The WOW method to monsters? Would you hate it?

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Most people on the thread understood the premise just fine. Mistaking people disliking something for not understanding it is some sort of syndrome online, I think.

Personally, this system is a lot more interesting than traditional foes just disappearing from the campaign after a point, or having armies of mooks to get through to get to the meat of the encounter. Having said that, I certainly do agree that there's a suspenson of disbelief that'll be required in a standard campaign.

Of course, if you build a campaign around this model, it's certainly possible to make it more plausible -- maybe the campaign is about fighting their way to the Dark Lord and as they level, they're encountering progressively more elite agents and troops. A squad of level 12 gnoll rangers are perfectly plausible if they're the Lord's Claws and not just, say, some random tribe that happens to be dramatically tougher than the ones 50 miles away.

And I agree with the monster adventuring party idea -- even in a standard campaign, there's nothing stopping you from having evil counterpart parties being more or less the party's level (and levelling up at roughly the same speed) as their antagonists. Heck, after the players kill off a few enemy NPC parties, you can have the survivors band together in a Legion of Doom kind of thing for added fun.

 

[Stalker0]

Someone was talking about the final fantasy problem...which is definately a believability issue with the tribe of 12th level characters.

How can you explain a low level town where just a few miles away lives a tribe of 12th level bloodthirsty gnolls? That town would be toast.

But hey, if you or your players don't care about the whole internal consistency thing do what you want. If your players are big on the exciting combat, who cares about the backstory.

 

[Saeviomagy]

Only useful magical items and potions will be kept by the PCs. The armor and weapons, unless they are really nifty, they will sell. Even if they trade in their old magic weapon for a new one, they still have to sell it. Since this is an NPC, he won't have that much misc. magic anyway, it will mostly be magic armor and weapons, with some potions or Quaal's tokens or what not.

And everything they sell is worth half.

 

[Aristotle]

As others have said, the tools are already there.

I've got no problem with the characters meeting groups of higher level humanoids as long as some plausible reason exists for their higher levels. It has to be a little more than what WoW gives you, which is basically "the more powerful gnolls live here, they are all higher level". For instance...

You might run a campaign where the 1st level PCs encounter 1st level humanoids (exiles with little training who have taken to stealing from travellers). Later they might encounter some villages of the humanoids where the average level is around 3 (with some lower and maybe one or two higher). Then the quest takes them into territory where they find small military outposts, and the average humanoid is 8th level there. And so on and so forth all the way up through high level champions of the humanoid realm and to an epic confrontration with the avatar of Gruumsh and beyond if you're story supports it.

 

[Gundark]

How can you explain a low level town where just a few miles away lives a tribe of 12th level bloodthirsty gnolls? That town would be toast.

Well while I understand what your saying if you want realism technically those bloodthristy 12th level Gnolls wouldn't know that they're 12th level let alone that the low level town is full of low level humans. In the D&D world (unlike WoW) its not like that everybody goes around with their level glowing over their heads. All the Gnolls would know is that there is a 100 of them whereas there is a 1000 or so in the town and the town is behind a wall.

When you have this mindset the D&D world makes more sense...take the Dalelands from FR for example it used to bother me why hasn't a group of badies marched in a taken over the Dalelands? All there is a bunch of low level commoners (and one high level mage) to defend the place. That's because if D&D were "real" there wouldn't be that mindset of "what level you are". Take out this mindset of levels and having a tribe of 10 th level warriors isn't such a weird thing.

Another thing....when you boil it down what's the difference between fighting a tribe of 9th level Gnolls vs. fighting a tribe of frost giants. They're both CR 9 monsters.

 

[D+1]

I know that there is an "internal consistency" that many feel needs to be maintained. But really does it?

For me... emphatically yes. At least most of the time. There are sometimes those campaigns or portions of campaigns where I just don't care as much about that internal consistency. But those games tend to be fewer and further between as the internally consistent games are simply far more satisfying for both myself and my players. YMMV as always.

The logic can be applied on the other end of the spectrum, why do all the high level monsters hide out until the PCs are ready to take them. If you think about it, if you want realism characters/monsters wouldn't know what "level" they are.

Well... one of the aspects of that internal consistency is fixed encounters placed well ahead of time that are in no way gauged according to current PC levels. And even when encounters ARE gauged to PC levels sometimes they are gauged high, sometimes VERY high, sometimes very low, etc. It is the variance in difficulty, time, place, and nature of encounters that gives the campaign both internal consistency and an approximation of verisimilitude.

A group of 10th level adventrues while talented isn't going to know "gee we' re 10th level we shoud be able to wipe that whole Orc tribe". If it was "real" they would use caution not march into the middle of the camp and start swinging.

No, something like that can actually be run both ways. One is closer to "reality" but both are perfectly workable as approaches to fantasy settings. The more "realistic" perception by the PC's would be that ANY humanoid of roughly the same size is going to be roughly the same challenge, barring magic or other enhancements to their capabilities. The more "fantastic" - but no less internally consistent - approach is that just as in a more "realistic" setting the PC's still have a very good idea of what they themselves are capable of and have a reasonable understanding of what a particular group of opponents is capable of (including knowing that while most gnolls are fairly mundane that it is POSSIBLE that they have strikingly heightened class abilities just as the PC's themselves can.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

Well while I understand what your saying if you want realism technically those bloodthristy 12th level Gnolls wouldn't know that they're 12th level let alone that the low level town is full of low level humans. In the D&D world (unlike WoW) its not like that everybody goes around with their level glowing over their heads. All the Gnolls would know is that there is a 100 of them whereas there is a 1000 or so in the town and the town is behind a wall.

Do your PCs know that they are 12th level? Then so do the gnolls.

The Auld Grump

*EDIT* This is actually why I don't play MMORPGS, my disbelief suspenders rupture way too quickly to enjoy them...

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Orc, pie, 10 foot room. None of these complications arise.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

In my campaigns, even if they advance high in level, ordinary people (whether humans or monsters) in a region won't advance in step with the PCs. Level 3 above the baseline is noteworthy. Anything above that for "standard" enemies is exceptional, and likely to appear only if they are some sort of special military unit that can recruit from a large population base.

Yes, sometimes the PCs will fight large numbers of ordinary enemies even when they are high level - but that's just scene dressing until they reach the main bad guy of the evening so that they can have their fight.

"There are a thousand 1st-level orcs between you and the Orc Warlord Gnazbul. What do you do?"

If they just charge into melee, it will take a lot of time - time that the army might use to attack the PCs' allies (assuming that this is a big battlefield between two clashing armies. If they expend some spells to clear the path, they can do that, but they draw attention, give the enemy time to prepare, and uses up some of their resources.

But the ordinary orcs won't be much of a threat. And this is as it should be - this is D&D...

 

[S'mon]

I know that there is an "internal consistency" that many feel needs to be maintained. But really does it? The logic can be applied on the other end of the spectrum, why do all the high level monsters hide out until the PCs are ready to take them.

They don't. I use the common approach that some areas are more dangerous than others - if you want small groups of orcs, adventure in the Barren Hills. If you want big tribes of orcs, go on to the Mountains of Doom beyond the Barren Hills. If you want freaky weird things, enter the Hell Pits beneath the Mountains of Doom. If you want Balors & Marilith, pass through the Abyssal Gate from the Hell Pits into the Abyss...