D&D 5E Poll: What is a Level 1 PC?

[Bluenose]

There are plenty of times in history that someone without adequate "kinging it" skill sat on the thrown. After all, they have people for that sort of thing. Thing is that usually those people eventually get all uppity and decide that they'd make better rulers.

Sounds like an adventure to me. You got the throne, now keep it.

 

[hamstertamer]

The problem is that being 5th level in order to present a decent cooking challenge to the party means he's also 5th level in every other way - hit points, saving throws, BAB or combat ability, etc., etc., in whatever class you decide - you've had to add all that other baggage in just to make him a decent cook. The game as written doesn't allow you to divorce cooking skill (or anything else a character can do) from the levelling system, but it should. In 1e you can fake it, sort of, by assigning "secondary skill - cook" to a non-adventurer and then either rolling or choosing how proficient he is; in 3e you can't.

Lan-"I don't cook, I unintentionally inflict poison"-efan

A "decent cook" for me would be first level. +4 ranks, Skill Focus +3 KS:cooking. There's no reason to have a cook higher than that.

 

[Hussar]

But, Hamstertamer, according to Ahn above, the average adult is 2nd to 4th level. Your "good cook" is a rank amateur in his world.

 

[Imaro]

The problem is that being 5th level in order to present a decent cooking challenge to the party means he's also 5th level in every other way - hit points, saving throws, BAB or combat ability, etc., etc., in whatever class you decide - you've had to add all that other baggage in just to make him a decent cook. The game as written doesn't allow you to divorce cooking skill (or anything else a character can do) from the levelling system, but it should. In 1e you can fake it, sort of, by assigning "secondary skill - cook" to a non-adventurer and then either rolling or choosing how proficient he is; in 3e you can't.

Lan-"I don't cook, I unintentionally inflict poison"-efan

Unless of course I want a complete character as a 5th level challenge. If I am taking the time to stat this cook out before he is encountered then I probably have some inkling that he's going to be encountered and a challenge (perhaps in more than just cooking) for the PC's. The thing I find hard to understand is that people don't think combat ability for commoners and peasants wouldn't increase over time in a world as dangerous and monster-filled as your typical D&D world as presented in the books. I would expect even non-adventurers to have proficiency in combat. YMMV of course...

 

[Neonchameleon]

Where the disconnect seems to be coming is there should and must be NO DIFFERENCE in the above case between a statted-up party member NPC and the same at-the-time-irrelevant NPC you met yesterday when she served your ale in the tavern*. Just because she joins the party changes absolutely nothing in the game world - she is exactly what she was, and must be; otherwise internal consistency goes out the window. Ditto for if she never joins the party - she still is what she is.

* - e.g. Dragonlance's Tika Wayland

Lanefan

I disagree. I think giving up your day job and joining an adventuring party changes one hell of a lot about someone. It changes various things like the level of acceptable risk people are going to take, how they move, how they are armoured.

I would not see anythign wrong with using different stats for the following NPCs

The third man from the end in the second row of Hoplites.

Odysseus' best scout wearing light leather armour and carrying a bow.

A commando who had been hidden in the wooden horse and had now burst out trying to take the gates and cause as much mayhem as possible.

They are, of course the same person. As a PC you need to be able to handle all the rules for all those roles at once because resource and skill management is necessary. But I don't see any reason NPCs need to at all. The interaction focus is centered around the PCs and the way the same NPC behaves in all three circumstances is fundamentally different.

 

[Imaro]

By creating a 5th level NPC you are:

• Semi-arbitarily assigning him a level.
• Arbitrarily assigning him a class.
• Arbitarily allocating his stat points.
• Arbitrarily allocating his feats.
• Semi-arbitarily allocating his skill points.

That's two and two half arbitrary decisions just to get the baking skill for our baker. And a whole lot of allocations.

Uhm there's nothing arbitrary about level... I determined this by deciding what level in the sandbox I want him to inhabit and thus be an appropriate challenge for. I assign his class based on what his profession is... so again not arbitrary. Uhm, actually I'd randomly roll his stats so yeah I guess arbitrary but then letting fate decide means no bias on my part which I enjoy in a sandbox. Skill points and feats are based on the concept for the NPC... so again... not exactly arbitrary.

With the 4e system I:

• Semi-arbitrarily assign him as a level 5 due to this being a level 5 area.
• Semi-arbitrarily designate him an expert (i.e. hard DC) rather than inept or proficient by level 5 standards.

Done. That took me all of a few seconds. And was IMO a lot less arbitrary than your way.

Uhm... your entire method was as arbitrary or moreso than the one above and still leaves entire areas of the NPC blank. Your method leaves me with no information to guide me if the players decide to, instead of challenging him in cooking, do something else such as arm-wrestle him or lie to him(as players often do). In my method I have everything I need to determine what happens regardless of how the PC's choose to interact with the cook.

 

[S'mon]

The thing I find hard to understand is that people don't think combat ability for commoners and peasants wouldn't increase over time in a world as dangerous and monster-filled as your typical D&D world as presented in the books. I would expect even non-adventurers to have proficiency in combat. YMMV of course...

(1) I wouldn't expect combat ability to bear any relation to cooking skill.

(2) Going by the world in the books, combat may be more common than in real world civilised societies, though certainly no higher than in many real-world hunter gatherer societies, where death from combat can be the fate of 60% of all males. But in the quasi-medieval parts of the D&D world I wouldn't expect most NPCs to have ever engaged in lethal combat, or gained experience of such. Certainly absolutely nothing like PCs' activities. Do you really assume the typical D&D farmer or seamstress is a veteran combatant?

 

[Imaro]

(1) I wouldn't expect combat ability to bear any relation to cooking skill.

(2) Going by the world in the books, combat may be more common than in real world civilised societies, though certainly no higher than in many real-world hunter gatherer societies, where death from combat can be the fate of 60% of all males. But in the quasi-medieval parts of the D&D world I wouldn't expect most NPCs to have ever engaged in lethal combat, or gained experience of such. Certainly absolutely nothing like PCs' activities. Do you really assume the typical D&D farmer or seamstress is a veteran combatant?

Edit: The cooking skill doesn't bear any relation to combat ability it is related to level. Level in turn bears a relation to combat ability and every other ability in D&D. It is an abstraction of all arouund relative power level...or are you saying that magic skill(wizard's BAB increases as he levels)l, thieving skills (Rogue's BAB increases w/level), piety (Cleic's BAB increases w/level) and so on all are related to one's combat ability? If so then a commoner's slight rise in BAB makes perfect sense in the context of the game.

What is a veteran combatant? Going by Pathfinder (because my 3.x books are put up and I don't have time to search for them) a commoner of 3rd level has a BAB of +1 a Fighter of the same level has a +3... Seems like a pretty big difference. At 6th level the commoner has a BAB of +3... a 6th level fighter has a BAB of +6/+1 and can attack twice in a round. This is all without considering feats. I'm not seeing how the Commoner can in any way be considered a veteran combatant (both the rogue and the cleric outclass him as well)... The commoner's BAB is about equal to a Wizard's... both probably having experienced little to no weapon training and experience in combat during their lives.

 

[Neonchameleon]

Uhm there's nothing arbitrary about level... I determined this by deciding what level in the sandbox I want him to inhabit and thus be an appropriate challenge for.

This is why I said semi-arbitrary.

I assign his class based on what his profession is... so again not arbitrary.

Expert or commoner? Semi-arbitrary at best.

Uhm, actually I'd randomly roll his stats so yeah I guess arbitrary but then letting fate decide means no bias on my part which I enjoy in a sandbox. Skill points and feats are based on the concept for the NPC... so again... not exactly arbitrary.

The number of them you get and how you spend the non-core ones absolutely is arbitrary.

Uhm... your entire method was as arbitrary or moreso than the one above

Nonsense. I didn't make the petty distinctions about the exact physical stats. The level you claim to be non-arbitrary. The ability to bake well is non-arbitrary.

and still leaves entire areas of the NPC blank. Your method leaves me with no information to guide me if the players decide to, instead of challenging him in cooking, do something else such as arm-wrestle him or lie to him(as players often do).

Nonsense. Giving the level gives me three values. Easy, medium, or hard. I should be able to work that one out based on any text I have. That is all I need. If you are really telling me that your description of a baker doesn't say whether he'd be easy, medium, or hard to arm wrestle then I wonder whether you think fluff should match rules at all.

And as for 'lie to him', lie about what? Because it's going to be a lot harder to lie to him about the quality of flowers than about gems. Bluff isn't just lying.

In my method I have everything I need to determine what happens regardless of how the PC's choose to interact with the cook.

So do I in mine. But I spent about three seconds thinking about stats ("5th level. Good at baking. Lousy at noticing anything outside the kitchen") You on the other hand (assuming he's a commoner) have had to roll six ability scores, allocate twenty four skill points (for an average 5th level human), deal with 5d4 hit points whichever way, calculate AC and saving throws, and anything else I've forgotten. How long does that take you to do? Two minutes per NPC? Five?

And there's no significant difference between our NPCs that isn't within one standard deviation of a d20 roll - within one standard deviation and for a one-shot NPC, who cares? I don't think anyone's worried whether his profession (baker) skill is +11 or +13 as long as it's not +2 or +27.

And because I have a decent narrative system for the NPCs the stats are obvious. Describe them and give one number (the level) and everything else just falls into place. For his combat stats, he's massively outclassed so he's a minion. Describe him physically and I have whether to use Brute or Skirmisher Minion stats to see whether he can escape (unlikely either way).

This means that I not only have adequate numbers for all his skills, I can create them at the tabletop without the players having time to notice. And I still have clear numbers to use.

 

[S'mon]

are you saying that magic skill(wizard's BAB increases as he levels)l, thieving skills (Rogue's BAB increases w/level), piety (Cleic's BAB increases w/level) and so on all are related to one's combat ability?

Only for PC classes!