Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Timlagor 02-11-07, 04:19 PM	This one seems to be raising the most contention at present and doesn't seem to have it's own thread. Would the Circle consider making APL+4 the limit? I think that would solve many of the issues satisfying most of the players and not be unreasonable.
Jon_N 02-11-07, 04:37 PM	This one seems to be raising the most contention at present and doesn't seem to have it's own thread. Would the Circle consider making APL+4 the limit? I think that would solve many of the issues satisfying most of the players and not be unreasonable. I think that would be a reasonable compromise. It means that you're not going to get 15th level wizards playing APL8 games, but does allow for increased flexibility at games days and local home games. The main problem I have with telling people they can't play is that sometimes it makes the table unviable, and everyone goes away unable to play. Personally, I think the APL that the game should run at is the APL that peole WANT to play - certainly at home games (the APL is a more a guide and recommendation to the most ideal level of play). Don't impose any limits on it and leave it up to the players to choose their own APL (even if EVERYONE takes 1/2 xp and 1/2 gold). If they choose to cakewalk it, great. If they want to play "hellspawn", equally great. Of course, that's never going to be accepted by the powers that be, but I don't see anything really wrong with it as it means that EVERYONE at least gets to play every game they wish to. It you're upfront about the fact that the party mix may lead to some unchallenging combats and the players have no problems with it, then ultimately what's the harm?
scon40 02-11-07, 04:57 PM	We've discussed it multiple times now, but we (the Circle) are still resolved to go with the APL+3 rule. If it proves to be a problem down the road, we'll address the issue again then.
Japangirl 02-11-07, 04:59 PM	Agreed. One of the most enjoyable gaming experiences I've had was a 17th level cleric walking a bunch of 8th level characters through APL 12. We had fun helping out a little and going "oooh that's AWESOME!", he had fun just relaxing and not worrying about dying because APL 16 and 18 can be really brutal. He retired as an NPC in our region, and my character that played with the Baron now sees him sometimes giving out missions and jumps up and down excitedly :). I wouldn't want to do that every mod, but for that once it was a lot of fun. EDIT: Agreed with Jon, not Steven. Circle members must be ninjas, to get their posts in right as I'm writing mine!
Swiftbrook 02-11-07, 05:01 PM	Repost from main thread: Topic: APL +3 Cap. Disclamer: I have not read all 24 pages, so if this topic has been decided (or beaten to death) I appologize in advance. I don't like this and would like the old wording retained. Rational: It can be very hard to get a table organized to play a mod. A good class rounded table is even harder. I had a hard time finding a table for the GenCon Special at Indy this year. This is Indy were talking--lots of people. I have two characters, a 7th level and a 1st level. In now way did I want to play my 1st level in the Special. Many people I met wanted to play a specific character in the special. With the APL +3 cap, you futher limit the creation of tables. Also, I want to play my 8th level character (he bumped) in a series of mods. If the only table is APL 4, I'm out of luck. I can understand the rational, but I've also played at a table with (if I recall correctly) a 10, 8, 6, 4 & 4 at APL 6. It was a hard mod for everyone. I haven't seen the APL system abused. I think the APL +3 cap is not needed. Please remove the cap. The current compromise of APL +4 would have made the table I played at "legal" under a new system. -Swiftbrook
indar 02-11-07, 05:13 PM	We've discussed it multiple times now, but we (the Circle) are still resolved to go with the APL+3 rule. If it proves to be a problem down the road, we'll address the issue again then. The problem I see with this rule, is that unlike the other stuff, fixing it after the fact won't help. In marginal groups, low-frequency play groups, "home games" where characters have died multiple times, and other venues where mustering with a problem, it will either lead to people playing by the rules and being driven out of the campaign, or ignoring the rules to play. Either is bad. The people playing by the rules who leave aren't going to be checking the LGCS meekly to see if they can play again. They'll be gone. Leaving the "cheaters" whose groups are now automatically illegal. Bad laws tend to end up not getting enforced.
Timlagor 02-11-07, 05:16 PM	I do think you'd be better off trying APL+4 and changing it down to APL+3 later if necessary but I doubt it will bother me a lot.
Mithreinmaethor 02-11-07, 05:23 PM	Well actually since the APLs go up in even numbers the APL+3 should really be APL+4. A 12th level could play APL 8 10 12 or 14 etc. As groups add people to the LG community it allows those that have been in the community for awhile to be able to play down to levels the new people can play at.
Mattastrophic 02-11-07, 05:48 PM	I've been arguing this one for awhile now... Consider this convention mustering scenario: We have a module that includes APL 2-12. It's time for the slot, and people with a 9, a 9, a 10, and a 12 sit down. They average to 10, they play APL 10, everyone's happy. But then someone else sits down. He wishes to play his 2nd-level character. According to RPGA rules, he cannot be turned away from the table, as it's a convention that he paid for. The average suddenly becomes 8.4. This table is only allowed to play APL 8. The 2nd-level character has just ejected the 12th from the table. It is unfair to turn someone away because someone else of lower level decides they want to play. It further reduces play opportunities for those of us who have hit level 10 or so. It saddens me that the Circle perceives situations like this example to be a "problem" within the campaign. Mustering is difficult enough; why make it even moreso? -Matt
solbergb 02-11-07, 06:05 PM	Yeah well. In this case as a judge, I would first (in nearly any APL10 mod I've ever run) say "You WILL die if you play in this module at APL10. I'm not saying I'll try to kill you, I'm just saying it is almost impossible that you won't die. A level 2 character at a level 10 table will die from a casual attack from a monster, or being caught accidently in the area effect of something aimed at a real threat. This death will happen suddenly and without warning, as the bad guy does a perfectly normal offensive choice for that level. Your character is so weak a nusiance trap might kill them outright." If they still persist, I'll give examples. "A typical area effect at APL10 is from a EL12 or 13 caster...this means maximized fireballs (60 hp/30 if save) are on the table, as are finger of death spells with save DC's in the 20s, blasphemy, etc. A typical melee attack will do 20-30 points of damage on a hit, a full attack may do well over 100, and anything out there WILL be able to hit you easily, often with power attack full. Are you sure you really want to play at this table. That usually convinces the person not to play. Should the person insist. I'd encourage everyone to bring animals and I'd rule that the animals contributed enough to bring it to APL10, since we're also assumign the level 2 character is contributing to the EL, and a riding dog or warhorse is easily as tough as most L2 characters. Then I'd play it as written, pulling no punches. I've slain enough mounts, companions and similarly weak creatures accidently that I'm pretty certain the life expectancy of that level 2 is less than 3 encounters. Indeed, at the last APL8 mod I played, the riding dog one guy had lasted exactly 2 or 3 rounds of the first combat, and wasn't even being targeted...the PC had dismounted before the attack came in. Personally, I think the EL+3 rule should apply in the other direction too. If it did, I might be willing to concede EL+4 might be ok, because applying it in both directions constricts the options enough that EL+4 might be needed for mustering sometimes. With someone playing up though, bringing a warhorse per character (max EL's allowed in current draft rules) can usually fill in the gaps enough to keep at the desired APL. This is part of what makes it hard for a baby character to lower the APL. The other thing is the "6 player bumps +1 rule" - if the L2 is the 6th guy, it takes less to keep the APL on keel.
Mattastrophic 02-11-07, 06:29 PM	That usually convinces the person not to play. Should the person insist. That's the real problem. According to the RPGA, we cannot turn this character away. And according to the LGCS draft we have to turn the L12 away. No amount of riding dog padding is going to change the fact that the Circle is telling us we have to turn people away because they're too high-level while we have to allow the low-level to play. It's stupid. -Matt
solbergb 02-11-07, 06:30 PM	Actually...if you DO the warhorse padding you do NOT have to turn the higher level guy away. And I'd insist on warhorse padding BECAUSE you would othewise have to turn away the higher level guy. That's my point. The # of tables skewed by low level chars is a lot less than those by high level, because you can do artificial things to RAISE the APL, you just have no such remedy to LOWER it. As I said, I prefer a rule that prevents playing out of APL in both directions, but think that if done so, you need to widen what out of APL means a bit to help reduce the mustering problems.
indar 02-11-07, 06:30 PM	Another immediate concern is that MANY mid-level PCs are in Red Hand right now. They'll end up significantly higher, leaving a hole in the ability to muster. I know I have a 3 and a 10 available for regular play right now, My mid-level is going to be out of play for the rest of the year, and may end up near 10 himself.
solbergb 02-11-07, 06:34 PM	Yeah, Red Hand is significantly warping the 597 play scene. OTOH, there are a ton of 596-597 2-8 modules. Since they won't be played by the Red Hand characters, they will presumably be played by existing APL2-4 characters, and those chars will fill the gap for 598. There will be extra level 8-12 people in 598 but that isn't a bad thing. RHOD though is having a strange effect on mustering, because of its structure.
Mattastrophic 02-11-07, 06:34 PM	Actually...if you DO the riding dog padding you do NOT have to turn the higher level guy away. That's my point. The # of tables skewed by low level chars is a lot less than those by high level, because you can do artificial things to RAISE the APL, you just have no such remedy to LOWER it. And yes, I truly do agree with you. Though in practice, this rule may pan out to be much more painless than it seems, what I don't like is the concept of what the Circle is telling us to do. It shows that they are would rather ignore the perceived problem of higher-level characters "ruining the fun of others" than fix it. So they just issue a copout. No matter how confident the Circle is about how their decisions always lead to a growing number of players, that doesn't make the decision right. -Matt
solbergb 02-11-07, 06:38 PM	Actually, I really dislike chars that play up a lot because it warps the expected gold they should be getting. I was in favor of the most draconian approaches to that in past, although the current ruleset works fairly ok. I don't really see this problem in mustering described much. Where I play and the conventions I've traveled too, people seem to be adults and recognize that they have to be flexible. I sometimes change out the char I intended to play, but usually don't have to, and I have not ever seen a case where somebody HAD to play a character 4 over APL (and when I've seen it done, the table was generally only fun if the chars roleplayed with each other, or the mod had lots of noncombat stuff because the EL'd challenges were rarely challenges)
copper_wyrmling 02-11-07, 06:50 PM	I have not ever seen a case where somebody HAD to play a character 4 over APL (and when I've seen it done, the table was generally only fun if the chars roleplayed with each other, or the mod had lots of noncombat stuff because the EL'd challenges were rarely challenges) Soon after I moved to the States, when I went to my first (out-of-town) Bissel convention, I was in a situation where: -I wanted to play my L14 cleric if possible since it had become clear that she wasn't going to get a lot of play opportunities in my immediate area. -Some other people wanted to play a min-APL-10 mod that was retiring at the end of the year (this was a November con), but there were only three PCs in-tier for APL 10 (11+10+8 iirc), plus one who was willing to play up from L6. -Besides my cleric, my next-highest-level PC with TUs left was L4. So I played my cleric 14, and we had a lot of fun. In the first combat I just buffed everybody else, made sure they weren't in danger, and let them play (and eventually put brambles on my staff and went in to help, but only after doing the righteous wrath and recitation - rather more relaxed and less resource expenditure than the PC's normal playstyle). The second combat looked like it would be long and boring (lots and lots of smaller devils with nasty special attacks), so with the permission of the GM and the rest of the table, my cleric Holy Word'ed it. The other PCs still got to have some fun, sneaking around with Silence stones and Invisibility to stop the Holy Word from causing collateral damage ;) Then the final combat turned out to be an EL15 - a CR14 advanced cadaver collector with a swarm of shocker lizards. In that one, I have no idea how an ordinary APL 10 party was supposed to defeat it: my cleric pretty much soloed it while the rest of the party got the NPC prisoners out, she felt challenged (CR14 vs CR14 is a decently tough fight), and I'm pretty sure they were glad to have her along ;) That's the only time I've ever played more than three levels out of APL. It doesn't always have to be four hours of playing cheerleader for everybody but the high-level character.
The_Jester 02-11-07, 07:39 PM	I've been arguing this one for awhile now... Consider this convention mustering scenario: We have a module that includes APL 2-12. It's time for the slot, and people with a 9, a 9, a 10, and a 12 sit down. They average to 10, they play APL 10, everyone's happy. But then someone else sits down. He wishes to play his 2nd-level character. According to RPGA rules, he cannot be turned away from the table, as it's a convention that he paid for. The average suddenly becomes 8.4. This table is only allowed to play APL 8. The 2nd-level character has just ejected the 12th from the table. It is unfair to turn someone away because someone else of lower level decides they want to play. It further reduces play opportunities for those of us who have hit level 10 or so. It saddens me that the Circle perceives situations like this example to be a "problem" within the campaign. Mustering is difficult enough; why make it even moreso? That is so wildly improbably it's groan-worthy. While something similar probably has has happened in past it is such an unlikely occurrence that trying to write rules based around it does the game a disservice. You write rules for the common game and to accommodate the uncommon as best you can but you simply cannot write rules that will account for every conceivable possibility. In the above situation the APL2 player would have to be a rule-quoting masochist to risk putting his 2nd level character up against EL 10-11 threats that can knock him from full barbarian w/toughness to -10 dead in a single minimum-damage scratch. AND selfish enough to knowingly boot someone else from the table. Meanwhile, the rest of the table knows they're not operating at full strength and, and after the L2 bites in after the first AoE, they're going to be a table of 3. Best thing to do? Grab the L12, don't turn down the L2, but walk away and leave him alone at his con table and run the game somewhere else as a non-paidfor private session.
Swiftbrook 02-11-07, 07:44 PM	Britts wrapping up so this is quick. Mod APL 6 to 14 4 to 6 players most only have one character that can play mod APL comes out at 8 High character is a 12 RPGA rules says you can't send the player packing RPGA LGCS says he can't play Playing a level 1 or 2 is as good as dead I still don't like the APL +3 cap. -Swiftbrook
qstor 02-11-07, 08:43 PM	Britts wrapping up so this is quick. Mod APL 6 to 14 4 to 6 players most only have one character that can play mod APL comes out at 8 High character is a 12 RPGA rules says you can't send the player packing RPGA LGCS says he can't play Playing a level 1 or 2 is as good as dead I still don't like the APL +3 cap. -Swiftbrook I know the player. You should have insisted that he play ANOTHER PC. Mike
Mattastrophic 02-11-07, 09:20 PM	That is so wildly improbably it's groan-worthy. Except... these situations do happen. I can actually recall a few. -Matt
JamesMaissen 02-12-07, 12:20 AM	I don't really see this problem in mustering described much. Where I play and the conventions I've traveled too, people seem to be adults and recognize that they have to be flexible. Add in that many modules now will say things like 'important for members of such and such metaorg, etc' and understandably players will wish to abide by this. -James
solbergb 02-12-07, 12:42 AM	Well yeah. What I expect in those situations is to first accomodate those who need a certain char to play the mod, then try to find a way to have folks not taking an XP penalty. Usually you have 1-2 folks who have a deep need to play the particular character and a bunch of others who can be more flexible for whatever reason. If the 1 char who has the deep need is the one at APL+4, he should wait to play the mod till he has an appropriate table. Stupid mustering things do happen. I got a mail where the example went something like this: final slot in a convention, that had attendence hampered by snowstorm, so judge pool was a little thin and his slot had one no-show from a player. 9 players drop to 8. Two players ignored their commitment to play the slot and instead played it in a midnight madness. 8 players drop to 6 The judge ran late in the penultimate slot, no alternate was found, the slot was delayed. Two more gave up and left. 6 players drop to 4 No combination is possible where someone doesn't take half XP. The guy playing the APL+4 character did so because half xp/gp bothered him less than it bothered the others. What isn't mentioned is that the table could have gone off without the APL+4 character, it just would have meant a different member of the party would have been taking half XP. The table would have gone off if either the APL+4 person had a different "half xp" character or if one of the other 3 was an adult and accepted half XP (playing up or down) to make the table. Stupid situations happen. This one occurred because of an act of nature, last-round-of-con fatigue, two selfish players and the assigned judge unable to pace the previous module correctly (possibly due to having to run a complex module for brain-dead sleep-deprived end-of-convention playes) and running over. Even then, they got it to work and could have made it work under the current ruleset. The situation the rule prevents is the "high APL Bully", as described by one of the Naerie triad members in a Yahoo thread. Unlike the above situation, the high level char was forced on the table, rather than magnanimously taking half xp so everyone else could take full with approval of all involved. The result was a very ugly game including two people quitting LG entirely. You can actually say "No, you can't play your L15 guy at this L10 table. Pick another character or walk away."
clannagh 02-12-07, 12:47 AM	That is so wildly improbably it's groan-worthy. This exact scenario actually happened quite a bit at the Sydney Spring Revel Con where a lot of players moved region to Ratik from Perrenland. I heard about a number of tables that had problems with a table of mainly higher level ex-perrenland characters and one person insisting on playing his new level 2 "Ratik" character.
Mommy was an Orc 02-12-07, 04:04 PM	OTOH, there are a ton of 596-597 2-8 modules. Since they won't be played by the Red Hand characters, they will presumably be played by existing APL2-4 characters, and those chars will fill the gap for 598. There will be extra level 8-12 people in 598 but that isn't a bad thing. I think it depends on what happens with the two big Intro only modules coming out this year - Scourge of the Howling Horde and the Greyhawk Ruins mods. That's going to create probably a lot of 2-6 level characters this year, who can play those APL 2-8 mods.