XP As Will To Power?

[JoeGKushner]

Has anyone thought of XP as a A "Will to Power" model so to speak? Why elves who are hundreds of years old are eclipsed by humans in a matter of years? Why swordsmen who open up their own schools are surpassed by farm hands who struggle against orcs, then ogres, then trolls, then giants?

I was thinking that it could actually represent such a faction. Pitting one's life on the line and rising in actual power as opposed to scholastic training.

 

[The Edge]

Thats just about how I've always thought about it. At least when it comes to fantasy games it makes much more sense than 'experience' in its literal meaning. Everyone has 'power', and some have more than others. Gods have so much they practicly are power. Anyone can gain it, and if they know how to use it they can do just about anything with enough. eg Amazeing spells can be cast (such as wish with its XP cost).

 

[Insight]

I am of two minds on this issue.

First, in terms of 'experience points', I view that as something to drive the development of your story and your player characters. If you view things as such, you can ignore/handwave/obviate the need to worry about NPCs and how they get XP. They are just whatever level you want them to be to suit your story. So, in other words, NPCs do not use or gain experience points. They are what they are when you want them to be. The player characters are the only ones whose development matters anyway, so they are the only ones who need or track experience points.

Second, if you do want to try to figure out how people other than the PCs gain experience points, you first need to decide how common high-level characters are in your setting. If high-level characters are fairly common, you would want to come up with alternate experience point systems to simulate a peasant's work, a wizard's studies, a soldier's combat duties, etc.

But I'll still bring it back to the reason for tracking such things. The players likely don't care how your villain got to be a Wiz 10/Demonologist 10/Human Paragon 3, so why should you?

 

[Umbran]

I don't think of it as a will to power, because that would get in the way of the "reluctant hero" concept. How many XP is a function of what you've been doing, not what you want to have been doing.

I think of it more as a substance that accrues onto characters - a sort of "epicness" that the character accumulates.

 

[WayneLigon]

I think of it more as a substance that accrues onto characters - a sort of "epicness" that the character accumulates.

I usually look at it in reverse: it's a quality the heroes already have, though they may not recognize it. They are like statues of 'epicness' and XP chips away at the rough covering around them, eventually revealing what was there all along. People are usually born with 'epicness' though they may live painfully mundane lives all their life; nothing ever happens to them to scrape away that outer covering. Some do, though, and they usually wind up as adventurers.

(A corollary to this is that 'epicness' is a thing, so it can be granted, or taken away, or changed, or detected. This is what those swords who 'can only be removed by a true hero' go by.)

I had another GM use a similar model, except that only people with real souls even got 'XP'; they were the ones destined (or perhaps fated) to really make a difference. Most people walking around didn't have real souls; they just kind of rose up, lived their lives, then sank down into the big pot of slowly-simmering 'soul stew', no different than any other part of the broth. Metaphysically, they were walk-ons or 'Girl with Glasses'. They might struggle and strive and train but there was a ceiling they could never get past. People who through some means acquirred a real soul could gain XP and could go beyond that ceiling.

 

[Aust Diamondew]

I think of it as XP. Most adult evles in my games are at least level 3-4. Adult dwarves and gnomes are levels 2-3 and many adult humans, halfling and orcs gain level 2 fairly early on. NPCs (or PCs) can gain levels simply by training and living although you will gain levels much much slower in this way. I also limit PC level ups by having a more realistic amount of down time (or time when they're doing nothing that's worth gaining XPs). Typically PCs in my games will level up no more than 2-3 times in one in game year. And will sometimes even take a few years off. Villains or important events don't happen constantly in my games and I also tend to reduce XP slightly awards (and treasure equally) after the lower levels.

 

[JoeGKushner]

NPCs (or PCs) can gain levels simply by training and living although you will gain levels much much slower in this way.

But why?

If you have access to the best equipment and the best trainers, you tend to be one of the best. Boxers don't idle the hours away between bouts. Runners don't wait just for their one moment in the sun to run. In the old days, sword schools weren't invented by peopel who went out and killed bandits for fun and profit. (Well, not always...)

It's one of the reasons I was thinking of Will to Power. Why isn't training more effective?

 

[Umbran]

It's one of the reasons I was thinking of Will to Power. Why isn't training more effective?

Well, if you want training to be effective, as a DM you are in your rights to say, "Training is challenging yourself. Since you're meeting challenges, you earn XP, and go up levels." And suddenly, training is effective.

I don't do that for four basic reasons -

1) It means the heroes are not special. Anybody can (and will) get to where the heroes are just by practicing, without having history or stories behind them. That's not entertaining enough for me.

2) I think training should be able to get you up to the level of what a normal human can do, but not beyond that. Analogy to real-world training fails because mid to high level characters can do things that no real-world human could ever accomplish, no matter how hard they trained.

3) "Epicness" (which shares some similarities to Robert Jordan's "tav'eren") helps describe why the PCs go up against greater and greater challenges, and why low-level PCs generally don't run into things they cannot handle unless they are stupid. There's no particular reason why a mundanely trained 15th or 20th level fighter should not just encounter normal orc for all of his existance. There's no particular reason why all the 1st level characters don't meet great wyrms. If, having accrued (or revealed, in WayneLigon's case) "epicness" alters fate, so that these higher level people keep running into greater and greater challenges than the less-epic populace, all this is nicely explained.

4) Highly effective training is a disincentive to heroic action. This is similar to #1, above, but more about the mechanic than the esthetic. Sane people, given two routes to power, will take the safe one for as long as it is reasonable, they want to prepare well for a rough lifestyle. So, your basic character should, if they have a choice in the matter, train up to the point where training works well, and only then go out and seek their fortune. This, in essence, sets where "1st level" or "starting character" is.

 

[Aust Diamondew]

But why?

If you have access to the best equipment and the best trainers, you tend to be one of the best. Boxers don't idle the hours away between bouts. Runners don't wait just for their one moment in the sun to run. In the old days, sword schools weren't invented by peopel who went out and killed bandits for fun and profit. (Well, not always...)

It's one of the reasons I was thinking of Will to Power. Why isn't training more effective?

I see your point. Risking your life to gain XP shouldn't result in a greater gain than simply training in a non-lethal setting. Maybe battles should simply count as 'training' and only in a few circumstances actually grant more XP than actual training.

On the other hand 'Real life' experience can be more far more valuable than simply training. Who is a better general, a man who has led an army half a dozen times in battle or a man who has read 10,000 pages on the art of war? Probably the former. Though no doubt the latter with some 'real life' experience could be equally good if not better.

However there is also the matter of saftey in simply training versus going out and killing bandits. At the end of the day in dnd if your character gets killed fighting bandits your life goes on. However a NPC (or a person in real life) who gets killed fighting bandits life doesn't go on. I might be able to get 300XP in one day by defeating some bandits (and possibly die) or I could simply train that day and get maybe 3XP at little risk to my life for example.

 

[shilsen]

Keith Baker, in discussing his concept of PCs and the role of XP on the WotC Eberron boards, said that he simply views PCs as special in a way most NPCs are not. They accrue XP, go up in levels, and gain power in a way that most NPCs don't. Works for me. Call it a will to power, being chosen by the gods, etc.