Is it cheating to start a PC above 1st level?

[rushlight]

I have to say that for a new campaign, starting at 1st level (or even pre-1st, as I did my current campaign) is much more fun.

First, it allows you to use monsters in ways that you normally couldn't. Things like regular animals, or a single kobold or goblin. Those really low CRs like 1/4 and 1/2 become really fun at 1st level. It's a side of the game people rarely experience.

Second, it allows the growth of an interesting personality. IMC, the players left their hometown at 1st level with the objective of returning an item they found (on the body of man from a caravan that had been attacked) to the Big City. They were persued the whole way by werewovles and a Death Knight, LoTR style, from the moment they left the town. The knolwedge that they only had 4 to 10 HPs to lose made those encounters very interesting, and very fun. Sure, I could have done something similar and started the players at 3rd level or whatever. But the end result was the same, and it was much more fun for the players to know that they started at the very bottom, and earned every point of XP. Those characters travelled by day only from that point to about 7th level... It was very cool.

 

[Ourph]

How on earth do the level 3's contribute ANYTHING to the campaign?

I mean really - they don't even get experience from most fights.

Of course they get experience. You determine XP based on the AVERAGE level of the party, not on each PCs particular level. A party composed of 6 characters of levels 3rd, 4th, 6th, 8th, 11th and 12th has an average level of 7th. That means the party has an XP entry through CR14 encounters.

 

[Pseudonym]

Of course they get experience. You determine XP based on the AVERAGE level of the party, not on each PCs particular level. A party composed of 6 characters of levels 3rd, 4th, 6th, 8th, 11th and 12th has an average level of 7th. That means the party has an XP entry through CR14 encounters.

You calculate xp based upon a challenge's CR for each character at their level, then divide the amount by the total number of people. You don't average the party level.

Edit: That is, unless you are referring to 3.0, not 3.5.

 

[Ourph]

You calculate xp based upon a challenge's CR for each character at their level, then divide the amount by the total number of people. You don't average the party level.

Edit: That is, unless you are referring to 3.0, not 3.5.

Yes I was referring to 3.0. I was not aware they changed the XP procedure in 3.5. IMO that seems like a mistake, as the averaging of party level for XP is one of the things that made low level PCs in a high level group playable, as the low level PC would tend to catch up with the rest of the group quickly.

 

[starkad]

I think part of the problem with this mindset is the vast difference between 1st/2nd editions, and 3.x. In the old days, high level was 7th-10th. You rarely, if ever, saw characters above that. Now it is different. 7-10 is mid level. They distributed power over more levels in some ways (feats), and kept it the same in others (spells, with lots of tweaks), because of balance disparities. Now it's not uncommon to see a 10th level party. Things have been clarified better, power has been distributed over a larger amount of levels, and flat out functions better.

My 2 cents at least.

 

[JDJarvis]

""In my current campaing we have PCs adventuring together of levels 3-12 the higher level charcter do tend to rule the day and bring along the less experienced characters in thier wake""


Well, I would never play in that kind of unbalance game. And I can speak for my friends too. I think it would be so frustrating to play a PC that is useless, it would simply be a burden for all the higher levels PCs. And in fact, in all the games that I have played in, this would be impossible.

So high to mid level charcaters are just supposed to materialize out of nowhere to replace a lost PC? What is the point of playing well if there is no chance to lose much in the process? Where are all the less experienced folks when the champions are going toe to toe with giants mounted on dragons? It certainly isn't impossible to have a wide spread in character levels and enjoy playing in such a campaign if the DM knows what they are doing and the campaign stays fun. I've been DMing this campaign pretty much weekly for about 4 years now.

None of the PCs in my campaign is useless everyone gets a chance to shine.
sure a 3rd level character can't hope to always defeat a threat that requires the might of a 12th level character but while the 12th level character is battling the previously mentioned giants mounted on dragons the less experienced fellows are making an end run for the scenarios objective or dealing with troublesome goblin skirmishers.

In my camapign new players start with a new main character under the party average and folks are allowed to bring in a second character at 1st level if they wish. Not every character in the campaign is an epic hero and those that are don't always know they are until they are tested.
The camapign is a status quo campaign, the villians and environment aren't designed for characters of level X specifically but for what is in any given area. The local baddie doesn't have some uncanny ability to always upgrade his forces to be an appopriate challenge for the PCs sometime the PCS outclass the villainsous flunkies by a wide margin and other times they get thier butts seriously stomped if they don't go in with thier eyes open.

 

[Elf Witch]

So high to mid level charcaters are just supposed to materialize out of nowhere to replace a lost PC? What is the point of playing well if there is no chance to lose much in the process? Where are all the less experienced folks when the champions are going toe to toe with giants mounted on dragons? It certainly isn't impossible to have a wide spread in character levels and enjoy playing in such a campaign if the DM knows what they are doing and the campaign stays fun. I've been DMing this campaign pretty much weekly for about 4 years now.

None of the PCs in my campaign is useless everyone gets a chance to shine.
sure a 3rd level character can't hope to always defeat a threat that requires the might of a 12th level character but while the 12th level character is battling the previously mentioned giants mounted on dragons the less experienced fellows are making an end run for the scenarios objective or dealing with troublesome goblin skirmishers.

In my camapign new players start with a new main character under the party average and folks are allowed to bring in a second character at 1st level if they wish. Not every character in the campaign is an epic hero and those that are don't always know they are until they are tested.
The camapign is a status quo campaign, the villians and environment aren't designed for characters of level X specifically but for what is in any given area. The local baddie doesn't have some uncanny ability to always upgrade his forces to be an appopriate challenge for the PCs sometime the PCS outclass the villainsous flunkies by a wide margin and other times they get thier butts seriously stomped if they don't go in with thier eyes open.

With a lot of planning I guess you could do this and make the game fun for all levels. The problem I see is the higher you go the more deadly combat gets. For example area spells get more powerful as you level up so in that scenero a fisrt level characer is usually going to be toast because they simply do not have the hit points to survive even if they only take half damage.

My 12 level fighter routinely does at least 50 points of damage in one round and since I crit on a 15 1 out of 4 hits seems to become poosible crits. There is no way a much lower level character is going to live through a battle with my fighter.

And this is where my problem with this comes in as a DM you have to pull your punches if you want the lower level PCs to have any chance of living. Do you have your mages not throw an area effect spell if the lower level pc is in range? Do you have the higher level fighter ignore the lower level pc if they are closet to them in say an ambush? Or do you let the chips fall where they may?

I am just wondering how you handle these issues in your game?

 

[Aaron L]

So high to mid level charcaters are just supposed to materialize out of nowhere to replace a lost PC?

And on the other side of this I say: SO a group of experience people are supposed to accept a bubmling neophyte into their group for no reason? Making people replace high level characters with much lower level characters very much stretches credibility in the game when they are allowed into the party for no reason other than "they are Bobs new character"

 

[dead]

*shrugs*
Is it really any different than a GURPS campaign that starts GURPS characters at 250 points instead of a 100? Or an Exalted character with 30 bonus points instead of 15?

Create characters as the DM thinks is appropiate for the game he wants to run. Who else cares?

This is very true, Wildweasel, but for some reason I can easily create a GURPS character at 250 points and have no problems with it (actually, I would have a problem if the other characters didn't start at 250 also -- I'd feel like I was missing out on something). On the other hand, if everyone started characters at 5th level for D&D, somehow it wouldn't feel right. Why would this be?

Well, here's my theory: The D&D game is highly focused around *powering up* in levels. I'm not having a go at D&D; no way! I love it when my PC advances to the next level and gets that extra +1d6 to Sneak Attack, or whatever. In a game like GURPS, however, this *powering up* focus doesn't seem as prominant. Sure, every game has an advancement scheme, but some games focus on it more than others as that central feature to the game's enjoyment.

I dunno. That's just a theory.

But, then again, if other folks had started their GURPS characters at 100 points and had advanced them to 250 by the time I was entering play, then I would, indeed, feel uncomfortable about starting a 250 point character. If it was a campaign where everyone started at 250 points (a Supers campaign probably), then I'd have no problem. I cannot say the same for D&D, however. No matter what D&D campaign, it'd feel incomplete not to start at 1st level. I know that I'm being silly, though; levels are a game mechanic just like GURPS skill points are.

 

[Brother MacLaren]

And on the other side of this I say: SO a group of experience people are supposed to accept a bubmling neophyte into their group for no reason? Making people replace high level characters with much lower level characters very much stretches credibility in the game when they are allowed into the party for no reason other than "they are Bobs new character"

Well, I don't know for sure, but I'd guess that probably happens with some frequency in the military, especially special ops units and the like. Highly trained professionals have to show rookies the ropes (even if the rookie is very proficient by the standards of the general populace). Happens in sports, certainly, as well as academia, business, etc. And, looking more at the fantasy/adventuring world, it happens in comic books (The Avengers, to name one). I agree it is difficult and requires a lot of explanation in a D&D game, but it isn't totally unrealistic. A good DM could pull it off - I don't know if I'm that good or not.

But back to JDJarvis' point: in some types of campaigns you have to ask "Where did this high-powered character come from and why haven't we heard of them before?" This is especially important when the characters are world-shakingly powerful (which may be anywhere from 12th to 20th or higher in your campaign) or where the campaign setting suggests that there are a finite and very limited number of "heroes" (such as Midnight). You have to come up with an explanation for how the hero was previously unknown or unnoticed despite their long string of heroic feats necessary to gain that high level.

I still agree that starting high-level characters is sometimes a necessity, but whenever possible I'd prefer to start my own PCs at level 1 if there's a reasonable chance it can work.