How Broken Is It to Just Advance Characters Past 20th w/o Epic Rules?

[Crothian]

Right, so what happens is you get more and more meaningless attacks. It's a waste of time.

I have found that players enjoy the long odds of those attacks and it is worth the extra few seconds they take.

 

[AuraSeer]

I doubt you'll have much trouble. The epic rules are really designed to address the balance issues you see when very high level characters have to interact with each other.

The easiest balance example is BAB, which diverges widely if you follow the standard progression. A Ftr40 would end up with a +40, a Wiz40 only +20, and the disparity gets worse as the level rises. At some point, any monster whose AC presents a challenge for the fighter becomes totally impossible for the wizard to hit, even with a touch attack. If these two characters were in the same party, it'd become difficult to design encounters in which they both could contribute.

But you don't have to care about that. If your nonepic PCs will be encountering some epic NPCs, it doesn't matter that the NPCs are balanced against each other, only that they're more powerul than the PCs are. You can go ahead and use the standard progression and not worry about it.

 

[Gold Roger]

Well, Monte Cook advanced arcana evolved to 25th level and I think Piratecat worked a none-epic-rules straight level advancement for his campaign. So I guess it's possible.

Personally, I've never been interested in the issue. In my oppinion there needs to be an ultimate stopping point behind which no mortal/PC can advance and it's just natural for me to use 20th level as that point.

 

[Kaodi]

You could invent an arbitrary limit to how far a characters abilities could advance. Like say, no PC can have a base attack bonus or base caster level exceeding 25, and a base save exceeding 20, or skill ranks exceeding 30. So, say a 25th level fighter could keep advancing as a fighter for more feats, but they might find it more worthwhile to take up skulking or spellcasting. A 25th level wizard might take up sorcery, or divine magic.

So, practiced spellcasting would count as part of your base caster level, but a reserve feat that gives a bonus to fire spells would enable you to go higher.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

The two times I've DMed groups that hit lvl 20 I just ignored the epic rules as well. To be perfectly honest I don't think they make sense and create an overly rigid artificial divide with no internal logic to it.

I'm not in love with the ELH, but there is a logic to it that they spell out quite clearly in the book: After 20, the disparities between classes will mean there are classes that essentially just break down without the baseline being reset with the BAB and saving throw changes. That's pretty logical and, since it's spread across every class, quite internal as well.

The new spell systems and wirefu applications of skills don't follow the same logic, but they really both look like alternate systems bolted onto the basic epic level logic. That said, I think throwing away spells above 9th level and Greek mythic hero skill checks leaves one with a very simple set of guidelines on how to adjudicate the odd level 24 NPC and the like.

 

[Olaf the Stout]

I don't think that you should have any problems if you keep going without using the Epic rules. If you did so I wouldn't use many monsters out of the ELH though as they pump up the power level quite a bit.

Of course that doesn't really matter since you said that this is more a theoretical discussion than anything else.

Olaf the Stout

 

[Michael Silverbane]

Since you're talking about NPCs, and there is little liklihood that the PCs will get into the epic levels, I see no reason not to use the standard advancement for those few levels beyond 20th. Really, they're not that likely to come into play, and your players aren't going to see the nuts and bolts behind them anyway, so why create extra work for yourself by switching to a whole new rule-set when you've already got a perfectly good one to go on.

Later
silver

 

[jmucchiello]

There's no reason not to use the epic rules for BAB and saving throws. It's actually pretty logical. The unfortunate problem is that the core monster rules don't follow the same rules. But that is easily hand-waved. If you ignore the epic spell system there's nothing wrong with going over 20th level. Spellcasters improve by taking more metamagic and feats like increased spell capacity. It works just fine in out 27th level game.

 

[takyris]

I don't see a problem with just continuing the rules for saves, BAB, hit points, and easily systemized abilities (Sneak Attack, Ranger Favored Enemies, other things that you can point to and say, "Every odd level" or "Every multiple of 5").

My only issue would be how spells get handled. I haven't looked in awhile, but can you plot caster levels beyond 20? Maybe you can -- I haven't tried, but I'm guessing stuff maxes out, and you apply the same rules to the higher level spells until you've got the maximum number per day all the way up to 9th level. If you can deal with that, cool.

My inclination would be to avoid the specific-class-abilities issue, though, by assuming that anyone who gets past level 20 does so by recognizing his (or in this case, her) weaknesses and working to offset them, or at least complement her abilities. So your NPC might be a Cleric (or Wizard) 20 / Rogue 7 at this point, and the Rogue levels are mostly about increasing her odds of survival and learning new skills. She's not disarming traps, but she's picking up Use Magic Device and Decipher Script, which she'd never bothered with before.

Just a thought. My basic feeling is, "Yeah, you're fine," though.

 

[Nyaricus]

Right, so what happens is you get more and more meaningless attacks. It's a waste of time.

Honestly, the quickest this is going to accumulate is once ever 5 levels, you get another attack. Since el is just continuing the progression using non-ELH rules, the balance is going to be a bit different, but oh well - nothing to have a cow about, IMO.

My only issue would be how spells get handled. I haven't looked in awhile, but can you plot caster levels beyond 20? Maybe you can -- I haven't tried, but I'm guessing stuff maxes out, and you apply the same rules to the higher level spells until you've got the maximum number per day all the way up to 9th level. If you can deal with that, cool.

Personally, I already have 10th level spells in my games. If you look at a Wizards spell progression, he, at 19th and 20 levels, should have one and then two 10th level spell slots (and also gets a total of two extra 9th level slots at those levels). Simply, these are great slots for the use of and promote the use of metamagic feats for spells.

For 20th level and beyond, just follow the progression.

Also, consider upping the number of Cantrips. Having an epic-level arcanist being able to cast 4 cantrips a day is lame, IMO.

cheers,
--N