Should Roleplay Determine Character Advancement?

[Argyle King]

Sould rp be the only thing someone advances from? No, not the only thing, but I do enjoy games in which character points are awarded for roleplay or in which new advantages are gained from an in game event.

Let's say my character helps rescue the local merchants daughter. The GM then determines that I gain the Contact advantage and now have the merchant as a reliable contact from who I can buy goods at a discount or who may have local gossip from time to time to help me out.

Getting back to points... I think being rewarded should be a combination of good play as well as good roleplay. Good play would consist of the normal things we think of when gaming and advancing through missions and objects of the game. Roleplay would consist of playing the character; I think playing in a manner which is consistant with your established character should come with rewards as well.

Example

I remember one campaign in which a fellow player's motivation for his character was to rescue the wife of his character. It's was his character's sole reason for being involved with the rest of the party. The party ventures to the area where his wife is being held. We had arrived with just enough time to save her from being sacrificed along with some other people from a local village.

The party engages the enemy... all except for the guy who was 'trying to save his wife.' Instead, he runs into a nearby building and proceeds to loot the gathered belongings of the people who had been captured. After the battle; his wife now dead due very largely in part because he ignored the opportunity to save her, he complains to the GM that there wasn't enough treasure among the miscellaneous belongings of the people who had been sacrificed.

In character, one of the other characters mentions being sorry that we couldn't save his family. The response? "...we need to go somewhere else with better treasure."



Don't get me wrong, I have a pretty good sense of humor, so I would have laughed and could have understood if he were playing some sort of satirical character who didn't really care about his wife, and just wanted an excuse to adventure for loot. However, in this case, it was played straight and seriously. He needed to find his wife. Unfortunately for his wife, saving her life was ignored in favor of the possibility of getting to some loot before the rest of the party could.

I personally feel that it would have been better from a reward perspective (and considering what I would reward someone points for) had the party fought and had to retreat, but, in the process, managed to save the character's wife; running away and not killing the enemy, but succeeding in the fluff reason for going on the adventure.

 

[Michael Silverbane]

I've noticed a lot of folks warning that 'roleplaying is subjective', as a potential downfall of awarding xp solely (or mostly) based on roleplay. While this is true, I think it is something that can be overcome pretty easily.

One way to do so would be to give (allow the players to select) one or more personality traits by which to judge their roleplaying. If Player A chooses 'conciliatory' as one of his personality traits, and then makes a point of going along with what others choose, then he's fulfilled his roleplaying requirement, and the group can receive a commensurate xp reward.

Another way might be to ask the players themselves, "how well do you feel that you roleplayed during this session?" They are, after all, probably the best judge of whether they played their characters or not. Again, success in this regard should contribute to a group xp reward.

 

[onedtwelve]

One way to do so would be to give (allow the players to select) one or more personality traits by which to judge their roleplaying. If Player A chooses 'conciliatory' as one of his personality traits, and then makes a point of going along with what others choose, then he's fulfilled his roleplaying requirement, and the group can receive a commensurate xp reward.

This is exactly what I'm suggesting. Letting the players choose several character traits and judging them by how well they stuck to those traits and/or how many of those traits they managed to play out during the session.

Another way might be to ask the players themselves, "how well do you feel that you roleplayed during this session?" They are, after all, probably the best judge of whether they played their characters or not. Again, success in this regard should contribute to a group xp reward.

I also like this idea, or at least the idea of it I wonder how it would play out, though.

I also want to make it clear that what I'm suggesting would not involve XP in any way - not based off of kills or roleplay. I would simply be letting a character straight up level up based on his/her roleplaying (the system I use is very simple, so there isn't too much to character advancement).

What I'm hearing here, though, is that even with traits or whatever, roleplaying is a poor way to judge people; I should instead have the characters level after a certain number of sessions. Do you think it would be more appropriate to have them advance after completing an adventure instead of having a meta "number of sessions?"

The real answer to your query is that it depends on what focus I want play to have. For D&D I play 4E with standard xp mechanics, because I use D&D when looking for a 'gamist', 'challenge based' game and the xp model there fits such play well. If I want a more exploration-based, or 'simulationist' focussed game I will pick a system that does not have "experience points" in the sense they are usually thought of.

In response to this, I want to make it clear that I'm trying to encourage the players to make a well-rounded character. Instead of "the ranger" I want "Elwood the ranger, out on a mission to kill the goblins encroaching on his family's land." (poor example, but I hope you get my meaning). I want them to have fully fleshed out personalities so that it would be easier to get into character and really understand how the character would react in certain situations. By "roleplay" I mean staying in character in a rich setting with lots of in-party interactions and lots of problem solving as opposed to the traditional kill monster, solve puzzle, unlock door dungeon delve. That's why I thought about character traits as a measure. I think I will keep them, but am not so certain that they would be a good measure for character advancement now.

I'm still uncertain as to my best option, though. As of now I'm leaning more toward having them advance based on completion of an adventure as defined by me. So if they rescue the princess they advance, but if they do not, they do not advance, and if they neglect to recover her jewels that would all just be in the fluff. What do you think?

 

[MinistryOfGame]

I actually created a game where you only get XP for roleplay. It's a very simple superheroes game, and I designed (read: ripped off the mechanics of another game) it for people who want to roleplay. The game basically awarded XP (measured in lollies) immediately upon some action I, the DM, considered worthy. Those lollies could be spent to fuel your superpowers, or you could save them up (lots of them) and spend them on stats. There was definitely a correlation between how tasty the XP candy was and how much was spent immediately. Run it several times, always been fun. One of my most hilarious roleplaying anecdotes arose from that game.

In the 2E D&D game I am invariably running (seems I'm always running one) I also award my players and their characters individually for roleplaying, among other things (they of course get xp for killing stuff, using their skills, and completing quests too). Yes, it's my decision what good roleplaying is - it's also my decision whether it rains, how sharp a sword is, how smart 18 intelligence is, and what gods do. If the gaming group is really good, I get to choose what's for dinner.

How do I judge what XP my players get? The short answer is: Fairly.

A longer answer is that I give XP for doing things in character, for doing things that help the plot or story keep moving forward, for doing things that are ingenious, for bringing my favourite type of snack, for getting better at the game, for helping others - pretty much whatever I want. Someone got 50xp for pulling two plastic cups apart a few weeks ago. I judge the players individually, and I award them on individual merit - so I don't hold them to any gold-standard of RP, I judge them based on their own previous play. I list those individual XP awards on our game's website every week, and the players are always super-keen to see them.

It's no more or less arbitrary than saying "I don't use XP. Okay, you all get a level now" except that I get to encourage my players in positive ways by attaching little numbers that are meaningful to them, but more or less meaningless to me. All this post-modern relativistic "RP is subjective" stuff is all well and good for the metagame, but at my table, I'm still the DM last I checked.

 

[Dice4Hire]

When I count xp, roleplaying and furthering the game gives bonuses, but I try not to have those bonuses much more than 15-20% of the xp earned.

More than that and the group starts to get unbalanced.

I also worry about players abilities having too strong an impact on the xp. I mean, this is a role-playing game, not a test of the players, so yes, I do not have roleplaying equal leveling very much.

 

[Rhun]

While I think giving bonus experience for good roleplaying can be a great incentive for players, I don't think it would work well as the sole criteria for determining character advancement. The obvious reason against is that depending on your players, you could end up with characters of varying power levels...and that can lead to problems in properly setting encounter difficulty.

 

[Haltherrion]

Not for me. For one thing roleplaying is very subjective. Even with the best of intentions on the part of both players and ref, I've found any but small RP rewards get too easy to game. You get people roleplaying for the sake of power (because levels are power) and not for the sake of roleplaying.

But ignoring that aspect for a moment, why is RP advancement a better means of advancing characters? As a mechanic, it seems to be very weakly coupled to the things that level advancement gets you (mostly more combat ability in most game systems). It feels like declaring someone an uber cyclist because he can type quickly.

 

[MinistryOfGame]

But ignoring that aspect for a moment, why is RP advancement a better means of advancing characters? As a mechanic, it seems to be very weakly coupled to the things that level advancement gets you (mostly more combat ability in most game systems). It feels like declaring someone an uber cyclist because he can type quickly.

As opposed to giving XP to a character who doesn't fight in combats for the stuff the party kills?

 

[steenan]

For me, it strongly depends on what kind of game it is. RPGs have different focuses, so they reward different things. What one has to care about is having the reward system fit what the game as a whole aims for - otherwise the dissonance will result in frustrated players, rule abuses or both.

Anyway, I'd rather not use "roleplaying" as measure of advancement. It's not that I oppose mechanical rewards for how the characters are roleplayed; I see no problem with that. The problematic part is that the criteria are very nebular. You may still reward roleplaying with much better defined method, just by dividing "roleplaying" into several aspects, like:
- presenting consistent character personality
- pursuing and achieving character goals
- relating to character's background, creating ties with NPCs and events in the game world
- acting out the character in a way other players enjoy
- being nice to other players during inter-character conflicts

With such list, players know what is expected from them and what is important in the game, instead of trying to guess what the GM wants.

 

[Balesir]

This is exactly what I'm suggesting. Letting the players choose several character traits and judging them by how well they stuck to those traits and/or how many of those traits they managed to play out during the session.

[snippage]

In response to this, I want to make it clear that I'm trying to encourage the players to make a well-rounded character. Instead of "the ranger" I want "Elwood the ranger, out on a mission to kill the goblins encroaching on his family's land." (poor example, but I hope you get my meaning). I want them to have fully fleshed out personalities so that it would be easier to get into character and really understand how the character would react in certain situations. By "roleplay" I mean staying in character in a rich setting with lots of in-party interactions and lots of problem solving as opposed to the traditional kill monster, solve puzzle, unlock door dungeon delve. That's why I thought about character traits as a measure. I think I will keep them, but am not so certain that they would be a good measure for character advancement now.

I'm still uncertain as to my best option, though. As of now I'm leaning more toward having them advance based on completion of an adventure as defined by me. So if they rescue the princess they advance, but if they do not, they do not advance, and if they neglect to recover her jewels that would all just be in the fluff. What do you think?

This post reinforces what I was thinking earlier - if you haven't seen or tried the game "Pendragon" you should beg, steal, borrow or do whatever it takes to get a good look at that game. Even if you don't use it as-is, it has a ton of ideas and is a whole system built to enable just this sort of play, albeit in one specific milieu (Arthurian Legendary Britain).