D&D 5E E6 in 5e

[dave2008]

The elephant in the room is: playing D&D without the level-up experience is boring.

You can level up, you just don't increase (or increase at a much slower rate) your HP & attack bonus. There are other reasons to level up.

That being said, I disagree that D&D without level up is boring. One of my current groups is lvl 12 and we started when 5e came out. That is approximately 2.5 levels per year and we play about 1-2/month. So about every 6-8 sessions (4-8 hrs each) they level. That is a snails pace compared to most on these boards I think. We have essentially played E10 for the life of 5e and have been having a great time. As DM I feel I can control the fun more than the level up mechanic.

My "particular issue" has a specific solution: WotC doing better monster design, not coddling their high-level critters.

Not really, because though that has already happened to some extent, they are not going to go back and make changes to what they have already published. Part of the reason is, the monsters work just fine for a lot of players and groups.

Now, if I ever get a bit more free time I will publish a 'tactical monster' series and give your PCs some real pain

EDIT: I honestly believe I could keep a campaign interesting for years without any leveling. It is such a minor point in our games currently.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I suppose I worded that poorly. In my anecdotal experience most role-players are also computer gamers. Most of this category of people that I know are younger than I am. Many of those computer gamers play MMO's, and are highly concerned about how much fun the "end-game" is to play. I have heard similar concerns about D&D: it takes too long to get to 20th level, there's nothing to do at 20th level, games end before 20th level or shortly after getting there, etc.

Just as an aside but I think that generation is actually aging now and younger 20-somethings and below tend to not have played MMORPGs in my experience and thus do not see "endgame" the same way. I feel like most of the people you're describing are between 26 and 36 now.

Re E6 in general I think it would be great to see a framework which did actually allow some access to the great spells and powers of D&D (including higher level non-caster abilities) but in a much more restricted and limited framework, probably using Feats developed specifically for the purposes.

I'd also look at reworking a lot of monsters. Some are fine under E6 (ie one that should be epic threats) but others feel like they were pushed up in HD etc. to provide a threat to higher level PC so could be tuned down a fair bit.

 

[CapnZapp]

I honestly believe I could keep a campaign interesting for years without any leveling.

Me too. Every time we're playing a game without levels, the lack of levels doesn't impact the interest one bit.

 

[dave2008]

Me too. Every time we're playing a game without levels, the lack of levels doesn't impact the interest one bit.

Let me clarify: I can run a 5e D&D game without levels, for my group, and we would thoroughly enjoy it.

 

[Garthanos]

IMX, new players will often come to the table wanting to play a representative character from fiction, and that character would often be either high-level when modeled in D&D, or outright unachievable in the system.

Side effect of martial versatility being verboten perhaps?

 

[dave2008]

Side effect of martial versatility being verboten perhaps?

As a fan of 4e I would think you know that is not the case. Not to mention the 5e battlemaster (and with the new UA all fighters) can get quite a bit of versatility.

 

[Garthanos]

As a fan of 4e I would think you know that is not the case. Not to mention the 5e battlemaster (and with the new UA all fighters) can get quite a bit of versatility.

I am kind of prodding Tony about what characters cannot be designed from fiction I think if we shoot for paragon aka name level from olden times somewhere most can be done without too many things left behind. There has been some active discussions where it is noted one could probably mash all the martial classes into one hero class without it being too powerful. And discussions noting where the thief stole the ability of the fighting man to sneak, climb and jimmy locks and traps and similar things Conan one of the inspirations for the fighter could be said to walk all over the boundaries between fighter rogue ranger and perhaps eventually warlord.... ie every 4e martial class. Fictional characters are able to do the things that serve the story so I think that can mean a lot of versatility. Honestly as I said kind of just prodding to figure out what he meant. I do agree people without D&D background may have well have let's call it mid to highish level expectations they want to be round table Knights in shining armor the central protagonist of the story.

 

[Garthanos]

'less badly imbalanced' might be a fair way of putting it.

Mainly because I'm a bit tired to come up with an amusing ranking of fictional mass murderers by relative sanity, at the moment.

Edit: (further edit: OK, some of these get obscure...)

This edition is imbalanced in the game sense like...	...this fictional serial killer is imbalanced in the crazy sense
3e	The Joker
(PF1)	(Carnage)
(Arduin Grimoire)	(Deadpool)
2e	Pamela Voorhees
0e	Hans Beckert
B/X	Billy Haloran
1e	Norman Bates
5e	Hannibal Lecter
(13A)	(Frank Castle)
4e	Dexter Morgan

fun upgrade that is... Dexter LOL

 

[Garthanos]

Let me clarify: I can run a 5e D&D game without levels, for my group, and we would thoroughly enjoy it.

Most fictional characters rarely blatantly level up so I think one could pick the right level perhaps and entirely play within story expectations of those. Levelling too much in D&D results in an expectation change which for some people might even be discordant.