How fast do your characters advance in level?

[Angel of Adventure]

The lower level guys in my epic game have gained levels about 1 per 2 games. I'm probably in the minority when I say I'd like it to go faster, but I would so that they can fight buffer stuff!

 

[tetsujin28]

Remember the old days of AD&D, when it took months (of GAME time) to go up in level? (Or maybe it was just my DM ).

Yeah. I hated the hell out of that. Even in high school playing nearly every frickin' day it took forever. I just don't have the time for that.

Folks say that 3e is designed for rapid level advance, but I'm not convinced it must be so.

It doesn't have to, but I'm sure glad it does. We advance about every four adventures, meeting roughly three times per month. By the old system, we'd probably still be 2nd level or so.

 

[genshou]

I did notice a variant xp system called the Sweet 20 System. You can find it here. Not a bad variant system for those who want to give more control over xp to their players. I might even institute this in my WLD game.

That system reminds me of the Sims 2 Aspiration & Goals system. Each Sim has one of five aspirations (Finance, Knowledge, Family, Romance, Popularity) and earns Aspiration reward points for fulfilling goals which are randomly determined each day from a list focusing on your sim's Aspiration. Some goals have more merit than others. For instance, learning how to cook a meal is worth 250 or 500 points, meeting someone new or becoming friends with someone is worth 1,000 points; falling in love is worth I think 3,500 points. You have four or five goals at a time (haven't played the game in a while, so can't remember the specifics) and they reset each day (remember that because of the rate that sims age, a day in Sims 2 time is fairly close to a year in real time). You can lock one specific goal if it's one you want to focus on and don't want to reset (for example, I lock "Fall in love" or "WooHoo" (the Sims 2 way of saying "have sex") as you can't usually accomplish them in a day and they are goals you don't want to be replaced by "Learn to cook toaster strudels" the next day). You also have 3 randomly selected fears as well, which will cause your reward points to go down if they are fulfilled. Usually social fears are more likely to pop up if there is an accompanying goal; ie you can flirt with Alice anytime, but if it's one of your goals that day you are MUCH more likely to have "Be rejected for a flirt with Alice" as one of your fears.

Would such a system for XP gain work in the World's Most Popular Role-Playing System? I think it sounds like a great system.

 

[Odhanan]

Nope. Didn't happen back then to me. As I recall, advancement could get very quick. We were young, however!

Same thing as Merrik. Playing by the rules, I don't remember campaigns where characters would take twenty sessions to level up. Five/six instead of the three/four of 7 hours by RAW now, maybe. But "forever"? Certainly not.

 

[Doc_Klueless]

Back in '81 when I started playing, we'd hand out gold and xp like water and shoooooooot up through the levels.

The rate of character advancement has actually slowed down some from the rate back then.

Personally, I like to follow the book fairly closely when it comes to handing out experience. It's just, now, I use a different book: Last time I ran a game I used the Level-Independent XP from UA because it felt more old-school D&D to me.

 

[Bryan898]

I'd say my players level every 1-2 sessions. A session is generally 10 hours or more, once every two weeks. This yields about 1.5 levels a month, which we're completely happy with. I don't think some of my players could play the same character much more than a year and a half, and I certainly like to change my campaigns after about that long. I've had two campaigns go epic since 2000, one to the 23 area before a TPK against a major reoccuring villian, the other went to level 28 before the campaign came to an end.

The sessions aren't combat heavy, its been 3-5 combats per session, however they are usually higher EL. My players like somewhat powerful characters, borderline munchkin power, and therefore can take on higher CRs. A "boss" fight usually is 4-6 CR higher than the average party level.

We played a lower power game a few times, and it's pretty amazing how much slower the levels come when your combats are at an EL around the average party level.