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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Libramarian" data-source="post: 6101008" data-attributes="member: 6688858">The perceived value of a level where just your numbers go up is related to how closely the DM is keeping the monsters' numbers to yours. If the monsters level up whenever you do, then "vertical advancement" isn't so exciting; you need some new "horizontal advancement" toy to make it interesting. If the monsters don't necessarily level up when you do, but are fixed in level, because the DM has built ahead of time all the encounters for 3 or 4 levels in a sandbox environment, then those vertical advancement levels are not so "dead" anymore. More HP matters: it gives you more of a cushion against your current level of opposition and allows you to take on the next level with more confidence.The classic D&D dungeon is basically a formal ("gamist") structure for this sort of sandbox environment.4e and Next (so far) don't have rules for building a big enough dungeon to get this sort of game going on. Thus, dead levels are more of a concern. 3e is the liminal case where the rules are there, but encounter prep is so complex and touchy that the culture of the game, how people actually play it, shifted away from dungeon prep to encounter prep over the course of the edition. I suppose there were other reasons for this shift as well but I think that was the main one.Have you played the Elder Scrolls videogames? The level-scaling in Skyrim is more complex, but in Oblivion levels were REALLY dead--the strength of the enemies was tightly coupled with your character level, so levelling was almost entirely an illusion. It's possible to beat the main quest of the game at level 1. Doing random dungeons between parts of the main quest does not make it easier. Sandboxing is not much fun unless the monsters and treasure are placed objectively.</blockquote>

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