Opinion: PoL and high tiers do not fit in the long run

[DarkKestral]

PoL doesn't mean that there are no cities. That's not true. There are cities. There may even be metropolis sized cities. What it means is no more modern nation states in your fantasy worlds. Considering that most campaign settings lack trains and instantaneous communication, that makes a great deal of sense.

You can have nation-states. You can even have powerful ones. All you need are nation-states that can't quite hold the border without losing the center, or hold the center without losing the borderlands. Think the "Old West" and in particular places like Tombstone or much of what is now the western states during the Three Trails period. Sure, they could use the railroad, but it's expensive and you still have to protect the route, which just can't be done totally. So you have to assume that you'll need some guards on the train...

Or, you can have places where the nation state simply doesn't care enough to protect it. Maybe the town's mine is played out, or perhaps there's been one natural disaster too many... all the king knows is he's spending way too much money and not making enough back. So he's pulling out the soldiers and letting the townies fend for themselves.

In such an environment, you can have a consistent nation-state.. it's just that for whatever reason, it's not so powerful that it can completely pacify the region without more of an investment than is currently possible or likely.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

I am not saying that gaining levels requires it. However, the PCs would probably have to live in a bubble if they made it to level 10 without quite a number of folks hearing of them let alone levels 20+.

I agree, that being a hero is necessarily tied to level, its just that higher level people are more likely to be recognized for their accomplishments due to the sheer number of such accomplishments thereby receiving the commensurate rewards and recognition for their deeds.

I have yet to run a campaign where the PCs amassed any sort of social power at all. The last couple of campaigns I called the PCs managed to get from 1st level to a good 14th without actually talking to another person longer than "I'd like to sell this treasure. No time to talk, there is this enclave of powerful evil cultists threatening to destroy the world and wouldn't you know it, they have huge amounts of treasure. We keep having to make trips back here to sell things before we go back in." Most of the people in the world didn't even believe them and figured they were just making up excuses to avoid telling them where all the treasure they found came from. They saved about 2 people from being kidnapped by the evil cultists, but no one really believed them either. I mean "evil cultist are going to destroy the world soon, but don't worry...there are a group of 6 heroes stopping them single handedly." It's not very believable. So the PCs managed to get through the whole campaign without ever receiving recognition for their work.

Your above example isn't what I am referring to in regards to the example I gave. Your example is actually a very, very rare kind of situation in no way indicative of the playstyle I am referring to. In most kill, level up, kill level up campaigns, the setting exists as a life support system for all the dungeons lying around. If you are running another type of game not related to my comments, then great.

I can't see how you can be insulted when the game you are running/DMing isn't one where the PCs are one dimensional XP sinks going from place to place killing things, robbing them and playing no part in the greater setting.

It IS though. I just finished running another adventure where the PCs were asked to go into an ancient temple and recover some artifacts from the past at first level. There they contracted a magical disease and there was no known way to stop it. They spent the next 9 levels tracking down clues about what might cure them, racing from place to place before the enemies could get there before them before ending up with a confrontation with a creature of huge power. However, in 10 levels they went into town in order to ask around about the cure, find a clue, then head out to a dungeon in search of the items they needed before coming back to town, selling magic items and doing it all again.

They saved no kings or kingdoms, did nothing that normal people would recognize as "heroic". No reason to be given castles or have anyone flock to them as followers.

Sure, there is a plot and reason why they don't gain these things. I, as the DM, could care less about the politics of any of the countries of the world, what the people on the street might think about these strange people coming into town covered in blood with giant sized suits of armor for sale. I don't care because they aren't important to the campaign. It is about the PCs trying to find a cure for their disease. Anything that advances that plot and gets the PCs enough XP to defeat the challenges I have planned for the next session I'll do. When it comes down to it, my campaign could be summarized by a series of battles in order to gain powers with a thin plot to tie it together. But it's fun.

 

[Lizard]

I have yet to run a campaign where the PCs amassed any sort of social power at all.

Wow.

That's all, just...wow.

 

[ruleslawyer]

What it means is that you don't have modern nation states, which a lot of published settings had. Greyhawk and Forgotten Realms particularly are made up of nations. You won't have that so much in a PoL setting. Instead you get city states as the largest "national identity".

Minor correction. The Realms really have only one nation per se, and that's Cormyr (which is as of 3e rather fractured and beset anyway). Everything else *is* city-states. That was more so pre-2e, and in many ways the unification of Tethyr and the establishment of the Silver Marches confederation are more "Realms-shattering" than stuff like the Time of Troubles. The setting continually re-emphasizes (see Power of Faerun) the idea that the Realms as a whole is dominated by highly geographically disparate mercantile powers and secret societies rather than monolithic nation-states or empires.

Just a point to emphasize that "points of light" is hardly a new concept, nor hardly impossible to do even in a world that features plenty of magic, complex civilizations, and trade routes.

 

[xechnao]

the Realms as a whole is dominated by highly geographically disparate mercantile powers and secret societies rather than monolithic nation-states or empires.

This is not PoL. At least not in context with the point of this thread. If you consider this PoL then I have no problem with PoL anymore -as long as you give me all the necessary consistent info to construct such a setting.

 

[tomBitonti]

Does having high level PCs force out POL?

Hi,

Sorry, I'm very late to this thread.

Would high level PC's necessarily force out the POL structure of the campaign?

Factors that might keep the POL structure intact:

* Larger organizations attract larger foes. (The demon lord cares not for a pitiful village. But a teeming metropolis, there is a worthy prize!)

* Higher level threats may cause considerable collateral damage to incipient civilizations.

* High level opponents may be faced, largely, off-screen. That is, on another plane, not in the POL world. I'm thinking that the players detect a looming threat from the far realm, and travel there to defeat it, saving the world. (Oh, but if anyone knew the horror that was averted!)

(Edit: So ... perhaps the high level characters are needed to keep the setting from falling into a worse state than POL.)

 

[ruleslawyer]

This is not PoL. At least not in context with the point of this thread. If you consider this PoL then I have no problem with PoL anymore -as long as you give me all the necessary consistent info to construct such a setting.

You may be taking the word "dominated" out of context... or I may have provided insufficient context. What I mean by "dominated" is that the overwhelming majority of the powers-that-be in the Realms are mercantile groups with vastly dispersed influence (so a coster with individual merchant leaders present in cities separated by hundreds of miles of trail) or secret societies with similarly dispersed influence. The existence of powers-that-be is not at all inconsistent with the "points-of-light" paradigm. It's a question of how those powers wield influence.

 

[Victim]

Definately differing gaming styles.

One camp (the camp I am in) says that high level characters are heroes because of what they have done and receive the benefits of that heroism in ways beyond merely leveling up and collecting more powers. In this style the characters gain titles, lands, alliances, lead cabals/knighthoods/mercenary armies, become prominant within their faiths, etc. In other words they impact the world in believable ways.

In another style of play the PCs accumulate levels so they can assault the next dungeon which just happens to be just right for a band of 23rd level adventurers. This style of gaming makes hero a mechanical descriptor as opposed to the actual impact of the character on the setting. They build nothing and live in a weird episodic world where one thing doesn't actually connect to the next and the setting never really responds to them except by sending them more things to kill. The only goal for a PC in this style of game is achieving the next level and its powers, abilities and feats. IMO, if one plays with minis, this is equivalent to D&D as Monopoly. Hit 30th (or epic) level and you win the game.

In 3e WoTC really demonstrated the latter style with the idea of epic level dungeons and an epic level city (Union) with 20+level town guards LOL. In other words boring, unimaginative, the same ol' stuff but with some flashier effects.

Wyrmshadows

I don't see the only choices as either PCs as stronghold builders who carefully raise communities that can function without the intervention of their amazing powers or PCs on a perpetual leveling treadmill. High level PCs can have significant setting impact without being builders, IMO.

In fact, considering the lack of overlap between adminastrative skills and personal power, I'm not sure why high level characters are especially suited for those tasks anyway. The whole 'build a stronghold' thing just seemed like dodge that would A) suck up vast quantities of treasure, and B) shift play away from mechanical elements (frequent fighting/adventuring) since those elements started to break dowm as levels increased.

If epic characters tend to have epic flaws (as per most myths and legends relating to epic figures), then you have further reasons for instability. Even if some great hero tries to settle down and build up a community, that doesn't mean that they'll have the temperment to make it work in the long haul.

Considering the support the Epic book recieved and its lack of real update, I don't think WotC is really all that fond of the approach presented in the ELH either.

 

[PeterWeller]

I think there's a couple of misconceptions about PoL getting bandied about. First of all, it isn't a setting. It's a very loose framework with which to build a setting. Stop calling PoL a setting. Second, there's nothing about PoL that prohibits nations, kingdoms and the like. They're just really big points of light, and the PoL idea just assumes that the entire map is not divided by political boundaries, nor do these large points of light necessarily border each other (but neither do they necessarily not border one another). There's nothing that says the points of light can't have politics or "the darkness within" either. Finally, the party doesn't have to be the only group of heroes or adventurers in the world; they're just the ones who should be the centerpiece of the campaign. This may seem real obvious, but it's meant a proscription against having NPCs, whatever their power, steal the spotlight. You can have other adventurers and heroes in the world, and they can do important things, it's just that the things the players do should be the most important in the end. You want a class of professional adventurers and sell swords a la the Forgotten Realms, go ahead. The adventuring "profession" fits the PoL concept very well.

 

[Fenes]

I think there's a couple of misconceptions about PoL getting bandied about. First of all, it isn't a setting. It's a very loose framework with which to build a setting. Stop calling PoL a setting. Second, there's nothing about PoL that prohibits nations, kingdoms and the like. They're just really big points of light, and the PoL idea just assumes that the entire map is not divided by political boundaries, nor do these large points of light necessarily border each other (but neither do they necessarily not border one another). There's nothing that says the points of light can't have politics or "the darkness within" either. Finally, the party doesn't have to be the only group of heroes or adventurers in the world; they're just the ones who should be the centerpiece of the campaign. This may seem real obvious, but it's meant a proscription against having NPCs, whatever their power, steal the spotlight. You can have other adventurers and heroes in the world, and they can do important things, it's just that the things the players do should be the most important in the end. You want a class of professional adventurers and sell swords a la the Forgotten Realms, go ahead. The adventuring "profession" fits the PoL concept very well.

In other words, PoL is "different name for the same"? That does not sound in any way different from just about every campaign setting I ever read.