Quick, describe your high-level (10th+) game.

[Zappo]

My now-over Dragonlance campaign ran from 10th to 19th level. The characters worked for the dragonarmies, and they made a name for themselves by scouting and claiming two mines of adamantium for the Queen Takhisis. After that, they were sent on a mission to retrieve an artefact which should have granted victory to the forces of evil, and which instead freed Chaos upon the world. The overgod reborn destroyed both the dragonarmies and the Solamnic army by corrupting and enslaving almost all evil dragons, and attacking the Solamnic border with a horde of chaos dragons... the players were supposed to wander around for a bit, find out how to fix the problem, do so, and end the campaign.

Instead, one of the PCs decided to play an Alienist summoner and... uh, he was very poor at negotiating with fiends. He unleashed on Krynn two or three balors, several minor demons, and condemned the soul of one of the other PCs to the Abyss.

Oh, and he caused an enormous army of extraplanar drow to invade the planet.

And he managed to summon one of the Dark Eight and promise him that he would open a permanent gate to Baator right in the middle of Ansalon.

All of this for little or no benefit to the party, and the funny bit is that he didn't even mean all of that to happen. Unfortunately he got killed by a chaos dragon before the other PCs realized everything, but that's good because it didn't leave him time to complete his part of the deal with the pit fiend. As a result, the campaign lasted several months more than what I had planned.

 

[Schmoe]

The party I DM is 12-13th level, without any single-classed casters. They have:

Grig Rogue/Sorcerer
Human Ranger/Druid
Elf Bard/Sorcerer/Rogue/Cleric/Virtuouso
Human Fighter/Cleric/Windslayer
Human Bard/Paladin
Half-Fiend Fighter/Barbarian
Dwarf Monk

The virtuouso handles the diplomacy, and everyone else handles the beatdown. The grig is the closest thing to an arcanist, and he just gained 4th level spells. They do quite well in combat, despite lack of a real cleric or arcanist.

They are on a quest to reunite 4 divine tokens of power into a legendary artifact, in order to reshape the boundary between the world and the Void. They have just completed a two month journey across the desolate ruins of a shattered country. The campaign began in the relatively mundane safety of the civilized regions, but as they have moved further abroad they have found that fantastic realms lie beyond normal ken - most of them deadly.

The group is currently assaulting a tower ruled by a diabolist and populated by demons. It is believed that the diabolist is in possession of one or more of the tokens of power, but he has locked himself away and has not been heard from for several weeks.

Since the party has ventured on their epic journey, the campaign has had a heavier focus on combat than intrigue and diplomacy, but that should eventually change once the group has recovered the tokens and made it back to civilization

 

[Bagpuss]

Heroes aren't made by chasing orcs around. Heroes are made when something big happens and they do something about it.

Hmm guess you saw a different version of the Two Towers than the rest of us then.

 

[kigmatzomat]

Party is 6 15th level PCs and a couple of NPCs(15th ECL paladin, 13th ECL awakened dog/fighter/rogue cohort) played since 1st level. Game is set in an "alternate timeline" Dragonlance (i.e. I threw out everything beyond DLA & Taladis box except the notion of the Chaoswar) campaign that's been running since 3e came out.

The premise is the Chaoswar occurred, the gods went away (stopping magic over 2nd level), and ancient, cannibalistic dragons took over. The players are "catalysts" in a prophesy to revoke the hold of the gods "from beyond" and return the original Spirits of K'rr'nn from the hybrid form Chaos (X'aos) they have been trapped in out of necessity for nearly 6,000 years. The elder races (Irda, M'rrrm'k, Laesh, Vek, Thanoi) have receded to the fringes and try to avoid the attention of the usurper gods.

The PC's ha've made peaceful contact with draconians, a psionic secret society, at least one Irda and a few elder races.

The party's ex-mages (3 players who dropped out) learned the arcane magic of the elder races and are part of a burgeoning secret mystic academy trying to teach enough wizards and sorcerors to eventually challenge the draconic overlords.

The PC cleric was taught about the Spirits of Krynn and has become known known as 'The First' for his role spreading the word and initiation rites of the Spirits. These priests of the Spirits have spells up to 5th level.

This has brought the world to the edge of several bitter religious wars, but those are small potatoes compared to the big problems.

Due to being in a particularly foul mood, the party had attempted to destroy a beasty that lipped off to them when they were only supposed to ask "which way did he go?". The beastie had been kept in captivity for tens of thousands of years because the gods were afraid of what might happen were it to be killed. The players went ginsu on it and chopped it to bits. The bits squirmed away, escaping the cell it was in but not the prison; a city full of undead. It then began taking over its jailers. The recently invested god of the dead's first task is to recapture and contain the beast which requires evacuating nearly 100 million corporeal undead of various flavors to Krynn. Mmmm, nothing like ghoul hordes roving the countryside to send morale plumetting.

I think I've got material for at least another 10-12 levels, assuming the rules don't get too cumbersome.

 

[Pants]

The PC's (10th-14th level) are struggling to prepare the countries for a massive invasion of undead led by a powerful Lich. They have tangled with one of his henchmen several times (a 15th level Necromancer).

However, recently they have finished dealing with a long plot-thread that should have been over a while ago involving a Glabrezu who was selling cheap, mass produced, soul tainted magic weapons through the black market. The weapons would drive the user into an uncontrollable frenzy and the Glabrezu was using them to spread chaos, in hopes that this would allow him to become a Demonic Lord (the PC's don't know this part). The plot culminated when one of Northern Lords allied himself with the demon and performed a near successful coup to slay the other Lords and take the kingdom for himself. (Un) fortunately, the poor bastard was Flame Striked into a grease stain and the PC's escaped with a few of the remaining lords. They later returned to the castle, only to find that the demon had taken over and filled the castle with dretch, chasmes, vrocks, hezrou, babaus, and a couple of slaad.

After a long battle (which included a part where the PC's fled while being pursued by vrocks and chasmes) the PC's won out, killed the glabrezu, and helped to restore order. In return, the Northern Kingdom has pledged their soldiers to the war AND the PC's have been made nobles and given land (and a rundown old Keep). After that, the Druid got killed by Frost Giants... damn.

 

[ergeheilalt]

Forgotten Realms - City of the Spider Queen

Characters spanning levels between 13-14. Last week their Fighter/Rogue/Duelist recently turned vampire was slain by a death attack. Other party memebers consist of a human Paladin of Mystra (with a cohort wizard), a sneaky human fighter/rogue - more often then not looking for his own profit, the mute, human tumbling rogue (no one has speak sign language), and a human weapons master. Soon to be joining the group is a half ogre fighter raised in the depths of the underdark. Power levels are high and so far a grand total of three characters have died (the above mention duelist, a mystic theurge of Azule, and the sneaky rogue).

Spoiler

We just got finished with the Koa-Toa island, we are nearing the Drow caverns and expect a lot of flashing, banging, and booming.

Erge