Experience Points? Who Needs 'Em? My 4E Eberron Campaign

[Almacov]

I have literally never played in or run a game where experience points were tracked.

This may have something to do with my cousin, who introduced me, not tracking them when we played, and the fact that I introduced nearly all the other DMs I've played with to the game.

Laziness prevails? Eh. It's just a hassle we've never found worth dealing with.

 

[FireLance]

Somewhere in the middle of 3.5e, my gaming group stopped tracking experience and just used a "level up once per adventure" convention.

We also stopped giving out treasure and tied equipment gain to levelling up, but that's a topic for another thread.

 

[Sammael]

I still give out XP, but I tried to simplify the whole thing quite a bit. Players get 1-3 XP per encounter (depending on difficulty), 1-3 XP per session for participation, 1-3 XP per quest, and 1 XP for each new experience (i.e. entering the Underdark for the first time, flying for the first time, encountering a particularly nasty monster for the first time). It takes 20 XP to get to level 2, 45 for level 3, 75 for level 4, etc. Since higher-level characters can generally do more than lower-level ones, they get to have more encounters per day, so the progression rate remains approximately the same as during lower levels (four 4-hour sessions per level).

 

[S'mon]

I really like the "Achievement tick" plan. I think it's a great idea and might not be too quick in the end, depending on what you consider an achievement, of course.

Yes, I think I'd typically give out 3-4 ticks per session, but anything from ca 2-6 would be possible (0 if they do nothing, of course).

That would be for more linear adventure path type play. Currently though I have a system I like a lot where new PCs start at lower level, but PCs below the level of the highest level PCs gain x2 XP until they reach that level. It rewards survival & attendance, but does not result in a permanent level deficit.

 

[ScottS]

I wanted to try the 4e experience budget system when I started a paragon retro campaign, and in general it works about as well as the 3e system from an encounter planning perspective (i.e. it levels you in about 10 fights / 12 hours, although the fights suffer from the typical 4e pathology of being boring, not particularly challenging, etc.). For that reason alone I think it has a place in the rules. I'm also sufficiently old-school that I like the "attendance grade" aspect (i.e. I make no special effort to keep people at the same level if they miss sessions etc.), and I'd also suspect that for some people "the progression's the thing" (that the tactile tracking of experience points is a compelling part of the experience <.< ). On the other hand, playing without XP is also OK if it doesn't involve the DM giving out levels "when he thinks it's the right time" (leading to unseemly player whining, begging, etc. at the table).

 

[Starfox]

XP is a relic. We quit using it with Eberron too coincidentally.

Maybe the stories told in Eberron are such that the old xp metrics no longer apply?

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I wanted to try the 4e experience budget system when I started a paragon retro campaign, and in general it works about as well as the 3e system from an encounter planning perspective (i.e. it levels you in about 10 fights / 12 hours, although the fights suffer from the typical 4e pathology of being boring, not particularly challenging, etc.). For that reason alone I think it has a place in the rules. I'm also sufficiently old-school that I like the "attendance grade" aspect (i.e. I make no special effort to keep people at the same level if they miss sessions etc.), and I'd also suspect that for some people "the progression's the thing" (that the tactile tracking of experience points is a compelling part of the experience <.< ). On the other hand, playing without XP is also OK if it doesn't involve the DM giving out levels "when he thinks it's the right time" (leading to unseemly player whining, begging, etc. at the table).

In my online campaign, i still use the XP values for determining the encounter budget and stuff like that, but I simply tell the players now when to level. In the end, I adjusted the XP they got anyway. Each session is only 2 hours long, and the "normal" advancement seems simply to be too slow for my taste then. Especially since I really don't want to use the combat/plot ratio from the typical WotC adventures.

 

[Nebulous]

yeah, i quit using XP in 3rd edition, and don't use them now in 4e. Players level up every 4-5 sessions of 3-4 hours each. To me it is just a bunch of fiddly math that is pretty pointless to track because the end result is about the same. I don't even mess with XP for encounter design, i have a rough idea of how tough i want a fight to be without having to calulate numbers. But i didn't mess with encounter level either in 3e, i always just eyeballed it.

 

[vagabundo]

I like giving out XP, I dont know why, but I do. I need to up XP to speed advancement. Or give some extra, quest related, rewards. So maybe a Major Quest reward for clearing out the Duergar Fortress.

 

[wedgeski]

I don't think I could ever give up on XP entirely, but I have simplified matters by unifying the advancement rate for all characters, so everyone is always on the same XP total, but that total is derived from the standard 4E rewards.

If I want to tailor the levelling speed (which I have been doing recently), I simply award a fixed amount per session on top of whatever is earned in the normal course of play. They call this the "turning up bonus".