What if bonuses never stacked?

[AbdulAlhazred]

That's not correct at all. As I said, the stakes would still differ by level. So your level would define wether you were fighting orcus to save the world, or fighting some goblins to save a village.

The level system would define the kind of threats you would face, but the gm would be free to draw the combat stats for those threats from ALL the monster resources which would normally be mostly innaccessable by level without a bunch of revision.

With a combat systme free of level, you can take whatever monster build you want, and use it in the part of your game where it makes the most sense.

That winged rampaging giant spellcaster might be orcus, or it might be a gargoyle warlock villain who they take down in heroic tier. The combat stats are the same, but the GM gains the ability to use any given monster at the perfect time in their campaign.

People might say "What? Orcus should be a special fight!" Well frankly, every fight should be a special fight, and every monster should be memorable and well made.

And again, this gives GMs that option- if they want to sav ethe super-solos for later levels, they can. If they want later levels to be defined more by say, hordes of low-power foes built as swarms, they can do that too. It's up to the gm to decide the kind of threats and the character of the threats the pcs fac ein various plotlines.

I think this would result in better design for the powers and monsters that games actually use. Rather than stretching those constructs across 30 levels, the game could focus the best possible design, take more risks and make less generic 'filler' monsters, and also offer suplements with new monsters that would be useable at any level.

OK, so what you are proposing is to eliminate half-level bonus. As I said above, you can do this. In fact I worked up the math for that quite a while back. There are a bunch of other things that have to be changed in minor ways, but it does NOT work without the other effects of leveling. Now, I haven't played this variant, it was purely a paper project. I am strongly of the opinion monsters will still fit into a very definite set of level brackets. They may be wider than the existing ones, but the big iconic monsters are going to need to be tougher, that is just basic necessity.

don't think most games do that that well, especially as levels climb. Focusing level on the idea of the impact the pcs are having on the world would enhance that experience.

You can't really bake this kind of thing into a game. It is a matter of expertise at designing and running a campaign.

I don't have a problem with a power curve, in fact what i'm talking about is emphasising that. All I want to do is remove level from combat mechanics.

The combat mechanics ARE the power curve. There is no other meaningful power curve. It is practically tautological given that D&D focuses quite a bit on combat between monsters and adventurers the only meaningful power curve is how bad-assed your character is. You can have story based things that can be quite significant, but your player is not going to feel like his character is really a big hero if he can't go out and slay a dragon, which needs to be something he's got to work up to in order to be interesting.

I agree that that is a serious draw, but I feel as if it's not the kind of thing that will keep people coming back to a tabletop RPG in this day and age, with the alternatives they have.

There are things unique to rpgs, like colaberative story, and a custom-made sort of entertainment, which I think could be enhanced by moving away from levels. Currently, it's assumed that levels bolster them; I feel that removing levels could actually serve those other goals better.

Except it HAS been bringing people back and driving campaigns forward for neigh on 40 years now. I know it has worked for me since before the days of AD&D. I don't disagree that RPGs have unique features and bare power progression is not one of them, but I think it IS an aspect of the game that enhances the other aspects. It is hard to say if 4e has too much or too little of a power curve. I'd observe that it is flatter than any previous edition (especially that of 3.x which was WAY steep).

Frankly, when I think of what keeps a game going, I think 'leveling up' is hugely overtrated.

It's often down to things like 'manage to get a routine going without too many scheduling problems' and 'does this group of semi-strangers hit it off/does this group of friends prove compatable in this context'.

Keeping a game going is pretty hard- and I think it's presumptuous to assume that leveling helps that much when well, there are plenty of level-based D&D games that fail, regardless of how much leveling is going on.

I don't think it is presumptuous. As I said before, after 35 years of GMing all sorts of games with all sorts of power curves from nothing to 2e my observation is that the steeper power curve games more reliably delivered a long term forward moving style of game. Some genre don't work well with leveling and steep power curves, like CoC. Others really could probably have used some degree of power curve, like Traveller where its complete lack was an active flaw in the game. I ran a long Traveller campaign, but the players always lacked real drive. It sputtered on and off for 4-5 years. Meanwhile our D&D campaign ran solid from 81 on up through the early 90's and I'm pretty sure some spin-off games are STILL running in one of my co-DMs current group. When the PCs would run into old characters like Francis McGillberry or Triborb VII everyone would be "ohhh, that guy's powerful, lets learn how to do that!"

 

[Crazy Jerome]

Now the issue there is progress- how do you feel progress without leveling up your combat stats? Well, it forces real progress. Progress in the story, progress in what is being fought for, the kind of progress that, for instance, has been clearly missing from the epic tier.

I know this is extreme, but it would still be D&D.

No it would not. It might be D&D-ish, if done well, but it would not be D&D. That is, you can tweak RuneQuest quite a bit (a very un-D&D-ish game) and get play sessions that are somewhat similar to a gritty D&D for awhile--if you are careful. But you can't get a campaign going that seems like D&D.

Or you can use GURPS or Hero or some other generic framework with all the patina of D&D (fighter distinct from wizard, fireballs and cure light wounds, magic items, etc.) and get something that will follow an arc similar to a D&D campaign. But your adventures won't play like D&D at all. You'll be playing GURPS or Hero or whatever generic system you picked.

Don't get me wrong. What you are doing will probably be fun. It certainly was when I ran Fantasy Hero in the Forgotten Realms for about 7 years. But if you think that is D&D, you need to widen your gaming experiences.

 

[catastrophic]

OK, so what you are proposing is to eliminate half-level bonus. As I said above, you can do this. In fact I worked up the math for that quite a while back. There are a bunch of other things that have to be changed in minor ways, but it does NOT work without the other effects of leveling.

As I said, I'm not talking about modding 4th edition here.

They may be wider than the existing ones, but the big iconic monsters are going to need to be tougher, that is just basic necessity.

It is by definition, not basic, nor necesary. Levels are something that is not needed in the combat system, and clearly make it more complex and difficult to maange, to the point that, recall, woct actually got the math wrong for higher level monsters initially.

You can't really bake this kind of thing into a game. It is a matter of expertise at designing and running a campaign.

That's not the case. Firstly, advice on the subject is vital, and framing it as level advice makes sure gms focus on it. Second, I am not of the opinion that there are areas of the game mechanics can't help with, even if only on a lower complexiy level.

The combat mechanics ARE the power curve. There is no other meaningful power curve. It is practically tautological given that D&D focuses quite a bit on combat between monsters and adventurers the only meaningful power curve is how bad-assed your character is. You can have story based things that can be quite significant, but your player is not going to feel like his character is really a big hero if he can't go out and slay a dragon, which needs to be something he's got to work up to in order to be interesting.

And he can work up to it without arbitarily bigger numbers being involved. He can't fight that dragonany earlier, if he does, he can still be at a huge disadvantage- such a system would certainly have room for more or less woerful monsters, but it would silo "L+x" instead of baking it in in a way that makes a lot of content redundant at any given level.

Except it HAS been bringing people back and driving campaigns forward for neigh on 40 years now.

So we have levels to thank for that? Why do you assumethis? They might help, but if your game succeeds, it's about a lot more than the level rate.

I don't think it is presumptuous. As I said before, after 35 years of GMing all sorts of games with all sorts of power curves from nothing to 2e my observation is that the steeper power curve games more reliably delivered a long term forward moving style of game.

I'm not proposing a system without levels. Levels would define the whole world of options the pcs would have, by defining stakes, options, resources out of combat.

Meanwhile our D&D campaign ran solid from 81 on up through the early 90's and I'm pretty sure some spin-off games are STILL running in one of my co-DMs current group. When the PCs would run into old characters like Francis McGillberry or Triborb VII everyone would be "ohhh, that guy's powerful, lets learn how to do that!"

I've always found that "my pc is x level" is not really viewd with any particular interest- it's the fun of the game that gets people coming back.

Don't get me wrong. What you are doing will probably be fun. It certainly was when I ran Fantasy Hero in the Forgotten Realms for about 7 years. But if you think that is D&D, you need to widen your gaming experiences.

On the contrary, my play experience is what leasds me to be sure it would still be D&D. I've played fantasy hero, i've played rolemaster, i've played scifi games, and indy games, and wod games and unknown armies, I even played freaking paladium.

And i'm quite sure that the game i'm describing would be 'D&D' to the same degree that say, 3rd and 4th edition are.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

No it would not. It might be D&D-ish, if done well, but it would not be D&D. That is, you can tweak RuneQuest quite a bit (a very un-D&D-ish game) and get play sessions that are somewhat similar to a gritty D&D for awhile--if you are careful. But you can't get a campaign going that seems like D&D.

Or you can use GURPS or Hero or some other generic framework with all the patina of D&D (fighter distinct from wizard, fireballs and cure light wounds, magic items, etc.) and get something that will follow an arc similar to a D&D campaign. But your adventures won't play like D&D at all. You'll be playing GURPS or Hero or whatever generic system you picked.

Don't get me wrong. What you are doing will probably be fun. It certainly was when I ran Fantasy Hero in the Forgotten Realms for about 7 years. But if you think that is D&D, you need to widen your gaming experiences.

Agreed. I think a very low power curve 4e based system would work pretty well and be fun. It would be particularly suited to certain types of game, but it would lack some of the characteristic features of D&D. There's no objective way to say what is or is not D&D, but I think Mike Mearls was right when he said something like "D&D is what the community thinks it is and expects it to be" (heavily paraphrasing but I think that is about the gist of it). I think a non-leveled 'D&D' would probably be at least out there on the fringe of what people would label as being D&D.

Anyway, I think people should be encouraged to experiment, so if catastrophic wants to put together a homebrew like that I think that would be cool. I've toyed with doing it myself a few times. Just not really sure who would be interested, given that there are already a TON of good FRPGs out there with SW and HW/Q, and WHFRPG and a number of other pretty well supported games it seems unlikely the work would garner much notice.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Or you can use GURPS or Hero or some other generic framework with all the patina of D&D (fighter distinct from wizard, fireballs and cure light wounds, magic items, etc.) and get something that will follow an arc similar to a D&D campaign. But your adventures won't play like D&D at all. You'll be playing GURPS or Hero or whatever generic system you picked.

While he didn't run a whole campaign with it, many years ago, a Champions! DM did go ahead and mimic D&D (AD&D 1e - this was a /long/ time ago) with Hero. He took it to an extreme, though, he didn't just model a fantasy RPG with clerics who 'healed' and and the like, no, he modeled the artifacts of D&D mechanics. So, armor, instead of being bought as armor, was bought as DCV bonus - making you harder to hit, not harder to hurt. All hp-damage-cuasing weapons and spells were not regular Hero "Killing Attacks," but 'Transforms' (vs resistant defense, cumulative, with stun multiplier, etc) that ended up acting just like KAs, but instead 'transforming' you into a 'corpse.' The Transformation was reversible via Raise Dead/Resurection. It was a bizarre and involved undertaking, but it was eerilly effective.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

As I said, I'm not talking about modding 4th edition here.

OK, you did discuss the 'treadmill' etc so I think we're talking to some extent within the realm of games similar to 4e, which makes this very apparent, though in a sense all editions of D&D have had some degree of this. The greater power curve and rather unbridled power of spellcasters at higher levels in the past tended to mask it a bit.

I'm not NECESSARILY talking about 4e either. In fact I would say that by the time you ran everything to ground and created a consistent game that focused on this type of design it would be quite different in many respects from 4e, though it could still share a good bit of basic mechanics.

It is by definition, not basic, nor necesary. Levels are something that is not needed in the combat system, and clearly make it more complex and difficult to maange, to the point that, recall, woct actually got the math wrong for higher level monsters initially.

Yeah, I don't put ANY stock in the 'got the math wrong' nonsense. It is basic addition. Nobody got it wrong. They simply didn't consider it to be a matter of concern, and in fact most people I have played with that are knowledgeable about high paragon/epic play seem to agree that there was no reason to consider the 2 point slide in base to-hit to be an 'error' of any kind.

The thing is, slightly changing parameters as levels increase actually HELPS your game. Things change a bit. Defenses are very important in heroic tier for instance, but far less so in epic tier where survival shifts more to damage reduction and effect avoidance/negation.

Levels really have little to do with the combat system per-se. They contribute to the underlying math that defines how an encounter will be played out, but levels themselves are far more an aspect of game play in the longer term. In fact it is rather interesting that 4e both reduces the more obvious significance of levels and at the same time leverages them more effectively to progress the game. Within the context of encounter design however levels mean not a lot. Encounter design parameters DO change somewhat, but that has more to do with the way characters evolve than leveling math, which is as simple at 30th level as it is at 1st and is so utterly trivial overall as to be a non-issue.

That's not the case. Firstly, advice on the subject is vital, and framing it as level advice makes sure gms focus on it. Second, I am not of the opinion that there are areas of the game mechanics can't help with, even if only on a lower complexiy level.

Well, this IMHO is exactly one of the benefits of levels. They provide a robust framework on which to build the evolution of the characters. Game mechanics don't do everything, but you certainly employ the mechanics to realize things, and it is mighty convenient that high level PCs are somewhat different from low level ones and playing through the levels provides a distinct sense of evolution. The pace and timing of that might be more under your control without levels, but that is more of an issue for people picking up the game in general than a feature. One of the main reasons D&D has been successful down the years is that a DM starting out with the game has a pretty clear idea of where he's at. His players are low level and there is a nice subset of the game they can instantly interact with while other parts are clearly left to later. Likewise the players have a clear idea of how the game will evolve, they will go up in level and different opportunities will open up for them as a natural consequence of that. A DM with the experience to frame up a good story arc will be able to play that out within the level structure as easily as not IME. Given how easy it is to relevel, reskin, and generate monsters and other game elements in 4e you really need not feel terribly constrained anyway. If you want to just run a gritty 6 level campaign that ends in killing 'Orcus' you can just make him a level 10 solo and go at it, no problem.

And he can work up to it without arbitarily bigger numbers being involved. He can't fight that dragonany earlier, if he does, he can still be at a huge disadvantage- such a system would certainly have room for more or less woerful monsters, but it would silo "L+x" instead of baking it in in a way that makes a lot of content redundant at any given level.

I don't see this as a real problem though. I can so easily remake any monsters or other game elements at whatever level I need them to be that being locked into only certain content at certain levels is really not an issue. Your neophyte DM may not feel that way, but (s)he is also unlikely to have mastered the less obvious aspects of going outside the lines on the page yet that simply dropping them into a system with no power curve is not helping them. They may well follow the advice given closely and build things up, and they may not. At least in something like 4e it is QUITE clear how you can run a basic game within the standard parameters, just line up adversaries at an increasing level at a pace that the rule book quite clearly spells out.

So we have levels to thank for that? Why do you assumethis? They might help, but if your game succeeds, it's about a lot more than the level rate.

Well, I don't think I'm ASSUMING anything. I'm just passing on my experience, which is that level based games (games with a steeper and fairly obvious power progression in general, they don't HAVE to be using levels) is a far more consistent way to produce a game with a long-running story arc in which PCs progress through stages of development. It consistently produces a desire on the part of the players to push forward and evolve their character. This may all in some sense be smoke-and-mirrors, but human psychology seems to work with that kind of mechanic to produce that kind of game, at least in my experience. Likewise games without formal progression mechanics tend to spin. Players become more distracted by side issues, character buy-in tends to be less, etc. You can work against that tendency, but it is a lot easier to go with the flow and the results seem to me to be well worth whatever 'cost' there is (and I'm not convinced there is much).

I'm not proposing a system without levels. Levels would define the whole world of options the pcs would have, by defining stakes, options, resources out of combat.

Well, OK. I obviously don't know how you would propose to work that. It certainly is possible. I just think you'll find that most players reactions are going to be that they enjoy the feel of progress that comes from numerical progression. It DOES have actual concrete effects too in that old adversaries become trivial annoyances over time, etc. As I say, running a long-term Traveller campaign fairly well convinced me (and talking to the players about it too) that long term the lack of mechanical character progression held things back. You can get all the wealth and contacts and options etc you want, but in some sense your character is still the same old guy you rolled up way back when. Beyond that all the options and gew gaws are ephemeral anyway, it is all just pretend. The mechanics are the most concrete part of the game and there is simply a type of satisfaction in advancing your character that doesn't exist in games without that.

I've always found that "my pc is x level" is not really viewd with any particular interest- it's the fun of the game that gets people coming back.

Sure, but there is a definite aspect of character identification and buy in. The AD&D characters I most clearly identify with are the ones that got to the highest levels. Heck, I can't even remember the names of the lower level ones off the top of my head, but the magic user that got to 15th level so he could make permanent items and cast some really gnarly magic? Yeah, I can write that character's stats down almost from memory. I couldn't tell you the name of a single character I ran back in the 80's in other games, not one. Some of them were cool and did cool things, but they didn't get to high levels and be able to kill an ogre with a careless wave of the hand.

On the contrary, my play experience is what leasds me to be sure it would still be D&D. I've played fantasy hero, i've played rolemaster, i've played scifi games, and indy games, and wod games and unknown armies, I even played freaking paladium.

And i'm quite sure that the game i'm describing would be 'D&D' to the same degree that say, 3rd and 4th edition are.

Yes, it just goes to prove how diverse people's definitions of what 'D&D' is actually are. I don't really know for sure what I would think of said game. I don't think it would TO ME feel a lot like D&D in key respects. It would remind me of D&D probably and I might enjoy it quite a bit, but I don't think I personally would consider it to be D&D. I also think you'd have to change more stuff than you imagine in order to make it a cohesive game, though of course the bar for that is a lot lower if you're doing homebrew than if it were a product.