(Discussion) General Part IV

[Thomas Hobbes]

There are 3 or 4 new characters in the last week, most of whom have been posting in the Red Dragon, looking for something to do...

Adventure submitted to the living EN world hotmail account (that is the place, right?).

 

[dpdx]

RE: if you're looking for an in-game mechanism to get higher-level players for your game, you could use the NPCs, like Joe and Tiggle. They could "recommend" people. After all, they know everybody, right?

The mechanism could be like this: Client comes in to post a job, or to introduce himself and his need to Joe, one of the bartenders could talk to him on the sly. 'She's not here right now, but who you really want is Zoe.' (for example.) 'She's really good when the chips are down, and that's mighty nasty opposition you're going against. You'll also want to talk to him, him and her over there.'

 

[Kahuna Burger]

I think it's okay to have a higher character advice. In 3rd level parties, 1st levels could still be usefull if they manage to stay out of combat, but later on it'll really become a problem.

uh, are we going to just keep introducing characters at first level when there are 10th level dudes running around? Aside from the idea that we might rapidly stop getting any new players, I for one eventually want to play something with an ecl, which I can't with first level starts... and then there's the counter problem of the one uriel brought up - if I want to run a "low level" campaign, can I tell mr 5th "no, you can't come and do it for the rest"?

Oh, and I am ALL for allowing levelups during campaigns. That's where you are learning, and there's nothign to say that a 1st level wiz didn't have spells in his book in an uncompleted form that he hadn't fully grasped yet, but that expereince of casting burning hands while ducking a seleton's sword really brought it all home for him. But seriously, if you accept the standard D&D 'logic' that you get better at everything by killing monsters, there's no justification for having to add in studying as well... if that would work, I could send Katherine on a no risk sabatical of learning and hunting rabbits and come back leveled up.... One way or the other, here.

Actually, those two questions kind of fit together. You could allow characters to be introduced at a higher level but still new to adventuring... a wizard who has been learning in his ivory tower or a fighter who has trained with his father's men for years but never been bloodied... those sort of character archetypes are common in fantasy...

Kahuna burger

 

[dpdx]

I think it's fair that the people who first signed on to participate in this world have a chance to gain the first experience.

Besides, maybe we should have a rule: if your first character dies, you have the right to make a new one at either the same level or one minus, whatever the judges decide. That would allow people who've invested and built on this setting to introduce higher level and/or ECL characters according to their time in the game.

 

[Uriel]

Address for a few posts/comments...

My games seem to move fast..hehe
Sorry, but I do like them to move. I just concluded the PbP (Under a Vaulted Sky:The Silver Door) in the PbPs, with a minimal of character death(when I was sure that I was going to kil 4 or 5 of them). Everyone had a great time, and now maybe I'll 'Story Hour' the whole thing.

Anyways, me being at home (cast/off my feet) helps with my games' speed; I may have a slower posting rate when I return to work, but at this point, that is still over a month away.

I am going to allow In-Game leveling, though I am hesitant to just instantly let Mages add spells: One Wizard will be going from 2nd to 3rd, thus 'suddenly' gaining 2nd Level Spells. I'm not sure how I want to handle this as of yet.

Perhaps we <DMs>can have a tagline on Adventures.

Recruiting: The Entarbus Crypts <2-4>.
Then then would look like old-school D&D Modules...
A 3 Level range sounds fair. 2-4, 5-7 etc...

When I mentioned not allowing some level characters in an adventure, part of it was for purely selfish reasons.
Simply put, I do not want to continually have to run 1st level adventures.
So far, I've started 4 of them, having picked up the gauntlet, and I love beginning characters getting to know themselves and the World.
However, I have adventure themes that require a higher ECL, as well as wanting some of these players a chance to get to play the PRCs that they have created, gain the feats, create the Magic Wands, whatever.
I don't think we will really have a shortage of DMs wanting to run LVL 1 games, though.

 

[Creamsteak]

You could always grab 20 players of random character level and throw them all through a meatgrinder .

Also, I now have AIM. My name is AntonidasHeman if anyone wants to message me about stuff immediately.

 

[WizWrm]

New version of Mercurial Initiate is up, awaiting comments and suggestions.

 

[dpdx]

Ode to Sparky

Can I just nominate Sparky for Living ENWorld Participant of the Month, or something?

I freaking love Sparky's PC, Rainca of the Barav Kree. Cool name, cool background, cool setup. She needs to slay monsters, real soon.

And he made Phyrah, the air and travel goddess for the pantheon. And gave Chennet' some love. Phyrah only needs one more Judge to become official.

I know there are other participants worthy of a gold star, but considering I only saw Sparky's first post here about four days ago, if that, I thought Sparky should be deserving of an ode.

 

[Thels]

I think it's fair that the people who first signed on to participate in this world have a chance to gain the first experience.

Besides, maybe we should have a rule: if your first character dies, you have the right to make a new one at either the same level or one minus, whatever the judges decide. That would allow people who've invested and built on this setting to introduce higher level and/or ECL characters according to their time in the game.

Of course. If you join first and stay active, then you have a right to have the most experience. However, a slight problem starts to occur that Uriel's 1st games progressed a little faster and that most players sticked together to his next adventures, which kind of breaks up the LEW idea, as the idea is to continually mix around characters.

As for dead/new characters, there was a discussion about that earlier, which hasn't had a result so far. The idea was to be able to abandon your character and start a new one at a lower level, so you could pick ECL races. I'm not sure if that's the way with dead characters as well. Anyhow, if a character dies and get's resurrected, it loses a level, so I think that if your character dies and you pick another character, it needs to be at least one level lower.

Maybe for the sake of simplicity there could be a rule that dead characters can be abandoned with the same result as living characters of one level lower?

For example, if dropping a living character would earn you another character of one level lower, then dropping a dead character would earn you another character of two levels lower.

That means you lose one level over dying and one level over switching a character.

 

[Uriel]

Of course. If you join first and stay active, then you have a right to have the most experience. However, a slight problem starts to occur that Uriel's 1st games progressed a little faster and that most players sticked together to his next adventures, which kind of breaks up the LEW idea, as the idea is to continually mix around characters.

They went a lot faster

Seriously, though. The concept of LEW is creating a World through a group whole. Me running a few little adventures with the same characters isn't going to disrupt things.

Some of the players from the first two (yourself included) opted to adventure elsewhere, while others stayed on for my next two. I also have 5 new characters (that were not in the starting two), all first (except for Sturm) in my adventures. So, I think that this trend will continue, with some folks staying on, while others go elsewhere. I would hopt that the storyline and the DMing style/fun is what motivtes them instead of the quick XP route, because those XPs are being earned in a series of sudden death encounters (the players will cringe if they merely add the Feral to an Orc, an uber Munchkiny NPC killing machine. Wait till the Feral 6th Level Monk on the next level...)
I would hope for a few other characters of a level higher than first to jump aboard the next one, but looking around, I don't think it's going to sync all that well. What I will most likely do is run 1 game, with a cap at 6 players or so, and let the others go off and do whatever they wish, they do all have other motives and goals as well.

Maybe I should stop DMing in LEW for a month or so...I might be setting a bad curve or something.