D&D General Why Editions Don't Matter

[gorice]

Anecdotally: I think most people run 5e with milestone levelling. I make a point of handing out XP when I run 5e (I use a 'quest' system), and it always seems to surprise players who are new to the group.

 

[Aldarc]

But the reason to have XP is to level, correct? So leveling is still the reward. Even in 5E one of the options is to forego XP and do milestone leveling. So hitting that milestone could be a goal.

I thought I was being clear but let me reiterate: leveling is rewarding but not a motivation for me. I want in story motivations that make sense to my PC.

Sure, leveling is the carrot, but having "XP for gold" or even "milestone leveling" affects how players chase that carrot.

As I said, XP for discovery in Numenera affects how players engage the game, because if players want to level, then they will look to make discoveries so that they can earn XP. Likewise, in order to get XP for their characters, characters in B/X will look to acquire gold in dungeons or elsewhere. Shadow of the Demon Lord, in contrast, has a quasi-milestone system. It's simply you earn a level if you finish the adventure. But this system is at least more transparent for players, which orients their goals to completing the adventure.

One issue with milestone leveling, IME, is that it is rarely transparent to players, which makes it more difficult for players to set goals for their characters or for players to have a good sense of their character's impending new capabilities. It's often when the GM feels like it according to their whims or even "the adventure says the characters should be this level when they reach this point."

Something interesting about my gaming history and D&D compared to other games.

My group and I have almost always abandoned the XP system of D&D dating back to the 2E era when we first started gaming together. We've pretty much always done some form of milestone XP, although not usually triggered a specific event so much as X number of sessions or "adventures" or similar. The few times we've decided to start tracking XP per the rules, it never lasted and we always went back to just kind of eyeballing it.

What I've realized is that D&D is the only game where this is the case. The XP system is just cumbersome and there's nothing compelling about it, so we just get rid of it. I don't think we're alone in that, and I think the Milestone option being an official option in 5E says a lot.

But in all the other games I've played over the last few years, we always follow the XP/advancement systems.

The end of session questions of PbtA and FitD are a great reward structure. They reward examination of character and interactions with the world and other characters. It involves the players in the process.

Spire: The City Must Fall rewards players for making changes in the city. So it actively promotes what the game is meant to be about. Go out and try to change the situation in the city.

Heart has Beats, which are player chosen goals for every session of play. If they manage to hit the Beat for a session, they get a new ability. This gives players a wide range of choices for what to focus on in play, and gives the GM cues about what to involve in play.

So yeah... I can't agree that RPGs don't benefit from reward structures... I just don't think D&D's has been all that useful for quite some time.

IMHO, XP is easier in a lot of other games because the numbers required tend to be substantially flatter and smaller than the numbers D&D often requires, so XP in these other games feels less like trying to balance the books of a Swiss bank account. Leveling Numenera, for example, requires 16 XP to level: i.e., buying four 4 XP character advancements. That's for all six tiers of play. As you say, questions at the end of a session in PbtA and FitD often deal with smaller amounts: e.g., "1 XP if your character did X, Y, or Z."

 

[hawkeyefan]

Sure, leveling is the carrot, but having "XP for gold" or even "milestone leveling" affects how players chase that carrot.

As I said, XP for discovery in Numenera affects how players engage the game, because if players want to level, then they will look to make discoveries so that they can earn XP. Likewise, in order to get XP for their characters, characters in B/X will look to acquire gold in dungeons or elsewhere. Shadow of the Demon Lord, in contrast, has a quasi-milestone system. It's simply you earn a level if you finish the adventure. But this system is at least more transparent for players, which orients their goals to completing the adventure.

Yeah, the XP for gold works because it makes it clear what the game is meant to be about. You're supposed to get gold.

If you want the game to be about finding your brother's killer, then maybe a game that rewards XP for gold isn't the best choice. Or else maybe it can be modified for that.

Of course, many players and GMs have gotten used to having such fiction-based incentives not be mechanically rewarded because they tend to bring some level of satisfaction to the player... but I don't see how incentivizing that kind of thing can be viewed as bad. At least not if the system for doing so is not overly complex or cumbersome.

One issue with milestone leveling, IME, is that it is rarely transparent to players, which makes it more difficult for players to set goals for their characters or for players to have a good sense of their character's impending new capabilities. It's often when the GM feels like it according to their whims or even "the adventure says the characters should be this level when they reach this point."

Absolutely. That's something I had been working on correcting in my 5E game, before I placed it on hold. I was eyeballing things and granting a level with each significant goal resolved. But the players weren't really aware of this. It didn't cause any major issues, but I'm gonig to address that when we resume.

IMHO, XP is easier in a lot of other games because the numbers required tend to be substantially flatter and smaller than the numbers D&D often requires, so XP in these other games feels less like trying to balance the books of a Swiss bank account. Leveling Numenera, for example, requires 16 XP to level: i.e., buying four 4 XP character advancements. That's for all six tiers of play. As you say, questions at the end of a session in PbtA and FitD often deal with smaller amounts: e.g., "1 XP if your character did X, Y, or Z."

Absolutely. It's also generally unique to each player. So you don't need to divvy it up amongst each participant and all that. It's simpler and easily implemented, and in some cases, a worthwhile discussion about the game and the characters.

 

[AnotherGuy]

As I said, XP for discovery in Numenera affects how players engage the game, because if players want to level, then they will look to make discoveries so that they can earn XP.

Aldarc could you expand on this please? What does make new discoveries mean in the fiction?
I have the Arcana of the Ancients - have not used it as yet. I believe that still follows the std D&D XP model though.

 

[AnotherGuy]

Absolutely. That's something I had been working on correcting in my 5E game, before I placed it on hold. I was eyeballing things and granting a level with each significant goal resolved. But the players weren't really aware of this. It didn't cause any major issues, but I'm going to address that when we resume.

Given @Aldarc's description of Shadow of the Demon Lord I had a similar idea.
I was thinking of making it open to the players and that it would be dependent on which ever came first
(i) achieving x significant goal in the storyline; or
(ii) a time-lined event which the PCs know is occurring

 

[Aldarc]

Aldarc could you expand on this please? What does make new discoveries mean in the fiction?
I have the Arcana of the Ancients - have not used it as yet. I believe that still follows the std D&D XP model though.

"Make new discoveries" means when the players discover something new in the Ninth World that they can understand and put to use, which is often an artifact, device, location, or even an abstract truth about the world.

DISCOVERING NEW THINGS
The core of gameplay in Numenera—the answer to the question “What do characters do in this game?”—is “Discover new things or old things that are new again.” This can be the discovery of something a character can use, like an artifact. It makes the character more powerful because it almost certainly grants a new capability or option, but it’s also a discovery unto itself and results in a gain of experience points.

Discovery can also mean finding a new numenera procedure or device (something too big to be considered a piece of equipment) or even previously unknown information. If the PCs find an ancient hovertrain and get it working again so they can use it to reach a distant location, that’s a discovery. If they locate a signal receiving station and figure out how to turn off the transmission from an overhead satellite that’s causing all the animals in the region to become hostile, that’s a discovery. The common thread is that the PCs discover something that they can understand and put to use. A cure for a plague, the means to draw power from a hydroelectric plant, an operational flying craft, or an injection that grants the knowledge to create a protective force field dome over a structure—these are all discoveries.

Broadly speaking there are three categories of discoveries Monte Cook details: Artifacts, Unmoveable Devices (often in ruins), and Miscellaneous. PCs will get XP based on the Artifact's level. The core book also discusses player-driven awards for XP that may be centered around achieving a goal or mission that the PCs make for themselves.

 

[Garthanos]

A lot of games don't need that kind of story because they engage a different part of my brain that involves the twitch reaction/combat survival desires. The older Doom games were like that, minimal story but fun combat that kept me going. But even then the bang bang shoot parts of the game were interspersed with sections of exploration and light puzzle solving, the most recent version focused pretty much entirely on the action and I can't get into it either.

I needed the somewhat better flavor/stories Heretic and Hexen (and plugin alternates that were fan made like WoT Quake) to bring me into the twitch I needed some of my favored genre at minimum.

 

[Garthanos]

Complete tangent, but: Morrowind had the best story of any TES game, IMO. The problem was that the designers were so averse to railroading people into following it that most people never found it.

I can confirm I didnt really find it

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Not sure. Asymmetric design? Inconsistent? I suppose it depends on if you consider it a positive or a negative.

Generally, "asymmetric design" is used to refer to things like classes or factions rather than separate play-processes. I think if I wanted a neutral term for the split between combat and non-combat I'd call it something like "siloed." It's already a word in relatively common use with regard to offering different types of power. Some folks would prefer character growth be siloed, while others would prefer to reduce the overall silo design so combat and non-combat are not as separate.

IMHO, XP is easier in a lot of other games because the numbers required tend to be substantially flatter and smaller than the numbers D&D often requires, so XP in these other games feels less like trying to balance the books of a Swiss bank account. Leveling Numenera, for example, requires 16 XP to level: i.e., buying four 4 XP character advancements. That's for all six tiers of play. As you say, questions at the end of a session in PbtA and FitD often deal with smaller amounts: e.g., "1 XP if your character did X, Y, or Z."

Ah, Numenera...the game I wish I could like. So many good nuggets melted to several awful ones.

That said, the general idea of using XP to shape and direct player behavior/goals is great. Numenera does it in one of the worst possible ways (XP as both the "bennie" currency and as permanenr advancement currency), but other systems use it quite well. I love Dungeon World's stuff for example because it naturally generates less XP by having players roll 6- less often as they improve, so they don't nees an exponential curve in the math to get one in the results.

"Make new discoveries" means when the players discover something new in the Ninth World that they can understand and put to use, which is often an artifact, device, location, or even an abstract truth about the world.

Broadly speaking there are three categories of discoveries Monte Cook details: Artifacts, Unmoveable Devices (often in ruins), and Miscellaneous. PCs will get XP based on the Artifact's level. The core book also discusses player-driven awards for XP that may be centered around achieving a goal or mission that the PCs make for themselves.

Is this from the new(er?) edition of Numenera? I remember the intense controversies over the original version's advice to literally change the world if the players ever thought they'd actually figured out something about the past. One of the other reasons I was incapable of actually enjoying my interactions with Numenera as a game system.

 

[Aldarc]

Ah, Numenera...the game I wish I could like. So many good nuggets melted to several awful ones.

That said, the general idea of using XP to shape and direct player behavior/goals is great. Numenera does it in one of the worst possible ways (XP as both the "bennie" currency and as permanenr advancement currency), but other systems use it quite well. I love Dungeon World's stuff for example because it naturally generates less XP by having players roll 6- less often as they improve, so they don't nees an exponential curve in the math to get one in the results.

I don't disagree with any of this. Numenera is a traditional game designed by what a traditional designer thinks a narrative game is. I likewise think that the XP system as a source of bennies was one of the worst parts about the game. There are things that I like about the game, and I don't mind running it, but I have been disappointed by the lack of leap forwards in game rules or editions that really takes these commonly-cited rough spots into consideration.

Stonetop also has a neat work around XP and bennies. You don't level up until you get back to town. So if you have excess XP, you can use 2 XP to "Burn Brightly" for a +1 bonus after a roll has been made.

Is this from the new(er?) edition of Numenera? I remember the intense controversies over the original version's advice to literally change the world if the players ever thought they'd actually figured out something about the past. One of the other reasons I was incapable of actually enjoying my interactions with Numenera as a game system.

There is still supposed to be unexplainable mystery about the world and the past civilizations, but you can still figure out that if you pull a lever that water comes out of the tap. But that facet you dislike about Numenera is what I like about it though I would not go so far as to change the world if the players thought they figured out the past. Dune has a quote in the appendices - "Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe is always one step beyond logic" - and I think that Numenera attempts to embrace that ethos or sentiment.