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Message: <blockquote data-quote="howandwhy99" data-source="post: 5997787" data-attributes="member: 3192">Spell levels didn't used to be discrete, or at least not as much as they have been. They were like a lot of early D&D, discrete based on averages. HD were exactly 3.5 hit points for d6s or 4.5 hit points for d8s. That didn't mean any monsters actually had that number of hit points but a 3 or 4 could be considered a rounding down of those values. Their hit point ability hadn't progressed far enough to reach 1 hit point more, but it could be at 0.5. It just wasn't necessary to be so precise.  However, based on averages they were right within the bandwidth to be expected.Spells worked similarly, along an advancing stairway of discrete averages. All 1st level spells were not 100 points in power, more like 50-150 with the designers doing their best to catch it near 100. 2nd level might be 151-250, but probably 300, with 3rd being 600 as I believe level growth scaled logarithmically. This leaves a lot of extra room for designers to "get wrong, but right enough" when it came to assigning a spell level. All that stuff received a bit more custom design by each caster anyways and every DM had their own opinion about which spells were weak or strong for a spell level anyways. At the table it's their system, let them finalize the details.Also, in AD&D Gary already mentioned alternate names for the ubiquitous level term. RANK = class power with higher levels representing greater prowess.LEVEL/LAYER = the depth of the dungeon complex with higher numbers increasing in hazard.POWER = "Level as a measure of magic spell difficulty” (and effectiveness, increasing in both)ORDER = “Level as a gauge of a ‘monster’s’ potential threat” (HP, magic, damage, venom, 1-10 increasing in power)Power is pretty common as a reference to a character ability now after 4th, but it could be defined differently for DDN. Or we could get whole new terminology, who knows? I miss not having spells altered from class level too, but it could always be rewritten. It's still just a playtest after all. I'd like to have separate class XP, but I doubt we'll see that again.</blockquote>

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