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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Liquidsabre" data-source="post: 1683160" data-attributes="member: 15635">I currently have a mid-level party (~11th) that is rapidly approaching the higher-levels, despite multiple, ahem, set-backs (i.e. deaths). <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />While I've never run PCs this high before I did a considerable amount of research on how to run a good high-level game of D&D in preparation for it. You must realize as PCs grow greater in power the scope of the kind of stories that get told increases dramatically. No longer are the PCs searching for the magical dagger in a chest hidden somewhere in the keep, no longer are they hunting down orc bandits that have been harrassing local trade, rarely are they seen crawling through goblin warrens or dungeons with simple spike and pit traps.Instead, your PCs are not only amassing great wealth but (ideally) responsibilites as well, or avoiding them at all cost, either one makes for great story. No longer are our heroes saving the village on the border of their kingdom (low-level), neither are they defending the border keep against barbarian attack (mid-level). Instead our heroes are seeking out great and powerful enemies to the kingdom and throne, both external and internal threats! Scheming intrigues of the Noblese or powerful rise of an undead army to the north lead by a lich king. Adventures and quests at the higher-levels involve the PCs in great events that help shape and alter the course of possibly many kingdoms, through failure or triumph. Or conversely, the PCs are plotting the downfall of the evil kingdom and attempting to rally a rebellion. BIG things, the scope of change and events grows larger as PCs go from mid-level to high-level play.So it's easy to understand how some people don't care for roleplaying at this grander-sclae and scope of play, where half the time the 17th level Paladin is managing his keep and reading progress reports on his border towers and frost giant rumblings in the mountains to the east. The party wizard may be heading his order of arcane wielders on their continent, researching the creation of a great artifact that will help unite the three kingdoms, and the 18th level Rogue finds himself the unwitting guildmaster for a notoriously evil assassin's lodge bent on world domination. These things happen, not to mention the planar campaigns that can occur as armies march to do battle for supremacy between the lower planes!High-level/epic games are the stuff of legends and lore, the kind of things sages write about in ages to come. Low-level play is the stuff of youthful exploration where a single magical dagger is a prized possession and one must fight to stay alive against a single goblin and his rat-tooth comb that gleams menacingly in the torch-light. Both are great and wonderful experiences, just different in scope is all. Problems occur when one doesn't realize that the scope MUST naturally evolve to include much grander schemes and events, or else you get problems such as high-level spells foiling the DMs plans and such.The mystical key that unlocks an unknown portal doesn't hold as much grandeur as it once did once the party wizard shrugs and cast Legend Lore on it. Ahhh, but the worlds and elemental planes on the other side of the portal, that's where the high-level adventure awaits!Typically I don't even consider what my PCs abilities are, though I try to be generally aware fo them. I enjoy a bit of surprise in discovering what it is they do to accomplish the goals they set out for themselves. Generally when building story and villainous schemes I just make things appropriately big and nasty for the scope and let the PCs figure it out. As pirate cat is fond of doing, don't limit the spells and abilites during high-level play, require them!Cheers and best wishes, hgih-level play can be an awfully rewarding experience if done well!</blockquote>

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