The Gaming Den

Personally, I don't like the idea of starting most campaigns at level 1. It leaves very little room for 'below' that range (like for commoners and housecats) unless you pad the first level; which of course just pushes up the time limit for your RNG.

Unfortunately, even though the mechanical situation for it is really simple, the problem is that a lot of players have it firmly entrenched in their brains that a game needs to start at level 1. You can gussy it up with stuff like tiers and iconics and adventuring support but they will dig their heels in. So a question abounds--is there any way to stop these dillweeds? Do you think that there's some blurb or mechanic or whatever that can pull these out or do we just accept the fact that the game is going to have to end 2 levels early?

why have a first level if everyone is going to start at third.

Because some people like their challenges to come in the form of malnourished goblins and housecats.

Psychic Robot wrote:why have a first level if everyone is going to start at third.

The only reason there's a desire to start at 3rd is because the PCs are more capable. Because they've advanced two levels. Therefore they are "better" than some enemies they might face.

If you make level 1 characters have all the bells-n-whistles of a level 3 character (in order to start more capable), then it's a bit odd that the transition to level 4 improves your character by such a small amount, and you have the problem of everything you meet being as powerful as a level 3 character.

yeah but you could just say "level one means you have a sufficient level of training to go out and adventure"

The level 1 is to have some room at the bottom for things like children and housecats and kobold baby snatchers. You (presumably) don't want PCs to start off their D&D career that weak, but if you make 'bottom of PC power' level 1 then you can't have things like commoners graduating from the wizard academy or peasants becoming temporarily legitimate threats because they got into the mithril equipment. This is precisely what creates silliness like 3E aristocrats being forever screwed over or the entire 4E minion debacle.

The problem is that if you do have a level 1 for that then you're going to have a lot of people start their campaigns at housecat level. Not that it's a bad idea in of itself (Wesnoth does this) but a lot of people aren't trying to model the 'Steve the Crap Covered Farmer becomes Angel Knight Steve' story so much as being incapable of starting an adventure off from the designated first level. This problem persists even if you call sub-PC levels things like Level B or Level -3.

I dislike first level because it's so swingy and brittle. A wizard pretty much just dies if he gets hit, and has only one (realistically two, from bonus spells) action that he even cares about before he is actually as bad as a commoner.
A fighter is better, in that he might (maybe) be able to take two hits, but he is still not better than a commoner in any way that anyone cares about. Worse, the only things you can beat up on are pathetic. Not that they're woefully underpowered (though that's true too), but you actually feel bad about beating up asthmatic goblins.
First level DnD is a ghetto of sadness and suck. second isn't much better. I don't like playing games where the premise is that I can have fun later, especially when I can skip directly to the fun part.

I always thought level 1 was pretty much the domain of scrappy kids with their dad's old sword and helmet, anyway. So if you want to be a dude who's murdered enough jermlaine to warrant a post as a caravan guard, then you can be 3rd level. Makes sense to me.

Maybe a more fundamental question is why do games even need levels?

Schwarzkopf wrote:Maybe a more fundamental question is why do games even need levels?

ARghraghragagh.

No seriously - this is game design 101. It is honestly frustrating to see people "not get it".

Classical "Class and Level" games have these advantages:
-Stronger flavor rails
-Easier to write and balance
-Easier to make characters for
-Easier to make adventures for
-Better role protection


Classical "Point Buy" games have these advantages:
-More Freedom
-More flexibility

Yes, few systems are PURE one or the other, but to not get why levels are a "thing" is crazy.

I didn't say that I don't get why levels are a "thing", chief, I questioned the assumption that a game (any given game, all games, this game, that game) NEEDS levels.

I don't *actually* disagree with all of your pros/cons there. Just the 'easier to make characters for' part is bullshit. I've played/written/written for point-buy games where you can make a character with one tenth of the time and effort it takes to make a leveled D&D character. Overall, though, pretty good summary. But I do think that questioning people's assumptions from time to time is good, even if it causes them to say, and I quote:

"ARghraghragagh."

My favorite game is Shadowrun, which has never had levels (or for that matter, really, classes). And it does indeed suffer from problems with balancing adventures to be an appropriate challenge level (your advantages 2 and 4 for classical "class and level" games.)

Schwarzkopf wrote:I didn't say that I don't get why levels are a "thing", chief, I questioned the assumption that a game (any given game, all games, this game, that game) NEEDS levels.

Yeah, no one cares. The topic is about starting at level 3, which implies that levels are used. Don't change the topic to a discussion about whether his game, which uses levels, should be re-written to try out something you think is nifty.

What game? No game is mentioned in the topic title or OP. I mean I guess we're talking about any of a dozen stupidly identical and crappy variants of D&D but it's not like that's actually stated anywhere in the first post.

I guess what I'm challenging is the "everything is always D&D so much so that it doesn't even need to be explicitly stated" mentality. And if 'no one cares' maybe they should.

Or maybe not. Who gives a fuck, I mean this is the Den.

For D&D (AD&D/3.5E/PFRPG), I always like starting at level 2. In AD&D, that greatly increases the party's survivability and in 3.5E/PFRPG, it allows you to start as a multi-classed character (instead of an arcane warrior who isn't arcane or who isn't a warrior, e.g.).

Schwarzkopf wrote:What game? No game is mentioned in the topic title or OP. I mean I guess we're talking about any of a dozen stupidly identical and crappy variants of D&D but it's not like that's actually stated anywhere.

Most games with "levels" are fairly similar to D&D in how they work, in my experience. There are exceptions, though (e.g. V&V, where your level has a more limited affect on how tough your character is).

2nd Level is still pretty deadly.

Schwarzkopf wrote:2nd Level is still pretty deadly.

Not in my experience, assuming you let PCs go to -10 or -Con score or whatever before dying. By 2nd level, the odds of getting insta-KOed by a single hit are fairly small. But YMMV.

Lago PARANOIA wrote: This problem persists even if you call sub-PC levels things like Level B or Level -3.

Does it really?

In my experience, games/campaigns where things are set up using terms like:

Background Level,
Apprentice Level,
Starting Adventurer level

Go over pretty well with characters starting at level 3 - even though this is all just legerdemain of hiding the numbers behind adjectives.

So I expect that the "everyone should start at level 1" meme you are railing against here has more to do with level 1 having the number 1 attached to it than with the power level of level 1 in relation to potential threats.

Or maybe my own experience is just abnormal?

Lago PARANOIA wrote:Personally, I don't like the idea of starting most campaigns at level 1. [snip]
So a question abounds--is there any way to stop these dillweeds? Do you think that there's some blurb or mechanic or whatever that can pull these out or do we just accept the fact that the game is going to have to end 2 levels early?

In my experience the game ends after the DM has some emotional problem and everyone gets pissed off and blames the game for things not being fun, which is almost always before 12 levels have been gained by any player. Even when things go well, gaining more than 12 levels demands that the setting, DMing, player commitment, and real life problems somehow magically align to become a campaign in the top 1% of the success range. I've never once been bothered by the concept that players only get to advance 17 levels instead of 19. (sorry for the digression.)

Anyway, I think where you start depends entirely on who's playing.

I like starting at level 1
New players, sometimes even players new to the setting or houserules, really benefit from starting at level 1. Because everything is so swingy, and the chances of death are so high, it actually feels like a pretty big accomplishment to get to level 2. You might die and have to make a new character. Because of this, it's a bit of a different game than what you experience at level 5, but it sets up expectations in the players that things are dangerous, and you should value your life and take things seriously.

Also, I like that it allows you to get to know your character slowly, so that you aren't going to advance to level 4 and feel a little lost, without an ability to understand all the options you had at level 3.

These guys are going to be intimidated by level 12. Let it take some time to get there, and keep the level progression rate at roughly 1 level per 3 game sessions until the game ends at whatever level they achieve by then.

This assumes (rightly, I think) that you're talking 3.5 and not 4e, because in 4e at level 1 you're not playing a game that's much different from your level 5 game. You can do epic-seeming things, and assuming you didn't screw up making the character it takes about the same number of attacks to take you down, regardless of level.

I like starting at level 4
For people who have already played the system past level 4, playing at level 1 is almost painful and frustrating. They know the score, and even hinting that keeping track of more than 6 feats/abilities/spells/skill/concepts is a challenge is going to start a heated argument. If they can handle it without a hitch, by all means skip ahead a bit.

The end result is more fun straight out of the gate because they're getting back to the fun they remember from previous games, and they still get the nostalgia of feeling underpowered and simple. It also spreads the possible foes out a bit and gives you the freedom to face them off against an ogre warlord and his merry band of 16 wolf-riding goblin archers - and they can handle it without feeling overwhelmed because they aren't noobs.

These guys are going to be itching for level 12 before they even come up with a name. Get them there, and let the high levels come slowly. The level progression rate is going to be fast at first, and then spread out to around 1 level every 8 game sessions for the last few levels.

Bottom line, you're calling people dillweeds for liking something different than you do, without there being an objectively better option that fits all situations. If you're running the game, make the choice that fits the players. If you're a player and you've been voted down, you're the dillweed for saying that what they like is worse than what you like.

Level 1 very much has the "this is where you start" vibe to it. Whereas "Level B," particularly if kept on a wholly separate table in an entirely different section of the book (i.e. the section on monsters instead of the one on character advancement), doesn't have that connotation. I'd find it hard to believe that people would insist on starting at the lowest possible level even if the rules for playing at that level are an optional rule in the appendix. Or a splatbook.

Chamomile wrote:Level 1 very much has the "this is where you start" vibe to it. Whereas "Level B," particularly if kept on a wholly separate table in an entirely different section of the book (i.e. the section on monsters instead of the one on character advancement), doesn't have that connotation.

I sort of agree. Level 1 has a "This is where a character starts" vibe to it. Implicitly, actually.

It's not a difficult concept at all to grasp that your character started at level 1 and went through a montage of training and rat killing to get to level 3, when the story picks up because now things start to get interesting. If that's how you want to set up a game, that is.

Schwarzkopf wrote:What game? No game is mentioned in the topic title or OP. I mean I guess we're talking about any of a dozen stupidly identical and crappy variants of D&D but it's not like that's actually stated anywhere in the first post.

I guess what I'm challenging is the "everything is always D&D so much so that it doesn't even need to be explicitly stated" mentality. And if 'no one cares' maybe they should.

Or maybe not. Who gives a fuck, I mean this is the Den.

Look guys, the question isn't why this theoretical game should start at level 1, it's why should it even have levels?

No guys, the real question is why should the game have a DM?

No guys, the real question is why is it played on a table top not on a computer?

No guys, the real question is why is it a game instead of a political movement?

Long story short, even as a hypothetical game, when someone assumes that the game has levels, you are obligated to accept that the hypothetical game has levels in order to have a conversation. Just like when I assume a game is a PnP RPG with a DM, people are required to accept that the game is not on a computer and not DM less to be an actual participant in the conversation.

Lago PARANOIA wrote:Do you think that there's some blurb or mechanic or whatever that can pull these out or do we just accept the fact that the game is going to have to end 2 levels early?

Let the game go to level 22. Now you have your scrappy levels for weak monsters to fight on the PC's adventure at level 1 3, and they get to play for 20 levels if they really want.

Bihlbo wrote:
In my experience the game ends after the DM has some emotional problem and everyone gets pissed off and blames the game for things not being fun, which is almost always before 12 levels have been gained by any player. Even when things go well, gaining more than 12 levels demands that the setting, DMing, player commitment, and real life problems somehow magically align to become a campaign in the top 1% of the success range. I've never once been bothered by the concept that players only get to advance 17 levels instead of 19. (sorry for the digression.)

I'll go even further than that: Fewer than 50% of the D&D games I have ever seen or been involved in advanced more than 2 levels from the starting point.

None of the games which have gone more than 5 levels of advancement have involved the exact same player group for all of those levels. A large component of what allows a game to continue long term* is a playgroup that can handle players leaving and joining and players that left rejoining in a way that doesn't ruin the experience for the continuous players.

Where Long Term is generally anything longer than the 10-14 weeks in one college semester.

Chamomile wrote:Level 1 very much has the "this is where you start" vibe to it.

Same reasoning applies to age. "Why would you ever start playing a character that wasn't 1 year old?" is ridiculous, and "Why would you ever start playing a character that wasn't 1st level?" is ridiculous for exactly the same reasons.

because a baby can't do anything in real life you stupid fuck, levels are an abstract measurement of power and do not correlate to things that actually exist