

The Core rules don't mandate any downtime at all. The design philosophy is to serve the "back to the dungeon" mentality. All meaningful play happens in the dungeon; everything else is ancillary. Training rules, for example, are an optional variant, meaning many parties level up their characters in the dungeon, on the spot, after a fight. The core rules are also based on the design assumption that most campaigns play levels 1-20 in 1 year of real world play.

If the campaign is one big dungeon, the time factor for level gain is based entirely on how well you do at avoiding ability damage and level drain. If you never fail your saves or always get restorations, 20th level can be achieved in 3-6 months of "in game" time.

In my own world, I have used training time to push things out, but in 1st/2nd Edition, I never put much "down time" in between adventures. PCs climbed 6-7 levels in 1 game year on a regular basis.

Comparisons to literary or movie pacing is not always good. While such may be the inspiration for the game. the game as a medium has its own needs that are different, and sometimes opposed to, books and movies.

 

[Brother MacLaren]

If the campaign is one big dungeon, the time factor for level gain is based entirely on how well you do at avoiding ability damage and level drain. If you never fail your saves or always get restorations, 20th level can be achieved in 3-6 months of "in game" time.

I take it you are using this as an example of an extreme, where there is minimal travel time. Travel time was a big reason for the level 1-7 BD&D game taking so long in-game (Isle of Dread was pretty far away IIRC). But you don't role-play every day of the trip.
I think such a compressed timeframe, while possible in the never-ending dungeon crawl, doesn't really allow the PCs to build up a reputation in the world. In fact, in such a situation, they'd be basically unknown even at level 20.

Comparisons to literary or movie pacing is not always good. While such may be the inspiration for the game. the game as a medium has its own needs that are different, and sometimes opposed to, books and movies.

I know there are differences, but I do like books, movies, and legends as a frame of reference for many aspects of the game. Combat mechanics is not such an aspect, but campaign pacing quite plausibly is.

 

[Silveras]

I take it you are using this as an example of an extreme, where there is minimal travel time. Travel time was a big reason for the level 1-7 BD&D game taking so long in-game (Isle of Dread was pretty far away IIRC). But you don't role-play every day of the trip.
I think such a compressed timeframe, while possible in the never-ending dungeon crawl, doesn't really allow the PCs to build up a reputation in the world. In fact, in such a situation, they'd be basically unknown even at level 20.

Yes, that would be an extreme case.

Let me be clear, I don't run my own world according to that scheme. I like to use the training rules and to somewhat pace things out.

As for reputation, well, a lot depends on the scale of your world. If your "world" is 1 town and the dungeon-filled lands surrounding it ... well, your reputation could be world-spanning by afternoon.

Before there was Mystara, the "Known World" consisted of the town of Threshhold and a couple dungeons. This is the sort of scale the core rules (absent a setting) are designed around. "Town" is not part of a larger whole; it is just a "supply dump" between dungeon expeditions.

For my own world, I want "Town" to make sense. So I modify what I need to, and work to make my world internally consistent (in a way that the Core probably never will be without some modification). At the root of that, though, is accepting the idea that 1st level does not make a PC superior to the rest of the population. I *like* the graduated scale, and the ability of NPCs to gain levels. NPC classes are inherently *inferior* to the corresponding PC classes, and I use FFG's Thug class as a lesser Rogue, as well as Hedge Mage and Friar classes of my own design as lesser Wizards and Clerics.