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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7724909" data-attributes="member: 42582">Are we talking about changing the power level in the fiction, or about changing the way the game plays at the table, in the real world?The first seems to be mostly a matter of taste - 4e, for instance, is expressly predicated on a Hero/Paragon/Epic tier approach to the fiction, so that PCs begin the game fighting goblins and kobolds, and finish it fighting demon princes, Tiamat, etc. You can do this without even changing the mechanics, just by changing the story elements from time to time.The second is a matter of design. In 4e, for instance, PCs increase their breadth of capabilities over time, and there are some non-numerically rated mechanical effects (eg domination, invisibility, flight) that tend to be the preserve of non-Heroic tier.In 4e, the changes in the fiction are very dramatic with level increase. The mechanical changes are also rather noticeable - a 30th level PC is far more complex to run than a 1st level one, because of the breadth and intricacy of the options available to that PC.I wouldn't agree that 5e doesn't increase effectiveness with levelling - the proficiency bonus applies to a range of dice rolls; and casters get a wider range of spells, some of which are simply numerical in their effect (and so may be "absorbed" by numerical changes on the GM's side of the table) but many of which open up a range of non-numerical but mechanical options (probably moreso than in 4e). It's true that AC in 5e doesn't scale to the same extent as in 4e, but that doesn't mean there's no defensive scaling - it's just built into hit points instead.In AD&D, the scaling is also there but built into the attack tables (which tend to scale more rapidly than in 4e or 5e, at least for fighters) and hit points; and a lot of active/offensive scaling is built into the spell system and magic items.Blowing things up with fireballs is a mixture of an arithmetical problem (expected damage) and a geometric one (targetting). It's not inherent in the idea of (say) Time Stop that it poses a fundamentally different and game-breaking sort of problem - rationing effort per unit of time is just another optimisation problemOf course, there is the less quantifiable tactical and logistical aspects of being in a position to bring one's fireball to bear, but the same might be said of Time Stop. And to the extent that Time Stop overrides such concerns (eg because the game system doesn't have any way, consistent with its fiction, of posing logistical or optimisation problems to people who can stop time) then that's not an issue with Time Stop per se but simply a problem with the particular design of that system. Fly spells would create exactly the same issue if no one ever came up with the idea of flying enemies and strong winds as elements of the game.I personally haven't had this experience. The "sense of improvement" can (in my experience) be conveyed in all sorts of ways -eg goblins surrender when they see the PCs; now when the PCs fight goblins they are in hordes rather than small groups; the PCs can stand with some prospect of success against giants, and hence can easily infer that goblins would cause them little trouble.In real life, sometimes you mightn't know if you've improved until you try the same task again. But in a RPG this knowledge is ascertainable simply by looking at the maths of the system, and how that correlates to the fiction. You don't need to actually test it out.In addition, as another poster pointed out, there is the issue that repeating past successes can make for boring play:</blockquote>

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