Long term advancement in DoM

[Angelalex242]

It is a dangerous thing when a Loremaster decides the best way to deal with powerful PCs is 'KILL EM DEAD.'

I caution against such thinking, as it leads to LM vs. Players mentality. That never ends well. It ends even worse in this ruleset. At least ask the player if he wants his character to die (or be shipped to the halls of Mandos).

If the dice randomly kill someone, (and you were rolling openly in fair sight of the table) them's the breaks, but if you're targeting somebody, or kill somebody with dice rolled behind the screen, you're doing it wrong.

[Rich H]

I really don't think Dave was suggesting that the best way to deal with character power levels was to kill them off, just that adventures and storylines involving TOR characters are going to result in character death (or succumbing to the Shadow) at some point during a 30 year cycle, simply by the law of averages. PCs are the exposed to more and more risk as they are the protagonists of the story and therefore are 'on screen' most of the time and exposed to more danger and deadly situations than anyone else. By the law of averages, someone is going to die at some point. This probability is higher or lower depending on the deadliness of the game system.

Lots of GMs do shy away from this so it is worth pointing out; I know that I was one such GM until I ran Pendragon where the game really encourages you to embrace such an outcome. It's cooked into the system and design - ie, the overriding desire to establish family and heirs before the inevitable happens and your knight PC falls to some Saxon axe!

... or kill somebody with dice rolled behind the screen, you're doing it wrong.

I don't think that's wrong to be honest. I've played in games with dice rolled out in the open and behind screens and experienced character death both ways - I didn't deal any differently with either way; they were both tough pills to swallow. I'm personally okay with a GM rolling his dice behind the screen but appreciate that others may have an issue with that.

[DavetheLost]

No, I wasn't suggesting gunning actively for the characters. Just thinking that over years of adventuring, battling OSC and trolls and worse, somebody is bound to die at some point. If the replacement is a new character then EXP levels are reduced and adventuring becomes challenging again.

DOM isn't the old Enemy Within campaign, in which a letter expressing concern over the inflationary spiral of experience, treasure and magic items was met with the cheery response "It really doesn't matter, because they are all going to die anyway."

[Angelalex242]

Well, rolled behind the screen is an issue of trust with your LM.

If you believe he wants the best for you and your characters, you're fine when he rolls behind the screen, cause he might be fudging in your favor.

If you think he's out to get you, though, you might start wanting him to roll in the open so he can't fudge anything against you.

[Rich H]

Well, rolled behind the screen is an issue of trust with your LM.

If you believe he wants the best for you and your characters, you're fine when he rolls behind the screen, cause he might be fudging in your favor.

If you think he's out to get you, though, you might start wanting him to roll in the open so he can't fudge anything against you.

Yeah, that's certainly a significant factor. I roll behind a screen, not to fudge (although I do occasionally) but more to hide how many dice I'm rolling. It's to keep the capabilities of antagonists hidden more than anything else.

[Jacen]

Lots of interesting discussion here. To keep things on a power level I am comfortable with I think I will give the players 100XP over 15 years.

[Rich H]

I posted some comments in the other thread which people may have missed so I'll repeat here...

Playing through TfW, how far along this road do people think a character should get? Once we establish that we can take a stab at breaking it down by adventure?

Okay Rich, I'll bite!

Let's also include Darkening of Mirkwood. Personally, I'm of the opinion that should a character survive through the entirety of the campaign (including all the adventures from TfW) they still shouldn't have scores of 6 in Wisdom, Valour, and a weaponskill; so they shouldn't accrue 169 XP.

Just throwing it out there for the moment but I think a rating of 5 in Wisdom or Valour, with the other trait having a rating of 4, and a rating of 5 in one Weaponskill is pretty high. I don't think they should be any higher. So I reckon that's a total XP spend of 78 points - it's late and I'm tired so someone check this for me.

Over a 30 year period, that's 2.6 XP per year.

Assuming 1 adventure each year, that's 2.6 XP per adventure.
Assuming 2 adventures each year, that's 1.3 XP per adventure.
Assuming 1.5 adventures each year, that's 1.7 XP per adventure.

These seem extremely low, so perhaps we need to accept that there should be more XP available, which would therefore lead to higher ratings in Valour, Wisdom, and a Weaponskill than I initially laid out above.

The mythic 6 Valor/6 Wisdom/6 Weapon can be thought of as 'You have achieved your place among the Wise.'

I think the only issue with that is that I wouldn't build many legendary NPCs with those values. For me characters with 6/6/6 (gulp!) across those traits would actually outshine people like Elrond, Gandalf, and Aragorn. Not by much, granted, as Gandalf (for example) may have a Wisdom of 6, Valour of 5, and Sword of 5 (maybe even just 4), but they [the PCs] would still be *better* in those areas. Mind you, NPCs *are* built using different rules to PCs but I still think it's useful to think of them with Valour and Wisdom scores as they are a barometer for PC competence.

This is all assuming that such ratings can't go higher than 6. I think there's a perfectly valid case for ratings slightly higher for truly exceptional circumstances/characters.

But is that a problem? Shouldn't our PCs be the stars of their gameworld? I think so, but they can be the stars and it not relate directly to the highest attribute rating.

Well, 169 might be the 'base rate.' You can modify it up for fast growth, or slow it down for slow growth.

I don't think 169 XP should be the base rate, that's the amount of XP needed to max out in Valour 6, Wisdom 6, and a Weaponskill of 6. There's nowhere really to go beyond that. The base should be lower to allow it to be reduced or increased using your logic of slow or fast growth, respectively.

I quoted 78 XP in my above post to get a spread of 5 and 4 in Wisdom/Valour and 5 in a Weaponskill. Perhaps that should be the lower point, with 169 being the upper. The middle point between those two is... 123.5.

Call it 124.

What would 124 XP buy us?

Wisdom or Valour at 6, with the other at 5, and a Weaponskill of 5. That all costs 119* XP, so there's a bit left over to spend. Obviously other combinations can be derived - eg, more of a focus on the Weaponskill.

That kind of feels about right. The PC hasn't 'maxed out' in all 3 scores but they do have extremely impressive capabilities - fitting for someone who has survived the trials and terrors of DoM + TfW?

*again, someone check as I'm tired and shortly off to bed!

...

A spread of 124 XP over a 30 year campaign nets us a rate of XP as follows:

4.13 XP per year.

Assuming 1 adventure each year, that's 4.13 XP per adventure.
Assuming 2 adventures each year, that's 2.065 XP per adventure.
Assuming 1.5 adventures each year, that's 2.75 XP per adventure.

Does that seem about right? 4 XP per adventure? Obviously an average that can be tweaked depending on the adventure's content but bear in mind that if you increase the accrued XP in one adventure it should ideally be offset with a lower amount in another in order to maintain the progression throughout the course of the campaign.

I think the game is designed with the idea that PCs will be involved in one adventure per year.

You could therefore represent XP accrual as:

Slow Growth/Power Progression: 2 XP per adventure.
Medium Growth/Power Progression: 4 XP per adventure.
Fast Growth/Power Progression: 6 XP per adventure.

... I appreciate that I've consciously rounded down on the slow progression and then rounded up on the fast progression in order to created some difference between the three 'tiers'. It should also be noted that if you wish to award bonus XPs during the campaign then some of the above points should be 'banked' in order to do this. If you award additional XP to those above then the rate of progression will obviously be increased.

So, a GM would pick one of the above rates depending on his own personal tastes as to how powerful he'd like the PCs to be in his campaign (if they all survived to the end).

Thoughts/comments?

[doctheweasel]

What happens if we disconnect XP gain from adventures and make it part of the End of Year Fellowship Phase? It seems like we are already talking about XP-per-year as it is. Would things be easier to digest and manage, or would that create too long a wait for players?

[Angelalex242]

That depends on how often you have fellowship phases.

XP Earned during adventures can be presented by gaming session, by adventure, both, or neither, but the bottom line is, you can't spend it till the fellowship phase comes along.

[Beran]

Another way of dealing with PCs with (too) high skills and such would be to use the Standing rules. By the time the PCs have spent AP and XPs to the point of getting close on maxing out Valour, Wisdom and skill levels they should also have a fairly respectable Standing rating. One of the driving forces in Tolkien's works is duty to lord or land; a high status Barding who is know for his diplomatic skills could be recalled to advise the court of Bard, a well travelled Dwarf could be called back to Erebor to help open up trade routes to the other kingdoms, an Elf that has renown fighting the Shadow could be summoned by Thranduil to help train "young" Elven warriors on how to battle them and a Ranger could be elected Captain of his group of Rangers.