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Why low level games are just better...
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- čas přidán 2. 08. 2024
- I know level 20 grinding is a goal for a lot of Dungeons and Dragons players, but today I want to talk about why low level D&D is just so much better to me.
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I'm very excited for DC20 for this reason. The HP and damage inflation is massively reduced, only going up by a point or two for every level.
@@cgollimusic Ah, a fellow DC20 enthusiast
I'm in this camp. It seems to not be "always careful to the point of paranoia or dead" like old school games tend to get described (Up to the point with my hated moment of "Don't even waste your time on the backstory of a character that won't survive 2 sessions"), but curb the resilience inflation AND makes sure the class fantasy is there since Level 1 (which is a problem with both 5e, where most of the class fantasy kicks in about level 6, and old school systems, where it easily can be even later, if your class fantasy is not "random nobody hoping to survive till the next meal").
Oh super interesting! I've seen it a couple times but haven't really taken a deep look. I'll have to do that!
@@TheFantasyForge DC20 looks super clean and great alternative
I love a combination of both! I love full progression campaign, low-high. My first home game was level 3-13 over the course of about 2 years, and it was excellent. Now we’re in a PF2E high power high fantasy campaign inspired by Wrath of the Righteous, and the idea of 1-20, currently level 6.
Right there with you, as long as the world and combat scales with me and doesn't make me feel like I'm a freak of nature and just a powerful player character instead haha
5e also has a massive problem of bloat, especially at later levels, you REALLY start to notice it at around level 5... which by comparison makes those low level games seem more streamlined. TOBIAS Spotted at 5:21!
I think this is misunderstanding what HP is.
Hit points are a mix of not only physical toughness, but also luck and stamina through a fight. If a creature took a hit every time they took damage, adventurers would be walking piles of scar tissue.
Instead, HP can be represented by general vitality over combat. A critical hit that doesn't kill a creature could be narrowly avoiding a fatal blow that means they have to expend a lot of physical vitality to not die. Likewise, HP decreasing over a battle doesn't mean taking hit after hit, but pushing your body into high levels of physical and mental stress because you are *actively trying not to die*.
Not that this disregards that 5th edition is inherently better balanced for lower levels, nor that a smaller, more relatable threat makes the stakes seem higher than a more obscure armageddon-like threat, but saying HP is number of hits means you essentially devalue combat, and how your characters are getting more skilled as they level up.
No totally! I actually flavor HP as luck most of the time because I don't like the idea of a boss with 6 gashes and 12 arrows sticking out of them haha.
But either way, no matter how you flavor it, the less HP you have, the riskier it is and that's the sweet spot for me lol
I agree. I my games reaching 0 HP means the end of combat, not necessarily death. Could as well mean disarming, surrendering, unconsciousness or something else, according to the situation. Not every "hit" should mean drawing blood. It only means the combat is drawing to a close.
@@czernoboltthehunter2739 In theory sure, but that's not actually how it's written out. Attacks that reduce HP are attacks that "Hit" and "Deal Damage", and regaining HP is almost always flavored as healing. The idea that HP isn't meat points or wounds is stated, but not supported.
yeah, and as a story it makes sense and is engaging to treat HP as health. My Player describes their combat action and wants it to take the enemy out. Me describing it as physically connecting and doing damage fulfills that desire. Me instead describing it as pressuring and stressing the opponent feels more similar to describing a missed attack that barely fails to connect.
I'm currently running a series of low-level solo adventures with help of AI. I think at lower levels combats are quicker and less frequent, and you may make social interactions the core of the story. That's when you may want to run pirate campaigns, escapades, heists, horror and mysteries unfit for more powerful heroes.
Feeling the progression of a campaign is so fun. my current party has gone from being stranded on an island and struggling against bandits at level 1 to being level 16 leaders of a pirate fleet able to fight gods and demon lords
That sounds pretty dang awesome haha. I had a party get robbed by bandits at like level 10 once and it was so funny watching them wake up in the middle of the night like "oh god it's just bandits? Guys we really don't want to do this"
5:20 Tobias wouldn't need a sword attached to a rope to cross a ravine. He would just spontaneously appear on the other side like he always does!
The cutest little displacer kitty is seen at 5:21, right in the clip from the D&D movie when Doric turns upside down through the portal. Bravo Tobias for hopping on board for the free planeshift ride!
5:21 Now if only a druid could turn into a displacer beast. I would absolutely become Tobias if that was possible.
5:21 I sight with my astounding truesight, a Displacer Kitty
5:21 Tobias and displacer beasts/kittens in general would make amazing thieves
To the video's point, I think I have to agree! Having those limitations, whether it be low spell slots, limited gear, or low HP those limitations definitely helps raise the stakes and leads to much more creative decisions. My first full campaign I finished up went from level 1 through 12 from Phandelver and Below and those lower levels were probably the most fun I had in that group, but the high-level abilities led to some great combos too!
I like when its darker and grittier. Its why i like symbaroum so much. But id rather have the rules and not need them then to just wing it and hope i balance it properly
100%. Keeping the potential for death to arrive any moment creates excitement and suspense. That + the other reasons are also why I enjoy leveling characters in MMORPGs.
Arriving at the plateau isn't actually the primary goal of these kinds of games. The goal is to have fun, and it helps to use whatever guiding stars you can find to keep you engaged, to keep reaching for, and looking forward to the next session, is more valuable than ever holding it in your hand (which the reality may not match our expectations / day dreams of)
Beautifully put! Yeah reaching a plateau is a good way of putting it. That's how it feels to me when I play higher levels. But even high levels are still fun, I do enjoy it!
Honestly don't like low level stuff because of how much you could insta kill a character (which many people anymore do not like, though conversely systems like Fabula Ultima without death but only narrative stakes are a turn off), though many of your pros are similar to why people like OSR games like becmi or b/x dnd and various rules collections.
Personally, my favorite is high level, though in a different but adjacent system (pf2e), where it's pretty easy to manage (though it eating up a ton of time still happens).
Are other systems want to actually try higher levels in play, but jumping in there isn't easy most of the time.
I can totally see that. I'm just the weirdo that loves the stakes being up all the time and I love the risk haha
Tbh high level is painful when you have 5-6 players. I DMed Out of the Abyss for 2.5 years from 2 to 15 level. I had very optimised and cohesive party and they killed Zuggtmoy at level 6 lol (tbh her statblock is shite).
In the end it was difficult for me to create a challenging encounters and get rid of slog.
I heavily rebalanced almost all "deadly" monsters to become deadly af. Last stan out was against very deadly demons and liches who were minions (to get rid of slog).
And before the final combat I made my players to fight each other as a demonlord with custom statblocks to decide who will be THE LAST AND FINAL BOSS.
And this last one was long and dangerous combat encounter. After I finished this campaign I had nothing inside me.
It just took a piece from me. I am relaxing from DMing for 5 months now.
So, high level is interesting experience, but you have to be prepared for this. I liked it, even tho it sucked all the life from me. Probably I'll repeat it later this year 😂
Worlds Without Number seems like a good system for high stake and realistic combats. But death is very much an option as a result
Also I am a player now, it is a good political and detective story with many different types of encounters. Less combat for sure. Recently we hit level 4! Feels great after dming from 2 to 15 level for 2.5 years 😂
That's one of the reasons why I really like Shadowdark and Dragonbane. Those games are DEADLY.
5:21 I spy a good lil displacer kitty! Sneaky lil guy
Low level always felt more rewarding to me than higher level, especially with how 5e is written. High level just gets way too tedious, and it doesn't help my friends like to min max like hell 😂
Yeah I love the low level stuff haha
@@TheFantasyForge You sure you don't just want to play an OSR system?
@@21Skluanm21 I'm just not a fan of dungeon crawls, they never felt immersive to me, just more like hack and slash games. Unless maybe I don't fully understand what OSR means lmao
@@TheFantasyForge You have no idea of what an OSR dungeon crawl is like. 'Hack and Slash' is more like what 3.5e and modern dungeoncrawling is. Diablo. OSR dungeoncrawls is about exploring your environment, thinking about your surroundings, solving the puzzle of dealing with the goblins that're too numerous to fight in the first place. Combat barely lasts a few rounds, extremely rare to go beyond 2. A whole idea of OSR play is getting rid of skill checks and focusing on the immersion of navigating your environment in the fictional space, managing rations, keeping your torch lit, dodging dangers because needing to roll dice means you've prepared poorly.
Hi Tobias! (5:25) We almost have the same name
Depends...in my opinion of course.
Definitely depends! This is just why I like low level DnD, there's lot to love about high levels and I might just make a video about that now haha
@@TheFantasyForge Having played since the late 70's I can honestly say that as both GM and player, I've done plenty of both. The low level play is closest to the spirit of gaming. From a GM's perspective, I've learned how to run a low-level campaign. As I'm sure you well know, there are tricks to doing so; navigating the "sandbox" in such a way that the characters progress slowly; steady, yes, but slow.
@@yourseatatthetable I've played with an OG player, he's almost 70 now, but he is by FAR the most creative player I've ever had.
@@TheFantasyForge That's awesome
I’m with you on low level dnd, it’s the juiciest part! The world is just bigger and more daring when you’re small time. I find video games even become a snooze at higher levels when you have the gear and answers to best most anything and everything. I want to perputually be afraid of wolves howling in the night and bandits looking to get a knife to your throat on the highways! But that’s just me✌️
Couldn't have said it better myself lol
I really do prefer lower level play. Once the game goes beyond level 10, it is much harder to plan adventures and challenge the party. Still, the players want to play around with those abilities and power, so if a game continues to run, I put those levels in. I haven't been above level 15 in many decades though, except for a level 20 one-shot.
I think it has less to do with level and more to do with story. As long as the game has a beginning middle and end, I'm good. Games that die a slow painful death around level 7 are the worst. Wild Beyond the Witchlight took us to only level 7, but that was really fun.
High level play can be risky, you just have to have a DM that is good at designing encounters. It's harder at high levels to challenge the party though.
Agree! High level is still fun, don't get me wrong, but there's something so awesome about low level
Oh I love WBTW! What did you think of it? *no spoilers for anyone reading
@@TheFantasyForge - it has lots of interesting and fun elements. It is much more focused on roleplaying than combat however and breaks a lot of D&D lore giving it an Alice in Wonderland feel. I found it more like a 'choose your own adventure book' than playing D&D. I still enjoyed it very much despite that. You know, getting together with friends and all that.
To me Lvl 15 it's the maximum level in all of my campaigns, after that the game becomes kinda boring, basically based in who roll the bigger initiative win. Obviously you could balance this but i prefer using all that time in creating a new campaign. And well obviously because post lvl 15 the casters are gonna be extremely powerful while the martials need to be careful with the enemies you need to use for those casters
👍
thanks for the love!
That is precisely the reason why people play games like Warhammmer or Harn or even Fate - everything is much less heroic and epic, more realistic and therefore more riskier and engaging
🥳🫂👍🏿
😁😎😳
I love playing in lower level games but the higher level games are enjoyable to dm
Running those higher level games was so much harder though! I'm curious what you love most about them
@@TheFantasyForge i'm running a campaign at level 20 right now and it is pretty fun, you can just use everything and It Will be balanced, a Terrasque? Go then, a Greatwyrm? Of course! IT'S SO FREAKING FUNNY
@@TheFantasyForge I just like using all the tougher creatures and seeing how players counter them
@@juandipop6955 You know when you put it that way it sounds awesome lol. I mean I know the game is "balanced" just in how it's built in general, but I just love how one hit might kill you in most encounters at low level haha
@@TVMAN1997 hell yeah! I can definitely see the appeal in that. My players have surprised me more than once in combat that was supposed to be "hard"
Having watched the video, I feel like I still don't really understand your position here.
Points 1 and 4 I can't really argue with, except to say that those points are simply cons being presented here without the corresponding pros (for example, high-level D&D promises new experiences to players who have got the hang of how to play, and while combat is longer, that's essentially a necessary consequence of players having more choices, i.e., more agency).
Point 2 comes across as being based on a classic misunderstanding of what HP is meant to represent in D&D, and even then, it makes assumptions about the tone and setting of the game which aren't universally applicable.
Point 3 similarly doesn't make a lot of sense to me: higher level play can still pose real threats to the player characters, and at the same time necessarily involves in-universe stakes that are higher than those at low-level - or what, are you still fighting goblins in the forests at level 15? Perhaps point 3 could have been improved by giving some concrete examples? I'm not sure.
Point 5 - which, incidentally, is wrongly titled on the screen - is again dependent on setting and tone. If your setting is medieval Europe, then being able to cast Fly is obviously a big deal. If your setting is "medieval Europe, but wizards have been a prominent force for centuries", then the bad guys should expect you to cast Fly and have prepared something to work against that. Perhaps what you really mean here is "forcing the players to get creative in the same way requires more work on the part of the DM" - but this is my own speculation, it's not what you said in the video, and that's what I mean when I say that I'm not sure I really understand your position.
This video wasn't really meant to be any point, just me talking about what I like about low level games as stated when I say "today I want to talk about why I love low level Dungeons and Dragons" lol. That's it really. Just a video about something I thought would be fun to make a video on haha
Definitely see your points though! I use HP at my table as "luck" partly, so not every hit is suddenly more blood loss or anything lol. Totally, every table, setting, and even DM is different. I think this whole video is more of like why I like it at my own table. Sorry if it was confusing!
With respect, I just wholeheartedly disagree. High level games are where things truly get interesting for me as both a DM and player. As a DM, there are so many cool monsters of higher CR's that if we stuck to only low level (Tiers 1-2), as DM, I would never get to usr and my players would never see, thats both a waste of my money resources. As a player, yeah, I want to be able to use those higher level abilities because they are often some of the coolest things on offer and what's the point of having 20 levels if you never get the chance to reach that high?
I will agree that combats take longer at higher levels, but in my experience that's typically the fault of casters and the spellcasting mechanic in general. When you have a party of mostly martials or non-casters? Things go way smoother and faster. Experience and system/game knowledge also plays a factor as to how fast any given combat goes.
As far the problem of hit points is concerned, the solution or method I use to handle it is two-fold. 1) both players and monsters hit hard. Ensure that both sides feel powerful to simulate each blow having the potential to be killshots. 2) Manage player AC. Generally as a rule I dont let players have higher than 20 AC to ensure that monsters still have a decent chance to hit, so I rarely give out AC boosting items and players really have to work towards breaking that soft cap of 20. With these two things combats rarely last more than an 5 rounds and more than an hour irl.
Regarding player creativity, I'll just say that in general, my players who favor playing pure martials (Fighters, Barbarian, Monk and Rogue) are far more clever than caster mains BECAUSE they have less options. Casters are too used to spells solving all of their problems. Martials more often interact with the game world because they often have to in order to gain any type of leverage or advantages.
Yeah, i think character complexity is a big problem with high level dnd, but that shouldnt be conflated with a superhero/demigod themed game being inherently unfun.
Being above human scale is very fun for many people...but dnd 5e and games like it do it very poorly imo.
In ideal world, the whole progression would feel absolutely awesome, your characters would go from zero to hero in believable gripping story of intense emotions. Thing is, unless you're playing heavily roleplay oriented games without relying on the rules and rolls too much, much can end this, from us players with real life flaws of all kinds and understanding of each other and our wants and needs, to the rules not fitting well enough to some rolls just going awry. Despite that all this game can be very fun at all its stages only barred by understanding and proficiency with it's utilisation of rules other aspects. TLDR think it's compicated, but still love each part of it. (It's just that it's easier to work with less tools)
Hard disagree. It depends on what type of game you want, and you are speaking as if the things in low level play are universally preferable.They aren't. Also, you can be just as creative at higher levels with more tools to do more interesting things.
Totally agree! Players can get creative at any level. But I also think that the higher level you go, the less realistic it becomes and slower overall combat becomes.
I definitely prefaced the video with "I think" and "why I love" so as to not speak in absolutes. I know everyone has their preferences lol.
@@TheFantasyForge My dude, i am playing a half angel who casts spells by doing little dances with a pair of castanets. What about that makes you think i am here for realism?
These things are to taste. DND was started by guys wanting to playthrough realistic battle sequences. It has an audience in this space.
@@FattyMcFox bro chill, he is not the enemy. If you're mad at something else, adress that but forgr is not the problem
@@718jef my comment wasn't even aggressive. The "Hard disagree" is just " I strongly disagree with the statement." The Video poster and i get each other 's viewpoint even while disagreeing, i even gave a silly response to his comment. There is no conflict here.