How many xp-awarding challenges do you have in your game sessions?

[Wombat]

When I ran D20, I simply handed out xp at the end of the session, based on what they had done, what they had encountered, etc.

I'm not going to hand out points in the middle of the session. Just not my style. If you advance a level, it will be in the next session, not the current one.

 

[HellHound]

When I ran D20, I simply handed out xp at the end of the session, based on what they had done, what they had encountered, etc.

I'm not going to hand out points in the middle of the session. Just not my style. If you advance a level, it will be in the next session, not the current one.

I think that's a given. Even for CP2020 where every roll you make can earn you IP (improvement points), the actual points are only handed out at end of session.

 

[shilsen]

Like Mallus and a few others, the pll evidently doesn't apply to me. I just award a fixed amount of XP per session, irrespective of what the PCs do during it, to keep the PCs advancing at a speed I'm comfortable with.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

4-6, closer to six given challenges of all types.

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

I couldn't say.

Now that I don't use XP, I do...but I basically plan a session ahead of time based on what would follow from the previous week. I'm a very, very heavy 'on the fly' kind of DM so it can be anywhere from none to ten depending on what the players go for and how creative I am at the moment.

This counts more than just combat, but anything that is challenging enough to deserve at least some XP reward.

EDIT: Not only that, but most of my game sessions are more like 6 hours on average.

 

[JRR_Talking]

half the posts thus far dont use xp per challenge rating /encounters

joy of the internet

usually about 4-5

i just ran 4 hours of Barrow of the forgotten king / RPGA version. was something like 9 xp giving encounters of one sort or another in the four hours

John

 

[Doug McCrae]

I don't use xp. I award a level every two sessions. We play for eight hours. There's about 6 fights or otherwise challenging encounters per session so I picked option 3.

 

[MerricB]

Depends a lot, but I've said 7. Generally between 4-9.

Cheers!

 

[Quasqueton]

After around 80 responses, the main averages seem to fall around 2-4 encounters per 4-hours sessions. Let's call it 3.

If all of those challenges are equal to the party's level, we get:

13.33 encounters per level = 266.6 over 20 levels divided by 3 per session = 88.9 sessions, one per week = 1.7 years, or 1 year 8 months [Real Time] from 1st to 20th level. (And this assumes a 100% attendance for the PC, and group, every single week.)

20 months to level 20. That averages 1 level per month. It's probably a bit faster at the low end and slower at the high end.

This is pretty much right how the designers said they designed the system. Cool to see it seems to work as designed.

Now maybe I can get a campaign to last the full 89 game sessions required to make level 20. I dream of the day.

Quasqueton

 

[The_Universe]

I shoot for 3, but I usually get closer to 2. So, I voted 2.