Level Adjust Correction!

[Sylrae]

I just had a moment of inspiration.

Here's how a Level Adjust works in RAW. Say You have a level adjust of +2. That means that when you take your level 1 class, youre now a level three character.

While this might work well at low levels, at higher levels you find the class abilities are much better than the now pitiful racials you have. And youre paying more and more for each level than your companions are.

What if you didnt have to, and yet would still be compensating for that Level Adjust.

Instead of going by the levels, why not go by experience?

So Lets make a drow.

Drow Have a Level Adjust of +2
We'll give him a level of wizard, since he's a male drow.

Under standard rules, that makes him a level 3 character.

For argument's sake, let's say he's not third level, he's first level, as indicated by his class.

Instead of the standard penalties, we look at the XP/Levels table. A Level 3 character has 3000xp.

So now we can do this 2 ways. We can add 3000 to each level the drow takes, or the drow can start at -3000 XP. He still receives his level 1 class though.

Now our drow will be marginally more powerful than a level 1 human wizard, but the human wizard will gain in power more quickly, because he doesn't have 3000 experience debt.

Once the Drow's 0LA friends reach level 4, he'll reach level 3. He should consistently be 3000XP behind them, but consistently 2 levels behind them.

This way, The drow pays for his +2, but the +2 doesn't keep getting more and more expensive. He'll be 3000xp behind. Normally, by ECL 20 (level 18) he would be 37000 behind, due to the ever increasing cost of a level.

What do you think?

I should NOTE, that you probably dont want to stick a minotaur with full abilities in with a first level party. However, you could easily take the savage species class for minotaur (which is spread over 8 levels) and use it.

Instead of the Minotaur Levels counting for actual levels, you'd give him a separate level progression for them. So if the Minotaur has 3 levels of minotaur and 2 in fighter, he didn't pay XP for a 5th level character, he paid XP for a 3rd level character, and XP for a second level character. Then if he wants to get another Minotaur level, it'll cost 3000 xp (for a total of 6000 spent in minotaur). If he wants his next fighter level, it'll cost 2000 xp (for a total of 3000).

Thi system could be used with casters to make multiclassing easier, but it would take some more thought to make it work effectively.

We can all agree that a Bard 10/Wizard 10 is nowhere near as good as a Wizard 20. Nobody would take it if they saw the difference between their level 20 and another level 20.
But what if they paid the cost for their bardr 10/wizard 10 separately?

A 10th level character has 45000xp. So the Bard 10 costs 45000xp, and the Wizard costs 45000xp. The Character is now expected to have 90000 xp instead of 190000, which makes the sorcerer10/wizard10 just under level 14, which is about accurate in terms of power level.

Obvioiusly this needs tweaking, because a Barbarian10/Fighter10 is just as good as a barbarian20. but as an Idea, it does hold potential...