D&D 5E Do You Prefer Sandbox or Party Level Areas In Your Game World?

So these are two approaches that campaigns can (and do) use. They have various names, but I'm using these names. I've used both approaches in the past.

Obviously there is more nuance than the definitions below, but these are two possible extreme ends of the poll when voting feel free to choose whichever end you tend towards, or embellish in the comments.

Sandbox -- each area on the world map has a set difficulty, and if you're a low level party and wander into a dangerous area, you're in trouble. The Shire is low level, Moria is high level. Those are 'absolute' values and aren't dependent on who's traveling through.

Party -- adventurers encounter challenges appropriate to their level wherever they are on the map. A low level party in Moria just meets a few goblins. A high level party meets a balrog!

Which do you prefer?

 

[Lanefan]

Why would there be no warning? People tend to notice when there are ancient dragons about. If the 3rd level PCs IMC want to go where the ancient dragons are, ok I'll run that for them.

Agreed.

Likewise a level 20 party can certainly enter a safe area, but the GM should use the appropriate play mode for the area - ie not tactical exploration mode, rather a brief summary.

Disagreed. I'll run it exactly the same as if it's a 1st-level party going in there until-unless the Goblins notice they're being chopped down like wheat and react differently than they might if they were in a more even fight.

e goblin would likely not want to fight, but he might have info. I've seen PCs recruit goblin tribes to their side w good diplomacy.

Ditto, but that sitll doesn't mean any of it gets handwaved.

 

[Lanefan]

How do your players or characters know when to flee? Are you using only published monsters? It might be a carry over from Rolemaster, but in most of my games, the power of the monsters are not know to the players until they have fought them more than once and even then there are different power levels for the same monsters. Specially if the DM is using home brew versions of any of the monsters.

Well, there's always an element of trial and error involved, and sometimes the errors might cost the party a character or two...

 

[Lanefan]

But I think that's an important difference.
1. The GM presents the party with a level-appropriate encounter. (Morrus 'Party')
2. The party seek out (what they hope is) a level-appropriate encounter. (Morrus 'Sandbox')

#1 suits some genres, eg super heroes, better than #2. 4e D&D is particularly tailored to this approach; 3e to a lesser extent - 3e PCs often tend to die very fast vs too-high-CR threats, but people have used 3e for successful sandboxing albeit within a narrower level range than 1e allows. My attempts to use 4e for sandboxing have been pretty dismal, whereas 4e is great for soap opera dramatics.

#2 is the more Gygaxian/Old School feel, and can feel more empowering. It also is more apt to surprise the GM with what happens, which I like. Pre-3e is built around this approach (though 2e AD&D got a bit muddled, with GMing advice often set to #1 while the mechanics remained the same as for 1e).

I think #2 suits an exploration/discovery game best, #1 suits a dramatic or melodramatic game best.

Interesting to note that, not by coincidence, 3e and 4e also have the steepest power curves among the various D&D editions. Thus, in those editions there's a) a narrower level-appropriate window and b) more of a push to make encounters somewhat level-appropriate because outside that window it just doesn't work very well.

Ditto for level variance among characters in the party: 3e and 4e are the editions that - again due to the steep power curve - don't handle this nearly as well as 0-1-2-5e do.

 

[pumasleeve]

I dont think I have ever run a party game. So I guess Sandbox. Truthfully Sandbox games tend to be as linear as railroad, they just have the illusion of choice. Thus, the party rarely runs into anything they cant handle.

 

[iserith]

I dont think I have ever run a party game. So I guess Sandbox. Truthfully Sandbox games tend to be as linear as railroad, they just have the illusion of choice. Thus, the party rarely runs into anything they cant handle.

I've certainly seen a lot of DMs who advertise a game to be sandboxy then you find yourself on a published adventure path.

 

[imagineGod]

Challenge Ratings exist for a reason.
Do not let TPK ruin your friendships

 

[OB1]

I chose Sandbox, but will mention a few important caveats.
1. A single area may have multiple Tiers of challenge in it. PC actions will primarily determine what type of challenge they find in such areas.
2. Plot hooks from NPCs are typically (but not always) level appropriate.
3. Lore plot hooks may tempt the PCs towards areas above their Tier
4. When going somewhere above their Tier, I'll turn up the heat over several encounters until it reaches the full level of the area, giving the PCs the opportunity to cut bait. This happened in my last session, where they accomplished some of the things they wanted to in an area above their Tier, but eventually realized that some other things would have to wait till later (though they did go farther than I initially thought).

In my current campaign, the players have been going back and forth between NPC plot hooks at their level and taking up Lore hooks above it. In my last campaign, they rarely did anything besides take the NPC hooks.

 

[S'mon]

I suppose I make too many custom monsters and dislike stock monsters for that to really work for me.

I make a ton of custom monsters (& NPCs) but maybe it's more how you use them. I tend to emphasise reusable assets.

 

[S'mon]

Agreed.

Disagreed. I'll run it exactly the same as if it's a 1st-level party going in there

OK, you do badwrongfun if you must.

 

[tetrasodium]

You guys been busy over the weekend. lol. Sorry I missed out.

I think your term "the fiction" might be where there is confusion. If you mean the story of the adventures of party X then fine of course you can't argue there story includes a dragon they didn't encounter. If though, and here is where a lot of taking it, you mean the reality of your world then you are just wrong. When I prep something and put it into the world it is in the world. It doesn't matter if the players ever encounter it or not. A lot of people are seeing you challenge the latter and of course as a result you are getting pushback.

Now, being able to change something merely because the players don't know it (yet?), doesn't mean a DM will change it. The DM will not change it in fact if they are playing in our style. And when I say won't change it, I mean for that particular period of time. The world moves along so the DM will move along all the PCs over time as well. But the fact on date XYZ, said character existed and was doing something is a truth of the campaign whether the PCs ever realize it or not.

So maybe we can call that campaign truth. I find I don't care for the term fiction anyway in regards to a roleplaying session.

I realize you have a style of play where you change things all the time even when you've prepped it. You have no regard for campaign truth. I accept that is how you play.

Here twenty something pages and "our style" reads a lot more like a thought experiment than a cohesive style of game play those who engage in it could explain details & clear confusion when presented with people expressing confusion stemming from a logical inconsistency created through fairly straightforward gameplay examples. You yourself were repeatedly asked about railroading and player agency only to avoid the questions entirely by declaring that I must be responding to the wrong person not once, but twice & maybe even more.
Can you frankly confirm or deny if "our style" is a thought experiment or if "our style" is something you have significant experience actually putting into practice?

Can you also be explicit on who is included in the implied "us" for "our style" as I'd like to avoid inadvertently responding to the wrong person. I'm sure others would appreciate not conflating the arguments of people not part of "our style" too as you seem to argue both that "our style" is an isolated very personal thing that should not be conflated with that of people who seem to be arguing the same point as well when the collective is inconvenient but quick to shield "our style" as a collective monolith.

@Lanefan seems to be in lock step with you on the inability to see a difference between written in the notes and made real through play, but when presented with an example of a setting with a published quantum fact from an official setting
with deliberately conflicting and uncertain causes he avoided offering clarity by declaring here that he is not familiar enough with the setting to comment on how the logical inconsistency what you are calling "our style" processes something like the linked possible causes while still steadfastly seeming to remain unable to see a difference between in the notes and made real during play.

@Emerikol it's fine if we disagree, but if this is not simply a thought experiment those of us with seemingly conflicting views might find that answers to some of these kind of questions are valuable things we can improve our own gm toolboxes with. What happens when the gm notes say something like this

from page24 of rhime of the frostmaiden. The notes say that you can roll, the notes say that you can choose, the notes say that you can take one of these suggested towns & just declare it so. Until you do one of those things and the players are in the town with the caravan in question while that caravan is there it is in any other town except for the one the players are currently in. How does this or the deliberately murky eberron cause behind day of mourning published with an array of conflicting yet strongly implied quantum causes & might never be introduced during play work out in what you call "our style" where things written in the notes are more or just as real as those introduced in play even if those notes never actually get introduced?