Thinking about squishing the levels of D&D down and sort of normalizing a more horizontal experience rather than a grind towards quasi-godhood which begs the question: Do you need to have incremental rewards and goals to have a good, long term adventuring experience? - ThreadSky

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flyinggiantian.bsky.social • 11 days ago

Thinking about squishing the levels of D&D down and sort of normalizing a more horizontal experience rather than a grind towards quasi-godhood which begs the question: Do you need to have incremental rewards and goals to have a good, long term adventuring experience?

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flyinggiantian.bsky.social•11 days ago

The acquisition of wealth, power, are these things necessary to playing RPGs? Money seems so abstract sometimes - a high score rather than a useful tool. And the power scaling of D&D is so abstract.

flyinggiantian.bsky.social•11 days ago

One of my great failings is not making the rules of D&D more… freeform.

simons-mith.bsky.social•11 days ago

I can suggest a way from a LARP I used to play that gives the game a really 'long tail'. You choose a level cap: 8th, 10th, 5, whatever you like and let the characters level more or less normally until they reach it. Once you reach the cap, you're stuck, and you buy abilities individually.

simons-mith.bsky.social•11 days ago

An extra hit die, a point in an attribute, an extra spell slot; each of these now costs almost as much as a level. Characters have now pretty hit the power limit of the setting, and future improvements are little incremental steps, not a full level's package of cool new stuff.

simons-mith.bsky.social•10 days ago

In the LARP the level cap was at level 8 (and levels 6 and 7 were a bit slower to attain than previous levels) and these extra abilities were bought with 'points past 8th'. Stretched the longevity of the game a lot, but still regularly gave PCs new abilities to play with, just much more slowly.

flyinggiantian.bsky.social•10 days ago

Definitely something to consider. It sounds like I’d need to see it in action. But I’m even envisioning doing away with hitpoint gain or maybe just reverting to just the con modifier. Part of that would mean complete redesign of monsters, which begs the question, why not just start over?

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