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Havvy
2010-11-22, 07:02 PM
Thread Preface: The following is an essay I wrote yesterday. I would like help organizing and expanding it. As such, if you feel things can be moved around, or a topic could be expanded, please say so.


Experience Points...because you didn't have enough numbers to worry about.


GM: Alright players, with that last blow, the monster falls down dying.
Player1: I check for loot.
Player2: I stand guard in case anything becomes alert to its death.
Player3: Umm, how much experience do we get for this encounter?
GM: Erm, let me get out the Magic Item Compendium to roll for treasure. While he loots for treasure, you don't find anything. Okay, now let me see for experience. It was CR N...and lets see, you all leveled up last time so now the average party level is Y. Based on that, you get, umm...let me check the book....uh,
Books shuffle around the table.
Player1: Erm, what was the loot?
GM: I'm trying to find experience real quick, hold on!

Experience systems exist to allow for allowing player progression through levels. There are two level systems; point-buy and tier. Point-buy levels are those such as World of Darkness and GURPS and any game where you spend experience to raise one part of your character. Tier based level systems are those where you gain a hodgepodge of bonuses at each level. DnD uses this system heavily. Rarely, a system will combine the two, and usually with disastrous consequences, but that is another essay. A key difference between point-buy and tier systems is that while experience is required during character creation for point-buy systems, they are not required for tier systems.

But are experience points required after character creation? That depends on many factors of the game. If the game is short, the definite answer is no. They get in the way of everything else. But what is short? For a quick paced game, 15 minutes is short. For a game where skill is objective, there is no definition of short. Ultimately though, we care about pen-and-paper games. Short for a pen-and-paper game consists of three sessions. Longer than that, and you have a reason have a level up somewhere in-between, but until then, the effort to create and update a character takes longer than the fun that will be utilized from it.

So, for short games, experience is a nuisance, best to keep out or you will lower the fun provided.

So, that still leaves the possibility of experience points for long games. But to answer whether experience points are needed in DnD, one must look at how and why experience points are used in general. By looking at role playing games such as Final Fantasy and World of Warcraft, we get these rules. In these games, experience is used to cause a grind. This grind is placed in so that the player does not ignore every minor challenge and run straight for the lore and bosses. It is also put in to make the player feel accomplished in having gained a level. More important, it is used to slow the game down so you cannot reach end-game in one sitting. Finally and most importantly, it is used to judge whether or not the player is ready to move to the next level.

Pen and paper games can be played at multiple paces, but of which, none of them surpass 'somewhat slow' in speed. And because pen and paper games are ran using an intelligent world controller, usually called the game master, there is already a method of judging whether or not the player may move on to the next level, or whether they need to. As such, those reasons are removed.

And in a pen and paper game, there is somebody there to make sure bad things happen if you ignore the normal enemies. The laws of cause and effect are not bounded by what can be coded, only what can be rationally explained, and more probable, rolled. The game master has the job of making sure that players are adequately challenged. They should know what is trivial to get past (like say, a brick wall) and what is not (like say, a wall made out of force energy). They design encounters based on this.

And what if the game master wants to create lots of challenges for a specific level of play? In this case, experience is detrimental, as it could lead to a level up to quickly. At other times, what if the game master cannot think of many challenges that are just right for a certain level of play. In this case, experience is again detrimental, as it causes a level up too slow. And, more probable with point-buy systems than tier based, what if the game master wants to create huge jumps in power, like those equivalent to level gains in DnD. In these cases, game master fiat is a better judge than the game master giving experience.

This also leads to less bookkeeping, removing a section almost useless during gameplay. Nobody cares that they leveled up while playing. They care between games, where they make changes.

Fiat is a wonderful system for games where you have somebody there to make judgements. As such, DnD should have used fiat.

And removing experience removes a lot of bad mechanics from games that try to interface them in other ways. DnD Crafting, Thought Bottles, Ability components, ect. If you have to trade experience for using your abilities, you are paying for it with every usage, which makes you level up later than others, which puts you below the wanted averages. Not good at all for designing encounters or the player!

As such, when playing pen-and-paper games, don't use experience. Keep the levels, but have the game master in control of what level the group is at. It is not something that accepts fine-tuning and enjoyment to be side by side.

mucat
2010-11-22, 07:55 PM
I agree that experience points are clunky and unneeded; I'm more likely to just say "characters level after each plot arc" or something similar. But you're kind of building a straw man here. I sincerely hope that this:


GM: Alright players, with that last blow, the monster falls down dying.
Player1: I check for loot.
Player2: I stand guard in case anything becomes alert to its death.
Player3: Umm, how much experience do we get for this encounter?
GM: Erm, let me get out the Magic Item Compendium to roll for treasure. While he loots for treasure, you don't find anything. Okay, now let me see for experience. It was CR N...and lets see, you all leveled up last time so now the average party level is Y. Based on that, you get, umm...let me check the book....uh,
Books shuffle around the table.
Player1: Erm, what was the loot?
GM: I'm trying to find experience real quick, hold on!

...never actually happens. If it does, the problem has nothing to do with the experience system, and everything to do with a DM who doesn't understand how to run a game.

Havvy
2010-11-22, 08:08 PM
I actually do see that happen at least once a month...with different DMs...making me believe that is occurs commonly amongst those who haven't thought too far ahead...

It is a strawman as you said though. I wrote it to get myself into the mindset of experience points and decided to keep it on, if anything, to show that it does take time out of your life to use such a system.

Quietus
2010-11-22, 08:12 PM
I agree that experience points are clunky and unneeded; I'm more likely to just say "characters level after each plot arc" or something similar. But you're kind of building a straw man here. I sincerely hope that this:



...never actually happens. If it does, the problem has nothing to do with the experience system, and everything to do with a DM who doesn't understand how to run a game.

It's actually not uncommon, particularly with newer groups. I find this really helps, though : http://www.penpaperpixel.org/tools/d20encountercalculator.htm

Please elaborate, though - how does the fact that a particular table is buried deep in the DMG, yet is expected to be used after every encounter, of which there is expected to be four in every in-game day, make it so the DM "Doesn't understand how to run a game"?

Starbuck_II
2010-11-22, 08:12 PM
First, what DM gives EXp after battle and not after the session (he should have added by than)?
I've never had one.

Treasure is the only thing you need right away.

Havvy
2010-11-22, 08:22 PM
First, what DM gives EXp after battle and not after the session (he should have added by than)?

1) As said by Mucat, that part is really a strawman.

2) DMs that only have one encounter per game or those who are very slow at DMing (to the point that we can discuss every decision for about five minutes before he is done looking up his custom charts)...

3) Should I add a point into the essay about how experience points are usually only given after killing something (destructive encounters) instead of building something up (constructive encounters)? Or that some DMs don't give experience for going against the environment when the environment is tough. Or how some don't give experience for socially averting encounters...

GoodbyeSoberDay
2010-11-22, 08:43 PM
Some DMs use the experience mechanic poorly. The OP's solution is to ditch the experience mechanic, but those DMs could just as easily change the way they use the experience mechanic.

Of course the mechanics can get in the way of what the DM and the group want to do. They're supposed to be tools for the DM to adjudicate without being or appearing arbitrary or biased, or expending much effort. It's basically trivial to say that if you don't like a particular tool, you don't have to use it, but some people actually do like to use that tool.

IME most DMs have used the experience rules as a baseline and then tweaked the end result based on our particular circumstances. If there was some sort of encounter that we easily defeated or bypassed due to the rules improperly estimating the level of challenge the encounter posed relative to our specific group, then we would get less experience. This is encouraged in the D&D 3.5 DMG, for instance. This method is usually quite easy for an experienced DM, and it rarely results in any complications.

Edit: It's also worth pointing out that many systems, like Pathfinder, have different experience tables based on how slowly or quickly you want to progress. This way you have a menu of accessible options that (generally) distributes bookwork around the table and gives the GM one less thing to worry about. And it bears repeating that any experience calculation should be done between sessions.

Enix18
2010-11-22, 08:45 PM
I'll preface this by saying that I totally agree with you. As a DM, I did away with the XP system a while ago. It's not only unwieldy, but unnecessary (as you've endeavored to make clear in your essay), so I tend to rely on personal judgement to determine when characters level up. I've also reworked a lot of the rules to make sure that characters aren't burning XP to fuel their abilities, and altogether I think it's much better than going by the rules as written.

However, I do still have a few pointers. I figure you wouldn't mind a few structural tips, so here goes:

Firstly, I wasn't particularly pleased with the second paragraph, about XP in short games. You seem to spend plenty of time discussing exactly what constitutes a short game. In fact, I would say you spend too much time on this issue—unrelated tangents are never a good thing when you're trying to make a point in a short essay. You may want to rework this portion to focus more on the point, which is why XP is unnecessary in short games. In total, you devote only a sentence or two to actually explaining this point; I suggest you flesh it out a bit more.

Unfortunately, few other section suffer from a similar issue. The most glaring example seems to be the second-to-last paragraph. Now, I really agree with what you're saying here; in fact, this is one of the biggest reasons why I reworked the XP rules in D&D. However, I don't you devote as much time to it as you ought to. Further details, and possibly examples, could definitely flesh out your point more. I'm not sure if you're restricted by a word limit, but if you aren't than I would encourage you to add a little more detail to sections like this.

On a slightly different note, the very short, third-to-last paragraph seems rather egregiously disconnected to me. Those two sentences—"Fiat is a wonderful system for games where you have somebody there to make judgements. As such, DnD should have used fiat."—simply do not work. Prior to this point in the essay, you barely even mention DM fiat aside from a few passing examples. Then you throw in this little paragraph without any sort of build-up or transition. Your logic here seems a bit disjointed, not to mention undeveloped. If you work on my suggestion to flesh things out a bit more you can probably fix the latter issue. However, the disjunction is something that will require a bit more finesse to fix. Try to work on creating more transitions between paragraphs as well as between individual ideas, as this will help with the flow and clarity of your essay.

Similarly, your conclusion paragraph is definitely too abrupt. You know how they teach you the five-paragraph essay format in high school? Well, there's a good reason why your conclusion is supposed to take up an entire fifth of your paper—the final, definite summation of your entire essay is rather important. Instead of suddenly ending with the statement you currently have, trying preceding it with a few sentence that summarize everything you've said. This will help to clarify the logic behind your conclusion and make it seem far less abrupt.

Other than that, I can't say that there are any glaring issues. There are a few grammatical/orthographical errors, but I assume you'll fix those when you go back to edit and revise your paper. Hopefully, the rest of my criticisms will be helpful to improving what you have here—remember, I wholeheartedly agree with your point, and it's for that reason that I would like to see you produce a really high-quality essay on the topic.

— Enix18

Starbuck_II
2010-11-22, 08:47 PM
1) As said by Mucat, that part is really a strawman.

2) DMs that only have one encounter per game or those who are very slow at DMing (to the point that we can discuss every decision for about five minutes before he is done looking up his custom charts)...

You have 1 encounter... you could have looked up chart before the game...

The only time when you should have to look up when there is more than 1 encounter or encounters made up on fly.


3) Should I add a point into the essay about how experience points are usually only given after killing something (destructive encounters) instead of building something up (constructive encounters)? Or that some DMs don't give experience for going against the environment when the environment is tough. Or how some don't give experience for socially averting encounters...

XP is also given if bypassed monsters to achieve goal (sneaking pass a town of Drow in underdark without alerting sentries awards full XP).

Gan The Grey
2010-11-22, 09:14 PM
I don't know what place this will have here, but experience is a necessary component of sandbox games. Taking it away invalidates an aspect of the persistent, non-PC-centric world.

GoodbyeSoberDay
2010-11-22, 09:16 PM
I don't know what place this will have here, but experience is a necessary component of sandbox games. Taking it away invalidates an aspect of the persistent, non-PC-centric world.What about free-form sandbox RP?

mucat
2010-11-22, 09:30 PM
I don't know what place this will have here, but experience is a necessary component of sandbox games. Taking it away invalidates an aspect of the persistent, non-PC-centric world.

I'm not sure I buy that...though to an extent, it depends on what you mean by "sandbox". If it's just "players can do what they want, rather than being on plot rails", then the DM can still just level the party whenever he feels they've accomplished about a level's worth of stuff. If it's a sandbox game with a revolving cast of characters, where not every character is present on every expedition, then you do need some way to keep track of individual levels...but I would be just as happy saying "20 hours of play nets you a level, assuming you were doing things and meeting challenges," and then adjust that up or down if the players are using their time especially effectively or especially pointlessly.

Even for a rotating-cast game, it might be best to keep everyone at the same level. That kind of game seems great for people with busy schedules who can't necessarily make every session...but not if those who can't play as often end up unable to contribute meaningfully when they do play. I know that there's the argument that "someone who doesn't play shouldn't reap the same rewards". But levels shouldn't be seen as a reward for playing the game. Playing the game is the reward for playing the game; character levelling just keeps the game from growing stale.

The Big Dice
2010-11-22, 09:43 PM
But are experience points required after character creation?
A lot depends on a variety of factors there. True20 has done away completely with the whole concept of Experience Points. In that game, you level up as and when the GM says you do. Then again, that game has also pretty much done away with everything that comes from D&D, even though it still uses the D20 system.

Games like Cyberpunk 2020 and the Chaosium BRP system take a more skill-based approach to earning experience. In those games, using a skill in a meaningful way garners either Improvement Points or an Experience Check. And both are a long, long way from the D&D model.


So, that still leaves the possibility of experience points for long games. But to answer whether experience points are needed in DnD, one must look at how and why experience points are used in general. By looking at role playing games such as Final Fantasy and World of Warcraft, we get these rules. In these games, experience is used to cause a grind. This grind is placed in so that the player does not ignore every minor challenge and run straight for the lore and bosses. It is also put in to make the player feel accomplished in having gained a level. More important, it is used to slow the game down so you cannot reach end-game in one sitting. Finally and most importantly, it is used to judge whether or not the player is ready to move to the next level.
Ironically, games like Final Fantasy and World of Warcraft owe huge amounts to earlier editions of D&D. The concept of grind, that is repetitively killing fairly weak enemies for treasure and experience, is completely copied from D&D editions going all the way back to the white box.

However, this method of XP accumulation is also pretty much unique to D&D and video games. The same can be said for levelling in games. Video games and D&D are the only places I can think of these days that use that particular concept.

It could be argues that the Roll and Keep games, Legend of the Five Rings and Seventh Sea are a hybrid of skill-based and level-based games.


And, more probable with point-buy systems than tier based, what if the game master wants to create huge jumps in power, like those equivalent to level gains in DnD. In these cases, game master fiat is a better judge than the game master giving experience.
Skill based games tend to escalate more rapidly early on than a level based game like D&D. If I can concentrate on my primary offensive and defensive skills early on, once they hit an optimum level they don't need to be improved anymore.

The paradigms between the two types of game (conscious deliberate improvement in specific areas compared to arbitrary improvement in many areas at once) are very, very different.

Once a GURPS character hits a weapon skill of 16-18, there is no need to take things further. When a L5R character hits a weapon skill of 5, there is no real incentive to increase it until secondary character abilities are at a comparable level to the primary combat ones.

This leads to an initial escalation of combat ability, followed by a much more leisurely rate of development in every other area the character touches.


And removing experience removes a lot of bad mechanics from games that try to interface them in other ways. DnD Crafting, Thought Bottles, Ability components, ect. If you have to trade experience for using your abilities, you are paying for it with every usage, which makes you level up later than others, which puts you below the wanted averages. Not good at all for designing encounters or the player!
Again, these are issues unique to D&D. One thing I will add to these points is, my players are extremely unwilling to invest Experience in magic items. If you need 20,000 Experience Points to reach a certain level, then spend 5,000 Experience Points, you now need 25,000 Experience Points to reach that level.

It doesn't matter that you may earn those points faster than other party members due to the foibles of the D&D Experience system. The maths doesn't lie. It takes you more XP to reach a given point if you spend them.


As such, when playing pen-and-paper games, don't use experience. Keep the levels, but have the game master in control of what level the group is at. It is not something that accepts fine-tuning and enjoyment to be side by side.
When it comes to experience levels, the GM is always in charge of where the group is.

But, the GM should not be afraid to experiment with the game system. Personally, I find that XP for killing things leads to a very one dimensional game. Where characters are still dungeon bashing even though they are in the upper echelons of the levels they can reach. The dungeon might not be a traditional set of underground tunnels populated with monsters guarding treasure chests. But the concept of site-based killing and looting never really goes away.

I find giving out experience on an ad-hoc basis works much better in D&D. The GM has perfect and total control over how fast the characters advance. Players still have Experience they can spend to make items that they will use up, out grow or lose to an untimely Disjunction.

Ultimately, the answer to the question "Do we need Experience Points" is somewhat vague. We don't need them. But they serve a useful function in defining the pace of character growth. But, don't look to video games for ideas on how to tinker with systems surrounding Experience Points.

Those video games are usually using ideas based on 35 year old tabletop roleplaying games.

If you want to tinker with some of the fundamental assumptions behind how you favourite game works, feel free to do so. But I'd strongly suggest taking a good look at how other RPGs do things. You might find some ideas that really spark your imagination.

For other ideas, it's worth checking out this guy's (http://www.youtube.com/user/LordStrange) Youtube channel. He's putting some novel ideas on how to really mess with the D20 system up.

Havvy
2010-11-22, 09:48 PM
To those that have posted (especially Enix18, and mucat's latest post), thanks. I wrote this because I felt it needed to be written, so no, I don't have any limits, outside the topic itself.

I'll try to flesh out the conclusion, but I've always felt that they were redundant (especially in a five paragraph essay) to the point that I'd restate things or feel like I'm saying something new in them.

I'll add points about sandbox games.

I'll expand on DM fiat as an option for leveling.

I think I'll outline as follows:


Intro
Level Based Systems
Ways to level
Types of games (i.e. sandbox, quest focus)
Best for Pen-and-Paper Games
Conclusion


I've been ninja'd by The Big Dice.

Endarire
2010-11-22, 09:57 PM
Experience Points exist largely to tell you how close you are to the next level. They're the progress bar.

The DM can do away with this progress bar and say, "You level now." I prefer this method since it lessens the grind-happy attitude.

Also, "too quickly."

Githyankee
2010-11-22, 10:02 PM
I don't know what place this will have here, but experience is a necessary component of sandbox games. Taking it away invalidates an aspect of the persistent, non-PC-centric world.
Not true; I run a sandbox game without xp. When the PCs complete a significant goal (clearing out the dungeon's first level, rescuing the princess, etc.), they level up.

The only difference from a more structured game is that the players choose their goals.

Foxwarrior
2010-11-22, 10:26 PM
GoodbyeSoberDay, Mucat, and Githyankee have all quoted the same two sentences and proceeded to ignore the second one :smallconfused:. If you take away the laws of physics governing experience, then NPCs all over the world will be leveling up for no particular reason, while others may be bounty hunting for centuries, but they won't go up in level, because the DM did not think about them.

And yes, I did create an account just to say that.

mucat
2010-11-22, 10:34 PM
GoodbyeSoberDay, Mucat, and Githyankee have all quoted the same two sentences and proceeded to ignore the second one :smallconfused:. If you take away the laws of physics governing experience, then NPCs all over the world will be leveling up for no particular reason, while others may be bounty hunting for centuries, but they won't go up in level, because the DM did not think about them.

And yes, I did create an account just to say that.

I'm not sure I understand your point. Why would NPCs be affected by the way PCs gain levels, or by whether the DM thinks about them often?

(For what it's worth, I usually figure an active human NPC gains a level every 1 to 4 years...though most NPCs will "reach their potential" at some point, and from then on gain levels much more slowly if at all.)


EDIT: And welcome to the board! Glad I was part of the reason you created the account, even if I'm not quite sure how to answer your point! :smallsmile:

Foxwarrior
2010-11-22, 10:47 PM
I was trying to point out your lack of emphasis on "non-PC-centric". In a properly non-PC-centric world, you need to minimize the rules that apply differently to PCs and NPCs. Since XP determines whether you're a dirt farmer or a Dragon Tamer, it's important enough that no non-PC-centric world can exist if the XP rules are different for PCs and NPCs.

DM Fiat XP gets messy when trying to make a self-consistent world.

Morithias
2010-11-22, 10:52 PM
First, what DM gives EXp after battle and not after the session (he should have added by than)?
I've never had one.

Treasure is the only thing you need right away.

HEY! I do that. I'm semi-insulted.

Vladislav
2010-11-22, 10:53 PM
1. My PCs level up at the speed of plot.
2. So do my NPCs.
3. The plot needs of PCs and NPCs vary.

Call it PC-centric, call it DM fiat if you will, it works.

mucat
2010-11-22, 10:58 PM
I was trying to point out your lack of emphasis on "non-PC-centric". In a properly non-PC-centric world, you need to minimize the rules that apply differently to PCs and NPCs. Since XP determines whether you're a dirt farmer or a Dragon Tamer, it's important enough that no non-PC-centric world can exist if the XP rules are different for PCs and NPCs.

DM Fiat XP gets messy when trying to make a self-consistent world.

Ah, I get your point now.

I would answer that XP is an out-of-game concept, so even if the in-world physics is the same for PCs and NPCs, they don't necessarily follow the same XP rules. Even in a sandbox game, the PCs are the protagonists, and the story bends around them...it's just that it's a story about a world that doesn't bend around them, if that makes any sense.

I would also say that even if you follow the detailed XP-granting rules of the game, it makes no sense to assume that NPCs gain levels by those same rules. The studious NPC headmaster of a wizards' academy gained his magical acumen by study and long nights in the lab, not by tallying up level-appropriate encounters. (Though admittedly, you could stretch the word "encounter" to fit this case; "two months' research counts as one level-appropriate encounter" would net the scholar a level every couple years or so...)

I don't think it would break players' immersion, or their sense that the game world doesn't know they are PCs, to handle their advancement on a different schedule than the NPCs follow, as long as there's no in-game evidence that this is happening.

Foxwarrior
2010-11-22, 11:07 PM
The XP rules are part of the in-game physics. For a caster or Monk, they determine how far you can move in a single round. For a Ranger or Druid, they determine how big and scary your pet is. And so on. XP rules can't be an out-of-game concept, because the characters in the game are affected by it significantly.

As for the headmaster of a wizard academy, there are a couple of courses of action he could have taken to get that power without changing the rules:

RP experience, which is basically handed out for existing and not being too ordinary.

Combat experience earned in the distant past.

Combat experience earned because he's a member of a Fight Club on the side.

Quest experience for discovering important things about magic and whatnot.

Gan The Grey
2010-11-22, 11:07 PM
Not true; I run a sandbox game without xp. When the PCs complete a significant goal (clearing out the dungeon's first level, rescuing the princess, etc.), they level up.

The only difference from a more structured game is that the players choose their goals.

To all who have commented in opposition to my idea on sandbox games, I apologize. I hadn't realized how very specific my own brand of sandbox game is, and in doing so have failed to realize that there may be other ways of doing it. Let me clarify my position.

I run an E6 sandbox game. The setting is a large island with multiple races, a handful of nations, and a very detailed history and diverse landscape. Each area is well-defined and game sessions are based on a robust random encounter generator that determines what, who, and how many a player group runs into on any given day. It generates changes in weather, monster encounters, animal encounters, encounters with people, coming across items, natural undiscovered aspects of the landscape, area-specific encounters (named monsters and landscape specific events), and even allows for encounters consisting of multiple different types of encounters all at once (i.e. trade caravan being attacked by gnolls during a rainstorm). I have skeleton NPCS and monsters on standby for quick and easy insertion. Dungeons, ruins, and towns are located in specific areas.

Basically, my rational behind creating this setting is to completely remove the need for me to fiat what's going to happen in a particular session. True, I will determine the details and how certain aspects interact, but I tend to rely as much as possible on the roll of the dice.

As such, experience is generally handled based on the random situations that pop up. Should a group defeat a band of gnolls, +XXX exp. Should a player out talk and out diplomacy a 3rd level aristocrat, +XXX exp as appropriate for their level differences. Some parties level faster than others based on luck, but if they do, its because they've earned it by dealing with more difficult situations. The ones that level slower generally tend to actively go look for harder challenges, and again, they earn their experience based on the challenge.

In my games, gaining experience isn't just a mechanic to keep people from leveling too fast. It's a way to congratulate them for succeeding at difficult challenges, and a way to encourage them to seek out increasingly difficult situations. I could say, "John, you level up this session," but then it diminishes the work they put into gaining the experience. Right now, a fight is both a victory AND a measurable sense of accomplishment. Taking away experience gain would also take away a bit of the 'I Win!' feeling. And leveling isn't something I the DM hand out on what appears to be a whim; its something the players earn based on expectations presented by what they see when they read the rules.

In general, I think experience works BETTER in a game like this, because, like you said, it doesn't really mean much in a game where what happens to the players is entirely dependent on the DM fiat.

mucat
2010-11-22, 11:19 PM
That's cool; it sounds like the XP system works really well for your game, and there's no reason for you to mess with a good thing.


(I would point out that PCs "looking for harder challenges" would probably happen with or without a direct numerical tie to level advancement. Presumably, there are things the PCs want to accomplish on that island, and as they grow powerful enough to pull off a given step toward those goals, they're likely to give it a try.)

Gan The Grey
2010-11-22, 11:21 PM
That's cool; it sounds like the XP system works really well for your game, and there's no reason for you to mess with a good thing.


(I would point out that PCs "looking for harder challenges" would probably happen with or without a direct numerical tie to level advancement. Presumably, there are things the PCs want to accomplish on that island, and as they grow powerful enough to pull off a given step toward those goals, they're likely to give it a try.)

I would probably agree with this, lol. :smallbiggrin:

arrowhen
2010-11-23, 09:46 AM
I was trying to point out your lack of emphasis on "non-PC-centric". In a properly non-PC-centric world, you need to minimize the rules that apply differently to PCs and NPCs. Since XP determines whether you're a dirt farmer or a Dragon Tamer, it's important enough that no non-PC-centric world can exist if the XP rules are different for PCs and NPCs.

DM Fiat XP gets messy when trying to make a self-consistent world.

Even if the world isn't PC-centric, the game you're running in that world is -- after all how often do players get together for a session and say, "You know what? We've been talking about our characters an awful lot lately; why don't we take a break from that and spend this session talking about what some random NPCs are doing over in the Kingdom of Faroffistan?"

XP doesn't determine whether you're a dirt farmer or a Dragon Tamer, class levels do. XP just determines how fast the tiny subset of the world's population who are controlled by players gain those levels.

Githyankee
2010-11-23, 10:40 AM
In general, I think experience works BETTER in a game like this, because, like you said, it doesn't really mean much in a game where what happens to the players is entirely dependent on the DM fiat.
Sounds fun! It's more randomized than how I run my game, but I probably wouldn't mind as a player. You're the one who calculates the xp, after all.

I think a lot of us have a disdain for xp because of how D&D treats it like an accountant's books. What I mean is, getting to 2nd level requires 1,000 xp. One thousand! Do we really need that many numbers between 1st and 2nd level? Getting to tenth level involves more xp than most of us will ever see in dollars. Maybe that's why some gamers like D&D xp system so much.

Add to those huge numbers 3e's elastic xp, and we get a system much more complicated than it needs to be. Not only do DMs and players have to deal with penny-worth xp values, DMs have to use a chart to cross-reference level with CR to create those values.

Speaking for myself, it's not that I can't do it; I'm an engineering student, finishing up calc 1 this semester. It's that I don't want to bring my calculator to D&D. I think if D&D used a simpler xp system, for example "one xp per encounter, ten xp and you level up," I wouldn't have dropped xp entirely. Heck, even one hundred xp per level, or ten xp accelerated per level wouldn't be a hassle.

My 2 coppers.

Starbuck_II
2010-11-23, 10:40 AM
HEY! I do that. I'm semi-insulted.

Do you fumble through the book like the OP said a DM might or are you prepared to give them exp?

arrowhen
2010-11-23, 11:00 AM
For an interesting alternative to GM-awarded XP, google "sweet20 experience". (Sorry, I can't really do links on my cheap little dumbphone.)

Ormur
2010-11-23, 11:12 AM
Awarding XP has never bothered me (except for what exactly it represents in-game). Encounter level calculators are easy and quick to use so I don't even bother to calculate it beforehand, just at the end of the session or the encounter. The way I build encounters, few difficult and comparatively over CRed, means it doesn't take many to level up and I prefer that. I occasionally reward extra XP for completing missions.

I don't like ad hoc leveling. I prefer the DM to work within the XP system. If it's entirely done by fiat you never know how long it is until you level and it makes XP cost problematic. Having a set mechanic for leveling is a good idea in my mind for the same reason we have mechanics in general, it gives the DM a structure to work within. The CR system might well be borked but at least it provides a baseline to be fiddled with, just like mechanics for fighting.

Calmar
2010-11-23, 12:04 PM
I let my players level up every first or second session, depending on how much trouble the characters had to navigate. It's about as fast, as when I actually calculated the. Plus, no one is moaning, because he's only 80 XP away from next level at the end of the session.

Morithias
2010-11-23, 06:32 PM
Do you fumble through the book like the OP said a DM might or are you prepared to give them exp?

Memorized the page, and can do the calculations before they even divide the loot that I roll up in advance. I do the experience after, because well. If they skip a few rooms they get less, but the money in the safe isn't going to just vanish unless I intended to remove it.