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Iceforge
2016-06-11, 01:20 PM
Greetings fellow playgrounders!

Many years ago, I heard the quote by John Wick (paraphrased, as I cannot find the video in which he said it) "James Bond was never first level", and how playing high level characters (or very powerful characters, based on which system you use) can be fun for the players, specially if you often play low-powered campaigns, which I am also a fan of, but variety is gold.

One problem I always had with high level characters is that I prefer to build my own worlds when I DM, and a mixture of me being poor at getting a lot of it into writing and having players, who simply don't have the time nor energy to read a ton about a world in advance to a game (which has made it fruitless to do the effort in getting it writen down in a way readable by anyone else but me), means that high level characters often don't make a lot of sense, as someone high level is supposed to know a lot about the world in which the game takes place, understand how the world works and know about what exists in the world (or even more importantly, what does not exist in the world!)

An idea I had recently and am slowly building up more and more in my mind, is a world where multiple worlds exist, once ravaged by ancient evils (think Titans, like Greek Titans) and these evils was locked away in each of their seperate worlds, with an order of guardians in each world (explaining common language and common races across the multiple worlds) and one last world seperated from the rest, the central world that connects all the other worlds, in which no titan was trapped and locked away, ancient magic locking all the connections between the world (effectively blocking all planar travel).

The players would then take the role as someone from an Order existing in the central world, whose job it is, through magical means, to monitor the other worlds for signs of this ancient evil escaping captivity, and while it has been without any signs for time beyond counting, the order still have powerful individuals in their service, who battle the evils of their own world, when suddenly activity is spotted in multiple worlds, most significantly in one of them.

Fearing if orders still exist in the other worlds to deal with it and not wanting to leave the other worlds to their own fate and give the ancient evil time to grow powerful enough to open the connections between worlds themselves, the connection is opened and our heroes are sent into an, to them, unknown world to try and find out what is going on and make sure the ancient evil does not escape captivity, not knowing what form it might even have manifested in, if it has indeed escaped entirely from its ancient prison.

Would that be a pitch that appeals to you?

What other ideas do you have to make high level characters make sense in a world they might not entirely know out-of-character?

Honest Tiefling
2016-06-11, 01:30 PM
I think you need to define these orders better. They seem like they would be important, but not much information is granted about them, particularly their impact on the game. I mean, do the players get access to minions?

And here's a suggestion: Even if you like world building, out source! Have them make suggestions or outright build some of these worlds. Hopefully, they can explain their own world to the rest of the group, and have a more personal connection to it. Even if they are only giving basic details, it might help to lure them in. Or maybe they'll learn why it is often so hard for you to put it into writing and getting others to pay attention to it?

If you are ever in a pickle with world building, remember Chandler's Law: If you are in a corner, have a man with a gun burst in. Except replace 'gun' with 'fire, lots of fire'. It gives them an immediate mystery to solve, and a reason to rush over and deal with it. The society itself is going to have extreme reactions but not have time to fiddle with everyday activities or minor quibbles. Reactions are extreme, and short. Or there is a total collapse allowing the players to step in and take control. Given the power level of the game, I would allow them to assert control because it comes with the territory and they'll probably be suited to do so.

Iceforge
2016-06-11, 01:37 PM
I think you need to define these orders better. They seem like they would be important, but not much information is granted about them, particularly their impact on the game. I mean, do the players get access to minions?

Not even thought about that yet, generally the player group in questions rarely, if ever, use minions, even in the one shots where we are playing high level (Im not the only one DMing for this group, fortunately we split it between us), and yes, its just a new idea, won't be something we play for a while in any case, so yes, need to define a lot of things more


And here's a suggestion: Even if you like world building, out source! Have them make suggestions or outright build some of these worlds. Hopefully, they can explain their own world to the rest of the group, and have a more personal connection to it. Even if they are only giving basic details, it might help to lure them in. Or maybe they'll learn why it is often so hard for you to put it into writing and getting others to pay attention to it?

Good idea, the setup would allow players to also be hand-picked powerful individuals from other worlds, while I was thinking they was all from the central world, it would allow those who want to do so to be from their own world and do some world building if they feel like it.


If you are ever in a pickle with world building, remember Chandler's Law: If you are in a corner, have a man with a gun burst in. Except replace 'gun' with 'fire, lots of fire'. It gives them an immediate mystery to solve, and a reason to rush over and deal with it. The society itself is going to have extreme reactions but not have time to fiddle with everyday activities or minor quibbles. Reactions are extreme, and short. Or there is a total collapse allowing the players to step in and take control. Given the power level of the game, I would allow them to assert control because it comes with the territory and they'll probably be suited to do so.

Not sure I understand that law then, that just seems like unfun play to me, at least how you described it, but perhaps I am misunderstanding something

Honest Tiefling
2016-06-11, 01:57 PM
Not sure I understand that law then, that just seems like unfun play to me, at least how you described it, but perhaps I am misunderstanding something

The law is unfun if used improperly. The idea is to introduce a fire (or other natural disaster) when you're in a corner as a back up plan. If for instance the party is going to a world you don't have fleshed out, they run into a city that is dealing with an earthquake. They shouldn't be expecting to get much information from the rubble regarding their cultural pratices, and dealing with said earthquake or related problems keeps them occupied while you whip something up.

Iceforge
2016-06-11, 02:00 PM
The law is unfun if used improperly. The idea is to introduce a fire (or other natural disaster) when you're in a corner as a back up plan. If for instance the party is going to a world you don't have fleshed out, they run into a city that is dealing with an earthquake. They shouldn't be expecting to get much information from the rubble regarding their cultural pratices, and dealing with said earthquake or related problems keeps them occupied while you whip something up.

Ah, now I get it :) That makes much more sense and makes it more fun, a way to avoid lack of prep to be a problem

Cosi
2016-06-11, 04:02 PM
The simple solution to exposition is to provide it on a need to know basis. If the players know enough about the situation and setting to make informed decisions (both about their immediate environment and about places they might want to go), and you give them new information as necessary, that's probably fine. The players don't need to know a great deal about the setting to play characters who know a great deal about the setting. They just need to know whatever is relevant to their current situation. You probably know the capitol of Iceland, but if you we're explaining to someone how to do your job you would not need to give them that information.

I second the suggestion that you give people the opportunity to fill in the world for you. It lessens the work for you, and increases player investment. Write down some basic information (i.e. "It's a small mining town with rich natural resources. There's a power struggle in the local government.") and then let the PCs fill in other stuff (i.e. "They were mining gold for the imperial mints, but when the empire pulled out the switched to mithril which is more internationally valuable, but deeper underground", "The power struggle isn't about the local government itself, it's about which nations to approach for closer trade ties"). Then the players show up, and the plot moves from there. Maybe they try to convince the townspeople to join whatever faction they're working with. Maybe the miners dug too greedily and too deep, awakening something scary with a bunch of tentacles.

As far as inspiration for high level plots, just read some books. Malazan, The Second Apocalypse, The Codex Alera, and many other books have high level plots and high level characters. That said, your basic set-up sounds fine so it's not terribly pressing.