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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Thasmodious" data-source="post: 4705853" data-attributes="member: 63272">Ah, but that's my central question.  First, I should have included "unless campaign events change this", but then it should also be obvious that I mean "unless campaign events change this".  The question is, why does "lvl 2" have to be written in stone?  I want the PCs to have the option of visiting the fabled Emo Caves.  In my design notes, its obviously a low level challenge and hooks will get seeded into NPC interaction from the game start, maybe a PC even starts with a map to or of an area of the Emo Caves (especially, in a sandbox game, I like to start the game with the PCs knowing certain things about the setting).  Lvl 2 is just an arbitrary meta-game number.  In my sandbox settings, its not part of the information for the locale.  This is because, if it is part of the information, the Emo Caves become a very limited option for the PCs.  Caves full of lvl 2 creatures will only be fun and challenging for a narrow range of PC levels (say 1-3), then it becomes a cakewalk and not worth their time for the entire life of the game (unless those completely random and in no way influenced by the PCs (or their levels) campaign situations arise, of course).  This seems limiting, not freeing like the playstyle is meant to be.  When I design the setting, the Emo Caves will be written about - story, hooks, history, and it will say "goblins live in these caves."  But that can mean a lot of things.  It could be nothing stronger than lvl 2 cutters and a hexer chieftan.  It could include bugbears and hobgoblins and ogres or leveled goblins, with templates.  There are a lot of game tools in several editions of the game to give a lot of range and variety to your monsters.  I like to use those to keep the game interesting and the sandbox open.  Unless the PCs have risen well beyond the challenges of the Emo Caves (epic levels, say), I have a lot of room to make the Caves exciting and challenging for as large a range of the game as possible.In a sandbox game, the DM has a lot of freedom, too.  He's the one designing the playground, after all.  I think it is limiting and restrictive to divide the whole setting up into predetermined zones where the PCs have to figure out where they can go and where they can't.  This would be like playing through the world of an MMO.  I don't mean this in an insulting way, but that is exactly what games like WoW do.  The PC can go anywhere, but the mechanics of everything in a certain zone is set in stone.  If the PC goes there at lvl 4 or lvl 80, the monsters in it are still all lvl 55 and for most of the gameplay that locale is either near instant death or a cakewalk.  This divides up the world too much for my taste, and its limiting, not freeing, which is the idea of a sandbox setting.This is true of even bigger things like major NPC villains and monsters.  The evil baron, why do I need to stat him before the PCs are set directly onto his path?  He influences the setting, but what "level" does he really need to be to do this?  I may know the level of some of his servants before then, the agents of his oppression, but there is no level that says "must be this high to be an evil baron".  So a range of challenges is useful there as well.  That marauding dragon?  Well, clearly he can't be a baby wyrmling, but is there a reason I have to settle on his numbers long before the PCs believe they have risen in power enough to go after him?  They can go visit him at 1st level if they want, aware that he is "big and burns whole villages and all who have come after him have died".  It's their short-lived characters.  But, if the PCs at 15th decide to go after him, maybe they have a chance, if they're very smart.  They wouldn't if I had simply set in stone that he was a lvl 30 dragon.  But, using an elder instead of an ancient, and shaving a couple levels, they'd have a shot, an incredibly difficult shot, but a shot nonetheless.  Otoh, if he's been a terror for the whole campaign, but I set his stats in the beginning as a lvl 22 elder instead of the lvl 30 ancient, and the PCs go after him at 24th level, he will be very easy.  The scourge of the campaign, a breeze, just because the PCs leveled enough.   In summary, I don't like to let the arbitrary numbers of the meta-game system limit and restrict my sandbox.  I like to use the tools on hand to leave the setting as open as I possibly can, so the players really do have freedom of choice and fun.</blockquote>

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