XP is way too high in 4th Edition!

[Goonalan]

I have been a d&d player since the 70's. I cannot believe the outragous XP that 4th edition gives to PC,s! Leveling up after only 8-10 encounters! Are you kidding me? I don't want Players leveling up after 50 encounters! I have alot of 1- 3rd level dungeons for my characters to explore. I cannot have them leveling up so fast. I am seriosly thinking of using 2nd edition xp for monsters. Is anyone else as upset as I am about this?

No, I didn't get upset I just talked to my players and told them I'd like to X sessions between levels- they said, 'ok', and er... that's what we did- took less than five minutes to resolve. Not really a biggie... certainly not something to get upset about.

From memory they completed 'Sellswords of Punjar' and a much expanded version of 'KOTS' by the time they got to level 3, with a few random/other encounters thrown in besides. We played out the Goodman Sellswords Trilogy alongside the WOTC Heroic Trilogy- very nice when you add the Goodman flavour and cover up the WOTC grind.

Cheers Goonalan

 

[Jhaelen]

I have been a d&d player since the 70's. I cannot believe the outragous XP that 4th edition gives to PC,s! Leveling up after only 8-10 encounters! Are you kidding me? I don't want Players leveling up after 50 encounters! I have alot of 1- 3rd level dungeons for my characters to explore. I cannot have them leveling up so fast. I am seriosly thinking of using 2nd edition xp for monsters. Is anyone else as upset as I am about this?

Errm, no. The most important question first: What do your players think?

I know, that _I_ would be upset if it took my pc 50 encounters to level up.

Why don't you just advance the monsters in your 1-3rd level dungeons? It's easy as pie in 4e.

Second, I think you're misremembering: In 2e and 3e it took precisely 13 encounters of an equal level to get from level 1 to level 2. Note, that 2e uses approximately a quadratic xp progression, while 3e and 4e use a linear progression. This means it took progressively longer to advance further, while it takes about the same time, now.

This is probably a matter of taste and might also depend on the setting you use, but again, I vastly prefer the linear progression.

 

[Neonchameleon]

I have been a d&d player since the 70's. I cannot believe the outragous XP that 4th edition gives to PC,s! Leveling up after only 8-10 encounters! Are you kidding me? I don't want Players leveling up after 50 encounters! I have alot of 1- 3rd level dungeons for my characters to explore. I cannot have them leveling up so fast. I am seriosly thinking of using 2nd edition xp for monsters. Is anyone else as upset as I am about this?

You mean the outrageous XP that every edition of D&D has given? 3e levelling was about as fast as 4e - and 1e levelling was actually slightly faster based on published modules, matching 1e module to its 3e conversion (remember you got XP for treasure back then). 2e I don't know so well - but in 2e apparently it was 13 encounters of equal level to level up rather than 10.

So is anyone else as upset as you are? Possibly. But they don't use D&D XP rules and that's one reason they've avoided them. And honestly I can't think of much more boring than exploring low level dungeon after low level dungeon. That said, speak to your players. If they are willing to go with 20-30% experience points or "Level up every X sessions" then just do that.

 

[Abstruse]

The group I DM (and sometimes play in) like to level fairly fast. This is an average of how it has gone:

Level 1-4: 1-2 sessions
5-8: 2-3 sessions
9-12: 3-4 sessions

This is pretty much what I experienced running a game. I had a group of 6-8 players depending on the week and, doing XP budgeting per the DMG, they got to 2nd at the end of the first session, 3rd at the end of the 3rd, 4th at the end of the next, 5th after two more sessions, 6th after three sessions (though one of those sessions was 80% RP), 7th after three more sessions, and a couple hit 8th before over the next three sessions and then the holidays killed the campaign.

I wasn't taking advantage of the quest rewards for XP though and since I had such a large group, I was throwing them up against much harder challenges (they also had a Cleric and a Shaman so they could take a ton of punishment and with 2-4 strikers, they could dish it out too). So that may have accelerated their leveling as well.

If you think they're leveling too fast, you can award XP however you want. You can even do away with it completely and just tell them when they level, which is used a lot by DMs with heavily story-based campaigns. However, keep in mind that the players may get frustrated if they don't feel like they're advancing, and most of the more fun and/or epic-feeling monsters aren't even available until they get to around 5th (beholders, giants, hydras, dragons that aren't fresh out of the egg).

 

[Klaus]

I have been a d&d player since the 70's. I cannot believe the outragous XP that 4th edition gives to PC,s! Leveling up after only 8-10 encounters! Are you kidding me? I don't want Players leveling up after 50 encounters! I have alot of 1- 3rd level dungeons for my characters to explore. I cannot have them leveling up so fast. I am seriosly thinking of using 2nd edition xp for monsters. Is anyone else as upset as I am about this?

I game once per month (if that much), so I level my PCs *every session*!

 

[GreyLord]

Second, I think you're misremembering: In 2e and 3e it took precisely 13 encounters of an equal level to get from level 1 to level 2. Note, that 2e uses approximately a quadratic xp progression, while 3e and 4e use a linear progression. This means it took progressively longer to advance further, while it takes about the same time, now.

Page and book where you got that 2e quadratic xp progression?

I don't recall that in any of the 2e books. It states more that it should take between 3-6 adventures, or up to 10 adventures, but ultimately is up to the DM for how much they earn with experience.

3 adventures (min suggested) typically was MORE than 13 encounters in 1e and 2e.

I suppose you could go with an adventure per session...but even then I think it would balance out to MORE than 13 encounters to level...though there really wasn't any such thing as "encounters" per se back then.

PS: Just to clarify, a DM COULD as per the rules give them as much XP as he wanted to have them level in ONE encounter if he wanted...just they could only level once per time XP was awarded. However, as per the rules...with the monster XP...it could take quite a lot of battles to get to the next level. Treasure wasn't inherently given just because you killed a monster...though if you were smart enough to figure out their lair...and then to their main treasure you could get the XP for it.

That could be up to several hundred goblins or orcs that you'd deal with just to find it in the first place however.

 

[jester_gl]

In 2nd edition there was xp guideline per player in addition to all the xp gained from killing monster. Everyone got 1 xp per gp of treasure, casters got 100xp/spell level casted in a useful way, warrior got 25xp/HD of the monster they killed solo, rogue got twice the xp for treasure and only required about half the xp the other class needed.

In the Night Below boxed set, a three books adventure that got from 1 to 16 or so, they suggested using these guideline. I was surprised at how fast the group was leveling, and just as much surprised when the book said the party was supposed to be around level 7 by now...and they were.

A first level cleric with average wisdom had 3 first level spell. If he stayed home and healed injured person with these spell, he was level 2 in 5 days of doing next to nothing.

 

[UnknownAtThisTime]

I have been a d&d player since the 70's. I cannot believe the outragous XP that 4th edition gives to PC,s! Leveling up after only 8-10 encounters! Are you kidding me? I don't want Players leveling up after 50 encounters! I have alot of 1- 3rd level dungeons for my characters to explore. I cannot have them leveling up so fast. I am seriosly thinking of using 2nd edition xp for monsters. Is anyone else as upset as I am about this?

Am I "upset" about this and is it "outrageous"? No.
Do I think XP is just a tad high? Yes, I do.
As DM is there an easy way to adjust this? Sure is!

 

[Dausuul]

*insert joke about walking to the dungeon uphill in the snow both ways*

Okay, now we've got that out of the way...

I recommend simply adjusting your XP awards. If you want PCs to level up after 50 encounters instead of 10, cut your XP awards to 1/5 normal. Simple as that. (Or do what a lot of us have taken to doing and just tell your players they level up when you damn well feel like it.)

Second, I think you're misremembering: In 2e and 3e it took precisely 13 encounters of an equal level to get from level 1 to level 2. Note, that 2e uses approximately a quadratic xp progression, while 3e and 4e use a linear progression. This means it took progressively longer to advance further, while it takes about the same time, now.

You're both misremembering and getting the math wrong, dude. First of all, in 2E, it did not take "precisely 13 encounters" to level up--it didn't take precisely anything to level up, because different classes leveled at different rates. At 2,000 XP, the fighter was level 2, the cleric was level 2 plus a bit, the thief was more than halfway to level 3, and the poor wizard was still poking along at level 1.

Second, 2E and 4E both have roughly exponential (geometric) XP tables; the amount of XP required to reach level N+1 is approximately K times the amount of XP required to reach level N. In 2E, K is 2, although you see a lot of variation from the baseline at levels in the high single digits, and sometime around level 9-12 (depending on class) it levels off and becomes a linear (arithmetic) progression, with fixed XP per level*. In 4E, K is the fourth root of 2. There's some rounding to make the numbers look pretty, but otherwise it's a smooth exponential curve all the way up.

3E has a quadratic XP table. The amount of XP required to reach level N is equal to (N^2 - N) * 500.

[size=-2]*Side note: This leveling-off would in theory cause a 2E PC's advancement to start accelerating once you hit name level; you continue to fight tougher foes and get bigger treasures as you level up, with correspondingly larger XP awards, but you only need the same amount of XP to advance. In practice, the difference wasn't noticeable, at least to me. But then, I never got past level 14 or so. The folks with characters in the 50+ range might disagree.[/size]

 

[Piratecat]

We ignore xp and level up every 5 sessions. That's about twice as fast as my 3e campaign, but it's perfect for finishing the campaign (lvls 1-30) in almost exactly 6 years.

If you don't like the XP speed, just slow it down. It's simple to do and doesn't do anything other than make your game more fun for you.