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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 6281817" data-attributes="member: 4937">To a point, yes.  But you are (I think) no longer saying anything about the need for that arc to have some arbitrary numeric value attached to it.  The arcs you are talking about aren't dependent on hitting 10th or 20th level, or getting 50 or 100 hit points.  The growth I'm talking about and which you are expanding on isn't marked by particular growth in levels.  There are goals I hear you referencing here are in the game, and not in the metagame.  And if that is so, then we are in agreement despite your refinement and quibbles.If a player is so mature that from the outset he concieves of the growth of his character being in terms of personality change and not numeric inflation, then he has a very different set of needs from his campaign than the guy who just wants a 20th level Hulking Hurler.  It is in some ways harder to meet the needs of the former than the later, but it in no ways requires as much level grinding for its own sake.   Character growth in terms of power and scope of influence is relative to the environment.   You don't have to be as wordy as Robert Jordan or GRR Martin to have characters grow in depth; character growth is usualy relative to a situation within a story as much as the story itself.  The story is only there as a vehicle for showing how the situation changed the character.   There are several 2e adventures that laughably have the characters grow in absolute power and save the world, and yet force them to retain the same lack of influence, reknown, and relative power they enjoyed as 1st level characters.  So many DMs are stingier with reknown, influence, and power than they are with gold and +5 vorpal swords, and with NPCs that level up whenever the PCs do so that city guards are elite 12th level fighters, and the guy behind the bar polishing glasses is a retired 15th level adventurer.  In the FR, anyone who is anyone is 20th level.  If that is your model of the world, of course you need to level up, but I question whether you are actually gaining anything by doing so.</blockquote>

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