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Perhaps when you and your friends reach such epic levels in a campaign those rules might exist but as of now where is not a focus on those things.
It should take easily more then a year or two of regular weekly or bi-weekly gaming to get into the high teens after all.
Also be careful as your repeating something from about 30000 other threads on here.
Hello,
I am considering buying the game and I was wondering when a book would be released that allows characters to go beyond 20th level. I like the epic characters that existed in D&D 3.0/3.5. The rules for those characters could certainly use improvement, however.
The pathfinder game looks interesting to me and I don't really like the 4th edition D&D rules. Having a power that a character can only use once a day or less doesn't really appeal to me. I like the old system where spells and such abilities as shapeshifting could be used several times a day. I also think fighter-type characters should have powerful melee attacks all the time, not just once or twice a day.
The people at paizo have said that although they will eventually release epic stuff it would not be in the near future...
The home-brew section of the boards have multiple attempts at filling this current void. Most are good. Check it out. An example that a friend and I have been working on, but there are many more, search around.
The short answer is that characters are allowed to do so now. Things like spell progression, bonus feats and abilities (like Rage power or Rogue talents) are pretty easy to extrapolate from the existing 1-20 levels presented. That's assuming you don't multi-class, of course - A Wizard/Cleric/Mystic Theurge could easily work their way up to 50th level (well, maybe not easily) within the framework of the currently printed rules.
The challenge of course would be finding appropriate and challenging threats for such epic-level characters. My honest advice, unless you're in love with certain high-level abilities is this: if you're advancing so quickly through levels that needs for 20+ content seems on the horizon, consider slowing your party's advancement. The best group I ever ran advanced at half-pace, requiring twice the number of xp to reach each level. They just loved their characters and wanted to enjoy the game rather than necessarily racing their way to the top. Another option is to start that slowing at a predetermined level, like 7+ or 11+ so that characters are able to get their core or character-identifying powers without the low-level grind.
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It should take easily more then a year or two of regular weekly or bi-weekly gaming to get into the high teens after all.
Holy slow advancement, Batman! My group played through the Age of Worms AP in about a year. It took us all the way from 1st up to 23rd. We played once a week for 4 hours, then, right before our deployment, we stepped it up to 2 nights a week - still 4 hours per night - for about a month. Do you use a slower progression system or something? To only reach 14-ish after a year seems ludicrous to me.
Hello,
I am considering buying the game and I was wondering when a book would be released that allows characters to go beyond 20th level. I like the epic characters that existed in D&D 3.0/3.5. The rules for those characters could certainly use improvement, however.
The pathfinder game looks interesting to me and I don't really like the 4th edition D&D rules. Having a power that a character can only use once a day or less doesn't really appeal to me. I like the old system where spells and such abilities as shapeshifting could be used several times a day. I also think fighter-type characters should have powerful melee attacks all the time, not just once or twice a day.
I really hope Paizo doesn't try to get to clever with an epic level book like 3.5 did. That was one of the worst books.
I want a simple rules system that allows for epic level advancement of current characters. I don't want new Prcs or epic level class choices or a highly different magic system. I want a post-20 progression for different archetypes, classes, and Prcs that already existed. And a post-20 magic system that builds on the existing one rather than tries to create a whole new one.
And epic level modules as well.
I imagine it will be a while before such rules come out. But I hope they do them. My players are almost 20. They want to keep playing those characters beyond 20.
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Well you really need stuff to do post 20 beyond the main rulebook. Not a gigantic pile of monsters, but then the world wouldn't survive long with huge amounts of epic monsters roaming about either.
In all honesty you've already got the tools to keep playing via multi-classing. Maxed out one class and then start picking up things from another. You should know when feats are available and stat bumps and the like.
21st level character? Fighter 1/Wizard 20. Done. Need another? Rogue 2/Bard 19. And so on and so on.
It's not "epic" in the old sense but honestly it allows the game to continue to function as well as any of the d20 stuff functions past level 15.
I once ran a game all the way to 57th level in 3.5... i don't plan on going past 20 ever again - it just wasn't worth the effort to keep it fun for the group.
I could agree with you. I don't agree ... but I could...
Though next time around I'll do the same thing - start at low level, give out flat XP, and see where we end up ...
What's left to do in hard cover books other than Epic. I can think of lots of thing but not much that would make a whole hard cover book worth it except for Epic. So what will come out in 2012 for hardcover books? I could see Epic rules and book of additional rule with stuff like Kingdom rules, Mass Combat, Races, Psionics, and all the stuff that really isn't book on its own.
What's left to do in hard cover books other than Epic. I can think of lots of thing but not much that would make a whole hard cover book worth it except for Epic. So what will come out in 2012 for hardcover books? I could see Epic rules and book of additional rule with stuff like Kingdom rules, Mass Combat, Races, Psionics, and all the stuff that really isn't book on its own.Well, let's see what we have so far:
- Core Rulebook
- Bestiary 1 and 2
- Inner Sea World Guide
- Advanced Player's Guide
- GameMastery Guide
- Ultimate Magic
And what we know is coming:
- Bestiary 3
- Ultimate Combat
- Advanced Races Guide
This definitely leaves spots for psionic and above-20th rules, but it also leaves a spot for "high level gamemastery," which I'm pretty sure we'll see before above-20th rules.
Other things that I think warrant a hardcover: general monster rules along the lines of Savage Species, environmental books like Frostburn, Sandstorm and Stormwrack, and a planar handbook more recent than The Great Beyond (and ideally not Golarion-specific) - if this were closer to Planescape in scope and depth, that would be all the cooler.
I don't think we'll see anything like Libris Mortis or Lords of Madness, much as I liked those books, because they use the Revisited line to cover that sort of thing (even though it's not really the same kind of coverage). And we're also not likely to get a Dark Tapesty or interplanetary hardcover - such things are likely to go into the smaller Campaign Setting and Companion books, I think.
Yet, I'm still hoping that there will be some motion of some sort on the above-20th front next year.
The things that were done wrong ... Epic Spells and the approach to monsters - trying to fill in monsters for every CR up through the mid 50s is just plain silly, an approach more like the one taken for AD&D monsters (few that require a truly beyond normal party to take down, with a "more epic level" battle simply including more of the already tough monsters) would be much more elegant.
I find some of them unrunnable - a shapeshifter that can take ANY shape, or ANY combination of shapes? Riiiiight.
My biggest issue is trying to justify why all these epic creatures are kicking around. So far it's holding together ... so far ... and it *does* make the underdark a really, really nasty place. No wonder nobody goes down there :)
There are already rules and guidelines for playing beyond 20th-level. They are in the Core Rulebook under the GameMastering chapter. I have provided an excerpt below:
Although Classes doesn't describe what happens after 20th level, this isn't to say that there are no resources available to you should you wish to continue your campaign on to 21st level and beyond. Rules for epic-level play like this exist in numerous products that are compatible with the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, although in many cases these alternative rules can provide unanticipated problems. For example, if your campaign world is populated by creatures and villains who, at the upper limit of power, can challenge a 20th-level character, where will epic-level PCs go for challenges? You might be looking at creating an entirely new campaign setting, one set on different planes, planets, or dimensions from the one where your players spent their first 20 levels, and that's a lot of work.
Paizo Publishing may eventually publish rules to take your game into these epic realms, but if you can't wait and would rather not use existing open content rules for epic-level play, you can use the following brief guidelines to continue beyond 20th level. Note that these guidelines aren't robust enough to keep the game vibrant and interesting on their own for much longer past 20th level, but they should do in a pinch for a campaign that needs, say, 22 or 23 experience levels to wrap up. Likewise, you can use these rules to create super-powerful NPCs for 20th-level characters to face.
Experience Points: To gain a level beyond 20th, a character must double the experience points needed to achieve the previous level. Thus, assuming the medium XP progression, a 20th-level character needs 2,100,000 XP to become 21st level, since he needed 1,050,000 XP to reach 20th level from 19th. He'd then need 4,200,000 XP to reach 22nd level, 8,400,000 XP to reach 23rd, and so on.
Scaling Powers: Hit dice, base attack bonuses, and saving throws continue to increase at the same rate beyond 20th level, as appropriate for the class in question. Note that no character can have more than 4 attacks based on its base attack bonus. Note also that, before long, the difference between good saving throws and poor saving throws becomes awkwardly large—the further you get from 20th level, the more noticeable this difference grows, and for high-level characters, bolstering their poor saving throws should become increasingly important. Class abilities that have a set, increasing rate, such as a barbarian's damage reduction, a fighter's bonus feats and weapon training, a paladin's smite evil, or a rogue's sneak attack continue to progress at the appropriate rate.
Spells: A spellcaster's caster level continues to increase by one for each level beyond 20th level. Every odd-numbered level, a spellcaster gains access to a new level of spell one above his previous maximum level, gaining one spell slot in that new level. These spell slots can be used to prepare or cast spells adjusted by metamagic feats or any known spell of lower levels. Every even-numbered level, a spellcaster gains additional spell slots equal to the highest level spell he can currently cast. He can split these new slots any way he wants among the slots he currently has access to.
For example, a 21st-level wizard gains a single 10th-level spell slot, in which he can prepare any spell of level 1st through 9th, or in which he can prepare a metamagic spell that results in an effective spell level of 10 (such as extended summon monster IX, or quickened disintegrate). At 22nd level he gains 10 spell-levels' worth of new spell slots, and can gain 10 1st-level spells per day, two 5th-level spells per day, one 7th-level and one 3rd-level spell per day, or one more 10th-level spell per day. At 23rd level, he gains a single 11th-level spell slot, and so on.
Spellcasters who have a limited number of spells known (such as bards and sorcerers) can opt out of the benefits they gain (either a new level of spells or a number of spell slots) for that level and in exchange learn two more spells of any level they can currently cast.
You might want to further adjust the rate of spell level gain for classes (like paladins and rangers) who gain spells more slowly than more dedicated spellcaster classes.
Multiclassing/Prestige Classes: The simplest way to progress beyond 20th level is to simply multiclass or take levels in a prestige class, in which case you gain all of the abilities of the new class level normally. This effectively treats 20th level as a hard limit for class level, but not as a hard limit for total character level.
There are already rules and guidelines for playing beyond 20th-level. They are in the Core Rulebook under the GameMastering chapter. I have provided an excerpt below:
** spoiler omitted **...
Yep! And those are okay, so long as you don't get too far past 20th.
I'm really curious to see how the game goes a week from Sunday, where there will be level 36 pregens :)
I'm guessing it will feel kind of flat compared to an equivalent 3.5e game, because while there's a ton of material out there, there's nothing that makes an above-20th-level character much more than a below-21st-level character with more feats and stuff.
The gap in power isn't any more noticeable at level 25 than it is at level 16 in Pathfinder.
At the very worst, you get to a point where the first person who wins initiative simply wins (on account of the high/low saves).
The gap in power isn't any more noticeable at level 25 than it is at level 16 in Pathfinder.
At the very worst, you get to a point where the first person who wins initiative simply wins (on account of the high/low saves).
What you say makes a lot of assumptions, but has a grain of truth. Which is why I pointed out that the Core Rulebook system works well as long as you don't go too much past 20th-level.