Reducing Level Adjustments xp required question when leveling

[Zhepna]

Hi

I have a group of two players and they start lvl 4

player #1 is lvl 4 with no level adjustment (so he has 6000 xp)
player #2 is lvl 2 with a +2 template

We use the Reducing Level Adjustments rule.
I give them 4000 xp. The player #1 now have a total of 10000 xp so he become lvl 5
What happens to players #2?
From my understanding, he had 1000 xp at lvl 2 and now become lvl 3 and have a total of 5000xp so he is not lvl 4 but is not far.

A player is saying that they both gain a level and player #2 will be exactly at lvl 3 with no exceeding xp because his ecl is 4 so it take him 4000 to level from lvl 2 to lvl 3.

I could be wrong, I don't know, that's why I ask here. Thanks for the information.





https://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/races/reducingLevelAdjustments.htm

[tyckspoon]

Unless something -specifically- calls out Hit Dice (in which case the 2 levels + LA character is disadvantaged), you will have the easiest time working with this if you just think of both players as the same level.
The guy with 4 class levels is Effective Character Level 4. They need 10,000 total XP to reach Level 5, and was presumed to start at XP total 6,000 in order to be level 4, so they need to gain 4,000 more XP to get their next level.

The guy with 2 class levels and 2 Level Adjustment.. is ALSO Effective Character Level 4, and needs 10,000 total XP to reach level 5. They were also presumed to start at 6,000 XP in order to be ECL 4, and need to gain 4,000 more XP to get their next level.

The way Level Adjustment interacts with gaining XP and leveling up is not any more complicated than that, and trying to make it be so is where most of your mistakes will be made.

[Crake]

+2 level adjustment cant begin being bought off until level 6 (ecl 8). Essentially, when the character hits level 6, they go from level 5 (ecl 7) to level 6 (ecl 7), then it happens again 3 levels later, at level 8 (ecl 9) to level 9 (ecl 9)

To buy off LA, you need to gain 3x your level in LA, so at +2 LA you need 6 levels, followed by 3 levels, for a total of 9 levels, for +1 LA, its just 3 levels (which seems to be what you’re confusing this with), and for +3 LA, its 9 levels, followed by 6 levels, followed by 3 levels, for a total of 18 levels to fully buy off.

In terms of actual levels, as mentioned before, just consider the level adjustment as “monster levels”, so player 2 is “class level 2/monster level 2” but they get no benefits from those monster levels in the form of HD, skills, feats, etc

[Darg]

To add on to that, when using the reducing level adjustment variant rules, the xp cost is really just to reduce your xp total to be the amount it would be if you flat out subtracted a levels worth of experience.

So, as the character has only 2 class levels and an ECL of 4, they need 4 more class levels to reach their first LA buyoff. Or ECL 8 (6+2). Once here they pay 7,000 xp to reduce their LA by one which makes them ECL 7 (6 class levels + 1 LA). At class level 9 (ECL 10) they get another opportunity to buy off. Here they would pay 9,000 xp to go from ECL 10 to ECL 9 so that their ECL finally matches their class level.

[Beni-Kujaku]

To add on to that, when using the reducing level adjustment variant rules, the xp cost is really just to reduce your xp total to be the amount it would be if you flat out subtracted a levels worth of experience.

So, as the character has only 2 class levels and an ECL of 4, they need 4 more class levels to reach their first LA buyoff. Or ECL 8 (6+2). Once here they pay 7,000 xp to reduce their LA by one which makes them ECL 7 (6 class levels + 1 LA). At class level 9 (ECL 10) they get another opportunity to buy off. Here they would pay 9,000 xp to go from ECL 10 to ECL 9 so that their ECL finally matches their class level.

To make it simpler, they don't gain two actual levels at once when they use buyoff, but they start gaining a bit more XP than the rest of the party (since they become an ECL lower), which makes them slowly catch up to them.

[Darg]

To make it simpler, they don't gain two actual levels at once when they use buyoff, but they start gaining a bit more XP than the rest of the party (since they become an ECL lower), which makes them slowly catch up to them.

The variant rule is honestly a bit complicated. I just give character's LA levels ( just first class equivalent HP and skill points when they hit the ECL level breakpoints) Seeing as the biggest complaint on these boards is that you lose out on health, I think I nailed the fix right on the head. The skill points were a pet peeve of mine.