D&D 4E What level is your 4e game? (Poll)

[Quickleaf]

[MENTION=996]Tony Vargas[/MENTION]
Yes, I agree, and it seems there's a chorus of others who agree with you. I'd find it challenging to write a module at epic because there's so much campaign story that's gone on before that determines the focus of the players. I think there are two ways to handle it more easily:

Do an adventure path with epic support like WotBS or (I believe) Zeitgeist will be.

Follow [MENTION=59411]Pour[/MENTION] 's idea to make a Dungeon Delve product strictly for epic tier.

 

[MarkB]

So far it looks like about 3/4 of us ENWorlders are playing in games which are 13th level or below. That seems to equate to playing up till 9th level in a 20 level system. Now I wonder how much of this is preference driven by a lack of support for higher levels?

Actually, going by the poll numbers, it looks closer to half-and-half. I count 42 votes in the 1-13 range, and 38 in the 14-30 range. (Note - since it's a multiple-choice poll, the percentages listed are misleading, as they add up to more than 100%).

That's a rather heartening result for high-level play, and better than I'd have expected.

 

[keterys]

One problem with providing epic adventures to others -
1) By that point, the PCs should be such an incredible focal point to the campaign that it's almost ludicrous to provide adventures without knowing who they are.
2) PC abilities can differ _so_ drastically based on composition, choices made, and how they interpret certain things. I've had a few playtests going of the adventure I'm working on now.

In one group, the PCs have Mantle of Unity (share defenses) and Valorous Charge (everyone gets an attack and also gets +Con to defenses) such that every encounter the monsters roughly need 15 to hit AC and 20s to hit Fort, Reflex, or Will.

In another group, the monsters rarely get to act because of an avalanche of stacking crowd control.

In another group, the PCs average about 1600 damage in the first round.

In yet another group, the PCs average about 300 damage in the first round.

-

Anyhow, if anyone needs ideas and set piece encounters they can modify to their own use for Epic, I encourage you to look at the epic adventures on www.livingforgottenrealms.com - lots of stuff to steal.

They're a bit more than a "Dungeon Delve" but they might serve well enough, anyhow.

 

[Torgaard]

Our online 4E campaign (I'm the DM, we use Fantasy Grounds and Ventrilo) hit its 2 year anniversary last month. For the most part a core group of four players has hung in there for most of that. We've been at five players for a couple months now, and I don't see that changing. We play once a week for 3-4 hours, give or take a week or two every few months when schedules collide.

The campaign is healthy, the players (mostly 40-something's) are still as excited about that next session as they were at the beginning so I think this thing just might make it. *knock-on-wood*

The party is currently at 8th level, and a couple party members might hit 9th level at our next session.

 

[Quickleaf]

Actually, going by the poll numbers, it looks closer to half-and-half. I count 42 votes in the 1-13 range, and 38 in the 14-30 range. (Note - since it's a multiple-choice poll, the percentages listed are misleading, as they add up to more than 100%).

That's a rather heartening result for high-level play, and better than I'd have expected.

Ack, you're right! Forgot I made it restricted multiple choice. I stand corrected, sir!

Yes, I have another poll over at RPG.net and it seems like ENWorld has a higher percentage of players interested in high level 4e than over there.

 

[Pour]

You got more votes than I expected here, [MENTION=20323]Quickleaf[/MENTION]. Nice work.

As for Epic support, given the points [MENTION=996]Tony Vargas[/MENTION] and [MENTION=43019]keterys[/MENTION] made, I think the delve is even more viable, really, unless you're going to tailor an AP with a players' guide including restrictions/build preferences. I think it offers a range of options to be redressed, plugged, and played.

I wouldn't put anything that was 100% out of the book, either, because out of the book really doesn't work well with Epic in my experience. I'd like to push the boundaries of Epic play and force abstract out-of-combat power usage, planning, in-game resource and organization letting, and certainly deadly or difficult hazards, diseases, traps, and obviously monsters with increasing difficulty the closer to level 30 we go. Include a few pretty maps, items, and other elements packaged into the level-based chapters and set a DM loose.

As an aside, I also think come level 26-30, deadly elements may very well be acceptable features of meaningful Epic combats, the idea being there are a number of resurrection clauses in ED's, items, and rituals at that point. And frankly, when it comes to the highest tiers of the game, and the realm of gods, demon lords, primal spirits, primordials, far realm entities, I think the risk should be its greatest.

Put that all together, I think you have a resource DMs can go to for one-shots, inspiration/stat blocks for their own adventures, or an ultimate goal to gear some aspect of a campaign toward. We could include bits on integrations, reskinning, suggested plots before and after, set up, and all that good stuff, too.

 

[Scrivener of Doom]

So far it looks like about 3/4 of us ENWorlders are playing in games which are 13th level or below. That seems to equate to playing up till 9th level in a 20 level system. Now I wonder how much of this is preference driven by a lack of support for higher levels?

In the case of my group, no.

We just prefer to aim for about 12th-14th level to finish our campaigns and then start again. That's been the case since 1E.
[MENTION=43019]keterys[/MENTION]: I think you guys have done a great job with the LFR Epic adventures. They're certainly superior to those that WotC published - and I know that's not saying much - but you've really made adventures that feel Epic in scope rather than just being about monsters with higher defences etc....