Quote Originally Posted by Morty View Post
I'd remove HP from this equation, since their ungodly bloat is one of the reasons high levels come apart at the seams.
Eh, if I remember B/X gives either 1HP or 2HP per level after 9th, although fighters might get 3HP a level (they do in AD&D2e, although I only know that as I own the books). I'm going to use Basic Fantasy, as I have the pdf and it's close enough for our purpose, so fighters get +2HP per level. Assuming 10 CON (reasonable because stats are randomly generated in order) and average hp rolls for both a fighter and a wizard the fighter ends up with 62.5 hp compared to 90 if they just continued getting hit dice, while the wizard has 33.5 hp compared to 50.

A T-rex does 6d6 damage per attack and attacks once per round. That averages at 21 damage per attack, so the wizard is eaten in two rounds (one if unlucky), while the fighter needs three rounds on average. Using a Red Dragon we get a claw/claw/bite dealing 1d8/1d8/4d8, and assuming they all hit we deal an average of 27 damage, so the wizard is gone in one round and the fighter in two.

Also, 4e makes the most effort to actually define the kind of gameplay experience that different levels should bring, but unfortunately, that effort is pretty half-baked. It doesn't help that 4e does little to combat the "same thing, but with bigger numbers" problem. It arguably makes it worse, really.
4e's vision of higher levels is 'same thing, but with bigger numbers and you can teleport 30 feet once per combat'. It's also at the weird point where the most interesting gameplay is arguably at levels 1-10, but to me the most interest part of your characters is at levels 11-20. Paragon Paths were much more interesting than Epic Destinies, and more fun because you had a decent number of options (except for a few cases where your 1st level choice funneled you into one).

I'm annoyed that more Paragon Paths didn't become 5e archetypes. I mean, you can fit some into existing classes fairly easily (avenger->paladin and invoker->cleric, seeker->ranger is also fairly easy). Also they could have chosen the Initiate of the Dragon, Mountain Devotee, or Radiant Fist as the third monk archetype instead of the Four Elements one, and I'm sure several people would have preferred it.