The bit about starting at 3rd level came out very early.  tl;dr - veteran players aren't going to get a sense of wonder from the early levels twice, so skip if they're not that interested in the challenge alone.  This is from the 1E DMG:

Quote from: DMG pg 12STARTING LEVEL OF EXPERIENCE FOR PLAYER CHARACTERS

As a general rule the greatest thrill for any neophyte player will be the first
adventure, when he or she doesn't hove any real idea of what is happening,
how powerful any encountered monster is, or what rewards will be
gained from the adventure. This assumes survival, and you should gear
your dungeon to accommodate 1st level players. If your campaign has a
mixture of experienced and inexperienced players, you should arrange for
the two groups to adventure separately, possibly in separate dungeons, at
first. Allow the novice players to learn for themselves, and give experienced
players tougher situations to face, for they already understand most
of what is happening - quite unlike true 1st level adventurers of the
would-be sort, were such persons actually to exist.

If you have an existing campaign, with the majority of the players being
already above 1st level, it might be better to allow the few newcomers to
begin at 2nd level ot even 3rd or 4th in order to give them a survival
chance when the group sets off for some lower dungeon level. I do not
personally favor granting unearned experience level(s) except in extreme
circumstances such as just mentioned, for it tends to rob the new player of
the real enjoyment he or she would normally feel upon actually gaining
levels of experience by dint of cleverness, risk, and hard fighting.

It has been called to my attention that new players will sometimes become
bored and discouraged with the struggle to advance in level of experience,
for they do not have any actual comprehension of what it is like to
be a powerful character of high level. In a well planned and well judged
campaign this is not too likely to happen, for the superior DM will have just
enough treasure to whet the appetite of players, while keeping them lean
and hungry still, and always after that carrot just ahead. And one player's
growing ennui can often be dissipated by rivalry, i.e., he or she fails to go
on an adventure, and those who did play not only had an exciting time but
brought back a rich haul as well. Thus, in my opinion, a challenging
campaign and careful refereeing should obviate the need for immediate
bestowal of levels of experience to maintain interest in the game.
However, whatever the circumstances, if some problem such as this exists,
it has been further suggested that allowing relatively new players to
participate in a modular campaign game (assuring new players of
characters of higher level) would often whet their appetites for continued
play at lower level, for they can then grasp what it will be like should they
actually succeed in attaining proficiency on their own by working up their
original characters and gaining high levels of experience. This reasoning
seems sound, and provided there is a separation of the two campaigns,
and the one isn't begun until new players have had some number of
expeditions as 1st level characters, it is not destructive to the game as o
whole.

Ha! I totally do the opposite. In Lion & Dragon you start as a level 0 apprentice.

Quote from: RPGPundit;1083018Ha! I totally do the opposite. In Lion & Dragon you start as a level 0 apprentice.

Yes, I am aware; and that can be fun.  But most players won't be excited, if every campaign starts at Level 0.  I wonder how many people skip past Level 1 in D&D 5E?

Quote from: Razor 007;1083043Yes, I am aware; and that can be fun.  But most players won't be excited; if every campaign starts at Level 0.  I wonder how many people skip past Level 1 in D&D 5E?

I prefer to make Level 1 more durable since IME there is a special magic about starting at 1. Bringing in PCs later in the campaign I eventually have to allow levels above 1, but it pains me a little.

I think it really depends on two things: The group of players and the type of game you want to run (Edition is mildly a third reason). If I have an experienced group of people, jumping into an Adventure Path for 6th level characters isn't difficult at all and can be fun for them because they already know the ropes of levels 1 through 5. OTOH, my group right now has gone from 1st level through now 6th level in our 4th Edition game and it was mostly done because I have a new player and my 10-year old daughter, so I felt starting small with a limited number of options and paths was easier to get into than "hey, here's 50+ feats, powers, items and you have to pick you Paragon Path and make sure you set your stats right for this feat at 21st- blah blah.

I will say that having a character survive from 1st level (or in some instances, 0-level - which honestly might be the next 4E game I run muahahaha) and progress to the upper tiers of heroic awesomeness is VERY rewarding. There's something about seeing the organic progression from fledgling nobody to a person recognized across multiple regions because of your actions. Not to mention how they can shape the areas they've been in.

I've started campaigns at higher level and started campaigns at level 1 (or even 0).  My only word of caution for starting at higher levels is that the more complex the system, the more a player learns how his class works as he/she levels.  I've played in a game where we started at level 7 and a lot of the players were like, "Woah, these are a lot of systems to take in all at once."  You get to ease into those systems if you start at 1, or even 3.

This isn't as much of a problem with OSR games, or other games with simpler mechanics.

Quote from: S'mon;1083057I prefer to make Level 1 more durable since IME there is a special magic about starting at 1. Bringing in PCs later in the campaign I eventually have to allow levels above 1, but it pains me a little.

Which is the same as letting the players start at a higher level but renaming it 'one'.

The experience points for low levels in 5E are extremely low, so you might as well consider 3rd Level as starting characters.

I DMed one AD&D group that started out as zero level using the Treasure Hunt module. They were 12th-13th Level when the campaign was retired a few years later.

Quote from: Razor 007;1083043Yes, I am aware; and that can be fun.  But most players won't be excited, if every campaign starts at Level 0.  I wonder how many people skip past Level 1 in D&D 5E?

One or two of the 5e modules suggest starting at level 3 or so. Princes of the Apocalypse for example. Rise of Tiamat at level 8 since it is supposed to be a continuation of the prior module.