Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
White Dwarf Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Nest
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions, OSR, & D&D Variants
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
EN Publishing
Twitter
BlueSky
Facebook
Instagram
EN World
BlueSky
YouTube
Facebook
Twitter
Twitch
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions, OSR, & D&D Variants
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
How viable is 5E to play at high levels?
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="CapnZapp" data-source="post: 7216291" data-attributes="member: 12731"><p>You could say it's "broken" at first level, because all notions of balance and fairness are thrown out the window - the second your DM rolls a 20 on a monster attack, you're probably dead, and there's almost nothing you can do about it.</p><p></p><p>But if you (non-jokingly) think it's too easy at low levels, I really can't help you - that's where the game actually works. </p><p></p><p>And by <em>works</em>, I specifically mean that it's easy fun and straight-forward to truly challenge the players. And by challenge, I mean <em>in combat</em>. (Since that's where 99% of the design and balance effort is put. <em>Out of</em> combat you could easily argue the game works just as well - or not - at level 1 as at level 20)</p><p></p><p>Also at low levels, the world around the heroes can still threaten them, meaning you don't necessarily need to pull out fantastical monsters or nasty spellcasters. (Which, as we're discussing here, gets in short supply as you level up)</p><p></p><p>Low-level heroes do not yet have so many hit points and so many tricks (and so many sleeves!) that it starts to become a real problem, yet they have enough hit points and enough tricks that they usually can rebound from a set-back: getting critted doesn't necessarily mean death, your buddies can help you out when you fail an important save, and so on. </p><p></p><p>The first thing is good for us DMs. The second thing is good for players, who obviously like it when failure only/mostly happens when you did something rash/stupid/in character rather than just having bad dice luck.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="CapnZapp, post: 7216291, member: 12731"] You could say it's "broken" at first level, because all notions of balance and fairness are thrown out the window - the second your DM rolls a 20 on a monster attack, you're probably dead, and there's almost nothing you can do about it. But if you (non-jokingly) think it's too easy at low levels, I really can't help you - that's where the game actually works. And by [I]works[/I], I specifically mean that it's easy fun and straight-forward to truly challenge the players. And by challenge, I mean [I]in combat[/I]. (Since that's where 99% of the design and balance effort is put. [I]Out of[/I] combat you could easily argue the game works just as well - or not - at level 1 as at level 20) Also at low levels, the world around the heroes can still threaten them, meaning you don't necessarily need to pull out fantastical monsters or nasty spellcasters. (Which, as we're discussing here, gets in short supply as you level up) Low-level heroes do not yet have so many hit points and so many tricks (and so many sleeves!) that it starts to become a real problem, yet they have enough hit points and enough tricks that they usually can rebound from a set-back: getting critted doesn't necessarily mean death, your buddies can help you out when you fail an important save, and so on. The first thing is good for us DMs. The second thing is good for players, who obviously like it when failure only/mostly happens when you did something rash/stupid/in character rather than just having bad dice luck. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
How viable is 5E to play at high levels?
Top