How Do You Like Your Extents of Progression?

[Reynard]

Competent With Little Change, but Zero to Zero.5, Always Powerful But No Progression and similar options work for me too.

I just really dislike vast power level growth. It makes things that I like a lot (like, for example, actually having an antagonist), for all intents and purposes, completely impossible.

I'm not sure that's the case. There are plenty of examples of bad guys being present but too powerful (or wealthy or connected or whatever) to take down until the hero(es) gain enough power of their own (or allies or the MncGuffin) to finally defeat them.

 

[loverdrive]

I'm not sure that's the case. There are plenty of examples of bad guys being present but too powerful (or wealthy or connected or whatever) to take down until the hero(es) gain enough power of their own (or allies or the MncGuffin) to finally defeat them.

While, yeah, nominally you are up against the Dark Lord Of Evil Darkness, in reality you are interacting with his 10th in command.

I don't dispute that there are workarounds the fact drastic power level progression necessitates characters "outgrowing" previous threats, this is what they are: workarounds.

 

[Reynard]

While, yeah, nominally you are up against the Dark Lord Of Evil Darkness, in reality you are interacting with his 10th in command.

Or him. See: Harry Potter.

 

[John Dallman]

It really depends on the campaign. In the past three and a half years, I've played my first ever campaign that stayed with the same party of (AD&D1e) characters all the way from first to tenth-ish level in weekly sessions. That's the first time I've done that since starting gaming in 1979. All my other D&D has been in the context of much larger multi-GM campaigns, where parties were formed for individual scenarios or story arcs. So this is the first time I've had that "classic" experience, and I think I might have grown bored with it if the GMing hadn't been so good.

In general, I want enough advancement that I can get the feeling of how characters change, and can correct errors of character design in point-buy systems. I like to be able to prepare for new challenges if I can tell what they will be. But development of characterisation and inter-character relationships doesn't usually cost advancement points.