XP as dated?
Relique du Madde
Adventurer
The problem with that system (or at least your one line description) is that playing the game essentially becomes a job since your character's pay (level) depends on the hours you "worked" (played) and not how they spent their time.
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I've always hated XP. It seems that it only serves to take people out of the game mentality. It makes me feel like I am in a very slow video game.
It rewards what you want it to reward so instead of keeping up with a bunch of numbers to kill creatures or count money I would rather have them focus on playing their characters.
I could spend all of my time adjusting numbers of creatures to match a certain amount of XP per session to have them level at the rate I wish or I could write a story.
The way I do leveling is that you level every four sessions you are there for. If we are meeting less then once a week then it could go to every three sessions.
It's simple and it means that when you choose to kill a monster then it is because you need to and not because you want to level. The choices are only for in game reasons.
It rewards what you want it to reward so instead of keeping up with a bunch of numbers to kill creatures or count money I would rather have them focus on playing their characters.
I could spend all of my time adjusting numbers of creatures to match a certain amount of XP per session to have them level at the rate I wish or I could write a story.
The way I do leveling is that you level every four sessions you are there for. If we are meeting less then once a week then it could go to every three sessions.
It's simple and it means that when you choose to kill a monster then it is because you need to and not because you want to level. The choices are only for in game reasons.
Lwaxy
Cute but dangerous
Exactly. I used to be tempted to deduct XP for needless killing, and occasionally did.
GhostBear
Explorer
I remember old games which gave XP amounts for killing, for example, sheep. It was a minimal amount, but a player thought he was going to be clever and he spent all his accumulated wealth to buy a large herd of sheep, then slaughtered them, expecting an XP boost. He was very unhappy when that didn't happen and all he had to show for his efforts was a field of bloody wool.
That event, I think, is was really soured me to any kind of RAW XP progression.
If you go by RAW and provide level-appropriate combat encounters on a regular basis (even once a week in game time) it's possible to have epic level characters within a few years' of in-game time.
Does it really make sense that a level 1 wizard would roam the countryside for a year and come back with the power to annihilate an entire city with a wiggle of his finger? To me, that is pretty ridiculous.
To get around it, you're forced to provide lots of low-level encounters that provide minimal (if any) XP and space out significant encounters time-wise. Or you can toss out the XP RAW, which is my preference. I dole out levels when it seems appropriate.
The GM that I typically play under cuts XP rewards down to 1/10 of their normal value. I asked him about it, and he says that he still pretty much gives levels when he thinks it is appropriate, too. He just uses the XP because some of the other guys like the sense of progression. It's really a ruse just to keep them from complaining, but they don't have to know that.
As a player, I'm probably in the extreme minority, but XP and levels just aren't a big deal to me. I'd rather enjoy playing my character and trust my GM to provide encounters appropriate to my party's capabilities. Going 20 sessions without any mechanical advancement is fine with me if the game is fun.
Tolerance to math seems to vary greatly. I think it's a fair system, and dead easy to calculate in Excel. Other don't use Excel all day long like me, though.
mcbobbo
Explorer
If that year included nothing other than plying his craft, I'd find it ridiculous that he not get better at it. And if your progression along the wizard track runs you into quadratic power issues, you might take that up with the game system rather than XP rewards in general.
Put it this way, would a pit fighter who did nothing but fight for his very life for a year solid somehow not discover the methods for killing with ease?
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