This exercise has evolved since its beginning, and now revolves more and more about "making sense". Right now, everything kinda makes sense, except for skill scaling. A level 1(30) wizard and a 1(1) wizard still have roughly the same base arcana... which makes no sense.
What changes when you gain levels?
· Skills
· Attack bonuses
· Defenses
· Ability Scores
· You gain class levels, gaining:
· Feats
· Powers
· Class features or class feature improvements
· Hit Points
The idea is not to take the concept of levels out of the game, but to extract the mathematical need for level bonuses and all "math fixes" from the game, in addition to modifying the rules to allow PCs and NPCs of different levels to more easily have adventures together.
This is perfect if:
· Your game has shaky attendance
· You hate printing new character sheets every other level.
· You find unexplained half-level bonuses ridiculus.
· You look at levels as a measurment of how renown/deadly/powerful somone is, and not how high his AC is.
· You like mixing up levels of PCs, NPCs and Monsters
· If this is your deal, consider only removing half-level bonuses to attack rolls and monster's defenses, and don't read the rest of this post.
The balance of the game is intact, since we only removed the level bonuses mathematically.
Show
When you gain a level level all these numbers increase, but they mean nothing monsters and DCs also scale with level. We can easily remove these increases, for players, DCs and monsters alike. What actually happens is the players get the "illusion of progress", for every 2 levels the player's attributes increase by 1, but the monster's attributes by 2. What then happens is an arms race between players and monsters where players have to use most of their resources just to keep up. This means Expertise Feats, Increased Defenses and such have all become mandatory. A pointless increase of numbers that only means we have to spend reasources on something as stupid as math in a roleplaying game.
This is what we have decided to remove from the game to make sure players can focus on what's important, and forget all this math nonsense.
· Ability score increases
· all "half-level" increases
· Scaling attack bonuses of Expertise feats, and all feats that increase anything previously increased by half-level bonuses.
This is what we decided to modify in the purpose of reducing the gap between PCs of different levels and remove mondatory feats:
· Improved Defenses and Superior Defenses feats.
Modifications:
This is what we have decided to remove from the game to make sure players can focus on what's important, and forget all this math nonsense.
· Ability score increases
· all "half-level" increases
· Scaling attack bonuses of Expertise feats, and all feats that increase anything previously increased by half-level bonuses.
This is what we decided to modify in the purpose of reducing the gap between PCs of different levels and remove mondatory feats:
· Improved Defenses and Superior Defenses feats.
Modifications:
Show
Improved Defenses (replaces all improved defenses and superior defenses feats)
Benefit: You gain a +2 bonus to a non-AC defense of your choice.
Special: You can only take this feat once. If you meet the prerequisite of the Superior Defenses feat matching with the non-AC defense you chose, you gain the benefit of that feat.
Improved Defenses (replaces all improved defenses and superior defenses feats)
Benefit: You gain a +2 bonus to a non-AC defense of your choice.
Special: You can only take this feat once. If you meet the prerequisite of the Superior Defenses feat matching with the non-AC defense you chose, you gain the benefit of that feat.
I am likely to call upon this sort of structure for a future campaign, but I am going to continue my current campaign unchanged.
Skill advancement
Now skill advancement makes even less sense than before. Now characters can go from 1-30 without getting at all better in their traits. The 3.5 ranks system was more realistic, but 4e is simpler and we will keep it this way, for balance's sake. Although I never fully understood why a Pixie wizard, without magic, would have more chance of success of knocking down a steel door than a Dragonborn Brawler Fighter, just because the wizard is level 30 and the fighter level 1? It really makes no sense, at all. If I were making my own system, I'd find a way past this problem, but since I'm not I'll just leave things as they are.
I've reflected on this time and again. I think there are two keys to this in a narrative form.
One: Everything Scales by Level (even the wall you scaled at level 1)
Using this approach, you simply tell the players that skills scale and DCs scale. The DC to scale a wall is not always DC 8; it is maybe always Moderate DC. Then, outside factors like a slippery surface, rope, or bound hand add or subtract from that DC (or possibly add or subtract from the PCs modifier).
Thus, when the level 1 wizard has trouble scaling the town wall, it makes some sense that he hasn't got much physical prowess. The DM sets a moderate DC and the wizard makes an attempt.
Later, the level 10 wizard has returned to the same town and attempts to scale the wall. Over that period, he still never felt inclined to increase his strength nor his physical prowess; however, he has watched his allies climb, so he might have gained a few tips. He might think the DC will still be a low number, but the DM appropriately sets a moderate DC--for level 10--which is just about as much difficulty as it ever was.
Later still, the wizard again comes to the wall with intent to climb. He is not level 20 and has only increased his strength a tiny bit and not shown interest in physical prowess beyond a nive new pair of boots or gloves with an enchantment. He might think the wall will be the same DC, but the DM again appropriately sets a moderate DC--for level 20. The difficulty is still pretty nearly the same.
At the same time that the wizard is not really making any headway against the wall, he may have picked up a number of better choices from his arcane spells and/or rituals than attempting to climb. I imagine it might look like Star Trek's scene of Kirk climbing El Cap with Spock wearing rocket boots: the fighter has the physical prowess and training and interest in simply climbing the wall while the wizards floats nearby asking why he needs to go through all the troule and toil of climbing.
If the wizard made the attempt at level 2, 12, 22 he receives the same Moderate DC for his current level with all the penalties and bonuses from the surrounding circumstances. Thus, the treadmill illustrates he hasn't really made much growth at all.
Two: The Basketball Team
In this example, we take a look at a supposed group of friends who all play basketball. They got into the game in Middle School and began to show a natural inclination to unique field positions. This is like the group of adventurers that all seemed to be naturally inclined to unique class and role features and powers.
Let's imagine Middle School is level 0. The players behind these basketballers each tell a short tale of playing the game and meeting each other; they all make a pact to remain in the game of basketball until they are all pro ball players.
The group rises to Heroic Tier, er ... High School. They join the school team and begin training. In time they get picked up on the Jr Varsity team, then the Varsity team and through senior year, recruiters are showing interest.
Each basketballer gets picked up for Paragon Tier, er ... College. They get a scholarship to play for the college. They are getting some visibility on a national level as they play college basketball. Some are even getting minor groups of fans across the country. Pro athlete agents are licking their chops to get these guys into the NBA.
In time each gets drafted into a pro team. They are now playing pro ball, just as they promised each other, er... I mean, they are all gaining an Epic Destiny in Epic Tier.
Throughout the growth, they face other opposing team ball players that have made a similar rise through practice, natural talent, and coaching. It seems like every game is still about as much hustle and requires as much drive as any game before. They even find themselves getting into pick-up games outside the regular season that pits them against capable and skilled athletes who aren't playing pro.
Now, let's return to the Heroic Tier stats for a quick look. The group of friends each picked to specialize in different positions. Each was capable of covering each other's position to a small degree, but for the most part, they were specialized for an exclusive path of training. This is like the differences seen in skill modifiers and DCs. For a trained skill with a favorable modifier, the chance of success is great, while for an untrained skill or a trained skill without a favorable modifer, the chance of success is only fair to middling. If it is an untrained skill without a favorable modifier the chance of success is very low indeed.
Alright, let's look at Paragon Tier stats for a moment. The group might have taught each other some tricks. Multiclassing, items, and feats are starting to blur the lines of specialization, but are also improving those specializations. Each could cover the position of a teammate a bit better than before if needed. Also, using an untrained skill or a trained skill without a favorable modifer, even at hard DCs, the chance of success has improved--even if only slightly. In fact, the chance of success with an untrained, poor-modifer skill might not be so bad.
Lastly, by Epic Tier they've taught each other much more; they can function as a team or solo. They don't always have to keep each other around to cover a position. The chance of success has begun to really flatten now such that most skills can be put to use without an incredible fear of failure.
Most importantly to me is that even with a well trained skill and excellent modifier, the dice could simply go cold. We've all seen pro-athletes that drop the ball, trip, strike out.
From these two examples, I would say to players that the growth doesn't mean that a PC can always expect that a DC 8 lock will remain a DC 8 lock every time it is encountered. It means that bluffing the king at level 1 for a hard DC will probably still require a hard DC at level 21. But, those levels do indicate you have more options for using powers, applying benefits of items, knowledge, reputation, friendships, powers, and rituals which just might avoid a dice roll altogether.
And after alll of that, I don't see why the level needs to provide a +anything while the DC gains a +anything. Why not simply keep the numbers mostly the same regardless of level, yet still offer more optins for players to overcome an obstacle without resorting to dice.
Although I never fully understood why a Pixie wizard, without magic, would have more chance of success of knocking down a steel door than a Dragonborn Brawler Fighter, just because the wizard is level 30 and the fighter level 1?
Are you seriously wondering why an Archmage, Demigod, Archlich, or Avatar might be better at opening a door then a starting hero? It doesn't sound so odd to me...
A level 30 character isn't "a Wizard", he's practically a Deity. Would you wonder why a Deity is better at opening doors then a mortal?
I use a level light system for my games, though the system has evolved to such a point that it is no longer even D&D I will list the initial rules that we used here that my group absalutaly loved.
Level no longer adds 1/2 level anywhere.
Skils don't gain level bonus nor do DC. wal A will have DC x as long as the wall remains the same. Players gained +1 to all skills each teir, they also could take skill focus feats to further represent there training in particular skills. This made such feats usefull and made sence. why should wall A have a higher DC simply becouse character is higher lv. Just was dumb to increase both and added annoying math changes that had literaly no effect.
Attack and defence, this was anouther change and one we though long and hard about. we devided attack and defences into difrent types. here is a list of those types and a short description about them
Natural - Natural ability is one way attack and defence could be increased with levels and is represented by increasing the relivent stats.
Trained - Trained is anouther way, this is represented by feats. We changed the to hit and defence feats to not scale. Defence feats add +2 to a particular type of defence -AC-reflex-fort-will. And attack feats add +1 to attacks of the chosen type -Light blade rods ect. defence feats could be taken 3 times each and attack 5 times each for a total of +5 to hit and +6 to each defence (could take 5 rod and 5 light blade if desired)
Gear - Gear we prety much left the same meaning that gear effected attack and defence by up to +5
Passive- this is the last of the effects to attack and defence, passive bonus was only +2 per teir for a total of +4 to attack and +4 to all defences. This represented the increase in overall power, even a character who never increased there ability activly would have picked up at least a little from all there adventuring, as to say a demi god who never even thought of tring to avoid being hit would still be slightly harder to hit.
So total we had stats increase pluss trained of up to +5 attack +6 defence pluss gear of up to +5 attack/defence pluss passive of up to +4 attack and defence
for a total varience of Stat increases +14 attack +15 defence.
This means a lvl 1 character could gain +14 to hit if he never increased his stats and +15 to all defences if he never increased his stats. a sizable difrence but not a surmounting one.
For monsters this means monsters gained 1/2 lvl to all attacks and defences to count for these pluss gain +2 to teir.
so to hit and defence made a lot more sence to us and maintained the exact same desired effect of scaling slightly and being very balenced without the level bonus, this allowed for a larger varience in character levels without disrupting the overall feal and advantage of leveling.
Most other factors remained untouched by this set up, We did grant more feats then we did before but I forget exactly what we did I think we granted a feat every level to allow characters to take skil focus feats and to hit and defence feats but has ben a while since we used this system as like Is aid we adventualy took it further and designed out own game system based upon similar ideas.
Although I never fully understood why a Pixie wizard, without magic, would have more chance of success of knocking down a steel door than a Dragonborn Brawler Fighter, just because the wizard is level 30 and the fighter level 1?
Are you seriously wondering why an Archmage, Demigod, Archlich, or Avatar might be better at opening a door then a starting hero? It doesn't sound so odd to me...
A level 30 character isn't "a Wizard", he's practically a Deity. Would you wonder why a Deity is better at opening doors then a mortal?
touché
Character Creation Rules: All characters are effectively level 1 permanently. Whenever you level up, the following game elements do not increase in value:
- attack rolls (no half level benefit)
- defenses (no half level benefit)
- skill modifiers (no half level benefit)
- ability modifiers (no half level benefit)
- ability scores (does not increase as time goes on)
- hit points (remove all the Hit Points per Level Gained entries of all classes)
In addition, all game elements that increase at certain level or tier intervals (e.g. Weapon Expertise, Weapon Focus) do not increase in value, although certain game elements -- particularly those whose benefits equal that of your level, like for instance a game element that is worded similarly to "you deal damage equal to your level", or "you gain temporary hit points equal to your level" -- are exceptions to this rule.
As a result of this, it is highly recommended that the DM stick to using just the level 1 DC table (8 Easy, 13 Moderate, 19 Hard) for a significant portion of the game, perhaps with a bonus/penalty based on certain situations (e.g. level 30 Planeshaper opening a door vs. level 1 Wizard opening a door, or something to that degree).
Monster Creation Rules: Remove all the level modifiers for monster creation, specifically for hit points, attack rolls, skill checks and defenses. It is highly recommended that when determining damage rolls, the DM stick to the first 10 entries of the new damage table for monsters.
You still advance in your class via levels, so you still get new powers, feats, paragon paths, epic destinies etc. Since there is no good way of preventing damage scaling you also advance in HP (think of it as EFFECTIVE hit points instead of just general toughness. For example, psions might think of half their hit points as the durability of their "psionic shield" that enemies have to pierce before doing them any real physical harm.).
@ chaosfang
Hm.. removing bonuses to defenses, attacks and damage from feats is something I myself would not do, but I am interested in what effect it would have. 4e does seem to have to many "mandatory" feats, so taking stuff like expertise, improved defenses and improved initative out of the game is essentially giving some characters from one to five free feat slots to put something more focused on roleplay than just having the right numbers to make the game more fun.
Please compile a list of feats/feat benefits you'd remove from the game :D
Why remove ability score increases? I think that is the most logical of all over-time increases
problem with that is there is to little benifit to leveling up and players like the feal of leveling up, so you basicaly need to grant them the feal of being stronger without making lower level monsters and characters useless.
To replace these feats, I think characters should get a +1 or +2 bonus to everything that should scale with leve at level 11 and 21.
Why remove ability score increases? I think that is the most logical of all over-time increases
My train of thought was that the exercise pertained to removing D&D's level-dependence, while allowing players to retain a "feel" of progress. The most logical assumption is that instead of PCs progressing via levels, PCs instead progress via other venues or means. As games in general tend to grant more powerful items and additional features -- often attached to levels -- along with significant story progression, to help give the feeling of progress, in a level-less system we'd end up focusing on those additional benefits, instead of the now-absent levels.
Since there's no actual math to fix -- since same-level enemies will always be hit roughly 50% of the time, seeing as you're always level 1 anyway -- I see little reason to increase ability scores unless you remove the effect of ability scores on attack rolls at least.
At its simplest, without levels to actually gauge our characters, the alternative methods of progression would be
* items -- specifically Grandmaster Training, Divine Boons and other non-math fix bonuses, which I would highly recommend over +3 or higher weaponry and protective gear.
* story -- benefits that may or may not have mechanical bonuses for the party (like infamy or respect, land ownership or what not).
The system I proposed aims to grant the third method of progression -- additional features, such as powers -- without actually increasing the character's level, since again we're talking about a system without levels.
Enhancement bonuses are still here (or inherent enhancement bonuses, if that's your thing), so these things do scale, but they do not give the illusion of success (like these level bonuses and math fixes) nor do they take up feats that could be used for interesting stuff like Fey Cantrip or other flavourful feats.
Imma gonna go ahead and fix my first post (in blue, of course ;) )
And yes, since the feats aren't as mandatory as before, you could play a character from 1 (1) to 1 (30) with mostly flavorful feats and still be able to keep up with the rest of the group ;)The only class that still doesn't get fixed in spite of all this would be the Binder, but I never really was a fan of WotC's really shoddy attempt to capitalize on the potential to make a controller out of the Warlock (I might even end up making a homebrew class that I'd swap in if someone on my table wanted to play Binder).
What about 5-10 HP for each inherent bonus for monsters, depending on monster role (artillery,lure,brute etc.)?
What did I miss? What's up with the Binder?
When you read up on the Binder, and try to make one, then try to build the exact same concept using the regular Warlock, suffice to say that the Warlock does a better job at being a Binder than a Binder. Specifically because Binders tend to be ranged controllers, whose class features trigger when you reduce an enemy to 0 HP, or when an enemy adjacent to you is reduced to 0 HP.
A bit of conundrum that, and apparently the solution is to overhaul the class itself, as no system can apparently fix the Binder the way it's written.
This "addon" does require a lot of custmizing on behalf of the DM. Mainly about damage scaling. Does sneak attack still scale, and other damage-increasers? Should we make monsters scale HP along with these features, or just not make these features scale... If if they don't scale weapons still and arms slots still increase damage...
What about 5-10 HP for each inherent bonus for monsters, depending on monster role (artillery,lure,brute etc.)?
It's up to you whether or not Sneak Attack or other class features actually scale, since the only means for the DM to counteract the increase in damage is to increase the monsters' hit points, be it by increasing the monsters' level, turning the monsters into Elites/Solos, or raising the monsters' CON score; there's no actual suggested CON score per level, so it's actually quite legal to make a 100 CON level 1 Brute, which would grant him 120 HP, plenty of HP for Sneak Attack and other damage increasers to eat through.
As monsters would likely end up in the level 1 ~ 5 range, with abilities being the distinguishing factor between them -- save perhaps for deities and creatures you would want to establish as nigh-unkillable [then have a plot device reduce their HP, defenses and damage to level 1 when needed] -- the HP and damage factor may need some play-by-ear tweaking, a.k.a. playtesting
Thanks in advance! :D
About this races of numbers, there are two things you can do:
· Take out all leveling bonuses
or
· Ask your DM to make sure the monsters are created with the party in mind and not some "standard ruleset". This means the players can still use the online builder and the DM can use all offical 4e stuff without having to change any numbers.
As I said before, this levelessness is just an excercise, made for those with the itch to use something custom, and not something everybody should use. This is something only experienced DMs should consider using (especially those that have ongoing public events).
Can somone, with more experience with the upper tiers, give the stereotypical stats of a level 30 monster, 1 standard, 1 elite and 1 solo. And then the same with a level 30 player, one with magic items, but no feats, and one with the feats (expertise, improved defenses)?
Thanks in advance! :D
For the monsters, all you have to do is look up either the DMG or the Monster Vault or equivalent ;) Level 30 Brute with 25 CON is 1 HP Minion, 335 HP Standard, 670 HP Elite, 1092 HP Solo. Defenses would likely be around 43, while attack bonuses are often +35 to hit.
For PCs it's a bit trickier, but the basic defense-boosting feats would grant you, at most, +4 to a single defense or +3 to all Non-AC defenses, and typically AC defenses are boosted by around +2 with feats (feat bonus, shield bonus). Keeping a +16 masterwork plate armor, +2 heavy shield, +1 plate specialization, +15 half level, and +6 enhancement bonus in mind, that's 50 AC at level 30. NADs are typically far lower than 50 at level 30 -- sometimes barely reaching 40 at level 30 -- although there are certain builds that go beyond 50 NADs (certain classes even beat 50 AC).
I wanted to comment on a few things though:
Ability Score increases:
I am playing a brand new level 1 (1) wizard.
You are playing Gandalf the Grey, after he has personally re-summoned Sauron and killed him, just for the fun of it. (Level 1 (30)).
Hell yes I think you should be allowed to hit 20% more often because you have Int 28 and I have Int 20.
Will that make it harder to balance things in combat? Probably - but seriously, it's a difference between a brand new hero and an immortal multiverse shaper who's about to become the greater God of Magic. There should be a difference. And there should still be an extremely pressing reason as to why my wizard and yours are both travelling together, let alone expecting to have approximately the same chance of hitting.
Scaling Feats:
Leave them in. See above reasoning: A level 1 (15) fighter should hit more often than a level 1 (1) fighter. The difference from stats will be +2, the difference from scaling feats will be .. +1. The difference from enhancements will be +3. The difference from miscellaneous sources will be +1. Thus the level 1 (15) fighter will hit 35% more often; which is hugely significant, but the lower level fighter CAN still hit, even with everything stacked against him - and, as above, there should be a gosh-darn good reason why Bruce Lee and my brother Jim are adventuring together. The single biggest chunk (and almost half of it) is from an item, and as mentioned, Bruce Lee can easily hand my brother Jim his spare +2 longsword that he no longer wields (not that Bruce Lee would ever use a longsword, but no matter), and the difference drops to only 25%.
Hit Points:
Keep base hp as a level 1 character.
Any type of scaling source, let it scale. So you get 30 THP (as a level (30) wizard), but you only have 25 hp (as a level 1 wizard) - no problem; you're a demigod, you SHOULD have more survivability than a level 1 character. It's just suddenly actually significantly noticeable. (Note: This means toughness would scale, and suddenly that feat would actually be AMAZING by all standards, instead of a piece of junk that a melee ranger gets to have.)
Monster Attack/Defence: Drop the half level, but no more. Since we didn't take out any other scaling thing, we end up with numbers that are about right, but if you want to tweak it a little to be lower to give that level 1 (1) person a chance, I don't mind.
Everything above this point is my opinion, and basically comes from the fact that I (as DM and player) WANT a noticeable difference between characters who are wildly different levels of experience, even if level and experience are tossed out the window; but I can accept that we could drop all such scaling math and make everyone simply level 1.
Now the only real problem, and the only part of the arms race, and the part that I did not see any true solution to, although it was mentioned in passing:
Scaling monster hp, damage and PC damage.
PC's (especially strikers) are designed to increase their damage output, often by huge amounts. We already have optimized PC's who can kill at-level monsters at-will. Most of this damage comes from: Feats, and items. Neither of these are being taken out of the system yet (things like Called Shot, or expanded crit ranges; the scaling feats that grant a feat bonus (like weapon focus) are probably the worst feats for increasing damage, and so even if you kill the scaling, you really haven't impacted the characters actually damage at all, in absolute terms.)
So it would seem that you need to scale monster HP almost as much as normal. Perhaps (if you take out all scaling, including ability scores), you MIGHT half the hp, but even then, that would probably result in PC's completely wiping high level monsters out, without any effort. Large disparity in party 'levels' will also lead to absolutely ridiculous imbalances in the party, far FAR worse than any possible differences in hit rates. At the most extreme, I can see an optimized level 30 character hitting 90% more often than a level 1 character with complete feat scaling as I propose above (which means the high level character hits 10 times for every 1 hit the low level character gets). However, PC damage will be more like: Level 1 striker hits for 15 damage. Level 30 striker hits 3 times for 80 damage each. That's 1600% more damage. And that's NOT the limit of optimization, unlike with hitting. So with PC damage we realize that a high level character can literally be doing the damage (regardless of hit rates, just purely comparing damage assuming they both hit all the time) of 17 low level characters (or more), if that's his shtick, and that will be extremely obvious and not-fun.
On the flip side, monster damage becomes even MORE tricky than PC damage. If I fight a kobold, and then the next day I fight Surtur, I'd like to feel that the Lord of Fire Giants is going to do more damage. But since we're not scaling PC hp (at least not much, even in my proposed variation), Surtur clearly can't do as much damage as he used to, or he'll one shot any PC. So do we have Surtur be the equivalent of a kobold? Or do we have Surtur slaughter anything he so much as breathes on?
I don't think there's any possible easy fix for monster damage. If you do take out PC hp scaling completely as Chaosfang suggests (but which I am opposed to), then the obvious solution is that ALL monsters are changed to level 1 (or 2 or 3 or 4 or 5) damage expressions.
But I don't like that, for the same reasons that I propose that scaling bonuses remain with this system. Surtur really should be stronger than a kobold.
So my suggestion is that all monsters do damage equal to: (their original damage expression + level 1 damage expression)/2. Basically cut the damage increase in half. Now Surtur still does far more damage than a kobold, but not nearly as much as he used to.
Why? If we keep scaling hp sources in (not including hp scaling from gaining levels - that is one thing that I agree should not be kept in), then we see that level 1 (30) character who is decked out for survivability, can achieve as much as, oh, 80 hp (including temp hp); which is enough to (barely) survive a hit or 2 from our modified level 30 monster. But a level 1 (1) character will be shredded like so much cheese, as he should be (from a roleplaying point of view).
This would also change the dynamics of the system hugely; high level characters would be EXTREMELY afraid of high level monsters. Even mid level monsters would be scary. I think (with a little tweaking and playtesting), this would actually result in a system far closer to dungeon delves from original d&d (and movies). When adventuring, you go after tried and tested humanoid monsters; and they will be low level (even if you're high level) - and if there are lots of them, they WILL pose a threat. Heroic monsters will become bread and butter, at all levels; paragon monsters will become truly terrifying things. And epic monsters are challenges that only the most prepared adventurers will go after, because adventurers are simply not built of the same stuff as monsters. A human, no matter how awesome, or close to becoming a demigod, is NOT physically equivalent to an eight hundred foot tall Elder Evil made of the very mists of the Eternal Flame from the great Beyond. If the human does happen to be on the doorstep of divinity, and has some great allies, and some great planning, then PERHAPS they can fight such an Elder Evil.
The arms race completely disappears; to fight an high level monster requires foresight and planning - it requires roleplaying. If the party does well, they are prepared for a totally one sided fight (and not the parties side). If the party doesn't bother, they die.
Bringing along level 1 (1) characters to a level 1 (30) fight is still utterly ludicrous. But bringing level 1 (1) characters to a level 1 (10) fight isn't; nor is bringing level 1 (21) characters to a level 1 (30) fight; which, under the normal system, WOULD be a ludicrous proposition.
In the end, I am loving this discussion, and the theory that comes from it. If we can come up with a satisfactory answer to monster and PC damage, I will playtest this as soon as I can. But while I'm willing to deal with complicated math-fixes for monster damage, I don't know if there is a good answer to monster damage; and PC damage imbalances between party members of different levels also leaves me completely clueless as to how to propose a solution.
I think taking a lot of the math scaling out is a good idea, 1/2 lvl needs not be applied to anything but HP and damage scaling should remain and some to hit scaling around 15 -20 difrence with feats and junk betwean lv 1 and lv 30, this does allow a huge difrence in players level and still be usefull but keaps the feal, so maybe new characters start out like 6 LV behind the rest of the party or even as much as 10 LV behind but LV twice as fast so they can catch up which condition that if they miss a game they don't gain extra XP untill they make 2 games in a row again
something like this is for those public games so they don't get all the benifit.
though honestly could start them at lvl but they don't get any gear since the lack of gear alone will make them have a notable difrence and if they fall behind from not showing then that should be find since level has less of a impact
**********************
so in short I personaly say that hp and damage realy needs to scale in some way, even if it's minor, pluss powers take damage scaling into concideration so high level encounter and daily powers are usualy notably stronger and more damaging then lower lvl ones pluss 3D12 damage with keaping lvl 1 hp would always be devistating let alone 5D12 that some powers give
Nelphine, I have a wall of text for you, I'll post it later tonight or tomorrow xD
Do I understand correctly that improving stats, skills, and feats is replacing leveling up? Or have I missed the whole point.
and that the desired effect is to have levels grant small power increases mainly to damage and hp whil modifing to hit and skills to a lesser degree
so attack bonus , skills, inititive, and most other variables besides hp and damage would only go up with stats gear and feats.
thus allowing a charcater of much lower lvl to still effectivly travel with the group.
Level would grant new feats, new abilities and hp with ocational stat increases as normal.
think there is a few difrent veiws on how to go about it but the one agreed upon thing is that 1/2 level should be removed.
and that the desired effect is to have levels grant small power increases mainly to damage and hp whil modifing to hit and skills to a lesser degree
so attack bonus , skills, inititive, and most other variables besides hp and damage would only go up with stats gear and feats.
thus allowing a charcater of much lower lvl to still effectivly travel with the group.
Level would grant new feats, new abilities and hp with ocational stat increases as normal.
Not a bad idea
To make it easier on the DM and structure, you basically remove the half-level bonus and keep everything else. Should work seamlessly in playtest, at least theoretically - - - - -
In the freeze-PC-level scenario, I'm thinking that monsters wouldn't scale as much (1 ~ 10 basically, if the PCs are level 1), and you utilize the minion-standard-elite-solo determinants more often... maybe something like level 1 ~ 4 monsters in normal games would be level 1 minion ~ solo in this setup, level 5 ~ 9 monsters in normal games would be level 2 minion ~ solo in this setup, and so on. So a level 35 Lolth normally would be a level 10 solo, having:
468 HP
26 AC , 21 Fort, 24 Ref, 24 Will
Initiative +21
Perception +19
Scourge would be +15 vs. AC, 2d4+8 damage, with Effect: the target takes ongoing 10 damage (save ends).
Among other necessary adjustments. That way a Kobold would still be far less threatening than a deity, and yet the deity doesn't go a-stomping the party with just one hit and impossible to be harmed with stuff that doesn't involve miss damage.
It's a bit of a stretch really, but it's not impossible ;)
still means the pc demigods are no stronger then the pc aprentice which seams realy wrong that a kobold can take a demi god down as easily as they can a aprentice
PC Demigod with +5 weaponry, +5 armor, Toughness, Improved Defenses, Weapon Expertise, damage reduction and several other feats, powers, and items, going down as easily as the level 1 apprentice who has just 1-2 feats and mundane equipment (or at best +3 equipment if the PC Demigod was benevolent enough to give the apprentice his discarded or old equipment), especially given how Demigods and other epic destinies have means to shrug off death 1/day?
Let's see that level 1 Kobold with +5 vs. AC take down the level 1 Wizard who has Shield, 24 AC [10 + Unarmored Agility + 20 INT + 5 enhancement bonus + staff of defense + defensive staff], 29 HP [Toughness, and maybe more, if the DM grants the Wizard an item that increases maxHP], and tempHP/damage reduction from stuff like Virtue, as easily as a level 1 Wizard who has 18 AC [10 + Unarmored Agility + 20 INT + staff of defense] and 24 HP.
EDIT: Aside from "it's easy to emulate increasing HP via equippable items", oftentimes in shooter games like Half-Life and Doom, you'd have both Armor and HP-recovering items along the way -- Potions of Cure Light Wounds and the like from Mordenkainen's Magical Emporium could help stretch out the party's day, and other means of granting tempHP and surgeless HP might be in order. And I'm thinking that the very idea of the freeze-level scenario is that, unlike the remove-half-level-bonus scenario, even the most feeble threats will always be threats, minions would have to be dealt with very quickly, and the importance of teamwork and strategy/stealth would be key to survival.
In my personal opinion, with scaling HP and feats, the gap between apprentice and demigod would be large enough to beg the question, "why not just stick to the default setting?"
(wizard at level 1 has 16 con, wizard at level 29 has toughness, the epic amulet that grants higher max hp, and an ability that grants thp based on level)
Freeze at level 1 scenario:
Level 1: 26 hp
level 29: 51 hp, 1 thp
Remove half level bonus scenario (as I envision it) with monster hp scaling, and pc bonus hp scaling, and stat scaling, assuming con was increased 8 times:
level 1: 26 hp
level 29: 69 hp, 29 thp
note there's not a HUGE difference; in fact the big difference comes from the difference in thp, which may be a rechargeable ability - I emphasize this because if you DO have a rechargeable source of thp, then in the freeze scenario it's completely useless; but in my scenario it's actually a very powerful ability.
also note:
in the freeze scenario, the level 29 wizard has exactly 100% more hp than the level 1 wizard. Thus a level 1 kobold only needs to hit the level 29 wizard twice as many times to take him, which is not actually unlikely, even given the 6 higher ac + immediates, so due to luck a level 1 kobold pack is almost as big a threat to the level 29 wizard as to the level 1 wizard. This also means that you have a VERY limited range with which to scale monster damage.
in the partial scaling scenario, the level 29 wizard has about 300% more hp than the level 1 wizard; which means level 1 kobolds are not a threat based on complete luck, but still do pose a notiecable threat in terms of daily resources - it also means if you follow the guidelines for paragon/epic tier minions in DMG2 (where you get 5 or 6 minions per standard respectively instead of 4), you aren't as likely to cause an auto TPK. And finally the damage range monsters can choose from can be somewhat higher - and if your party actually goes in for thp based on level, then the DM will actually have a larger range to choose monster damage from.
As a final comment: I think the difference here (compared to the 191 hp a standard level 29 wizard would have based on my assumptions) is still significant, but it grants the dm more leeway to make mistakes when deciding on monster damage than the freeze scenario does.
However, I'm still not sure how to decide on monster damage, in either scenario.
If you could come up with a hard and fast rule for monster damage with the freeze scenario, I would happily agree to the freeze scenario; without such a rule, I think the extra leeway from partial scaling will make the transition far smoother, for any DM who wanted to try these ideas out (I also think that due to that extra leeway, it will probably be easier to find a hard and fast rule for monster damage based on partial scaling instead of complete freeze).
Edit: As a note, one reason I want the partial scaling in, especially on THP based on level, is to make as many sources of THP viable as possible, since due to the extremely low life of the party, THP will become far more useful than normal - so cutting out any of those resources seems like a bad idea. It also allows for slightly more variance in healing surge values between levels, which I think is nice as a subtle indication of your higher experience.
Regarding non-scaling HP:
At level 1(1) with non-scaling HP I can essentiall only make encounters at evel n+0 to n+x where x>0. However, if I freeze the group at level 4 with half level bonuses and level 4 HP, I can have encounters from n-3 to n+x where x>0. This gives me much more control over the difficulty of the encounter.
It's true though that monster's will scale alongside the party somewhat, but will most likely stay within the 1-10 range.
Also, if we think about damage in percentages, at level one where a character might only have 20 hp I can only take him down to HP dividable by 20. That is the PC can never have 5/40 HP left, the steps in damage are much larger percantace wise. Also, the PC would only be able to take 20 hits at most before being brought to 0 HP without healing. This is why I like the 60+ HP of higher levels.
Regarding Scaling HP:
I think as long as a demigod's attacks can one-shot an apprentice, and an apprentice can merely scratch the skin of a demigod be pretty accurate considering their difference in power. A kobold dealing 1d6+3 as a melee basic attack will seem like a poor excuse for a fighter to a demigod, since the demigod does have th HP of a level 30 hero.
This also means that all HP-related effects that scale will scale "+ your level" where level is "the number of times your hit points have increased via your class.
Regarding scaling HP, mixed with this experiment, aka "The Compramise":
I think classes gain 4 to 6 HP-per-level. Why not half the amount of hit points gained per level? This means that characters within the same tier can easiliy battle the same monsters (The HP difference between level 1 and level 10 would be roughly 20-40 HP). This means scaling is slower, and this experiment still makes sense. A Demigod is still a lot more powerful than an apprentice, and he should be.
What I'm not sure of: If PC HP scaling is reduced by 50%, how is PC damage scaling? Well... does it matter? As long as the DM uses new numbers for dominating effects, a PC's damage output and a PC's healthpool rarely connect.
If you see a problem with this last bit, please help me fix it.
Nelphine: I completely forgot your wall of text. I think it's probably too late now, but I'll post it anyways ^^
To emphasize, our goal is:
1 Remove unnessesary math from the game. Usually when a PC's number's get higher, so does the monster's number's. This means that the PC didn't actually gain anything, he just feels like he did.
2 To allow characters level at their own speed, even through poor attendancy, without it affecting the game to much. This means a level 1 character and a level 8 character should be able to fight in the same combat.
3 To minimize printing. ^^
I love the big post, and it would be awesome to try this levelness out, to playtest. I personally won't, since I like to be able to use the builder and official WOTC stuff without having to reconfigure the numbers. If you could help us with the damage/hp dilemma we would be most thankful. Now, to the response!
I'm not 100% I follow everything in this thread, but I do like the general idea behind it. Edit: And apparently
I am playing a brand new level 1 (1) wizard.
You are playing Gandalf the Grey, after he has personally re-summoned Sauron and killed him, just for the fun of it. (Level 1 (30)).
Hell yes I think you should be allowed to hit 20% more often because you have Int 28 and I have Int 20.
Will that make it harder to balance things in combat? Probably - but seriously, it's a difference between a brand new hero and an immortal multiverse shaper who's about to become the greater God of Magic. There should be a difference. And there should still be an extremely pressing reason as to why my wizard and yours are both travelling together, let alone expecting to have approximately the same chance of hitting.
Gandalf vs. The Apprentice:
Personally, I judge a wizard by:
· The size of his fireballs
· their epic destinies.
Seriously, have you SEEN some of the EDs? It's pretty clear which one is gandalf and which one is the Apprentice if Gandalf has is ED on.
Would it suffice if damage/HP scaled at least somewhat during the 30 leves of gameplay? That would make the demigod much more powerful than your measly wizard. Power isn't measured in to-hit, but the size of the impact/buff.
Scaling Feats:
Leave them in. See above reasoning: A level 1 (15) fighter should hit more often than a level 1 (1) fighter. The difference from stats will be +2, the difference from scaling feats will be .. +1. The difference from enhancements will be +3. The difference from miscellaneous sources will be +1. Thus the level 1 (15) fighter will hit 35% more often; which is hugely significant, but the lower level fighter CAN still hit, even with everything stacked against him - and, as above, there should be a gosh-darn good reason why Bruce Lee and my brother Jim are adventuring together. The single biggest chunk (and almost half of it) is from an item, and as mentioned, Bruce Lee can easily hand my brother Jim his spare +2 longsword that he no longer wields (not that Bruce Lee would ever use a longsword, but no matter), and the difference drops to only 25%.
Hit Points:
Keep base hp as a level 1 character.
Any type of scaling source, let it scale. So you get 30 THP (as a level (30) wizard), but you only have 25 hp (as a level 1 wizard) - no problem; you're a demigod, you SHOULD have more survivability than a level 1 character. It's just suddenly actually significantly noticeable. (Note: This means toughness would scale, and suddenly that feat would actually be AMAZING by all standards, instead of a piece of junk that a melee ranger gets to have.)
Monster Attack/Defence: Drop the half level, but no more. Since we didn't take out any other scaling thing, we end up with numbers that are about right, but if you want to tweak it a little to be lower to give that level 1 (1) person a chance, I don't mind.
Everything above this point is my opinion, and basically comes from the fact that I (as DM and player) WANT a noticeable difference between characters who are wildly different levels of experience, even if level and experience are tossed out the window; but I can accept that we could drop all such scaling math and make everyone simply level 1.
What should change, from a RP standpoint, is their ability to survive adventuring (Endurance, healing surges) and their knowledge, since there's a lot they don't teach you in school. However, 4e does not allow skill-scaling as easiliy as previous editions :/
If you can, that's what I would recommend, since that is probably the main difference between the two wizards: their spells, and their knowledge.
If you want that "more powerful spells should hit more often" just give your group a +1 to hit with paragon spells and a +2 to hit with epic spells. That should do it for ya. Although I see no connection between power and accuracy in this context. Think 3.5: Some spells are indodgeable, but their effects can be easily shrugged of. A level 22 orc hit by a level 3 fireball won't even bother to dodge, it will only take 0.2% if his healthpool anyways.
Making one mathematically more powerfull than the other means we have failed at goal no 2. So all scaling should be kept to a mininum. a -1 to hit compared to another character is managable, but a -5 is not managable. Same with skills, somone having 5 less in arcana than you is managable, but more than that makes that character useless. So The Apprentice might scale from 13 Arcana to 18 Arcana in 30 levels.
Remember tha "level" is also a character's "reputation", so I think we have managed to make a clear difference between the two wizards.
Regarding what should scale:
· You seem to be fixed on adding numbers and scaling, knowing that that's what we're trying to remove xD. I've already explained why feats shouldn't scale.
· We'll leave monster scaling to the DM, that's how it's supposed to be.
· Damage and monster HP is where we are both pretty ":S". These things need to scale, but I'm not entirely sure how… Normally? or 50% of what's normal?
How do the numbers look if we remove all scaling? Feats, sneak attacks and ability scores? Won't we then have a far more easily-managable encounters? 1(1) 1(8) 1(12) and 1(14) characters should then only differ in damage output from feats, items and powers, which is significantly less that feats, scaling feats, items, powers and ability score increases. As I said, how damage should scale is uncertain at this point.
************
Answers to other stuff you wrote:
· What is this talk of "high level monsters"? Didn't we just take levels out of the game.. or did I miss something?
· We have already figured out, that since PCs are only getting a +6 enhancement bonus and +1 feat bonus, monsters will always have the attack and defense stats as level 1-10 monsters.
My scaling hp scenario (which may not be the one you mean, but oh well) is this:
(wizard at level 1 has 16 con, wizard at level 29 has toughness, the epic amulet that grants higher max hp, and an ability that grants thp based on level)
Freeze at level 1 scenario:
Level 1: 26 hp
level 29: 51 hp, 1 thp
Remove half level bonus scenario (as I envision it) with monster hp scaling, and pc bonus hp scaling, and stat scaling, assuming con was increased 8 times:
level 1: 26 hp
level 29: 69 hp, 29 thp
note there's not a HUGE difference; in fact the big difference comes from the difference in thp, which may be a rechargeable ability - I emphasize this because if you DO have a rechargeable source of thp, then in the freeze scenario it's completely useless; but in my scenario it's actually a very powerful ability.
Wait, wait... 52 total damage a character can take before going down versus 98 total damage a character can take before going down not a huge difference... and 51 actual HP vs. 69 actual HP -- a 35% difference in HP -- not a huge difference in survivability, especially when equipment like Magic Armor are making you that much harder to hit?
Personally I'm thinking that the very reason why Soldiers are generally shunned upon is because they have just about the same HP as any other monster, but their AC is at least 2 points higher, so they can absorb more attacks and are generally harder to kill, even when compared to Brutes of higher level.
also note:
in the freeze scenario, the level 29 wizard has exactly 100% more hp than the level 1 wizard. Thus a level 1 kobold only needs to hit the level 29 wizard twice as many times to take him, which is not actually unlikely, even given the 6 higher ac + immediates, so due to luck a level 1 kobold pack is almost as big a threat to the level 29 wizard as to the level 1 wizard. This also means that you have a VERY limited range with which to scale monster damage.
in the partial scaling scenario, the level 29 wizard has about 300% more hp than the level 1 wizard; which means level 1 kobolds are not a threat based on complete luck, but still do pose a notiecable threat in terms of daily resources - it also means if you follow the guidelines for paragon/epic tier minions in DMG2 (where you get 5 or 6 minions per standard respectively instead of 4), you aren't as likely to cause an auto TPK. And finally the damage range monsters can choose from can be somewhat higher - and if your party actually goes in for thp based on level, then the DM will actually have a larger range to choose monster damage from.
As a final comment: I think the difference here (compared to the 191 hp a standard level 29 wizard would have based on my assumptions) is still significant, but it grants the dm more leeway to make mistakes when deciding on monster damage than the freeze scenario does.
However, I'm still not sure how to decide on monster damage, in either scenario.
If you could come up with a hard and fast rule for monster damage with the freeze scenario, I would happily agree to the freeze scenario; without such a rule, I think the extra leeway from partial scaling will make the transition far smoother, for any DM who wanted to try these ideas out (I also think that due to that extra leeway, it will probably be easier to find a hard and fast rule for monster damage based on partial scaling instead of complete freeze).
Edit: As a note, one reason I want the partial scaling in, especially on THP based on level, is to make as many sources of THP viable as possible, since due to the extremely low life of the party, THP will become far more useful than normal - so cutting out any of those resources seems like a bad idea. It also allows for slightly more variance in healing surge values between levels, which I think is nice as a subtle indication of your higher experience.
Just to clarify on my train of thought, note that the inspiration for how I'm designing the level-less D&D comes from games that have no leveling in the first place, where even the same creatures you've faced at the start of the game are just as fatal when nearing the end phase of the game.
Let's take Half-Life; the main reason why you'd find enemies easier to tackle isn't because you're this omnipotent superbeing per se, but because you're better geared, play smarter, and might rely more on less obvious or straightforward [and fatal] decisions. Instead of filling the day with one combat after another, you focus more on puzzles and other non-combat challenges. This line of thought is what is guiding me throughout this discussion: instead of my fluff saying I'm a demigod who can't be harmed except by the most powerful of beings, it'd be my fluff saying I'm where I'm at simply because I'm that good.
I suppose the freeze scenario really is better off at a more limited scaling then, since it would really be difficult to have it play all the way to 1 (30) without some serious rebalancing and estimation. However, I did mention earlier how I would scale the whole moster damage thing, if ever I would utilize the "freeze" scenario: I'd compress the monster levels from 1-40 to 1-10, and utilize the minion-standard-elite-solo setup as mentioned. Since I'll be using level 1-10 enemies instead of level 1-40 enemies, I'd be using only 1/3rd of the DMG's new damage table, so a level 30 monster scaled down to level 9 would probably be doing 2d8+8 damage against single targets, 2d6+6 with area attacks, and maybe an encounter power that does more damage; meanwhile, a minion could do anywhere from 4 damage (level 1) to 9 damage (level 10), so you still have kobolds being threatening from 1 (1) to 1 (30), but still not as threatening as Ice Titans.
In either system, Toughness would be a must-have feat, given how 24 -> 29 is at least one extra hit you can take (so would be feats that improve defenses, but that's already a given I suppose). TempHP-granting powers - Fighter/Barbarian powers, Bards, etc. - would be very useful in extending a character's life since you would gain the TempHP at-will, and both the Vampire and Runepriest would be a little more popular -- the former because even Regen 2 could easily be half a healing surge value per round, while the latter's damage reduction easily helps in party longevity.
NOTE: I've been using a homebrew formula for minions that proves to be a lot more brutal than recommended -- instead of taking the average damage per hit rounded down, I set it at 8+Level, with +1 damage every 3 levels if the minion is a Brute -- and just last week I set 8 exploding minions that dealt 10 damage each (along with four standards whose MBAs did 1d12+5 damage) against the level 2 party composed of a Hunter, Bladesinger, Whirling Barbarian, Beastmaster Ranger, Two-Blade Ranger and a leader Character Companion (warlord/cleric-ish), and the only reason why one PC died is because he got crit by his Whirling Barbarian friend and took ongoing damage that brought him past negative bloodied before he could be healed.
If they could take on that onslaught with only inherent bonuses by their side, how much more if they had auto-resurrect abilities from Epic Destinies, or other means to foil Death?
[ It'd be interesting how many would go Revenant or Undying Warrior if ever a level-less game was actually set up... ]
from experience and playtesting my group and I have done it was largely decided that damage and HP should scale skills attack and defences should scale at a much slower rate thus meaning a lowere lvl character or monster could hit though they would pose a much lower threat.
though low level controlers still had solid effect even against higher level monsters since slow and other status effects prety much are always as effective reguardless of level
Same with the mayor's son, who is a paladin of pelor who's only dabbled in adventuring. He's roughly level 4, but taking him with on any adventure would be a liability. Since I don't want these two magic users to be as powerful as my adventurers, I actually had to lie about their levels (after our swordmage got a pretty impressive insight check). They asked about these characters' levels 'cause they knew how important they where. From my standpoint I gave them these levels only due to them not being as famous or heroic as my adventurers...
If only they would ask questions like "what feats do they have?" or "would they drag us down if we had to fight 6 orcs of our combat abilities?". I could just answer them right them and there with answers that would imply "the dungeon master will have him help you, but he might die" or "he can hold his own, you won't have to look out for him if you bring him with you" and the group would be content.
...stupid levels. I want "renown points" and "combat prowess" to be what parties measure other adventurers by, not "levels".
**********
So what possible changes to we have to post #1? Do we agree on half-scaling of PC HP and Monster Damage, whilst monster HP and PC damage remains the same?
What would you call "recommended frosen levels"? Levels 1 to 8, with the exception of levels 3 and 7?
from experience and playtesting my group and I have done it was largely decided that damage and HP should scale skills attack and defences should scale at a much slower rate thus meaning a lowere lvl character or monster could hit though they would pose a much lower threat.
though low level controlers still had solid effect even against higher level monsters since slow and other status effects prety much are always as effective reguardless of level
Interesting... so a level-less system would be more interesting if basically just the half-level bonus was removed, and maybe for good measure the entire group would have the same amount of Inherent Bonus and feat scaling regardless of difference in level (e.g. if in a group of five, one is level 1, while the rest are level 2, everyone including the level 1 person has a +1 to hit and damage... and if everyone else is level 11 and the newbie starts off at level 1, even the newbie gets +2 to hit from Weapon Expertise, and not +1). That way the accuracy, skills and defenses progress slower, but the damage and HP progress faster.
The main problem I'm seeing is that if the gap between players is too wide, the DM will have trouble balancing between the new player not dying immediately when the group is dealing with an encounter appropriate for the guys in the higher end of the spectrum (because even though he can still hit and damage, his damage is too feeble compared to the veterans and if the monsters are threatening to the higher level players, the newbie is too easy a kill for the monsters), and the veteran player not being bored out of their skulls by the encounter that's appropriate for the newbie, since monster HP would be too easy to eat through, possibly to the point where the newbie can't contribute to the encounter either.
**********
By reducing all scaling by 50% we are effectively shortening the gap you speak of by 50%.
These lower level characters (that should never be more than level maybe 6 levels younger than the rest of the group) will be able to fulfill their class. A striker is still hitting harder than avarage for his level (which should be on-par with controllers/defenders/leaders of 2-4 levels higher), controllers' ability to control won't be affected at all, a defender can still mark and a leader can still grant bonuses and access to healing surges. Although all of these things might get a bit penalty (push 2 squares instead of 4, has 20 hit points isntead of 30 or heals +1d6 instead of +2d6) they can still pull of what they do pretty spectacularly.
********
If we do this, wouldn't toughness, improved initative, improved defenses and expertise still all be "must-have" feats? I gave this some thought.
Expertise:
It's all about a +1 to hit (heroic tier), right?
"Well," I thought to myself. "Why do people still take +2 weapons, instead of +3 weapons, if a +1 to hit is so important?".
The answer is "because the +1 to hit is sacrificed for a bigger damage die or property like 'brutal 2' or 'high crit'". What if we do the same thing to expertise?
Rogues and Rangers are two classes that thrive on accuracy. It doesn't matter what their modifier is, really, as long as rangers have magical bows and rogues have combat advantage their damage output is pretty much unpenalized. So they wouldnt mind taking this feat:
Improved Accuracy (replaces all Expertise feats)
Benefit: Whenever you make an attack roll, you can choose to gain a +1 feat bonus to the attack roll and take a -2 penalty to the damage roll.
Special: You gain the non-numberical benefits of a single Expertise feat of your choice.
This makes it less of a "no brainer". Does this work is is it ridiculus?
Improved Defenses (replaces all improved defenses and superior defenses feats)
Benefit: You gain a +2 bonus to a non-AC defense of your choice.
Special: You can only take this feat once. If you meet the prerequisite of the Superior Defenses feat matching with the non-AC defense you chose, you gain the benefit of that feat.
This is a good one, now instead of 3 feats for improving defenses, the PCs can only take one ^^
Toughness is for a level 1 to 30 character that scales. Now that we've reduced scaling by 50%, a PC won't really get any more HP than a level 15 character, although he can still be drowned in THPs. I think toughness should be reduced alongside the reduced max HP pool
Toughness (replaces... Toughness...)
Benefit: You gain 2 additional hit points. These additional hit points increase to 5 at class level 11 and to 7 at class level 21.
as for experteise I would personaly just remove it, maybe even just remove the to hit bonus to it since the secondary effects could still be worth taking the feat for.
The thing with feat tax realy is if there are so many feats that seam like a feat tax then in reality there are no feat tax just a lot of good feats since you can't possibly take all the feats that seam like they are needed. you can eather nerf all the potential feat taxes, leave it as it is, buff the weak feats or devide the feats so only half can be used for the multitude of feats that seam like feat taxes personaly I think they for the most part are fine the way they are. no matter whatyou do there will always be favorites umongst feats and powers.
is like choosing the feat that gives +2 to damage or the one for +1 to attack they both seam needed in a quest to min max but neither is realy better
Well, the +1 to hit and +2 NADs are, at least so I'm told, necessary to bring PCs' numbers' on par with those of their opponents. That's why I'm calling them mandatory. We are not talking about balance between classes, like for example the Ensaring Swordmage really deserving a slow on their triggered Aegis to become on par with other defendes, we're talking about balance between monsters and PCs.
+1/+2/+3 to hit in a system where attack bonuses don't scale is a huge boost, and made them even more mandatory than before, which is not the goal of this experiment. However, since we didn't touch damage scaling of PCs weapon focus feats are still available. It is because of that I think accuracy classes should still deserve some boost, just like damage classes like the barbarian do.
Before the weight of these +3 bonuses where 1/11th of the total attack bonus. Now, with non-scaling attacks, we have a +1 bonus weighing at 1/12. This means that they are just as good as before, although less mandatory. So even after all these changes, the +1 to hit is just as good. I guess we'll just leave it at that, eh?
What is the normal scaling of a monster's damage? 8+level avarage damage? Isn't that right? Well now the scaling of monster damage is 8+half-level. Isn't that funny, we removed half-level bonuses and as a result gave monsters a new one xD
Changed the first post (everthing that's blue is new).
What is the normal scaling of a monster's damage? 8+level avarage damage? Isn't that right? Well now the scaling of monster damage is 8+half-level. Isn't that funny, we removed half-level bonuses and as a result gave monsters a new one xD
Minions normally deal the average damage dealt for single target attacks (see errata for DMG monster template damage table). Normally, minions should be dealing around 4 damage at level 1, not 9 (which my minions were dealing). I've pulled back my punches for my players now -- dealing a scaling damage of 4 + level at heroic tier, with additional 2 damage at paragon and 4 damage at epic -- but that formula I posted is something completely off-topic, since it deals with beefing up minions and monster damage up to eleven, and has nothing to do with making a level-less D&D.
I'm still not sure if messing with the HP scaling is a good idea. Can you please convince me that's either good or bad, so I can stop feeling like it's both :S
I've created a group that is willing to test this out. This will be very interesting :D
I'm still not sure if messing with the HP scaling is a good idea. Can you please convince me that's either good or bad, so I can stop feeling like it's both :S
HP normally scales with the expectation that the individual and the party overall can take more blows before going down, so HP scaling should coincide with damage scaling as well.
For comparison, a level 1 standard deals 1d8+4 (average 8.5 damage), while a level 30 standard deals 4d8+20 (average 38 damage), whereas a typical PC at level 1 would have 12 + CON HP (let's assume 13 CON, or 25 HP), while a level 30 PC would have 157 + CON HP (let's assume 15 CON, or 172 HP). That would place the level 1 PC taking an average of only 3 hits to bring down, as opposed to the level 30 PC taking an average of 5 hits to bring down, excluding the powers, feats, chance to get hit, etc. that makes the level 30 PC that much harder to take down.
If HP scaling on either side is adjusted, then damage scaling on either side has to be adjusted as well. This adjustment, however, has to be done carefully, otherwise either enemies become too deadly too quickly, or combat becomes more of a chore than a theatrical point of tension.
This is also why I'm more in favor of the freeze-level scenario, which is actually more of a pseudo-freeze scenario, since HP -- temporary or otherwise -- could easily scale up if necessary; it's just that it'll be a DM-granted boon (maybe a divine boon or some ego-boosting stuff like reputation or "battle experience") as opposed to a level-granted mechanic.
To elaborate:
1 At level 1 a party of four could have the default character creation stuff.
2 Later on they get items that grant them the benefit of a feat, as well as an item that grants them 5 tempHP at the start of combat.
3 Then they get blessings from their deities that grant them an encounter power, and their item grants 10 tempHP at the start of combat instead of 5.
4 Then later they become so famous they gain reputation benefits that grant them the benefits of another feat, and maybe even a stat boost. Their tempHP-granting item grants 15 tempHP instead of 10.
5 Then they get training from a legendary group of heroes that grant them a level 1 daily, and their tempHP-granting item grants 20 tempHP instead of 15.
And so on and so forth. In other words, the existing mechanics doesn't exactly have to go away -- except perhaps the half-level scaling -- they instead are reflavored and placed back in as alternate mechanics. The party is still effectively level 1, but because of the boons, etc. that they have, they have almost the same durability and capability as a higher-level character, albeit without the half-level scaling.
You could even grant a blade that enhances Sneak Attack, or a bow that improves Hunter's Quarry, or whatever equipment is deemed the "signature" of the PC in question. That way, you can scale up the class feature and damage and even make enemies hit harder and take more hits, as per normal ;) All without raising the PC's level.
Monsters could stay at level 1, but their CON Score could be raised or lowered as necessary, raising or lowering their HP appropriately. As the PC's health/tempHP padding increases, so could the enemy damage increase.
I will probably be using that, taking jumps in HP and damage. For example, I'll have them freeze their everything at level 4, and then they won't get a HP or healing boost from their class until at level 8 where they complete a major mission for an Archangel or something. Then they get 4 levels worth of hit points each, and their healing words gets beefed up etc. Now they are, for calculating damage, effects, THPs, bonuses and HP at level 8. I will continue to have these leaps in features where appropriate.
For example these THP-granters that grant THPs "2+level" will just jump whenever they get a "boon".
I like this idea!
The other way to do this would be to reduce all HPs granted from the class by 2, and then have damage be reduced accordingly, but that would just mess up the balance all over again.
if they only gain hp and damage buffs as some divine boon then how did the monsters gain so much.
I personaly dislike it, again in my experience players like the slow and steady hp gain, even if you granted these gains perhaps every game (devide levels up so that they gain part of a level every game) which is similar to what the system we play now does.
basicaly I am more in favor of more levels instead of less, levels allow a player to feal liek they acomplished something so perhaps devide elvels into parts maybe 2 parts or 3 depending on how often and how long you game and then designe key points in the game where you feal they have acomplished stuff like realy hard fights or soemthing and grant them a partial level
remember that whatever the players are gaining the monsters are gaining albe it by using stronger monsters more then by upping the rank of said monsters.
also remember that damage and hp gain are more or less written into power designe to tweeking them effects the powers the monsters and the feal of the character itself
of all the things a player gains hp and damage gains is the single things that make a character FEAL stronger. They give more of the illusion of gaining power then anything else since it determains how fast you can kill stuff and how many hits you can take.
**************************************************************
so more to the point reasons to not mess with hp/damage
- powers are designed around current damage and hp idea (like 2x weapon damage and such)
- players feal like they are gaining power when they gain hp/damage increases
- swapping with damage and hp greatly effects the feal of monsters
- a lot more work altering the hp and damage of a monster then just it's attack and skills
let me toss anouther idea out
during character creation only grant +2 to trained skills and secretly write down how many skill points they missed out on.
allow them to otherwise make there character as normal
Right down secretly the effects of level 2 for the character. Tell the players to not leave there level section blank or X it out, when they ask why explain that your not using levels for this game.
During the game make ocational notes when they do stuff like defeating bosses or using a particular skill a lot.
At Key points or at the end of the game give each player bonuses based on what they did during the game. these bonuses are in fact parts of the skill points from training they never got, and parts of lv 2 benifits.
secretly keap track of there level so they become level 2 when you have given them all the benifits of level 2, then you start giving them level 3 benifits.
ocationaly don't give them a feat instead transfering that effect to skill gains the player has earned, potentialy even granting the effect of bonus feats if they realy earn them threw roleplaying and hard skill chalenges.
so in essence your using levels there gaining all but the 1/2 level effect of it (or all except the 1/2 skill benifit even) but to the players your just giving them bonuses based on the events of the game.
Wise players might adventualy do the math and figure it out but then if your assigning the effects of feats as bonuses then there math won't fully add up unless there realy knoledgable of feats and such and even then minor changes to gains could hide the effects further.
End effect is that you keap all the benifits of them leveling up but remove the idea of levels itself transfering the effects to a more explainable reason and making the players feal as if there actions have a greater effect on charcter evolution which in fact they would.
Personaly I would assign the benifits at the start of the next game so you can decide exactly what benifits the players had earned for there characters but maybe give small 1 HP or 1 skill point or something after key chalenges that make sence or at points where the player realy earned it or suprised you in a good way.
Drawback of this is that the dm has to keap activ log of all the things he has granted the players so to keap them at ruffly the same level and to know what monsters they can handle. benifit is that it encourages roleplaying, adds a feal that the character is growing in a realistic way, and removes the question of what level is he since players never actualy use levels they become a dm tool that is always kept secret. instead npc would b describes as he seams a little weaker then you guys or he seams extreamly skilled ect
@scaling feats/ability scores: You have convinced me - the point is to allow different level characters to feel like they contribute, and avoiding scaling certainly does that. All feat scaling should disappear. All ability score scaling should disappear at levels ending in 4 or 8. However, I do think we should leave in ability score increases at the beginning of paragon and epic tier (allowing a level 21 character to have a 24 in a stat if he started with an 18, had a racial increase, and took an ED that increased it). This would give a noticeable difference between a level 1 and a level 30, while not being a huge difference (20 to 24, a +2 to difference to hit, and it allows for feat acquisitions that require 21 in stats even if you don't have an ED that offers a stat increase).
@Monster HP: PC Striker Damage will NOT change much even without scaling feats and ability scores. (Note, by striker, I mean anyone built for damage, even if he is not actually a striker - most of this damage comes from multi-attacking, off-turn attacks, and static mods that are not scaling) (My DPR king Avenger would probably still top 400 DPR with at-will attacks). Therefore monster hp should stay EXACTLY as it is currently (and if your group halves hp in regular play due to non-optimized characters, then you can half monster hp in this verstion too - but that would be chosen by the group, and not be something included in this ruleset.)
@PC Damage: Leave as written, except that ability scores (mostly, see above) don't scale, and feats don't scale (no one will ever take weapon focus anymore, but that doesn't bother me)
@PC HP: I still firmly believe that having no hp scaling will result in every single PC wanting the amulet that grants extra hp - which makes that amulet far too powerful. By allowing for extremely limited hp scaling (ie: do not ever gain hp for gaining levels, but allow all other forms of hp and thp generation to stay as currently written in the rules), we provide alternatives, so that people can choose other neck slot items without completely shafting themselves. Of course, if you simply ban that amulet, then this wouldn't be required, and I would accept no scaling whatsoever. However, assuming my extremly limited form of hp scaling, then
@Monster Damage: If you leave in my limited pc hp scaling then you leave monster damage AS WRITTEN. Yes this means a level '35' brute (like tiamat) could do 70 damage in one hit - which means the only people who will EVER fight such a monster are those who are absolutely sure that they are ready. Note that I only mention monster level in order to reference monsters; obviously with levels being gone for PCs, we COULD also do away with monster levels, but see below.
@Anything else monster: Take out the half level bonus if applicable.
Why do I prefer this particular version? It means the DM only changes ONE thing - removing the half-level bonuses, which will be exactly the same change (and a very easy one) for all monsters. (Except for choosing what s/he will pit against the PCs - this will also need to be changed, but is subjective, and somewhat needs to be done with RAW anyway). The DM doesn't need to modify stats, which means no extra work for the DM; the DM only needs to adjust the xp value of monsters (kobolds will be dangerous opponents up until level 15 or so; giants will be dangerous even up to level 30). The DM can use orcs, or giants, or anything, for as long as s/he wishes without a problem; and if doesn't want a particular monster to be so dangerous, he can simply level it down, using the standard rules for de-leveling a monster, in order to change it's stats. He doesn't need to worry about a completely new ruleset. Instead, all the mechanical changes are on the PC side of the page; and while the DM has to adjust his thoughts about what is dangerous, so do the players - a level 1 (19) group will have to think long and hard about fighting a level 19 monster, as their survivability will be FAR lower than in the RAW version; but this will encourage further roleplaying, planning, and thinking ahead, which are all things that I personally believe are good.
Major drawback: With this version, PC's will generally fight lower level monsters. Young dragons will be true opponents even into paragon; adult dragons will threaten epic characters. Ancient dragons will probably swallow epic characters alive without blinking an eye. This could lead to boredom from fighting the same monsters over and over and to sadness at not seeing all the super-keen-cool monsters that are in all the different monster manuals.
Personally, I don't think this is a problem, as this is largely how I ran previous editions of D&D, but it is certainly something to be aware of.
@PC HP/Monster Damage: If we COMPLETELY take out scaling hp, then we have to modify the monster damage. Totally doable, probably will replicate the feel I want, and probably won't make high level monsters (like level 1 (30)) completely wipe out parties as regularly. Will take a lot more testing though to figure out exactly where the right amount is (although I agree that cutting level '30' monsters down to level '8' or so is probably right, we'd still need to test it.)
if they only gain hp and damage buffs as some divine boon then how did the monsters gain so much.
Are you asking my why a Frost Giant takes more hits to take down than a non-magically buffed human? I think it is more thematically correct that some generic monsters (kobolds, non-magical medium sized bugs) can be out-powered, and some monsters are way stronger than you up until a certain level. A level 1 group shouldn't be able to kill a Purple Worm just as a level 15 group shouldn't have to raise a finger til kill a non-magical pack of wolves.
I personaly dislike it, again in my experience players like the slow and steady hp gain, even if you granted these gains perhaps every game (devide levels up
so that they gain part of a level every game) which is similar to what the system we play now does.
This is interesting since I've never heard a player say "wow, I gained 5 HP" after I gave them their character sheet for the next level. At best I've hear the
con-based warlocks and sentinels brag to the tank how equal their HP pools are. Rewards should be given as deserved, not "after each session". If what they did in the session was just RP they should not get a combat-related reward, such as +1 hp (although skill points are no-problem, but require heavy DC-management... which is really boring).
basicaly I am more in favor of more levels instead of less, levels allow a player to feal liek they acomplished something so perhaps devide elvels into parts
maybe 2 parts or 3 depending on how often and how long you game and then designe key points in the game where you feal they have acomplished stuff like realy hard fights or soemthing and grant them a partial level
We never said we were taking out levels, just half-level bonuses and math-fixes. I even made it green so it would be easier to spot. They do accomplish something. Feats, items, divine boons, saving the planet. All of these things are pretty hefty rewards when you think about it. It was like the one time when vampires stole our cleric, and when we where saving her the rest of the vampire clan attacked the village. As soon as we could we stormed to the village. Holding their Vampire Lord's head in the air we said "this is what we do to your kind! We killed your master, will you dare challenge us". The clan of vampires ran with their tails between their legs to the nearest forest. You should've seen my group's faces, they basically had "feeling of accomplishment" written in their eyes.
also remember that damage and hp gain are more or less written into power designe to tweeking them effects the powers the monsters and the feal of the character itself
Then again, if there's anything that's okay, balance wise, it is upping damage numbers. Just look and Mordekeinen's weapon, most of them give a conditional +2 to damage rolls, but very few of them give any to-hit buffs. This is because damage is far easier to balance between PCs and Monsters than anything else. Let them do too much damage, if the monster is supposed to be very scary or important story-wise, we DMs have a knack of increasing their HP accordingly, even after the dragon has just hit 0 HP we sometimes think "nah, we'll give him 80 extra HP, just for the feel. They are really having fun right now and I don't want to end it right away". Increasing AC between hits or DCs betwen skill checks is far more noticable than increasing/decreasnig a monster's HP by 10% on the fly.
of all the things a player gains hp and damage gains is the single things that make a character FEAL stronger. They give more of the illusion of gaining power then anything else since it determains how fast you can kill stuff and how many hits you can take.
This is true, HP and damage scaling are the two things a PC can be measured by. This is why this should be kept in. Remember, most of our heroes start out as Bruce Wayne, and train their way to become Batman. However, when fate desires, the gods have no problem giving them the powers of Superman to fight the world's evil forces. They can train to their peak by themselves (become a PARAGON of an adventurer), but after that they need the aid of the supernatural. No man can fight vecna with only his mortal strength. This is why I agree on the freeze level advancement, it really makes getting to the next tier a big milestone. Even HP-scaling is like if after every 6 session an angel came down and said "there you go, +6 HP". I want these supernatural bonuses to come when appriopriate, not "every 6 sessions, no matter what's going on in the story"
The session where we save *insert something important here* and I tell them "You are reaching the peak of your physical prowess, the prime of your mortal selves. But there is *something threatening something important*. If you are to save *that thing* you will need a new method of advancement. Your durability alone will no be enough to face the *threatening stuff*
Most adventurers are used to this. Last session my group (level 8) just found a way of defeating a level 22 Elder Red Dragon that I didn't consider was possible! I can surely say that my group is used to be in way over their head and still come out on top xD
so more to the point reasons to not mess with hp/damage
- powers are designed around current damage and hp idea (like 2x weapon damage and such)
- players feal like they are gaining power when they gain hp/damage increases
- swapping with damage and hp greatly effects the feal of monsters
- a lot more work altering the hp and damage of a monster then just it's attack and skills
- Can be ignored, a person doing 2d6 extra damage on a crit once per encounter is no biggie. Most crits do something far more epic that that.
- This is true.
- Monsters will be left untouched.
- This is true, but freeze-leveling is based on freezing the level. Just keep monsters between n-2 and n+2 and you're good
@scaling feats/ability scores: You have convinced me - the point is to allow different level characters to feel like they contribute, and avoiding scaling certainly does that. All feat scaling should disappear. All ability score scaling should disappear at levels ending in 4 or 8. However, I do think we should leave in ability score increases at the beginning of paragon and epic tier (allowing a level 21 character to have a 24 in a stat if he started with an 18, had a racial increase, and took an ED that increased it). This would give a noticeable difference between a level 1 and a level 30, while not being a huge difference (20 to 24, a +2 to difference to hit, and it allows for feat acquisitions that require 21 in stats even if you don't have an ED that offers a stat increase).
I agree. The tiers are something special to me, I always plan something really epic for the sessions before getting to a new tier. I personally have no problem giving a level 8 character in a level 10 party 3 levels worth of HP and an ability score boost, I'd just make sure he wont get HP for the next three levels insead. I'd just make it a supernatural boons of sorts. He'll still be lacking in feats and powers, but his to-hit and HP would allow him to be on par with his friends. Being a paragon of an archer is more than just gaining a set of new features, he earned that title and is special for that, even without his Paragon Path.
@PC HP: I still firmly believe that having no hp scaling will result in every single PC wanting the amulet that grants extra hp - which makes that amulet far too powerful. By allowing for extremely limited hp scaling (ie: do not ever gain hp for gaining levels, but allow all other forms of hp and thp generation to stay as currently written in the rules), we provide alternatives, so that people can choose other neck slot items without completely shafting themselves. Of course, if you simply ban that amulet, then this wouldn't be required, and I would accept no scaling whatsoever. However, assuming my extremly limited form of hp scaling, then
We have realized that removing HP scaling is nigh-impossible, both for flavour and balance of the entire game. This is why encourage leveling like normally up to a certain points, then freeze the level, and then give HP in forms of rewards. Maybe they all feel the spirit of the dragon pass through them as he falls, imbuing their blood with his durability etc.
@Monster Damage: If you leave in my limited pc hp scaling then you leave monster damage AS WRITTEN. Yes this means a level '35' brute (like tiamat) could do 70 damage in one hit - which means the only people who will EVER fight such a monster are those who are absolutely sure that they are ready. Note that I only mention monster level in order to reference monsters; obviously with levels being gone for PCs, we COULD also do away with monster levels, but see below.
Monster damage scales with PC HP. If your PCs have 10 levels worth of HP, let the monster do damage as level 10 monster. Monster damage will have to scale, so kobolds won't be doing as much damage as tiamat due to a mechanical housrule like levelessness. Hitting a monster can be easy, but hitting it so it hurts is a different thing. A peasant trying to fight tiamat is till lacking ability scores, enhancement bonuses and feats, so he probably wont hit. But it's not because of some magical half-level bonuses. A peasant with a magical sword might have a chance of hitting him, but he'll do so little damage that tiamat wont feel a tickle.
Why do I prefer this particular version? It means the DM only changes ONE thing - removing the half-level bonuses, which will be exactly the same change (and a very easy one) for all monsters. (Except for choosing what s/he will pit against the PCs - this will also need to be changed, but is subjective, and somewhat needs to be done with RAW anyway). The DM doesn't need to modify stats, which means no extra work for the DM; the DM only needs to adjust the xp value of monsters (kobolds will be dangerous opponents up until level 15 or so; giants will be dangerous even up to level 30). The DM can use orcs, or giants, or anything, for as long as s/he wishes without a problem; and if doesn't want a particular monster to be so dangerous, he can simply level it down, using the standard rules for de-leveling a monster, in order to change it's stats. He doesn't need to worry about a completely new ruleset. Instead, all the mechanical changes are on the PC side of the page; and while the DM has to adjust his thoughts about what is dangerous, so do the players - a level 1 (19) group will have to think long and hard about fighting a level 19 monster, as their survivability will be FAR lower than in the RAW version; but this will encourage further roleplaying, planning, and thinking ahead, which are all things that I personally believe are good.
As long as the DM realizes that a level 4(15) group shouldn't have any problem with some kobolds, I agree.
However, monsters will need enhancement bonuses according to the inherent bonus system to keep up with the PCs gaining magic weapons..
Major drawback: With this version, PC's will generally fight lower level monsters. Young dragons will be true opponents even into paragon; adult dragons will threaten epic characters. Ancient dragons will probably swallow epic characters alive without blinking an eye. This could lead to boredom from fighting the same monsters over and over and to sadness at not seeing all the super-keen-cool monsters that are in all the different monster manuals.
Personally, I don't think this is a problem, as this is largely how I ran previous editions of D&D, but it is certainly something to be aware of.
@PC HP/Monster Damage: If we COMPLETELY take out scaling hp, then we have to modify the monster damage. Totally doable, probably will replicate the feel I want, and probably won't make high level monsters (like level 1 (30)) completely wipe out parties as regularly. Will take a lot more testing though to figure out exactly where the right amount is (although I agree that cutting level '30' monsters down to level '8' or so is probably right, we'd still need to test it.)
Actually, if DMs will use official monsters they obviously wont use a level 1 monster against a level 1(30) group. Levels are still in the game, so when leveling up/down an official monster he should only do so by 4 levels, and that monster only gains increases in damage/HP and a +1/-1 inherent bonus to defenses. This means that the PCs will always be fighting monsters with "correct" healthpools, making level 1 monsters just as threatening as minions.
I don't recommend removing HP scaling.
the problem with my responces are in honest we are descussing multiple ideas in the single thread, both freazing levels and similarly but difrently reduceing the effect of levels.
the idea I gave was kind of a mix betwean the two though I included option to use it with curent rules as well. my sugestion was remove the concept of levels from the table to prevent the situation that had ben brought up with players defining stuff by there level and as a way to make it feal as if every gain they got had ben earned.
I didn't mean to sugest that removing 1/2 level was bad.
***********
let me try to clerify, first this is based on allowing a grander level spread to be used but not based at all on the idea of freezing level since we have ben talking about both I figured I would clerify first
so curent running idea a player has 30 levels of those 20 are more normaly ran levels.
LV 1 at curent sugestion players make characters normaly
My sugestion is they don't gain any feats and skill training only grants +2 to all skills otherwise make character normaly
at level up currently the idea was that players gain all non 1/2 level junk and that level scaling and junk of feats r removed
The difrence betwean this and my idea was that the dm never actualy gives them a lvl up but rather slowly assignes and hands out the benifit of leveling up as they earn it, so in a game night they spend the whole night tring to talk the prince and his nobles into starting a crusade against someone or something of the sort then they might gain +1 diplomacy (since they started with less skill points benifit from training and you assigne feats theres room to do this without disturbing balence)
If they spent the whole night fighting threw some maze they might gain a new power or +1 dungenearing or some other benifit of there next level that is fitting to what they acomplished.
the idea had many points, first of all it spread the effects of level out further so that a player might be 3 and 2/3 a level behind instead of say 5 or 6 levels behind, it also was mostly based around removing 1/2 level benifits thus allowing a wider spread in level difrence (though I think keaping attribute benifits is better then removing them though they would now be spread out betwean multiple levels instead of just gaining 2 +1 bonuses and they would be more or less earned)
also it removes the very concept of level from the players mind so while player b might be 5 sessions behind and 2 full levels he dosn't know he is 2 levels behind he only knows he missed 5 sessions of rewards. this means that each session a player misses they miss a small reward, maybe 2 hop and a power or +1 to a skill or 1 HP and +1 to a skill or whatever, small but still rewards that add up and make the characters feal like they earned soemthing every session reguardless of what they did.
****
so again to highlight the point of hiding the level and slowly giving them the benifits
- removes the idea of level from players mind, point of this is that while a player might be 3 or even 5 or 6 levels behind they don't feal like they are so far behind becouse there not dwelling on the number
- stretches levels out so it should take longer to fully reach the next level but they gain small bonuses every game so the extended time to level is much much less noticeable. Again pointing out that players won't even know when there leveling they could only compare they might have had. Sugestion for this would be to add all there benifits per 4 levels up and slowly issue them out as earned each session thus making it impossible for players to fully know what level they should be
- by removing 1/2 level bonuses alone you allow a huge difrence in levels to run together. top that with stretching the levels out then theres no need to alter feats that scale, you will choose when they scale and there scaling effects would be stretched out. If it takes longer to actualy level and 1/2 level is removed then you have already effectivly greatly greatly increased the possible difrence in level. New players would make a character with only 1/2 chosen feats and only +2 skill points for training meaning they could be started 4 levels below the party effectivly and not feal horribly weaker with plenty of room to earn there way up
The idea is complex and I have actualy playtested it a couple times. It is a lot of work for the DM but had the effect of characters earning there gains, while allowing npc and players to have a wider spread of levels with close to the same effectivness in combat and much less feal of being greatly weaker since there was no level concept to compare power to (on the players side of things)
********************************
hopefully I was able to get the intent of my other post across still I often time add side thoughts making it hard to follow at times but the intent was to stretch out levels, hide the actual levels, and reduce the effect of levels by removing 1/2 level. I do beleive this fits the desire of larger level spread while adding in a few other side benifits
Here's the CharOp thread:
community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/758...
They started asking "why", which is the first part of not getting the point. It's an experiment, a hobby, something for us to fiddle around with before we go to sleep.
Today for example I started making a rank-based skill system for 4e, just for **** and giggles.
I'll read the CharOP thread som other time.
I remind you all to look at the #1 post now, since a lot have changed due to your comments. Many of you where right in your arguments and I've edited the expierment accordingly.
Remember, what is blue is new ;)
- This this all there is to a monster's melee attack bonus: 4+level?
- What effect do the ability score increases have on the game?
Will I be shot down if I really feel like some skills, like all knowledge skills, should gain a 1/2 bonus for realism's sake?
There are just a few things I'm unsure about this whole exercise:
- This this all there is to a monster's melee attack bonus: 4+level?
- What effect do the ability score increases have on the game?
Will I be shot down if I really feel like some skills, like all knowledge skills, should gain a 1/2 bonus for realism's sake?
1. Removing the half-level bonuses
2. Adding in the level benefits in ways other than actually increasing the level
3. Allowing level gap to have a significantly less effect
· Players hate missing
· Players like dealing damage.
· Players don't mind being fragile, or fighting difficult enemies
This means that if there are only a couple of levels between the players, having the same to-hit bonus is much more important than feats, powers, defenses and HP.
My friend who is more of a fan-fic writer than a DM wants to create his own world, and for some reason he want's the players to roll for their level. He's the boss, but I suggested that to-hit doesn't scale, just to prevent frustration at the gaming table.
Damage scales so slowly that it's irrelevant in this case.
But yea at the base your correct the idea is to make there level benifits be given as in game rewards of sort so that the feal of the level gain is greatly increased and controlled to a greater extent.
To me feals a lot better to gain a level benifit after a realy hard boss fight or other acomplishment then you earned Y xp level up. Also removes the feal that you can go grind levels. which is in part why even my normal games I don't use XP rather tell the players when they have earned the level up
I actually just realized something regarding player experience:
· Players hate missing
· Players like dealing damage.
· Players don't mind being fragile, or fighting difficult enemies
This means that if there are only a couple of levels between the players, having the same to-hit bonus is much more important than feats, powers, defenses and HP.
My friend who is more of a fan-fic writer than a DM wants to create his own world, and for some reason he want's the players to roll for their level. He's the boss, but I suggested that to-hit doesn't scale, just to prevent frustration at the gaming table.
Damage scales so slowly that it's irrelevant in this case.
True enough; even in my group the main frustration is in missing, and no matter how many times they call me an "evil DM" for throwing at them encounters that constantly *almost* kill them [and occassionally do], the overall reaction regarding my minion-and-brute-heavy Eberron is positive
If he wants players to roll for their level, then all the more the removal of scaling to-hit and our discussions regarding a "level-less D&D" helps prevent frustrations if one rolls a level 1 character while another rolls a level 20 character (level 1 guy won't become too much a liability, but the level 20 guy would still feel more powerful because of the shiney stuff he has [and at the very least, level 1 guy gets to kill off minions, while level 20 guy handles the big bad elite, who would probably barely take notice of the level 1 guy since he's "hittin' like a girl", so to speak... at least until the level 1 guy does something like cause the entire building to cave in on the elite, killing him instantly XD ].
I'll keep updating post #1 as long as you keep commenting!
I actually just realized something regarding player experience:
· Players hate missing
· Players like dealing damage.
· Players don't mind being fragile, or fighting difficult enemies
This means that if there are only a couple of levels between the players, having the same to-hit bonus is much more important than feats, powers, defenses and HP.
My friend who is more of a fan-fic writer than a DM wants to create his own world, and for some reason he want's the players to roll for their level. He's the boss, but I suggested that to-hit doesn't scale, just to prevent frustration at the gaming table.
Damage scales so slowly that it's irrelevant in this case.
you forgot player hate getting hit all the time. though granted this last 1 is more up to the dice but the biggest complaint in my games are that the palyers always seam to get hit all the time. Luckily for me all my rolls are done in the open so they kno w that my dice just hate them
anyhows more on subject yea more then anything attack and defence numbers are more important then prety much all the others