How Fast should EXP "Flow" In a Low Level Game?

[bunnynoah]

I'm just curious on how fast a character would level to 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc.

Because in one of my sessions, it took five 1 1/2 hour plays (5 weekends) to reach level 2.

[mgshamster]

The standard recommendation is one session to hit level 2 and one to two more sessions to hit level 3.

But even with that, some GM's want those low levels to last a long time. I know of a GM that modified the XP charts to force a lengthened time to get to level two - to better emulate the early editions.

Heck, I once played in a campaign that took two years of weekly play to get to level 4.

If this bothers you, here are two suggestions that may help:

1) Try to enjoy the story and the game more than the characters stats. Focus on the adventure more and the XP less. Focus on the character's personality and personal growth more than the character sheet's statistical growth.

2) Talk to your GM about leveling expectations and work with them on it. The two of you have mis-matched expectations for the game and it's causing strife. You need to talk to your GM about it and get your expectations on the same page. Either they need to adjust to your style, you need to adjust to theirs, or the both of you need to meet somewhere in the middle.

[MaxWilson]

That's slower than usual... but after playing one campaign by PHB/DMG rules wherein it seemed like it only took six sessions for any given PC to hit level 8 (and when the campaign ended some PCs were as high as 14th level), my player asked for a new campaign with slower levelling. (10x normal XP to advance. Note: other players didn't express an opinion but haven't complained so far either.) Five or six sessions in and one of the PCs is still level 2, whereas by the PHB rules he'd be level 4 or 5 by now.

So the real question is, does it feel right to you? Are players having fun with who they are? If so, how fast they "should" level is apparently "how fast they are levelling."

Edit: if you're a player and want to level more quickly, ask your DM is there's something you could be doing differently to get more XP. The answer might be "take more risks" or "make faster decisions and get through more adventure material per-session".

[Foxhound438]

1.5 hours is pretty short when it comes to session length, but 7.5 game hours to get 300 XP is pretty slow. Perhaps find ways to speed up game flow (tell everyone to plan their turn ahead, for example), or ask for longer sessions. If your Dm is spending a lot of time drawing maps, help them out with that.

If you spend a lot of time RPing though, you might want to ask for small XP bonuses for social encounters? otherwise there's nothing much you can do about that. Perhaps ask for harder combats when those come up, a fight against CR>average party level will give a decent chunk of XP.

[Laserlight]

As a DM, I would try to get you to L2 in the first four hour session--because L1 characters are really fragile.

But whether the players actually get to L2 is somewhat up to them. If half the session is discussing the rules, picking out gear, and talking about the latest movie you saw, then no, you're probably not actually going to make it to L2 in the first session.

[Gtdead]

I think that lvl 3 is a sweet spot at low levels.
Use milestones instead of encounter xp, allow your players to reach lvl 3 in 5-6 sessions, and then slow it down.

I like 3 because most classes gain their subclass features, while full casters get enough spells per day to stop thinking about resource managment too hard.

In any case, it took us three 4hour sessions to reach lvl 2. I thought it was fine because the campaign is very social heavy.

[Ninja_Prawn]

ask for small XP bonuses for social encounters?

Maybe try to convince your DM that "if you'd call it an 'encounter', it's worth XP." Of course, not every conversation is an encounter, but the vast majority of time in any session should be spent in some kind of encounter, either social, combat or exploration (because encounters are what makes the game fun). Thus you should be earning XP most of the time.

Another thing: large mobs of low-CR monsters are worth less XP than small groups of larger monsters. If you're facing a lot of those kinds of combats, you will end up levelling slower, but things will speed up if and when you start to face a few solo monsters.

[Slipperychicken]

Because in one of my sessions, it took five 1 1/2 hour plays (5 weekends) to reach level 2.

D&D is generally played with much longer sessions. Mine are typically between 4 and 8 hours. I think that your sessions are very short and that's why it takes a lot of IRL time to do anything. My groups wouldn't even get to a dungeon in 1.5 hours; that time is usually spent shopping, planning, and chatting in-character.


If you want players to get more fights and earn more XP faster, there's the option of "fast tracking" through the RP that generally precedes missions, and just move right into the dungeon or whatever mission area they're supposed to be doing. With 90 minute sessions, that doesn't leave you a lot of time, so you need to get right into the meat of the experience right away. You may want to start the players at 3rd or 5th level if you'd rather not have them spend half a year trudging through the tutorial levels.

[Iguanodon]

There's some stuff in the DMG about this. On page 261 there are some proposals for milestone leveling, and I think matching pace with that is a good idea. Here is the quote (emphasis mine):


A good rate of session-based advancement is to have characters reach 2nd level after the first session of play, 3rd level after another session, and 4th level after 2 more sessions. Then spend two or three sessions for each subsequent level. This rate mirrors the standard rate of advancement, assuming the sessions are about four hours long.

Comparing XP thresholds, it's clear that they expect each session to comprise one "adventuring day." For example, it takes 300 XP to reach level 2, and an "adventuring day" for a level 1 character is 300 XP, and they expect this it will take 4 hours of play.

Your sessions are short, so take more time at each level. Here is my most important advice: Make sure that players get a chance to try out all of their newly acquired combat abilities at EVERY level. My game sessions average 2.5 hours and are relatively low on combat, and the players only reached 3rd level after 10 sessions (using the recommended XP rules from the book).

[Malbrack]

For me, as a DM or player, I find the sweet spot of D&D to be levels 5 through about 12ish. You have enough spells and abilities to react to the world in a variety of ways, but casters haven't gotten to the levels where they completely break the game yet.

So, with that in mind, I try to make the first few levels go by quickly. As a DM, I give out a level per session (with a session being 4-5 hours) up until level 5, then I slow it down to more like 3 sessions per level up.

If the group is more experienced, I'll have them start at level 3. Because let's be honest: level 1 sucks.

It is hard to design combat encounters for level 1 parties, because if you make the enemies too wimpy, then it will be way too easy--which isn't much fun. But if you up the difficulty just a little, you run the risk of knocking out players in the first round of combat--which isn't much fun for most players either. By level 3 or so, you get a little more leeway in encounter design because it is not as easy to knockout a player in one round.

[Carlobrand]

RAW, it takes 300 XP to get from L. 1 to L. 2, a balanced party of 4 should be able to handle a monster of challenge rating equal to their own level (or several monsters whose total rating is equal to theirs), and six such encounters should get four level 1's to Level 2. One would then ask how long it's taking for those six encounters to occur, what experience is being given for activities occurring between such encounters (such as finding traps and so forth), and - if it's taking more than six encounters - whether the encounters are understrength for the party.

[DivisibleByZero]

I don't track xp for players at all.
I track the number of sessions they've played.
The players' level equals the number of sessions needed to level up. Doesn't matter if we roll a single die all night or not.
First session you're level one. Second and third sessions you're level two. Fourth through sixth is level three, and so on.
This also promotes players actually coming and not missing sessions unless they have to. And it rewards role playing in the same vein (again, even if no dice get rolled).
Seems to work well for us.

[Knaight]

It depends on how combat heavy the game is, and even then it's one of those things that can be altered to taste. With 7.5 hours (roughly equivalent to 2-3 more normal length sessions), I'd usually expect about two levels in a game with a typical level of combat. So, I'd suspect that XP progression is slightly lower or the game is a bit lower on combat than is D&D standard.