Are xp/levels/advancement necessary?

[RFisher]

For a 2 hour game then yes. For a multiple month campaign .... then why didn't he kill his nemesis in the first 2 hours?

So, your comparing a young boy wronged by a grown man; the boy dedicating his entire life to studying swordplay (not adventuring); & then seeking, finding, & confronted his nemesis... you're comparing this to a few months in a D&D game?

Again: My point isn't that advancement should be removed. My point is merely that it isn't essential.

Luke would never advance past farm-boy into Jedi Knight without GM hand-waving. Luke DOES improve. he gains "magic", his ability with a lightsaber improves (his two hit), he gains skill improvement, and he becomes harder to kill. That is gaining levels per se in essence of his journey from SW -> ESB -> RotJ. (and remember, he spent mere MONTHS with Yoda learning the force and saber skills before running off to face Vader)

I don't see how that has any bearing on my point that, while advancement is one thing that is enjoyable in RPGs, it is by no means essential. If you did take away advancement, most of us would still have enough others reasons to continue playing.

Clearly, its not a perfect solution, but leveling does a dirty job of showing improvement. If you don't like that method, I may suggest a system that handles improvement differently (like StoryTeller or WEG's d6 system).

I disagree. I think levels are a perfect solution. They have trade-offs vs. other means, which are also perfectly fine. But if someone asks me, "Are xp/levels/advancement necessary?" then I respond: No! Not only are levels not necessary, alternative advancement schemes aren't necessary either! Fun, yes! Heck, yes! Necessary? From experience (ironically ^_^), no!

Now I have known the odd gamer for whom advancement was a big part of what made the game fun for him. You know what? He managed to get quite a bit of enjoyment out of the games without advancement as well.

 

[buzz]

...unrealistic...

This is your problem right here.

D&D has levels for the same reason pinball machines have points.

Yup. Buy that man a cookie!

D&D is not designed (primarily) to be a realistic simulation; it's designed to be an enjoyable game. If you feel stymied by the type of (mostly) non-sim fun D&D provides, I'd highly suggest taking the advice of people telling you to try GURPS and similar systems. I'd also look at HERO, Ars Magica, HarnMaster, Artesia, and The Riddle of Steel.

 

[buzz]

Often there is an expectation (spoken or not) that players are supposed to judge the difficulty of an encounter, and its their own fault if they bite off more than they can chew. With monsters its usually much easier; dragons are tough, kobolds are weak. But when a single NPC can be as weak as a kobold or as tough as a dragon with no outward clues, its much more dicey.

I'm not sure how to reconcile your desire for realism with the desire for players to be able to size up everyone they meet in terms of CR just by looking at them.

The players have an expectation that encounters (actual encounters, as opposed to just meeting people) will be somewhere around their CR/EL. Gaging and preparing for those encounters is part of the resource-management game of D&D.

Also, any NPCs will likely have the same level of magic items and buffing the PCs do, and possibly give off auras, so some detect spells may reveal their general level of power.

 

[(un)reason]

This has been a pet peeve of mine for many years; not that the skills don't deteriorate, but that I can't come up with a workable system to define *how* they deteriorate. Still processing...

Lanefan

One idea I've played around with is to allow characters to rejig their levels for a relatively small XP cost (small enough to make it tempting to do so when you need a new set of skills rather than go through the effort required to increase your overall power level), lowering one of their current classes by one and raising another in its place. This allows you to reflect the learning of new skills and deterioration of old ones without lowering their overall power level. It also allows you to reflect experienced but retired adventurers that have lost touch with their adventuring skills, because they have converted their levels into NPC ones like expert, aristocrat and (if you really want them to have experienced a power drop) Commoner, so as to pick up skills more appropriate to everyday life. And that way, while they might be weaker when the PC's encounter them initialy, they can still brush off the rust fairly quickly if called back to the adventuring life.

 

[buzz]

One idea I've played around with is to allow characters to rejig their levels for a relatively small XP cost (small enough to make it tempting to do so when you need a new set of skills rather than go through the effort required to increase your overall power level), lowering one of their current classes by one and raising another in its place. This allows you to reflect the learning of new skills and deterioration of old ones without lowering their overall power level. It also allows you to reflect experienced but retired adventurers that have lost touch with their adventuring skills, because they have converted their levels into NPC ones like expert, aristocrat and (if you really want them to have experienced a power drop) Commoner, so as to pick up skills more appropriate to everyday life. And that way, while they might be weaker when the PC's encounter them initialy, they can still brush off the rust fairly quickly if called back to the adventuring life.

See: rebuilding rules in PHB2 (e.g.).

 

[The Human Target]

As to the core question, no they aren't needed.

Some people like em though.

Not me, but some people.

 

[Nightfall]

Ah..the power of cheese! And it is necessary!

 

[xnosipjpqmhd]

I'm not sure how to reconcile your desire for realism with the desire for players to be able to size up everyone they meet in terms of CR just by looking at them. The players have an expectation that encounters (actual encounters, as opposed to just meeting people) will be somewhere around their CR/EL. Gaging and preparing for those encounters is part of the resource-management game of D&D.

Many GMs (myself included) present a campaign world with a variety of levels of creature, entirely independent of the PCs' level. High-level NPCs exist. Do I go to great lengths to pit them against 1st level PCs? No, but interaction is inevitable, and sometimes it leads to confrontation.