I refuse to DM 3/3.5 past 7th level. How about you?

[WizarDru]

At 1st level, the paladin climbed down a rope into the Sunless Citadel and fought for his life against a giant rat that would have killed him if not for the timely intervention of his friends.

At 26th level, the paladin delivered the death-blow to a demi-god attempting to ascend by merging the Far Realms with the Prime, as Solars and creatures of nightmare did battle around him, and would have been killed if not for the timely intervention of his friends.

I enjoy each game equally, and enjoyed running each.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

i refuse to referee it. Period.

Ditto. But it was around 10-12th level when I realized what a chore it was to run the game and we switched systems to finish the campaign up.

 

[kigmatzomat]

According to the poll the usual messageboard argument that D&D is un-DMable at higher levels seems unfounded.

Well, it may beyond some DM's comfort zone but there are enough story hours to prove otherwise. My own game is at 19th level after playing all the way through from 1st. I hit a few rough spots, mainly when multiple players hit "goody" levels that boosted their output but I've learned to anticipate them.

It may seem complicated at first, but I noticed that actually playing up to those levels eases the transition considerably. All those new aspects to the game don't spring up suddenly.

Running characters up to the target level seems to be key. One-shots with higher level, unplayed characters tends to be slower and more difficult both for the player and DM. I can't count the number of times someone said "Oh, dang it, I forgot I could..." on either side of the screen.

Doing a "test run" is probably also a good idea. Every 6 months or so I run a one-shot with characters 5-10 levels higher than my core campaign. It gives people a chance to try out different classes (one guy loves mages for one-shots but prefers fighters for campaigns) and me a preview of how people are going to try to play the game. Cuts down emotional noise about vague rules since no one is particularly attached to the characters.

Some aspects do change in leaps, like I suppose some DMs have difficulties when teleport is first introduced. I never noticed this spell to change how the game's played, but travelling from A to B was never a dominant factor in my games. The spell is also pretty limited in capacity.

I made teleporting a requirement for some adventures and I'm sure to apply the restrictions on going places you know and that are distinctive.

Heal was the spell that caught me off guard. I've beat the fighter down and am about to move on to the 2nd string combatants when *bang!* the fighter's on his feet, hale and hearty! My BBEG had exhausted too much resources and was soundly trounced.

It caught me way off guard but it worked well for the game. I just had to realize that some NPCs will have the requisite knowledge and foresight to plan against Spell X and others wouldn't. The "hard" part of it was acknowledging that the players will sometimes out-think me or that I'm going to make mistakes and to just roll with it.

 

[WizarDru]

Running characters up to the target level seems to be key. One-shots with higher level, unplayed characters tends to be slower and more difficult both for the player and DM. I can't count the number of times someone said "Oh, dang it, I forgot I could..." on either side of the screen.

Plus, characters built at a certain level don't have to suffer the negative impact of an 'optimal' build. When you're building someone from scratch to be 20th level, you can suffer those 10 levels where you're two caster levels behind the rest of the party. When you have to slog through those levels for months or years of sessions, it's much different. The same applies for spell choices, equipment rosters and so forth. I often see posts saying high-level is undoable, and when I press, they reveal that they started the game at 15-18-20-22-etc.

Which is not to say that it's unreasonable for someone to find high-level to be too much work, stretching their sense of verisimilitude beyond the breaking point or just no darn fun at all. Just that it's not a universal given, just a preference.

 

[Numion]

Heal was the spell that caught me off guard. I've beat the fighter down and am about to move on to the 2nd string combatants when *bang!* the fighter's on his feet, hale and hearty! My BBEG had exhausted too much resources and was soundly trounced.

I remember one EL 27 combat I run against my around 20th level group. This was in 3.0, and the cleric used on several rounds his extra Haste action to drop a mass heal. The group would've been literally toast otherwise.

 

[smilinggm]

At each level there are new options and opportuniteis that make the game fun. If you say that I refuse to run past "X" level, then you are denying yourself and your players these optins. I agree that as the PC's progress in level the math becomes more complicated, and that things do indeed change. But a good DM can roll with the changes. IMHO you are missing out on much of what the game has to offer at higher levels.

 

[radferth]

I think unrunable is a bit strong a term, but I agree it bogs down. I give kudos to third ed for having the game actually still work at high levels (mainly by keeping power progression fairly linear and ramping up monsters to match), but I have little desire to DM at those high levels. The reasons for this are:

Running high levels requires a lot of prep for cool villians. I acually enjoy this, but don't have the time every week. If I had a campaign get up there to the point where this was a problem, I'd probably have the players start new characters and run the old, high-level ones only occasionally.

Keeping track of spell effects can really be a bother at high level.

I really enjoy creating self consistant worlds and campaigns, and these generally have few folks capable of casting high-level spells (5-6+). I'm sure it is possible to make a good, self-consistant campaign with high-level spellcasters, it's just not what I am into. It's too super-hero-y (or anime-y) at that point. No one factor I can put my finger on, I just look at how characters I have seen act at 13th and higher, and it reminds me much more of the Avengers or X-men than the Fellowship of the Ring or Conan & Amalric.

 

[Arnwyn]

I'm happy with DMing any level (as long as the campaign started at first).

(I'm a little leery of Epic, though.)

 

[freebfrost]

I've run games at 1st, 30th, and everywhere in between.

Other than requiring a bit more forethought for encounters and challenges, I don't think that the preparation time is much more for higher level games. Of course, I don't even pretend to try to look through every book to customize encounters - my usual course of action is to come across a cool monster, feat, template, etc. in some book and then use that idea for the basis of one encounter and just build from there.

I suppose if I felt that I had to go through every rule to build the higher-level encounters, it would bog me down, but I don't see the necessity of that.

 

[Zzyzx]

I usually end up running until the pc's hit around level 12 or 13. By then, everybody wants to do something new and we end up retiring any surviving characters.

Amen. Same experience here.

We have too many ideas for fun play to get too attached to a particular party.