How dangerous is the game world?

[jedipotter]

So how dangerous is the game world? Can farmer Fred, level three comoner, expect to live to an old age and not have to worry much about monsters and other things way beyond his ability to handle?

How do you do it in your world?


And what is the ''default'' danger level in the D&D rules anyway? Player Character's are rare, as are NPC's with character classes. Most NPC's are of low level in NPc classes. Magic is rare. But what else?

[Silva Stormrage]

Depends where the farmer is living in my world. Under the protection of a powerful kingdom? Yes they have ways of fending off random monsters and the more intellectual/scheming monsters would go after something more worthwhile like a noble or a wealthy merchant caravan.

In the wilderness? Probably going to die horribly.

I would state that my campaign world is similar to Girl Genius for those familiar with the webcomic in terms of dangerous/lethality. Cities and towns are pretty much safe as long as you avoid the scheming of various monsters and sociopaths but the wilderness has the dangerous wild monsters and the like.

[jedipotter]

Depends where the farmer is living in my world.

So towns, cities and civilized areas are free from most dangers and harm, even more so powerful ones. The only danger is in the wilderness?

[Red Fel]

In my mind, it's different kinds of danger. A spectrum, if you will.

The less civilized an area is, the more you're likely to find dangerous monsters. The most dangerous things are going to be furthest away from civilization, for the most part (with the exception of creatures that specifically infiltrate society or prefer civilized company). And that makes sense; squishy but intelligent humans and the like will instinctively avoid areas that fill them with all-consuming dread, and most bigger monsters would rather feed opportunistically on the smaller monsters that avoid civilization than risk death at the hands of an army.

By contrast, the more civilized an area is, the more you're likely to find dangerous people. These can range from brigands, thugs, and robbers, to cults, guilds of assassins, and criminal syndicates. Ironically, a massive, reinforced castle-city is probably going to have more criminal activity than a small fortified town, simply given the high concentration of people and the correspondingly low likelihood of discovery.

As for Farmer Fred, chances are he lives in the countryside. Not the wilderness, but perhaps the fertile lands surrounding one of the larger fortified towns. He enjoys the protection of the town's militia and traveling monster hunters, but has the open space to graze his cattle and raise his grains. He'll have infrequent, minor monster encounters - say a band of Kobolds trying to snatch some of his grain, or some wolves attacking his sheep. He may have some minor human encounters as well - such as some brigands accosting his carriage while he takes his produce to market. Most of them will be opportunistic, however; Fred is more likely to surrender or flee than to fight, and neither wolves, nor Kobolds, nor bandits really want to have to risk injury in a fight if they can simply get what they want for free.

So Fred may suffer some losses, but I see him as unlikely to be in serious peril of life and limb.

[Extra Anchovies]

So towns, cities and civilized areas are free from most dangers and harm, even more so powerful ones. The only danger is in the wilderness?

Not necessarily the only danger, no, but urban and semi-settled areas generally have a higher adventurers/mi2 value, and as everyone knows, when adventurer density increases in an area, monster density eventually decreases a proportional amount :smalltongue:

[Sir Chuckles]

It really depends on the setting, and can range from anywhere inbetween "The farmer is likely to not die" to "Sweet googly moogly that's the 12th chimera attack this week."

It can even vary between that within the same setting, with, say, the main roads of the kingdom being relatively safe, but the side roads are patrolled by lone rogues instead of guards. Any time you ask a question about the "game world", the answer will be incredibly subjective, as different people will handle it differently. I've played in an Eberron world where dead bodies were being carted out of warehouses every other day, and I've played in Eberron where death is a slap on the wrists at worst.

And I'd just like to say something about your "default" rules. Players characters are not rare, but definitely not common. The difference is usually in stats (elite array vs. that Fighter with 18 strength), and NPC with PC levels are usually significantly lower level, or retired adventurers themselves. Magic is not meant to be rare, as magic items are factored into challenge rating. I, personally, don't believe it's meant to be full on MagicMart, but even small towns have access to potions, scrolls, and a half a dozen or so +1 weapons. You won't find the +2 Keen Rapier of Speed every time, but in a metropolis or laarge city it at least deverses a d% roll.

This factors into lethality, as well. An under equipped PC will die with more frequency than a properly equipped one.


So towns, cities and civilized areas are free from most dangers and harm, even more so powerful ones. The only danger is in the wilderness?

Usually no. Towns can still be attacked in numerous ways, as they likely have a guard outfit of less than 200, which is definitely within reason for an Orc tribe and it's three subjugated goblin tribes to raid. And that's not mentioning that smaller dangers can still happen internally, with that traveler who just entered town being a bandit or necromancer.
It's a sliding scale, not a two-way switch. This understanding is a disappointingly common problem we have with conversing with you...

[Fax Celestis]

It really depends, jedipotter. I seem to remember there being a startling rate of random occurrences of Orcus in your game world.

[Silva Stormrage]

So towns, cities and civilized areas are free from most dangers and harm, even more so powerful ones. The only danger is in the wilderness?

They are generally free from say. RANDOM danger. You won't find an owl bear rampaging through a capital city killing commoners.

Commoners MAY find that they get sacrificed by a hidden sect of demon worshiping cultists but random commoners tend to fly under the radar for most of those. The cultists would rather sacrifice a cleric of a good god instead.

But yes inside the cities its more political intrigue, the guards and law enforcement tends to be pretty competent in my campaigns.

[jedipotter]

It really depends, jedipotter. I seem to remember there being a startling rate of random occurrences of Orcus in your game world.

We need to get the name Orcus typed 1000 times to break the great seal!


And Orcus is an awesome NPC.....I've done the ''the minor bad guy finds the wand of Orcus(or Scythe of Orcus) and becomes a medium bad guy plot like 20-30 times.

[Flickerdart]

The game world is not significantly different from the real world when it comes to communities and threats.

Have you got a couple of houses together, some fences, some torches? Wolves and similar animal-level threats, even pack hunters, know well enough to leave you alone, because there's easier pickings elsewhere.

Have you got yourself a palisade, maybe a couple of militiamen? Barbarian hunting parties, whether orc or human, won't bother fighting you.

Your average peasant lives as a subsistence farmer, and has no wealth. No meaningful threat is ever going to want to target him - even necromancers looking for raw material will try and target the grave sites of larger settlements, in order to grab a whole bunch of zombies at a time.

Dragons? Dragons are smart enough to play the long game. Dragons won't eat the farmer when they can tax production and turn it into gold for their hoards. Dragons are the perfect liege lord.

The biggest threats to his livelihood, then, are nation-level events - wars where the peasant is drafted into the army or has the misfortune to live in the path of the enemy's force. Whether the army is made up of 1000 human warriors or 100 ogres doesn't actually matter very much.

Trouble comes to those who look for it. Adventurers overturn gravestones and get mobbed by wights all the time. Farmer Fred stays at home and gets to not die.

[Extra Anchovies]

We need to get the name Orcus typed 1000 times to break the great seal!

So he's like Beetlejuice times Bloody Mary, plus Candlejack, all times 100?


And Orcus is an awesome NPC.....I've done the ''the minor bad guy finds the wand of Orcus(or Scythe of Orcus) and becomes a medium bad guy plot like 20-30 times.

Hm. I don't think that would really be much of a factor in the average commoner's life; they've got about as much chance of being attacked by someone with the wand as they do of getting ahold of it themselves.

[Fax Celestis]

Hm. I don't think that would really be much of a factor in the average commoner's life; they've got about as much chance of being attacked by someone with the wand as they do of getting ahold of it themselves.

IIRC, jedipotter has a house rule wherein summoning spells have a 1% chance of accidentally summoning Orcus. Like I said: absurdly high rates of Orcurrence.

[Sir Chuckles]

IIRC, jedipotter has a house rule wherein summoning spells have a 1% chance of accidentally summoning Orcus. Like I said: absurdly high rates of Orcurrence.

1% per level.

[Fax Celestis]

1% per level.

Obviously the response to Orcurrence, then, is to demand someone on the other side of the planet and have him start spamming summon monster IV.

[Flickerdart]

IIRC, jedipotter has a house rule wherein summoning spells have a 1% chance of accidentally summoning Orcus. Like I said: absurdly high rates of Orcurrence.
Yes, but as soon as Orcus is summoned, another spell somewhere in the world will whisk him away before he has a chance to do anything.

[Phelix-Mu]

There are, in my mind, two ways of looking at the OP's topic:

1.) Simulationist:

The game tries to use percentages and the like to simulate population makeups, and it wouldn't be beyond reason to imagine that monster populations are similarly broken down (using ECL or *gasp* CR instead of npcs by class level). This was more explicit in previous editions in Random Encounter Tables, which gave a vague idea of how likely a certain thing was to happen (whenever something happened). In 3e, they cut back quite a bit on unplanned encounter generation stuff, but I think many DMs still probably use them from time to time.

Planned encounters are broken down in the CR section of the DMG, with a certain percentage being easy, a certain percentage on-target, and some too hard. Is this how it works for non-characters? Well, most unimportant npcs go to some lengths to make sure they don't have to face the worst that life has to offer (when such is in their control at all). Even if most are relatively safe, the difficulty spread suggests that some percentage do die when they run into something way beyond them or are just plain unlucky (happens to everyone). Also, keep in mind that availability bias causes people to misconstrue the relationship between perceived/actual amounts of danger, though it can cut both ways (leading to the emergence of both cowering peasants and foolish novice adventurers).

2.) Narrative:

The game is plot-centric, and while the wider world does exist, it generally follows a logic that supports the premise of the campaign. Could Mordenkainen have solved this problem himself in like five minutes? Maybe, but he's [insert convenient excuse]. So it falls to the characters to do the mighty deeds and carry the day.

So, does Farmer Fred have a hard time of it? Only insofar as the plot cares. This is an interesting example of observer-dependent reality; if the pcs look at Farmer Fred, suddenly he exists, and may even have a plot hook lying around somewhere in his homestead. But if the characters don't look, all the DM's efforts to make Fred relevant will amount to nothing.

In my game, I have a really, really big world. People and monsters number in the billions, and the bleeding edge of challenge levels sustain gameplay well-beyond 20th (though most such characters must venture off-plane to find enough challenge to actually level up). There is always the odd orc horde or plague that Farmer Fred might have to worry about, but the odd one-in-a-million chance has a demilich show up, and Farmer Fred probably doesn't adapt well, to say the least.

That being said, there are both safe(r) areas and areas that are less safe. As the realtors say, "location, location, location." If Farmer Fred lives in a populous/frequented area, he can expect adventurers to be around to problem-solve, a militia/standing military of some sort to provide a modicum of security, wandering magistrates, friendly churches, or simply good-aligned monsters that help sustain civilization or protect the innocent.

In other areas, however, Farmer Fred will need to guard against wandering npcs of ill-repute, rogue constructs, ancient evils that rise up and lay waste to the area around them, wandering monsters of all stripes, and the odd culmination of plots millennia in the making. My world is located on a dimensional rift, and routinely the Prime on the planet converges with one plane or another, increasing the frequency of extraplanar monsters wandering across the now-porous planar boundaries.

Conceptually, as DM, all of this is going on with or without the characters in a given campaign. In reality, though, I only need to really worry about stuff that enters the sphere of consciousness of those in the campaign; there may be a huge plot unraveling in an elven kingdom two continents away, but it remains irrelevant until...well, until it is relevant.

[Svata]

So he's like Beetlejuice times Bloody Mary, plus Candlejack, all times 100?

Wait, how did you finish your post after saying Candlejack? Do you-



Sorry, was at the store getting more rope.

[Haluesen]

So how dangerous is the game world? Can farmer Fred, level three comoner, expect to live to an old age and not have to worry much about monsters and other things way beyond his ability to handle?

How do you do it in your world?


And what is the ''default'' danger level in the D&D rules anyway? Player Character's are rare, as are NPC's with character classes. Most NPC's are of low level in NPc classes. Magic is rare. But what else?

In my game world magic is fairly more common than it is in some settings, at least depending on the kingdom you are in. Maybe there aren't a lot of casters in a small village in the middle of the countryside, but there will at least be a relatively close town with casters that can handle some threats. Beyond that, I play with commoner optimization. Farmer Fred likely will just be very good at tending to animals as well as perhaps a second vocation to serve the needs of the village and maybe some crafting too. But said village is also likely to have a group or 2 of well-trained (still commoner or maybe warrior) archers, someone with incarnum-based healing, a full-on highly defensive tank, and a few similar roles. Suffice to say, most threats between 1st and 5th level are easily handled by the village in my campaign setting. Even low-level players tread in cautious fear and respect. :smallbiggrin:

As for the default level of danger...I have no real clue there. I do not consider my setting very default. I think in default settings people tend to not consider the longevity of common people unless they are in the way of the PC's or need to be defended by the PC's for a quest.


It really depends, jedipotter. I seem to remember there being a startling rate of random occurrences of Orcus in your game world.

Wow that didn't take long to refer back to all those previous threads. :smallannoyed: Everywhere I turn, Orcus or JP are mentioned now.


We need to get the name Orcus typed 1000 times to break the great seal!


And Orcus is an awesome NPC.....I've done the ''the minor bad guy finds the wand of Orcus(or Scythe of Orcus) and becomes a medium bad guy plot like 20-30 times.

However I'm glad to see that you are entirely into it now, so I guess continue the Orcusing people. :smalltongue:


So he's like Beetlejuice times Bloody Mary, plus Candlejack, all times 100?

I am a poor fool...can you please tell me about that 3rd name there?


IIRC, jedipotter has a house rule wherein summoning spells have a 1% chance of accidentally summoning Orcus. Like I said: absurdly high rates of Orcurrence.

I do not believe you remember correctly. I thought that it was a 1% chance per level of the summoning spell bringing something in general that was not anticipated or desired, and not just Orcus. The whole Orcus thing has basically just become a flanderization of the idea as far as I know. I mean, it could summon Vecna perhaps, or 1000 Predators. Okay perhaps not, but I think the rule had more than just Orcus as a possibility.

[...]

We need to get the name Orcus typed 1000 times to break the great seal!


And Orcus is an awesome NPC.....I've done the ''the minor bad guy finds the wand of Orcus(or Scythe of Orcus) and becomes a medium bad guy plot like 20-30 times.

Why can't we ever have the Salad Fork of Orcus? That would be a good weapon. Or how about the Fine-Sized Dagger of Orcus?

Back to the subject matter, I think that if Fred lives in the wilderness, he would still be safe because most monsters would rather just eat other monsters as opposed to breaking into Farmer Fred's house and facing possible death at the hands of him. Also, if Fred has the Run feat, he's set for life.

[Tvtyrant]

In my worlds there are three area types; wilds, rural and urban. The wilds are bad. Manticores, Purple Worms, Dragons, the whole works run around eating each other and everything else.

Rural is the best place to live, farms as far as the eye can see and supported by casters and armies. Usually bandits are your only real danger.

Urban is where the knives flash in the night, where most of the important and powerful live amongst their limitless wealth (see things for sale by city size to envision the available markets.) Most cities are owned by extremely high level individuals who tax incoming and outgoing trade to line their pockets, and enforce a kind of general truce.

[Milodiah]

Obviously it depends on what part of the game world we're talking here. The areas with the highest population density tended to get that way because they're the ones that don't have the Tarrasque wandering around them, or entire families of dragons hanging out across the river, or evil aberrations lurking in caves right beside the backyard. The places that are like that don't feature all that many 3rd-level-commoner Farmer Freds, because it takes a special kind of person to try to homestead around there.

Also, I ensure that every settlement has a form of defense that matches up to its population and importance. If it's got more than, say, 500 people, there's gonna be at least somebody there with the combat potential of a 5th-level PC. And of course there are military forces to counter larger threats, city watchmen to deal with law and order/minor incursions, the roving band of adventurers if it gets particularly bad (what, you think the PCs are the only adventurers?), and much more.




I am a poor fool...can you please tell me about that 3rd name there?

Surely you're not talking about Candlejack, are-

[Extra Anchovies]

I am a poor fool...can you please tell me about that 3rd name there?

He's a character from the Freakazoid cartoon. If you say his name, he appears and abducts you. There's also a related internet joke (demonstrated in this thread by Svata and Milodiah) in which someone types his name as part of a post and then leaves the last sentence or word of their post unfinished, implying that they have been abducted. Beetlejuice's name has to be said three times to summon him, that times the three necessary utterances of "Bloody Mary" in front of a mirror to summon her is nine, plus the one to summon Candlejack is ten, times 100 is the thousand supposedly needed to summon Orcus according to jedipo—

[...]

He's a character from the Freakazoid cartoon. If you say his name, he appears and abducts you. There's also a related internet joke (demonstrated in this thread by Svata and Milodiah) in which someone types his name as part of a post and then leaves the last sentence or word of their post unfinished, implying that they have been abducted. Beetlejuice's name has to be said three times to summon him, that times the three necessary utterances of "Bloody Mary" in front of a mirror to summon her is nine, plus the one to summon Candlejack is ten, times 100 is the thousand supposedly needed to summon Orcus according to jedipo—

Wait, there was an internet joke about Candlejack? I never knew tha-

[Haluesen]

Surely you're not talking about Candlejack, are-


He's a character from the Freakazoid cartoon. If you say his name, he appears and abducts you. There's also a related internet joke (demonstrated in this thread by Svata and Milodiah) in which someone types his name as part of a post and then leaves the last sentence or word of their post unfinished, implying that they have been abducted. Beetlejuice's name has to be said three times to summon him, that times the three necessary utterances of "Bloody Mary" in front of a mirror to summon her is nine, plus the one to summon Candlejack is ten, times 100 is the thousand supposedly needed to summon Orcus according to jedipo—

Well I thank you both to put yourself at risk of abduction to enlighten me. :smallbiggrin: Yep that is just who I was referring to, and I did know the other 2 figured (please note I am intentionally not saying names), but the break down of the math is quite helpful. Surely it won't be long now before Orcus is summoned to us. :smallamused:

[Red Fel]

Why can't we ever have the Salad Fork of Orcus? That would be a good weapon. Or how about the Fine-Sized Dagger of Orcus?

I agree with this. Too many mythic figures have terrifying weapons, majestic relics, or obscure artifacts named after them. What ever happened to the Tea Set of Orcus? Or Kord's Favorite Serving Tongs? Or perhaps the Exceptionally Comfy Seat Cushion of Garl Glittergold?

I'd even allow for Elminster's Favorite Teddy Bear, Sir Fluffles. (It's got to be at least +4 in something, right?)

That said, we really should stop with the Orcus-teasing here. It's a tired gag, and it's kinda not okay. That and the Candlejack thing. Everyone knows it's ju

[Jeff the Green]

Depends where the farmer is living in my world. Under the protection of a powerful kingdom? Yes they have ways of fending off random monsters and the more intellectual/scheming monsters would go after something more worthwhile like a noble or a wealthy merchant caravan.

In the wilderness? Probably going to die horribly.

I would state that my campaign world is similar to Girl Genius for those familiar with the webcomic in terms of dangerous/lethality. Cities and towns are pretty much safe as long as you avoid the scheming of various monsters and sociopaths but the wilderness has the dangerous wild monsters and the like.

Same here, though even more extreme. In most settled areas, you're only slightly more likely to be attacked by monsters than you are in the real world. If you go into the Betweens, the wild areas between nations, cities, and settlements, even an experienced adventurer can expect to be eaten by giants, enslaved by the fay, or used as cannon fodder by an archon assaulting a demonic stronghold who cares very little for things like "freedom" or "autonomy" or "not mindraping people into throwing themselves onto an enriyes's sword".

[OldTrees1]

I have 4 default settings (ranked from safest to deadliest)

1) Normal
Civilized areas have an average background CR of 3 but the distribution is heavily biased towards lower CR. Thus the average farmer can be born, grow up and die all without seeing anything greater than CR 1. However there would still be the rare instances of goblin hordes and other higher CR events that would call for Adventurers for assistance.

Wilderness areas have CR depending on the denizens that make sense to be there. However those denizens tend to stay in their areas.

So Farmer Fred (level 1) can expect to see venerable age and reach level 2 (or level 4-6 if Fred lived in interesting times).

2) War
Civilized areas still have negligible background CR, but the real threat is The War. Frequent ceasefires prevent extinction. There is a high mortality rate but the survivors are hardier than normal. War tends to be a CR 8 encounter stretched over the day's combat. Exceptional soldiers are expected to face multiple CR 6-10 encounters in a day.

Wilderness is hard to reach if existent.

So Farmer Militia(farmer) Fred (level 4) is unlikely to reach middle age (level 8).

3) Inhospitable Frontier (sandbox)
The colony is surrounded by various threats that seek its extinction. These threats have a background CR of 6 but any threat left to grow can increase to CR 10 or higher.

So Farmer Frontierman(farmer) Fred (level 4) is likely to reach venerable age (level 8) provided the generation's crop of adventuresadvanced scouts is up to snuff.

4) The Elite City
Entry to the city requires passing through permanent 1 mile thick Cloudkill. No outside threats to speak of but children are exiled at maturity until they can return under their own power. Politics inside are like a egalitarian Drow house without a Matron Mother and where the alignment is more neutral than evil. Background CR is whatever the CR of those whose attention you catch (CR 8 thru 15+).

So Farmer Fred (level 3) is unlikely to be able to return to The Elite City. Thus Fred will live to venerable age (level 4) in the relative safety of the supporting villages.

[Thanatosia]

Yes, but as soon as Orcus is summoned, another spell somewhere in the world will whisk him away before he has a chance to do anything.
You're assuming the other side of the world has access to the non-traded undocumented top-secret non-eschewable material component.

[firebrandtoluc]

...perhaps the Exceptionally Comfy Seat Cushion of Garl Glittergold...

Blasphemy! No one touches Garl's favorite seat!

[Ashiel]

Another thing to keep in mind is that humanoids in fantasy games tend to be very resourceful. I imagine that they survive in much the same way that humans in reality do, by using the means they have available to them. Anyone can learn to make tools like alchemist fire in D&D, as it just means putting skill points into a skill that's a class skill for pretty much everybody. Likewise, mob-tactics can be dangerous even against up to middling CR creatures, or at least dissuading to most else. Most creatures on the material plane don't have lots of resistances (outsiders do, but your town/settlement should probably not be attacked randomly by lots of dretches unless something funny is going on).

Elemental damage such as acid and alchemist fire bypass most common regenerations and ignore damage reduction. Further such fare are common enough that they are traded in the smallest of settlements, alongside basic potions and such. In Pathfinder for example (where community GP limits and NPC wealth is pretty low relatively) you average 1st level warrior still has enough on-hand cash to carry a couple of alchemical goods and/or low level potions. Armed with things like tanglefoot bags, acid flasks, nets, and so forth, even the weeniest of humanoid creatures can give dangerous creatures pause.

That's also before you consider how plentiful resources such as bricks are (bricks being made primarily of clay, are rather sturdy when laid certain ways, and are very fire resistant) which are probably a popular building material in a world where 5HD nerds can throw napalm from their fingertips with a little bat poo and sulfer, so naturally structures made of common flame-retardant materials with moderate hardness that would make random raiding a pain for most creatures including humanoids. With moderately low level casters like adepts and clerics being able to prevent food from spoiling, or provide clean water, and so forth, in a fantasy game the idea of cutting a community off from the world and starving them to death isn't as appealing.

So let's pretend we have a pretty moderately high CR creature, such as a Wyvern (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/monsters/wyvern.html#wyvern). This creature could happily feed on humanoids, can fly over walls, and is tough as nails by comparison to pitiful 3 Hp commoners. But as a wyvern, do you really want to fly into a walled settlement and risk getting nailed with lots of nets, alchemist fires, tanglefoot bags, and shot at? Probably not. Might wanna grab one of those cheap goats on a farm though. Those are easy pickings and people might piss and moan about you stealing their goat, but you'd have to steal a ton of goats before someone's going to get some tin-cans and fire-speakers to come punish your shenanigans. :P

[Ashiel]

You're assuming the other side of the world has access to the non-traded undocumented top-secret non-eschewable material component.

I think it's more a commentary that at a 1% chance (not even counting a 1% per level as one poster said it was) that Orcus would just be constantly getting yanked all over the cosmos. I mean, you're basically saying every time someone utters a summon. Summons being one of the most universal of spells (divine and arcane casters have them, they are a common SLA, etc) they are incredibly common, so at any given moment there's probably a few summons proccin' the orcus call, so about the moment Orcus appeared, BAM, somewhere else. Never around long enough to actually do anything.

[Extra Anchovies]

I think it's more a commentary that at a 1% chance (not even counting a 1% per level as one poster said it was) that Orcus would just be constantly getting yanked all over the cosmos. I mean, you're basically saying every time someone utters a summon. Summons being one of the most universal of spells (divine and arcane casters have them, they are a common SLA, etc) they are incredibly common, so at any given moment there's probably a few summons proccin' the orcus call, so about the moment Orcus appeared, BAM, somewhere else. Never around long enough to actually do anything.

That would actually be a pretty horrible existence, being constantly summoned from one place to another. Only in any one place to get a brief glimpse of what's directly in front of you, and maybe just a brief moment of sound, before you're whisked off again to the other end of the multiverse. I almost feel bad for Orcus.

Almost. He is Orcus, after all.

[Ashiel]

That would actually be a pretty horrible existence, being constantly summoned from one place to another. Only in any one place to get a brief glimpse of what's directly in front of you, and maybe just a brief moment of sound, before you're whisked off again to the other end of the multiverse. I almost feel bad for Orcus.

Almost. He is Orcus, after all.

Makes you wonder how he would even have time to be evil, or if it's evil because he's so angry at being the butt of this cosmic joke and being yanked around by every Tom, ****, and Harry Potter.

EDIT: Wow, it censored the name ****. That's kind of offensive to censor somebody's name like that.

[jiriku]

And what is the ''default'' danger level in the D&D rules anyway? Player Character's are rare, as are NPC's with character classes. Most NPC's are of low level in NPc classes. Magic is rare. But what else?

I've never seen a "default" danger level for d&d. It's not like an mmo where various zones have set level ranges. Monsters are distributed according to habitat, and it's up to the DM to determine how dense or sparse that distribution is, and how active a threat to other creatures the monsters are.


How do you do it in your world?

I run a pretty narrative campaign. The fates of individual farmers, or even of mass populations, aren't really contemplated unless the PCs are operating in that area and will have opportunity to be aware of it. Put differently, I don't bother to address Fred's fate unless I think the players are likely to ask me about it. However, some things are generally true in my game world:
Grey elves are were immortal and skilled with magic, so all adult grey elves have had at least six class levels and most have at least one level in a casting class (although for the typical elf that class might be adept or magewright).
Large armies tend to be composed of troops with 4-8 levels in warrior, adept, or various PC classes.
Rulers of kingdoms are typically 10th-15th level.
Epic-level individuals are generally extraplanar entities that only take an interest in the game world occasionally, or people who are keeping a very low profile in order to hide from those extraplanar entities.


However, this level distribution is chosen primarily because we play chiefly in the 8th-16th level range. I want the PCs to start important and grow into giants who can change the course of nations. If I want to run a low-level game, I'll just step a few hundred years forward or backward in the game world's timeline, say "things are different now", and choose a level range where PCs are powerful enough in relation to the game world that they'll be asked to do interesting things and not just kill rats. In past campaigns, my players have prevented the rebirth of the two gods, accidently brought a new moon into orbit around the planet, ended an entire age of civilization by contributing to a chain of events causing the game world to become tidally locked with its sun, founded dynasties, shattered the artifact that was the source of elven immortality, and caused various other sorts of permanent mayhem that radically altered the game world. One of the things that made this possible is that the level distribution of the game world is pitched to make the PCs some of the few people around who could realistically attempt such things and succeed/survive.

[Yahzi]

But as a wyvern, do you really want to fly into a walled settlement and risk getting nailed with
a ballistae? They're really quite effective for the price.

I think my world is slightly more dangerous than Europe during the 100 years war. That is, a peasant is lucky to see 50. Whole communities routinely get exterminated but not so often that humanity is in danger of dying out. Etc.

In my world XP is a tangible resource that is harvested from peasants. This means that high-level people have a reason to protect them. Kings and Barons have huge estates of peasants more for the XP they produce than for their taxes (though nobody ever says no to a little tax money). Monsters like to come by and harvest that XP by eating the peasants, which is why everybody loves the king - because he kills the monsters.

So if you behave and do what you're told and work hard and live under the protection of a tough guy, you can have a miserable peasant existence. If you have a valuable skill you can live a decent life in a town. If you think you're tough you can go out there and get your own XP and maybe someday be a noble yourself. Good luck with that - the last 10 guys that tried it got eaten by a wyvern.

[Threadnaught]

It depends on the DM mostly, but this is usually true.


D&D, all settings, is a death world. While walls are kinda worthless against a lot of enemies they will at least slow down the random animals and a number of magical beasts that could otherwise kill a number of your people.


In my own campaign, an entire Metropolis has fallen to an Undead infestation, which has been contained and will soon be dealt with. There will be a massive attack from Lycanthropes, Druids and other creatures somewhere down the line.

The next Campaign will have all Elder Evils active at once. They may seek help here. :smallamused: