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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dragonblade" data-source="post: 5781229" data-attributes="member: 2804">I think trying to fix class imbalance by slowing progression is putting the cart before the horse. The real problem is the fact that classes are imbalanced in the first place. Fix that and there ceases to be a need for different rates of advancement.My preferred method of advancement is not even track XP at all and just let the DM decide when everyone levels up based on the needs of the narrative and the group itself. Thats how I usually run things, but sometimes I'll do XP.For players who achieve something dramatic like defeating a monster by themself, I think you can offer alternative awards. In 4e parlance, I would give out boons, treasure, bonus action points etc.And yes if someone misses a session they get the same XP and advance at the same rate as everyone else. Having PCs of different level makes it harder to design encounters for the group as a whole and its something that should be strictly avoided, IMO.All of the petty bickering and spotlight stealing squabbles disappeared once we went from 2e to 3e with its unified XP progression. 2e also had a system of bonus XP that differed from class to class. It made my job easier as DM when I no longer had to track that stuff on a player by player and class by class basis. Based on my own experiences, I can say that one set of rules encouraged player resentment and spotlight stealing and one didn't.Not wanting save or die is a completely different issue. I get to play for 3-4 hours a week. Our current DM is running Pathfinder. In the first combat, I failed a save and was paralyzed for long enough that I was out the whole encounter. That encounter ended up lasting most of that three hour session.Essentially I drove to my friend's house to play for about 5 minutes and then spent the rest of the night watching them play D&D. Maybe for some people that sense of verisimilitude is an acceptable tradeoff for sitting there and doing nothing. But it is not for me.My time is valuable to me and I play games like D&D to have fun and relax. If I wanted to go play video games in the other room, then I could have done that at home.This also has nothing to with thinking my character shouldn't fail. I have no problem with a penalty for failure, including character death, if it is the cumulative result of multiple meaningful choices, or a combination of choices and die rolls.But when failure occurs in the first round of die roll before you can even act, I have made no meangingful choices in the game, nor even gotten to make any choice. I suppose you could say I got to make two die rolls. I rolled initiative before I was hit and paralyzed, but that doesn't really help your case, IMO.The cost of a failure is way out of proportion to the path it takes to get there. One die roll and you are potentially sitting out your whole game session. And the other is that the failure of my character ends up unduly punishing me as a player and directly affecting my ability to participate in the game itself.</blockquote>

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