If PCs are 1st level, why don't their 9th level patrons help?

[Kichwas]

Something like this question was the first thing my players asked when I started running the Coin of Power Trilogy in Kalamar - in which a first level party is brought on by a band of mid-high level wizards (5th to 9th in Kalamar is high ) to save the world from an evil artifact and it's wielder.

So I've constructed a web of intrigue that the wizards are caught up in which precludes them being able to do much. I've only hinted at it to the players, but as the game moves on those hints have become stronger and stronger. Eventually the problems of these wizards may grow to outweigh the problem of the artifact...

Have your patron types be under investigation by somebody, with a batch of their normal allies run out of the area. Put a geas on one or two of them. Toss in shadowy figures left and right tailing them and then the PCs at some point as well...

Have one of the seemingly utterly vital patron NPCs turn up dead by intrigue...

steal their magical supplies. Even a 15th level wizard is nothing if some Local Pitchforker's Union, chapter 537 boyz drop by and burn all his books...

Powerful patron cleric? Maybe the inquisition is investigating him for heresy (false or true...), maybe he's been excommunicated as well (losing his clerical powers).

In short, give your patrons even more problems than the PCs have, but just enough concern to want to get somebody involved in looking into the affair.

Over time, have the patron's growing list of problems transfer onto the new hired hands (the PCs).

 

[GrumpyOldMan]

Mind you, unless every character is the same in the non-level based system, the question will always be asked: why don't the more skilled/powerful/experienced characters solve problem x, instead of leaving it to the less skilled/powerful/experienced PCs?

For the same reason that James Bond can't undertake every spy mission and Superman can't personally deal with all threats to world.

I can’t see how this argument works. Of course it depends on the system you choose to use, but in, for example Pendragon, very powerful knight is unlikely to be much more than twice as good as a beginning knight. In many systems the chief cleric would simply be a spiritual leader and not the all powerful monster killer a 9th level cleric is in DnD.

The fact that these ‘people’ are discussed in abstract terms as ‘a 9th level cleric’ leads to the type of situation originally described, where you have to make strange excuses to get 1st level characters involved. If the local church is led by the fat, bald & 50’ish High Priest of Mumbojumbo, and everyone knows he’s got the position by some astute political maneuvering no one is going to expect him to intervene personally. Why should he, he’s just a fat old man! This makes it more likely, rather than less likely that he’ll recruit some gullible locals to sort out a little problem for him.

James Bond went through a Superman (IMO) in the days after Sean Connery left the role. The original character was often beaten, battered and bruised. Now he’s Gadgetman, just another superhero! Like Superman, but again, a bad comparison, after all there are very few fantasy novels where characters are supermen. These days I prefer games where ordinary, if slightly gifted people fight against the odds.

 

[GrumpyOldMan]

Out of curiosity, how does the level-based nature of D&D have anything to do with the question at hand? You can substitute a group of beginning PCs from Shadowrun and get the same results. There are always going to be more powerful people in the world, regardless of whether that power is expressed in levels or greater skills (Shadowrun), or whatever.

There have already been a lot of good ideas for reasons why the higher-ups don't handle the task at hand. Here are some I like to use (possible overlap):


* Chain of command. Higher-level characters, PC and NPC alike, are going to have more responsibilities. A 12th-level warrior, who is also a general in the Royal Army, isn't going to be able to just abandon his duties to chase after a rogue wizard rumored to be trying to create a portal to the Abyss. Not only is he unsure the threat is genuine, but somebody needs to run the army. So instead he sends out a band of expendable mercs....the PCs.


* More important business. Yes, Mugwort the Mage studied magic at the feet of Alvin the Archmage, and Alvin the Archmage could easily deal with the dragon that is terrorizing the townsfolk. But unfortunately there is the small matter of a planar incursion from the Far Realms that he has to deal with, so ready or not, Mugwort is going to have to handle that dragon...

Managed to double post above, sorry.

Yes, see my post above. Don’t know much about Shadowrun (punk elves with machine guns – yuk), but there are lots of games where, even without levels characters can become ultra powerful. There are others (like pretty well every SF game I can think of, plus Call of Cthulhu, RuneQuest, HârnMaster & Pendragon) where characters improve, but not by the extent that they can kill 50 peasants (or orcs), without breaking into a sweat.

You raise a few interesting ideas but:

Chain of command, again, does this mean that when the PC becomes 12th level he’ll become a General in the Royal Army? Why are Generals expected to be better combat troops than their subordinates? Seems counter-intuitive to me.

So Alvin the Archmage is off in the Far Realms dealing with a planar incursion. Alone, is there no-one else who can deal with that threat. How many times is he called away by Planar crises? What happens if he fails? So Mr 12th level is away, hat about Mr 10th level, or Mr 8th level, or even scraping the bottom of the barrel Brian the Barely competent and his 2nd level band?

 

[Wippit Guud]

So Alvin the Archmage is off in the Far Realms dealing with a planar incursion. Alone, is there no-one else who can deal with that threat. How many times is he called away by Planar crises? What happens if he fails? So Mr 12th level is away, hat about Mr 10th level, or Mr 8th level, or even scraping the bottom of the barrel Brian the Barely competent and his 2nd level band?

How come The #1 sports team in just about any sport, lets pick hockey, given my heritage, will but in the second-string goalie against the last place team?

To see what he can do.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Some of this is a function of DM plotting. Will you call out first level adventurers to save the world? No -- that's the realm of high level folks. Let the less expereienced adventurers handle smaller, local problems -- things the local magistrate might handle if he had enough manpower, for example. Eventualy, those little things might reveal themselves to be part of the big "save the world" plot ... but by that time the characters are more experienced and ready to handle such things.

This very topic is why I tend to roll my eyes at campaigns that hook the players at low levels with campaigns to save the world -- they've got enough to handle in their little corner of it.

There's also the consideration of motivation for adventure and employment. What do you do when you're not saving the world? You've got to put food on the table and pay for your ale somehow. Those bits should be part of a campaign, IMO. Adventurers might venture off to the ruins of Chaos just because they're there, or to make a name for themselves, and not because the BBEG there isa threat to everything they know and love. Those sorts of adventures give a rationale for low-level characters in a world with much mroe powerful people.

 

[Eccles]

What's wrong with the 9th level cleric merely being extremely fat, lazy and ill-tempered? (Possibly even corrupt).

Villager: "Ogres are attacking the farmsteads!"

Cleric: "I can't be bothered. You deal with it."

I know this approach incensed my players at one stage, but it did make sense for the cleric!

 

[Kodam]

Hi!

So Alvin the Archmage is off in the Far Realms dealing with a planar incursion. Alone, is there no-one else who can deal with that threat. How many times is he called away by Planar crises? What happens if he fails? So Mr 12th level is away, hat about Mr 10th level, or Mr 8th level, or even scraping the bottom of the barrel Brian the Barely competent and his 2nd level band?

Now, if the Archmage isn't dealing with something serious like planar incursions he might be researching some new spell, doing politics within the academy or the city-council, trying to negotiate between some groups which are close to war, creating his own demiplane, helping a buddy with any of the above or simply recovering from something like that.
He might also view the Kobolds as appropriate tests for newbies to gather some experience; to train them. So that he doesn't have to rely on Brian the barely competent, wohm he happens distrust, in the future...
One other thought: High-ups tend to have mighty foes. These rumors could be a trap. If its only the kobolds, it supposed to be, those guys will be able to get things done, if its a trap they are ... expendable.

Kodam

 

[Dogbrain]

Mind you, unless every character is the same in the non-level based system, the question will always be asked: why don't the more skilled/powerful/experienced characters solve problem x, instead of leaving it to the less skilled/powerful/experienced PCs?

Not at all true. The difference between D&D and many other systems is that in D&D, a single 9th level character is equivalent to seventeen divisions and a support company of "starting" player characters. Perhaps not that much, but the disparity is enormous.

 

[CombatWombat51]

The 9th levels don't wipe the kobolds out for the same reason they don't mill their wheat, sweep the floors, forge their horse shoes, or any other task like that. It's specialization. The same reason why I pay someone to build my house, put together my truck, and grow my food. I've got my job, and I do it. Those 9th levels have their jobs, and they do it.

Also, you could look at it from a parent/child perspective. I have my little girl clean her messes when she eats, put away her toys, and she helps her mom fold clothes. Sure, I could pick up her stuff a whole lot faster and more efficiently, but she'll never learn how to do it herself if I don't let her. Those low-level characters won't ever grow up to lead the next generation of low-levels if the higher level characters do everything for them.

 

[DragonLancer]

The 9th level patron is dealing with other matters that a high level character needs to attend to, whether that be running his temple/monestary or off dealing with a evil that the 1st levels could never hope to defeat.