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Message: <blockquote data-quote="the Jester" data-source="post: 7460589" data-attributes="member: 1210">So I have only skimmed through this thread, so without delving into the posts of others, I will address the issue of the passage of time and the "1st to 20th level in a month" problem. First of all, I do see that as a problem. But that doesn't hold in every playstyle; in some, it's no big deal at all. And that's fine. Neither way is right or wrong; they're just right or wrong for certain groups.Now, that said, there are a few things I do to help ensure that time passes, and they're largely centered around the downtime rules. One thing that isn't centered around DT is travel. Most adventures don't take place conveniently close to the party's home city/area, so it takes time to get there (and back). And the way my world is set up, travel itself is arduous and dangerous. So to use one concrete example, one of my groups went on a major adventure that required about 2 weeks' travel each way to reach the site. Now, there are exceptions- sometimes the adventure is in town or whatever, and there are lots of adventure sites within a few days of home- but that travel time absolutely adds up. (All that traveling also encourages pcs to spend money on e.g. mounts, a stage coach, pack animals, etc.)Another factor that relates to this is a setting element. There are no other cities around; civilization has fallen, and the last city only stands because, at the time of the fall, a brave group of heroes (4e pcs) managed to save it. So if the party runs off to adventure 1,000  miles away, they have to come home to resupply. There's nowhere else to do so. Sure, they can burn spell slots to create food and drink and whatnot, but those are resources expended. Eventually, everyone goes home. Then there's downtime. First of all, if a group tells me they want some, they can have it, as long as no ongoing thing interrupts it. Second, I almost always insert some days or weeks of downtime after a major adventure. Third, I run multiple groups, so I'll often throw downtime at one group to help keep time fairly synchronized between groups. Finally, winter is nasty. Most of the time, that's two to four months of downtime nearly forced on pcs. If pcs do go out adventuring in the winter and conditions are bad, they will find themselves taking lots of environmental damage and exhaustion, and possibly dying. It's enough of an issue that most groups happily pass the winter as downtime. Now, I also use fairly liberal training rules. I'll let pcs spend 250 days of downtime to learn a skill, tool, language, armor, or weapon proficiency, and sometimes other things. There's a mad monk in the mountains who can train a monk in a special fighting technique. A pc spent 250 days of DT to learn to make an airship. Another spent the time to learn proficiency in the law. And so on. So there are incentives to using downtime. Also, I make heavy use of factions (all custom), and earning renown in your faction is another good DT option.</blockquote>

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