What is the "Base Level" of your Campaign?

[Desdichado]

I know, that's why it's the one thing I disagree with you on. It sounds like more book-keeping than I would have fun with, to be honest with you. Especially jumping into it with high level PCs where I'm not familiar with their abilities through organic growth.

 

[Al]

The chief problem I see with nearly everyone being low level is that it really throws off the campaign dynamic. My players commented to me when they saw an advancing enemy army of some 50,000 men why they couldn't simply assault it head-on (they're 18th/19th level). I told them that there would be plenty of top-level commanders etc. in the force and they would be ground down.

But if there are no top-level commanders, then PCs and NPC protagonists can and do do Conans. The idea of any stable society lasting more than a few decades, let alone an empire lasting several centuries, is moot when a few top level characters can simply take out the entire standing army of most nations. Between a handful of 15th+ level characters and a legion of 10,000 1st level warriors, I know exactly who's going to win. The only question is when the legion's morale breaks.

Now, you can play it that way. The PCs can be the *only* thing stopping the protagonist NPCs from conquering the world single-handed. But the PCs aren't there forever. What went before? What comes afterwards? Are there a constant stream of evenly-matched good and evil (or lawful and chaotic, or loyalist and rebel, or nation A and nation B) heroes that can constantly negate each other? I think not. Having a diverse army with high-level commanders, a solid complement of magic-users and decent strategy adapated for this sort of warfare means that standing armies stand a chance against high-level characters. And with them, so do stable nation states.

 

[Emperor Valerian]

Yeah, I operate under that system of levelling as well. The vast vast majority of people within my homebrew are 1st level commoners or experts, with a good amount of adepts thrown in. An average person in this world would likely encounter maybe once or twice someone as high as 5th or 6th level unless they lived in the bigger cities. 9th level for spellcaster is high enough that many of the nobles would eagerly higher such a person as their 'court mage' and brag about how much better their pet magician is than their neighbors, indeed, most of the nobles and governors are around 10th level at most.

There's very very few people in my homebrew that ever reach 15th level (maybe a couple thousand world-wide), and only a handful that have reached twentieth level or above... mostly concentrated in the two massive empires that split the largest continent.

Now, of course, when the PCs come into play, its usually easy for the BBEG to realize that they are threats above ordinary... and I usually don't play with stupid BBEGs. So the PCs find themselves getting set up continually against the best the BBEG can throw at them, and if the bad guy fails, he goes out and gets something bigger and stronger (or dirtier and nastier) to chuck at them next. So while there aren't many 15th level assassins in my world, my BBEGs are usually powerful enough and smart enough to know where to look to find them, rich enough or powerful enough to employ them, and then smart enough to send them after the PCs.

Same with armies. While yes, the bulk of the line of an enemy army would be 1st level warriors with 1st level fighters as sergeants, an army of 50,000 has quite a few officers, and probably a person who has reached those 'rare levels' as its commander. So while my PCs can mow through the common foot, they'd probably start having issues once higher level officers begin to swarm them.

 

[John Q. Mayhem]

For the whole "army of 10,000 vs. 15th-level chars," what I'd do is use WotC's online dice roller (or something similar) to shoot 500-700 longbows at each character a round. That's 25+ automatic hits, with a couple double-20s for 3d8, assuming they're in range. I'm thinking that if one or two of the commanders are wizards strong enough to occasionally dispel wind walls and such, the party might go down pretty fast... Of course, blaster magic would even up the scores in time, but even then, you can't hit all the archers at once and some would make their saves. A barbarian/fighter/paladin could be expected to kill 3-6 people a round (might have Cleave/Great Cleave or Whirlwind Attack), and an archer-ranger could do more. Even with healing from a cleric and potions, the arrows would devastate them I think.

 

[S'mon]

Armies of 50,000 vs 15th-level heroes - IMC the heroes would lose if they attacked head-on; even if the enemy leaders didn't defeat them they'd kill maybe a couple thousand troops at most before running out of spells; fighters in melee eventually get fatigued (NB per RAW if you hustle you're fatigued after 1 hour), they'd be ground down.
IMC an army of 50,000 would typically be something like 30,000 1st-level, 10,000 2nd, 5,000 3rd, 2500 4th, 1250 5th, 625 6th, 312 7th, 156 8th, 78 9th, 38 10th, 19 11 th, 10 12th, 5 13th, 3 14th, 1 15th & 1 16th. Mostly Warriors, maybe 10% Fighters, with a smattering of Rogues, Wizards & Clerics.