D&D 5E 5e XP Chart Progression Question

[Darrius_Adler]

Ok, so I am not normally heavy into picking apart the math of a system but I was working on an xp breakdown and discovered something really odd. It looks like it is actually easier to go up in levels past level 11. That feels a little off to me.

Kinda posting this up here so someone can double check my math and make sure I am not way off. The difference in number of encounters to level between going from level 10 to 11 and from 11 to 12 seems a little nuts. Why the sudden downward dip in the xp required to level? I am basing the number of encounters off the xp awards for the medium column on the Basic DMG PDF.

Level	XP needed to advance to the next level	Number of encounters at Medium difficulty to advance
1st	300	6
2nd	600	6
3rd	1,800	12
4th	3,800	15.2
5th	7,500	15
6th	9,000	15
7th	11,000	14.6
8th	14,000	15.5
9th	16,000	14.5
10th	21,000	17.5
11th	15,000	9.3
12th	20,000	10
13th	20,000	9.09
14th	25,000	10
15th	30,000	10.7
16th	30,000	9.3
17th	40,000	10.2
18th	40,000	9.5
19th	50,000	10.2
20th	N/A	N/A

 

[Iosue]

Ok, so I am not normally heavy into picking apart the math of a system but I was working on an xp breakdown and discovered something really odd. It looks like it is actually easier to go up in levels past level 11. That feels a little off to me.

Kinda posting this up here so someone can double check my math and make sure I am not way off. The difference in number of encounters to level between going from level 10 to 11 and from 11 to 12 seems a little nuts. Why the sudden downward dip in the xp required to level? I am basing the number of encounters off the xp awards for the medium column on the Basic DMG PDF.

That is the intended curve. Basically, they want the majority of playing time in the sweet spot of 3rd to 10th levels. They've found that this is where the majority of people play. If Levels 11-20 take as long as 1-10, or even longer, people burn out and campaigns falter. The idea is a quick ramp to 3rd level, a long time spent from 3rd to 10th as the meat of the game, and then relatively rapid advancement through levels 11-20 so people can play and enjoy those levels without burning out.

 

[Thank Dog]

Interesting. Can't really say anything else other than that, to be honest. I'm not sure yet whether or not this is a good or a bad thing. I think it's probably not very traditional but I'm not one for sticking to tradition merely for the sake of tradition. I really need to see how it plays out at the table before making an educated comment.

 

[Darrius_Adler]

Ok, well at least I am seeing what is intended. That isn't really going to work for my purposes so I will have to adjust the base xp chart and that easy to do, it just ends up making the xp required for levels to not be a nice even number.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Ok, well at least I am seeing what is intended. That isn't really going to work for my purposes so I will have to adjust the base xp chart and that easy to do, it just ends up making the xp required for levels to not be a nice even number.

I wonder what you have in mind... i too have been tinkering with starting at 3rd level but at 0xp thenaround level 7 or 8 up the xp cost and go back to a more 3e style chart from there

 

[was]

Yeah, I am not particularly happy with the XP chart. Hopefully we will see variants in the DMG.

 

[Darrius_Adler]

I wonder what you have in mind... i too have been tinkering with starting at 3rd level but at 0xp thenaround level 7 or 8 up the xp cost and go back to a more 3e style chart from there

The reason this will not work for me is I am working with a group of DMs on a chat game. A persistent setting available to be played in with or without DMs present. The team of DMs working together to run stuff for people who are on when they have time. With this sort of setup the game there is no set end point.

XP rewards are handled in a controlled manner limiting what can be earned on any one adventure so that people do not hit the end of the xp chart too fast. Also generally you want lower level players to have the chance to catch up at least somewhat to the higher level ones.

The standard xp progression for 5e just won't work for that.

 

[aramis erak]

One thing: the XP earned isn't the same as the "ranking XP"...

the XP earned will usually be half the "ranking" XP... Because the XP earned are just the critters, while that for ranking them is multiplied by 2 for 3-8 of them... so you're off by (typically) a factor of two.

 

[Xorne]

I just use "milestone experience" myself. At the end of an adventure (or episode of a campaign) the characters just level.

 

[KarinsDad]

Ok, so I am not normally heavy into picking apart the math of a system but I was working on an xp breakdown and discovered something really odd. It looks like it is actually easier to go up in levels past level 11. That feels a little off to me.

Kinda posting this up here so someone can double check my math and make sure I am not way off. The difference in number of encounters to level between going from level 10 to 11 and from 11 to 12 seems a little nuts. Why the sudden downward dip in the xp required to level? I am basing the number of encounters off the xp awards for the medium column on the Basic DMG PDF.

Nope. Your math is basically correct.

I did an Excel spreadsheet for this same thing and came to the same conclusion that Iosue did. Players are meant to spend a long time at levels 3 to 10, the intended sweat spot.

5E did not really take away things like Meteor Swarm, etc. High level play has mostly the same issues that it always has, just watered down some (especially via the Concentration rules). The way to avoid high level play problems from the customer base is to intrinsically have the customer base play in the sweat spot of balanced play.