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

[Aldarc]

Your conjecture is an interesting one!

I can't easily internalise/intuit it, as I'm not really a "your build" player. But intellectually I can see it. Especially in conjunction with the idea of trivialising encounters - if the build is a type of power/optimisation thing, then seeing it come online and do its thing once or twice might be fun, but there may not be ongoing reward in that (and the GM may not be all that interested either).

I also think it's partially about how players see the cool things that their character can do. For some, that is why they created their character; they wanted to see how a build or concept plays. But once the novelty has worn off? Then what? Again, I think that some player can become bored and become ready to try a different character concept out. Not sure what to call this. Maybe "PC as Player's Toy."

 

[Retros_x]

I was more inspired by the setting itself. I had old 3e GoT ( no, won't run 3.x ever again), Jamie was lvl 15, Ned was 9, plus some levels of Noble on both of them ( it had special subsystem that noble class used). Sandor was F10/Rog3 and Gregor was F18/Barb2.

But sure, i agree, 5e doesn't do great with high level low fantasy, although it kind-a should, since encounters are based around no magic items used.

Not sure why it should. I think the main reason for magic item being left out of balance because they don't want to assume a fixed magic item rate. But High level characters are highly magical. I think that just doesn't fit the genre. I actually like that about DnD that you have these different tiers of play with different feel to it. But it seems logical to me that you can't run a low-fantasy game on levels where characters have half-god like abilities. If one is hellbent on having a low-fantasy game where you can play to max level - D&D 5e is the wrong system IMO.

Additionally to my other claim why I think campaigns rarely reach high level (too long of a campaign, but nobody wants to start at level 10), I also support the other reason that was stated in this thread for missing high-level play is just not really mechanical, but narrative.
I've only played high-level in one-shots or adventures, never campaigns because high level campaigns also just feel weird. The stakes are high as in a story finale - but in every adventure. It feels like Dragonball Z like escalation and kinda gets ridicoulous.

 

[Minigiant]

And if you're not tgat familiar with 4E how do you tell what is the fiddly stuff?

We made it to level 7 hot enough xp to hit 8 and tapped out.

Dont buy the PHB2 or 3 or the Power books.

The PHB1 wasn't too fiddly unless you tried to be.

 

[tetrasodium]

Guess this depends on what your counting as epic and beyond epic. You can have low level PCs save a kingdom, but they can't do all that much....but sure you can have the story just "fix itself".
.

Sure you you just need to give them time to do so. Take a basic campaign outline like dndHAT or dread metrol and expand it from a relatively direct straight forward mini adventure by fleshing the PCs impact on your world's story out dramatically with more involved adventures out of what would previously have been a sessionish of play or less.... "Save the kingdom" as a story is only a stretch at low levels if you are moving so quick that you are actually describing "kill that thing" or "save the entire world/plane of existence that happens to be some nebulous 'kingdom' assumed to be the entirety of everything"...

Of course that reveals another problem 5e presents to the gm who will eventually run high level games. The PCs level so fast with so little risk and so few needs from the world that there's no time to develop any roots that would make their players care about what is in the world or establish much in the way of scope through play.