Why I dislike Milestone XP

[Gradine]

I think there's plenty of good reasons to criticize XP, but c'mon man, doing so on the basis of not wanting to do simple math or just opening up the calculator app on one's phone to do a little elementary-level multiplication, addition, and division is just a little hard to swallow. Are other methods easier? Sure. Is D&D's method hard? No. I don't mean to pick on you specifically either. Similar comments have been made before.

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I think that you and I have very different definitions of the word "simple", my friend.

And, here's the thing, it's not that I'm math-allergic by any means. I do fairly complex statistical analysis at my day job. I do not want to spend what little free time I have doing work. If your game math requires me to consult multiple freaking tables, for every encounter I build, that is work to me, not fun.

I don't doubt that some people do find that work fun or enjoyable, and once again more power to them.

And I'm not saying that I think D&D should have simpler XP math either; I don't need D&D's default XP system to conform to my expectations because even if it were simpler, it still incentivizes the wrong kind of gameplay for me.

For milestone XP, the rules give guidelines on how much to give for achieving specific goals. A major milestone is like a hard encounter. A minor milestone is like an easy encounter. I wouldn't say it's arbitrary, especially since milestones are tied to certain events or challenges in the adventure design. There's a purpose to it - to incentivize the players to engage with the prepared content.

Okay, well in that case let me consult those DMG tables for just a sec...



Sorry, my eyes just glazed over from boredom. I think I'll pass on that.

And I've seen plenty of players in my day who need to be encouraged to accept quests. I call them "defective adventurers." It's a player problem mostly, but it's a human universal in my view that if you want people to do a thing, recognize it when they do it so that they will do it again in the future. (This works for more than just accepting quests in D&D. Try it.) XP does exactly that, for whatever you set the XP to reward. Even people who are going to do it anyway (like me) will appreciate it in my experience.

I neither need nor want game mechanics designed specifically to deal with problem players, because I already have a mechanic to deal with problem players, and it's called the door.

And I recognize that neither me nor my players quite align to either of the classical, more "mercenary" and/or "sandbox" styles of D&D play, where this kind of XP system makes much more sense; we're definitely more narrative-heavy players. I don't need to incentivize them to do the content I've prepared; they've already signed up for that. Buy-in is not something I am ever really concerned about.

What I want to incentivize is great play, in the moment, and D&D's XP system doesn't really allow for that kind of ad-hoc reward structure (see also: tables). I'm sure there's a way to hack it to be able to do that, structurally (rather than arbitrarily) and simply, but I'm not invested enough to put that work in, because great play is not something I really have to worry about too much from my players either.

 

[Swarmkeeper]

An argument for granting XP (or partial levels, if that's your thing) for those that show up: you are running a West Marches style campaign with a bunch of players. Whoever can make it that particular game night plays.

As you may or may not know, in a West Marches campaign, there is an overarching theme of exploration and most adventures are succinct, one-session jaunts that end up back in the town/village that is the base. That makes it easy to "plug and play" any combination of characters.

For example, say you have a dozen players. Only 5 can make it this week for game night. Only those 5 characters that are being played get the XP for that session (assuming they survive!) It is not a punishment for the other 7 players or their characters. It's just the reality of the style of play. In fact, players can have multiple characters and choose which one goes on the adventure on any given session. The PC they "leave behind" is not being punished, it just isn't part of the adventure that day and so does not earn that session's XP. This style of play can be augmented by leaning on the downtime rules quite a bit - those PCs who aren't on the adventure that session could certainly still be doing some interesting things that benefit the character. Heck, the DM could even choose to give out some XP for that PC completing a downtime activity.

 

[Bradley Hindman]

I think it's a little much to say it's a "punishment" not to get XP for a game in which you didn't play. It is reasonable in my view to say that because of the plot-based game you choose to run, you use story-based advancement and you prefer to keep all the characters the same level for some reason and thus, if you don't show up to a session, your character levels up anyway. That's a good tool to use in a plot-based game. But other games are not structured that way. In a sandbox game, for example, there is no plot in the same sense and thus another advancement tool simply works better than the story-based advancement you use.

True. "Punishment" was probably poor word choice. In any event, we agree. The advancement system should match the tastes of the group and the nature of the campaign.

 

[iserith]

<looks at this post>
<looks at DMG's encounter building tables>
<looks back at this post>
<looks back at DMG>

I think that you and I have very different definitions of the word "simple", my friend.

And, here's the thing, it's not that I'm math-allergic by any means. I do fairly complex statistical analysis at my day job. I do not want to spend what little free time I have doing work. If your game math requires me to consult multiple freaking tables, for every encounter I build, that is work to me, not fun.

I don't doubt that some people do find that work fun or enjoyable, and once again more power to them.

And I'm not saying that I think D&D should have simpler XP math either; I don't need D&D's default XP system to conform to my expectations because even if it were simpler, it still incentivizes the wrong kind of gameplay for me.

Okay, well in that case let me consult those DMG tables for just a sec...

Sorry, my eyes just glazed over from boredom. I think I'll pass on that.

Here's a useful tool for you: Kobold Fight Club. Now you don't need to crack the DMG for encounter design.

But chiefly, my response was aimed at what I perceived as your objection to not using standard XP because of not wanting to do math at the table to give the players the XP they earned. It now seems you're referring to encounter design which is a separate issue and, in my view, not relevant to this discussion.

I neither need nor want game mechanics designed specifically to deal with problem players, because I already have a mechanic to deal with problem players, and it's called the door.

And I recognize that neither me nor my players quite align to either of the classical, more "mercenary" and/or "sandbox" styles of D&D play, where this kind of XP system makes much more sense; we're definitely more narrative-heavy players. I don't need to incentivize them to do the content I've prepared; they've already signed up for that. Buy-in is not something I am ever really concerned about.

What I want to incentivize is great play, in the moment, and D&D's XP system doesn't really allow for that kind of ad-hoc reward structure (see also: tables). I'm sure there's a way to hack it to be able to do that, structurally (rather than arbitrarily) and simply, but I'm not invested enough to put that work in, because great play is not something I really have to worry about too much from my players either.

First, XP is not "designed specifically to deal with problem players." It is designed to incentivize particular behavior via rewarding it. You asserted essentially that players don't need encouragement to accept quests. You didn't say your players. My counter was that some players do need encouragement and XP is a good tool for that in addition to dealing with problem players by other means.

There are many ways to handle character advancement in D&D. I side with no particular way because I change the way I do it based on the type of game I'm running and for which players are playing. Others it seems, runs one game, one way most or all of the time, probably for the same players, and I would hope they recognize that others don't do that and that standard XP, milestone XP, story-based, or session-based advancement are all different tools to support different play experiences.

 

[iserith]

An argument for granting XP (or partial levels, if that's your thing) for those that show up: you are running a West Marches style campaign with a bunch of players. Whoever can make it that particular game night plays.

As you may or may not know, in a West Marches campaign, there is an overarching theme of exploration and most adventures are succinct, one-session jaunts that end up back in the town/village that is the base. That makes it easy to "plug and play" any combination of characters.

For example, say you have a dozen players. Only 5 can make it this week for game night. Only those 5 characters that are being played get the XP for that session (assuming they survive!) It is not a punishment for the other 7 players or their characters. It's just the reality of the style of play. In fact, players can have multiple characters and choose which one goes on the adventure on any given session. The PC they "leave behind" is not being punished, it just isn't part of the adventure that day and so does not earn that session's XP. This style of play can be augmented by leaning on the downtime rules quite a bit - those PCs who aren't on the adventure that session could certainly still be doing some interesting things that benefit the character. Heck, the DM could even choose to give out some XP for that PC completing a downtime activity.

Yep, that's how I run my current campaign (not the downtime bit though). The upside to this play is that if I can DM, there's a game since I can always get at least 4 players out of 12 to play. Which is GREAT for me.

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

Not all campaigns are free roaming do-whatever-you-want sandboxes.

Who said they were?

 

[Caliban]

I've played in 2 games where the DM has used Milestone xp, or rather milestone levelling, as xp has not existed as we know it.

At the end of a 'chapter' of the game the DM has simply said - 'you have all gained a level'. There's no differentiation between characters that have been present for all the sessions of the chapter and those that have maybe only been in the party for 1 or 2 sessions.

It is lazy, it is forced, it's a clumsy way of keeping everyone at the same level.

It just doesn't 'feel' remotely right to me.

Thank you for posting this. Sometimes I forget how lucky I am to have players who aren't continually trying to compete with or one-up the other players. (Their characters do stuff like this all the time, but the players don't - an important difference.)

Then I read things like this and I really appreciate the fact that my players don't act like judgmental, spoiled children.

 

[BookBarbarian]

I think there's plenty of good reasons to criticize XP, but c'mon man, doing so on the basis of not wanting to do simple math or just opening up the calculator app on one's phone to do a little elementary-level multiplication, addition, and division is just a little hard to swallow. Are other methods easier? Sure. Is D&D's method hard? No. I don't mean to pick on you specifically either. Similar comments have been made before.

I've made those comments before and I'm here to make them again.

Once I saw the chart that should how much XP is expected over a typical adventuring day per level I immediately decided to abandon XP and just have the PCs level up passed on how many adventuring days had passed. It was the difference between me doing a little bit of Math once or a little bit of math over and over and over again. That seemed a simple choice to me.

It wasn't a matter of how hard it was as much as how much value XP was bringing to my game. To me the answer was not enough to justify doing that stupid simple math as often as is necessary to make it work.

As a bonus I no longer worry about making my encounters all that balanced. Some might be too easy, some too hard, but it will probably average out. Also some days might have too few encounters and some too many, but I don't have to sweat that either. It will probably average out too.

And while I think there are good reasons to use XP, as has been outlined by the AngryGM, I find that Inspiration does a good enough job of giving that type of reward for my game.

And speaking as one lazy SOB. I'll take good enough with minimal effort over better with more effort almost every time.

 

[5ekyu]

Why would you ever want to do that? And why would it ever be 'great'?

Being unable to play as often as you'd like, due to real life, is enough of a bummer. But then the group also punishes you for having a real-life obligation, by denying you exp? Having your character get more and more behind on other characters, is not going to make those real-life obligations magically go away.

I do not know why someone would want to punish foljs for not showing up by hitting their asvancenent but some really seem to be into it.

The basic xp system does it... Miss a session lose out on xp... and there are plenty of post already in this thread about that abd others.

To me if my players dont want to show, they shouldnt.
If my players want to show and cant, no need to whanmy them.
If a players attendance is a problem, i will deal with it ftf, personal, not by smacking their ability to play when they can make it.

As for great... I did not say it was grwat to do this... Just that if it was your goal, that is a great way to achieve it.

I tend to see weakening a character as a punishment for the group, so i am hurting everyone not just the target.

But then, to me, the only penalty for not showing up i see as mattering is you missing out on the fun.

 

[5ekyu]

Huh, I would not have called that milestones then, I would describe it as free-form level advancement. I'm not particularly opposed to that either, and I guess I can see how they are related, if you just call each chapter one big milestone. But whenever I've used milestones they've come in smaller amounts with more per level. To me the point is to reward progress toward your goal (whatever goal you have decided on), not just reaching the goal. And not just mechanical activities like fighting or finding treasure.

At least some 5e products refer to end of chapter leveling as milestone. Iirc one was literally "at the end of each chapter except r gain a level."

So the term is used by 5e a couple ways depending on product.