Slow Advancement Rocks

[Herschel]

And lets not forget level differences. 1E/2E generally went to around 10th level, but I think most people had their strongholds and/or retired by the early teens. 3E-style goes to 20th and 4E goes to 30th. In a campaign designed to a set length of time regardless of edition, leveling would by necessity be faster in later editions. In theory, those level gains would mean less but it's apples to oranges.

 

[Ranes]

It doesn't. Per the earlier post, PFRPG's "Fast" advancement is the same as 3.5's default advancement. PFRPG offers two tiers of slower advancement, but none faster.

My fault for not re-reading a thread I picked up on this morning. Thanks for the correction.

 

[Reynard]

And lets not forget level differences. 1E/2E generally went to around 10th level, but I think most people had their strongholds and/or retired by the early teens. 3E-style goes to 20th and 4E goes to 30th. In a campaign designed to a set length of time regardless of edition, leveling would by necessity be faster in later editions. In theory, those level gains would mean less but it's apples to oranges.

I think as the game has developed, more and more things have happened upon level gain. Remember the hulabaloo over "dead levels" at the (I think) outset of 3.5? Even the introduction of proficiencies/skills, weapon expertise/specialization and increased THAC0 and save improvements were all geared toward making leveling more immediately satisfying. One side effect of this, I think, was the steepening of the level curve. 3E in particular made it much more difficult to have characters only a couple levels apart adventure together.

This, in turn, creates a cascade of "balance" issues and play assumptions. For example, if there's a steep level power curve, it makes having players start off with new PCs at first level, even in low level campaigns, impractical. So, lethality itself becomes and issue and new systems both of dealing with character death and mitigating it in the first place have to be introduced. Eventually you get to a place where death is either very unlikely or little more than a gold sink -- except now you have also tied character wealth to level and instead of pulling cash out the character's pocket, you are taking away perhaps a +2 on an ability score, as well as setting the character behind the expected wealth by level curve.

I'm sorting of drifting off topic here, but this is where I think the problem really comes in and where I actually kind of agree with those calling for the slaughtering of sacred cows: holding on to certain D&D-isms actually impedes the design of the game, and thereby the play of the game, because in some cases the underpinning of a thing are removed while that thing itself is retained. Think of the +1 sword. Long ago in OD&D, B/X and (to a lesser extent) AD&D, a +1 sword was a worthwhile piece of equipment. Getting "pluses" to hit was pretty hard in those editions, and improvement was slow to happen, so that +1 bump matters, even for a mid level fighter. But more recent editions have vastly increased the bonuses to that d20 roll and the +1 sword has become trivial. The same goes for almost anything that offers a low bonus, like bless. Now, I don't want to see D&D cast aside the +1 sword or the bless spell; I'd rather see the game sort of circle back to where those things are important again. But, that's not likely to happen. Thankfully, the OGL let the retro-clone cat out of the bag and I *can* play D&D that way again, with new stuff and professionally published books and such.

/threadjack

 

[billd91]

I'm sorting of drifting off topic here, but this is where I think the problem really comes in and where I actually kind of agree with those calling for the slaughtering of sacred cows: holding on to certain D&D-isms actually impedes the design of the game, and thereby the play of the game, because in some cases the underpinning of a thing are removed while that thing itself is retained. Think of the +1 sword. Long ago in OD&D, B/X and (to a lesser extent) AD&D, a +1 sword was a worthwhile piece of equipment. Getting "pluses" to hit was pretty hard in those editions, and improvement was slow to happen, so that +1 bump matters, even for a mid level fighter. But more recent editions have vastly increased the bonuses to that d20 roll and the +1 sword has become trivial. The same goes for almost anything that offers a low bonus, like bless. Now, I don't want to see D&D cast aside the +1 sword or the bless spell; I'd rather see the game sort of circle back to where those things are important again. But, that's not likely to happen. Thankfully, the OGL let the retro-clone cat out of the bag and I *can* play D&D that way again, with new stuff and professionally published books and such.

I can sort of see what you're saying, but I have a different take on it. I don't think that +1 isn't worthwhile, if it weren't worthwhile, nobody would pursue it. Yet they do. The issue now, at least in 3e, is the multitude of ways to get that +1 and the way they stack to produce much higher bonuses.
I like having multiple ways to get that +1 (or so) because it gives the players choices on how to pursue it. I think 3e/PF can be improved by curtailing the number of bonus types out there and how high they can stack.

 

[brainstorm]

I am running my current Pathfinder campaign with the Slow Advancement switch clicked (for those unfamiliar, Pathfinder offers three different advancement tracks: fast, medium (i.e. typical 3.x) and slow (closer to AD&D)) and I must say it has vastly improved the game.

The campaign started as a 3.5 game. It was fun, but I was running an "old school" campaign style, except that the PCs were gaining levels very quickly. No one was exploring the various play options at any individual level, myself included, and it was bugging me.

For different reasons entirely (i.e. I wanted new stuff) I converted the campaign over to Pathfinder. Before doing so, I didn't even know that it has an official "slow advancement" option. When I realized it did, though, I bumped the PCs (during a "down time") to 9th level and switched on slow advancement.

It rocks.

The PCs have been there for about 6 sessions and are just nearing 10th level now. XP is still a good motivator, but I can be a little freer with CRs and the like and not speed-level the party. The players are really "getting" their characters and the characters' options and abilities -- especially the newbie girlfriend turned awesome player.

After 10 years of 3.x's speed levelling, I had nearly forgotten the benefits of keeping advancement steady but slow. I know some folks advocate "levelling whenever it's story appropriate", but since my campaigns are not "stories" that has never worked for or set well with me. I like XP as a reward and how it drives player motivation, and having this tool handed back to me (official rules are better than fiat, I feel) is pretty darn awesome.

Thanks, Pathfinder. Now get to work on that "B/X" style PF game.

As a player, I HATE slow advancement, and as a DM I like it even less. We play once a month if we're lucky. Rapid advancement is necessary to make any progress through the tiers. At one level per six sessions, it'd take our group 15 years to go from 1st-30th. We level up every other session, on average, and it works great.

 

[knightofround]

For different reasons entirely (i.e. I wanted new stuff) I converted the campaign over to Pathfinder. Before doing so, I didn't even know that it has an official "slow advancement" option. When I realized it did, though, I bumped the PCs (during a "down time") to 9th level and switched on slow advancement.

It rocks.

The PCs have been there for about 6 sessions and are just nearing 10th level now. XP is still a good motivator, but I can be a little freer with CRs and the like and not speed-level the party. The players are really "getting" their characters and the characters' options and abilities -- especially the newbie girlfriend turned awesome player.

Yeah, I have mixed feelings about advancement speed. What I've found is that my "desired speed", so to speak, depends upon the RPG that I'm playing.

I haven't played pathfinder, but I've always felt that 3E/3.5E was the most fun from levels 5 to 14.

Lower levels were boring because there was so little you could do in combat, and you couldn't feel very heroic compared to a peasant unless you ran a very low-tech, low-power campaign.

And then higher levels were boring because everything became more time-consuming. The combats got longer and more complex without become more fun. I also had to spend a lot more time plotting campaigns because the PCs gained so much power, wealth, and fame that it became more difficult to throw challenges at them. (or be challenged by them)

If I were to go back and play 3E, I would probably want fast progression 1-5 (preferably starting at 5), slow progression 5-14, and then fast progression 14-20.

That not to say that I'm against slow progression campaigns. My favorite campaigns in both Star Wars d6 and Vampire were slow low progression...it just fit those systems better.

 

[The Shaman]

LOL! That was a copy/paste from an xp I gave someone else in another post in another forum.

I meant to copy/paste & give xp for: "My fun comes from racking up experiences, not experience points." Can xp comments be edited?

It's the thought that counts.

 

[Doug McCrae]

I've experienced advancement too fast even for my jaded palate, when my PC levels up before I've had a chance to use all the powers he just gained.

 

[Michael Silverbane]

I've always felt like advancement in D&D 3x was much too fast.

In my game group we play a marathon (approx. 12 hr) session every other week, and we tend to have a lot of high challenge fights. That has led, on occasion to leveling every session, and often leveling every other session. Very rarely has a character gone three sessions between levels.

For me, as both a player and a DM, that is faster than I like.

 

[MerricB]

12 hour sessions? I can only dream of the days when I had the concentration to play D&D for twelve hours. (Yes, I know I play boardgames for 10 hours once a week, but it's a lot of different games - nothing similar about it at all!)

How often we play D&D has always been a problem when looking at how the rules are written. AD&D often seemed to assume daily play...

Cheers!