How our Epic Campaign played out

[sircaren]

My group recently tried an Epic campaign; we were able to play it for about 8 sessions (once a week). I thought I'd share my experience running the game. Overall it was a negative experience for me, but I'll try to be subjective.

First off, I'll describe the campaign concept. We wanted to give the Epic rules a whirl, so decided to do some combat heavy things for a while. The campaign was inspired by the Dragon issue about gladiators (don't have the issue number with me right now, sorry). Being epic level, we decided to play in the city of Union, slightly modified. We didn't want to simply be a new combat every week, so there were plans for some good city RPing and political plotlines. The owners of stables had quite a bit of power in our version of Union, and often political debates were solved in the ring so to speak. Also, all trials were trials by combat, but you were allowed to appoint a champion for yourself, or have a court appointed champion if you couldn't afford one (we got a chuckle out of that). PCs were allowed to volunteer to champion for this, leading to PCs fighting each other if the occasion arose. In addition, Union was occasionally invaded by different monster types. These monsters were always captured and allowed to fight for their freedom. It was considered a great honor among stable owners to have their champions fight these creatures. The players played as the star gladiators for one of the stronger stable owners. The players all started at level 30(we usually play mid levels, like 7-10 so was a jump for us). So that sets the stage...

The first problem I had was prep time. Each game session took about 12-18 hours to prep for; depending on who combat was with. If that week was about PC vs. PC fighting, it was easy on me, but rather boring. If I had to stat monsters...oh boy. Not to mention if there were spell casters for that week. After statting, equipping, and picking spells I still had to design tactics for the battle. That is just way too much time, while still having to develop some plot (admittedly, not a lot of it at the beginning).

Next were electronic aids, which I normally like to use both for prep and in game. To keep it short and simple, there aren't any that work with Epic very well. It was easier to just do it on paper, which is really hard for a computer nerd like myself.

Then came problems with the scaling of the rules, as the levels got higher. Several things just didn't seem to work anymore. Skill checks were mostly pointless, as were saving throws - Making a lot of spells pointless. I just don't like the idea of an Orc barbarian bullying my 80' tall mountain giants - without having to even roll. Talk about a boring gladiatorial combat... What about a vorpal weapon with all the feats to increase threat range? Bye bye huge hit point monster that happened to have a head. I found myself having to make more changes to the rules every week as we found stuff that just didn't seem to work well. Metamagic feats...I don't ever want to see another twinned, enhanced, maximized, stilled, quickened spell again, ever. And concentration checks - another gimme. Grapple generally ruled the day; all our battles eventually degenerated into wrestling matches it seemed.

Now don't get me wrong, we had a lot of fun too. It was fun brushing noses with exceptionally powerful creatures who had come to watch the match, and having all that power was pretty damn cool, in it's own way. I mean to look in the stands and see Demons and Celestials sitting side by side (well ok, maybe not side by side, but you get the idea) to watch the fun - all kept in line by the god of the gladiatorial ring, which was fun. But when a single battle lasted 4-6 hours (no joke), it was hard to get anything done. In the end we switched to a new campaign because I just didn't have that much time to prep for a game. Anyway that's my take on it, anyone else have similar experiences?

 

[WizarDru]

I can only speak to having used Epic-Level monsters (currently I've used three) in our soon-to-be-Epic game. Some of the issues I think you're hitting have to do with the fact that you STARTED at epic levels. Working your way up to Epic or even mid-levels ususally requires sub-optimal choices on the road to get there, while creating a character out of whole cloth has much different results. A feat that you might need for a prestige class isn't nearly as much of a sacrifice when you're building a 10th level character of 22nd-level character as it is when you have to actually LIVE through three levels with it.

I agree that prep time increases as you go up in levels. It's a problem I run across every game, now. Preparing a battle for 6 19th level characters is no small feat, but there are lots of things that can be done to simplfy. In the most recent combat in my game, I used 4 classed Efreeti (CR 15s), a paragon half-elemental Ettin and a Paragon Fire-Elemental Beholder. The creation time was actually made easier by just winging it, somewhat. Memorize the paragon template, and you're more than half-there. It just adds some numbers to all their abilities, and the only one really worth noting is the hit points, which is the only one which I might not be able to calculate in my head (adding +15 to all spell-like abilities, for example, is pretty easy).

You're right that some things do seem really pathetically easy for epic characters...but they still have achilles heels. The thing is, I think the setting you chose didn't really play to Epic-Level's strengths....just it's combat potentials. Epic level characters are nearly demi-gods...the stuff of legends that 1st level characters scarce believe. An adventure that's mostly combat is going to miss out on lots of the fun (IMHO) and opportunities that Epic level play should provide. Epic characters hop to different planes, fight dieties and demon-lords, battle unspeakable horrors at the edge of the world, and put the moon in a rucksack for the benefit of a princess or trickster god. It's absurd to a degree, and meant to be.

 

[bret]

And concentration checks - another gimme.

I thought there were some varient rules and a feat that made it harder to do the Concentration checks? Spell Harrier or something like that?

In any case, Concentration checks to cast defensively become pretty easy in a normal game by about 10-12th level. You have 13-15 ranks, plus 2 or more from Con. It is an automatic success for your low level spells, and even a sixth level spell only requires a roll of 5 or more (assuming +14 ranks at 11th level +2 for attribute).

Trying ot make a concentration check after being hit by a warrior is a different matter. When they are pumping out 20 or more hps of damage per hit, the concentration check (DC 30 or more) becomes difficult.

 

[DispelAkimbo]

The group I game with had a go at an epic level game. Again we rolled up characters specifically for the game to test the rules, so we avoided sub-optimal advancement, and spent the cash on exactly the items we required and nothing more. So it was not a completely fair test of the rules, but it gave us a taster.

Also as the game was purely an exercise in testing the epic rules, we did have a large emphasis on combat to ensure thorough testing.

With regards to preparation time, it took us 8 hours to create the characters (20 mins to get them killed) and none of us even attempted to roll up an epic spellcaster, the task seemed simply too daunting.

Overall we found that the various abilities didnt scale well at higher levels. Saving throws and skill checks were either guaranteed success (except on a 1) or more often guaranteed fail (except on a 20).

Likewise with attacks unless the DM tailored every opponent to be "mid-range" in everything, which then meant some of the group could do x to it and others could do y but none could do all. Which was okay until the third or fourth opponent at which point it became like fighting clones of the same opponent.

I think with a lot of work the epic rules could be made to work, and I suspect our DM may have had a hidden agenda or proving the rules didnt work because he wasnt fond of them himself.

However, one good thing did come out of our test of the epic rules....

This was the first time I had played a character over level 10. In the past i've always viewed higher levels as 'success' and as the aim of playing a character in the first place. But to have actually played those levels it brought back into focus that the best part of the game is actually the journey and what happens along the way and not simply reaching the destination.

It sounds obvious, everyone knows it, but for me this really proved it. I'm now looking forward to the next low level character I play and am definately more focused on the character side rather than the abilities side.

 

[Nine Hands]

Thanks for the info and I'm sorry you had so many problems. During our playtest we noted some major problems that were fixed prior to production, but we all knew that the core system was a problem and there was nothing we could do about it.

My current campaign is heading to Epic Levels and I have already encountered some of the problems you mentioned. In the end, it was up to me the GM to change some of the game rules. D&D is not really balanced at higher levels.

IMC, I fixed vorpal effects, harm, save or die spells (thanks to Andy Collins for that idea), stacking metamagic effects, spells that do not allow saves for some reason (Maze, Geas/Quest, etc). Once these are more balanced, epic play becomes a lot easier to deal with.

I still have to contend with the huge save DCs that my players can toss around (the archmage's spell power ability is a little out of line if taken twice) and I hate the Wieldskill spell

These balance problems are all related to the core system and not the ELH, the balance problem is just magnified as your level increases.

I see a couple of issues with the ELH right now (the feat that reduces metamagic costs is a problem when combined with Empower Spell) and if you are not careful with the Epic Spellcasting things can get out of hand VERY quickly. Just keep control of that and most everything else should work well.

As for computer support, PCGen does allow you to code in the ELH info, but you end up doing it yourself (its almost easier in the short term to do things on paper). I have had it working with the adjusted BAB/Save progression for the last 5 months or so. Now with Code Monkey Publishing working on the WotC books, PCGen and E-tools will hopefully be able to handle all of these things and more.

 

[D'karr]

The group I game with had a go at an epic level game. Again we rolled up characters specifically for the game to test the rules, so we avoided sub-optimal advancement, and spent the cash on exactly the items we required and nothing more. So it was not a completely fair test of the rules, but it gave us a taster.

Also as the game was purely an exercise in testing the epic rules, we did have a large emphasis on combat to ensure thorough testing.

The biggest problem with testing the rules in this way is familiarity.

A DM that has prepared adventures for the same group of PC's from low levels to high levels and then to epic levels has a high level of familiarity with that group. This allows him to pick and choose challenges that are truly challenging to that specific set of characters.

When you reach epic levels, there are so many capabilities to each character that just putting together an encounter, without taking into consideration the capabilities of the PCs, is counterproductive.

Epic levels requires even more tailoring to suit the party of characters.

A DM that does this in a progressive manner has a better understanding of which things work, which things work very well and which things just don't work at all. That balancing act is very difficult to make on a one shot adventure.

It is comparable to a newbie DM using an Ancient Red Dragon as a challenge to an appropriate party of equally newbie players. Even with appropriate level characters the players will not be really aware of all of the capabilities of their characters and the DM will probably not be very aware of all the capabilities of the dragon. It can become a slaughterhouse or a cake-walk.

 

[sircaren]

I see several of you talking about the differences between playing into the epic levels and starting right in the epic levels. That is one of the reasons we chose the gladatorial theme, it fit in perfectly with knowing little about the PCs themselves. They were simply professional gladiators that had been together for a number of years, with no carry over plotlines. IMO it was the perfect setup for what we wanted to do, which was get a taste of the epic rules. At our normal rate of xp, it would take several years to reach those levels. I think that leveling into the epic rules might have changed things a bit, but I don't really see how they would have addressed any of the problems I had.

Thanks for the feedback everyone, good stuff.

P.S. The campaign we started after the epic (in it's 4th installment tonight) started as a 0th level campaign. LOADS of fun for us.

 

[WizarDru]

I think that leveling into the epic rules might have changed things a bit, but I don't really see how they would have addressed any of the problems I had.

Some it might have, and some not. The issues with the rampant power levels would have been different. Players make sub-optimal choices on the way up the ladder, particularly as new options open up. Notice the dinkeldog (DM of Wulf Ratbane's story hour), myself and others allowed for an 'amnesty', where characters could get minor redesigns on their characters, now that they had learned what requirements might come from Epic levels. Getting a blank checkbook is also important, and different. Being able to buy a +5 Vorpal blade off the bat is far different from getting a +1 dagger, trading up to a +3 flaming longsword, and then finally raising enough cash for the final product. The same applies with magic item creation issues, and PC deaths. Feat acquisition is another issue. All of the metamagic issues you discovered would probalby be much different, if the players had to suffer two to three levels with cooperative spell, for example.

Prep time is another thing entirely. I think you imposed more work on yourself than possibly was necessary, but I agree it's a problem. However, it also sounds like possible unfamiliarity with the characters abilities might also have been a factor. If you're not as familiar with high level abilities (such as the limitations of wish, the range of meteor swarm, grappling with creatures of vastly different sizes, limbs and strength, PCs with ten different spell effects constantly active, and so forth), then you're going to have slow going until you master them.

Some things would be a problem regardless of how you got to epic, though, and need to be either house-rules or managed. The proliferation of save-or-die spells is a personal thing I don't much care for, and I'm looking at how to address it. Saves become an issue of automatic sucess or failure, with a 5% chance of a reversal. Skill checks become embarassing failures, or unbelievable successes. The polarization is a big issue with high-level play, and one I'm still trying to cope with.

 

[Pseudonym]

I still have to contend with the huge save DCs that my players can toss around (the archmage's spell power ability is a little out of line if taken twice)

Be happy I didn't take it three times then

 

[Ogwar]

As teh aforementioned Orc Barbarian, I wanted to ask how others are using Intimidation.

The PHB states the DC is usually 10+creature HD. My 30th level Barb had a +33 to his intimidation which means with roll of 10 I could Intimidate Level 43 creatures and make then back down.

Opposed checks are only good if those 80' Mountain Giants have intimidation too.