Experience Points and Leveling in an Adventure Path

[tomlib]

I'm currently a player in the Scales of War and Age of Worms Adventure Paths and running my own game which essentially is an adventure path as well.

Both my GMs for the published APs are concerned about the characters being the right levels for the adventures as we get to them. I've also noted this concern on the threads for other APs.

For my own AP I don't even bother to calculate EP and simply level at the appropriate break points.

I am somewhat concerned that my players find this inappropriate although no one has complained or even given me a hint that is the case. I think the advantages of doing it this way in a closed story arc campaign is that the players feel free to role-play out an encounter and avoid violence and that the leveling situation doesn't get out of whack with the adventure.

The main disadvantage that I see is that the players might feel that their leveling is being unfairly controlled by me and not the game mechanics.

Does anyone else have any thoughts on this?

Tom

 

[Weregrognard]

For my own AP I don't even bother to calculate EP and simply level at the appropriate break points.

I am somewhat concerned that my players find this inappropriate although no one has complained or even given me a hint that is the case.

I understand the concern. For some players, gaining experience points gives a feeling of accomplishment as opposed to having their levels "handed" to them.

I think the advantages of doing it this way in a closed story arc campaign is that the players feel free to role-play out an encounter and avoid violence and that the leveling situation doesn't get out of whack with the adventure.

May I suggest that you re-think how you reward players overcoming an encounter? If they overcome the obstacle presented by an encounter, even without violence, shouldn't they deserve the same amount of XP? I certainly think so. If that seems too "easy" perhaps you could turn negotiations into a skill challenge.

I may be wrong, but I think most APs are written so that players will be at appropriate levels when the time comes. If not, it's not too difficult to increase or decrease experience awards, add encounters, or use other means to reward the right amount of XP without giving players a "level kick".

OTOH if your players are fine with auto levels, then "no harm, no foul" as they say

 

[Crothian]

For adventrue paths I toss out XP. I look at the levels need for each adventrue and I make sure the PCs are at those levels when they need to be. When I was running Shackled City using the XP rules for some reason the PCs always seemed to be a level or two lower then what the modules asked for. I had to change the way the leveling worked though it did end in a TPK anyway.

 

[fba827]

It all really depends on the particular players - different people react differently.

But a follow up question or two -- do the players already know that you're doing this? (i.e. you told them flat out, don't worry about exp. points, i'll just level you when it's approrpiate) Or do they think you are potentially keeping track of experience points yourself and that you'll let them know when they have enough to level (i.e. "don't worry about exp points, i'll let you know when you are ready to level)

there's a subtle difference between the two.

also, how many sessions/levels have passed so far (you said no one has complained or hinted at a complaint - just wondering if that's after 2 sessions or 10)


If everyone's mentality is that they are there for "group fun" than chances are they don't care.

I, personally, would have 0 problem with such a system. My only request (if I were your player) would be that you be consistant in the approximate number of encounters that it takes to go up each level (i.e. somewhere between 5 and 10 encounters each level, as opposed to 2 encounters then 20 encounters than 5 encounters between levels - that would just feel too arbitrary and sporadic).

Having said all that, going back to my original statement -- if no one has complained or hinted at a complaint, then chances are good that you are fine.

 

[roguerouge]

I am somewhat concerned that my players find this inappropriate although no one has complained or even given me a hint that is the case. I think the advantages of doing it this way in a closed story arc campaign is that the players feel free to role-play out an encounter and avoid violence and that the leveling situation doesn't get out of whack with the adventure.

Tom

Well, you get the same XP for defeating an encounter by skills, swords, or magic, so I don't see why there would be an incentive to solve everything with the sword.

Also, if, for some reason, your particular DM ONLY awarded XP for those creatures you murder or defend yourself against, then you should trust that your DM will set up side quests to get you on track rather than deliberately send you into a TPK.

 

[RodneyThompson]

I think, as far as Scales of War goes, if your players go through the adventures then they should hit the right levels. I don't know about the authors' experiences on Shackled City/Age of Worms/Savage Tide, but I finished writing a SoW adventure and it was very easy for me to include enough XP in the adventure to make sure that the players get their level-and-a-half, plus a little extra. Now that things like skill challenges and quests have a codified XP amount and can be treated like encounters, it seems like you can get more XP into a single adventure if you want to.

If your players start falling behind, you can always fall back on the Side Trek one-session adventure, but make sure it's packed full of XP. If you include a major quest and a complexity 5 skill challenge you end up with two encounters' worth of XP that the PCs can pick up in a relatively short amount of gaming time.

 

[tomlib]

Thank You All

Hey everyone,

I appreciate the advice on this subject.

It's a good idea to keep the encounter numbers about the same for an advancement and I do that as best I can.

The players are aware of my system of not counting XP but leveling at the appropriate spot so that is not an issue.

As to an Adventure Path having the "right" amount of XP to level properly. I appreciate the effort the module writer has to put in to make this happen but those pesky players sometimes throw in a monkey wrench by skipping entire sections of the module or resting and then coming back to find reinforcements making appropriate levelling very difficult even if the stated XP seems to be the perfect amount. In a lengthy AP this is an even bigger issue.

As far as counting XP for negotiating out of a combat, I do that but sometimes the players just entirely skip a section. For example, my group recently came across an encampment of belligerent Blackscale Lizard Folk and simply decided to bypass them on their way to a bigger goal. So, that was more what I was talking about.

I don't think anyone had major objections to my system so I think I'll keep using it.

Thanks again and Happy Monster Slaying!

 

[JVisgaitis]

I'm working on this very thing with our AP now. I'm probably going to provide a guideline in the AP that says by this time the PCs should be around x level and maybe present some sample encounters to eke out those last few levels of the players skip a few encounters.

 

[JoeGKushner]

Our GM did the same as the OP.

"You need to be X at this point so you're X."

Worked fine for us.

 

[Dedekind]

My players were also fine with defined leveling points. My only issue was that there was one case near the end in the Shackled City AP that the points just came too close together to match my player's prior experience.

One potential complaint would be appropriate levels of treasure for their level. Missing encounters has that unfortunate downfall, and you'll just need to make sure and take care of it later.