Level advancement too fast?

[kigmatzomat]

Just interested in someone else´s opinion.
I´m halfing XP awards and we don´t even focus on battles. Most of the time we have just one battle an evening.
What´s your opinion?

Well, my game averages 8 hours long every other week with leveling occuring on average every 2 months or roughly after 32 hours of gaming. The number of combats varies as some levels consist of significant number of small consecutive battles, while others are more a few big encounters.

I do give RP awards when there is a challenge, risk, or serious effort on the part of the character so it's not all combat. I've also been known to arbirtrarily level the party if they spend several months in one place studying/training/etc. The month spent training with a young dragon was boiled down to 3 combats since I didn't want to power level them the way arena-esque combat tends to do but still gave the players useful experience.

It seems to be working okay since I've had the same core group for about 2 years in my group of 6.

 

[Durifern]

Actually I could adopt Fenes 2´s system alltogether because my XP/2 rule just happens to fit my/our tastes. We made the jump from OD&D to 3rd ed so we are used to a progress of something like one level a year (and we were allowed to pool the XP of all the SCs a player commanded).

Just did some statistics:

We are playing on the average once a month and level up every half a year. 6 sessions is less then I would have thought. There were some action heavy parts in between were most of the XP´s were earned and most often the battle´s CR is higher than the average SC level, because it´s the only battle they fight before resting.
I think my players would have shot me if S´mons calculation example would fit.

But I think if we would still play every week, I´d cut down the XP even more. Fact is, we like the play of low levels and a faster progression wouldn´t fit into the flow of the campaign. We´re palying since december 2000 and are finishing now the first major part of the campaign which was all laid out for a group of newbie adventurers who play with the big guys. If I hadn´t reduced the XP awards they would now be as powerful as the enemy...:

 

[kigmatzomat]

If I hadn´t reduced the XP awards they would now be as powerful as the enemy...:

Ummm, you can level the bad guys as they experience too. One of the reasons my players dread encounters where they don't capture/kill the BEG is they know he a) learned their tactics/abilities and b) gained XP.

This one lernian cryohydra had them worried as they'd fought it about five or six times and it's tactics kept getting better and better. Ambushes, crossfires around trees/boulders, attacking when they were ankle-deep in a creek to freeze them in place, it was great fun.
Heads everywhere.