Why not?
They are the ones that set the agenda, so it seems to me that it us always about choice.
D&D 5E Why Do Higher Levels Get Less Play?
- Thread starter Hexmage-EN
- Start date
They are the ones that set the agenda, so it seems to me that it us always about choice.
Zardnaar
Legend
Because some things are diametrically opposed. In that case they'll go with the numbers.
Somewhere in the middle can appeal to no one.
Okay, fine. Then you choose for yourself why high-level gets less play. I'm just giving out potential reasons. If you want to argue with all of them go ahead... but that just seems rather pointless to me.
Make up whatever reasons you want to answer the question if you don't want to accept other people's answers. Doesn't matter to me none.
Just like fast cars are required for fast driving, It would be definition require high level games to have high level play anyone can have a low agency high level one shot. Trouble is the fact that in wotc's zeal for simplicity one shot resulted in a situation where they designed against the gm being supported on except for that low agency one shot style that doesn't require much support.
As to"epic or beyond epic stories and plots" those can take place at any level because it's about the the scope or scale of story being told through pltrather than the level of PCs participating in those story and plots.
AnotherGuy
Hero
I feel they'd have to change the game in a significant way to increase the number of playstyles catered to.
You could do alot with modular options etc but still it would be quite tricky. The base game starts at high fantasy so high level play exacerbates the issue require far greater modular options to cater to specific playstyles or accommodate certain genres IMO.
Well, for my part I think it's pretty obvious why many people don't play high level D&D:
* Most games start at low levels, and so it takes too long to level up relative to how long people remain interested in a particular campaign/party/PC/playgroup;
* The PC builds get more complicated, especially spell-casters;
* Most GMs rely heavily on GM authority over the fiction to manage how play unfolds and to control the scenarios they are running, and at high level it becomes increasingly hard to maintain that authority - especially because of how high-level D&D spells interface with the fiction (in this thread, see both @Minigiant's recent posts, and @Zardnaar's post about "needing to be paid" for the effort of GMing high-level D&D);
* Various special cases of the previous point: fetch-quests for high-level PCs make less sense; dungeons for high-level PCs don't work as well (eg because walls are less constraining, the traps and creatures get more absurd, etc); high-level PCs are harder for the GM to "prompt" or "manipulate" through scenarios via threats and/or inducements, because of their greater capabilities and self-reliance; etc.
* The PC builds get more complicated, especially spell-casters;
* Most GMs rely heavily on GM authority over the fiction to manage how play unfolds and to control the scenarios they are running, and at high level it becomes increasingly hard to maintain that authority - especially because of how high-level D&D spells interface with the fiction (in this thread, see both @Minigiant's recent posts, and @Zardnaar's post about "needing to be paid" for the effort of GMing high-level D&D);
* Various special cases of the previous point: fetch-quests for high-level PCs make less sense; dungeons for high-level PCs don't work as well (eg because walls are less constraining, the traps and creatures get more absurd, etc); high-level PCs are harder for the GM to "prompt" or "manipulate" through scenarios via threats and/or inducements, because of their greater capabilities and self-reliance; etc.
I think the relative lack of modules and monsters is perhaps a contributing factor, but also is an effect as much as a cause.
I don't think that the reason for not playing high level D&D is because all the mythic scenarios that might be played out at high level are being played by groups who have restatted all that sort of stuff for mid-level PCs.
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Not a Decepticon
Hero
One less common thing I heard from videos made by people who did play/run for higher levels, is that...the pwoer creep is kinda fake. In reality the way PCs gain power shoots super high in the middle, there is exponential power gain for tier II and early tier III, that makes PCs rollsotmp all level appriopriate challenges. However later, their boosts often don't give them as vast improvements on level by level. Also, level appriopriate enemeis suddenly begin hitting like trucks, their attack bonuses go up so much that high AC builds are suddenly far less effective, their saving throws go up so they succeed agaisnt save or suck or save or die more often (and if not, they use legendary resistance). It produces a "withdrawal" effect, where players were riding high on power for long time, and suddenly leveling up no longer feel satisfying and they easily can feel lest powerful than before.
It's not about D&D embracing one or two styles.
It's about D&D being built for 1 or 2 styles while including nonsense spells like Simulacrum and Wish which warp the game paradigm, various spells that remove and negate walls and traps that reduce dungeon play, and the accessibility to hazard negating low level spells that no longer factor into combat math or corrupt it.
High level D&D is designed for you to be smart enough to build and understand a high level PC but then purposely play it stupidly to not abuse the resources you get.
D&D was created on vibes. And after level 10, the vibes all start catching up and there are nothing in the core rules to counter all the "cool stuff" you allowed. So DM have to either rush PCs to not give them time to use their resources properly, full their game with custom countermeasures, or get the players to promise to be dumb or ply them with snacks and beer.
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That's why in Tier 3, Players start to go heavy on the Combat as War spells and start to cheese out the monsters into submission with magically induced unfair fights.
For what it's worth, I don't think this is true of 4e D&D. I played 4e D&D to 30th level with a pretty experienced group of RPGers who are not afraid of pushing the mechanics. The game didn't break, and that's mostly because its in-combat balance is solid, and its out-of-combat resolution is via skill challenge (a type of closed-scene resolution) rather than via free GM adjudication of the fiction, and skill challenge resolution has no trouble incorporating rituals and other "wacky" magical effects into the framework (as the DMG and DMG2 explain).
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