High-level (15+) play

[tumblingdice]

If this topic has been discussed before, then please accept my apologies. While I know full well that LL goes only to level 20...

Does anybody have any experience with high-level play, the kind detailed in the old Companion and Master rules sets? Did you run or play in campagins where characters ran dominions, held tournaments, conducted wars and sieges, fought enormous dragons, roamed the outer planes and quested for artifacts and immortality? If so, what were your impressions? Did the rules still work at this level? Was it fun?

I ask because I finally got around to printing out the PDFs I have of both rule sets, along with some supporting modules, and am starting to have impure thoughts about trying something out via pbp.

[ancarr13]

yes, I had a vanilla hummie fighter get to about level 18 before getting killed in a siege.
It gets a little complicated but it is worth the time you put it

[tumblingdice]

Well, 40 plus views and only 1 reply. Thank you ancarr13 for your post. Even though it was a holiday weekend, I'd say it's a fair bet that the answer for the most part is "no."

All right, then, I'll pose two more questions.

1. Does anybody have any experience playing high-level AD&D, like the Bloodstone series?
2. Experience or lack thereof aside, would anybody have any interest in playing in a high-level campaign?

[Agrippa]

To be completely truthful tumblingdice I've yet to play in any high-level game let alone campaign in any edition or game system. Not that I wouldn't be interested though.

[ancarr13]

Ye have me sword...or bow, or fist if I can do a monk

[The Lizard of Oz]

I personally haven't played anything high level since high school. We had an excellent GM back then too but when ever we tried playing games in those ranges, and I'm not the biggest fan of the concept of "balance", but we either blew through his adventure scenarios easily or they hammered us. It was difficult to find that sweet spot. As for published content, Dragon Mountain was about the only highish level product we tried but it always petered out. Any more, 10th-12th level seems high to me.

[jasmith]

I've ran high level AD&D. Yes, it's fun and worth it.

[barrataria]

I thought I replied to this, but maybe I didn't (or maybe I did on another board if you cross-posted).

I am not really a big fan of "high level play" in the sense of dungeon crawls for gangs of level 15+ characters. My players generally did enjoy them, but they were playing characters developed through high school and college over like a decade or something. So, good game and good memories maybe more than the content of Bloodstone Mines (ick) or whatever I threw together.

Now, as to what is called in the 1E DMG "territory development", I've had a lot of experience. It was in each case my player's favorite phase of gaming. I started with the 1e DMG outline of activities: exploration and clearing territory, planning and building, and then dealing with neighboring powers. In a couple of cases they had to role-play acquiring rights to the territory from nobles. Rather than high-level superhero-type games, adventures were usually the lead character supported by henchmen/followers.

I didn't use the Companion rules for much more than inspiration (tables with stuff like "10% chance of comet" were a little too vague to do much for me). I think I made most use of CM1 Test of the Warlords, not in use of the adventures but as a model for running that kind of campaign. I would have used War Machine for battles if needed. There were two very good resources in Dragon magazine fleshing out high level play... one special issue about thieves (115) and one about magical colleges (123). The thief issue in particular is excellent; the whole drill of setting up a thieves' guild (bandit gang, "constable patrol", whatever) was really a rich source of adventures. As they discuss in the article, it's interesting to have the other players in the campaign control lower-level followers or whatever; if you're lucky enough to have a high level campaign each player would naturally have a chance to act as liege and have a couple of lackey characters in other games.

[tumblingdice]

That's exactly the kind of high-level game I'd be interested in, barrataria, not a high-level dungeon bash. Your post is encouraging.