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Message: <blockquote data-quote="The Crimson Binome" data-source="post: 6825951" data-attributes="member: 6775031">Every game is a balance between simulation and playability. It's a spectrum, and class-base systems tend to be further from the simulation end than skill-based systems are, but there's no hard dividing line. You need to make concessions if you want the game to be playable, but it's down to personal preference where the exact tipping point is.Be sure to not accidentally conflate simulation with realism, though. GURPS is a pretty good simulation of the real world (as far as games go), with almost enough concessions to playability (IMO) for it to actually be playable. It's not necessary for a game to simulate our world, though, as long as you're consistent and everything jives between the game mechanics which describe the world and what's actually going on within the narrative of that world. For example, if you're playing Highlander and your primary advancement is from decapitating other immortals, then it would make sense that your strength and sword skill and all of your other stats should improve at the same time, because that's how the world works and everyone knows it.The question at hand is whether experience points are necessarily meta-game information, in D&D, and I maintain that they don't need to be. They are primarily earned by doing a number of actions which would, quite reasonably (from an in-game perspective), allow a character to improve at those things which actually improve with level. If you don't stray too far from the basic assumptions of the game, then the quantifiable improvements in the skill and abilities of our Player Characters should make sense to outside observers within the game world.It's a lot like the issue of armor, which was addressed... at some point during 5E development. As they said, even though it would be more realistic for armor to grant DR rather than every attack being a binary pass/fail, it's still understood (from the character perspective) that plate armor is better protection that leather. That information is in-game knowledge, which the characters can act on, rather than out-of-game information that would require meta-gaming to act on.</blockquote>

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