D&D 5E Test of High Level 5E: Design 4 or 5 lvl 13 PCs for 6 to 8 encounter adventuring day

[benbatman]

I'm happy to run this in parallel; share the encounters with me and I will run them with one of my players and return the results. That will give an additional data point and feedback.

 

[iserith]

That's all I planned to test, then the roleplaying started. I don't know if you noticed the background of Jubali, but she's a princess already. She would not have been impressed with a king or wealth. I think I played her according to the personality I designed for her. I'm still not sure why people thought the gnome was speaking.

From Jubali's character post:

Traits: I am always in motion like the wind dancing across the world.
Ideals: Independence (I am beholden to no one and refuse to be confined by the world of human nobility)
Bond: My loyalty to my mother is unwavering.
Flaw: In fact, the world does revolve around me.

Reasons to take the hook:

(Trait) "Sure, I'll do it - I can't sit still in this pub for one second longer."
(Ideals, Bond) "I don't like taking orders from some human king, but my mother would want me to do this."
(Flaw) "The world can't revolve around me if there's no world left."

Any of those would allow you to claim Inspiration at my table.

 

[Celtavian]

From Jubali's character post:

Traits: I am always in motion like the wind dancing across the world.
Ideals: Independence (I am beholden to no one and refuse to be confined by the world of human nobility)
Bond: My loyalty to my mother is unwavering.
Flaw: In fact, the world does revolve around me.

Reasons to take the hook:

(Trait) "Sure, I'll do it - I can't sit still in this pub for one second longer."
(Ideals, Bond) "I don't like taking orders from some human king, but my mother would want me to do this."
(Flaw) "The world can't revolve around me if there's no world left."

Any of those would allow you to claim Inspiration at my table.

She was played appropriately. If it had continued, she would have negotiated for what she wanted. The purpose of shifting the negotiation from one where the king exerted his offer to a position where she would have exerted hers was worth pursuing. I would think forcing negotiations into her favor would be worth inspiration as well. That was the goal of her responses disregarding the other rigmarole.

Different styles with different goals, iserith. She did not intend to refuse. The other stuff I wrote was an example of the negotiating leverage high level players have. As I stated, timetables, destruction of the world, and the other stuff, just fluff to high level characters. Give me what I desire, then we go. If it had continued, I'm quite sure it would have reached a point where she got what she wanted and we would have went on the adventure. For example, she might have prepared to plane shift had they failed and not died.

Then again the roleplaying was completely unnecessary. This is an exercise in tactical play and math, not roleplaying.

 

[iserith]

Thats cool man. Im off to bed here myself (Australian time).

Im not sure how to run this with multiple players, this thread could be active for some time, waiting for everyone to declare actions, roll stuff and post! I could post the encounters as written, and we can all theory craft how they might play out, or we could run through them in order (that could prove to be quite challenging).

Im happy for a group consensus. Ill check back in in the morning to see what people want to do.

Perhaps we get the characters up and running and compare them to the encounters and get a feel for how they would play out to save time.

Ill throw this one open to the floor.

I would recommend just posting the encounters one at a time and allow 24 hours for debate. Each debate should include how you'd approach it as a player, how you'd run it as a DM (also how you'd modify the encounter if applicable), and any general comments on how much in the way of resources the PCs would be expected to expend based on how it would be run and played. Math nerds can add calculations as needed. Once the 24-hour mark is hit, we move on and post the next encounter. Repeat until finished. Once finished, we can have a post-mortem of the whole thing and then create an aggregate of responses to determine if the guidelines worked in this particular experiment.

I don't recommend actually playing it out. It will take months.

 

[Azurewraith]

I would recommend just posting the encounters one at a time and allow 24 hours for debate. Each debate should include how you'd approach it as a player, how you'd run it as a DM (also how you'd modify the encounter if applicable), and any general comments on how much in the way of resources the PCs would be expected to expend based on how it would be run and played. Math nerds can add calculations as needed. Once the 24-hour mark is hit, we move on and post the next encounter. Repeat until finished. Once finished, we can have a post-mortem of the whole thing and then create an aggregate of responses to determine if the guidelines worked in this particular experiment.

I don't recommend actually playing it out. It will take months.

That sounds like a good idea

 

[Celtavian]

I would recommend just posting the encounters one at a time and allow 24 hours for debate. Each debate should include how you'd approach it as a player, how you'd run it as a DM (also how you'd modify the encounter if applicable), and any general comments on how much in the way of resources the PCs would be expected to expend based on how it would be run and played. Math nerds can add calculations as needed. Once the 24-hour mark is hit, we move on and post the next encounter. Repeat until finished. Once finished, we can have a post-mortem of the whole thing and then create an aggregate of responses to determine if the guidelines worked in this particular experiment.

I don't recommend actually playing it out. It will take months.

Seconded. This sounds like a good idea.

Then we can have multiple groups take a shot at the encounters and give feedback for how they handle it. We can even discuss group composition to see which groups fare better.

 

[iserith]

She was played appropriately. If it had continued, she would have negotiated for what she wanted. The purpose of shifting the negotiation from one where the king exerted his offer to a position where she would have exerted hers. I would think forcing negotiations into her favor would be worth inspiration as well. That was the goal of her responses disregarding the other rigmarole.

Different styles with different goals, iserith. The entire point of her roleplaying was to shift the conversation to her advantage. She did not intend to refuse. The other stuff I wrote was an example of the negotiating leverage high level players have. As I stated, timetables, destruction of the world, and the other stuff, just fluff to high level characters. Give me what I desire, then we go. If it had continued, I'm quite sure it would have reached a point where she got what she wanted and we would have went on the adventure.

Then again the roleplaying was completely unnecessary. This is an exercise in math, not roleplaying.

I just find it's best to take a look at what's being offered then figure out how established traits, ideals, bonds, and flaws would allow for participation. I think that's particularly true for the purposes of this experiment. Negotiating a better deal is fine, but it probably wasn't clear to others that you did ultimately intend to go on the quest.

 

[Celtavian]

I just find it's best to take a look at what's being offered then figure out how established traits, ideals, bonds, and flaws would allow for participation. I think that's particularly true for the purposes of this experiment. Negotiating a better deal is fine, but it probably wasn't clear to others that you did ultimately intend to go on the quest.

Odd. As a player I look at my character as mine. I tell my DM what my personal goals are, I tend to focus heavily on those goals once I reach the higher levels. I actively search for adventures that interest me and help me achieve my goals rather than let the DM lead me around by the nose. I imagine this is more of a difference in what we both find fun. Though that is one of the reasons I like campaigns with long-term goals so the party is already actively invested in pursuing a particularly goal from a very low level where I can entice them with almost any plot hook.

 

[ThirdWizard]

Never change, ENWorld. Never change.

 

[BoldItalic]

(edit) post ditched in the light of recent other posts.