LoG Summer 2026 Rules Update Preview #2: Starting Characters Higher than 1st-Level

Legends of Greyhawk is a shared, convention-focused Organized Play campaign sponsored by Wizards of the Coast, set in the world of Greyhawk.

Gen Con 2026 is right around the corner and the next Legends of Greyhawk (LoG) rules update is coming very soon! You will find all the details on D&D Beyond when it is posted.

The admins have been listening to discussions online and at conventions and will be making a few changes or clarifications that are especially relevant as the campaign enters into Tier 2 play. While there are a few things we are still exploring, there’s a few rules we know we want to change right now. In next few posts of this blog, I’ll be looking at the reasoning behind the ideas for those changes. As always, nothing here should be considered final until the exact wording is posted to D&D Beyond.

I’m at a convention and haven’t played LoG before, but all the adventures are tier 2. How do I play?

Characters in LoG are normally expected to begin their career at 1st-level, but sometimes that doesn’t work out for real world players. You might be new to LoG but all your friends are playing Tier 2 adventures. A convention or local store might not be offering any Tier 1 adventures when you are available to play. Or might just not want to play Tier 1. This creates a problem where some players might choose to, or be unable to, play in a LoG game when they otherwise would like to; especially since they need to play ten Tier 1 adventures to make it to Tier 2.

That said, some players are opposed to others playing higher level characters than they feel they earned, especially if they get to choose rewards to just “give” their new character. Others worry that creating a higher-level character that a player has never played before leads to confusion and slower play at the table as the player gets used to the new character.

One of the changes coming to LoG has been piloted at conventions already, but will be becoming standard practice. With the help of our Premiere Organizers (POs), the campaign has created 5th-level pregenerated characters that you are welcome to use when playing in Tier 2 games. These pregenerated character are specifically designed to be friendly to new players, so they won’t have the most complicated abilities or spells, but are instead representative of what you expect for a particular class. The wizard hurls a fireball. The fighter swings a sword.

But don’t worry, you lose out on progress from playing these Tier 2 adventures. The pregenerated characters can be used to improve an existing Tier 1 character of your own, using these rules:

• The pregenerated characters never change. They do not level up after adventures, and you may not edit them beyond name or cosmetic changes. You may not swap spells, abilities, or items between adventures. Should choose to never play your Tier 1 character until it reaches Tier 2, you would have to play a 5th-level pregenerated character ten times.

• For each Tier 2 adventure you play with a pregenerated character, you get credit for one xp advancement that you can applied to a Tier 1 character of your choice. This counts as having played the adventure, so your Tier 1 character cannot play this adventure again in the future.

• For your Tier 1 character you may only choose Treasure Bundle 2 (gold) and receive any Mark of Prestige (MoP) that you earn with the pregenerated character. This way you won’t miss out on story connections for your character just because you used a pregenerated character. Your pregenerated character doesn’t receive any rewards, DMs are welcome to consider MoPs you’ve earned while playing your pregnerated character as relevant to the ongoing story.  

Striking a Compromise

The hope is that this method strikes a balance between rewarding those who play their character organically up from 1st-level, and those who don’t have the opportunity to do so before encountering a Tier 2 adventure at a convention or store. This will allow most folks to play, regardless of the challenges that might pop up due to a packed con schedule or joining an ongoing store game after Tier 2 has already started. Hopefully designing new player friendly character will limit ay confusion or slow play.

Tier 3 Pregens?

At this point, the Admins have no plans to replicate this method for Tier 3 characters. It is not expected that Tier 3 adventures will be as prevalent as they are in D&D Adventurers League, so it’s very unlikely players will run into situations where there is nothing else to play. Also, high level play is very complicated, and isn’t something that can be “easily” picked up by new players.

Hope you enjoyed this behind-the-scenes preview!