Is losing a level as bad as it sounds?

[NecroDancer]

I mainly play 5e but I'm thinking of trying out 3.5 (I'm deciding between a Dirgesinger or an Anima Mage but that's a different story). Looking over the rules it appears that you can be "level drained" by negative energy, I was wondering if it's as bad as it sounds or is XP easier to come by in 3.5?

[TheFurith]

Level drain isn't usually permanent. Totally annoying mechanic at times, but not usually permanent.

[Zanos]

There is restorative magic (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/restorationGreater.htm) that can restore permanently drained levels, but you usually get a save to avoid having levels become permanent.

In the absence of restorative magic, being level drained drops you to the halfway point between levels, and lower levels character have slightly increased XP rewards, so you catch up eventually, although you'll probably always be a little behind.

[rrwoods]

Also the gaps between levels get bigger as you go up, which is a natural catchup mechanic.

[Mordaedil]

I mainly play 5e but I'm thinking of trying out 3.5 (I'm deciding between a Dirgesinger or an Anima Mage but that's a different story). Looking over the rules it appears that you can be "level drained" by negative energy, I was wondering if it's as bad as it sounds or is XP easier to come by in 3.5?

Players using only the PBH (I have no knowledge of other supplements that expand on this) have two options for causing level drain that encompasses both the types you'll encounter in play. There are monsters that apply level drain as well, such as vampires, but we'll cover those by just dicussing the options the players have available.

Enervation: This spell deals 1d4 level drain for a period of hours based on your caster level. But it has a maximum duration of 15 hours, which means that the negative levels can not last long enough to actually permanently affect your character. They will vanish by the 15 hour period, harmlessly. But if they get continuously struck by enervation, it can still be very dangerous, as when their negative levels equal their actual character levels, they die.

Energy Drain: This spell deals 2d4 level drain permanently. This isn't actually permanent, as 24 hours after they took the negative levels, they must make a fortitude save per negative level. Success means the negative level goes away. Failure means the negative level goes away, but you also lose a full level of experience.

So as you can tell, negative levels or level drain doesn't mean you instantly lose a level, but you essentially get a debuff that reduces all saves, attack rolls etc. by -1 per negative level. They can become permanent or instantly kill you if you take too many of them.

Not all is quite as bad as it sounds, however. There are ways to counter negative levels, such as by casting Restoration spells. You should definately seek out a cleric to do that if you think you might suffer from negative levels.

In character terms, the character should feel as if they suffered pretty heavy bloodloss or in modern terms, donated to the blood bank. If your players can't quite imagine how it feels, just explain it as staying up a whole week or so, depending on their usual nightly tendencies (I know a lot of D&D players are some sort of weird night creatures that can manage on 3 hour sleep schedules, so present accordingly.)

[Fizban]

Negative levels are one of the most powerful debuffs in the game. Permanently losing a level can be reversed, but the problem is that creatures with Energy Drain can show up as early as 1st level if the DM is playing rough, while the spells required to reverse it don't show up until 7th character level or higher and have a time limit (so if you need to travel in order to reach a healer it's not gonna be good).

It's all a holdover from the older editions when some monsters would just straight up make you lose a level no saves no nothing if they hit you, because oldschool DnD was not a fair game. As with everything in 3.5, they can be trivial or terrible depending on how the DM/players/characters/monsters all match up.

Basically, if you actually lose a level and can't get it recovered with Restoration, your DM has screwed up. In such a case you're definitely behind, but being a lower level than the rest of the party means you get more xp than they do (around 30% IIRC). Combined with starting at the halfway point you should return to your old level fairly quick, but the rest of the party will be leveling up past you at the same time so it will still take quite a while to catch up.

[Mordaedil]

Yeah, it seems like the "catching up" mechanic was one thing AD&D did a lot better than 3rd+ editions. That and stats. Stats became so important in 3rd+ edition.

[Eldariel]

It's worth noting that if you have negative levels equal to your HD, you die. Energy Draining monsters tend to be undead with all the trouble that causes, and the worst part is that they generally produce spawns if they manage to kill the target. Some examples of Energy Draining SRD monsters include Vampires (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/vampire.htm), Wights (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/wight.htm), Devourers (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/devourer.htm) and Spectres (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/spectre.htm). They both create spawns of the creatures they kill, which has the bothersome side effect of not only making the enemy more formidable but also making resurrecting them a chore - indeed, even True Resurrection (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/trueResurrection.htm) is blocked until the Undead spawn is killed. You need to kill the undead spawn and cast at least Resurrection (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/resurrection.htm) for it to work.

But yes, it's very much so a pain though if you're only one level behind the party you'll still be mostly fine while getting XP at an increased rate and eventually catch up; same can be said for crafting items (also costs XP) and such. Basically, you'll be weaker and probably making less-than-average contributions but you'll be gaining over-average XP. Of course, the greater the difference, the faster you catch up provided you stay alive. It is worth noting that basically all forms of negative levels allow for Fort-saves before they become permanent and can be cured with Restoration-line spells (which can be Wanded) as said before. Thankfully Death Ward (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/deathWard.htm) exists on Druid, Cleric and Pally lists making people completely immune to any such effects so it can be defended against. There are also magic items that replicate the effect as well as other spells that offer similar immunities.