The Slow Death of Epic Tier

[mattcolville]

During my time as an AD&D player and GM, 7th level was the notional--though not explicit--beginning of the Second Phase of your character.

You'd survived the early levels, when you could die from a single hit, and you were now expected to build a stronghold and attract followers. People showed up out of nowhere because they'd heard of you and wanted to serve and aid you. You were famous!

By the time you were about 13th level, you were now legitimately "high level" and could do some astonishing stuff.

I think 18th level was about as high as anyone expected to get, and in almost 30 years of play I've never seen a character who naturally reached 18th level.

I think WotC seriously miscalculated when they expected people to reach even 20th level. I know their reasoning, and it was sound.

It's not a question of continuous play, it's a question of continually playing the same characters without something happen that causes people to say "let's start a new game!"

So I think compressing the tiers down so you go through all three in 18 levels is probably better. Also, I question the absence of real temporal influence. I think the End Game of AD&D is a good one, and it's time for the developers to give us something else to do besides kill monsters for 18 levels.

 

[Jack99]

I don't know if it would be a good idea with people complaining that paragon goes by too fast, but maybe something that would make Epic feel more Epic would be to have an 'ascension', where something happens to imbue the players with power and they actually skip a couple levels. Or maybe picking up your ED already feels like that. Never having made it to Epic I just don't know!

Its very important to make the acquisition of Epic Destinies a part of the story, not just another power they gain. Just as one should with the paragon path, if possible.

It replaces variable resistance. It gives a daemon a free action attack with +5 bonus to the attack and damage roll whenever an enemy within the aura (aura 1) spends a healing surge.

I see we share similar tastes... Do you enjoy killing your players' characters as well?

As it is, D&D cosmology limits it to evil gods being the primary opponent at Epic Tier. This is a bit limiting, and is one of the reasons the monster manuals are a bit anemic at Epic Tier.

I am not sure I agree. There are definitely more than the evil gods you can fight at epic level. Demons, devils, dragons, primordials, aberrations, etc. Plenty to go around. Or did I misunderstand you?

 

[Katana_Geldar]

You can also fight Acererak. I can't wait until my players get to the epic-tier end of Tomb of Horrors, as I basically have to move my players through five levels to get to the final dungeon.

And yes, there will be planular activity. I had no idea this was rather cliche, as I rather looked forward to taking my players to Hestavar and having them looking for where they are meant to go. On the way sailing the Astral Sea and fighting Githyank pirates.

Actually, that gives me an idea, need to talk to my Co-DM about something.

 

[Dice4Hire]

I see epic play as very doable, but its gotta be far from home where the heroic and paragon adventuring was taking place. If it is remotely near, you gotta wonder where all these epic guys suddenly came from. But if it is far far away, that need not break game realism.

Still, there i the question of why those guys don't go to the low level area in the first place, but that is always a question with D&D.

 

[Mesh Hong]

I have run a game from level 1 to level 30 and personally I loved Epic tier.

Epic tier is all about the PCs pushing themselves (or being pushed) to the very limits of their enormous power (physical, mental and social) which finally propels them beyond their wildest dreams into the unknown. The fulfilment of their individual epic destinies should be tantalising and compelling and yet mysterious and uncertain.

To me the main thing with Epic tier is that it should be Epic in scope, it should be driven or ridden like a runaway train. There should be no time for pontification or bumbling around, the PCs should either know what they want to achieve and race towards it before they are stopped or it should be coming at them like a juggernaught.

In Epic the bad guys aren’t trying to kill them, they are trying to DESTROY them and as a DM you no longer need to concern yourself with the petty concerns of finely balanced encounters or situations. Epic PCs are massive powerhouses capable of withstanding encounters many times larger than you dare dread and they should have the social power to call upon vast resources to help them achieve their goals.

Personally another thing that defines Epic tier to me is the struggle or realisation that each PC must go through as they redefine their self image in relation to the world. Lets face it an Epic level characters power is incomprehensible to that of a normal mortal man. As each PC progresses towards their destiny they should start to lose their connection to the mortal world, or fight a desperate mental battle to try and stay connected to it. Everywhere they go they will be recognised and at some level either loved or hated because of who or what they are, this is something that the individual PC can consciously use to achieve their goals, but there are also inherent dangers to a society that occur by the Epic PCs mere presence.

Any stray comment or action performed by a PC can send ripples or even waves through a community, their opinion can carry the weight of a Godly decree. Epic PCs are reluctant shepherds (or wolves) amongst sheep. Comments between themselves that they consider usual banter might be overheard with horror or taken as a call to arms or prophetic warning of impending doom. Cults of personality might spring up around a PC whether they encourage them or not, with eager heroes desperate to prove themselves worthy of their idols by interpreting their actions and questing in the name of the Epic.

Once the PCs reach the Epic tier the Gods also have to start paying attention to them, they have to try and persuade them to join their own fights and causes because if they don’t another god (or worse) will. If a PC is strong willed enough to avoid the political or emotional web of the God tier then the Gods have to decide what to do about the matter. On completion of their Epic destiny is the PC going to pose a threat to them or their powerbase? Is the PC altering or unbalancing the middle world in such a way that it will effect them?

Gods, Primordials, Devil and Demon Lords should all be encountered in Epic tier whether they are directly part of the plot or not. They are simply part of the world that the PCs are growing into and will be their piers come level 30, of course these encounters need not be military.

As a DM savour the polite conversation your group has with Dispater, or Asmodeous…… Even battle hardened killing machines who look on the middle world like an ants nest will stop, gulp and mind their manners when a lord of hell drops by in person for a polite chat. Now that’s Epic.

Anyway I should stop now to wipe the froth from my face, like I said I loved Epic tier, but your opinions, style and experience may vary.

 

[Ryujin]

Let me throw in what may be a fairly controversial idea: many DMs don't like Epic-level play because Epic-level PCs should have a great deal of ability to change the world, and this is something that they either do not want, or do not feel equipped to handle.

Take a look at the list of motivations for high-levels PCs that the Jester came up with in his post:

The founding of an empire and a dynasty by one pc
The founding of a religion by another
The creation and population of a plane
The extermination of a species of monster​

A DM who is invested in "his" homebrew might not want the PCs' actions interfering with "his" creation. Conversely, a DM who has gone through the Heroic and Paragon tiers by basically running dungeon crawls may find it difficult to switch gears when the PCs' ambitions expand beyond killing monsters and taking their stuff.

I think WotC has tried to address this by tying the flavor of their Epic destinies to the achievement of such goals. If you want to establish an empire and found a dynasty, take the "Dynast Emperor" epic destiny, and after you complete your 30th level quest ("You enter the final 10-square by 10-square room in the Epic planar dungeon. An Epic planar god is guarding an Epic planar artifact.") you automatically succeed at your goal with no additional rolls or effort required on the part of either you or the DM. After that, the campaign reboots and the DM doesn't have to worry about how what you have done will change the campaign setting thereafter. IMO, it's a way of handling PC ambition, but it's not a very satisfying way to do so.

IMO, Epic-level play should be about the PCs trying to make fundamental changes to the world, and seeing the effects of those changes. I guess there's not much that can be done about DMs who don't want the PCs messing with "their" creations, but for the rest, I think a sourcebook on how to handle the types of things that Epic-level PCs might want to do, how to craft problems related to those ambitions that would be challenging but not impossible to overcome, and how the PCs can actually experience (directly or indirectly) the effects (beneficial or otherwise) of their efforts to change the world before the campaign ends would be invaluable. However, given the scope and variety of possible Epic-tier goals, I'm not sure if it is possible.

Back in the old 1e days, my players loved it when I made them a part of the political landscape. One of the canned modules involved clearing a castle, down around Hold of the Sea Princes in Greyhawk, and they rebuilt it after taking it. From that point on I had them adventuring for various factions and nations, building their political credibility, and ultimately founding a nation as a ruling council.

I wish that someone would do that for me too, but I haven't found another DM who enjoys running that sort of thing.

When I run a campaign, I like giving the players a concrete, though ambitious, final goal. That's what Epic Tier is for.

 

[renau1g]

I see we share similar tastes... Do you enjoy killing your players' characters as well?

I killed 4/6 of my party the other day. Next time they won't all spread out and try to kill a different monster, while those same enemies maneuvered to focus fire on one PC at a time.

I see epic play as very doable, but its gotta be far from home where the heroic and paragon adventuring was taking place. If it is remotely near, you gotta wonder where all these epic guys suddenly came from. But if it is far far away, that need not break game realism.

Well, you could have it be in "their home". Perhaps the Githyanki launch an invasion of the material realm. (I believe Paizo did some adventures based on this before). Any "planar" threat could decide that they do want to take this piece of the Material realm for their own. The PC's (being amongst the most powerful creatures on the planet) can absolutely stop these threats while still having familiar faces around to help. (oh, joe the blacksmith that we saved from kobolds way back when were just starting out is still making our weapons, he's now moved into our keep to help full time...etc, etc.). There's tons of ways to have the big threats come here. Even those big bad guys could've heard of the PC's and want to snuff them out before they can ascend to godhood or whatever other epic destiny they're in.

 

[Prestidigitalis]

And your party kills another god *yawn*. Let's go out drinking.

I think a lot of players have a problem with that. Any god that can be killed by players isn't much of a god. Maybe -- MAYBE -- at level 30, and with a couple of artifacts or relics in hand -- a weaker god could be killed. But I'd be more inclined to think the best case would be to lock the god into a non-dimensional prison or the like.

One of my biggest problems with Epic material is the truly awful fluff. To give an example, the Essentials Thief Epic level blurb includes the line "Gods, demon lords, and archdevils alike fear the threat you pose." I'm sorry, but they don't -- not in any campaign that I can imagine.

True, many campaigns feature gods who have ascended from mortal form, and some of those might be more like what AD&D would have called Demigods. In that case, maybe.

 

[Prestidigitalis]

With regard to the issue of all Epic activity become extra-planar, I find myself thinking of Raymond Feist's numerous Midkemia novels. A number of them feature what could only be considered Epic-level characters (Pug, Macro, etc.), and they only rarely leave their native plane. But I'm not sure, offhand, what makes it work.

 

[Prestidigitalis]

Any stray comment or action performed by a PC can send ripples or even waves through a community, their opinion can carry the weight of a Godly decree. Epic PCs are reluctant shepherds (or wolves) amongst sheep. Comments between themselves that they consider usual banter might be overheard with horror or taken as a call to arms or prophetic warning of impending doom. Cults of personality might spring up around a PC whether they encourage them or not, with eager heroes desperate to prove themselves worthy of their idols by interpreting their actions and questing in the name of the Epic.

For a fictional example of this, look at the Ta'veren in Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series, and the "ripples" of improbability that accompany Rand in his travels.