This happens because the damage output does not increase with the hit point growth at the same rate so in 5e the higher level you go the more attrition there is.
This is what I believe is the central issue in this conversation, although I wonder if a TPK is really more likely at higher levels. If a TPK is, then I believe it is a result of our inability to measure CR at higher rating effectively -or- the possibility of the party failing to take the encounter seriously and getting themselves killed, possibly because they don't want to take the next two hours to go through the motions of the encounter.
My observations are that players want, most of all, the ability to live through encounters. They want HP and AC more than they want to deal damage per round. Likewise, monsters are designed with more staying power and less emphasis on D-P-R. The math of that will lead to longer combat encounters. I don't think this is going to change if we stay anywhere close to the rules we have today, and short of plot armor, isn't going away.
Maybe in 7e or 8e they'll figure it out, but i'm not holding my breath.
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Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt
This happens because the damage output does not increase with the hit point growth at the same rate so in 5e the higher level you go the more attrition there is.
It's actually fairly close for monsters (they tend to have a damage of about 1/3 of their hp), though a bit slower for PCs (level 1 damage output for a fighter is 80-100% of hp, level 5 damage output is more like 50%) but a lot of that change is really between level 1 and 2.
Points taken. I like the idea to use exhaustion. That might work. I'm however not very concerned of the "problem" that the spell-casters will be limited. One of the problems in my games is that since there are usually only one encounter per day, they are always fully beefed up. I rather need an incentive to stop them from using their full "arsenal", at the moment it's certainly not a problem that they feel limited. Quite the oposite.
You could always just reduce their full arsenal. Dividing daily powers by 3 gets them down to about the intended resource usage, though that works poorly for single use per day options.
As another followup/consequence for what BL is describing, in the older "classic" DnD you ended up with a lot of downtime. Ie the party explored a couple of rooms and may then retreat or camp. This brought up other encounters as well as a "time" element so that levels 1-10 lasted longer in game world time whereas now, you can go from level 1-5 in a few days of game world time (depending on your game etc). It also made "camping" and camp setup/supplies important. Which could be tedious early, but then once you get a few items it becomes solvable and characters feel a sense of progression.
Things to do in downtime then formed side-plots, narratives and provided a lot of other RP opportunities (negotiating with/become factions).
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"An' things ha' come to a pretty pass, ye ken, if people are going to leave stuff like that aroound where innocent people could accidentally smash the door doon and lever the bars aside and take the big chain off'f the cupboard and pick the lock and drink it!"
Well this brings up an interesting point that I noted as I was dong research for my Mystara campaign which was originally placed in BECMI that the amount of spells, resources and abilities players earn in that system are considerably lower then what we have in 5e.
I'm not that familiar with Basic D&D, the ancestor of modern D&D is pretty much AD&D. In which system wizards have fewer spells at low level, more spells at high level, and all their spells were cast at the equivalent of max level spell slots (comparing other classes is messier, because they didn't have 1-9 spell lists). This resulted in caster being significantly weaker at low levels, significantly stronger at high levels.
'Yeah there was definitely a different pacing to the whole game. A campaign wasn't the exclusive act of going on "adventures", you really sort of worked out your characters entire life. You actually spent a great deal more time and effort to creating vivid downtimes, back stories, dealing with politics and stuff like that in particular in BECMI. '
BL,
Its funny, I have played since basic and our experiences are vastly different. For me D&D has changed only a little from the early 80's. Back then, from what I can remember of the games I played in, players and DMs got bored and rarely played into high levels. There were always complaints between the DM and players due to this or that ruling. Giving a challenge to players was always a problem for the DM. Especially after a few levels since adventures were full of magic items and players quickly became overloaded with a variety of things of sometimes broken power level. The magic user player always overshadowed the group starting around 9th level (if you played a race that could go higher than 9th level). While the games were fun, creating vivid downtimes was hardly any more of a goal beyond getting to the next dungeon. And yes, combat could take awhile.
To my mind, the only real change over the editions and years has been consistency. Sitting down at a modern game you have much more of an idea of what to expect versus old school games which were likely to have a whole host of traditions and house rules. Indeed the downtime activities you describe would have been entirely house rules. Or something lifted out of a fanzine.
I think newer players are more influenced by other media (ie video games). It's easy for them to latch on to the whole defeat your enemies, loot the bodies, upgrade equipment, repeat mechanic of the many supposed rpg games out there. It's harder to understand the richness and added complexity that good role playing can provide. Problems like Godrick is having are hardly unique. They just highlight the difference between crunch and flavor that every edition struggles with.
Yeah there was definitely a different pacing to the whole game. A campaign wasn't the exclusive act of going on "adventures", you really sort of worked out your characters entire life. You actually spent a great deal more time and effort to creating vivid downtimes, back stories, dealing with politics and stuff like that in particular in BECMI.
That's your particular group, not something special about BECMI. Neither system has/had particularly strong system support for doing anything but combat, so it's really up to the players and game master to decide they want to get involved in that stuff.
Good points. I suppose we never played much past 10th level back in the day. I recall some rules for followers and hirelings but I don't know that anyone I played with ever established a stronghold of any kind.
Establishing a base of operations might be a good mini game type challenge for higher level characters in 5E. A good way to expend gold and involve the players in conflicts that don't necessarily require combat. The old Birthright campaign setting did a fun but imperfect job at that. Probably some of my most found memories from my 2nd edition days.
I may have to take a trip back down memory lane and revisit the collected basic rules. The basic red box and expert blue box where my introduction to D&D and I have warm fuzzy feelings for the Isle of Dread.
From B-L
This happens because the damage output does not increase with the hit point growth at the same rate so in 5e the higher level you go the more attrition there is.
This is what I believe is the central issue in this conversation, although I wonder if a TPK is really more likely at higher levels. If a TPK is, then I believe it is a result of our inability to measure CR at higher rating effectively -or- the possibility of the party failing to take the encounter seriously and getting themselves killed, possibly because they don't want to take the next two hours to go through the motions of the encounter.
My observations are that players want, most of all, the ability to live through encounters. They want HP and AC more than they want to deal damage per round. Likewise, monsters are designed with more staying power and less emphasis on D-P-R. The math of that will lead to longer combat encounters. I don't think this is going to change if we stay anywhere close to the rules we have today, and short of plot armor, isn't going away.
Maybe in 7e or 8e they'll figure it out, but i'm not holding my breath.
Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt
It's actually fairly close for monsters (they tend to have a damage of about 1/3 of their hp), though a bit slower for PCs (level 1 damage output for a fighter is 80-100% of hp, level 5 damage output is more like 50%) but a lot of that change is really between level 1 and 2.
You could always just reduce their full arsenal. Dividing daily powers by 3 gets them down to about the intended resource usage, though that works poorly for single use per day options.
As another followup/consequence for what BL is describing, in the older "classic" DnD you ended up with a lot of downtime. Ie the party explored a couple of rooms and may then retreat or camp. This brought up other encounters as well as a "time" element so that levels 1-10 lasted longer in game world time whereas now, you can go from level 1-5 in a few days of game world time (depending on your game etc). It also made "camping" and camp setup/supplies important. Which could be tedious early, but then once you get a few items it becomes solvable and characters feel a sense of progression.
Things to do in downtime then formed side-plots, narratives and provided a lot of other RP opportunities (negotiating with/become factions).
"An' things ha' come to a pretty pass, ye ken, if people are going to leave stuff like that aroound where innocent people could accidentally smash the door doon and lever the bars aside and take the big chain off'f the cupboard and pick the lock and drink it!"
I'm not that familiar with Basic D&D, the ancestor of modern D&D is pretty much AD&D. In which system wizards have fewer spells at low level, more spells at high level, and all their spells were cast at the equivalent of max level spell slots (comparing other classes is messier, because they didn't have 1-9 spell lists). This resulted in caster being significantly weaker at low levels, significantly stronger at high levels.
'Yeah there was definitely a different pacing to the whole game. A campaign wasn't the exclusive act of going on "adventures", you really sort of worked out your characters entire life. You actually spent a great deal more time and effort to creating vivid downtimes, back stories, dealing with politics and stuff like that in particular in BECMI. '
BL,
Its funny, I have played since basic and our experiences are vastly different. For me D&D has changed only a little from the early 80's. Back then, from what I can remember of the games I played in, players and DMs got bored and rarely played into high levels. There were always complaints between the DM and players due to this or that ruling. Giving a challenge to players was always a problem for the DM. Especially after a few levels since adventures were full of magic items and players quickly became overloaded with a variety of things of sometimes broken power level. The magic user player always overshadowed the group starting around 9th level (if you played a race that could go higher than 9th level). While the games were fun, creating vivid downtimes was hardly any more of a goal beyond getting to the next dungeon. And yes, combat could take awhile.
To my mind, the only real change over the editions and years has been consistency. Sitting down at a modern game you have much more of an idea of what to expect versus old school games which were likely to have a whole host of traditions and house rules. Indeed the downtime activities you describe would have been entirely house rules. Or something lifted out of a fanzine.
I think newer players are more influenced by other media (ie video games). It's easy for them to latch on to the whole defeat your enemies, loot the bodies, upgrade equipment, repeat mechanic of the many supposed rpg games out there. It's harder to understand the richness and added complexity that good role playing can provide. Problems like Godrick is having are hardly unique. They just highlight the difference between crunch and flavor that every edition struggles with.
Current Characters I am playing: Dr Konstantin van Wulf | Taegen Willowrun | Mad Magnar
Check out my homebrew: Items | Monsters | Spells | Subclasses | Feats
That's your particular group, not something special about BECMI. Neither system has/had particularly strong system support for doing anything but combat, so it's really up to the players and game master to decide they want to get involved in that stuff.
Good points. I suppose we never played much past 10th level back in the day. I recall some rules for followers and hirelings but I don't know that anyone I played with ever established a stronghold of any kind.
Establishing a base of operations might be a good mini game type challenge for higher level characters in 5E. A good way to expend gold and involve the players in conflicts that don't necessarily require combat. The old Birthright campaign setting did a fun but imperfect job at that. Probably some of my most found memories from my 2nd edition days.
I may have to take a trip back down memory lane and revisit the collected basic rules. The basic red box and expert blue box where my introduction to D&D and I have warm fuzzy feelings for the Isle of Dread.
Current Characters I am playing: Dr Konstantin van Wulf | Taegen Willowrun | Mad Magnar
Check out my homebrew: Items | Monsters | Spells | Subclasses | Feats
All that stuff existed in 2e and 3e (not sure it was in 4e), it just got put into splatbooks.