It's a nerdrage slapfight! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Z7oZB7onK4

Quote from: jeff37923;728176I think the problem has to do with your terms because there are plenty of games out there that do not use levels for characters.

Exactly. The whole concept of "levels" makes no sense for many, if not most, games out there - and for all of the games I personally have been involved in for at least the last decade. If your point rests on this fulcrum, which it seems to, I might as well be posting in Urdu or Sumerian for all the insight I could usefully give. If my posts are not germane to the topic, I shouldn't be posting. I apologize for any confusion I might have given - it was entirely inadvertent.

-clash

Quote from: dragoner;728179It's a nerdrage slapfight! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Z7oZB7onK4

This made my eyes and ears bleed.

Quote from: jeff37923;728185This made my eyes and ears bleed.

LOL! Yeah. (though they are in fact being sarcastic, it is almost a parody of a parody)

Quote from: Sacrosanct;728117as I said, its very easy to resolve this.  A lot of people said their campaigns ended long before they planned.  So of those people, was it the norm in those situations for the campaigns to end before they got to the mid teens or higher?

You're the only person here who thinks high level starts at mid teens - except possibly in 4e D&D, as I discussed earlier. Traditionally (pre-3e) high level is either 7-9 or 9-12, depending on whether 'high' only starts at Name level when the XP costs stop doubling and you can get your followers/castle/domain etc, or if High is the later part of the footloose adventurer phase, so 7-9, with 9+ classed as 'Endgame' or 'Very High'. 3e defined High as 11-15, Very High as 16-20, which caused some problems as the game has a lot of legacy systems that don't work well when pushed so far.
But however you look at it, High Level starts by 9-11 in every edition pre-4e. Admittedly things get a bit weird with Mentzer BECMI; it has the traditional 9th Name Level in Expert, but then the Companion & Masters sets kind of recalibrate levels with a lot of grade inflation. So I can see someone who only owned the Rules Cyclopedia, which smushed BECM together, getting a bit confused about what levels mean.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;727875Once you all wrap up with teh campaign, what do the PCs do?  Just fade off into the sunset?  Do players still want to keep them around for kingdom management?  Are they just infrequent NPCs in future campaigns?

Do you mean stuff like telling the players what happens after the campaign ends?

I used to try to do that. But it always ended in disaster and it was just me making up what happened to them. So i found just leave it. What i have done is hold onto pcs and use them as npcs in later campaigns, often with different players.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;728172The sad part is that his hang up has nothing to do with the point I was making.  Don't like my term of "high level"?  Fine, replace it with "super high level" if you want.  The point was that it appeared to me most people's campaigns got cut significantly short than what they intended, and because of that, it didn't seem as if the high teens range of levels were ever experienced.  And therefore, would it make more sense to make campaigns with a smaller scope, since it appears many of them are cut short anyway.

OK, but I think it is and was common for campaigns not to ever be intended to reach the high teens levels, yup. With eg 1e AD&D it's pretty clearly intended to end in the 9-14 range, and I think was fairly often played that way. My original 1e highschool campaign actually eventually had PCs with insane levels (highest ever was a lesser god with 117 total levels across three classes). After my first experience of 3e, running it to around 18th level, all my subsequent 3e campaigns were designed to only go to around 8th level, and did so.

Quote from: S'mon;728206You're the only person here who thinks high level starts at mid teens - except possibly in 4e D&D, as I discussed earlier. Traditionally (pre-3e) high level is either 7-9 or 9-12, depending on whether 'high' only starts at Name level when the XP costs stop doubling and you can get your followers/castle/domain etc, or if High is the later part of the footloose adventurer phase, so 7-9, with 9+ classed as 'Endgame' or 'Very High'. 3e defined High as 11-15, Very High as 16-20, which caused some problems as the game has a lot of legacy systems that don't work well when pushed so far.
But however you look at it, High Level starts by 9-11 in every edition pre-4e. Admittedly things get a bit weird with Mentzer BECMI; it has the traditional 9th Name Level in Expert, but then the Companion & Masters sets kind of recalibrate levels with a lot of grade inflation. So I can see someone who only owned the Rules Cyclopedia, which smushed BECM together, getting a bit confused about what levels mean.

Clearly I'm not the only one when they come out with an AD&D book called "High Level Campaigns" and all references to high level are AFTER PCs have access to level 9 spells and whatnot.  I.e. after they reach the high teens, and that's what they consider high level.  Just because most gamers didn't play much after level 10 doesn't necessarily mean that level 10 is high level.  Clearly the intent of high level was at levels higher than that, as is evidenced by xp table going to level 29 in some cases, and the combat matrix going to level 20, and Skip Williams himself considering high level at near level 20, not level 10.  So do I believe official publication, or an anecdotal opinion from Joe Random Gamer?

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;728208Do you mean stuff like telling the players what happens after the campaign ends?

I used to try to do that. But it always ended in disaster and it was just me making up what happened to them. So i found just leave it. What i have done is hold onto pcs and use them as npcs in later campaigns, often with different players.

No, not really.  the players dictate what their plans are, whether that be doing kingdom management or just retiring.  The only exception would be something like, "Hey Bill, I might use Iolo as an NPC every now and then, are you cool with that?" (me as the DM and Bill being the player for Iolo).

Quote from: Sacrosanct;728215Clearly I'm not the only one when they come out with an AD&D book called "High Level Campaigns" and all references to high level are AFTER PCs have access to level 9 spells and whatnot.  I.e. after they reach the high teens, and that's what they consider high level.  Just because most gamers didn't play much after level 10 doesn't necessarily mean that level 10 is high level.  Clearly the intent of high level was at levels higher than that, as is evidenced by xp table going to level 29 in some cases, and the combat matrix going to level 20, and Skip Williams himself considering high level at near level 20, not level 10.  So do I believe official publication, or an anecdotal opinion from Joe Random Gamer?

I owned that 2e AD&D book about playing levels 21-30 (the original cap was 20). It was pretty bad. It was indeed called High Level Campaigns. I guess you win the Internet.

Quote from: S'mon;728236I owned that 2e AD&D book about playing levels 21-30 (the original cap was 20). It was pretty bad. It was indeed called High Level Campaigns. I guess you win the Internet.

FWIW, I don't care about winning the internet or anything.  Only that the statement I made earlier isn't some while crazy statement as BV was implying.  We disagree, and that's perfectly fine.  You presented what you felt high level encompassed in D&D based on references, and I presented my side.  But I don't think my statement was all that crazy.  That's all I was trying to get at.

I swear, with some people, it's not enough to say, "I disagree and here's why" (what you did), but they have to lead off with "you're fucking wrong and I don't need to explain myself" as their default response.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;728217No, not really.  the players dictate what their plans are, whether that be doing kingdom management or just retiring.  The only exception would be something like, "Hey Bill, I might use Iolo as an NPC every now and then, are you cool with that?" (me as the DM and Bill being the player for Iolo).

I guess this is something I do sometimes do then. Though only if the campaign is knowingly coming to an end (most campaigns don't usually get that kind of deliberate ending in my group).

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;728243I guess this is something I do sometimes do then. Though only if the campaign is knowingly coming to an end (most campaigns don't usually get that kind of deliberate ending in my group).

Yeah, I'll  never use a PC as an NPC unless it's pretty clear the campaign is over, and even then I like to get teh player's input.  Still their character after all.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;728242I swear, with some people, it's not enough to say, "I disagree and here's why" (what you did), but they have to lead off with "you're fucking wrong and I don't need to explain myself" as their default response.

Really?

Quote from: Sacrosanct;728042oh, and 10th level isn't high level play.  I swear, sometimes it seems you have to argue over the most minor things just to argue.

So, is this an example of, "I disagree and here's why," or, "you're fucking wrong and I don't need to explain myself?"

Quote from: Sacrosanct;728244Yeah, I'll  never use a PC as an NPC unless it's pretty clear the campaign is over, and even then I like to get teh player's input.  Still their character after all.

Admittedly, I have only done this a few times (mostly because I don't want to mess too much with PCs and I worry about them becoming Mary Sues). But when I have done it, it was effective. I know in one case, we had a Ravenloft campaign where one of the PCs was a druid who failed some powers checks at the end of our campaign and her hair turned stark white. With the player's permission, I used her as a bad guy in a later campaign.