Different XP progressions as a means of class balance?

[Ahnehnois]

If you could only multiclass at 1st level then there's no problem,

Except that you lost control of your character's development the moment you created it!

I still can't believe there are DM's who don't use the experience point system in their games. Perhaps including more xp related rules might curb this too.

I'd say it's pretty common. I'm off topic here, but what's so hard to believe about that? How does losing XP harm the game? How does having XP contribute anything at all? I used to use it, but I sure don't miss it. I'd be quite happy if XP (and CR/EL or its equivalent) was presented as an optional subsystem.

Why would you want to curb this?

 

[Kynn]

AD&D used different XP progression tables as part of the means of balancing classes. A Fighter needed to get 2000xp to reach 2nd level; a wizard (magic-user) needed 2500xp. If both had 5000xp, then the Fighter would be 3rd level while the wizard was 2nd.

Part of the problem is that this was only true at low levels. By mid-levels, when the wizard was becoming powerful, it changed around the other way.

To be an effective balancing factor, the low-level magic-user should have required LESS experience (since she was so weak after expending her one spell) and the mid-level should have required MORE experience.

AD&D got it backwards (at least half the time) when it came to balancing the classes through XP progression.

 

[Mattachine]

Differing xp tables is a way to admit that some classes are powerful and others are not. That was explicitly the case in AD&D. I didn't like it then, and don't like it now, either.

 

[steeldragons]

In RIFTS, the charts weren't on the pages for each class. They weren't anywhere near them. They were impossible to find, level after level. This is because Kevin Simbieda is insane.

Obviously that wouldn't be the case in D&D5, and maybe confusion was the wrong term. There are various issues caused by differing XP curves:

1.) New/young players getting confused about how much XP they need for the next level, when their fellows are all leveling at different rates. This may seem dumb, but I know this confused and frustrated me when I was a kid playing 2e.

2.) Breakdown of meaning in what a "level" is. If a wizard hits level 3 at 5000 XP and a fighter hits level 3 at 2500 XP because the wizard is twice as powerful, why are they both being called "level 3?" This means that levels don't correlate with power OR amount of XP. If the wizard is more powerful at level 3 than the fighter, they're not at the same level.

3.) Breakdown in time between rewards. This may be a feature-not-bug to some, arguing that wizards should have to wait longer to get to the good stuff, but it seems to me that playing a class who has no new powers, features, bonuses, abilities for twice as long as your friend could be frustrating and become boring.

4.) Breakdown in maximum power caps/character usability time. If a wizard levels at more XP than a fighter, because he gets more power per level, then a wizard effectively has more overall length in-campaign AND more overall power than a fighter. A wizard's player can use that character for much longer (because he'll take much longer to reach level 20 or 30) and when he hits level 20 (or 30) he'll be way more powerful than the fighter who hit level 20 6 months ago, especially if that fighter's player started a new character in the meantime. Or should the fighter's player just play a static, unchanging character until the wizard maxes out?

So, basically, all of this stuff is "But they get to do/have/go up at X...and I wanna too. Why can't I have it?" To quote Veruca Salt, "I want it NOW, daddy!" <stomp feet and pout>.

 

[Ratskinner]

I still can't believe there are DM's who don't use the experience point system in their games. Perhaps including more xp related rules might curb this too.

Gods no. At least not in the core/basic game. The more the mechanics are intertwined, the harder they are to modify. I only use XP when the players demand it (or if in 4e to help balance the encounters.) I don't mind some math, but I want it to be worth something or mean something. XP just seems so kludgy and arbitrary...and if something's gonna be arbitrary at the table it should be me..the DM.

Plus, I like the Awesome Point system of levelling from Old School Hack sooo much better. It'd be easy to implement in D&D, too. I plan on Hacking it into 5e as soon as the playtesting is done.

 

[KesselZero]

Yes, I would be annoyed if some classes were objectively more powerful than others. I don't think that's unreasonable.

 

[steeldragons]

Multiclassing. How is that working? They're not going back to pre-3e multi/dualclassing madness,

While I cannot say I know anyone who went made with the pre-3e mode of multi-classing...I cannot say it is not possible someone did. Provign a direct correlation might be difficult for the psychiatrists, though.

nor are they cutting multiclassing out.

I would not think so, no.

How can you have a chart that covers every possible combination of classes?

Why would such a chart be necessary?

This is the class you are playing, when you hit "next level" for that class, go on up to the next level of that.

Everyone/thing/class starts at 1st. Option 1) Split XP, as gained, evenly among all classes. Option 2) DM alots XP as appropriate for the amonut of time/use spent in a particular class. (IOW, Spend all of your time in armor and swinging swords and cast a spell once! 95% of your XP goes to your Ftr levels not your MU)...Option 3)

You go up in whatever class you were last playing. At "level up" you can switch classes to apply XP toward.

If you are a "Mage 1/Ranger 6/Thief 2", then your next XP is getting to 3rd in Thief. So you have skills as a 3rd level Thief...not a 9th level "character."

Say...since I would NEVER allow/say you are casting as a 9th level MU either...you then,"turn back to your roots and again take up the study of the arcane", i.e. want to get to Mage 2. Your next XPs are all going to that.

This is "difficult"? Confusing? Makes following tables "too much trouble"?

Also, I think if you can't fit what you need for a class on one table in one page, that's too much info.

How could/would you need more than 1 page to list a table of XP?

And, frankly, XP shouldn't be in in the PHB at all. That's a DM issue.

This, I very much agree with.

 

[tlantl]

Except that you lost control of your character's development the moment you created it!

I thought creating your character meant choosing what you want to do with that character. How does choosing your class at creation cause you to loose control of your character?

I guess I look at characters differently because the idea of class for me is choosing my method of adventuring.

I don't look at D&D as a a means toward a class build.

I hated having to wait until I gained a level before being able to add a class. I hated having to give up class related abilities because I chose a second class.

I hated having to plot out every detail of my character so I could qualify for a less than ideal prestige class to avoid experience penalties or the loss of spell levels or the multitude of other annoying factors that system foisted on me as a player.

If I want to play a fighter/thief I certainly don't want to be a crappy fighter and a useless thief. I want to be good at both. I'll take an experience point hit or slower leveling, especially if there are only 20 levels to gain before there's no reason to keep playing my character.

I hated the unnecessary complications the 3e multiclassing system caused me as a DM.


As for the not using experience points, well go to it and have fun. It just ain't D&D to me. But I come from a time when you needed to track them or you didn't level up. There was a time when you got xp for a lot of things. You got bonuses for high ability scores. You lost experience under certain conditions. In other systems it was used to pay for item creation. I guess in the latest iteration of the game you didn't really need them but from what I could see you don't need a DM either. Just a consensus of the rules and a grid to fight on.

 

[Minigiant]

Nah.
Every game I've been in when people are different levels for any reason, a problem of some sort arises.

People beg for XP.
The higher levels are asked to do more.
The lower level PC controllers get gloomy

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I think there might be a few uses for such mechanics, but not exactly in the AD&D manner: http://www.enworld.org/forum/new-ho...rful-imbalance-balanced-game.html#post5823383



The AD&D charts are built on several assumptions:

1. Characters will be of different levels, inherently, and not just because of differences in the charts. Different rates of play and success also factor in.
2. The balancing factor of some classes being more powerful than others at a given level.
3. The different rate of advancement at different points in the level hierarchy (e.g. see cleric initial burst followed by slowing down later, relative to fighters).
4. Limited or non-existent multiclassing.

Change or remove any one of those assumptions, and the AD&D-style charts become suspect.

Personally, the only two that I see of any strong promise baked in to every class, on purpose, are #1 and #3. (Per my link above, #2 might have some after the fact cleanup and/or oddball class extension capabilities.)

Like several others, I prefer that a given level be roughly the same power as other levels, and in such an environment, if I want to play with different power levels, I want to manage the advancement that goes with it. (I would appreciate the system making it easier to handle these characters in play, but that doesn't have anything to do with how they advance.)

As for different rates of advancement for different parts of the chart, I'd think that if you really had a need for this, you couldn't have more than 4 or 5 such charts. Any more detail than that would be too fiddly. Then you'd just tie each class to whichever chart made sense. If clerics got the "fast early, slow later" chart, then fine. Of course, that monkeys with what "level" means, too.