Can you earn experience points for your comrades?

[GMMichael]

But more to the point, i myself really dislike the idea of the GM defining player character goals by his interpretation of "what a fighter is" and hard coding that into the game mechanics. That, to me, crosses over a line between what things GMs should be defining and what the players should be defining.

If a GM told me picking rogue class would hinge my rate of advancement to stealing... I would be very worried and strongly review what was discussed at session zero or have questions for session zero ready.

This is just a difference in opinion of what a Class is. To you, a class is a set of bonuses that your character gets. To me, a class is a play style. Actually, part of my motivation is to redefine "class," since the set-of-bonuses type became so bland after years of abuse.

A "rogue" shouldn't necessarily depend on stealing for advancement. A "thief" should have no problem with that at all. Which is why I would title my classes appropriately...but I think that's a different conversatioin.

 

[GMMichael]

I run a campaign in which all experience points are group points: every player earns the same amount, even if they are absent, even if they join the game anew.

Moreover, (frequent) bonus experience points for art, journals, ideas, maps and other cool stuff accrue to the whole group.

This way no one feels left out, and everyone feels the altruistic energy of being part of group helping each other even in Out-of-Character ways.

So, yes, a PC can earn experience points for his comrades, but experience shouldn't have anything to do with which class you choose, or whether or not you participate?

 

[MarkB]

1) Encounter/session design isn't a check&balance, it's just good GMing.

Except that you specifically described using it as a check-and-balance system to evenly distribute XPs. And if you want to do that, the easier solution is, well, just to evenly distribute XPs.

2) If you remove individual effort from the XP equation, then you remove an incentive to be outstanding. Each PC just needs to do the bare minimum to get their share of the pot.

My suggestion was to use a different incentive, not to remove any incentive at all.

The inspiration for the party-assist XP idea comes from wanting XP to be more interesting than "you killed all the monsters, here's your share of the XP pot." By tying it to class goals, it adds to a player's feel of a class, but ends up with a difficult situation like this - balancing the amount of XPs that each PC gets.

Inspiration, or what I call hero points, is a good carrot. But if PCs don't get XP for doing what their class does, what would earn them XP? And if you don't get XP for encouraging and bolstering the party in your specialty, what's another way to tie class goals to party XP (the latter, hopefully, promoting teamwork)?

There's already a fairly small number of classes in 5e, which I don't think is a bad thing in itself. But it does make it a little harder to individualise characters.

By obliging players to play up to the stereotypes of their classes in order to earn XPs, you'd be homogenising them even further, which I personally feel is not a positive outcome.

It seems like if you want to award individual character behaviour, the way to do that would be for players to define goals and ideals for their characters - not their classes - and then award them for successfully pursuing those goals. Preferably not using a currency that impacts their level progression.

 

[Sunseeker]

This is just a difference in opinion of what a Class is. To you, a class is a set of bonuses that your character gets. To me, a class is a play style. Actually, part of my motivation is to redefine "class," since the set-of-bonuses type became so bland after years of abuse.

A "rogue" shouldn't necessarily depend on stealing for advancement. A "thief" should have no problem with that at all. Which is why I would title my classes appropriately...but I think that's a different conversatioin.

Part of the potential disconnect between you and some of this conversation seems to be you talking about "your game" which you admit is something of a different beast than "the game" which is the stuff that comes printed in the books.

If you say a "Class" is a banana and I say a "Class" is a tomato, and the book says a "Class" is a watermelon then we're going to have a problem with our discourse since only one of these definitions is actually accurate: the books.

The only problem I have with generic things like "class goals" is that they imply certain things. That there is a universality to common elements of the game. Does that mean there are "race goals"? What do characters who are uninterested in these universal goals do? Are they punished for not seeking them out?

So, yes, a PC can earn experience points for his comrades, but experience shouldn't have anything to do with which class you choose, or whether or not you participate?

If you are interested in other people's answers, in short, yes, for 3 reasons.
1: Shared experience points mean that when others win, you win. It puts "group" over "individual" which I think is important in group-based gameplay.
2: Class, working off above as defined by the book, says little about your character beyond what you are good at. You may want to get better at it, you may want to discover new ways of doing things. Those sorts of decisions should be made by the players, not their choice in race, class, background or other mechanical elements.
3: Participation is difficult to judge. If everyone comes to the table ready to play and Joe and Frank roll several lucky crits and the bat guys roll several unlucky misses and combat goes smoothly, James the healer may not need to do any actual healing. Or, maybe Joe and Frank roll some terrible misses and the enemies get several lucky crits, but when James goes to roll his healing dice, it all comes up very low. Do we reward James less in the second scenario because his dice rolled poorly? Do we reward James less in the first scenario because his services were not needed today?

2) If you remove individual effort from the XP equation, then you remove an incentive to be outstanding. Each PC just needs to do the bare minimum to get their share of the pot.

I dislike this argument for many, many reasons, most of which cannot be discussed here as they are political in nature.

Fundamentally, it hinges on player greed as a motivating factor to succeed.

There are plenty of things to motivator players to be outstanding, and IMO, few of them are "more experience points".

Here's an example: In the game I'm in, way back when, my PC gained 2.7 million experience points. Just me. The DM was doing individual XP at the time. How did I achieve this ridiculous number of experience points? I slapped a boss monster with a black hole. Why did I do this? Well, it wasn't because I wanted the spotlight or because I wanted to be amazing, but it was because the the boss monster was an on-again off-again ally with our group, generally treating our characters poorly while demanding we undertake extreme quests and risk death for little reward and said quests got my character killed once (It was only a setback!), so my character had a bone to pick with this guy. We came across some "black hole stuff" which I stole a small container off and then threw it in this guy's face (I crit, yay!).

He died, I gained 2.7 million XP (we were like, level 10 and he was some insane class level +ancient dragon nonsense, it was a gonzo campaign, but still).

The incentive of "getting this guy back" was a completely in-game developed incentive, having no bearing on XP at all. I would have been happy if I had gained no XP for it if just for the fact that I showed him what for!

But back to the greed thing. Greed is a motivator for some, but makes role-playing non-greedy characters difficult. If every character is out there to step on the others just to get their extra helping of XP, you're going to end up with a very disfunctional party. And what of the guy who just wants to be a generally good-natured helpful sort? That guy for whom greed and more time in the spotlight does nothing for? Do they just get nothing while Greedy Joe steps on everyone else to get ahead?

That doesn't to me, seem to generate a very positive play experience.

 

[5ekyu]

This is just a difference in opinion of what a Class is. To you, a class is a set of bonuses that your character gets. To me, a class is a play style. Actually, part of my motivation is to redefine "class," since the set-of-bonuses type became so bland after years of abuse.

A "rogue" shouldn't necessarily depend on stealing for advancement. A "thief" should have no problem with that at all. Which is why I would title my classes appropriately...but I think that's a different conversatioin.

Its less to do with my view of what class is as how much i want the rules to enforce my view of what a player's character is or how they should be played as opposed to what the player's is.

Well, see, back in the day when classed systems had nobackground or skills and so basically race, class, alignment were about all the tools at your disposal, class did to a very substantial amount equate to playstyle and goals... And some, perhaps many, me included found that less satifying and migrated away to other more flexible systems which let the player choose the playstyle.

A "fighter" may be a thief, with mugging and intimidation. A "wizard" sure could be a scout, woth familiars, invisibility and scrying.

To me, and perhaps others, the growth of less limiting classes and broader mechanical options not chaining playstyle and goals to "class" or "race" was a step forward, one that to us made classed systems worth a look.

So, the more rules a GM wants to put back into a game to define and limit my character's goals, mindset, playstyle to some pre-conceived concept *the GM* prefers leads me to take a bog step back and consider who the GM thinks should be running the PCs.

Like alignments, the more the GM's view of "how a PC should be played" is enforced by rules over pkayer choices, the more that tends to set the stage for player-GM conflict.

So, definitely not what i would see as a step forward.

But surely, might be for some.

As for this...

"If you remove individual effort from the XP equation, then you remove an incentive to be outstanding."

Do GMs frequently have a problem of players not wanting to be outstanding, not being part of the mix and action?

I have had players who did and were very happy to not be the lead, not be in the hotseat, but they are fairly rareand imx were not a problem... Just there for a more casual supporting cast play.

Not sure the games would have played out better or more enjoyable if over time that had resulted in them lagging behind the others in level?

Would yours?

One of the basic issues of "incentivized xp" is the underlyin question of "is your game going to be better if players who dont go along with your chosen incentives keep playing but just keep getting weaker and weaker as they get more and more behind?"

Is your game more fun for the others when their "thief" or "cleric" is not only not playing "right, as defined by the GM" but is also a couple levels down?

 

[Lanefan]

My worry is that any system that allows characters to earn xp for events/actions/things they didn't actually do promotes "passenger" play. By "passengers" I mean the character(s) who do all the planning etc. but don't actually take any risk, preferring to leave the dangerous bits to others but who are quite happy to share in the xp reward - and the loot, for all that.

In the system proposed in the OP: if I'm the party Thief all I need to do is teach my fellow adventurers how to steal, help them plan their thefts and maybe even do a little zero-risk scouting for them, and then just let the xp roll in as they go out and steal stuff (and maybe get caught or even die in the process) while I sit in the pub. Provided I've a good source of new recruits to replace the dead or captured, I can keep this going for ages.

And believe me, I've played with characters (and players) who would quite happily do just this if given the opportunity.

What I do is just the opposite: if you're not involved and-or not at risk then no xp for you. If you're only peripherially involved e.g. hiding up a tree "keeping watch" while the battle rages below or you arrive on the scene just in time for the last foe to topple then you'll probably get half xp. Xp are earned either by exposure to risk or by taking steps to mitigate or negate it - the 1e idea of giving the same xp for a foe whether the foe was defeated, intentionally avoided by stealth, rendered non-threatening via other means e.g. persuasion, and so on.

Lanefan

 

[Lanefan]

"If you remove individual effort from the XP equation, then you remove an incentive to be outstanding."

Do GMs frequently have a problem of players not wanting to be outstanding, not being part of the mix and action?

I have had players who did and were very happy to not be the lead, not be in the hotseat, but they are fairly rareand imx were not a problem... Just there for a more casual supporting cast play.

Not sure the games would have played out better or more enjoyable if over time that had resulted in them lagging behind the others in level?

Damn right they would, says the player often on the other side of this coin: the one whose characters in their attempts to be outstanding keep losing lives and levels and magic items while these passengers ride on my coat-tails.

If you want the rewards then stick your nose in it, take some risk, and get involved. You're already going to expect a full share of the loot, I'm not willing to give you a full share of the xp as well.

One of the basic issues of "incentivized xp" is the underlyin question of "is your game going to be better if players who dont go along with your chosen incentives keep playing but just keep getting weaker and weaker as they get more and more behind?"

Is your game more fun for the others when their "thief" or "cleric" is not only not playing "right, as defined by the GM" but is also a couple levels down?

Hint: 1e had this system where it took different classes different numbers of xp to bump a level - you've just discovered why it works. The game as designed kind of expected some classes to be less involved than others.

Lan-"yeah, sore point, in case it isn't obvious "-efan

 

[5ekyu]

My worry is that any system that allows characters to earn xp for events/actions/things they didn't actually do promotes "passenger" play. By "passengers" I mean the character(s) who do all the planning etc. but don't actually take any risk, preferring to leave the dangerous bits to others but who are quite happy to share in the xp reward - and the loot, for all that.

In the system proposed in the OP: if I'm the party Thief all I need to do is teach my fellow adventurers how to steal, help them plan their thefts and maybe even do a little zero-risk scouting for them, and then just let the xp roll in as they go out and steal stuff (and maybe get caught or even die in the process) while I sit in the pub. Provided I've a good source of new recruits to replace the dead or captured, I can keep this going for ages.

And believe me, I've played with characters (and players) who would quite happily do just this if given the opportunity.

What I do is just the opposite: if you're not involved and-or not at risk then no xp for you. If you're only peripherially involved e.g. hiding up a tree "keeping watch" while the battle rages below or you arrive on the scene just in time for the last foe to topple then you'll probably get half xp. Xp are earned either by exposure to risk or by taking steps to mitigate or negate it - the 1e idea of giving the same xp for a foe whether the foe was defeated, intentionally avoided by stealth, rendered non-threatening via other means e.g. persuasion, and so on.

Lanefan

Ok so a couple questions...

First, how is it "promoting" passenger play to let the character gain Xp for planning and such and then sitting back? The character gains the same Xp after planning and such if they go join in the action as if they sit it out - so it seems it would neither promote or discourage either choice. *IF* your character wants to go join in the "derring do" great, if not, just fine. Seems like if the character has an investment in-game in the outcome and has skills that can help, its smarter to go and help, but hey, maybe not. meanwhile, if the others are fine with this, what is the problem?

More to the point, how would the game be "better" if the "passenger" did all that, stayed back, let the others go do the derring-do and was just gradually lower and lower level compared to them?

is it going to be much more awesome funtime for all if at "third tier" the passenger is say 9th level or even 6th level so that when the team is working all as a unit in scenes he can provide less?

is you game helped by that divergence of levels.

second, how is this passenger thing a problem if the players are enjoying the play? How is that so much of a problem to warrant some form of level skew being a good penalty?

 

[Lanefan]

Ok so a couple questions...

First, how is it "promoting" passenger play to let the character gain Xp for planning and such and then sitting back?

Easy answer: most players (and characters) when given options will, all else being equal, trend toward the path of least resistance. Here, that path is to sit back and let others take the risk.

The character gains the same Xp after planning and such if they go join in the action as if they sit it out - so it seems it would neither promote or discourage either choice. *IF* your character wants to go join in the "derring do" great, if not, just fine. Seems like if the character has an investment in-game in the outcome and has skills that can help, its smarter to go and help, but hey, maybe not. meanwhile, if the others are fine with this, what is the problem?

The character who rarely if ever joins in the derring-do is, by law of averages, going to outlive the rest of her party (and probably their replacements as well) by a wide margin; all the while slowly but surely accreting wealth and xp the others don't have.

More to the point, how would the game be "better" if the "passenger" did all that, stayed back, let the others go do the derring-do and was just gradually lower and lower level compared to them?

is it going to be much more awesome funtime for all if at "third tier" the passenger is say 9th level or even 6th level so that when the team is working all as a unit in scenes he can provide less?

Eventually one hopes the passengers will realize why they're falling behind and join in more often.

What I've seen happen in the past goes roughly like this. This is an abbreviated version where things happen quickly, to show my point; but imagine this spinning out slowly over a 20-adventure campaign:

Party forms with 6 characters A-B-C-D-E-F, let's say character A is the passenger. They go out in the field and after their first adventure their status is:

A - alive, full share of xp and loot*
B - alive, full share of xp and loot*
C - alive, full share of xp and loot*
D - alive, full share of xp and loot*
E - dead
F - dead (this, IME, would be my guy)

* - loot includes possessions of dead companions E and F, along with what the adventure gave.

So, a couple of recruits G and H come in to replace E and F and off this meery crew goes. After their second adventure they look like:

A - alive, full share of xp and loot (so now has 2 total shares of each)
B - dead
C - alive, full share of xp and loot (so also 2 of each)
D - alive but missed half the trip, so half share of xp and loot (thus 1.5. total of each)
G - alive, full share of xp and loot (1 total of each)
H - alive, full share of xp and loot (1 total of each) (my replacement for F - made it through an adventure, yippee!)

And they're all richer by sharing out B's stuff.

So now character I comes in to replace B, and off we go on adventure 3. Results afterward:

A - alive, full share of xp and loot (so now 3 and 3 overall)
C - alive, full share of xp and loot (so now 3 and 3 overall) - but at this point C retires, having had her fill of all this.
D - alive, full share of xp and loot (so now 2.5 and 2.5 overall)
G - alive, full share of xp and loot (so now 2 and 2 overall)
H - dead (I lose another one...)
I - alive, full share of xp and loot (so now 1 and 1 overall)

And a fourth adventure includng new recruits J and K is all we need to make my point clear - off they go, back they come:

A - alive, full share of xp and loot (so now 4 and 4 overall)
D - dead
G - alive, full share of loot and xp (so now 3 and 3 overall)
I - alive, full share of xp and loot (so now 2 and 2 overall)
J - alive, full share of xp and loot (so now 1 and 1 overall)
K - alive, full share of xp and loot (so now 1 and 1 overall) (my third try at this...)

Character A, by simply being a passenger while the rest of the party took the risk, is now both the wealthiest and the highest-level character in the group; with wealth even further enhanced by sharing in the loot from her dead companions. Assuming each adventure produced a vaguely-equal treasury, A might be 4 times as wealthy as J and K after the 4th adventure. Yet A has achieved this by intentionally sitting back and letting others take the risks, sometimes to their demise.

The level difference can be mitigated by the DM allowing new characters to come in at a particular level relative to the party average or whatever...but the wealth aspect cannot, as treasury division is almost universally a player-driven element. The DM can introduce new characters with some possessions, sure, but has to be wary about those possessions simply adding to the wealth of others when the new recruit dies.

second, how is this passenger thing a problem if the players are enjoying the play? How is that so much of a problem to warrant some form of level skew being a good penalty?

The passenger player might be enjoying it but the rest of the crew might very well end up feeling resentful, particularly if my example above starts coming out real.

Lanefan

 

[MarkB]

[MENTION=29398]Lanefan[/MENTION] This feels very much like a subjective experience. You may feel like the player in question is sitting back and letting others get involved, but they may feel that they're playing a valuable support role and managing risk sensibly whilst you keep taking suicidal risks with your characters.

Either way, this is a player issue, and player issues are rarely resolved effectively using in-game solutions.