One of the complaints I often see about games is scaling- as soon as you level up, all of the bad guys do, too. This can be a difficult act to juggle, and sometimes ends up wayyyyyyyy overpowered, making you leveling up seem like a complete waste of time. I once had a GM when playing 3.5 edition D&D who would use a spreadsheet to upgrade each critter's Challenge Rating to the player's level, so a level 12 character fighting Orcs would be fighting 30 Hit Die Half-Dragon Half-Fiend Orcs which would hit you for colossal damage, while the level 6 player would only be fighting 10 Hit Die Orcs, for example. It was a gruelling game.
5th edition seems to favour set statistic blocks, without the advancement options that 3.5 (for example) has for every critter. Which means by the time you get to be whatever feels like high level, you've actually got an opportunity to be a proper badass, wading through fights with the City Watch or the Royal Guard, as appropriate. And as much as it feels like a good idea (as a GM) to up the challenge so your players are fighting harder foes, my advice is: don't. Let them have their moments where they swing into action and literally mow their way through hordes of guys, and feel like all that levelling up has been worth it! You can still give them challenges, but not everything has to be difficult. One of my takeaways from playing Apocalypse World is that one of the specific rules for the GM is "be a fan of the characters". Let them get moments where they get to be cool, and everyone goes "holy crap you just took down ten guards without a scratch", or "wow, you just sneaked past a Dragon!", or "you just counterspelled that mage's impossible death magic, NICE!!!". It'll mean that there's a difference in intensity between some fights, so you can vary the challenge and not just keep the pressure on all the time. Also posted on Game Masters Stash on 17 July 2020. Comments are closed.
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AuthorI'm Luke. He/him pronouns. Archives
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