How do you picture class and level distribution?

[tzar1990]

So, in the "Kingdom-Level Threats" thread, an interesting discussion popped up partway through - a serious disagreement about how levels should be handed out to NPCs.

Some were in favour of higher levels (i.e. an elite military force, like the Spartans in 300, might have every man being level 10 or more) while others favoured a lower-level approach (Leonidas himself might have been 10 and his lieutenants might have been 5, but most of them were probably around 1). Similarily, the distribution of classes was disputed - some argued that being a wizard is a skill that can be taught to anyone and any good soldier will be a fighter, while others argued that being a wizard requires incredibly rare dedication and inborn talent and Fighters are only the very cream of the crop.

My take on things is as follows:

The vast majority (90%) of people are level 1. This is the level of merchants, farmers, trained but untested soldiers. You can't get past this level without engaging in serious encounters beyond the scope of everyday life.
Levels 2-4 are for people with dangerous jobs, or lives that are going to frequently put them into dangerous situations. By level 4, you're a veteran soldier, a cleric tending to a good-sized town, a career criminal, or a fully-trained wizard. This is the highest level that "average" people can get to - Joe Peasant is never going to make it past 4, even if he spends his whole life as a soldier.
Levels 5 through 9 are the individuals who are officially considered Badasses even by the standards of veterans and other powerful individuals. At this level, you're likely a crime lord, the head of the city's mages guild, the single best fighter in your city, or the head of a major temple. If you made it this far, you were generated with the Elite Array.
Levels 10 through 15 are the best around. The king's personal mage. The spymaster who controls entire nations. The Pope. The knight people consider unbeatable, or at least the very best around.
Level 16-20: You're not just the best alive. You're the best in centuries. The wizard who devises spells thought impossible. The cleric who ascends to sainthood, if not becoming a deity himself. The swordsman whose deeds and skills become legendary, inspiring others for centuries on end. The assassin who becomes a boogeyman people fear to name centuries after her death.


Classwise, the majority of people level 1-4 are NPC classes, with 10s and 11s in all their stats. This isn't a choice on their part! If they could take PC classes instead, they'd happily do so, as said PC classes are just better at their jobs than their NPC equivalents. But PC classes represent a rare capacity for growth and personal power - most people just lack the ability, the inherent drive or heroic spark that lets them take be a Fighter instead of a warrior, a Wizard or Cleric instead of an adept, etc. Of course, individuals above level 4 are definitionally badass and heroic, so they're pretty much all PC classes.

Of course, this is all just my opinion, man. :smallbiggrin:

How do you picture things being arranged?

[Eslin]

I tend to think of it as a more even distribution - the graph'll still be thinner at the level 20 end than the level 1 end, but if my players can reach level 20 in a couple of years (game time) of constantly risking their lives, others can too. People keep trying to keep all the npcs level 1-5 thinking that's like real life, but real life isn't like D&D - in a universe where getting angry enough literally makes you stronger, life is very different. An average city has a few level 20s, enough 15s to form a guild and enough 10s that you'll meet some on the street on a daily basis.

[Grey Watcher]

I'm reminded of an analysis that I stumbled across a few years ago suggested how NPCs might gain experience. Basically, it took a look a a subsistence farmer Commoner and figured surviving for a year was equivalent to surviving a standard, level-appropriate encounter. This was under 3.5 rules, so I believe that works out to gaining 1 level every 13 years? He had some notes about gaining levels slightly faster if you were, say, trying to farm enough food for yourself, your family, and taxes for your liege. I seem to remember the math boiling down to that, assuming he starts at age 16 with 0 XP, by the time he's dying of old age, he might, just barely, hit level 10.

I'd say that having NPC vs PC classes isn't so much a lack of some intrinsic quality as just not having had the same quality or intensity of training. A Warrior might have served on the city watch, capturing petty crooks and breaking up barroom brawls a few times a week. A Fighter may have served in the military during some major conflict and, as a result, spent every single day either in drills or combat. As a result, the Fighter's had a much more focused and intense experience of combat.* Likewise, an Adept might have gone to a decent magic school or seminary and done well at his classes, but also spent a lot of time going out and being social and stuff. A proper Cleric or Wizard, on the other hand, worked tirelessly to stay at the head of the class at a major academy.

As for what levels represent what degree of skill or power, I'd say I pretty closely agree with the OP:

1-5: Most people will fall somewhere in this spectrum, with, obviously, the higher level ones being rarer and commanding more respect and notice.
6-10: Definitely among the best in their field, but not unheard of.
11-15: Easily one of the best alive, only a few people in a given generation get to this level.
16-20: Truly exceptional. No human alive has ever seen anyone as good at you at what you do, and even the most aged of elves have to think back a bit for a fit comparison.
20+: Assuming 5E ever bothers with rules for such, this would mean you're quite possibly the best ever. Before or since. "You won't find someone like her in a million years. Trust me, I know. I've looked."

*This is not say that any nation that fights a major war suddenly has an army full of PC-classed characters. For starters, only a handful of regiments will see enough combat to push them over that threshold. Secondly, of those that do, the vast majority suffer some sort of career-ending injury, if they survive at all.

[Thrudd]

We'll need to see if the DMG has any advice on this when it comes out. So far, most NPC's are treated like monsters rather than having a PC class. They have a set number of HD and a few class features that are relevant. Commoners, which I assume to be the vast majority of people in the world, are 4hp, all average ability scores, and a +2 proficiency bonus, and no other abilities.

People with PC classes I would assume to be one percent or less of the population. Of those with class levels, tier 1 (level 1-4) would be in the vast majority. People stop the adventuring life for many reasons, a primary one being death. Most don't make it to tier 2 (level 5-10) "These characters have become important, facing dangers that threaten cities and kingdoms." Even less go on to become tier 3.

According to the PHB: "In the third tier (levels 11-16), characters have reached a level of power that sets them high above the ordinary populace and makes them special even among adventurers."

"Special among adventurers" I say would be 1% of adventurers.

Fourth tier (17-20) are world or multiverse saving heroes. This would be likely only a handful to maybe a couple dozen on the planet/plane.

In a 1000 people, 10 would be adventurers. Maybe 1 of those would be above level 10. Two or three would be tier 2, and the rest tier 1. You will most likely never randomly run into a tier 4 adventurer, you would need to seek them out.

[Sidmen]

I'm personally quite happy to say "NPCs don't generally have levels" and call it a day. Give the NPC the traits you think he should have and judge what CL that would make him (and thus how much XP he is worth).

Spartans aren't Level 4 Warriors (or whatever), they're CL 4 NPCs with dangerously high AC and attack bonuses. Probably with Advantage vs. Fear and a special shield wall ability.

[T.G. Oskar]

Hmm...is there a mention of adding class levels to NPCs?

I figured that, the way the Monster Manual is handling NPCs (having Guard, Knight, Cultist, etc. as monster entries, adapting each based on the race as per a template), NPCs won't have classes at all. At best, they'll be like how 4e handled NPCs (with unique entries rather than a standardized system).

That said: if making a correlation between NPC Challenge and PC Class Levels, it depends on the setting. This progression could probably fit Greyhawk: most people would follow the "templates" of Challenge 1-2, while more prestigious NPCs would probably have a better Challenge 15 rating or so. That could allow for Challenge 21+ NPCs, which would be incredible threats. It wouldn't be the same for Eberron, though, where level 10 is assumed to be "international superstar/threat" range, and anything beyond that is almost legendary. And in Faerun...it actually depends on the range.

Now, I could probably picture something along the lines of special NPCs (using Shadowrun terminology, Prime Runners) that are built with PC rules to exemplify their "special snowflake" status. Thus, the BBEG could be a 20th level Necromancer Wizard, or a 20th level Death Cleric of an evil deity, but its Dragon and Mooks could be Challenge 18 creatures and NPC templates in that regard. Maybe the Dragon (the trope, not the creature) could have a special ability that's unique to them and that makes them resemble one of the classes (the Necromancer's bodyguard could have spell progression equal to the Eldritch Knight but none of the class features in addition to Multiattack; the Cleric's general might have a rechargeable, fixed damage "smite" ability or a special aura), but not exactly built as one of the classes. But, as far as I've seen, there's no such thing as "NPC classes": all Commoners are Challenge 1 NPCs, all Guards are Challenge 2 NPCs, all Knights are Challenge 2 NPCs, and so forth.

Maybe I missed something?

[tzar1990]

I tend to think of it as a more even distribution - the graph'll still be thinner at the level 20 end than the level 1 end, but if my players can reach level 20 in a couple of years (game time) of constantly risking their lives, others can too. People keep trying to keep all the npcs level 1-5 thinking that's like real life, but real life isn't like D&D - in a universe where getting angry enough literally makes you stronger, life is very different. An average city has a few level 20s, enough 15s to form a guild and enough 10s that you'll meet some on the street on a daily basis.

I tend to avoid designing my settings like this for a several reasons:

First, I feel that level 20 should be something special, a sign that you've become literally as powerful as anyone can ever be in your area of expertise - you will never have superiors, only equals. Having someone who's literally tied for "best X in the history of ever" in every average city means that reaching the absolute pinnacle of potential is just kind of a thing that happens fairly often.

Second, high-level characters warp the world and narrative around them. If you've got several 20s and quite a few 15s or so, it means you have large-scale effects like Tsunami, Earthquake, Storm of Vengeance and Meteor Storm available in every city - with the issue being that any one of those is enough to destroy a neighborhood and everyone in it. Subtler characters still have ways to **** **** up - Etherealness let's you get into anywhere not warded by one specific spell (and that ward requires 30 days straight of casting a level 6 spell to become permanent). Various forms of scrying mean that high-level characters can accurately teleport anywhere - and if you have something from a given location (like, say, a coin from the bank vault) you're guaranteed to arrive accurately. Gaseous Form is similar to etherealness in capability, albeit limited to only getting you places that aren't airtight. Hell, even a monk can learn to teleport 60 feet all night every night.

These abilities can be countered, yeah, but generally only by other high-level characters. And if you say that everywhere important is getting the kind of magical protection that you need against high-level characters, the world stops looking so much like medieval fantasy, since it's generally lower-magic than that. I don't want every reasonably sized bank to be a Gringotts-style magically-warded fortress. I don't want you walking past people capable of raising the dead, binding angels and demons, throwing out geai, making multiple suits of full-plate in a single day, or stealing your body on a daily basis. I want a world where having a castle to protect against major threats is reasonable (since people who can just ignore walls are rare). I want a world where most people are farmers working for a feudal lord. I want a world where going toe-to-toe with a dragon is impressive enough you're likely to get a personal knighthood from the king, not just a seat at the big kids table at the local bars.

Third, having lots of high-level characters mean the PCs aren't special or powerful. You're not the last things standing between Cityville and the terrible blue dragon if there are a bunch of other dudes in town as or more capable than you of stopping him. Being the only ones who know an assassin is coming for the king is a lot urgent if he has a dozen men capable of resurrecting him on staff, and several attending him at all times. Rallying an army to face the Dreadful orcish horde is a lot less important if Bob the Wizard and his buddies in town can casually wipe them from the battlefield with a few spells.

Finally, it assumes that everyone follows the same character creation and xp rules as are listed in the Player's Handbook, and that those rules are actually how the world works, rather than a useful approximation that sacrifices things like "realistic growth rates" in favor of fun. I would fully assume that NPCs don't actually work on the XP system at all - they grow more slowly than PCs, and they gain levels based on careful study and practice, not from engaging in adventures.

[Totema]

They kinda already discuss this in the PHB with the whole "tiers of play" thing. It's pretty much in the spirit of what Grey said, though.

[Saintsqc]

To gain levels, you have to gain experience and there is plenty of ways to gain experience.

Lvl 1-4 : ~70% of people are < lvl 5. Young people and those who doesn't feel the need to work harder are lvl 1-4. Ex : Jo the Soldier was a lvl 1 figther when he joined the militia. He gain his first lvl when he fought bandits for his lord. Since then, he spend his days chilling at the gates of the city, playing dice with his friend and talking with strangers. He has remained lvl 2 for the rest of his life.

Lvl 5-9 : ~25% of people are < lvl 10. Only the talented and the ambitious pass the lvl 5 barrier and from there it's a slow ascension. Lvl 5-6 are not uncommon, but a lvl 9 is rare. Ex : Jack the Witted start his career as a bard. After playing in taverns and inns for years, he caught the attention of a king. The lord introduced him to his court. Sooner than later, Jack builded a strong net work and earned his place in the court. Jack will die lvl 9 as a king's diplomat.

Lvl 10-14 : ~4% of people are < lvl 15. Only the gifted, who worked hard to develop their skills get through lvl 10. Lvl 10-14 are usually old and have a lot to tell. Ex : Jim the Mage spent all his life at the Academy. He has started his career as a lvl 1 wizard, doing paper work and studying all day. Now, aged of 146 yo, he is the Director.

Lvl 15-20 : ~1% of people reach this point. Not only a lvl 15+ needs to be gifted and experienced, but he also need a ton of luck. Lvl 15 are very rare, lvl 20 are legendary.


That's how I see lvl distribution. In real life, I see people with high responsability job as lvl 5-9. Lvl 10-14 would be like world-known scientist/artist, etc. Lvl 15-20 have marked the history and has been leader of nation.

[Zweisteine]

I came up with two relatively simple equations based off of the old 3.5e leadership tables.

1 level 20 character, double for each level down, then either multiply by 10 for level 2 and 100 for level 1 or by 10 for levels 3, 2, and 1. One ends with 132 million people, the other with 72 million.

From my traditional 3.5e point of view, I think this:

Most people are level 1. These are the farmers, the serfs, the lesser scholars, the apprentices.
With some experience and hard work, a good number of people hit level 2. These are mostly artisans, some scholars, most soldiers who have seen battle, and a few other select common folk.
Level 3 is achieved through further experience. Renowned artisans, seasoned soldiers and guards, studious wizards, and a modertely-sized town's mayor might be level 3, as is the world's best mundane farmer.
At level 4, you have reched a level of mastery. Fewake it, but some do. Master crafters, the leaders of large cities, higher-ranking sdiers, and high-ranked priests might be level 4.
Level 5 is near the top of hat you will reach without adventuring or serving in a war. The world's best craftsmen, the highest priests you can access, and the leaders of armies might have reached level 5.
Going from 6-10 or so, you'll find the last standard NPCs. The king who led his men to battle for decades could have reached this range, as could the world's leading wizardly scholar on the planes. With some exceptions, the high priests of major religions fall in this range, having been granted power through their devotion, rather than experience. Some Druids could have reached these levels, but they are borderline adventurers.
Above level 10, you'll have almost exclusively adventurers and it-related characters, who are often either ex-adventuers or villains. These are people known accross the world, if they want to be known. They begin to econe the stuff of legend, and their stories might be remembered for centuries.
At the last few levels, characters are like unto gods made men. Simply by being in a town, they can change it, and their stories will be remembered forever. Besides the PCs, only a few in the world can have this level of power. Most NPCs who come close are actually lower-level, but have abilities unique to NPCs, such as the level 16 druid who all Druids see as a paragon of man's relationship with nature. The ony NPCs who should have this power are the Big Bad, his lieutenant, and the one mighty archmage who can Crete a magic item for the PCs if they defeat the Big Bad.
Looking at 5e, though, I think the distribution might chane a bit more. I'm envisioning levels 4-7 being a bit more common. I thinkers guards and important figures an have higher levels, but the uppermost levels (12-14+) must Mai rain their important role. PCs who get that high are special, and they affect the world. Even in Forgotten Realms, where casters in those upper tiers are integral to the world, not many get there. Of course, The PCs are more than likely to meet many of those high-tier figures, but they should k ow who those people are. You know you're important when Elminster comes to your door with a quest.

Okay, I can't type any more.

I apologize for any typos. I'm not using a proper computer right now.

[pwykersotz]

For 5e I have a simple rule. NPC's don't get class levels unless they are of the same 'importance' as the PC's (maybe 3 to 5 people over the course of 20 levels).

We have rules for race-agnostic NPC's of various roles. Knights, thugs, berserkers, priests, mages etc. I will be using these for NPC's. The PC's aren't necessarily as powerful as them at level 1, but they are prodigies. Pound for pound they have more abilities and more flexibility than the rest of the world.

I was never able to do this in 3.5, and I'm super excited to try it out here.

[ambartanen]

The vast majority (90%) of people are level 1. This is the level of merchants, farmers, trained but untested soldiers. You can't get past this level without engaging in serious encounters beyond the scope of everyday life.
Levels 2-4 are for people with dangerous jobs, or lives that are going to frequently put them into dangerous situations. By level 4, you're a veteran soldier, a cleric tending to a good-sized town, a career criminal, or a fully-trained wizard. This is the highest level that "average" people can get to - Joe Peasant is never going to make it past 4, even if he spends his whole life as a soldier.
Levels 5 through 9 are the individuals who are officially considered Badasses even by the standards of veterans and other powerful individuals. At this level, you're likely a crime lord, the head of the city's mages guild, the single best fighter in your city, or the head of a major temple. If you made it this far, you were generated with the Elite Array.
Levels 10 through 15 are the best around. The king's personal mage. The spymaster who controls entire nations. The Pope. The knight people consider unbeatable, or at least the very best around.
Level 16-20: You're not just the best alive. You're the best in centuries. The wizard who devises spells thought impossible. The cleric who ascends to sainthood, if not becoming a deity himself. The swordsman whose deeds and skills become legendary, inspiring others for centuries on end. The assassin who becomes a boogeyman people fear to name centuries after her death.


I'll start out with the caveat that several people mentioned- NPCs in 5e won't have class levels of any kind. At least, the vast majority of them won't. But that doesn't mean we can't discuss NPCs of comparable power to a character of a certain level, whether that NPC actually has class level or not.

That said, I really like your system and it's pretty much what I use when DMing with two caveats- a minor one and a very major one.

The minor caveat is that a level 16-20 NPC is a paragon of a class that only comes around once every few centuries but they have a tendency to stick around for centuries as well. Eberron does a good job of this as an example with NPCs in this range being an awakened great oak druid, an elven lich partway through a centuries old quest to become a god, and a divine spark that posses a new host in each generation. All of them have stories important for the whole world and are almost always not from character races (or not anymore).

The major caveat is that this distribution only works if your campaign goes into the low teens and stops there. To reach twelfth level, the characters need to solve almost all the problems of a medium-sized empire (well, problems susceptible to being smacked with sharp objects; there is still going to be poverty and injustice and such trivial things dominating the lives of the masses but beneath the notice of our heroes) and trying to push for anything past 13th level just completely breaks the system. The problem is that DnD characters become better by facing level-appropriate challenges which means that a campaign that goes from level 10 to level 20 needs to come up with ~65 this-is-the-most-dangerous-of-this-generation challenges and ~65 this-is-the-most-dangerous-the-world-has-seen-in-centuries challenges. At that point you either move the action to a different location where things are a lot more epic (e.g. go fight in Valhalla where the 'average' soldier is a CR10 einherjar), change the makeup of the setting (e.g. the BBEG opens an interdimensional gate that unleashes hordes of powerful demons on the world) or the party defeats the same two or three epic enemies dozens of times each without somehow ever killing them or having the bad guys become a joke.

Note: While 5e did make 1024 CR 5 creatures a credible threat for a 15th-level group, an encounter of that type is still totally impractical to actually include in a game.

[tzar1990]

Note: While 5e did make 1024 CR 5 creatures a credible threat for a 15th-level group, an encounter of that type is still totally impractical to actually include in a game.

Point of order - for a level 15 group of 4 PCs, the XP budget for a deadly encounter - the hardest encounter you'll expect them to fight out of - is 25600.

It only takes 7 CR 5 monsters to over that budget. Because of the way bounded accuracy, encounter building and XP work, you don't need a ton of dudes to make an appropriately difficult encounter.

Heck, even at level 19 - the last time you'll be worrying about XP - a deadly encounter for four players is 43600 XP. You know how many CR5 creatures it takes to surpass that? Just ten. That's all.

[ambartanen]

That does change things a lot. I guess I am still too much in the 3e mindset and hadn't noticed that pretty glaring difference.

XP reward scaling is a bit strange though. Seven CR 1 creatures are considered the equivalent of a CR 3 creature but seven CR 7 creature are stronger than a CR 18?

[Mr.Moron]

Broadly speaking. If NPCs were treated as PCs, it'd break down like this for my first game:

Level-0: Everyone not mentioned below.
Level-3: Powerful warriors, important knights, an elite pirate. A very experienced mage:
Level-5: The strongest warriors, the captain of the guard, leader of criminal organizations. The best king's mage for 3 kingdoms.
Level-7: Heros of old legends.
Level 10+: Has not yet ever been attained in the setting.

[tzar1990]

That does change things a lot. I guess I am still too much in the 3e mindset and hadn't noticed that pretty glaring difference.

XP reward scaling is a bit strange though. Seven CR 1 creatures are considered the equivalent of a CR 3 creature but seven CR 7 creature are stronger than a CR 18?

Seven CR1 creatures is considered a hard encounter for level 7, actually

The XP budget for lvl7 medium (assuming four players) is 3000, while a hard encounter would be 4400

A CR1 Creature is worth 200 XP. If you had seven of them, the XP total would be 200 * 7 * 2.5 (the 2.5 is the multiplier for having multiple monsters, as described in the encounter design section of the DM packet). This works out to be 3500. This is above the budget for medium, but not hard, so it qualifies as a hard level 7 encounter.

[ambartanen]

A CR1 Creature is worth 200 XP. If you had seven of them, the XP total would be 200 * 7 * 2.5 (the 2.5 is the multiplier for having multiple monsters, as described in the encounter design section of the DM packet). This works out to be 3500. This is above the budget for medium, but not hard, so it qualifies as a hard level 7 encounter.

Derp, i thought they were 100 xp each. Ok, well, I've completely made a mess of my argument :D

Throwing much lower CR enemies at characters in the low teens is going to be a novel experience but definitely a welcome change if it actually works as described.

[LordVonDerp]

I tend to think of it as a more even distribution - the graph'll still be thinner at the level 20 end than the level 1 end, but if my players can reach level 20 in a couple of years (game time) of constantly risking their lives, others can too. People keep trying to keep all the npcs level 1-5 thinking that's like real life, but real life isn't like D&D - in a universe where getting angry enough literally makes you stronger, life is very different. An average city has a few level 20s, enough 15s to form a guild and enough 10s that you'll meet some on the street on a daily basis.

Yup. Being a high level doesn't make you special, it just means you trained longer and harder than other people.

[BRKNdevil]

I try to make it make more sense than anything else. the pc's that are level one just starting off and learned more skills than anything else so i'd have Commoner Hit Dice be the same as them until they hit level 4 after that, most commoners the pc's meet will max out at level 10 in middle to old age with most middle aged persons being around 4 hit dice. children would be at 1 hit dice.
most npc warriors, mages and other combat related personnel would be ranging around 5 to 10 hit dice with the new guys are relatively low trained persons staying in the 2-4 range. mid level commanders, High level advisors, and semi important lords, kings and other such people would be around 11 to 16 hit dice and the king who fought his way to the throne would range at 17 to 18 because they went through hell. the truly important npc's would be around 20
That way most people would not die instantly when struck and such and the players are special not through their mad hit dice but because they have a higher level of training and dedication to their craft. also so that a horde of cats won't be a threat to anyone but small children.