Why do levels one and two suck so bad?

[JDJblatherings]

RULES
Because the randomness inherent to 1st and 2nd level D&D is much, much higher than what I want from an RPG (or most any game, really). Because low-level characters in D&D are *monumentally* incompetent, able to fail at otherwise trivial tasks. SAGA fixes both.

CHARACTER
Because the "budding adventurer" type holds almost no interest for me. I would much prefer to play a character who is already really good at what he does and has been doing it long enough to have an interesting background in it.

uh...you roll for characters attempting trivial tasks? Why bother? Roll the dice for the hard stuff and dont' sweat the trivial stuff.

 

[JDJblatherings]

picture this-

Your party spots a Fire Giant accompanied by a band of hobgoblins loaded down with gear nervously rushing along as best they can under their burden.


with PCs at 1st level, this is MAJOR and presents a lot of opportunities.

with PCs at 8th level it's a quick fight and little campaign building gets done.

 

[Nifft]

Your party spots a Fire Giant accompanied by a band of hobgoblins loaded down with gear nervously rushing along as best they can under their burden.

with PCs at 1st level, this is MAJOR and presents a lot of opportunities.

to die horribly while accomplishing nothing. Oh, or we could run away!

with PCs at 8th level it's a quick fight and little campaign building gets done.

Wait, a fire giant plus 10-100 hobgoblins (plus hobgoblin leadership) is a speedbump for 8th level PCs?

Really? -- N

 

[Celebrim]

Why do players hate levels 1 and 2 so much? As a DM, I've found it crucial to develop much of a characters future in the first couple levels, yet players just can't wait to get past it to get to the "good levels."

I can think of alot of different reasons.

1) Arcane casters can end up being mere bystanders until level 5 or so.
2) Low level adventures are very hard to design. You have to be careful what you throw at the players while still maintaining a sense of fearsomeness and dread in what the players are overcoming. You seemingly have a comparitively narrow pallette of options and this can produce very redundant, lame, adventures if you aren't careful.
3) The 'sweet spot' of D&D has always been that area where things don't go wrong in a single die roll. That means high enough level that a single swordswing doesn't drop your character, and low enough level that the 'save or die' effects aren't a worse problem.
4) Alot of players have thier ego invested in what thier characters can do. They enjoy the illusionism of accomplishment, and being the fantastic hero. First level characters have humble abilities, and this just doesn't inspire them. It's not meeting the need that drives them to play. Problem solvers and RPers do better, but even then a problem solver can be frustrated by his lack of familiar tools with which to approach the problem and RPers can be frustrated by the lack of depth inherent in just starting out (which doesn't really have to do with the level you start out so much as beginning in general). All of these issues can be addressed by a skillful DM, but it is hard I think even for an experienced DM - which is why really good modules for 1st level characters stand out to me as such masterpeices of design. (Think 'Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh', 'Sunless Citadel', and 'The Whispering Cairn)
5) If you are used to high magic campaigns, the nature of play at 1st level can be very frustrating to you. Most peoples ordinary D&D experience simply doesn't prepare them for caring about encumberance, rations, rope, torches, 10' poles, etc.. At 1st level, that's what the game is all about. Many players, especially those used to solving problems with magic, can get really frustrated by the different sort of bookkeeping, the mundanity of it all, and the different problem solving skill set you need.

Personally, I love D&D at 4th level and under. Granted, arcane casters tend to suck (but arcane casters tend to suck!), but there is a certain feel of adventuring with torch and rope in the dark places of the earth that gets totally lost once you can fly, create light magically, and blow things up good.

 

[Particle_Man]

Personally, I find that my players also dislike levels 1 and 2 (and 3 and 4, but to a lesser extent), but they also like having the more 'organic' characters that come from playing through those early levels. If there was a really strong way to generate 'organic' higher level characters, that would be ideal for my group, but I've never seen such a thing.

Unearthed Arcana has a "traveller-like" way of rolling up random feats and such on tables, if you want to start with a non-tweaked 5th level character. Takes some choice away from the player, though.

 

[Particle_Man]

The characters confront the BBEG,

"You fools! You shall never beat my little pets! Mwahahahaha!"

And the characters know fear as they see in front of them a fearsome force:

Eight angry cats. And they look hungry.

 

[Lord Zardoz]

Why do players hate levels 1 and 2 so much?

A few of the key reasons have already been posted in this thread:
- People have played lots of 1st level characters
- Character fragility
- Character ineffectiveness
- Tired of always fighting Kobolds and Goblins

There are a few others that are less obvious which I will post here.
- Lack of access to desired class features
- Limited choice due to tactical considerations
- Vulnerability to DM Railroading

Quite often, when coming up with a character concept, a player will often have some idea of the various 'cool things' he would like the character to do. Often times, the character concept cannot quite be realized until the character gets access to certain features that are not available until level 3 or 4 or so.

Half Orc Barbarian with Cleave: must be level 3.
Mage with Metamagic Feats: Must be level 3 unless you like metamagic Cantrips
Ranger with Animal Companion: Must be level 4
Mounted Combat build: Horses are expensive, as are the feats
Disarm based build: Low attack bonuses make this difficult, also a waste of time against opponents with less than 3 HD.
Desired Prestige Class: Usually not before level 5 at the earliest.

Another point is that at low levels, certain things are just not optimal for purely tactical considerations. If you want to eventually play a Dwarven Defender, some of the feat choices are sub optimal. Starting at level 1, your not likely to choose to take Iron Will or Endurance as feats. A character that is built 'organically' will often have a player make feat or skill choices based on more immediate needs than long term planning

And lastly is railroading. At lower levels, a DM can easily force the players to avoid combat by putting something in front of them that is blatantly out of their league. At higher levels, it becomes much more difficult to railroad the players. For players who hate railroading, the higher levels offer some insurance that they can try to do things in a way they find entertaining, rather than the only way physically possible within the rules.

END COMMUNICATION

 

[jodyjohnson]

The encounter that I thought would have killed them (a fight with a raging barbarian grimlock) ended when the cleric cast a hold person and the grimlock failed the save with a 2. The rest of the party made short work of the held grimlock.

Grimlocks are Monstrous Humanoids which takes a Hold Monster spell. Having access to a 5th level spell normally makes short work of low level encounters. By the book you probably would have had a TPK.

 

[Particle_Man]

Some people rail against being unable to play a fighter that's been in a couple of wars. I enjoy actually having that fighter having been through those wars by that point in his life.

This would be a good argument for either bringing back 0 level characters (for background not play), or allowing one NPC level to be replaced by a PC level given a payment of xp (so a fighter who had been through the wars started background-wise as a 1st level warrior, for example, and starts play as a 1st level fighter).

 

[Celebrim]

When my friends and I played 1e, one of the highest compliments we could give was "good first level player", for those who asked good questions and sought creative solutions to problems.

I like to play as a 1st level PC, but its frustrating to ref 1st level PCs as a DM because you really have to have the kid gloves out.

But, speaking as a DM, the main reason I like to start campaigns at 1st level anyway is because it weeds out the chafe. The players that are entertaining at first level (and some of my fondness memories DMing are refing a 1st level character whose player just suddenly went out on some unexpected tangent), are the ones that are going to be entertaining at higher levels. Conversely, nothing so brings out the jerk in a bad roleplayer as forcing him to play a first level character.