How do you deal with Roleplaying XP?

[sword-dancer]

If somebody could give me an objective working definition of good roleplaying TM, perhaps I would use it.

OTOH I expect that every player plays his Character as "good" as he can how he sees, interprets, etc him.
I don`t look into my players thoughts, aind if they thought they had a ggod reason, why their chars do some things ord don`t, or do it other ways then I expected, how could i as GM declare they are wrong, without explaining it.

Someone wrote on this board a time ago.

Good roleplay is a reward in itself.

To go into a little more detail....

Don`t get me wrong, but this read like a TDE post of the good= Cliche roleplayer TM fraction!

If his deity is god of healing and he goes out of his way to heal strangers, however, then it isn't that he used his spells- he went out of his way to follow the example of his deity.

I would "reward" or say better react to it ingame!
His speriors would see him as a especially faithful, pious man. He would get the respect of the flock of the faith, etc pp, maybe even his god would recognice his devotion.
OTOH The player could also be a subtle Powergamer, getting more power through his additional XP, or forced to act in this kind because he must fear to get behind if not.

Likewise, while a rogue won't get rp xp for picking someone's pockets, she could get rp xp for joining the local thieves' guild.

Would joining the local thieves guild not have his own rewards ingame?
But waht if the rogue isn`t a thief but an honest person who is an infiltrator, scout, etc pp?

For example, a dwarf fighter makes a point of buying only dwarf-made weapons. Sounds good to me. So do...

..an elf who talks down to the other, short-lived races because they're short-lived.

Or the orc who breaks beautiful stuff cuz he's an orc.

Or the gnome who demonstrates his racial dislike of kobolds.

And if the Character in this example did exactly the opposite?

 

[the Jester]

OTOH I expect that every player plays his Character as "good" as he can how he sees, interprets, etc him.
I don`t look into my players thoughts, aind if they thought they had a ggod reason, why their chars do some things ord don`t, or do it other ways then I expected, how could i as GM declare they are wrong, without explaining it.

One of the things I was trying to convey is that the system I use is designed purposely so that the pc makes the call as to what they did for rp xp, and I just approve it (or not). Very rarely do I deny a pc the rp xp he or she is trying to get- usually if a player didn't earn the race xp (for example) for a session, when I'm getting everyone's rp awards written at the end of the session the player will say to me, "Well, I didn't really have anything for race today..."

I would "reward" or say better react to it ingame!
His speriors would see him as a especially faithful, pious man. He would get the respect of the flock of the faith, etc pp, maybe even his god would recognice his devotion.

Sure, there are always in-game rewards as well. The whole point of awarding rp xp is- well, it breaks down into two main lines of thinking, for me.

1. I want the players to roleplay. I don't care if they play a character that I like, or if they play their elf with my vision of elves; but I want a vision of the character in the player's head. That's what I'm rewarding. Different bards have called a very wide range of behaviors for bard xp- from singing in character to mocking other bards to trying to bluster their way through guards without a fight. Which one is "right?" Who cares?? The players are roleplaying in all cases. Now, for a case in which I would not give rp xp: at the end of the session, the single-classed wizard, for class, says, "I fought a lot with a sword!" This is an example of a time in which I'd scratch my head and ask how that was wizardly. Prolly in the end suggest that the player call it for personal concerns instead. Short of things like that, it's really easy to get all four categories of rp awards, every session; my system's designed that way intentionally.

2. The second point to awarding xp for roleplaying has to do with pacing advancement. I run sessions periodically with no combat, sometimes several sessions in a row; and in standard 3e you gain 0 xp for those. I don't like that; I prefer a 'smoother' rate of advancement, especially given things like social challenges (which I firmly believe can be worth xp). My assumption is that the pcs will have not quite as many combat encounters as standard, with a slight weighting towards tougher encounters. Xp for these are cut in half, as I mentioned above. Combine this with rp awards- I assume each pc will get four awards per session (though some average more, with props and helping 'lube' the game, and some occasionally average less for a few sessions at a time)- and I assume a slightly slower rate of advancement for the pcs in my game. All things being equal, instead of 13 1/2 encounters advancing the party a level at a rate of 4 encounters per session, it should take (on average) about an extra session or two to level. In practice, this ends up being more or less true depending on factors like the party's level distribution, but 3e advancement is far too quick for my tastes.

Would joining the local thieves guild not have his own rewards ingame?
But waht if the rogue isn`t a thief but an honest person who is an infiltrator, scout, etc pp?

Sure, an infiltrator could call it as personal xp, perhaps alignment xp, maybe class xp (rogue or bard in disguise, f'rinstance), etc. And the in-game rewards are there too; but combat encounters have in-game rewards like treasure and magic items, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't get xp for 'em.

And if the Character in this example did exactly the opposite?

To be specific:

A dwarf who buys only weapons made by non-dwarves- well, I probably wouldn't give him race xp for that; but if he had a personal or alignment-based reason, or even some sort of class-based reason... well, that's a different category, but there you go. If he refuses to buy weapons made by dwarves of a rival clan or something I could easily see race xp, though.

An elf who treats other races as equals, despite elven longevity: sounds elven to me. Sure, I'll give you race xp for it- as long as you can point to a specific example of it each game.

An orc who tries to preserve the beautiful- sounds like personal or alignment (or maybe class, for a bard or similar type) xp to me. Not much orcish about preserving pretty things- unless it was an orcish work of art or something like that, I suppose.

Gnomes who like kobolds? Well, again, at a glance it doesn't sound too gnomish, but I can easily envision arguments that would persuade me without too much trouble. Again, I'd tend to think this would be 'personal' rather than 'race' xp, but I'm flexible.

That's another thing: my system is designed to allow maximum flexibility without pigeonholing pcs into the roles they don't want to play. It helps the player flesh out the character- it gives them a sort of set of guidelines to build from, without laying down hard and fast rules. There's no list of 'dwarf xp is any of these ten things' or anything like that; it's very freeform.

In fact, if I'm Chaotic in alignment, I'm calling this system for alignment xp...

 

[Bendris Noulg]

I award pretty much based on how well a character interacted with the story, especially if they do something that actually helps in developing it by becoming involved in more intensive areas of role-play. For instance, a Cleric or Paladin becoming very involved in the political machine of his religious organization (more "barbaric" types would have something akin to a Shamanic brotherhood), opening the door for more types of role-play and role-play focused sessions.

This award, however, is given at the end of adventures (or, for longer quests, a "phase" of the adventure that permits a little R&R), with the rest of the Experience Points, so it gets lost in a collective mire of CR Experience (scaled down from standard to 50%), story-goal awards, "stump the DM" awards (as stated earlier in the thread, unexpected but still in-character decisions make the character more realistic than less), and various other odds-and-ends that I give out. Add in semi-regular solo side quests (becoming seperated, called to an urgent meating of their guild, splitting up to intentionally occomplish 2 or more tasks simultaneously, etc.), and who got what for which reason doesn't really stand out since the difference between accumulated awards, over the long run, never becomes more drastic than 2 or 3 Character Levels (not all that dramatic in low-magic games) and changes constantly between who's the highest Level and who's the lowest (and regular enough so as not to generate competition).

 

[sword-dancer]

In fact, if I'm Chaotic in alignment, I'm calling this system for alignment xp...

[/QUOTE]
1. I want the players to roleplay.

I thought that was at least one reason to play.

Now, for a case in which I would not give rp xp: at the end of the session, the single-classed wizard, for class, says, "I fought a lot with a sword!"

Why not ?
Why shouldn`t he get RP XPs for that.
Mind you my Spellcaster/Psionic did most of his combat and damage to others with his energy Wapons, his Spells and Psionic abillities he used mostly for other things.
She harmed bodily only one person with psionic, killed after a mind reading.
Because she judged it unacceptable to let such a foul creature threaten others if she could do something about it.

2. The second point to awarding xp for roleplaying has to do with pacing advancement. I run sessions periodically with no combat, sometimes several sessions in a row; and in standard 3e you gain 0 xp for those.

IIRC the DMG there was at least a variant rule for getting XP for Non Combat Challenges!
If you overcome Challenges without Combat, especially Non Combat Challenges, the reward would be equal to the Combat XP reward.

Sure, an infiltrator could call it as personal xp, perhaps alignment xp, maybe class xp (rogue or bard in disguise, f'rinstance), etc. And the in-game rewards are there too; but combat encounters have in-game rewards like treasure and magic items, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't get xp for 'em.

I would call it if the rogue is not an thief but an infiltrator class XP, alignemnt XP person al XP equal, i don`t use any of them.
And there could be other rewards for those as well, from treasure and magic items, given freely as gift, reward thanks or needed equipment for other missions, connections etc..

The race XP i hand another POV

Culture forms our POV but not necessary in the way the culture see as appropiate.
APerson could see the cultural ways as wrong or choose to not use it.
See Prince Pickel in Dragonheart, or Drizzt do Urden.

I`ve an example IMC,
Not all Darke elfs are drow and no all drow are darkelfs.

 

[Silver Moon]

One formula I have used is to assign a percentage score for each player as one would grade in school. I then multiply that against the maximum value, calculated as 100 x the average level of the party.

Another formula that I've used is to just pick a number between 0 and 1,000 in increments of 100 and assign that to each based on how well they played.

 

[Kichwas]

I've tried methods of rewarding roleplaying XP in the past -in fact last time I ran DnD it was the only method of XP I had-, but I find it always ends up going to the people you favor personally at that moment. The player who is most liked out of game will get noticed more than the others - even if one of the others is actually doing the 'best' roleplaying.

In the end, I don't want to promote or reward favoritism, I just want to promote or reward fun.

So rather than reward roleplay, I just try to promote it during the game.

That said, I'm currently rewarding journal writing, just to get the concept started with my group. Hopefully in time I'll develop some writers and then it will just be 'fun'. This goes against my logic above - which I'm aware of - and it isn't really working either. I get journals, but sporadicly. On this, I'm still seeking solutions. The ideal one would be to write the journals for the sessions myself and promote fun that way, but I just haven't had the time between GMing and my other activities to do so.

 

[Jeph]

I just hand out a completely arbitrary amount of Exp to each character at the end of a session. Usually 300*(mode party level), but sclae it down to 200x for a dissatisfying night or up to 400x or even 500x for a really awesome time.

I find myself basing the Exp award off of the entire session as a whole, generally, instead of the player's or characters--including how well I think I ran the game and how much fun the players had; and sometimes most importantly how much feedback I get. I don't exactly know my logic for this, but hey, it's worked so far.

 

[Doc_Klueless]

Back when I had a group...

If you take time out of your busy life (and as hard working adults/parents, we all had very busy lives) to show up on time for the game session and participated in the fun (didn't sit around reading books, watching TV, ignoring the game and others), you get full experience points, regardless of whether or not your character did much or not. It's all about the social interaction of the players in the group.

Though there are times I wish I had a system like others here.

 

[Dr. Niles Crane]

I've used a variety of methods, but settled on a flat equal rate for all characters present for the adventure, with a bonus for players who write an in-character journal. As DM, I'm not comfortable with awarding EPs just for combat: some of the most enjoyable evenings of gaming are those of pure role-playing and there is no reason (IMHO) they should be worth any less (or more) than a night of dungeon crawling. Also, my group is not competitive with each other and doesn't look to "keep score" by using experience points, although perhaps removing them from their concern has allowed them to focus on roleplaying: they don't have to worry about missing out on experience points if thier characters decide to do/not do something (no "DM judgement" on their actions).