|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
And less like incompetent bumbling morons who exist just to give your cleric his spells while the PCs comment on how they 'really' are saving the day.I like gods who are incompetent, bumbling morons, but not all of them: just enough for fun.
And I usually give a reason for why gods don't do their own work, usually either "gods aren't powerful enough to do everything" or "they're too busy almost literally holding up the universe". Or both.
Deities can be as blue or orange as you want them to be, the trick is if the god doesn't really hold up his end of the bargain, you start asking why they're worth the worship they get.
The Pathfinder core setting deities for example, the good ones anyway, seem incompetent. They offer no salvation. They assure no safety for the soul. They don't really do anything besides empower clerics. In an infinite universe, sooner or later, a daemon's making lunch out of your soul just by virtue of wearing things down.
I partially blame it on the old Gygaxian ethos that still looms over fantasy RPGs like a miasma, the idea that the bad guys are many, varied, and powerful, but its only the heroes who can accomplish anything. These are the people who are ok with a drow city having three dozen 12th level clerics and a level appropriate boss cleric, but the surface kingdoms consider a single 10th level guy to be legendary.
I built my pantheon (and hey large portions of my campaign setting) around the idea that the good guys don't need to be pants-on-head just so the PCs can feel like special snowflakes.
My nation states are functional, can deal with problems when they detect them, and high level folks are common enough to deal with high level threats. PCs are a part of the method for dealing with those high level threats.
And less like incompetent bumbling morons who exist just to give your cleric his spells while the PCs comment on how they 'really' are saving the day.I like gods who are incompetent, bumbling morons, but not all of them: just enough for fun.
And I usually give a reason for why gods don't do their own work, usually either "gods aren't powerful enough to do everything" or "they're too busy almost literally holding up the universe". Or both.
Deities can be as blue or orange as you want them to be, the trick is if the god doesn't really hold up his end of the bargain, you start asking why they're worth the worship they get.
The Pathfinder core setting deities for example, the good ones anyway, seem incompetent. They offer no salvation. They assure no safety for the soul. They don't really do anything besides empower clerics. In an infinite universe, sooner or later, a daemon's making lunch out of your soul just by virtue of wearing things down.
I partially blame it on the old Gygaxian ethos that still looms over fantasy RPGs like a miasma, the idea that the bad guys are many, varied, and powerful, but its only the heroes who can accomplish anything. These are the people who are ok with a drow city having three dozen 12th level clerics and a level appropriate boss cleric, but the surface kingdoms consider a single 10th level guy to be legendary.
I built my pantheon (and hey large portions of my campaign setting) around the idea that the good guys don't need to be pants-on-head just so the PCs can feel like special snowflakes.
My nation states are functional, can deal with problems when they detect them, and high level folks are common enough to deal with high level threats. PCs are a part of the method for dealing with those high level threats.
They don't even sally out and attack a nearby undead land when undead are hated by the faith and the followers of the good anti-undead god massively outnumber the undead, and could pillage and end the undead civilisation (loot and a win for the god). Golarion needs realpolitik and more cross-country ideological struggles actually leading to war.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Agreed on the snowflake, but going in the other direction of pcs not being powerful or unusual can have problems based on the games I've been in.
If anyone of consequence, mook or elite, is around seventh level at least, then the players are really weak and small at early level and for a long time. They have to be coddled, anything can wipe them out, the npcs are all better than you and then you have to scape up the pole to even be average. It can set the players as servants without any real power for some time, and that isn't enjoyable. Then when you get around say 7th level, even if you go above, you aren't that excellent, you aren't that great - even if you have done some amazing feats, you still aren't very big or powerful in the grand scheme of things. Say you are eighth level? Great, all of these paladins are around that level. Do you feel average yet?
I've heard it argued persuasively that many fantasy games are in the old setting of rare heroes, serious threats, limited state power and a whole lot of wild badlands. Basically ancient world meets Conan in how a lot of world is set out archetypally. The players are there to move between the regions in trouble, and they always have a place and a job to do. If states are too strong and levels are very high around, there isn't that much of place for them, and worse than being made less interesting they really may not be needed and the players may pick up on this.
So I like the old school feel where what the players do and who they are (and how they grow) really matters. I don't want everyone and their dog to be around level 7, that isn't very fun in my experience. If it is all planned, organised and controlled and the many divisions of national heroes can take care of problems, you can just sit out over there in the places without exciting badlands and we'll deal with it. Perhaps you should do some shopping, or something really minor befitting your lowly rank? Well that isn't thrilling.
PS: Vampire can also have this problem, if every other vamp is of a better gen than you and everything is already organised and arranged. Be quiet now and watch the show.
Power to the players I say!
|
|
Agreed on the snowflake, but going in the other direction of pcs not being powerful or unusual can have problems based on the games I've been in.
If anyone of consequence, mook or elite, is around seventh level at least, then the players are really weak and small at early level and for a long time. They have to be coddled, anything can wipe them out, the npcs are all better than you and then you have to scape up the pole to even be average. It can set the players as servants without any real power for some time, and that isn't enjoyable. Then when you get around say 7th level, even if you go above, you aren't that excellent, you aren't that great - even if you have done some amazing feats, you still aren't very big or powerful in the grand scheme of things. Say you are eighth level? Great, all of these paladins are around that level. Do you feel average yet?
I've heard it argued persuasively that many fantasy games are in the old setting of rare heroes, serious threats, limited state power and a whole lot of wild badlands. Basically ancient world meets Conan in how a lot of world is set out archetypally. The players are there to move between the regions in trouble, and they always have a place and a job to do. If states are too strong and levels are very high around, there isn't that much of place for them, and worse than being made less interesting they really may not be needed and the players may pick up on this.
So I like the old school feel where what the players do and who they are (and how they grow) really matters. I don't want everyone and their dog to be around level 7, that isn't very fun in my experience. If it is all planned, organised and controlled and the many divisions of national heroes can take care of problems, you can just sit out over there in the places without exciting badlands and we'll deal with it. Perhaps you should do some shopping, or something really minor befitting your lowly rank? Well that isn't thrilling.
PS: Vampire can also have this problem, if every other vamp...
2e had name level to account for this. You 'arrived' at around level 9-10. That was the point where when people mentioned the world's greatest warriors/wizards/etc you started showing up. I let bad guys figure out who the heroes are with Knowledge(nobility) or (local) checks when they get to that level.
The issue from a fluff design though is that if the goodies are limited to like level 1-5, the bad guys shouldn't be able to field 18 level 13 guys to act as mooks against the party.
Points of Light style settings always bugged me because it was like, you the 9th level cleric were the highest ranked priest of McGoodigle the god of goodness, but the Dark Lord of Fire Ants apparently had so many 9th level clerics they got thrown against you and the party, and he always had stuff of higher tier.
The problem is that the Points of Light DM wants to simultaneously challenge the party (necessitating baddies of similar level) while wanting the PCs to feel special (hence why they're apparently the only people able to do anything). But this creates a situation where the bad guys are sitting on massive legions of power and for some reason are pussy footing around good guy countries they could crush out of hand.
It creates verisimilitude issues.
Similarly, as kings are kings because they can assure things like protection of the people and rule of law, I'm always mystified that given kings in PoL settings are literally incapable of maintaining that order to the point that a malevolent tribe of goblins are beyond his capability to address.
As I've said, I built my campaign setting to deal with the stuff I disliked in existing settings. I've been called out by people (who are rarely in my games) for quashing player agency or specialness.
Some folks have disliked the fact that they can't use the fact they're 13th level adventurers to bypass laws and legal requirements, and that there are always bigger fish around.
One guy, who wasn't even a player in my game, got genuinely offended when he found out that the party could count on their allies in one of the nations to handle part of a bad guy's plan without their input, freeing the party up to deal with other stuff. Basically the PCs could trust a government ministry to be able to handle the low tier stuff while they focused on the big bad himself.
He attempted to inform me that if the party wasn't responsible for everything then they weren't getting to be heroes.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
He attempted to inform me that if the party wasn't responsible for everything then they weren't getting to be heroes.
Because Winston Churchill, who didn't fight a ground war himself, totally wasn't a British Hero in WW2...
My CS tends to skew a bit toward the actual movers and shakers being in the 8-14 level range, with a peppered number of higher ups working for them. Every 17th level hero figure doesn't go on to rule a country, after all. The king of a very large elven and goblin kingdom is 7th level, the iron fisted ruler of a military dictatorship is 9th level. Both of them have allies within their countries who are much more powerful. Said elven king's wife, for instance, is 13th level, and the military lord has a few generals in the 12+ range. The antagonist to an on hiatus campaign is a CR18 mythic high priest of the destruction god who is the spiritual adviser to a 12th level rogue.
One notable exception is the country full of space wizards whose ruling council is entirely 20th level wizards, but they are super xenophobic and insular (The country has a 1/4 mile tall x 90' wide wall around it, for example).
One thing that I really emphasized in the mythic game I have on hold was that after a certain point, humanoid enemies become below you. Yeah, they had a good number of fights with some CR7 bloodragers, but that was when they were assaulting the power center of a cult itself. Their next adventure saw them up against 300 by the book kobolds. The challenges for an 8/4 party in Tor became their quest to make a godkilling weapon, as they had to plane hop and track down mythical foes to do so. Everything else became mostly fodder (partly because they were mythic) because their APL started exceeding the normative range for your typical foes.
...Agreed on the snowflake, but going in the other direction of pcs not being powerful or unusual can have problems based on the games I've been in.
If anyone of consequence, mook or elite, is around seventh level at least, then the players are really weak and small at early level and for a long time. They have to be coddled, anything can wipe them out, the npcs are all better than you and then you have to scape up the pole to even be average. It can set the players as servants without any real power for some time, and that isn't enjoyable. Then when you get around say 7th level, even if you go above, you aren't that excellent, you aren't that great - even if you have done some amazing feats, you still aren't very big or powerful in the grand scheme of things. Say you are eighth level? Great, all of these paladins are around that level. Do you feel average yet?
I've heard it argued persuasively that many fantasy games are in the old setting of rare heroes, serious threats, limited state power and a whole lot of wild badlands. Basically ancient world meets Conan in how a lot of world is set out archetypally. The players are there to move between the regions in trouble, and they always have a place and a job to do. If states are too strong and levels are very high around, there isn't that much of place for them, and worse than being made less interesting they really may not be needed and the players may pick up on this.
So I like the old school feel where what the players do and who they are (and how they grow) really matters. I don't want everyone and their dog to be around level 7, that isn't very fun in my experience. If it is all planned, organised and controlled and the many divisions of national heroes can take care of problems, you can just sit out over there in the places without exciting badlands and we'll deal with it. Perhaps you should do some shopping, or something really minor befitting your lowly rank? Well that isn't thrilling.
PS: Vampire can also
Yeah I definitely hear you. Our party wanted to join with the Drow in Second Darkness after a while, because they were better and used more diverse mercenaries. The arrogant rather weak elves were not winning us over. We were starting to rebel at helping weaklings. This problem can come up if players are feeling a bit burned out or doing the same thing over and over. I get around it by have npcs help and fight with the party, proving they want to solve these serious problems as well, but there aren't that many of them (if there are fifty mook guards, maybe there are 2 knights around level 6 that are open to helping the pcs). It also makes parties more diverse and allows different class combinations - but I am influenced by JRPGs like Suikoden here.
While less relevant to a game and more relevant to mass combat, old 2ed had name level and through the rules its impact in battle when they are were a percentage of an army. Running mil sims in dnd, the percentage of name level can make all the difference - a small name force can really punch above its weight and through a lot of enemies. I quite like 9th being the cut-off point of normalcy and meaning you are now quite heroic. As when you get that far you have completed many quests, may have even solo-ed a few problems or had to fight on when the party has otherwise fallen, and will have cleared multiple dungeons at that stage (if you use dungeons).
...Agreed on the snowflake, but going in the other direction of pcs not being powerful or unusual can have problems based on the games I've been in.
If anyone of consequence, mook or elite, is around seventh level at least, then the players are really weak and small at early level and for a long time. They have to be coddled, anything can wipe them out, the npcs are all better than you and then you have to scape up the pole to even be average. It can set the players as servants without any real power for some time, and that isn't enjoyable. Then when you get around say 7th level, even if you go above, you aren't that excellent, you aren't that great - even if you have done some amazing feats, you still aren't very big or powerful in the grand scheme of things. Say you are eighth level? Great, all of these paladins are around that level. Do you feel average yet?
I've heard it argued persuasively that many fantasy games are in the old setting of rare heroes, serious threats, limited state power and a whole lot of wild badlands. Basically ancient world meets Conan in how a lot of world is set out archetypally. The players are there to move between the regions in trouble, and they always have a place and a job to do. If states are too strong and levels are very high around, there isn't that much of place for them, and worse than being made less interesting they really may not be needed and the players may pick up on this.
So I like the old school feel where what the players do and who they are (and how they grow) really matters. I don't want everyone and their dog to be around level 7, that isn't very fun in my experience. If it is all planned, organised and controlled and the many divisions of national heroes can take care of problems, you can just sit out over there in the places without exciting badlands and we'll deal with it. Perhaps you should do some shopping, or something really minor befitting your lowly rank? Well that isn't thrilling.
PS: Vampire can also
On the issue of power and kings, rampaging brigands doesn't break verisimilitude for me, as I've studied medieval history a bit and the forms of power in civilisations across time. The actual military power of kings was often really restricted. They have great power in and around the capital and in their demesnes, but far away or on the borderlands that is another noble's jurisdiction. The king may be really unhappy with petty raiders, but it isn't his job to keep Baron Wilkwillow's serfs alive. Nor is he going to go out there and personally risk death fighting the bandits, when Wilkwillow may try and kill him to back the Vargonian faction and their coup in the capital. The best game that I've seen that tracks your power, approval and dominion over your people and the nobility is Total War: Attila. It does it quite well and clearly explains the situation, and the effects of really strong control, or a really weak leader.
To up the stakes a bit to make a point, the king probably can't defeat the tribe of rampaging ogres because that is not his job, and such meaty power isn't required for his position or his rule. He has jobbers to deal with ogres, a range of killers, generals and armies to deal with problems like that. While I really like the warrior becomes lord model that many players have gone for since 2nd ed, kings can certainly be a different kettle of fish. Some brigands harassing a border domain does not mean they are weak and it doesn't mean it is their problem. Only when it becomes a larger threat or the bandits get into the king's own estates is it their problem that they will have to deal with or lose a tremendous amount of face. Feudal politics really was quite fascinating, and I can see why it hangs around in games like Pathfinder and D&D - the power is not absolute and safety is not assured, so there is something for players to do. :)