Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="robertsconley" data-source="post: 9675293" data-attributes="member: 13383">The City State of the Invincible Overlord is not a “safer” area. It has its own dangers, political, criminal, and otherwise, every bit as perilous as Dearthwood. Players often choose to start there because they understand how to operate within civilization, not because it’s less dangerous. That’s a choice rooted in context and familiarity, not a mechanical assumption about level-appropriate zones.Nothing prevents a group from starting in Dearthwood. They could begin as orcs from one of the tribes. The systems I use fully support that. But so far, no group has chosen to. That’s a player-driven outcome, not world-scaling design.The flaw in your argument is that you’re debating your assumptions about my setting rather than asking how things actually work in the Majestic Wilderlands or Majestic Fantasy Realms. When I explain them, you reframe the answer to fit your model, rather than engaging with the point I’m making.You’re baffled because you’re trying to force everything into a framework of level-scaling and content gating. I reject that model. My worlds don’t scale to the players, the players learn to navigate the world.You’re welcome to believe that, but here’s a map of Blackmarsh. Here is the text of the setting. Feel free to analyze it however you like, but you won't find the kind of level-zoning you're assuming”[ATTACH=full]407550[/ATTACH]The text of the setting is attached. There have long been two traditions in D&D. One treats level as a special marker of heroism or narrative significance, seen in much of Gygax’s and TSR’s work. The other, seen in Judges Guild’s City State of the Invincible Overlord and Wilderlands, treats level as life experience. Every NPC has a class and level. What I’m doing is part of that lineage. It’s not idiosyncratic, it’s historically grounded. If you’re unfamiliar with that tradition, fine, but it is not a redefinition.I’ve stated clearly, here, on my blog, on other forums, and in my published works, how I use level and class. It’s the way Blackmarsh was designed, a fairly popular setting. I’ve never claimed my approach is the only valid one. I’ve consistently said it’s a way, not the way. Yet you keep insisting it’s impossible, or evasive, simply because it doesn’t match your framework. That’s not debate, it’s projection.This is a good example of missing the point. I never claimed GURPS and D&D have the same rate of advancement versus the out of game calendar. I said the survivability curve from 50 to 250 points in GURPS is comparable to the curve from levels 1 to 10 in my Majestic Fantasy RPG. That’s a structural design comparison, not a pacing one.And for the record, most of my GURPS campaigns started characters at 125–150 points, roughly equivalent to 5th level in my Majestic Fantasy RPG. I have run several GURPS campaigns where the character started at 50 pts as well. If you want to start a thread on progression pacing, feel free. But it’s irrelevant to your earlier point about the survivability of the characters in the two systems.</blockquote>

Verification