D&D 5E D&D Mechanics Work Very Well at High Level

[Dausuul]

None of that is what I would consider "breaking." You should expect parties to punch well above their weight when the players know what they're doing, and the higher-level they get, the more it will happen. The game is balanced on the assumption of middling player skill, so highly skilled players will outperform and unskilled players will underperform. As the PCs get to higher levels, they have more options and thus greater scope to use their skills. This happened even in 4E.

The solution is easy enough: Ramp up the difficulty! If they're walking over encounters that are supposedly Deadly, then throw double-Deadly encounters at them. If that doesn't work, go triple-Deadly. Whatever it takes. The players get to have the satisfaction of taking on crazy-big challenges and winning, and the DM gets the fun of going on mad monster rampages.

IMO, "breaking" is when the game becomes un-fun either for the players or for the DM. I found that high-level 3E "broke" because combat turned into a blizzard of numbers and planning adventures became mostly about figuring out how to pose a challenge that the spellcasters couldn't erase with a wave of the hand. High-level 4E was better, but it could get very grindy and while there wasn't a blizzard of numbers, there were frequent flurries.

So far, my experience of middling-high-level 5E (12-13th level) is that it's crazy but not too crazy. The PCs are very powerful and have a lot of resources, but the DM can still challenge them without too much difficulty, and combat isn't a slog.

 

[ren1999]

Over powered characters crushing my challenges has not been my experience so far. I don't change any of the stats from the Monster Manual. I just test the encounters myself with copies of my player's characters and then I add more monsters until the characters suffer to a challenging degree. If a trap or obstacle is too weak, I change its stats.

 

[Joe Liker]

I think 5E works best from an AD&D mindset of "there's as many monsters as there are, now what are you going to do about it" instead of a 3E mindset of "the DM will give you level-appropriate encounters." I skipped 3E except for in video games, but from Internet forums I get the idea that 3E players expect "fair" challenges calibrated to PC level.

Yes, and that was magnified a hundredfold in 4e.

It makes me kind of glad CR is a meaningless number in 5e, except that it also means XP awarded for killing monsters seldom has anything to do with the actual risk involved.

 

[Jack99]

IME, I have zero trouble challenging my party of level 14 characters by following the encounter guidelines, and they have stats and items well above the norm. Even medium encounters can once in a while, depending on how the dice fall and which tactics the monsters use, cause some difficulties. But if I want my players to really sweat and wonder if they are going to make it, it does take an encounter that is Deadly, but never far above the point where an encounter changes from being Hard to being Deadly.

What I have found however, is that the CR of individual monsters is not a limit. My party of 3 have and can deal with monsters up to a CR which is 3 or 4 higher than the party level. As each of those combats have been touch and go (no deaths, but v. close to a TPK each time), I do not think they could manage a monster of a CR 6 higher than the average party level.

For reference, the party consists of a wizard (enchanter), a paladin (vengeance) and a barbarian (totem). Especially the barbarian is a beast with 175 hp and taking half damage almost constantly due to him rarely running out of rages.. Although when he does, the difference is staggering.