XP/Leveling Up Variants?

[Malvoisin]

Hello,

I have heard that some DMs have done away with the traditional xp system, and simply inform their players as to when they level up. Has anyone tried this? How well does it work? And, how then would you handle things that depend of experience points, such as creating magic items?

I'd welcome ideas and discussion about this or any other variations on the standard experience system. Thanks!

 

[shilsen]

I've completely dropped the "XP by CR" system, but I haven't done away with XP. Instead, I simply award a fixed amount (usually 1,000 XP) to each PC per session. This has a lot of benefits for me. it saves me time since I don't need to calculate XP based on CR. I avoid all of the questions that one sees on these boards when a DM has an unsual situation and is trying to work out how much XP to award. I still have an XP total for things like item creation and other activities that use up XP (which I have a lot of IMC). It lets me keep PC advancement at a pace I'm comfortable with. And it has completely moved my players out of the mentality of combat having the benefit of providing XP, which for me is a good thing.

 

[mvincent]

One level each session.

(I had a DM do this and it worked out pretty well. In my own game, I've been meticulously calculating and recording everything in a spreadsheet... and it's always averaged out to 1 level per session). The disadvantage to this is that players that are behind on XP or using XP for magic never get to catch back up.

 

[Paraxis]

The thousand per session idea sounds good, but could you provide example of what you have none item makers spend xp on so everything keeps balanced. I would think that with a neat and clean system like 1,000 xp per session is nice but still having them spend xp on items sounds bad.

I do the normal CR method and keep it in mind when I make my modules, one level every 3-4 sessions is what I average.

One level a session just seems way out of whack unless its an all day thing I could see it if the session was 12 or more hours. My own games run about 3-4 hours.

 

[mvincent]

One level a session just seems way out of whack unless its an all day thing I could see it if the session was 12 or more hours. My own games run about 3-4 hours.

My sessions are typically 5 hours, but my group is likely more combat-centric and moves through encounters faster than most. For groups that move at a slower pace, 1/2 a level or even 1/3 a level per session could be appropriate.

1000 xp per session would mean almost no advancement at higher levels (assuming you don't scale it somehow according to their level). If you do scale it according to their level, you are still effectively doing what I proposed above (just with more math).

 

[Benimoto]

In a previous campaign, I've used the DMG variant for standard XP per session. I went with 300xp x level, with adjustments for people who had fallen behind in level to catch up quickly.

XP aren't such a huge pain to track, so it's a good idea to keep track of them to allow for things like character death or item creation of have an effect. But totalling up XP, and making sure the adventure you have in mind awards an approprate amount of XP usually involved so much fudging that I did away with it for that (and probably future) campaigns.

 

[Bad Paper]

Doesn't this belong in House Rules? It might get better play over there.

 

[shilsen]

The thousand per session idea sounds good, but could you provide example of what you have none item makers spend xp on so everything keeps balanced. I would think that with a neat and clean system like 1,000 xp per session is nice but still having them spend xp on items sounds bad.

I'm not sure why you think spending XP on items is bad. If someone falls a level behind, they will get 25% higher XP than people a level higher (that's approximately what the DMG system gives you for a difference of 1 level), so they should catch up soon. It hasn't come up yet.

1000 xp per session would mean almost no advancement at higher levels (assuming you don't scale it somehow according to their level). If you do scale it according to their level, you are still effectively doing what I proposed above (just with more math).

The PCs are currently 9th lvl, which means it'll take them 9 sessions to make 10th lvl, and then 10 to make 11th. I'm planning to cap out at 8-10 levels per session, so I'll up the XP accordingly. There's really little math involved, since I'll just up it to 1,500 or 2,000 XP as needed.

Doesn't this belong in House Rules? It might get better play over there.

Actually, I'd suggest asking about this in General Discussion.

 

[mvincent]

The PCs are currently 9th lvl, which means it'll take them 9 sessions to make 10th lvl, and then 10 to make 11th.

That's fine (especially if that works for you and your group), but you understand that is much slower than the norm?

The CR system seems to assume 4 encounters of equal CR to the average party level (for a party of four) per day (which is about one session), or about 12 such encounters per level (i.e. about 3 sessions per level).

Even that seems a bit on the low side (or for a beginning group), since a party should likely be handling groups of monsters with higher ECL's than their own level (example: a combined/boss encounter could easily equate to 2 or 3 regular encounters, otherwise it may not be a decent challenge).

My own group has been able to acquire a level per session for about 75% of the last 45 sessions (rotating DM's, covering three campaigns, and meticulously calculated in spreadsheets). For levels 1 through 7 they've been able to average a level per session 100% of the time.

 

[Animal]

My own group has been able to acquire a level per session for about 75% of the last 45 sessions

geez.. what level are they now?