D&D is best when the magic is high, fast and furious!

[The_Gneech]

Re: interesting

Oh and the article above me on the difference between raiders of the lost arc and x-men you should go watch x-men 2.

[snip]

I'm not demeaning indiana jones ,in fact I love the movies .But you're comparing a guy in a typical movie where bullets never hit any of the good guys and he uses his wits to save the day to a movie movie aimed at kids where the antagonists still had to use their wits just happened to be in a different world.

Actually, I saw X-Men 2, and I enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed the first one, but you missed my point entirely.

I can have fun getting all twinked up to go tromping around Faerun; it's a nice change ... but in the end, all it does is make me homesick for good old Hyboria.

-The Gneech

 

[Gothmog]

Good comparison between Indiana Jones and the X-Men Gneech- it illustrates the point perfectly. I know I would rather game in Indy's world because I can relate to it. X-men is cool in small amounts, but it becomes too much after a little while.

I also agree with you Joshua Dyal, although I was trying to not be quite so blunt when I said it. The "bigger is better" syndrome that plagues Hollywood is just as corny and silly in games, if not more so. You get sutck in a never-ending cycle of trying to outdo the previous BBEG or "cool effect", and its a no-win situation.

 

[dren]

I find the key to D&D adventuring is balance.

It's much easier to balance the danger vs rewards at lower power levels. If it's too hard, players die and they can lose their interest in the game because they are playing meat puppets. If it's too easy, PCs think they are gods and kill npcs just like they were human exterminators. With low ro middle level of magic, it's easier to plan ahead and create good encounters which can challenge the players

With high magic, I usually find it goes to meta-gaming way too easy and players lose sense of character over getting items with more bang. For me as the DM, it loses interest when character and role playing is secondary to the toys, whistles and explosions. Sure those toys are fun, but only so much so.

If you can perfectly balance the game out over all twenty levels and keeping players involved in the role playing action using high magic campaigns, good for you. I've just never seen it done yet.

 

[ShadowX]

I don't get this arguement about making the character more important. So instead of using the abilities of an item you use the special abilities of the character. Whats the difference? Both do the same thing. Killing someone with an item is just as epic as using abilities from you character, especially since the monster power levels will be scaled accordingly and so the battle would be just as tough in either style of game. Anyways why are we arguing about this? Just let each person play the campaign he wants too.

 

[Ace]

Thats nice and all and far be it from me to tell you how to play D&D, but don't some of you find that boring?

I do. I don't go to work for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week so that on the weekend I can get together with my friends and die because a kobold criticalled my PC. Nor do I enjoy tromping through some dungeon and at the end having nothing to show for it but some potions and a +1 sword!!


The reason for this thread? Simple. I see so many threads touting the virtues of low-power gaming and dissing high magic as the sole purview of the munchkin that I felt compelled to speak out.

Epic D&D is not just the realm of the munchkin. Epic D&D games are some of the most exciting of all!!

I am glad you enjoy Epic gaming!

I can't stand it myself. I expect my game worlds to make sense and resemble the real world more or less.

I can't deal with armies of Giants, AH-64 attack mage squadrons, fire-ball on line!! Incoming!! high action gaming. Because I am addicted to world building and history and classic sword and sorcery I want worlds that let me have those things

for me to enjoy a game I want less monsters, less magic and no (ok very few) dungeons

YMMV

 

[Dragonblade]

Well, its seeming more and more that all of you have had bad experiences when playing at high levels.

In older versions of D&D, high level play did break down quite significantly. In the current version of D&D that is not the case. It is quite easy to scale challenges for high level groups and keep the challenge and rewards of the adventure proportionate.

Basically, everything you do in your low-level and low-magic games, I can do in my high level game and more. I have all the role-playing and all the danger and excitement of a low-level game. But also a lot more options available to my PC's and a lot more freedom in being creative when designing adventures.

Whats the point of having levels if attaining them doesn't mean anything? What's the point of there being powerful magic items if the PC's can never use them?

I don't play D&D to do what I can already pretty much do in the real world. I want to play D&D to do things that are utterly impossible in the real world!!

To those of you who dismiss high level gaming as boring, I truly cannot fathom your thinking. To me its low-level and low-magic gaming thats utterly boring!

 

[Fenes 2]

Whats the point of having levels if attaining them doesn't mean anything? What's the point of there being powerful magic items if the PC's can never use them?

I don't play D&D to do what I can already pretty much do in the real world. I want to play D&D to do things that are utterly impossible in the real world!!

To those of you who dismiss high level gaming as boring, I truly cannot fathom your thinking. To me its low-level and low-magic gaming thats utterly boring!

Wouldn't it be much cooler and provide much more options if the players could play gods instead of low-level PCs like a measly Wizard-40? What is the point in having all those cool stats in the Deities&Demigods if the players never can play them? Naw, lets forget gods, lets play overgods! Much more options, less restrictions!

Where do you draw the line? When will your present high-level/high-magic game become boring and "not-cool-anymore", so that you will have to switch to playing gods to get that sense of awe and wonder?

 

[S'mon]

It's strange, I find the pro low-magic arguments here much more compelling, the adherents of high-magic arguments come across as very weak. Yet I've enjoyed GMing ultra-high-powered (deity level) AD&D for many years, and I enjoy high-magic fantasy novels, especially those of Michael Moorcock, where super-powerful magic destroys armies and ends worlds, where heroes battle directly against demonic gods. If anything it's the _mundanity_ of magic in 3e, not its power, that I find dispiriting. The ubiquitous buff spells are perhaps the best example. I find that eg the GMW spell caused much more disruption to my gameworld (eg by making enchanted weapons almost obsolete) than an ostensibly flashier spell like flamestrike or searing light.

 

[DragonLancer]

Low-magic plot: A plot to undermine the king results in the prince being kidnapped and his cousin who bears a strong resemblance and who works for a shadowy organization takes his place.

High-magic plot: A plot to undermine the king results in the prince being kidnapped and replaced by a doppleganger who works for a shadowy organization.

Two simple plots but immediately one is more interesting with far more ramifications both magical and mundane.

Either of these are interesting. However, both are time honoured plots and nothing new. I could go with either.

Low-magic locale: A grey stone citadel set on a windswept peak overlooking the countryside.

high-magic locale: A gleaming crystal palace floating mysteriously atop the same peak glows with a strange blue light when gazed upon at night.

Two locales but one is instantly more interesting and wondrous than the other.

Yes. The low-magic one conjoures the best menta image to me. The other just makes me imagine bad saturday morning cartoons from my childhood.


Like debates on alignment, this is one that isn't going to be agreed upon. We all have different ideas on what makes a good game. I prefer a low to middle magic level, but others prefer high.

 

[hong]

I've been gaming for a little over 20 years now, and when I said I have seen and heard of the high-magic stereotypes utilized thousands of times, I literally have.

_Literally_ literally?

1000 campaigns over 20 years translates to 50 campaigns per year, or one per week. D00d, if you're going through campaigns at that rate, I'd think there was something wrong.

To me, I know exactly what to expect from pulp high-magic fantasy, and there isn't really anything left to surprise or intrigue me. I became a low-magic convert about 8 years ago because it was so novel and different to me, and the campaign world has much more internal consistency and logic, and holds together better.

I have the real world for internal consistency and logic. Fantasy is about escapism.

High magic worlds wouldn't have anything like our medieval societies- but most settings seem to ignore this, instead using medieval technology, culture, and beliefs as a basis and slapping high magic on top of it.

If it helps people kill monsters and take their stuff, why not?

If you are going to have a high magic world, you have to completely rethink the effect omnipresent magic would have on a culture and modify it from there.

Or you could just not think. Thinking too hard about fantasy is bad.