D&D 5E DM's: what do you do with players who miss time?

Maxperson said:

Even if they were on a time sensitive mission to save the princess, town, country, world or whatever?

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Most likely, yes. With an incomplete party, they would probably not be able to defeat the big bad.

Imaculata said:

All good questions, but I think a better question is, what does it matter? What if the character is brought back to life after 3 adventures, and receives the same level as the rest of the party? You say it doesn't make sense, but isn't the mechanical effect on the game more important?

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Absolutely not. The mechanical effect on the way the game plays out is secondary to the in-game logic.

the Jester said:

Absolutely not. The mechanical effect on the way the game plays out is secondary to the in-game logic.

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So does this mean that you'd rather have a player be several levels behind the rest of the party, but it making sense, than have them all be the same level and it not making sense?

Frankly, I obviously lean towards the latter. "Levels" to me are simply an indication of the power curve of a character. Ideally, the players are all of a similar or equal level, or else the game becomes unbalanced. Their adventures are just an excuse to explain why they are gaining in power, but as a game master I don't really need any excuse for it. My players like to feel like their character is slowly getting stronger, and learning new abilities. Why this happens, is secondary to the game mechanic to me. All that matters, is that it happens, and that the players feel like there is progression. Because this means they can do new things, and fight stronger foes. It also means for me as a DM, that I can raise the difficulty of the challenge, and introduce stronger adversaries. This is the goal of character levels to me.

Some DM's prefer to simply hand out a new level at the end of an adventure, which also totally works for me. The goal is progression, but game balance is equally important. I do not want any of my players to be stronger than another.

Take a berzerker for example. They rely a lot on having lots of hit points, and outlasting their foes. So any new character level is important to them, because it gets them better saves and a large pool of hit points. But they are also front liners, which means that they are probably more likely to go down first in a tough fight. They take the most damage after all, and are right in the middle of things. If they are one level behind on the rest of the party, or two levels behind, that is a pretty big deal. The average level of the party could be two levels higher than their own, and so the monsters they'll face will be of a much higher challenge rating than they are prepared for in terms of hit points and saves. This is also why a level drain is such a big deal, especially on fighter classes. It means a big drop in hit points. I wouldn't want that as a DM. Which begs the question why you would want individual experience levels to be different in the first place. From a mechanical point of view, it seems entirely inefficient and counter productive to me.

I don't really care about game balance. What I do care about is rewarding the things I want to see players choose to do (combat, exploration, social interaction, character development) in a way that encourages them to all contribute and work together to succeed and advance (a party XP pool to which everyone individually contributes).

A player's absenteeism or lack of good faith participation is not, in my view, a problem that can be resolved through the XP mechanic.

I agree, Iserith. I don't think a player deserves to be punished to begin with, for not being able to attend a session. It is a harsh reality of our busy lives, that sometimes we cannot meet an appointment. Most players do not choose to be late for a D&D session. It just happens.

Now some players have a habit of not meeting appointments to begin with. Not just in D&D, but any appointments. Holding out on exp is not going to change neither the former, nor the latter behavior. It is just something they do. And if you can't come to some sort of an agreement with them that they will show up on time, you are unlikely to change that behavior through in-game means.

So either kick them from the group, or deal with the fact that they will usually be late. But talking with them first, is probably the one and only solution.

I'm not sure I see it as a punishment though and it's certain that others in this thread do not. I definitely don't think it serves the goal of encouraging players to show up to play, however.

In the end, it comes down to what goal a particular reward mechanic serves and whether it serves that goal well. In my approach, for example, whether you do something on your own or with the group, you're contributing to the party's XP. Therefore, I don't particularly encourage or discourage solo, split party, or whole party play - whatever makes the most sense in the emergent story is what the players choose. In the case of a table that uses "individual XP," I imagine that this encourages solo play quite a bit since you don't have to divide up the XP with other players. I wouldn't want to encourage that particular kind of play more than others, personally.

Lanefan said:

Which, in effect, means the PC gets experience while it is dead;

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I think that sentence is at the heart of this discussion.

In my games, a player controlling an NPC gets XP because XP is something a player gets, not something a character gets. XP is a reward for overcoming challenges; a reward which the player can then use as currency to make their character better.

Greenstone.Walker said:

I think that sentence is at the heart of this discussion.

In my games, a player controlling an NPC gets XP because XP is something a player gets, not something a character gets. XP is a reward for overcoming challenges; a reward which the player can then use as currency to make their character better.

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And for other people, XPs are something PCs get to reflect the things they do. Players get to have fun at the table, PCs get XPs. And that's why if a player has more than one PC at the table, they each get XPs instead of the player just getting the same share as all of the other players (who may or may not have multiple PCs). And that's why XPs aren't transferable between PCs.

Imaculata said:

All good questions, but I think a better question is, what does it matter? What if the character is brought back to life after 3 adventures, and receives the same level as the rest of the party? You say it doesn't make sense, but isn't the mechanical effect on the game more important?

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As [MENTION=1210]the Jester[/MENTION] already pointed out, in-game consistency and logic is not only more important than the mechanical effect, it should be what drives the mechanical effect.

How else would that character be able to work in the party, if all the players are of a much higher level? You'd have to bring that character up to the same level as the rest of the party anyway, or he/she would be a dead weight.

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A valid point in cases where your average party level is going up by two or three per adventure, as in most as-written APs. That said, 5e at least seems to be more forgiving in such things than the last couple of editions; and if you're playing a campaign where an average adventure isn't guaranteed to get the party level average up by even one (which is by far my preference) it becomes even less of an issue.

Greenstone.Walker said:

I think that sentence is at the heart of this discussion.

In my games, a player controlling an NPC gets XP because XP is something a player gets, not something a character gets. XP is a reward for overcoming challenges; a reward which the player can then use as currency to make their character better.

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I could not disagree more.

Players don't get xp. I'm not 34th level, which I'd be as a player if I'd been advancing at just one level per year of doing this; nor am I a 31st level DM if the same (il)logic applies to DMs. (as a side note, this is also why I shudder when I hear about DMs giving xp for bringing snacks to the game and suchlike)

Xp are purely a character reward for things a character does in the game, whether a player is involved or not.

On a broader note, I wonder if some of the disconnect here is tied to whether or not PCs (as opposed to NPCs or the rest of the game world) are special snowflakes in some campaigns but not in others. To me, an adventuring PC is exactly the same as an adventuring NPC, only it has a player attached to it and because of that we see a lot more of what it does in its career. Adventuring NPCs get xp and levels and death and rewards just like adventuring PCs do because the internal logic of the game world cannot (and absolutely should not be able to) tell them apart. I just don't bother running all the numbers for any of 'em until I need to dream up an adventuring NPC right now; I can fill in the back-details later if needed.

Lan-"34th-player/31st-DM multiclass, eh? I sure don't feel any stronger for it...or smarter...or wiser...or..."-efan

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