I've seen a decent amount of posts on this board about how anything above 15th level doesn't matter because no one ever plays at those levels, is that actually true in general?
I know my group does, but maybe we are in the minority. Why don't people play at high levels?
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
High level characters have already been scry'd/fry'd but it's okay because they have clones.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
High level characters have already been scry'd/fry'd but it's okay because they have clones.
Pf everyone sims themselves and uses them like snowbot wars.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
For the group I game with its mainly a matter of time. In our campaigns we generally get quickly through the lower levels but as we progress higher there seems an increasing chance that something will happen to derail the game. Things like the GM's life getting busy, key players leaving, etc. Most of our campaigns fade out before 10th level. The highest I've ever played is 14th level.
Morag
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The answer is - your mileage may vary.
Many groups start from first level and play until the group dissolves. This could take a year to progress to tenth level if you play once a week or once every other week.
Groups that can play more often tend to level faster, and of course groups could always just start at high level. (I occasionally start a group at 20+ levels for over the top play).
Pathfinder society play caps levels before 15th, last I heard. Bear in mind, pathfinder society play is not the same as a home game since all sorts of rulings are adhered to. This also tends to limit player exposure to beyond 15th level play.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I've seen a decent amount of posts on this board about how anything above 15th level doesn't matter because no one ever plays at those levels, is that actually true in general?
I know my group does, but maybe we are in the minority. Why don't people play at high levels?
More serious response is people usually don't just start at high level so their campaign usually doesn't make it that far, and DMing at that level is a different game where most don't like to put that much effort into it.
I love high level though.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
A few things:
1. What's written is usually for more down to earth level ranges. Pathfinder Society and most Paizo written Adventure Paths cap lower (PFS caps at 12th for standard play, most APs cap by 16th)
2. Many people like starting at the very beginning. Which means that by the time that they ARE high level, the game that they have been playing has dissolved or reached its logical stopping point.
3. The god walking amongst mortals disjunction. When you are playing high level, two things happen.
First, the common folk become insignificant. Seriously, the high level sorcerer can roast a small town from orbit and the high level barbarian is literally unable to be killed by the commoner. You become a god listening to the pleas of his subjects.
Second, your enemies scale to you, not your world. Suddenly, out of nowhere, there's these big bad doods who JUST SO HAPPEN to be challenge for you. You would have thought that you would have heard of the super magic necromancer who lived in the valley over from you before this...
4. Game rules and the rules of physics start breaking around level 12.
No safe place to rest? Just make your own plane of existence!
Story assumes that the players can't access certain resources? Let's just teleport to a major city!
Ok, this monster has DR 20/Adamantium AND Good, it will at least take a few hits to kill.....annnnnnd the fighter has a +5 weapon.....
At least this CR20 will wear them down....they Gated in their own CR20....
It's a DC40 locked door. Rogue 1 could never make it, rogue 2 doesn't even need to roll.... (seriously, had a character in my Skull and Shackles game that NEVER had to make profession(sailor) checks because he blew every DC out of the water before rolling)
|
| 7 people marked this as a favorite. |
My problem is that new campaigns always start at 1st, and then die before breaching the teens. So I've endlessly played the first couple levels without ever getting to really dig into higher level stuff. Only organized play has allowed me to do so thanks to being able to take my progress with me to new tables. And when we do start at high levels, the characters haven't grown into their level, don't have any grounding, and make for a really bumpy time getting the group to gel.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
High level characters have already been scry'd/fry'd but it's okay because they have clones.
Clones still have the penalty of negative levels, so they're not too ridiculously damaging, also probably requires a few gentle repose items for the cloning facility, which can be attacked.
For the group I game with its mainly a matter of time. In our campaigns we generally get quickly through the lower levels but as we progress higher there seems an increasing chance that something will happen to derail the game. Things like the GM's life getting busy, key players leaving, etc. Most of our campaigns fade out before 10th level. The highest I've ever played is 14th level.
Morag
That's disappointing.
The answer is - your mileage may vary.
Many groups start from first level and play until the group dissolves. This could take a year to progress to tenth level if you play once a week or once every other week.
Groups that can play more often tend to level faster, and of course groups could always just start at high level. (I occasionally start a group at 20+ levels for over the top play).
Pathfinder society play caps levels before 15th, last I heard. Bear in mind, pathfinder society play is not the same as a home game since all sorts of rulings are adhered to. This also tends to limit player exposure to beyond 15th level play.
Huh, wasn't aware that PFS capped before it reaches high levels. That would severely flavour peoples experiences.
More serious response is people usually don't just start at high level so their campaign usually doesn't make it that far, and DMing at that level is a different game where most don't like to put that much effort into it.
I love high level though.
Isn't even mid-level a very different game to low-level though? I'd have though that gap would've been breached.
A few things:
2. Wait... People like starting at level one? Yeesh...
3. a) Ah, my group loves that.
3. b) Huh? Why do the enemies have to spontaneously appear? That sounds more like the GM's fault than anything.
My problem is that new campaigns always start at 1st, and then die before breaching the teens. So I've endlessly played the first couple levels without ever getting to really dig into higher level stuff.
That's rather disappointing.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
We played from Level 1 to Level 11 before a TPK in the middle of Rise of the Runelords. We debated starting a different campaign but made 4 new PCs to take up the torch.
That lasted until two weeks ago until another TPK with our now Level 13 party. We will take one more kick at the can with four more new characters who somehow come to Sandpoint when they should be destroying small nations.
Both times the group was killed with Confusion and/or Dominate spells. And my guy had a +18 Will save....didn't matter.
As someone said before, the high levels are fun but you have to have a committed DM to handle all the details.
It's difficult to start at high level. One reason is all the paperwork required to even get there. It's easier to spend all the work required to level up over several sessions, so most players do it that way, but suddenly having to stat out and gear out a high level character is a pain.
That compounded with the fact that high-level characters have an overwhelming number of abilities and tricks makes high-level characters boring and difficult.
That is to say, if you created the character at a lower level and got to level him up then it feels good because you get to feel the character develop.
Therefore the most satisfying way to reach a high level is to actually level one up from a lower level to a higher level. This is of course difficult to do because it takes time and a playgroup willing to stay together for all that time.
| 14 people marked this as a favorite. |
High level play is boring and swingy. Instead of the early and even mid game where things are incremental (you beat on the bad guy over time until he dies, you debuff him and he fights more poorly, you travel here over X days, you need to do research for Y time, or talk to Z people), it becomes a swingy, all or nothing, start and stop game built around having exactly the right ability for the situation and your opposition having exactly the right countermeasure to stop that ability.
You don't debuff the guy and he just fights worse, the guy is totally out of the fight with your spell. Or, he's got spell resistance, immunity, a high save, etc., and you did nothing with your turn. You blast the guy into oblivion on round one with your pouncing charge, or he has the right DR or a shut down ability and too much AC and you do nothing. You instantly teleport to the place you need to go, or you can't get there because the proper countermeasures are in place. You ask a deity and find out every bit of information you need or every enemy is mindblanked, etc.
People say "Scry and Fry" ruins things. Other people point out that "Scry and Fry" is blocked by Mindblanks and Teleport Traps (i.e. exactly the right countermeasures). Either way, doesn't that suck? You get this crazy powerful abilities and either they work and trivialize everything, or they do absolutely nothing and you might as well not have them. It's not fun.
It sucks. Without the countermeasures, the game is too easy. With them, you're just playing low level again with inflated numbers.
|
|
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
High level play is boring and swingy.
Meh. Only if you spend all your time in combat. (Which if you get into combat, it will take up all your time.) If you instead spend your time exploring exotic locales that require your new powers to reach and traverse, and dealing with planes spanning plots and politics, where your attack bonuses don't matter as much as what you can do for your allies and enemies, it can be pretty fun.
|
At higher levels the power difference between different characters becomes greater. The set of options becomes hugely greater. The effects of differences in play styles becomes greater. The number of broken rules combinations becomes greater ( no matter what your definition of "broken"). The time to resolve a combat becomes greater.
Essentially, the game changes drastically. Its a LOT harder to play and LOTS and LOTS harder to run.
I think the surprising thing is how many campaigns make it to and survive high levels :-).
For me, play past somewhere around level 10 starts to feel like superhero gaming. And I think there are better superhero games than Pathfinder.
I do like an occasional high level game but not a steady diet.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I've had ONE, game I ran where the players reached 20th. After that point, we knew it was best to retire the characters, but not dismiss them.
Those characters became undeniable icons in the setting. Their presence changed the power-landscape. Some ruled, others wandered as icons- all were considered near Demi-Gods. Once they became NPCs, I applied some Mythic Adventures tiers on them.
At this point I took a look at some of their most powerful, surviving enemies, and they too, became Mythic. It was a great seismic shift in the setting.
Players loved, playing new characters working under this new paradigm!
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
YO.
High level play is boring and swingy.Meh. Only if you spend all your time in combat. (Which if you get into combat, it will take up all your time.) If you instead spend your time exploring exotic locales that require your new powers to reach and traverse, and dealing with planes spanning plots and politics, where your attack bonuses don't matter as much as what you can do for your allies and enemies, it can be pretty fun.
Combat was only a small part of my post. I think everything gets boring because you can solve most noncombat problems in a single spell as well (or that spell is useless because the correct countermeasure is in place).
Nothing about exploring exotic locales and dealing with planes spanning plots and politics restricts such things to high level play except that those things arbitrarily require specific spells which are arbitrarily high level. You could run a plane hopping game with level 6 characters if you just included a freestanding portal or something, and some access to "you don't die immediately upon entering this plane" abilities. It's all artificial.
And again, it fits my theme. You can use these new powers to go to that new plane, but that means the game only works because of your power, but it also does nothing but facility the game's plot. It's all circular and tedious.
In 3.5 our GM was used to homemade games and he wanted to get into something that he didn't have to think to hard about. Pathfinder had the its APs. We have played Second Darkness 1st through 15th (rolled stats 7 players) and we are into the second book of second book of Runelords (again rolled stats and 7 characters). We fully expect to get to 15th level. I talked to the GM because I heard on here about the AP going to 17 and he said that it could go to that with side quests but it didn't NEED to. So I am guessing he will arrange it so we get to the end in a little bit shorter time. I don't mind the high level games. I guess we will see once we get passed 12th level.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
And again, it fits my theme. You can use these new powers to go to that new plane, but that means the game only works because of your power, but it also does nothing but facility the game's plot. It's all circular and tedious.
I suppose leveling up is circular and tedious to you as well.
You've gotten more levels, now you face tougher foes. May as well have stayed at 1st level and kept doing the same thing you've always done.
I don't see how the high levels are anymore artificial than the rest of the game.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I'm currently DMing an E8, Mythic, Reign of Winter campaign. Previously, I had gotten the group through the entirety of Curse of the Crimson Throne, and by level 12 they were all still having fun, but began to really chafe at how dense rounds of combat got. Everything took forever, and everything had a million spells, modifiers, abilities, and other things to keep track of. So I suggested we stop at 8th level for the next campaign and they were excited. Now, having done a few sessions at 8th, they're extremely happy with being right on the cusp of overcomplicated, but able to do essentially what they want to do with their characters. It also has the added benefit of me being able to really hit them with the increasingly difficult challenges that the AP throws at them, and they're starting to become more and more creative to compensate. It's also become a bit of a resource test for them, so they're becoming a lot more cautious and turning every fight into something that could be their last. Of course, I won't just merk them (and Mythic Tiers are going to help out a lot, on top of tons of bonus feats), but there is a lot more tension and they're having a lot of fun with it.
Getting past 12th gets tiresome as a DM. It's really just a lot of paperwork and bookkeeping, and if it's bad for players, it's even harder on a DM. For some people it's their thing, but for others it's just too much. High level play gets boring unless the DM puts a lot of time into designing impossible encounters that the players have to overcome with their godlike power. Lower level play also fits the aesthetic of my group (and my own tastes) more, as well.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The name of the game is Pathfinder no matter what level you are at, but how the game plays changes as you level up. A lot of it also depends on how the players play the game. It can be hard for GM's to challenge players without one-shotting them, while at the same time not having their encounters overrun. Personally I don't have a problem with it, but I understand why it is not for everyone.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I think the biggest reason, cited above, is group break up. Density of combat grounds / chances for TPKs off a few bad rolls also seems to go up. Finally, a vast number of GMs are simply not up to the challenge of dealing with the options available to high level characters.
As for math breaking down - eh... sort of. If you are all on the same page in terms of optimization it isn't a big deal. When you aren't it gets choppy at any level, but can be more noticable.
Personally I love high level play because...
High level play is boring and swingy.Meh. Only if you spend all your time in combat. (Which if you get into combat, it will take up all your time.) If you instead spend your time exploring exotic locales that require your new powers to reach and traverse, and dealing with planes spanning plots and politics, where your attack bonuses don't matter as much as what you can do for your allies and enemies, it can be pretty fun.
Suddenly I have a great deal more respect for ToZ, as he stole the words out of my mouth.
In my current 15th level game combat is a sideshow for me (personally) to what I can accomplish hanging around at the higher levels of power. Interacting with major players as an equal, having the ear of powerful figures, leading or founding organizations, building those organizations and taking on the role of quest giver at times is hugely rewarding. Even more so when you've seen the growth of a character from the guy who was standing in line before, to the guy who now literally owns the place.
Heck, our last two months of adventuring have mostly been to get our hands on swag to fund side projects we have going. Founding schools, marrying into the nobility, building shipyards, and so forth.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Second, your enemies scale to you, not your world. Suddenly, out of nowhere, there's these big bad doods who JUST SO HAPPEN to be challenge for you. You would have thought that you would have heard of the super magic necromancer who lived in the valley over from you before this...
Ah, the famous "DBZ Conundrum"- or "why are there so many people that can casually destroy planets coming to earth?"
Getting past 12th gets tiresome as a DM. It's really just a lot of paperwork and bookkeeping, and if it's bad for players, it's even harder on a DM. For some people it's their thing, but for others it's just too much. High level play gets boring unless the DM puts a lot of time into designing impossible encounters that the players have to overcome with their godlike power. Lower level play also fits the aesthetic of my group (and my own tastes) more, as well.
Yeah, the one time I GMed a high-level game I got a bit burned out by how much of a pain in the ass tracking everyone's magic items, class abilities, and active spells got to be. The one time I threw a pair of themed sorcerers at the party, the sheer number number of spells in play on both sides just got insane.
And of course the more abilities/powers/spells you have running, the easier it is to forget about things and make mistakes. More often than not when I ran a high-level encounter there would be at least one instance where either I or one of the players went "Oh yeah, I totally forgot that I can do that!"
For me, higher levels lose their luster to me. I guess not luster, as they are certainly shiny - but they lose personality. When your power level exceeds the entire population by such a great margin, consequences are hard to internalize. The only reason I see to play at high levels is to keep the same characters going for longer - it's not because higher levels are somehow more compelling. My favorite time, usually is between 4th and 8th levels. That's when personalities have developed, and characters have started to take real shape. That's when the impact of their action goes beyond local news to regional impact, etc.
|
| 6 people marked this as a favorite. |
As a long time DM, for me it's all about time.
An average game session for my group is 3 or 4 hours. At high level, that's maybe one fight.
To prepare for that one fight, I often need to read and understand large numbers of stat blocks, reference feats and spells, work out how they synergise, work out what buffs will be up prior to or during combat then run all of those creatures as intelligent and powerful combatants that want to survive as well as destroy the players.
Given that my work involves large quantities of brain power as well, then high level game play quickly loses its lustre.
Things like iPads/laptops running hero labs has sped things up a little bit, but mostly for the players themselves not so for the DM.
The PRD is an invaluable resource for quick referencing as well. However, it still means far more work as DM than many are able to or willing to put in for a session to be effective.
Cheers
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
It seems like simplified magic option from Unchained might help in regards to managing the hundreds of spell effects on people, since it lowers the amount of low-level buffs people shove on their allies at the start of the day.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Just to say - I love high level and low level play, though they are very different.
I think there is more to simplifying magic than keeping rack of buffs and debuffs. It is the narrative control the players could potentially have.
At 17+ level, you are dealing with simulacrum, wish, miracle, and other powerful spells that could change how you make an adventure. This is if the players are actively working with you to build a story. If the players are the types that love causing chaos - look out.
Players have the option to leave the story no matter the level, yet high level characters can teleport continents or worlds away to buy equipment and then return within minutes of game time. They could make simulacrum of themselves, major NPCs, or even maybe the BBG if they have the right information. I won't even go into divination. Long story short, at 17+ levels, you just handed a group of monkeys a toolbox full of stuff they could throw at the machine you call a plot.
It isn't a bad thing if the GM can improvise, and has a group of players that work diligently to help the plot along (just because I can does not mean I will). It just means you have to make a plot with an open mind, and be able to improvise something if the group decides today is a good day to planar shift to some other realm or teleport to the planet Castrovel to explore elven ruins.
Also - because of the narrative control players have, it is VERY hard to write high level campaigns since creative players have so many out of the box options to deal with issues at their level. High level campaigns tend to best work as short hook, line, and sinker type ideas rather than a fully fleshed railroad outline.
Getting past 12th gets tiresome as a DM. It's really just a lot of paperwork and bookkeeping, and if it's bad for players, it's even harder on a DM. For some people it's their thing, but for others it's just too much. High level play gets boring unless the DM puts a lot of time into designing impossible encounters that the players have to overcome with their godlike power. Lower level play also fits the aesthetic of my group (and my own tastes) more, as well.Yeah, the one time I GMed a high-level game I got a bit burned out by how much of a pain in the ass tracking everyone's magic items, class abilities, and active spells got to be. The one time I threw a pair of themed sorcerers at the party, the sheer number number of spells in play on both sides just got insane.
And of course the more abilities/powers/spells you have running, the easier it is to forget about things and make mistakes. More often than not when I ran a high-level encounter there would be at least one instance where either I or one of the players went "Oh yeah, I totally forgot that I can do that!"
Still, it is relatively convenient that the enemies generally show up in order of weakest to strongest (raditz to bu)
The androids and cell might get an excuse (reoccurring villain seeking revenge and doing his research), but it awfully convenient that it is placed between frieza and bu.
Of course, maybe I am just forgetting a lot of filler with low tier "villains" (saiyan man .............)
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I've seen a decent amount of posts on this board about how anything above 15th level doesn't matter because no one ever plays at those levels, is that actually true in general?
I know my group does, but maybe we are in the minority. Why don't people play at high levels?
I been playing with my current group for about 10 years now and we play, on average, twice a month in 12-14 hour sessions (start at noon on Saturday and play till we get tired).
In those ten years we have started 5 different campaigns. The original campaign went to level 27 till it was 'retired', one got shelved at level 8 because 2 players moved away, the main one we play now is level 11, we have an alternate game that is level 6 and we have one we play with only 4 players that just hit level 4 (we play that one when key players who play remotely are busy so only the local people are around).
The assumption on all the games are we will go to 20+ but time limits on how often we play make that happen slowly.
The original game ran about 6+ years before we basically retired the characters. They are all still alive but the group wanted to try out new hero's.
To prepare for that one fight, I often need to read and understand large numbers of stat blocks, reference feats and spells, work out how they synergise, work out what buffs will be up prior to or during combat then run all of those creatures as intelligent and powerful combatants that want to survive as well as destroy the players.
Given that my work involves large quantities of brain power as well, then high level game play quickly loses its lustre.
This is precisely why I stopped my Pathfinder campaign at Level 12.
Up to Level 9, I found myself spending maybe 4 hours out of game to prepare for 4 hours of gaming.
After that, the time required grows significantly because of the combinatorial nature of powers.
And the power level itself ramps up pretty quickly as well. Poor planning leads to one of two destinations:
- The group steamrolls over the enemy like nothing, because I forgot Player X has Ability Y.
- TPK, because I forgot that none of the players had an effective counter to Big Bad's Ability Z.
Neither outcome is fun, for the players or myself. So, I get to spend 8-10 hours planning around it.
And even after all of it, there's still the element of player surprise that is crazy-difficult to plan for.
So, now I'm running a Shadowrun 5th game for the group. It remains to be seen how much planning will be necessary at Prime Runner levels.
Two reasons, in our case. We like starting at level one and have never survived past level eight or so (we always run into something which wipes the floor with us). Secondly, we don't have time - we tried creating high level characters and running a module and it took nearly a whole session of PC-generation then the second session was a torturously slow fight.
In general, we get to play for around a bout three hours. like games where combats are ten-fifteen minutes (maybe half an hour for a "big finish" climactic battle). We can manage that playing PF in levels 1-5, but higher than that is beyond us.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
'Cause masters can't be bothered to think beyond "go there by foot so I can throw you random encounters table".
Honestly, it's a vicious circle because for one to DM high level players, he must first have been a high level player himself to understand the flow of the game when high level resurces are readly available.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
'Cause masters can't be bothered to think beyond "go there by foot so I can throw you random encounters table".
Honestly, it's a vicious circle because for one to DM high level players, he must first have been a high level player himself to understand the flow of the game when high level resurces are readly available.
Well, it helps that 'walk there and things happen along the way' is a lot closer to actual human experiences than metaphysical plane walking relying heavily on teleportation as well, as seen at high levels.
And a lot of the greatest classical epics in history can be summed up that way as well. The Odessey, Journey to the West, etc. etc.
It can be hard to write complex storylines on a weekly basis that fully incorporate high level mobility while also balancing high level combat and still balancing your real life. GMs are people to (or at least they were before they sold their souls for eldritch power to cause rocks to fall... but even Cthulhu needs a day off every few millenia.)
But yeah, experience can be a factor as well. Most of the good examples of this stuff usually comes from different media formats (television, movies, novels) that prove challenging to adopt into your table top system while dealing with the above concerns.
|
|
'Cause masters can't be bothered to think beyond "go there by foot so I can throw you random encounters table".
Honestly, it's a vicious circle because for one to DM high level players, he must first have been a high level player himself to understand the flow of the game when high level resurces are readly available.
I've done both. Now I buy per written APs where Paizo uses all their experience to create awesome plots and reasons to travel.
Even their games plod along at high level because of reasons stated above.
RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I'm in agreement with others that a lot of it is various forms of campaign fatigue. The default assumption is starting at level 1 and working up - so when you have players quit, or move, or PCs die, or are retired, or the first major plot is resolved - it's very easy to start over. Getting to high levels takes a lot of time if you start from scratch, and real life and game circumstances conspire against you having that time.
Also, running and playing in high level games is different. It's not quite like learning a whole new system, but your experiences at lower levels don't readily prepare you for what you'll see in a good high level game. So you can end up with a situation where everyone is playing and running with the skill of a newbie, just with bigger numbers and more toys. Only practice and advice can help with this issue.
High level play can be a lot of fun, and it can work - many groups have made it work just fine. There are a few threads kicking around the boards with fantastic advice fro running high level games. Personally I'd love to see an official "guide to high levels" or some such book from Paizo that incorporate a lot of the good ways to run these levels.
Unless the GM has a good reason to continue the adventure to high levels, there is the issue of breaking the immersion by giving an idea to the players the world works by MMO zones.
In MMOs, you move to a new zone in the persistent world and the level of the wildlife and common folk usually jump by 5-10 levels. Wow, the shore crabs are now as strong as the final boss of that early dungeon in the game! Woah! Oh course nobody cares in an MMO, we do not need immersion for a number generator. Same can't be said of tabletop RPGs.
Also from what I have seen, character motivations can crumble because players do not actually plan 20 levels ahead. They might invent plot hooks for the first 7 levels, but then it starts getting harder. The elephant in the room being the fact that not all characters need or deserve to get to high level. While all casters have natural reasons to become more and more powerful, someone's thug character has none of that.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Extremely useful thread for ideas on how to run high level games.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
DM frustration usually.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Unless the GM has a good reason to continue the adventure to high levels, there is the issue of breaking the immersion by giving an idea to the players the world works by MMO zones.
In MMOs, you move to a new zone in the persistent world and the level of the wildlife and common folk usually jump by 5-10 levels. Wow, the shore crabs are now as strong as the final boss of that early dungeon in the game! Woah! Oh course nobody cares in an MMO, we do not need immersion for a number generator. Same can't be said of tabletop RPGs.
I don't understand why people keep giving this as a reason. If the GM does that, it is their doing, not something innate about high levels.
I'm currently writing up a campaign plotline that goes from level 2-22, and at each stage I know were all the different characters of different levels are and what they are doing. If the party interacts with those higher or lower level beings then they do, creatures don't just pop into existance when the party level's up unless the GM does it.