Not Used: Creating Higher Lvl PC's

For some storylines, quests, and possible parties, Players may need characters with varied lvls than are available to them normally. I was wanting to suggest a concept of creating a new PC that was given a higher starting lvl (not by system, but DM oversight), but would play with an appropriate XP Debt so no additional lvls would be gained until that debt was cleared.

And sorry for the "Just Returning and Swamping the Server with Multiple Notions" thing; just trying to help.

No need to apologize, O Ancient One ... player suggestions help make the server go 'round!

It is an intriguing idea ...

Interesting idea indeed. Would allow a player to bypass early encounters that dont yield much XP/loot... which is both good and bad

Also, would create a situation of a higher level PC with totally crap gear, lol. This would make it much more attractive for spellcasters, methinks.

I am sure there are ways to work it so that it is viable. I will ponder it some.

One of my old characters gave me the notion. I had to play with a bunch of Epic PC's in a war scenario, could do very little to help effectively, and yet gained a ton of XP for the night. While this feeds my gluttonous Powergamer innards just fine, I thought it might be better for all concerned in such scenarios to offer the PC a new starting lvl a few lower than the others and then have to work off the buffed debt; either as XP or as entire lvls whatever is deemed acceptable.

In this way nobody should be accused of favoritism either as a Player or DM, and all can share rewards as relative equals

The other issue I see is, if we apply the 'cost' of starting higher level as an XP debt.... there is a way for players to clear an XP debt, and there would need to be some way of preventing that character from being retired until the debt is payed off (this should be a simple debt-check added to the retirement script if hasnt already thought of and fixed it).

In theory I like the idea, the devil is in the details of how it is made to work. Making it abuse-proof will be tricky.

In my thoughts, this would only be used in a DM run event, so any possible anti-exploit flag could be attached along the grant, then removed automatically once the debt would be cleared. Such a flag would not be accepted as worth anything as a retired PC, since it would be less than a positive value. Or is that wishful thinking?

Restricting something like this to be done by DMs only would solve some of the concerns about the process being used for the right reasons in an appropriate situation.

DMs to my knowledge, currently, do not have any commands to apply, increase, or decrease XP debt. We can zero it out, but thats it, I think.

The issue of players having at least one way to clear an XP debt (not going into detail here), I believe is still a concern.

The retirement issue is based on the PC being given extra XP to gain these extra levels. You cant have the levels unless you have the XP for them. If the PC were allowed to be retired while the XP debt was unpaid, then the player would in essence gain a significant chunk of XP to put on another PC for nothing. As long as the player is unable to clear the XP debt, this concern can be addressed by putting in a check for existing XP debt in the PC retirement script. If the PC has debt, they cannot be retired.

I think the PC possibly being able to clear the debt is my main concern, with a side order of DMs not being able to manually adjust XP debt.

what about an undroppable item in said PC's inventory that the scripts check against - that could possibly stop retirement and other issues from happening. As a plot item as well, the PC couldn't dump it anywhere, and its presence in the inventory would be a constant reminder of the price paid for the start-up levels.

Could work as variables as well, but with a physical item in inventory, it's very clear what the situation is.

Thats a great idea, Eric.

Thanks, Dave! You know us pac-rat types ... always thinking about inventory!