The ELH is a great book (if you know how to use it)!

[ashockney]

Breakdowns in the ELH:

Devastating Critical
Hitting AC 70+
The amount of time it takes for six PC's and villians to take up to 10 actions each - per round.
Dual-wielding sneak attack (1200+ damage/round)
Improved Metamagic (the one that reduces the level penalty)
Multiple uses of the feat that allows you to cast more than one quickened spell in a round.
The increasing saving throws and static save DC's.
The limited number of spells left in the game, worth using...Epic players know. Test the knowledge of those who've really played.
Anti-magic shell becomes godlike. Place it on powerful golems, and you've got a real problem.
Multiple dragons, using grapple (again, preferably in an anti-magic shell).

That's off the top of my head from the epic campaign we ran to above 30th level.

 

[Pants]

The feats are wildly unbalanced; it's telling that some of the "epic" feats are now regular feats (Manyshot, for example) while others are almost more appropriate as Salient Divine Abilities.

*cough* Manyshot never was Epic.
But your entire point still stands...

 

[Kerrick]

I noticed that in your original post, you propose to deal with this problem by having everyone in the world level up with the PCs so there will always be challenges for them. As you have noted, this also jars with D&D conventions. However, this means that the PCs will reach the level of play where they are important characters - lords, ladies and commanders of armies - but they will not progress to the point where they are the most powerful individuals in the world. While this would lengthen a campaign, wouldn't this in a way also limit the style of play?

It doesn't have to... in our world, the general rule is "there's always someone bigger and badder than you." This is not to say that the PCs can't be the biggest and baddest on the block - the most powerful being on the planet has been beaten (rather soundly) a few times by PCs in the past. It's all relative.

In fact, the very presence of epic levels, or even high levels in general, makes the world operate in a silly fashion, because naturally any good GM is going to be scaling challenges for his PCs. The question becomes, why in the world do challenges even exist that are appropriate for low level characters in the first place?

Let's see:

1) Because the more powerful beings of the world don't deign to notice those of such insignificant stature as the PCs;

2) Because the more powerful beings have more important things to deal with as has been brought up numerous times already);

3) Because if the world is done properly, "any good DM" could easily think of low-level challenges for his low-level players. One of our low-level adventures consisted of clearing a tribe of goblins from a ruined city. We didn't kill all the goblins - we just had to kill their ape-god, and they got scared and fled.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hi Darth K'Trava!

Our DM found that most of the monsters would trounce our 33rd level party...

Thats probably because the Challenge Rating Rules are broken (more noticeably at epic levels) and as a result pretty much all the epic monsters are incorrectly rated.

 

[Agamemnon]

That is assuming there is a "correct" way to rate monsters, which I for one doubt. XP is something that cannot be pinned down onto a page because there are too many variables to take into consideration. For example, fighting a LG character dominated by an evil wizard becomes a whole lot harder if one of the player characters is a paladin who wants the opponent to be taken down alive.

 

[BSF]

Personally, using LA+0 race characters in a base-40 game, I would play a brief 'childhood campaign' (maybe 2-4 sessions, with the PCs reaching 2nd or 3rd level). Then, I would skip forward 10 years and pick up with the characters at 8th or 10th level, where they begin their adult careers.

You would treat it as episodic initially. There is nothing wrong with that. It can be a fun jump into a game. It all depends on what kind of story you are telling with the campaign.

Well, I'm not as married to the PCs-start-at-first-level concept as a lot of D&D players and DMs seem to be. For my part, I often like to create characters with backstories that don't 'fit' into a single level and don't involve adventuring, so starting at a higher level doesn't bother me a bit.

Some players are able to do this very well. They can put together story backgrounds and then translate these into game mechanics very effectively. Heck, some players can even do so without having to optimize every little thing. There are some players that can min-max a character very effectively and then string together some elements that rough in a background. There are some players that have a very difficult time with translating background ideas into a functional character on the mechanical side.

Each player is different and I long ago learned that I cannot expect everyone to be able to leverage the rules of a game system the same way I can. Many of them just don't have the interest.

It is because of this that I am hesitant to run my Angels campaign. Maybe I am still waiting for the right mix of players?

An 'all-angel' campaign sounds very cool, BTW.

In the last campaign, the PCs stumbled across an artifact from a past age. Alas, they lost it to the last person they wanted to see get it back. Afterward, they found out the name of the artifact and then the bard was able to put some context to it.

"The Hammer of Dol Mannul. Crusher of Angels, Destroyer of Souls,
the Hammer of Strength and Malice, Forged from the Black Iron mined
from the Mines of Acrimony of mythical Mount Virulence which appears
only once each millenium and never in the same spot twice, quenched
in the blood of a thousand virgin Elves and baptized in the agony of
10 enslaved Solars. Bringer of Doom to those that oppose tyrannical
order. The Hammer of Dol Mannul was a potent weapon for the forces
of darkness."

In the game pre-history, Elves were an immortal, divine race. In terms of Dieties and Demigods, each Elf would be a minimum of rank 0. Almost all Elves would be considered Epic in terms of the ELH. A thousand virgin Elves is not an easy thing to collect. Of course, enslaving 10 Solars isn't an easy feat either. The Angel campaign would involve finding a way to destroy this artifact. I have even thought of writing it up as a mini-game in case people here on EN World would have some interest in playing with it. I think it could be a cool, episodic game that would have some serious smackdown opportunities to it.

I think I get where you're going. It's the distinction between 'mythic' and 'Epic' made earlier in this thread. I, and some others, enjoy the 'bigger everything' style of Epic. I can see how the ELH doesn't cater to the Epic = mythic style of play. It does cater to the style of Epic play I enjoy, Epic play where the world is itself Epic and the PCs, although eventually heroes, aren't necessarily The Heroes. At 30th level, they're elite - but so are the 30th-level Imperial Guard, so are the CR 30 soldiers of the Heavenly Host, so are the CR 30 dragonrider/dragon pairs of the orc high warchief. It's a style of play that I very much enjoy, and the style that the ELH does fairly well, albeit apparently despite itself.

Yep, I said as much in my first post to this thread.
My 'issue' is with the assertion that you must scale all NPCs to play with the ELH correctly. And if you don't scale then that is one of the primary reasons why you might not like the ELH.

Most of what I don't like about the ELH is that the bigger everything technique is not innovative. There are a lot of people here running ELH campaigns and I am not sure that they couldn't have come up with most of the mechanics in the book. It's an uninspired extrapolation. The biggest benefit to the book is that if you want to play that way, somebody has done the basic work for you. That is a fine effort and has value. I just wanted the ELH to be about more than that.

One caveat - I only enjoy 'bigger everything' play for non-spellcasters. The presence of high-level spellcasters is baggage that comes with running or playing in a high-level standard D&D campaign, but it's not something I would otherwise seek out.

I can see that. The Epic spell system is weak. Most of us can agree on that. The idea of spellseeds is very cool. The implementation was just weak. I have been contemplating how the Elements of Magic might be retooled to become an Epic style spellcasting system. I tossed the idea out to RangerWickett to see if he had any thoughts. I think it would be neat to have quests to get spellseeds and then be able to rework all spells that are affected by that seed, on the fly. Acquiring Spellseeds would then allow you to break the memorized formula approach in a way that exceeds metamagic feats. I'm not sure it would work in practice at Epic levels, but it is worthy of some thought.

I don't disagree with the bigger everything approach to Epic. It doesn't completely suit my style of play. And if the only way people are seeing for it to work is to scale all NPCs upwards, then it seems that the ELH is even less functional than I imagine. I want a book that let's me bring modest beginning characters up from the beginning. I want the characters to transcend. I think the Immortal's Handbook will be more in line with what I am looking for.

 

[Zamora]

random thoughts

Hi,

I'm in an Epic game that started with characters created at 17th level to play in Bastion of Broken Souls that are now 24th level. Myself and another guy have run one adventure each, and we are now on our third. Overall, it's been great fun. Some stuff about our game:

1. The starting point for the game was the World of Greyhawk. The NPC issue has not really come up. When the PCs were attacked multiple times by powerful foes in the city of Greyhawk itself, with quite a bit of collateral damage to property and innocent bystanders, they were summoned to see Nerof Gasgal who banned them from the city. They've been back since covertly, but were genuinely worried by his threat to put the Guild of Assassins on to them.

2. I don't like Union -- it seems really dull as well as a bit daft. I introduced Sigil as a metropolis where the PCs could hang out and resupply, using Planescape supplements for interesting locations and NPCs.

3. One of the PCs is now the most powerful cleric of Wee Jas in existence. She is also mad (long story) and is seen by the rest of the priesthood as the Chosen One who moves in mysterious ways. They are all scared of her.

4. Combat takes a long time. Spell DCs don't keep up with saving throws (although a lot of the PCs have gone for the +6 headband/+5 tome combo which helps). Sneak attacks combined with two weapons and a ring of blinking = tons of damage.

5. Adding class levels to tough monsters gives you credible opponents. We've also used some of the monsters in the ELH which are also pretty challenging.

6. There's been a lot of planar adventuring. The PCs have had to return a mystical child to Celestia by finding and opening the one mystic portal that was capable of transporting him, and also to break into Demogorgon's fortress to steal back the Sceptre of Good. We've used the Celestial Hebdomad as patrons a couple of times.

Anyway, as I said, it's been great fun. It's also nice when we switch campaigns and go back to our simple 6th level game!

Cheers


Richard

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hi Agamemnon!

That is assuming there is a "correct" way to rate monsters, which I for one doubt.

Well how about 1 CR = 1 Level.

XP is something that cannot be pinned down onto a page because there are too many variables to take into consideration. For example, fighting a LG character dominated by an evil wizard becomes a whole lot harder if one of the player characters is a paladin who wants the opponent to be taken down alive.

There are always going to be situational modifiers, however I am talking specifically about the CRs themselves, before modifiers.

If the CR is way off to begin with then it makes it far more difficult for the DM to attempt any sort of balance.

 

[molonel]

In my setting, The Godspell, there are plenty of epic PCs. However, most have no idea they exist. Some are traveling the planes; others are conducting research. Some are hibernating or comatose; others are ruling incognito. Then there are those are watching out for the machinations of rivals and supposed allies, while there are also those keeping some terrible creature/god/cosmic entity out of the world. Simply put, they often don't have the time or inclination to start stomping around most of the setting. When they do, they either rule as gods on "earth" or they fight with other similarly ranked powers while lesser mortals run for cover and/or take sides.

That is, perhaps, one of the best-written and most succinct descriptions of the role of epic PCs and NPCs in a D&D game that I've read anywhere.

You may consider it stolen.

 

[Dragonblade]

Cool! I wanted to stir up some serious discussion on not only high level play but on what people look for in an epic game. In my epic campaign world, there are no real low-level NPCs. level 1 effectively represents a young and inexperienced child. Your average field labor might be a 10th level commoner. The experienced blacksmith might be around 15 to 20th level as an Expert.

The reason I did this was because to me, D&D doesn't make sense if every Commoner is 1st level or every soldier is a 1st level warrior. If I look at the training of a modern marine or even a Roman legionnaire, the skills and feats that even a grunt would possess are far beyond what a 1st level warrior could possess. Hence my opinion that the notion of 1st level NPCs everywhere is silly. I have simply used the ELH as a rules tool that allows me to rescale my world to be more realistic.

Just tacking on the ELH to a world of low-level NPCs never worked for me. I like gritty games. I want PC's to be powerful, but not so powerful that they can walk into a town and kill everyone without breaking a sweat. I wanted a world where a PC mage can cast Wish, or a PC cleric can cast Mass Heal, or a PC fighter is a fearsome and deadly warrior on the battlefield. Yet in that world, even though the PC's are heroic champions, I didn't want them to be walking gods. I wanted them to fear insulting a noble, and obey the local laws. Not only out of respect or the goodness of their heart, but because that noble could very well be powerful enough to kill a 30th level PC in a duel, and the local authorities are powerful enough to arrest and hang even a 40th level PC if he commits murder.

By raising the NPC level scale, I can run epic adventures and still keep the gritty feel of low-level gaming. Towards that end, I have been more than satisfied with the ELH overall.

However, some of you like Joshua Dyal, raise some excellent points about the problems with high level play in D&D in general.

So what would a good epic level rule system look like to you and would you change anything about core D&D 3.5 to make it work as you imagine?