D&D General Why does D&D still have 16th to 20th level?

[EzekielRaiden]

Personally, I think the lack of interest for getting all the way to 20 (or 30 or 36 or whatever) is much more on the shoulders of DMs than it is on the shoulders of the game.

I've been running the same game for the same people (well, mostly the same people, we've had a few drop out and one join up) for three years. We've blown WAY past Dungeon World's normal level 10 cutoff. We have, by my estimation, attended to between half and two-thirds of the threats, events, and surprises I think I can reasonably squeeze out of this region of this campaign world, so I'd estimate I can probably get somewhere between two and three years more out of it before this campaign logically should wrap.

I honestly don't know how other DMs struggle to find content and challenges. For my part, it's much more a matter of paring down the number of plausible directions into something the party can actually work with, rather than suffering eternal analysis paralysis.

Now, I'll note, there's absolutely nothing wrong with saying "okay, we've gotten far enough, this game needs to wrap up now." Nor with "this was a one-shot/short-run game, we never planned for it to last long." But I just don't really grok this "we would love to ACTUALLY get to 20th level, it just never happens" thing, especially if you game consistently with friends rather than joining online games (as most of my player-side experience has been.)

 

[Reynard]

Personally, I think the lack of interest for getting all the way to 20 (or 30 or 36 or whatever) is much more on the shoulders of DMs than it is on the shoulders of the game.

In 5E I feel ot is a result of WotC "training" groups that campaigns are single stories that end around 12th level. If the early modules had presented 20 level sandboxes, that is what people coming to the game would accept as normal.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

High levels let you tell a different type of story.

This! This exactly. The scope of your storytelling changes.

A 4e game (for example, since it has a higher top level) could go from "village protectors" to "the baron's favorite heroes" to "the king's trusted agents" to "saving the world from the lich king and riding off into the sunset and eternal glory." Or it could go from "expert agents" to "power brokers between kingdoms" to "world-saving heroes" to "god-slaying saviors of all existence." In either case, the scope evolves over time, and things that were terrible challenges either become condensed into more-abstracted, higher-level challenges, or simply overlooked as no longer relevant.

For that first group, a squad of kobolds is a serious threat at level 1. By level 10, a squad of kobolds is an obstacle on your way to dealing with the kobold warren. By level 20, a squad of kobolds is no longer even an obstacle, and even dealing with a kobold warren is pretty well beneath you, unless they're the advance force of some nastier threat, like an adult dragon. By level 30, adult dragons and their armies of kobolds are collectively a concern, but not a primary one, you have a world-ending superboss to defeat.

As the scale telescopes out, you begin to lose focus on the lowest-level things, because they're just...not important enough anymore. They may, occasionally, reappear in the story, but only to emphasize how things have changed, how you just don't perceive the world the way you did back then. The mechanics themselves recognize (and adjust for, within discrete limits) this sliding scale of difficulty and relevance.

Perhaps 5th edition's principle that monsters should remain a threat across a huge range of levels is acting detrimentally here? That is, it encourages DMs to think that the scope should remain more-or-less fixed, which means the difference between 5th level and 15th level kind of becomes just "you roll a bigger fistful of dice." If so, I'd find that...well, rather ironic, given that 5e's "it has the same mechanics always" was meant to reduce the "treadmill" feeling and increase the realism and impact of the game.

In 5E I feel ot is a result of WotC "training" groups that campaigns are single stories that end around 12th level. If the early modules had presented 20 level sandboxes, that is what people coming to the game would accept as normal.

Hadn't thought of it that way, but yeah, I can definitely see it.

 

[Maxperson]

In 5E I feel ot is a result of WotC "training" groups that campaigns are single stories that end around 12th level. If the early modules had presented 20 level sandboxes, that is what people coming to the game would accept as normal.

I think using D&D Beyond numbers is flawed beyond belief. The vast majority of players don't play online. They play in person. During the Pandemic my group had to play online and it was very frustrating and not nearly as enjoyable an experience. It's no surprise that the D&D Beyond numbers are low with that kind of experience.

I've been playing since 1983 and in many different groups with different DMs. Probably half of those groups went above level 10 and most of those to levels 15-20. When I go to game conventions and watch groups playing D&D, I very often see PCs in the teens to 20, and it's not uncommon for me to see 20+. Once I saw a group that was over level 100 and walked away laughing at the absurdity, but hey, they seemed to be having fun.

Using the D&D Beyond numbers as representative of D&D at large is like using this site to do the same thing. It doesn't work. I don't doubt that many more games stop at under level 10. A lot of campaigns implode due to real life and a lot of groups don't like high level play. However, a very significant number do go to high level and the support needs to remain for it.

 

[Undrave]

I think 5e needed Epic Destinies for those last five levels.
They not only grant you new abilities that evoke a character of legends, they give you, more importantly, an end goal. They give you an idea of what your character’s retirement will look like, what sort of lasting impact you’ll have on the world. It means that you play your character with that final goal in line and your DM has some kind of guidance on what to throw at you and the sort of relationships you can build.

Your normal class(es) should just end when you reach level 15 and then you do your last 5 levels in your epic destiny.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I think 5e needed Epic Destinies for those last five levels.
They not only grant you new abilities that evoke a character of legends, they give you, more importantly, an end goal. They give you an idea of what your character’s retirement will look like, what sort of lasting impact you’ll have on the world. It means that you play your character with that final goal in line and your DM has some kind of guidance on what to throw at you and the sort of relationships you can build.

Your normal class(es) should just end when you reach level 15 and then you do your last 5 levels in your epic destiny.

Well maybe not end. But you could get the epic destiny on top for the last levels like you get subclass on top of your class.

 

[Retreater]

 

[Reynard]

I think using D&D Beyond numbers is flawed beyond belief. The vast majority of players don't play online. They play in person. During the Pandemic my group had to play online and it was very frustrating and not nearly as enjoyable an experience. It's no surprise that the D&D Beyond numbers are low with that kind of experience.

I've been playing since 1983 and in many different groups with different DMs. Probably half of those groups went above level 10 and most of those to levels 15-20. When I go to game conventions and watch groups playing D&D, I very often see PCs in the teens to 20, and it's not uncommon for me to see 20+. Once I saw a group that was over level 100 and walked away laughing at the absurdity, but hey, they seemed to be having fun.

Using the D&D Beyond numbers as representative of D&D at large is like using this site to do the same thing. It doesn't work. I don't doubt that many more games stop at under level 10. A lot of campaigns implode due to real life and a lot of groups don't like high level play. However, a very significant number do go to high level and the support needs to remain for it.

I didn't mention D&D Beyond. I was talking about the actual published modules.

 

[Umbran]

So, of course, the number of levels is arbitrary. In fact, you could use the levels D&D gives you, but just jump from 1 to 3, to 5, to 7, and so on, and suddenly the number of levels is halved.

How many levels you want D&D to have is based on a few questions:
How often do people play?
How long does a campaign run?
How high power do you want the typical game to get before it ends?
How much higher above that should the game go, for those who want extra?

I don't doubt that most long-running games get to 10th or 15th level. But that doesn't mean the game rules should stop there. I suspect that sufficient folks use the higher levels to justify their existence, even if they aren't the most used.

 

[Maxperson]

I didn't mention D&D Beyond. I was talking about the actual published modules.

I know, but it's the metric for threads like this and why high level should be denied. I was sort of bouncing off of your post to say my piece.