D&D 5E Why Do Higher Levels Get Less Play?

[Hexmage-EN]

Since then, we've seen far fewer high level adventures, and most truly high level foes have fallen out of the basic monster books (when was the last time Tiamat or Demogorgon was in a Monster Manual? 1e).

Demogorgon was actually featured in 4E's Monster Manual 2, along with Orcus in the Monster Manual and Lolth in Monster Manual 3.

 

[J-H]

I voted for 2 options:
1. High level PCs are harder to plan for. When your players can Wish-cast Antipathy on the final boss to make his army run, that can ruin a carefully plotted railroad. They can cover up an assassination with Disintegrate, and tank multiple Fireballs to the face without blinking. You have to be willing to let them guide the plot more. Also, they can be very destructive. A 20th level party can put out a Meteor Swarm from the wizard, two Smites and a fear aura from the Vengeance Paladin, a DC 24-38 grapple check from the Barbarian, and a Gated Solar from the cleric. If your BBEG only has 280 hit points and AC 22, he's dead.
2. Campaign length. I am on session 55 of BG2 and the party is about to hit level 12. These are 3 hour sessions and it's approaching 2 years IRL.

I would add two more.
3rd: WOTC publishes few high-level adventures, so most DMs and players don't have an "easy" entry into it. I understand that the Rod of Seven Parts adventure does go up to 20, but I've also heard that there's a levelup about once a sessions and it's a railroad, so there's little opportunity for emergent play.

4th: Some tables run very inefficiently, causing high level combat to drag out. Players need to know what they are doing and have their dice selected before their turns start.

 

[Blue]

I clicked every option except DMs don't want to use high CR opponents, but that's still only a slice of the picture.

Here's my "Other" options:

1. Not enough published adventure support at high levels. Many DMs run from modules.
2. Creating characters at high levels not well supported. (No official rules on magic/wealth, lots of irrevocable decisions made prior to seeing party synergy, etc.)
3. System isn't as well tested at high levels and there's not as much material for it.
4. PC power levels much more impacted by optimization. This is both char-op and party optimization, such as putting together a Microwave crew.
5. Barrier to entry for casual/new gamers (this is related to number of things a PC can do is overwhelming, but it contains more than just that.)

 

[grimmgoose]

I'm running two high level campaigns at the moment, and for me, it's genuinely because it's just less fun.

Prep is a weird thing where it takes less time, and yet more time (depending on the session/encounters). Sometimes it is genuinely better to prep next to nothing, because you almost have little-to-no control over what your party can do (other than managing their threats). Sometimes, you're spending a ton of prep-time just on managing statblocks and numbers.

Spellcasters become "mini-DMs", where they can tell you, "hey, 50 sessions ago I picked up a demon's dagger. I'm going to use it to go to hell real quick" and then yeah - better be quick on your feet to improv that out-of-nowhere decision.

Plot/narrative wise, I lose interest hard. You've gotta up the stakes - world threats, plane threats, multiverse threats. You can work hard to tie character plot and motivations to it, but it isn't easy. It's really easy to care about that village you've been staying at for the past few weeks. It's much harder to care about the death of a multiverse (it's too big; less personal).

Fights take so long. And even worse - you're either looking at super-dangerous rocket tag fights, or you're using multiple encounters (which, combined with longer fights, means you're spending more time in initiative then outside of it).

 

[NN]

Seems like it's missing the main option; the game doesn't scale well and is too tedious to enjoy at that level, even if you want to.

bingo

 

[payn]

5e is the only edition I've played where high level has been poorly supported.

Im not sure what you mean by support here. Is it rule books? Adventures? Both? Compared to prior editions I think high level 5E is actually pretty easy to run and play. There are numerous adventures that go into high level, al beit, not many that start there. So, I dont think the rule support has been as necessary because its not a mess like ti was in the past.

 

[Tonguez]

Because superhero games need different rules, just using more powers to beat up more powerful enemies is tedious and not a fun challenge like it should be.

 

[Maxperson]

Im not sure what you mean by support here. Is it rule books? Adventures? Both? Compared to prior editions I think high level 5E is actually pretty easy to run and play. There are numerous adventures that go into high level, al beit, not many that start there. So, I dont think the rule support has been as necessary because its not a mess like ti was in the past.

Mainly it's the lack of interesting high CR monsters. The great majority of high level monsters are just, oh look, another dragon, giant or outsider. Not a lot of interesting high level monsters. On the other hand, there's a glut of them at CR 6 and under. Then it starts to diminish, becoming worse and worse as you get higher in level.

Low level is supported, but high level really isn't.

 

[payn]

Mainly it's the lack of interesting high CR monsters. The great majority of high level monsters are just, oh look, another dragon, giant or outsider. Not a lot of interesting high level monsters. On the other hand, there's a glut of them at CR 6 and under. Then it starts to diminish, becoming worse and worse as you get higher in level.

Low level is supported, but high level really isn't.

Gotcha...yeah. I have only experienced the campaign book play and haven't looked at the MM. Are there more than one for 5E? Seems strange to not have a lot of monsters even if the rule books are kept to glacial release pace.

 

[delericho]

IIRC, the majority of campaigns still start at 1st level, or at the very least at low level. Most of those then collapse pretty much right away, and even the ones that don't average 6 sessions (or approx 24 hours of play). So there isn't much time to level up significantly.

Basically, there just isn't time to get there.