Level 1-20 in Three Months?

[Craftzero]

I've read the GM threads for the first book and the last, I have a bit of a concern that I hope some of you can help me with.

I love the AP, but I find the total length of time that it takes the PC's to go from level 1-20 - three months - to be somewhat unrealistic. I can't buy that a level 1 wizard goes from casting magic missile to casting wish during a single season - no matter how busy he might be... This applies equally to all classes - a swordsman going from a novice (as in, level 1) to a master of the blade (level 20) just breaks my immersion a wee bit. Note that this is not unique to Agents of Edgewatch! A few AP's have a very, very short amount of time wherein the PC's become master of their craft.

So the question is this - how can I extend AoE to last for longer than a few months? It's highly dependent on the festival, correct? The side commentary on page 3 of Book 1 suggests that the time is flexible, I'm sort of at a loss how to make it last a year (or maybe two?). For the record, my players do love their downtime - so this is another reason why I'm looking for suggestions as to how to stretch out the narrative.

Thanks in advance for any help/commentary!

[Yakman]

well... book 1 deals with a lot of the preparation for the festival. it's reasonable to extend that out further... they are building lots of stuff. probably takes a long time to do so - not like these big events go up overnight.

but remember - "Level" is a conceit used to keep play interesting and different for the players. It's not really a 'thing' it's a way to tell your story and keep it exciting for your players. So yeah, you can just let it be 3 months. In my game, my group got to level 10 in a month - it's fine.

[Naurgul]

The original Chicago World Fair lasted for 6 months. You can stretch the AP story so book 1 is right at the start of the radiant fair and book 6 is after it's over, or even later. Conceivably I think the whole plot with reasonable added downtime can be stretched to about 1 year in extremis. That's still not a very "realistic" 1-20 level timeframe but it's less jarring than 3 months.

[GreatGraySkwid]

Yeah, I'm running my Radiant Festival from the Spring to the Fall. Three months never made any sense to me.

[Evil Paul]

The timeline doesn't work for me. And the Radiant Festival is only really relevant for Book 1. This is what I did:

* Book 1: Radiant Festival. Spring Year 0. Normal Weather.
* Book 2: Christmas movie. Midwinter Year 0. Snow and cold weather.
* Book 3: Summer movie. Summer Year 1. Heatwave.
* Book 4: Shortly after Book 3. Autumn Year 1. Rains.
* Book 5 / Book 6: Shadow Absalom. (See other threads on topic)