Help for high levels dungeon mastering

[Selion]

(Im sorry for my bad english)

Hi there, a pair of years ago i had the insane idea to start a level 1 to 20 pathfinder campaign with some old friends, without having any dungeon mastering experience. Recently my players broke the edge that separate middle to high levels (level 12 atm), as DM I have some troubles balancing the game. These are the things that puzzle me more:

1) my players build their characters in a flavour oriented way, selecting feats and spells that fit with their backgrounds over those that would make them powerful. I like that, but to face CR>12 monsters some basic tools of utility are needed (dimensional anchor to counter teleports, some form of protection from death effects, flying, invisibility purge, freedom of movement, and so on), the spellcasters of the group are a ghost witch (yeah) and an evil seer (who has basically only divination and enchantment spells, and as player is not used to this kind of character). I often resort in knowledge checks or npc to give suggestions about some form of preventions that should be obvious to PCs with high skills, but i hate to do so, it would be more pleasing for my players to find themselves something to trick their opponents (and hopefully me).
2) The group is involved in a war between reigns, so there are high level npc. It is weird to build a plot in which people can use spells like teleport, discern location, true resurrection, geas/quest and there is a risk to fall in point 1), npc or knowledge check to understand what is happening.

3) High level spells are often ambiguous, for example the seer has just taken geas/quest. We read together the description and couldn't understand HOW the target is compelled: is he aware of the spell or he can just run around shouting "An evil sorcerer cursed me, i'm going to kill children, someone stop me please" (we decided that the target is aware of the spell, but cannot take action that could prevent him to complete the quest, such as talking about the quest itself with someone that could help to remove the curse)

In conclusion, high level adventures seems full of a lot of technicalities that could break the immersion in the roleplay. I had not complaints from my players (old time friends, as i said), but i had this feeling and i would like to come up with a solution before things go sour. :smallsmile:

[martixy]

Well, there is this line:

A clever recipient can subvert some instructions
That indicates that you are very much aware of the spell and its effects.
As well the general wording of being given explicit instructions, as opposed to weird compulsions suddenly manifesting in your mind out of nowhere.

I've played in a couple high-level camps and it can still be interesting. It just takes planning. And intelligence(as in what the CIA does, not the stat). That's why it's high-level. You're not in the kid league anymore, advancing should require reasoned intent and focused effort.

Make sure to very strongly suggest to your seer not to be a dumbass.
Put the party in a couple of ambushes, make the bad guys always escape just before the heroes arrive to save the day, make them crave information on what their enemies are going to do next. Eventually they'll either wise up, or run the party to the ground and I think either option is fine.

[Selion]

Well, there is this line:
That indicates that you are very much aware of the spell and its effects.
As well the general wording of being given explicit instructions, as opposed to weird compulsions suddenly manifesting in your mind out of nowhere.


That's why we came up with that interpretation, awareness AND compulsion: the target of the spell must follow the instructions, it would be unreasonable if he could act freely (removing himself the spell, for example).

Maybe i should just require e more technical playstyle from the seer, even if it's hateful to say "study a good number of spells from the rulebook, even those you cannot cast".

I'm already ambushing the PCs the way you suggest, as a tutorial, I hope just they'll not die in the process.
:smalltongue:

[jiriku]

As DM, I try to refrain from [death] effects, and I scale the threat of my encounters to the ability level and the system mastery of the players. A certain minimum level of bookwork does arise, but I try not to push players to read -- if I have to ask them to do it, they're not going to do it.

High level games are just like low level games in some ways: your players will either explore and discover and accomplish, or they will sit around and do nothing and wait for you to bring the adventure to them. If your players are explorers, then high level play is a journey you can take with them, and you can teach and discover alongside them. If your players are do-nothing butt-sitters, then high level play is just like low-level player. You just have to make a railroad and tell them to get on the train. I like explorers more than those who just sit, but hey. Work with what you've got.

[martixy]

Well, what is probably meant by that is for ex.
Say you geas some dude from the enemy team to create an opening for you in a crucial moment, effectively forcing him to be a double agent. And you finish with: "Any you're not allowed to tell anyone about this." And maybe you're super intense kinda guy and inadvertently gesture towards something.

And then he goes and doesn't tell them about whatever you pointed to. Or he tells them he's been geased but not his mission. Or the other way around. Or he makes, very extra sure not speak about any of your schemes to people named "Anyone".

As for the other things, maybe you could come up with creative opportunities to for them to exploit their current abilities.

There is this one time when my party was force-fed that particular lesson. We were chasing after this evil cleric.
We had an encounter open up on us with an arrow of disjunction to the face from 300ft. Then the blackguard charged us on his phantom steed from the back.
{scrubbed}

Needless to say, there was almost no next time.
But boy did we learn our lesson.

So we made sure to know the when, what and how for our repeat performance. There were tactics and strategy and force cages and dimensional anchors and counter-spells and divide-and-conquer and they were much more prepared, but so were we. In the end all 650hp of the blasted bitch finally evaporated and she fell.

[Crake]

Honestly, I ran into this problem in my last game, where a player wanted to play in the high levels, but treat it like it was the mid levels. He didn't want to deal with planning, and consideration of high level magic, all he wanted was bigger numbers across the board. As I did not agree that high levels were simply about bigger numbers, but instead became a much more intricate game of world changing chess at that point, and I refused to succumb to his desires to make it so, I just stopped running that game, and epilogued it, after that player had a seriously nauseating bout of metagaming that basically made the game fall apart. At that point, I decided to not DM games above level 12 for that player.

Now, I personally have great anticipation for running high level games, but I want to run them as I believe they should be run, as world changing games, where the players actions can result in serious consequences. That's just how I envision them. If you want to run just a bigger number's game at those high levels, then just avoid creatures with save or die abilities, or creatures that require a whole slew of immunities to fight properly. Making NPCs with class levels helps here a lot.

Edit: Regarding geas/quest: Uness it was cast as an SLA (which is SERIOUSLY amazing btw, no save, standard action cast, gg), there is a 10 minute casting time in which the target must be restrained and forced to listen (the spell is language dependant, so if you can't hear it, you can't be affected), so there is NO WAY the target isn't aware that the spell was cast, especially since the caster was making magical gestures and incanations the whole time.

[Selion]

Edit: Regarding geas/quest: Uness it was cast as an SLA (which is SERIOUSLY amazing btw, no save, standard action cast, gg), there is a 10 minute casting time in which the target must be restrained and forced to listen (the spell is language dependant, so if you can't hear it, you can't be affected), so there is NO WAY the target isn't aware that the spell was cast, especially since the caster was making magical gestures and incanations the whole time.

(ok i should have opened another topic about geas/quest)
I agree that the target is aware, but what i imagine is that he has a worm inside his head screaming "accomplish the quest, accomplish the quest", and not something like "hey, you have a new part-time mission, lets think about that when you have some free time", he can subvert the quest instructions, sure, but he uses any mean to carry it out (so he cannot do anything in clear contrast with the quest, but that's my interpretation, it is not written in the rulebook). Namely, if i say "kill this noble", the target will likely plan something as if this mission were a top priority one, he will not just go to the gate of the noble's mansion with a dagger saying "let me in, i must kill the landlord". I said that the description of the spell is vague because there is not an explanation of the state in which is the target, so there are open interpretations reguarding this spell.
------
Reguarding the topic question, i think i'll just keep pushing heavily the "spy-game" in face of my players; they shall react accordingly. Just to let you know better the situation, they had in past sections:
1) a disguised rackshasa that used a diversion to split the party and kidnap one of them (he had a good fight and killed the rackshasa instead)
2) an invisible imp following them; they had to kill him (after an ESP-enforced questioning), because they feared he could have seen an npc they work for. (at least this caused my spellcaster to take true-seeing in spell list)
3) the imp was the familiar of a vampire evocator (there is a vampire task force in the reign), they rushed to the mansion in which he was sleeping, they lost time against magic traps and some low level guards, time enough to let the vampire conjure a bunch of devils and teleport away. The PCs lost the fight against the devils, and had one of them (again) kidnapped. The seer had to go back in time (using an artifact with severe and unknown consequences) to prevent the kidnapped guy to talk to the vampires if dominated.
4) back in time 10 minutes, they asked for help to the organization they work for. With their help they setup a teleport-trap (npc idea) to kill the summoned devil. After that they had to run away from the city to prevent the vampires to learn about their organization (npc idea)

The vampires don't know anything about the organization they work for, the PCs just killed a vampire spawn, the vampires sent a rackshasa to investigate and things escalated quickly. It's not like my players are taking stupid actions, before point 4) everything was right, but during point 4) i had this strange feeling i was pulling the strings too far; i had the npcs "teaching" to the players how high level divinations works and what to do to prevent the "discern location-planar binding-scrying-teleport" combo. My players used commune, they found the evocator could not track them with discern location and ran away from the city waiting for better times (if the vampire evocator sees them, knows their names or takes something in their possession they are basically ****ed).

[endur]

In conclusion, high level adventures seems full of a lot of technicalities that could break the immersion in the roleplay. I had not complaints from my players (old time friends, as i said), but i had this feeling and i would like to come up with a solution before things go sour. :smallsmile:

Agreed.

I'm currently running a level 11 face to face game.

While the players are having fun, I'm aware of potential issues, and would prefer that the game not go any higher level. In the future, I will end games before they get this high level.

[jiriku]

i had this strange feeling i was pulling the strings too far; i had the npcs "teaching" to the players how high level divinations works and what to do to prevent the "discern location-planar binding-scrying-teleport" combo. My players used commune, they found the evocator could not track them with discern location and ran away from the city waiting for better times (if the vampire evocator sees them, knows their names or takes something in their possession they are basically ****ed).

I agree, this went too far. When NPCs begin to *teach* strategy and tactics, you're trying to make the players play the game your way. Instead, have the bad guys USE those tactics against the players, and SHOW THEM how effective such tactics can be. Then they can decide to look for defenses and use similar tactics themselves. Or not. You can use the classic "villain monologue" to reveal the tactics being used, if you think the players won't figure it out on their own. (for example: "You fools! I've been using commune and discern location to track your movements this whole time! And that 'secret' plan you had to exploit my weakness? I dominated the entire staff at the inn you've been staying months ago, and they've been reporting your every conversation to me! Muahahahaha!")

It is important to understand, though, that many people are like Endur. They enjoy low-level d&d, but have no interest in high-level d&d. Know your players.