Lead-in to Cormyr: Tearing of the Weave

[ruleslawyer]

Sorry folks, despite the number of folks proffering this stance, I just don't get this notion that characters starting at 4th level and going straight into an adventure are going to be denied some opportunity to develop that they would be afforded by starting at 1st and going straight into some other adventure. If you don't want your party to go straight into the adventure, then have them dally in town. They can do that at 4th as well as 1st. Probably better.

Actually, they *can't* if the adventure kicks off right away... unless the module is written like that. RttToEE isn't, nor is RHoD, nor is any other WotC module I've ever seen. My point is pretty straightforward; it's not an issue of what level the PCs are, but what the module says happens in Scene 1. And if you think that PCs are going to be invested in the setting if the adventure kicks off without any buildup, I simply must disagree based on the narrative of the aforementioned modules.

And frankly folks, it strikes me as rather starry-eyed to focus on PC development being fostered by some cozy little vignettes with NPC's as the party goes about low-level "light work". This is turning a blind eye to the much more practical downside of sticking players with lowbie characters: sudden death of a highly ignominious nature as one's character dies instantly in the first round of their first combat. For the guy wearing scale mail with a red shirt underneath, there is no such thing as "light work".

Suddenly people who prefer campaigns that don't run like nonstop Special Forces missions are "starry-eyed?" C'mon.

Granted, 1st-level D&D PCs are a bit too squishy; this is a system issue that I've avoided by playing Iron Heroes, so I have little to contribute here. Fine. Start them at 2nd level. My point wasn't that the players need to start as rat-smashers, but that playing a couple of levels before the "main event" kicks in is a good idea.

 

[JoeGKushner]

True, but on the other hand...

This is a very pertinent point. 1st-3rd are usually useful levels for some "lightweight" adventuring designed to get PCs familiar with the NPCs, places, and ideals that they'll eventually (one imagines) be willing to defend to the death.

Isn't this entirely campaign dependent? For example, if you're running something like Slave Lords of Cydona, you're explorers and whisked away.

In other adventure paths, characters are 'on the move' so tp speak. Staying in one local for more than a few levels seems against the grain. Heck, even the original adventure path for 3.0 didn't make assumptions as to NPCs, locations, etc... and relied almost entirely on the GM to fill in those blanks.

 

[ruleslawyer]

I don't think it's *entirely* campaign-dependent. There are certainly concepts (nomadic or survivalist games, The World at War) in which in makes sense for the PCs to start off on the move, but even in games centered around constant travel or exploration, it's nice for PCs to have an identifiable origin. Sure, they could just write a character background, but playing through it is a far more natural way for players to start identifying with their characters, develop a point of origin, and ease into the mega-campaign than just making one up out of whole cloth.

Also, I wasn't attempting to make a totally universal statement. I was speaking specifically about WotC-style mega-adventures. Those have an implied setting of sorts, and the fate of that setting seems to be the general point of the adventure as a whole. Getting invested in the setting is therefore critical to impressing upon the players the seriousness of the crisis in which their characters are intervening at risk of life and limb.