Will Levels be taken out and shot?

[Schmoe]

It sounds to me like all you are saying is that you want adventures that fit all PCs. As others have pointed out, you can do this in the existing level system just as well as you could in a point-buy system. At a certain point, some challenges (requiring flight, divination, etc) will be beyond characters of a certain level or point value, and so some adventures will by necessity be put into a "niche." Scaling adventures can broaden the niche, but it exists nonetheless.

The Dungeon adventure paths are pretty good examples of how to broaden the niche within a level-based system. The adventures come with "Scaling the Adventure" sidebars, and there are conversion notes for placing the adventure within a particular setting (Eberron, Greyhawk, FR, etc).

 

[Jedi_Solo]

Levels can be tacked on.

0-99 points = 1st level
100-199 points = 2nd level
...

Then what would the difference be?

If "An Adventure for 500 to 700 point characters" is just "An adventure for 5th to 7th level characters" what's the point of trashing the current system?

 

[maddman75]

I wouldn't miss levels. I find them a very artificial game construct, and would rather get a small bonus every game session rather than a large powerup every few sessions.

 

[gizmo33]

But I don't want to keep defending this shoddy rule because it was just an example of something else than levels. R&D can come up with something much better than I can. It seems to me that most of the reasons for keeping Levels in the game are sentimental. The argument that Levels keep high level functions in check is a good one though.

I'm just saying: sentimental won't cut it. Bottom line will.

Of course, but IIRC no one on this thread that has tried to explain levels has said anything about sentimental being one of the reasons.

You either have a game system that increases the power of characters or not. If you increase the power of characters, then an adventure must be geared to a particular power level. That's just basic logic, and I wouldn't hold my breath for R&D to come up with a way to circumvent logic (although the irony is that people that don't understand basic logic probably would hold their breaths while waiting). Maybe I'm overly sentimental about logic, and yet it still "cut's it". Explain that.

 

[I'm A Banana]

So I wonder: In 4th edition will levels be removed? -Frankly, what is the importance of levels? If there were no levels every module would fit every group. Every monster would fit every group and it would be simpler to target players with new feats, prestige classes and challenges if there were no levels involved.

Levels will be kept.

However, my own fantasy is to see as much lateral advancement as vertical advancement. If I don't want PC's gaining *more* power (necessitating a change in the game's style), I should be able to stop the XP and still have them gain a broader selection of power (new skills, new feats, new spells, new items -- just none necessarily more powerful than what they have now, but definitely different, allowing them to do more things).

If they do that, I think they can make me happy.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Levels are familiar to everyone who's ever played Final Fantasy or World of Warcraft. That alone is sufficient business reason to keep them.

They also serve a valuable function in game design, making it much easier to codify target power, well, levels, for PCs with a certain amount of experience. I'm not fond of class systems, though I recognize their value, but level-based systems have huge design advantages IMO.

 

[Kunimatyu]

Levels are one of D&D's biggest draws from the player side of things. "Once I get to X level I'll get Y!" is something you hear during every campaign ever.

They're also a lot easier to "get" intuitively than a points system, and have the added benefit of being familiar to console and MMORPG players.

Vancian magic, on the other hand, needs to be turned into hamburger.

 

[gizmo33]

Vancian magic, on the other hand, needs to be turned into hamburger.

An alternative system that could stand on it's own merits wouldn't have to grind up the competition first.

 

[Mercule]

Ditching levels would be, potentially, the single stupidest thing WotC could do to 4E (rivaled, primarily, by removing classes).

If you want classless or level-less systems, go play Hero or GURPS. If there was a big market for that sort of system, one of those would have moved to occupy the D&D niche -- or, at least, the same sort of niche as WoD.

That said, if Hero had a Dungeon-like publication (of like quality), I would probably be running a Hero game, rather than a D&D game. Or not -- I'm at a stage in life where I just want an easy game to have fun with.

 

[mmadsen]

I think that Frostmarrow's contentious title grossly distorts his point: It is easy to scale for power level; it is hard to scale for entirely new kinds of power. If it weren't for spellcasters -- and certain magic items, and maybe a few feats -- then high-level parties would simply be more powerful versions of lower-level parties, and the same adventure could easily scale with party level.