Everyone loves leveling up, it is probably the single biggest highlight of a D&D game. You get new feats and ability score improvements, more hps, more spells, proficiency bonus increases, new class features, all the good stuff. But what does all this really equate to. You get more hps and do more damage but so does everyone you fight. You do get more abilities and spells which adds variety and additional choices to your characters which is good. But couldn’t we get that without the formulaic levels. Below is an outline of talking points which I will be covering in a future post.
The good
-Reward system that is standardized and easy to use
-Keeps characters balanced
-Requires no work from the DM
The bad
-Characters and monsters become bags of hp
-Damage scales so nothing really changes
-Almost completely disconnected from the world and story
The ugly
-In game rewards lose significant
-Ability scores make huge difference even at higher levels (Abilities scores grant up to +5, proficiency bonus at 20 level is +6)
-Magic items are less meaningful (Only provide a +3 max)
-Very few in-game actions change a character
-Less (no?) reasons to interact with the world other than killing stuff