All in all, I have found Eberron to be a great campaign setting. Forgotten Realms used to be my favorite, largely due to my introduction to it from the Baldur's Gate saga. After years of playing Forgotten Realms games in 2nd and 3.0 edition, I began to get sick of the monstrous power level of the setting, however.
The lack of a monstrous power level was one of the first things that caught my eye about Eberron when a friend told us about a game he had planned and wanted to run in this new setting none of us were familiar with. After flipping through the campaign guide, I became very interested in the setting, and read everything I could get my hands on about it, including most of the WoTC and Keith Baker articles in various places online.
We are a moderately conservative group when it comes to gaming style. We build PC's with a 32 point build, most NPC's with the default 15 14 13 12 10 8 (some that are meant to be a solo encounter get a more generous distribution, but it isn't common), stick very close to the recommended wealh by level for our PC's through calculated loot flow from the DM, and allow most 3.5 books in our games with the notable exception of Tome of Battle, Tome of Magic, and Incarnum stuff. Our 5 man/3 lady group is a mix of gamers/role-players, with only 2 hardcore min-maxers in the bunch.
We ended up playing that first Eberron game weekly for 2 years, from 1st to 18th level. Our DM ran a great game, but as we approached the 11th level marker, the feel of the game began to change. In the earlier stages, he did a great job of representing Eberron's overall power level - some key, moderate to high level NPCs, but in general anyone over 5th level being special. After that point, it seemed to us as though he simply abandoned that theme of Eberron, however. After the game had ended, we spoke to him about it, and he simply said that he failed to see a way to keep us challenged in the setting as it was written without accosting us with nothing but dragons, lords of dust outsiders, or the inspired.
Now that I am preparing to run my own game, I come across a similiar bridge. For those of you that have run long lasting games in Eberron, how did you manage high level PC's? Did you abandon the theme of the setting for simplicity as well? Stick to the few defined high-level non-human/demi-human adversaries in the setting? Discover satisfactory alternate courses?
My present thought is along these lines:
Once the PC's reach the level at which there are precious few human/demi-human NPC's of matching level, and mobs of 5th level elite soldiers are no longer threating, the PC's will pretty much have minor opposition in dealing with the 5 nations and neighboring kingdoms. If they want to do something, it will get done. Maybe that's how it should be, though. If your group of 13th level PC's has had major issues with Karrnath since the game began, maybe at that point if they want to storm the place, kill off all the Warlord's and leave Kaius out for the sun they should just be able to get away with it in terms of it being prevented. But that doesn't make it a good idea, and what they can't control is how the populace will react.
My thoughts are that maybe if high level PC's are capable of performing a feat without trouble after consulting the appropriate setting material, they shouldn't be prevented from doing it just because it's bad or should not be possible. Instead, focus on the reprecussions of actions, like them being banned from a country, or merchants refusing to barter with them for killing their beloved monarch. When they enter a tavern, all the patrons get up and leave. Karrnath going after their much more vulnerable loved ones and lower level allies instead. That sort of thing.
I welcome any thoughts on the matter.
Prevent PC's who should be capable due to setting balance, or out of DM "because I don't want that to happen."? Focus instead on reprecussions that are not necessarily combat oriented?
My ultimate goal is to find a way to handle such scenerios that do not cheapen the PC's rightly earned capabilities (even if the action itself is disruptive or foolish), while still finding a reasonable way within the setting to discourage or avenge such activity. I am curious how other GMs out their choose to handle such things.
My thoughts are that maybe if high level PC's are capable of performing a feat without trouble after consulting the appropriate setting material, they shouldn't be prevented from doing it just because it's bad or should not be possible. Instead, focus on the reprecussions of actions, like them being banned from a country, or merchants refusing to barter with them for killing their beloved monarch. When they enter a tavern, all the patrons get up and leave. Karrnath going after their much more vulnerable loved ones and lower level allies instead. That sort of thing.
This, this, a thousand times this!
It's very easy to forget this because the Player/DM relationship in D&D is often played out in the form of a fight to the death between PCs and NPCs, with the last man standing being the winner. When players begin to gain options that makes their killing of NPCs and death at their hands less of an issue, many DMs begin to scramble in search of another means by which to challenge them.
They tend to forget that there are many things in the world that cannot be satisfactorially dealt with simply with the death of a handful of people.
This is why when I design an adventure, the fundamental conflict is non-physical. It is always emotional, political, cultural, religious, economic, or metaphysical in nature. The violence is a manifestation and has its applications, but not the solution to the conflict in and of itself. PCs generally posssess fewer options that allow them to control/create/destroy ideas, and it is ideas that will change things here.
And of course, there are times when the players aren't interested in an emotional/political/cultural/religious/economic/metaphysical conflict. Sometimes they just want to kill something. I'm fine with that too. Sometimes I play GTA and instead of doing all the quests, I just run people over and shoot them. Sometimes when I play Halo, I skip the cutscenes so I can get to the part where I shotgun a hunter in the back.
Sometimes people need to indulge their vices. I've had plenty of games where the PCs were just flat out criminals- killing, stealing, pillaging, and being general terrors.
Rather than simply punish them, I made the fact that they were criminals central to the story. I started drawing on works like Pulp Fiction, Oceans 11, Repo the Genetic Opera, the Godfather, or Unforgiven to show that there's more to the world of killing and stealing than the mere act of killing and stealing.
Of course everything we're discussing applies to any game in any edition, or heck, to any story.
While it is true that high level PCs can absolutely reshape the face of Khorvaire (politically, economically, geographically) such actions would likely kick start The Last War again...which provides interesting plot points for how other nations would react to the actions of powerful PCs. Would they be viewed as heroes for exposing the vampire king? Or shunned as villains on the level of the Lord of Blades? Would Vol make her move to secure her power in Karrnath again?
(From a somewhat "video game" perspective Khorvaire is kind of the starting point. There are political ramifications, social and economic ties for the PCs and things can remain challenging until about 10th level. Then you kind of move on to Xendrik, and from there to Sarlona, and finally Argonesson for epic challenges. )
I have run one long campaign that took about two years to complete, which was a number of eberron adventures, interspersed with the Eyes of the Lich Queen module. The PCs ended the game at level 12 with an epic battle at the top of a draconic orrery with the PCs (plus their Airship and Dryad Artificer Cohort) vs. a Blue Dragon (into Bluespawn Godslayer) and a Dread Wraith.
While there is an Epilogue to the adventure and I plan on having the PCs act as recurring NPCs in any future Eberron games I run - that felt like a good stopping point for me. To really challenge them otherwise I would have needed to pull in some of the big players that you mention (Vol, Lord of Blades, Inspired, etc)
Now...I don't necessarily see anything *wrong* with stopping a campaign at that point if it's where you feel you lose that sweet spot - but as you point out in the PCs capabilities the nature of the campaign setting is going to change soon based on their actions.
Once a Fighter has become more capable than the best general on Khorvaire that can singlehandedly lock blades with the Warforged Despot, then the rest of Khorvaires issues start to seem....small.
And I think this is honestly intentional. Who cares what the Brelish Parliament is arguing about when you can create demiplanes for people, or travel to Syrania to go sky surfing with angels? As the PCs get stronger, their world view should become wider - maybe not even necessarily by choice. Other more powerful groups *should* start noticing that there is suddenly a wizard that destroyed the Karrnathi royal castle single handed.
But these are just a few of my thoughts. I've really enjoyed reading your post Lormyr and I enjoy your response as well Alex.
Alex_:
I agree with much of what you've said. In many ways the player/DM relationship is one of multiple significant facets, but several of these can often get left aside in what many consider the "core" of gaming - the conflict of DM scenerio vs. player resolution, or player instigated scenerio vs. DM NPC reaction.
Our group is a pretty good mix of role-player and gamer. Most of us are nicely balanced towards the middle - we require character driven personality, character growth, setting and NPC reaction and growth, engaging story, and memorable NPC's and plot. But we also love stabbing bad guys and jacking their stuff, tactical "must hold the line!" encounters, and planning assault of or defense of strongholds. For most of us, the game wouldn't be fun without both of those elements.
So that said, our group tends to avoid wanton destruction and juvenile antics simply by it's nature. But we are also the sorts that will follow through with an idea that the player knows is bad because it's exactly what the character would do given his experiences, knowledge, and emotional state. These sorts of situations tend to create our few instances in which we choose to ride out the opening of a can of whoop a$$ on the sort of scale that can be potentially disruptive to a story or setting. Our last DM after the one who ran our Eberron game was rather heavy handed (by my opinion anyhow), and I want to find creative and meaningful ways to continue to challenge my high level PC's with human and demi-human foes in a setting in which NPC's past level 10 are quite uncommon, without robbing them of their talents.
I'll give an example from our last game that I found very disappointing. One of our player's was a neutral aligned dread necromancer (this game was also in Eberron). His concept was that he had died, ended up in the bleak awfulness that is Dol'urrh, and got to experience first hand the soul numbing effects of the plane and all the awful outsiders that abuse and devour said souls. Thankfully for him, the plane was coterminus at the time, and he was fortunate enough to find a stray portal that led back to Eberron before his soul became fused with the plane. So once free, he did everything he could to avoid killing and sending souls back to Dol'urrh, while at the same time animating and restoring the souls (a matter of flavor to justify where the consciousness comes from the awaken undead spell) of everyone and everything he could to spare it the torment of Dol'urrh. His long term concept was to build a functional society of the dead "liberated" from Dol'urrh, and since no diety cared enough to spare their followers from the place, he would in effect, strive to be that regulator via judgement through undeath. A great concept the rest of us thought.
Well, the rest of our group loved our necromancer. We weren't about to stand idle by while those who disapproved of him tried to put a stop to his nercomancy. Clearly, this brought us into all kinds of conflict with the silver flame and the aerenal elves, as well as the blood of vol because of their significantly differing views on the purpose of undeath. At one defining moment, we were a level 8 and 9 group, and were assaulting the crimson monestary in Karrnath as retribution for actions by the high priest (and 8th level mummy cleric). Now, Malevenor is no slouch to be sure - but he's also not a match for a group of 7 that outlevel him either. Our DM did not think that we should be able to take on the crimson monestary though, so he "beafed" up Malevenor to atleast 13th level (as he was casting blasphemy spells at us), and also gave him a couple of dread wraith and greater shadow minions to protect him.
Needless to say, we got our butts kicked, but more importantly, we felt really cheated out of the capability we earned through 9 months of weekly play, and cheated out of a victory we felt we deserved due to exceptional planning and the nature of the Eberron setting.
Bofdm_:
I agree. I think most of us who have played higher level games, especially DMing them, realize how abruptly the balance of the game begins to rapidly distort after 10th level or so. Particularly between non-caster classes and caster classes. But the rift is all the more evident in a setting like Eberron, atleast on Khorvaire. As you have pointed out, pretty much all of the other continents are capable of being quite dangerous at any level of play.
I also agree with your perspective on organizations. Many of my past DMs got stuck in the mentality of "he's the king! ofcourse you can't kill him, he's the most powerful fighter in the kingdom!". I think that sort of mentality isn't very realistic, or very fun. I believe that if you choose a setting to run in, you should remain largely loyal to that setting. In the case of Eberron, if you remain loyal to the setting, it's very realistic that after a year or two or play there will be precious few individuals or organizations in the 5 nations or neighboring area that will be able to put a stop through physical confrontation any plan your PCs get into their head to execute. And a big part of me believes that's how it should be, if the player's have put in the time and had the fortune to survive long enough to achieve that state of personal power.
The dynamic of Khorvaire is also influencial and significant enough that the PC's lives can be made hell in other ways if their actions should ever warrant it. Picking a fight with a cult, or a single dragon of the chamber and it's immediate allies might be small scale enough to clean up the whole mess in a couple well-placed fell swoops. Killing a monarch, while very feesable as far as success in commiting the deed, is far more likely to have severe and lasting reprecussions of economic, political, and/or religious nature. While I generally try to avoid "un-fun" encounters in my DMing, in these sorts of situations where the NPCs can't put up a reasonable face to face battle, I might even consider the old rogue 5/assassin 1 with a triple crit hand axe and a couple of well selected and chugged potions creeping in your inn window at night for the coup de grace while you sleep scenerio. That will get most anyone not paranoid enough to sleep each night in a rope trick (a must for all troublemakers), and it's a very realistic reaction from a group of influencial folks that know they are seriously outgunned in a front on battle against a group of powerful troublemakers.
I suppose the meat of the dicussion is this: when it's ok for the PCs to throw their weight around, and if and when a line is crossed that should see those actions effectively blocked, and wether such a line exists at all?
Slightly off topic, I have heard good things about Eyes of the Lich Queen. What was your experience with it?
In regards to this example, there are a few different things I've seen DMs do in similar examples. While I agree that the players should feel confident in their abilities, assaulting the Crimson Monastery should be no simple task (though it sounds like you had a well planned pinpoint attack). Did your DM or the players know his capabilities out of game? One of the situations I've run into is that most prominent NPCs that are designed to provide a challenge for the PCs will level at the same time the party does to ensure they are a level appropriate challenge (often with the tagline from the DM of something along the lines of "What? Did you think they were just standing around filing papers rather than gathering xp themselves?")
But I completely understand how that can make the players feel cheated - that the high level they earned did not allow them to take out someone who was, by the standard write up, outmatched.
Which brings me to the second "trick" I've seen DMs use regarding NPCs - resources. Stupidly high amounts of resources. Even if a group of PCs decide to take on a prominent NPC, I'll use Kaius again cause what they hey I like the guy, they could probably take him in a one-on-one fight but if you're assaulting him in his royal castle you should expect significant magical traps and barriers as well as a number of intelligent undead minions that can come to his aid. While a strike force of high level PCs might be able to spear head a direct line to the throne room there is the issue of how long they can fight off waves of soldiers, casters, etc. The Dragonmarked Houses, high members in most religions, individual kingdoms all have stupid amounts of money that you can never really dream to have. Sure that jerk of a dragonmark noble that insulted you at the party and had you kicked out for wearing the wrong shoes in Lharvion? You could probably knock him out in a single punch. But that doesn't mean he isn't wearing a Wand of Lightning Bolt with a +3 Mythril Chain Shirt.
Clearly, this brought us into all kinds of conflict with the silver flame and the aerenal elves, as well as the blood of vol because of their significantly differing views on the purpose of undeath.
This Necromancer character sounds like he was a blast to RP with. I like the concept, and the distant nature of the gods in Eberron provides a good chance to play a character like this. Though I'm surprised that he apparently had trouble with the Blood of Vol regarding his methods as they are very similar in message.
To directly answer your last response rather than just comment on your response to Alex though...
Before I ran my game, I told my group of PCs out of game that most NPCs in the world are under 10th level, with levels in NPC classes and that this was just a part of the setting. For the most part they only met a few famous people (Larrian ir'Morgrave and Merrix d'Cannith come to mind - the entire party loved Merrix too, they have no idea what kind of things he has his hands in - it helps that Merrix was played off like Tony Stark) and they were either awed by their social status or their connections enough to not really try to challenge them. Drawing on the idea of having a contractor from the Campaign Setting, many of the endeavors the party underwent in my game were funded by Larrian and to a lesser extent Merrix.
One of the aspects of my game that I enjoyed the most was the standard Blood of Vol warrior. Complete with light crossbow and morningstar straight from the book. As my party continued adventuring and clashing with the forces of Vol I always kept the warriors with their basic stats - so while they were a challenge fighting a group of about 10 or so at 3rd-4th level, by the end of the game it was a Kill Bill type scenario of taking them down in waves, which I felt was a nice acknowledgement of how far their skill had come.
Ultimately the decision of When it is okay for the PCs to throw their weight around is how comfortable the DM is with the possibility of changing the face of the campaign setting. I don't think it's necessarily a terrible thing if the PCs through luck or skill manage to defeat a BBEG/powerful NPC that you had planned on having as a recurring character, but if you want to allow them to take out the head of the Crimson Monastery what sort of counterattack could you expect from Vol once she finds out what happened? That itself could be a bridge into having some of her 'personal guard' come looking for the PCs - assuming she would be insulted enough at having lost one of her powerful followers to do so.
There are a number of things in the world that are going to start changing at the start of my next Eberron game due to the actions of my previous party...here are a few of them I can think of off the top of my head.
1. One of the PCs has become a vigilante in Sharn under the code name Chill Wind
2. Another has a completely unique airship with a loyal crew and the ability to turn his ship into both a normal seafaring vessel and can actually turn it into a submarine thanks to the creative use of a few spells. He's become a terror across the Lhazaar Principalities as well as the diplomatic envoys of the Inspired.
3. The Kalashtar Cleric has started to clean up one of the poorer districts in Sharn but otherwise is kind of a traveling monk who masquerades as a follower of the Silver Flame, though he is actually a cleric of the Path of Light. His epilogue involved saving another character from the clutches of a Daelkyr, though suffering a mentally crippling illness in the process.
4. Another of the PCs has become the sidekick to Chill Wind
5. Cat, the changeling bard. Now this is the one PC that decided to throw me all kinds of curveballs. Every opportunity he had to mess with the status quo he took it. Originally the character was hired by Morgrave University to act as the publicist for the rest of the party - make them look good and by proxy make the university look good. Aside from being a bard full of awesome he was a gifted playwright, often getting his perform or profession skills into the 30s (mostly using action points).
By the end of the game his plays are the most popular new entertainment in Sharn, he makes some of his own wondrous items on the side that he sells on the black market, and using a favor from the Dragons of Argonesson (as a result of the end of Eyes of the Lich Queen) invented the first portable radio stone. (In that he can broadcast a signal that can be picked up and listened to via a select number of stones that can receive the signal)
As for the Eyes of the Lich Queen adventure, it's designed to go from 5th level to 10th.
The adventure starts with the hiring of the group by a man named Sur'kil to explore a temple in Q'Barra, then to the Lhazaar Principalities, to the prison island of Dreadhold then to a haunted island called Trebaz Sinara and finally to a dramatic confrontation on the shores of Argonesson.
All in all it's pretty well written, though some parts can drag on a little. Really the only complaint one might have is the tag for the party to actually continue the plot of the adventure hinges on them being cursed (with some benefits) tied to parts of the Draconic Prophecy and that if they don't figure out how to end it they'll die.
For the actual attack, we scried upon an item we had gifted Malevenor during our visit so that we could teleport right in ontop of him, blitz style. We had our second teleport ready to escape, as well as a pair of passwall scrolls incase we were dimensionally anchored or something and couldn't teleport away. That's when the DM decided to mix things up on us.
I agree that many NPCs do not sit idle by while the PCs adventure on. Some who are kept extremely busy, like city officials, kings, high priests, ect. likely have very little time to in which to advance their pesonal power in the way of leveling up (gaining influence certainly). Others, like the Lord of Blades, it's makes sense for them to advance during the course of a game if the DM feels it's appropriate. At the same time however, I strongly feel that should only be done for "iconic" characters in situations in which they will be playing a prominent role in the story as a patron, villain, or other obsticle/benefactor. And in this particular situation, it felt very artificial and very heavy handed from the DM in question.
The primary fued between our dread necromancer and the blood of vol was philosophical. Our necromancer pitied the undead, animating them only because it was (as he saw it) the lesser of evil vs. allowing their souls to fester on Dol'urrh. He also never animated anything against it's will, always using speak with dead before hand (clearly this wasn't an issue for beings of animal intelligence, and given the nature of Dol'urrh, most folks were all to willing to agree to be free of the place). Finally, he never turned any living creatures in undead, seeing that as cheating them of the chance to actually live and earn freedom from Dol'urrh's misery through leading a respectable life. He would also not "rescue" any souls that had earned their torment in Dol'urrh through atrocities (this was more of a case by case judgement on his part than simply not raising anyone who was evil, given Eberron's alignment relaxations). Saw what it came down to is in his eyes, the Blood of Vol animated the dead for power and personal profit from the experiences he had with them as much as they might have done it for more agreeable reasons.
He was a great character. Thankfully, our only religious character was a priest of the Traveller, so we had no conflict in that regard. Would have been real ugly real fast if we had had a paladin of the silver flame or something.
When I DM, I tend to build most of my major NPCs statically unless I am using a recurring villain. I primarily do this so that the PCs can look back later in the game at that badass wizard who could cast stoneskin when they are now themselves tossing cones of cold and feel like they've come a long way. I also use this as a deterrent from them successfully engaging those who I am not ready for them to engage on a story level yet. It tends to work pretty well in keeping my important NPCs safe until the right moment in the story, as well as allowing the PCs to feel satisfied with their progress. Although not always. . .I got a bad story about a 10th wizard, a well placed stunning fist from a 3rd level monk, and alot of experience and loot gained for the party. . .poor guy (ahem, me) never saw that coming.
I like what you are doing with your PCs from the last game. I tend to use old PCs alot in my games as well. It's especially fun for the player's when you have largely the same group.
You have all rasied good points in that players should be able to throw their weight around if they want to, but it will also have great ramifications for the world and for them. However I do feel that some of the NPC's are too weak, I mean, Vol is what.. 1500 years old? And supposed to be one of the most powerful necromancers in the world and she can't even cast 9th level spells. I dont think my players will ever face her, but I am making it known that they can't expect anything in the books to be the truth.
So this is my suggestion to you, let the powerlevel stay as it is if you want, but also make it clear that just because the book say Malevenor is only 8th level cleric, doesn't mean he will be a walkover. Increase his powerlevel in other ways, give him interesting abilities that are tied to that pyramid which is not connected to him being a mummy or cleric, but rather just the "manager" in the pyramid. Perhaps boosting his HP from a magical ritual or giving some spell like abilities that either alter the nature of the room or is just regular spells.
I, for one, will make a lot of use of the fact that Eberron is very high magic. Magic is their industry, so I think giving your lower-level NPCs great powers from something rooted in the place they are in, is a good way of challenging the high level group.
I'm also a great believer in being creative with the monsters and templates. I like to change it around so my photographic-memory-of-every-monster players gets surprised when they will meet a ghost at level 1 and be expected to 'kill' it
