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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Spatzimaus" data-source="post: 2826883" data-attributes="member: 3051">The flip side, though, is if you feel you're getting close to a level, you'd go on a spending spree under a "use it or lose it" system.  Make a ton of magic items, use Limited Wish a dozen or so times, reroll every single bad roll in an important fight, that sort of thing.  It's bad enough that some players seem to do ridiculous things when their character's a few XP short of a level.  One way you could get around this would be to allow them to store APs and XPs, but cap it at two level's worth (10 APs and 1000*level XP); since they'd be hitting the cap fairly quickly they won't just keep storing it, and there's less incentive to spend a ton on short notice.Really, I think what you want is a system that encourages them to slowly spend the points as they go, and I think a big part of the imbalance is the fact that they're getting a BIG lump sum of points every time they level.I know, it's a bit heretical, but how about this?> Break each adventure into "episodes" of a few sessions each.  Each episode usually ends with some significant event, like a boss fight.> At the end of each episode, each player chooses N rewards, where you set N based on their levels and the amount of stuff that's happened during that episode.> Each reward is one of the following:1 AP which MUST be used during the next episode and can't be stored beyond that, OR500 XP for crafting/spells/death, which can be stored indefinitely, up to a maximum of 500 XP per level, and can be transferred to other players on a 2:1 basis.> So, if N=3, you could choose 3 AP, 2 AP and 500 XP, 1 AP and 1000 XP, or 1500 XP.  Most people would gravitate towards the middle options, IMO; since you can't store the AP for long people would shy away from the 3 AP extreme, while the only people going for pure XP would be heavy crafters (who are generally crafting for the good of the party) and those paying off a death (below).> The death penalty can be gradually reduced by spending your stored XP; you can't buy it all off in one shot, but by spending a bit at a time you slowly get your abilities back as you go.  For instance, let's say a death at level 12 gave you a "debt" of 12000 XP (yes, I played CoH).  Each lost level is broken into four pieces, costing 3000 XP (i.e., 250*level) each:BAB and savesHP and spell slotsSkill points and FeatsClass abilities (turning, sneak attack, familiar/mount abilities, you name it)So, once you've stored up (250*level) XP in your XP pool you could buy back some of the lost abilities, one bit at a time.  Obviously some classes depend more on one category than another, so you can get your most critical stuff back almost immediately if you've been storing some XP.  If you've lost multiple levels, you can't start buying back the second one until you've completely paid off the first one.  In a more flexible game system you'd have an individual price tag for each ability, I suppose, but this should work well enough.</blockquote>

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