Do you Enjoy running high level games?

[Rystil Arden]

It is a combination of desisiveness, memorization and cheating that makes it easy. Take a 20th level fighter, I know without the books how many HPs, BAB, saves, skill points and number of feats he is going to have. I can pick out most of the magical items from memory and rarely have to go to the books unless I'm looking for something rare or if I don't know what to give him. Even the caster classes are easy to do, most of the common spells are common becasue they are used the most and I know them and their levels without need of a book. Attributes I justy write down what I feel he should have. The chating aspect is when I don't define a character fully. I don't need to spend all the skill mpoints of a 210th level character for instance if his job is to die at the hands of the PCs. So, I give him skills that matter but don't worry about the extra stuff that does not. If the charater lives and becomes important I can flesh him out later. I live by my sig and have no qualms with making things up, even high level characters at the time I introduce them tom the party. NPC stats are rarely so important they need to be done fully and completely right anyway. I take shortcuts to ensure a fun game is had by all and to hell with the rules and inconviences that get in the way.

Crothian, it seems that we do it exactly the same way. People always look at me sideways when I come up with 20th-level caster NPCs in under 5 minutes...in my head

Oh, and if I haven't said it already: Playing through high level is fun, but starting at high level is troublesome, as it doesn't give the DM the chance to feel out the characters.

 

[Crothian]

Crothian, it seems that we do it exactly the same way. People always look at me sideways when I come up with 20th-level caster NPCs in under 5 minutes...in my head

Oh, and if I haven't said it already: Playing through high level is fun, but starting at high level is troublesome, as it doesn't give the DM the chance to feel out the characters.

I agree totally. They few times I started at higher then say third level I really didn't like it. THe characters just seem flat and even if I go to the trouble of making them three dimensional it is just not the same.

 

[twofalls]

It is a combination of desisiveness, memorization and cheating that makes it easy. Take a 20th level fighter, I know without the books how many HPs, BAB, saves, skill points and number of feats he is going to have. I can pick out most of the magical items from memory and rarely have to go to the books unless I'm looking for something rare or if I don't know what to give him.

I haven't anything near your level of skill with the crunch. When I was younger I had the "core" (if you will) three books for AD&D basically memorized. Thats certainly not the case now. Heck, it's taken me this long to stop mixing 1st and 2nd ed rules in my head with the 3.0 rules, and it still happens on rare occasions. I can't make characters on the fly like you can at this level of play. I do think quickly. I can spin backgrounds, make up personalities, and tell stories on the fly, but just not the crunch past 5th level.

Even the caster classes are easy to do, most of the common spells are common becasue they are used the most and I know them and their levels without need of a book.

Oy vey. They give me headaches. BoVD, PHB, Magic of Faerun, Faerun Core book, Arcane Pocket Guide, and a dozen other books to pull spells and feats from. I can stick to the core books and do it faster, but I wont run cookie cutter NPC's, they just aren't interesting enough. The unwashed masses of enemies are fine with similar stats, but the champions of the battle need indviduality, and I just don't have the crunch skills to make that happen without bookwork.

 

[Rystil Arden]

As for advice about running a high level Darkhold game, here's mine:

1) Play the Zhents smart: The Zhents have a web of spies and information-gathering, including diviners. They're sure to be keeping an eye on any do-gooders who have crossed them in the past, particularly if the yare powerful (18th-level). If an 18th-level party is making plans to attack Darkhold, the Zhents will know unless all of them have Mind Blank. Use intelligent strategies to give the Zhents a fighting chance. If the PCs try something you didn't think of, don't feel bad about making up a reasonable Zhent countermeasure on the spot; Manshoon or the Pereghost probably have more Int than you or me

2) Use rivals: Few things will make what would be a sure-success mission more interesting than a rival adventuring group that is working towards a similar, mutually exclusive goal at the same time (if the PCs want an object, the other party might want it too, for instance).

3) Scare the players and their characters into extra caution: Your players probably aren't afraid of Zhent warriors. To enforce extra caution, have one of the PCs get an information leak that Szass Tam or Aznar Thrull is visiting Darkhold (it doesn't have to be true). If you're playing 3.0, the Red Wizard PrC is so frigging broken that your players will be super-extra careful!

There's more, but this should be a good start!

 

[Crothian]

I haven't anything near your level of skill with the crunch. When I was younger I had the "core" (if you will) three books for AD&D basically memorized. Thats certainly not the case now. Heck, it's taken me this long to stop mixing 1st and 2nd ed rules in my head with the 3.0 rules, and it still happens on rare occasions. I can't make characters on the fly like you can at this level of play. I do think quickly. I can spin backgrounds, make up personalities, and tell stories on the fly, but just not the crunch past 5th level.

THen you are half way there. Use the bonuses from the DMG and just add a few numbers to them. It doesn't matter where they come from, as long as the total bonus at the end is about right. At high levels being off either way by 2 or 3 isn;t that big a deal. I sometimes base it solely on the PCs AC. If I know the highest AC gets around 40 and I still want to be able tto hit that occasionallty I'll make the totalt bonus like +27. And it that's not enough the third round I'll increase it to +29. I feel as long as the players get challenged and are having fun it is okay. Nothing worse then spending jhoures designing an NPC and the players walk all over him, so don't be afraind to change the numbers during the battle.

Oy vey. They give me headaches. BoVD, PHB, Magic of Faerun, Faerun Core book, Arcane Pocket Guide, and a dozen other books to pull spells and feats from. I can stick to the core books and do it faster, but I wont run cookie cutter NPC's, they just aren't interesting enough. The unwashed masses of enemies are fine with similar stats, but the champions of the battle need indviduality, and I just don't have the crunch skills to make that happen without bookwork.

Indivduality comes from descriptions not abilities. You are obviously creative, so make up spell effects and spells at a moments notice. Turn that Firball into a screeching flaming condor that comes screamoing down from the heavens and explodes around the characters. The mechancs are exactly the same as a firball but the players think it is something new and exciting since it is described differently.

THere are short cuts to DMing and I use them.

 

[DrNilesCrane]

I'm currently running my campaign for characters around 18th level: I've found that the prep time required both to create appropriate challengs and take into account the wide variety of spells/options (we just use WotC sources, but that still covers a lot of ground). While I enjoy the campaign, it is definitely much more work at higher levels handling the mechanics (even when cribbing from Dungeon and other souces) than I'd like.

 

[Psion]

I'll say yes.

I really find that my imagination can tear loose at higher levels. At lower levels, the kinds of ideas I come up with seem so much more... pedestrian. The PCs get more interesting too, becoming well invested in power groups, having interesting capabilities and/or items.

Challenging the PCs is really not an issue. I find every party has a blind spot or a dozen of some sort.

I do not find high level battles tedious. The type of firepower that PCs can bring to bear at that level tends to shorten battles IME all but the most well defended foes. The one thing that bugs me is iterative attacks, and I sort of found a way around that.

 

[Wombat]

Overall I have much more fun with lower level games -- there is a greater taste of danger, less of a sense of cosmic oddness, and more of a notion of "I can wrap my brain around everything that is going on".

In D20 terms, I am great up to about 10th level, can handle up to 15th pretty well, and really lose it after that. Anything above 20th level has zero interest.

 

[Bryan898]

I like high level play and so does my group, some of the stuff you can do is just cool. IME it takes time to be able to run high level games without getting a headache from all the open options and keeping track of combat. I've gotten to the point where I can whip up a CR 25 encounter rather quickly, and have it be a good challenge to my PCs. Running an encounter with 5-6 different higher level baddies is only moderately hard anymore. Once your players get used to playing in high levels, they'll start to move faster too. My group goes through a round in no time, even in high level play. I don't see the whoever wins initiative dies first problem, I think that applies more to one-on-one combat than bigger encounters. I've still had fights last 5+ rounds when my PCs can dish out 300+ damage per round quite often. You just have to make sure to scale the saves and AC enough.

 

[Hypersmurf]

I've run many campaigns over the past 26 years, and the highest I've ever run a game is to 13th level prior this.

...

I promised to play the game to 18th level, because I have always ended games around this time.

[blink]

I'm so confused...

-Hyp.