D&D 4E Remove level drain from 4e!!

[Sanguinemetaldawn]

The hated level drain

Level draining is a clunky, broken and utterly unfun metagame mechanic from a bygone era. It needs to be removed from the game for a plethora of reasons.

I am an old school gamer, and even back in the early 80's I hated level drain, from the moment I first learned about it.

It is a cheap, sadistic mechanic that, in essence, robs the character of their achievements. The only good use I can see for it is changing the power level of the party for some kind of design reason. The problem with even this is it is so heavy handed, it frustrates and angers players.

Thats not to mention the design arguments. There are a very few interesting designs which it makes sense for, but outside that, good riddance.

Also, remember that in 1st Ed, there was no save against energy drain, and restoration was much harder to get. Now thats bad memories of gaming.

 

[thedungeondelver]

Level draining is a clunky, broken and utterly unfun metagame mechanic from a bygone era. It needs to be removed from the game for a plethora of reasons.

Any encounter with level draining undead can potentially cripple a party and severely suck the enjoyment out of the game for the unfortunate player whose character was drained.

Utterly subjective. The fun of the game is acquiring treasure and levels; having that challenged makes a challenging game, QED.

 

[Alaric_Prympax]

I am an old school gamer, and even back in the early 80's I hated level drain, from the moment I first learned about it.

It is a cheap, sadistic mechanic that, in essence, robs the character of their achievements. The only good use I can see for it is changing the power level of the party for some kind of design reason. The problem with even this is it is so heavy handed, it frustrates and angers players.

Thats not to mention the design arguments. There are a very few interesting designs which it makes sense for, but outside that, good riddance.

Also, remember that in 1st Ed, there was no save against energy drain, and restoration was much harder to get. Now thats bad memories of gaming.

Yeap, same goes for me and my group back in the day. We all hated it. But we always played with lots of treasure and paid through the nose to high level clerics for restorations which we put us back to the xp number from when we lost them.

If it's gone from 4e then that is so far the best thing I've heard yet about it.

 

[Geron Raveneye]

Funny...as far as I recall from some comment Gygax made, level drain was instituted to keep adventurers from simply trying to dog-pile certain monsters and drown them in melee attacks until they go down, but to research them, learn their weaknesses, and attack them in a carefully planned manner. Kinda like you would attack a dragon in his lair. One might say that, if some character actually got levels drained out of him, he wasn't careful enough..or simply unlucky. Which is a risk you take when attacking such a monster.

On the other hand, I'm not sure level drainers should be casual encounters, or on a random encounter table, or something like that, but pretty unique encounters every time that the characters have some time and resources to prepare for.

Replacing it could be as easy as swapping it for a Chill Touch effect, or something that simply drains HD instead of levels (DM rolls how much hit points simply vanish down the negative energy tube), with the risk of vanishing permanently if the save is unsuccessful.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Ah, level drain and rust monsters ... the only two things that players truly fear.

And as much as I like srtiking fear into my players, I agree this one should go, as draining a level is such a metagame-based effect. The better mechanic is a "drain in life force" that can be mechanically replicated by penalties to d20 rolls ... which remain until some form of restoration is cast. No impact on XP or levels.

But I'd like to keep the rust monster.

 

[blargney the second]

But I'd like to keep the rust monster.

Amen.

 

[DreamChaser]

Amen.

Especially in 4e where it sounds like a fighter attacked by a rust monster won't end up reduced to a muling babe with extra HP.

DC

 

[howandwhy99]

Level Drain doesn't work well in 3e. But just because something doesn't work in 3e means we should get rid of it.

Please keep Level Drain and Equipment Destruction in the game. If necessary, simply qualify them as more dangerous powers than they have been.

 

[Scarbonac]

Hate level drain; ability drain or a specific status ("Drained"?) which carries penalties for every "level" that would have been drained under the old system would be much more preferable, with reasonable in-game rationales for lessening the effects of the status.


Oh, and I want vast herds of rust monsters, like the bison of the Old West, covering areas the size of whole states.

 

[Treebore]

Good riddance!

As a DM, I despise level drain, chiefly because it does not make any sense why draining 'life energy' should mean the loss of levels and experience. It is a disjointed and metagamey mechanic. I also dislike 'punishing' the PCs in this manner - I like levels and XP to be permanent and so do my players - in fact they have never, ever throughout the course of my 3E and 3.5E games created a single magic item or used a single effect that required them to spend XP (though in I often modify these mechanics to not require XP).

When you get down to it losing HP is "punishment".