PDA

View Full Version : Assigning Experience Points



EnderChant
2010-01-11, 04:14 PM
Hello, Playground. I'm beginning my first rules-as-written, non-freeform game and I'd like to run an idea or two about assigning experience points by y'all.

For my game, I'm planning on giving out bonus experience points as follows:

Voted Points

Party experience will go to everyone, bonus experience will be on an individual basis. I'm of the ad hoc philosophy of experience, so hopefully you can trust my judgement on the matter.

However, you will also be able to influence the divvying up of bonus experience points at the end of each adventure. I will announce several categories for bonus experience("Best Mistake made by a Character" or "Most Creative Solution to a Problem" or even "Wittiest Dialogue" -- really, whatever I think is appropriate based on how the adventure played out). You'll then vote which character deserves bonus experience from each category. It'll be a really small bonus, probably a slight percentage increase (1-2% extra) in whatever experience points your character has been awarded. You can't vote for your own character. Under any circumstances.
The reasoning here is that by allowing players decide on how some experience points are alloted, they'll be more involved, and pay more attention to one another's posts (I forgot to mention that this game is Play-by-Post; any general advice for running PbP would be much appreciated as well, but by PM rather than on this thread.)

Metagame Bonus Points

Metagame bonus points. There's an old saying in film: "Beginners borrow, experts steal." I plan to do a lot of stealing. Names, cultures, maybe even plots I like. If you catch me and call me out on it (via PM please) you're eligible for bonus experience points. If you meet a wizard on an island and his name's Prospero, PM me (ripped from The Tempest, in case you were wondering). You'll get XP. An Oracle speaking in Vampire Weekend lyrics? (My favorite band right now, on a tangent.) Bonus XP for you. If you're wrong, you loose nothing. But you need to catch what I intended to be the rip-off or tribute. "Close" or "Sort of" isn't going to cut it. I'm going to be picky with this. Sorry.

Currently, if you tell me two or three things that you caught in the initial setting information, you can get twenty experience points to start the game with. This offer is good until we conclude the first adventure, mind you, so act now! (If you're interested, that is.)
The idea here is to reward players who acquaint themselves with the setting information, as well as pay attention to the names, places and story line (although I expect my group to do this naturally, I figure it can't hurt to reward them for it a little bit). This also lets me see what the players are expecting or theorizing so that I can adapt my game as I see fit.

Good idea? Bad idea? Please be honest.

E

Pigkappa
2010-01-11, 04:29 PM
If that is a small percentage (1% - 2%) and the players are nice people, it could be a good idea. Just hope nobody starts searching Google for every name they read!