Without epic levels it's mighty crowded at lvl 20 in Forgotten Realms :D
I mean technically the only lv 20s in any campaign are the PCs.
Well~. Technically, there are a small number of 20+ level characters in the lore, but none (afaik) of them have been active in 5e.
I believe there are actually a few characters in the lore that are not only above level 20 spellcaster, but can still cast above 9th level spells (like 3 or less, but still). Though, again, none of them have made an appearance as a 5e statblock yet.
Well~. Technically, there are a small number of 20+ level characters in the lore, but none (afaik) of them have been active in 5e.
For living characters, Halaster Blackcloak and Laeral Silverhand are legitimately above level 20; if you're willing to accept undead Acererak also qualifies.
What I mean is, NPC generally don't have PC levels. There are plenty of people more powerful than a 20th level PC but it doesn't actually make them >20th level.
Also, PCs at your table don't exist in my table's setting. The four PCs my players use are the only artificer, druid, warlock, and bard in the entire universe. I mean as level-able classes. The bard in Volo's, for example, is quite different from the bard in the PHB.
The newest 5th edition only supports up to 20 levels total per character. You can still buy 3.5 and 4th edition books that support play above lvl 20. I have the Epic Level Handbook which supports play past lvl 30 with epic spells, magic items, skills and feats. It also gives stats for several of the most powerful characters from Forgotten Realms. Elminster, for example, is; a 24th lvl Wizard, a 5th lvl Archmage, 3rd lvl Cleric, 2nd lvl Rogue and 1st lvl Fighter. That's 35 total levels.
i would be down to being a kind of kratos thing + there are a lot of monster that are waiting deep in the dark with crazy cr that did'nt get they chance yet like Daurgothoth who is just forgoten long now and deserve a complete stats block and there are also the vahalla that is supposed to be the ethernal fight supposed to be at minumum arround lvl 20 you could find challenge. there i wanna be a true god and i won't let a cap level stop me
Here is something that you need to remember about every version of D&D. Homebrew is your friend. The game can't do everything in its base/ official releases. If the game doesn't do something, figure out a pattern and make it do it. Any system, no matter how weird, as long as your players have fun with it, it is great. The Table i am playing at now has talked about going to level 25 or further. DND doesn't do something you want or has a rule you don't like? Change it. It might take some work, thought and dissection of the design, but it is very doable for no money.
The official rules are a starting point, not the end point.
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He/Him. Loooooooooong time Player. The Dark days of the THAC0 system are behind us.
"Hope is a fire that burns in us all If only an ember, awaiting your call To rise up in triumph should we all unite The spark for change is yours to ignite." Kalandra - The State of the World
Officially, L20 is max with maybe additional epic boons when the DM feels you’ve earned it. In the vast majority of campaigns/tables that is sufficient. In a 5e FR campaign you have a few NPCs like elminster, Larloch, Halaster that were stated out in previous editions as well beyond L20, same for Grayhawk (Bigby, Tasha, Mordenkainen) (and some homebrew worlds as well). At least a few of these were originally PCs not NPCs. I had the same problem - after 40+ years of playing all of my early (1e/2e) PCs had reached epic levels (or the equivalent - a 1e elven F15/W15 or elven F15/W15/Rge20 is effectively epic), I had no intention of just shelving them so my campaign was required to handle epic levels. It’s not actually that hard to do. Epic boons and a level every 50,000 EXP works. However, I added a few things. There are terms we use - like Archmage, that actually had meaning in earlier editions but don’t really in 5e (sorry but a CR12/L18 caster is not an archmage whatever the MM wants to say.) so I gave classes an epic prestige progression that turns them into something really dangerous as they get additional spell slots as well as HP and the level. Martials get additional attacks - so a L25 arcane archer would get 5attacks around and an extra use of their arcane archer shots as well as HP for each level, a PB of +7, etc.
As it is currently designed, D&D 5th edition characters officially retire at Level 20. It was the same with D&D 2nd edition characters as well. In D&D 3rd edition, it was possible in theory to advance a character to level 30, level 40 and so on, as long as the DM's mind was capable of handling the situation. In D&D 4th edition, characters could advance to Level 30 and then, once they completed their final quest, they would RETIRE to a well-earned place in the Afterlife.
If you want unlimited advancement, then you might want to scour DMSGUILD for 3rd edition source books and adventures. Note well: some of the 3rd edition Epic Level content (Level 30+) was only available from the wizards website as a download, whether any of this stuff still exists is unknown.
They don’t retire, but they’ve peaked in most ways. And fundamentally there is no way this system can be set up so PCs don’t peak at some point- sooner or later the content has to dry up. There are probably a few systems that support something closer to a true endless leveling arrangement like the World of Darkness/Storyteller system, but that’s a very different core system.
They don’t retire, but they’ve peaked in most ways. And fundamentally there is no way this system can be set up so PCs don’t peak at some point- sooner or later the content has to dry up.
Well, eventually any game is going to run out of steam, but there's no cap on the power level of custom monsters, it's just up to the DM to have the world still make enough sense for SoD.
It seems that most campaigns wrap up before level 15, but I've always felt that this is the point where the game truly hits its stride. Low-level play has its charms, but it can often feel like you're just hitting things with the pointy end of a d6.
By stopping early, players miss out on a massive amount of official content and the unique experience of commanding a veteran character. Playing a high-level character, with their complete suite of class features and legendary artifacts, is a completely different and far more strategic game.
For any DMs and players looking to explore that epic tier of play, I can't recommend the ruleset from 2CGaming highly enough. I'm currently running one campaign and playing in another using their system, and the complexity and deep challenge it adds to 5th Edition is exactly what our group was looking for. Single class or Multiclass progressions are accounted for. L20-30.
Back when I was playing in a D&D 3rd Edition campaign, I had a wizard who experimented with the meta magic rules of that edition. He took the familiar Fireball spell and then he augmented it to add acid damage, so that the target(s) had to save versus fire and versus acid. This augmented spell was a 5th or 6th level spell. He was planning on adding lightning to the mix, thus creating a 7th or 8th level spell. Then he was planning on adding cold damage to the mix, thus creating a 9th or 10th level spell and finally adding sonic (thunder) damage to the mix, with the result being an 11th or 12th level spell, with saves for fire, acid, lightning, cold and thunder. Unfortunately, he was killed long before he could complete the many augmentations. He would have had to be about an 26th or 28th level wizard to cast such a spell.
August 3, 2025: And....this wizard would have had to gain various meta magic feats to allow him to add all of those augmentations to the Fireball spell, along with other mete magic feats to allow him to cast a 10th level spell, an 11th level spell, a 12th level spell and so on. In retrospect, it was probably best for him to die before one of his miscast spells transformed the populace of an entire city into potted plants (one of outcomes of the Wild Magic Surge Table in the 2024 PHB).
Zenlos the doctor timeline 3b would beg to differ.
Check out my homebrew subclasses spells magic items feats monsters races
i am a sauce priest
help create a world here
You probably don't want 10/10, but plenty of multiclass setups are as potent as level 20 pure classes.
I mean technically the only lv 20s in any campaign are the PCs.
Well~. Technically, there are a small number of 20+ level characters in the lore, but none (afaik) of them have been active in 5e.
I believe there are actually a few characters in the lore that are not only above level 20 spellcaster, but can still cast above 9th level spells (like 3 or less, but still). Though, again, none of them have made an appearance as a 5e statblock yet.
For living characters, Halaster Blackcloak and Laeral Silverhand are legitimately above level 20; if you're willing to accept undead Acererak also qualifies.
What I mean is, NPC generally don't have PC levels. There are plenty of people more powerful than a 20th level PC but it doesn't actually make them >20th level.
Also, PCs at your table don't exist in my table's setting. The four PCs my players use are the only artificer, druid, warlock, and bard in the entire universe. I mean as level-able classes. The bard in Volo's, for example, is quite different from the bard in the PHB.
The newest 5th edition only supports up to 20 levels total per character. You can still buy 3.5 and 4th edition books that support play above lvl 20. I have the Epic Level Handbook which supports play past lvl 30 with epic spells, magic items, skills and feats. It also gives stats for several of the most powerful characters from Forgotten Realms. Elminster, for example, is; a 24th lvl Wizard, a 5th lvl Archmage, 3rd lvl Cleric, 2nd lvl Rogue and 1st lvl Fighter. That's 35 total levels.
i would be down to being a kind of kratos thing + there are a lot of monster that are waiting deep in the dark with crazy cr that did'nt get they chance yet like Daurgothoth who is just forgoten long now and deserve a complete stats block and there are also the vahalla that is supposed to be the ethernal fight supposed to be at minumum arround lvl 20 you could find challenge. there i wanna be a true god and i won't let a cap level stop me
Here is something that you need to remember about every version of D&D. Homebrew is your friend. The game can't do everything in its base/ official releases. If the game doesn't do something, figure out a pattern and make it do it. Any system, no matter how weird, as long as your players have fun with it, it is great. The Table i am playing at now has talked about going to level 25 or further. DND doesn't do something you want or has a rule you don't like? Change it. It might take some work, thought and dissection of the design, but it is very doable for no money.
The official rules are a starting point, not the end point.
He/Him. Loooooooooong time Player.
The Dark days of the THAC0 system are behind us.
"Hope is a fire that burns in us all If only an ember, awaiting your call
To rise up in triumph should we all unite
The spark for change is yours to ignite."
Kalandra - The State of the World
Officially, L20 is max with maybe additional epic boons when the DM feels you’ve earned it. In the vast majority of campaigns/tables that is sufficient. In a 5e FR campaign you have a few NPCs like elminster, Larloch, Halaster that were stated out in previous editions as well beyond L20, same for Grayhawk (Bigby, Tasha, Mordenkainen) (and some homebrew worlds as well). At least a few of these were originally PCs not NPCs. I had the same problem - after 40+ years of playing all of my early (1e/2e) PCs had reached epic levels (or the equivalent - a 1e elven F15/W15 or elven F15/W15/Rge20 is effectively epic), I had no intention of just shelving them so my campaign was required to handle epic levels. It’s not actually that hard to do. Epic boons and a level every 50,000 EXP works. However, I added a few things. There are terms we use - like Archmage, that actually had meaning in earlier editions but don’t really in 5e (sorry but a CR12/L18 caster is not an archmage whatever the MM wants to say.) so I gave classes an epic prestige progression that turns them into something really dangerous as they get additional spell slots as well as HP and the level. Martials get additional attacks - so a L25 arcane archer would get 5attacks around and an extra use of their arcane archer shots as well as HP for each level, a PB of +7, etc.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
As it is currently designed, D&D 5th edition characters officially retire at Level 20. It was the same with D&D 2nd edition characters as well. In D&D 3rd edition, it was possible in theory to advance a character to level 30, level 40 and so on, as long as the DM's mind was capable of handling the situation. In D&D 4th edition, characters could advance to Level 30 and then, once they completed their final quest, they would RETIRE to a well-earned place in the Afterlife.
If you want unlimited advancement, then you might want to scour DMSGUILD for 3rd edition source books and adventures. Note well: some of the 3rd edition Epic Level content (Level 30+) was only available from the wizards website as a download, whether any of this stuff still exists is unknown.
They don’t retire, but they’ve peaked in most ways. And fundamentally there is no way this system can be set up so PCs don’t peak at some point- sooner or later the content has to dry up. There are probably a few systems that support something closer to a true endless leveling arrangement like the World of Darkness/Storyteller system, but that’s a very different core system.
Well, eventually any game is going to run out of steam, but there's no cap on the power level of custom monsters, it's just up to the DM to have the world still make enough sense for SoD.
Oh, you can always write bigger numbers, I was talking about substantial features- class stuff, spells, those things.
It's usually easier to have unlimited scaling on a classless system; a lot of point systems can scale indefinitely.
Which is what I was saying earlier.
It seems that most campaigns wrap up before level 15, but I've always felt that this is the point where the game truly hits its stride. Low-level play has its charms, but it can often feel like you're just hitting things with the pointy end of a d6.
By stopping early, players miss out on a massive amount of official content and the unique experience of commanding a veteran character. Playing a high-level character, with their complete suite of class features and legendary artifacts, is a completely different and far more strategic game.
For any DMs and players looking to explore that epic tier of play, I can't recommend the ruleset from 2CGaming highly enough. I'm currently running one campaign and playing in another using their system, and the complexity and deep challenge it adds to 5th Edition is exactly what our group was looking for. Single class or Multiclass progressions are accounted for. L20-30.
https://store.2cgaming.com/collections/epic-legacy?srsltid=AfmBOoqOA9nX6kjLKOi3GpebcGoaF_g6bQepSLug72zb77scg80gsEli
Back when I was playing in a D&D 3rd Edition campaign, I had a wizard who experimented with the meta magic rules of that edition. He took the familiar Fireball spell and then he augmented it to add acid damage, so that the target(s) had to save versus fire and versus acid. This augmented spell was a 5th or 6th level spell. He was planning on adding lightning to the mix, thus creating a 7th or 8th level spell. Then he was planning on adding cold damage to the mix, thus creating a 9th or 10th level spell and finally adding sonic (thunder) damage to the mix, with the result being an 11th or 12th level spell, with saves for fire, acid, lightning, cold and thunder. Unfortunately, he was killed long before he could complete the many augmentations. He would have had to be about an 26th or 28th level wizard to cast such a spell.
August 3, 2025: And....this wizard would have had to gain various meta magic feats to allow him to add all of those augmentations to the Fireball spell, along with other mete magic feats to allow him to cast a 10th level spell, an 11th level spell, a 12th level spell and so on. In retrospect, it was probably best for him to die before one of his miscast spells transformed the populace of an entire city into potted plants (one of outcomes of the Wild Magic Surge Table in the 2024 PHB).