Another set of books...
Glen Cook's 'The Black Company' is a story of how a mercenary company with a lot of mooks, a few low-mid level fighters/rogues, and a couple of low-mid level spellcasters deal with their interactions with very high level full casters.
I'd probably put Silent and Goblin in the 4-7th level arcane caster range, Raven's maybe a 6th level fighter, and the Ten Who Were Taken are all 11th-17th level casters?
The Lady and the Taken were rediculously powerful for the setting requiring specialy attuned weapons to harm them...
They might even be Epic. According to the D20 Black Company book they are all Tier 4 magicians, which is highest Tier possible. So I'd say level 20 minimum. I mean did Limper ever actually die? I stopped after the first book series...
For the most part most literature really isn't set up like that unless it's one of the many obvious novelizations of someone's D&D campaigns (there are more than a few of these - they even sell well).Out of curiousity, are you taking the position that Malazin is one of those, or isn't one of those? It's not completely clear to me.
(To me it really, really has that feel and that's jarring enough to put me off, but I can equally see how someone else would really like it.)
Nah Malazan is Erickson's GURPS campaign, not a D&D campaign (no joke).
The first book is really jarring and honestly his pacing his pretty dreadful at time but honestly I like his stuff much better than the average Tolkien pastiche and the largely godawful urban fantasy that is dominating fantasy literature these days.
Goodkind seems to be a fairly obvious D&D novelization but honestly my dislike of his writing prevents me from being 100% on that.
WoT also seems like a bad pastiche of Tolkien meets D&D but I lost interest early on.
I would say it bares imilar power levels to what we would expect perhaps a 12-15th level mage to have if D&D magic allowed true damage specialization, but sheer world-thrashing is one aspect of high power literature that D&D tends to avoid, and for good reason lol
Hmmm...
I beg to differ...
Note the bolded points. Seriously, Meteor Swarm is a tremendous failure in terms of property destruction, and many many many Realms fans consider that event the worst thing ever xD.I would say it bares similar power levels to what we would expect perhaps a 12-15th level mage to have if D&D magic allowed true damage specialization, but sheer world-thrashing is one aspect of high power literature that D&D tends to avoid, and for good reason lolHmmm...
I beg to differ...
LOL
When people ask me "what were they thinking!?!?" I say, they threw a planet at Toril and still couldn't kill Drizzt...
Nah Malazan is Erickson's GURPS campaign, not a D&D campaign (no joke).
Eh, but you know what I mean: it's got the kind of weird characterization and sometimes odd plot elements that you'd expect to find in someone's home campaign but not so much fiction.
Disclaimer: I had to really struggle to finish Gardens of the Moon and gave up after that, so probably it gets better in those respects at some point.
Goodkind seems to be a fairly obvious D&D novelization but honestly my dislike of his writing prevents me from being 100% on that.
Huh, I don't think that's really fair -- there's too much of the plot that happens by what would be DM fiat and wouldn't really ever be the outcome of any set of rules or PCs.
The problem with Sword of Truth is less D&Dness more that it's clear that midway through writing the series he read the works of Ayn Rand, thought they were the most brilliant thing ever, and felt compelled to preach their gospel no matter how ridiculously he had to retcon his previous works to do so. (The evil, badass, rapacious conquerer antagonist of one book is suddenly a terrible caricature of a communist that's really all about forcible redistribution of wealth from the hardworking to the needy in the next book? WTF?)
Joseph Stalin vs Germany World War II. At first he was welcomed with open arms under the expectation ANYONE would be better than Hitler.
They were wrong.
But... that doesn't explain why his personality as established in a few books is replaced by a completely different personality in later books.
Conan single-handedly slew a remorhaz. Is that only eighth level?
Depends upone the stats of the Remorhaz. The Remorhaz Conan kiled may have had different stats than those given to it in 3.x/PFRPG.
If the idea that Conan was only 5th, 6th, or even 8th level is accepted and Conan killed a Remorhaz, single-handedly, then the Remorhaz's stats must have been within the range that a 5th to 8th level character could single-handedly overcome.
Another set of books...
Glen Cook's 'The Black Company' is a story of how a mercenary company with a lot of mooks, a few low-mid level fighters/rogues, and a couple of low-mid level spellcasters deal with their interactions with very high level full casters.
I'd probably put Silent and Goblin in the 4-7th level arcane caster range, Raven's maybe a 6th level fighter, and the Ten Who Were Taken are all 11th-17th level casters?
The Lady and the Taken were rediculously powerful for the setting requiring specialy attuned weapons to harm them...
They might even be Epic. According to the D20 Black Company book they are all Tier 4 magicians, which is highest Tier possible. So I'd say level 20 minimum. I mean did Limper ever actually die? I stopped after the first book series...
Pulls out Black Company Campaign Setting and:
Croaker: Level 15 multiclass in the end
Lady: 52nd level wizard/5th level great general
Sleepy: lvl 16 multiclass in the end
Howler: wizard 35
Soulcatcher: 35th level wizard/ 10th level jack-of-all-trades in the begining
The Dominator: 75th lvl wizard and a demi-power
It lists the average soldier in the Black Company as 4th level fighters.
Just about every character that appears in the novels is statted up in the setting book.
I love how in the novels the soldiers just pile themselves onto the high level wizards and just go to town.
Also, I recommend picking them back up and reading all of them. I don't want to spoiler Limper's fate.
Nah Malazan is Erickson's GURPS campaign, not a D&D campaign (no joke).
Eh, but you know what I mean: it's got the kind of weird characterization and sometimes odd plot elements that you'd expect to find in someone's home campaign but not so much fiction.
Disclaimer: I had to really struggle to finish Gardens of the Moon and gave up after that, so probably it gets better in those respects at some point.
Well im an erikson fan, but i must say it really depends on what you mean about better. I kinda picture his books as pretty niche specific, and i can tell you that the general oppinion, seems to either be you love them or you hate them. I really like his dark world, morbid sense of humor, very complex plots, and in general just the way he gets me to view his world. I can completely see how some people find one or more of these factors off putting, and i agree these books arnt for everybody. What i find interesting is the way, i think, he manages to make a fantastic world realistic, and still so much like our own.
What i meant according to literature on the other hand, was that erikson describes a world in which exists both lvl 20 gods and level 1 peassants, i.e describing a world just like the one high level DnD players inhabit. That was the connection i tried to make to this thread subject.
Which story/issue was that in? It sounds vaguely familiar, but I just can't put my finger on it. :D
As to original topic, Riftwar springs to mind. Think about the stuff that Pug, Thomas, Nakor and the rest are pulling off.
Agree with that all the way. Pug and Macros the Black rode a protected island to the beginning of the universe and Tomas could cut a hole into hyperspace with his golden sword. Pretty epic if you ask me.
The biggest problem I see in comparing literature to an RPG like Pathfinder or DnD is that very little fantasy literature involves a multiverse. Thus, most character are epic characters on their own little "material plane" so to speak, but there is little mention of how they would fare in a DnD style multiverse.
How are you defining epic?
It requires some careful study, and you can't just slap up the level required for their highest level ability and call it good, but a fair portion of the time (roughly seventy-five percent I would guess) one can come up with an approximate level equivalency.
It is as much a question of what is epic for material plane level foes and what is epic for anything beyond the material plane as it is anything else. After a while even Hercules and Beowulf run out of things that challenge them that come from their "plane" and never actually defeat anything much beyond that level that could be considered "from another plane" on their own, at least not through combat. The fact that most literature tends to focus on a single world (or "plane" in DnD terms), which DnD characters tend to stop doing at about level 10, tends to distort comparisons.
I didn't mean to make it out that the distortions were bad, just that they are there, but many people forget to take them into account.
Tolkien may have created what is more of a low magic/dark age style world than most modern fantasy but Aragorn is certainly a high level ranger. He wields one of the few magic weapons in the books, he is an expert at the tracking/evading/survival stuff that rangers do, he can heal, he wins every fight he is in despite wearing little to no armor, and he can lead whole nations. The whole point to Aragorn is that while he doubts his worthiness, he is in fact the most "special" character in the story.
All of which a mid range Ranger can easily do. He has CLW by that point, he's got the majority of his bonus feats, he's going to have a decent AC and a couple of Favored Enemies (and, really, Aragorn pretty much just fights orcs and occasionally trolls), and if he was really high level, he'd wield several magic weapons, not just one. Honestly, by level 7, a PC is already a master tracker. It's not like Aragorn wasn't tracking whole army units anyway.
(Though I'd personally stat Aragorn up as a Ranger/Paladin, myself. That even ramps up his healer-y-ness and makes him fit better overall.
It is as much a question of what is epic for material plane level foes and what is epic for anything beyond the material plane as it is anything else. After a while even Hercules and Beowulf run out of things that challenge them that come from their "plane" and never actually defeat anything much beyond that level that could be considered "from another plane" on their own, at least not through combat. The fact that most literature tends to focus on a single world (or "plane" in DnD terms), which DnD characters tend to stop doing at about level 10, tends to distort comparisons.How are you defining epic?
It requires some careful study, and you can't just slap up the level required for their highest level ability and call it good, but a fair portion of the time (roughly seventy-five percent I would guess) one can come up with an approximate level equivalency.
But I think that largely comes from the D&D cosmology being so detailed and that the majority of high CR bestiary monsters tend towards being either ancient dragons or outsiders.
Further I think that's largely predicated on the idea put forth early on in 3.x that the appropriate challenge for characters is primarily built around 4 PCs + entourage vs 1 or 2 big bads. I'm not sure that's a universal feature of everyone's campaigns.
It's actually been a while since I've really read that much fantasy literature. I know that if I get started on a new series, I am going to want to finish it, which means buying most if not all the books, and my budget would most definitely not like me. However, I would probably peg most characters like Hercules, Beowulf, Conan (from what I've heard about him, as I've never actually read any of that material), and similar mythical heroes at level 10ish. High enough to be able to usually single handedly deal with anything the natural world can throw at them, and just starting to play on a more cosmic scale.
But I think that largely comes from the D&D cosmology being so detailed and that the majority of high CR bestiary monsters tend towards being either ancient dragons or outsiders.
Further I think that's largely predicated on the idea put forth early on in 3.x that the appropriate challenge for characters is primarily built around 4 PCs + entourage vs 1 or 2 big bads. I'm not sure that's a universal feature of everyone's campaigns.
The reason that most higher CR monsters are ancient dragons or outsiders is because at a certain point, the CR of a monster becomes too high to practically fit into the material plane without a lot of stretching the few believable premises beyond the point of belief. It is noteworthy that most foes of legendary characters like Hercules are unique and after about one or two of them, the hero either runs of out challenges or suddenly faces a threat from outside the known realm, like what happens with most comic book super heroes.
IMO, there's a reason we're pegging most heroes as mid-level at best. In iconic terms, heroes are usually less powerful than the challenges they overcome (high level villains) — that is why they are heroes and not bullies.
Exceptions exist. Heck, exceptions abound! But just because a character is famous doesn't make them high level.
IMO, there's a reason we're pegging most heroes as mid-level at best. In iconic terms, heroes are usually less powerful than the challenges they overcome (high level villains) — that is why they are heroes and not bullies.
Exceptions exist. Heck, exceptions abound! But just because a character is famous doesn't make them high level.
Indeed. It's why I've always felt that, for example, Superman would make an excellent villain, but he makes a lousy hero. Of course he triumphed over the bad guys! They weren't Superman. But if a group of people were pitted against an invulnerable, flying, super-strong alien with heat vision, x-ray vision, super-breath, freezing breath, super-senses, and a super kiss, and they won? That'd actually be impressive.
It seems almost that DC agrees with me a bit, which is why they invented Superman Prime/Superboy Prime, and he repeatedly beats the ever loving crap out of tons of supers and has racked up a pretty impressive body count. He's still stupid, but at least it's actually a victory when he's temporarily taken out.
Honestly even though I rarely play with epic level rules the Epic range of 20-30 pretty much informs my power level comparisons.
As such levels 20-30 pretty much represent what I think of as JLA or Marvel Cosmic level action. As such my grading guide for literary characters tends to scale slower than what many people seem to go with.
D&D is an odd beast in general and I don't think many characters really map to D&D style high fantasy well at all but here are some ideas for High level:
Conan (High level Barbarian/Fighter)
Elric (High level Sorceror/Fighter/Eldritch Knight)
King Arthur/Galahad/Lancelot (High level Paladin or Cavalier)
Captain America (High level Paladin)
Hercules (High level Barbarian)
Batman (High level Rogue)
Dr Strange (High level Wizard although he is often close to Epic level)
Comparing D&D to M&M I typically would have 15th level+ D&D characters equal to PL 10-13. PL 14+ is Epic level play IMHO.
IMO, there's a reason we're pegging most heroes as mid-level at best. In iconic terms, heroes are usually less powerful than the challenges they overcome (high level villains) — that is why they are heroes and not bullies.
Exceptions exist. Heck, exceptions abound! But just because a character is famous doesn't make them high level.
Even most villians are only a couple levels within the levels of the heroes though. Unless you start talking about about gods, demigods, and the really high CR dragons, celestials, devils, and demons, at which point you can really only use a handful of villians as individuals before a campaign world starts to get hard to believe.
There is a reason that most high level campaigns start to shift after level 10 to more of a campaign where the PC's, the villains, or both are closer to organizations than individual characters.
High level D&D play has always been a weird thing. I agree that there is no literary corresponding genre.
Some try to make parallels to myth: Cuchulain, Merlin, Gilgamesh and so on. I find this strange, one more or less defining part of these heroes is that they were alone with their power. As has been stated, they did not adventure together with other powerhouses.
I would say that the central issue is that in literature, you either struggle to get power, or you are burdened with the responsibility or decline of that power, never both. The epic of Heracles is a tragedy that ends with his death after his wife gives him a poisoned mantle. Merlin tries to guide lesser men to build a perfect realm, yet his efforts eventually come to naught. And so on.
Put another way: At 20th level, there are very few to oppose the heroes in the whole world. At some point, their decisions need to start to matter to everyone else. If they decide to support a certain king somewhere, that king gets enough power to reshape his society... for good or bad. Even if all power in the world comes into the hands of the heroes, they still have massively difficult questions to deal with. If all they do is live the lives they did at level 3: Harassing a BBEG, slaying and looting a few monsters, and spending the loot on booze in a tavern, willing suspension of disbelief gets more difficult. And conversely, if they do take power and try to reshape the world, the DM's carefully planned setting changes significantly.
This is precisely why I have a hard time wrapping my head around Forgotten Realms, especially as a setting for organized play. With all those high level characters running around, even after the Spell Plague, how does Faerun not have a Spell Plague more often. World War I showed very clearly what happens when you have that many powerful people precariously balanced against each other; even a small spark not directly related to more than one of the powers was enough to engulf Europe.
It is also why most literature ends with the hero dying or becoming king; the story as it has been written up to that point must change, and most authors are already stretching their abilities just to get the story to that point in a logical manner.
The only literary genre that really goes into the realm of higher level play is comic books, and even a complete stranger to comic books is familiar with the continuity issues that plague that particular genre.