Character Level Disparity in a group

[Mad_Jack]

I've always used group XP* - any bonus XP that anyone might get for cleverness or good roleplaying is added to the group total.
All characters joining the party after the start of the game start out at the same level as the party - I've never understood why the party are somehow expected to be the only adventurers of their particular level in the entire campaign world.

On a related note, back when it used to cost XP to make a magic item, I always allowed whichever party member the magic item was being made for to supply the XP cost rather than the creator.

* And have a standing rule that, unless someone designates another player to run their character when they miss a session, the character is run by group consensus, mainly just trailing along behind the party and doing their "job" when and as necessary in accordance with how the character is usually played ...

 

[Lanefan]

In a home game, I generally allow replacement PC's to be ((lowest level in party) –1). New players come in at first and have to survive.

That's almost the exact opposite of how I do it. A player joining my game for the first time has their first character come in at the party average, to give them a bit of a jump-start. Subsequent characters come in at the "floor" level, which is a fixed thing that slowly goes up as the campaign goes along (but is always below the average of the played party).

Party exp all the way. All players start at the same level, and if they die, -and have to make a new character... guess what? They start at the same level as the current party level, with the exact same amount of exp.

The last thing I would want to encourage, is for the players to be fishing for bonus exp. So I decided a long time ago that any role playing exp, is a reward for the whole team, and not just one lucky player.

Dealbreaker for me.

Individual xp all the way, else I'm out.

Why? Because I've played with one too many players who refuse to put their character in harm's way, or who have them run and hide when a true threat appears and leave dealing with it to others. And as someone whose characters tend to stand in and take their lumps (and give 'em out too!) I resent having to share the xp with the passengers. Bad enough I have to share the loot with 'em.

Also, if someone isn't involved at all with a particular event (say, the main party gets attacked and this one guy sleeps right through the whole thing) why on earth should they get xp for it?

Lan-"this will be about the 47th time I've had this discussion in here"-efan

 

[pdzoch]

There is a much larger diversity of answer than I expected. Personally, I've kept everyone at the same level. It is much easier for me to plan adventures when the level is generally consistent. When a player can not make it (scheduled absence), I work with the assumption that the character has been "professionally engaged" during his absence and has maintain XP growth compatible with his party. This has been a rare occasion/occurrence. Likewise, when I have a guest player, she uses a character of the same level as the rest of the party.

I think a level above or below would not be a big deal, but when I hear about a character that is many level different from the group, it seems like a poor chance of survival and probably not much fun (but that is only my assumption).

 

[Gilladian]

It's a system of rating the overall power of 3.5 classes against each other for power, flexibility and ability to dominate the game. There are 5 tiers. Wizard, Cleric, Druid and I think Favored Soul are generally rated as Tier 1- able to fill any role at just about any time, and clearly more powerful while doing it.

 

[aramis erak]

I think a level above or below would not be a big deal, but when I hear about a character that is many level different from the group, it seems like a poor chance of survival and probably not much fun (but that is only my assumption).

In 5E D&D, 3-4 levels isn't too much an issue. Only reason I ask people not to play higher than the regulars is because of the wide range below peak and the propensity of high level characters to be laden with a half-dozen or more magic items around here.

 

[Jhaelen]

What RPG system are you asking about? Some edition of D&D, I guess?
Up to and including D&D 3e our group had rather elaborate rules to determine the level of characters to replace deceased ones or for the characters of new players joining the campaign late.

Luckily 4e opened my eyes and I did away with XP. Everyone gained a new level at the same time (i.e. when it made sense for the storyline), and replacement characters and new characters all started at the same level that the existing characters had.

 

[Blue]

Depends a lot on the system. For example, 5e is a lot more forgiving for some disparity.

In the current game I run (13th Age) I allow new players and replacement characters to start at any level up to and including the party level, with the point that I will be advancing them faster and they will catch up in not a huge number of sessions. Some players enjoy playing their character through the lower levels and growing them up. Plus they get to see what works and what doesn't as they build. However, I don't have a group that's looking to swap out their characters often - they invest a lot in making their characters real and also I try to have interesting character arcs in addition to any campaign arcs going on.

Last two campaigns I ran before this (3.0 and 3.5) ran for a total of about 12 years, with individual XP and a good chunk of XP coming from RP and story awards. That system it wasn't as fun to be behind, and when we had character deaths (lose a level to come back) we ended up even more split. Eventually I modified individual XP to be "those behind got their individual XP to catch up, but if you were in front/tied for first you'd get plot bennies instead. But that gave different spotlight time and I wasn't to happy with that either. Again, that system it ended up impacting character fun to be behind.

As a player, some of my formative campaigns were big level splits, but this is back in AD&D and AD&D 2nd, which were more forgiving for it.

One DM had new characters come in at 1st and we had a lot of character death. At the end of a RL year there were only 2 original characters, who both just hit 5th level - a paladin of Sarogin (sp?) who was proposing a holy beer run, and my magic-user. (Yes, in a grindy world where magic-users had one spell a day plus d4 HPs, I managed to keep a wizard alive. I was rather proud. I threw a lot of darts.)

The other level-varying campaign was the opposite. I joined a game that had already been going on for a few years, and the main group of chartered adventurers (this was the FR) was subsidizing new adventuring groups, and we were one fo those. So we had a bunch of high level characters plus one 1st level, and we'd often get throw into repercussions of the high level group when we were not the level to deal with it. It was glorious. The DM I think ended up running multiple groups in different parts of the same world, so there was always things happening that weren't the focus of the current group, plus even group of players had several parties of adventurers depending on who could show up that week. So we eneded up with 4+ characters of all different levels and scattered around the Realms, and often would have crossovers and characters of very different levels going adventuring together.

To a non-level-specific system, that group of players had a good amount of overlap with a Champions superhero game where everyone had as many characters as they wanted (some heroes, some vigilantes, some villains), we were all over the map in terms of points though we all started fairly buff, and half the plots were caused or aided (or taken over) by players.

(Nothing quite like your eidetic memory techno super possessed by an elder horror that also gave her magical powers fighting the rest of the team in space when you KNEW all of their weaknesses and vulnerabilities. Oh look, put HIM in magical darkness and his powers shut off - including life support. THAT hero stole your nano-technology to boost himself, but didn't know enough to lock you out of control of it. He can't survive in space without it either. Ah, good times. But I am wandering off target.)

I generally run big mythic campaigns, where having characters at the same level (for the most part) is best for my DMing style + player fun. But for a change fo pace I want to run a mega-dungeon grinder with each player having a stable where those not on the adventure get half XP and all new characters come in at 1st.

 

[LordEntrails]

As others have said, it depends upon the system and group.

Currently I keep all my player at the same level. I don't need to reward or punish players based on their attendance. Everyone plays when they can and I'm not going to punish people for RL impacts on a game.

I also am not needing or wanting to reward PC's different amounts of XP based upon their actions. Again, everyone is happy and playing for everyone's enjoyment so again, no need to differentiate.

 

[Sunseeker]

That's almost the exact opposite of how I do it. A player joining my game for the first time has their first character come in at the party average, to give them a bit of a jump-start. Subsequent characters come in at the "floor" level, which is a fixed thing that slowly goes up as the campaign goes along (but is always below the average of the played party).
Dealbreaker for me.

Individual xp all the way, else I'm out.

Why? Because I've played with one too many players who refuse to put their character in harm's way, or who have them run and hide when a true threat appears and leave dealing with it to others. And as someone whose characters tend to stand in and take their lumps (and give 'em out too!) I resent having to share the xp with the passengers. Bad enough I have to share the loot with 'em.

Also, if someone isn't involved at all with a particular event (say, the main party gets attacked and this one guy sleeps right through the whole thing) why on earth should they get xp for it?

Lan-"this will be about the 47th time I've had this discussion in here"-efan

While I get what you're saying, isn't it really the DMs decision if someone "contributed" to play or not?

This is exactly why I don't use individual XP. I don't need players getting into arguments over how they should have gotten more or someone else should have gotten less based on how many times their axe hit the bad guy. Attempting to sort out who "contributed" to the encounter more is the exact reason a lot of people don't want to play support or healers, because inevtiably someone will come along and tell them "Doesn't matter how much you healed us, you didn't hit the baddie, so your don't get XP." And that is my (the DM's) call, not yours.

 

[Darkness]

Thanks. That's what I got from context. Just curious what thise were. CODzilla, I assume? Not having played 3.5 (unless Pathfinder counts), and not an optimizer (I don't have the patience).

In case you'd like to see a tier system for 3.5, this one should cover pretty much every class:

http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=5293