Player: "I need to level up so I can do cool stuff!"

[Summer-Knight925]

Well to be honest I see the player's choice in what they do sort of unrealistic...


example:

A ranger is going up a level, he is getting a new favoured enemy (3e)

his first FE is orcs

he spent the last adventure fighting a lot of ogres (giants)

he chooses his new FE as evil outsiders...

anyone else see the problem here?
shouldn't FE be based upon what you last fought?

that is just me...many will disagree, but I see going up levels and going directions TOTALLY different from previous adventures...shouldn't the past have play into the future? just slightly?

 

[Rechan]

anyone else see the problem here?
shouldn't FE be based upon what you last fought?

FE is already very limited because it hinges on the DM throwing your FE against you.

Making it depend on what you have fought in the past means that "Hey now I can get orcs as my FE!" "But we're a high enough level we've moved on from fighting orcs." I mean why the hell would you say, take goblins when you're less likely to fight them after level 2-3? Your bonus, by level 15 is what, 4? But you'll never use it because you'll never face goblins at that point. There goes a nice feature of your class, unused.

It may make sense story wise but why would I choose a mechanical benefit that I won't get to actually use? I might as well write down "+5 vs. pink elephants" on my sheet. It may make perfect sense for my character but its purpose - translating story into a useful mechanical benefit - is wasted.

The amount of DMs who reward the "past influences future" thinking is imo vastly overshadowed by those who do not.

 

[Super Pony]

Woah hold the gnome...there are actual groups with only one "Grass is Greener in 3 levels" players in them!?

Seems like the only time I don't have at least a matched pair of snaggle toothed garlic & curry sweating "future-minded-if-then-power-nerds" at my table is when we're learning a new system.

I'll gladly trade my group for yours innerdude! There may be some shipping and handling costs involved. *winky face*

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

If it helps, my name really is Simon.

Well, that keeps things simple!

 

[pemerton]

shouldn't FE be based upon what you last fought?

My preference tends to be the opposite - that the GM confront the Ranger PC with his/her FE.

 

[TarionzCousin]

* no, "Danny" is not my name.

Mind if we call you "Bruce" to keep it clear?

 

[SteveC]

I think a lot of the issue with questions like these is what kind of game is being run. Is the game interesting for story and character development? Are the players trying to get to the bottom of a mystery or pursue their own long-term goals? In a case like that, I doubt there's much time to worry about character levels. If the game is largely about going from encounter to encounter, or looking for plot hooks, I think player's attention tend to focus on the mechanics.

During the 3x days, I played in a game that was weekly and lasted about three years. During that time, advancement was painfully slow at points, with months between leveling, but no one was concerned because we were all trying to figure out what was going on and working on advancing goals that had nothing to do with levels.

I play in an on-again-off-again game at the moment that's a big sandbox where it seems we're encountering things out of a random encounter table most of the time. In that game, the challenge and fun pretty much comes from the encounters we go through and character building, and as a result we're all far more concerned about the new shiny.

If the players are thinking about leveling, a really good question to ask is "what else have I given them to think about."

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Mind if we call you "Bruce" to keep it clear?

Do I have to move to Australia first?

 

[TarionzCousin]

Do I have to move to Australia first?

No, Bruce.

 

[ggroy]

There were a few 1E AD&D games I played back in the day, where all the players basically wanted to play uber high level characters from the start. So we agreed to start the game at level 30.

But I told the players they will probably get bored relatively quickly, playing at such a high level. In the end it turned out they indeed got bored after a number of sessions.