If it is a problem, it has been with me since I was a kid. We played a lot in the 80's, but using D&D's experience rules just took too damn long for a PC to go up. Didn't matter if we played every week or every day; it just seemed to take too long to me.
I've always done my best to go by the book where characters are concerned, but I was never able to resist fudging experience. Even though I always gave copious amounts for things like role-playing and entertaining me, it just never seemed like enough.
When I started a new group last year (after several years off to pursue more interest in my lint collection), we decided that three to three and a half hours on a Wednesday night would be best for our adult schedules. So now it was going to take forever and a day for a character to go up, right? Screw that.
First off, since the mid-90's I have let 1st level PC's go up to 2nd level in their first game. Didn't matter if we play for three hours or half that. Your weakling went out, looked in a hole, and swung a sword at whatever lurked inside, then *wham* you are now second level as the chairs are being folded up and the beer bottles hauled out to the bin. Nobody spent more than one session at 1st level.
I fudge the hell out of exp. after that 1st level. I usually take a look at how much a PC needs to go up, think about all that they did in the game and what challenged them and what life experiences they had, then jot down a number I think is right. I don't look in a book. Sometimes it's big, sometimes it's small. In the last game a 5th level female PC lost her virginity. I gave her almost 5 grand for that (a guy would get twice that. C'mon, it's tougher for guys).
Some of the estimates I see online indicate around 13 - 15 game sessions to go up. Man, if only there was that kind of free time in the world. Right now saying I run 24 session a year would be a generous number. In the better part of the 90's, when I ran 5-8 hour sessions once a month at most, people would almost never go up in a campaign unless I fudged it.
I like for it to take 3-6 game to go up after 1st level. Getting a level around every 2-3 months or thereabouts doesn't seem like overkill to me. After about 24 or so sessions since we started late last year, the highest character is at 8th level. 8th level after one year...no crime has been committed, has it?
I think a trade-off in my games is that I tend to end a campaign at around 8th or 9th level, then those guys go into "semi-retirement" and a new campaign with new characters gets started. I have no "end game." Very often, "retired" PC's get dragged into the current campaign at a certain point. The exception to that may be my current campaigns change of direction into a second year. I'm sending those now high level dudes into the Night Below adventure. Imagine how fast they will go up now!
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24 sessions in to my Mutant Future campaign and the highest level character is level 6.
ReplyDeleteI think I use pretty much the same method of calculating experience that you do - I think about what the party did and pick a number, maybe comparing that with what I gave them for previous sessions (I keep a log of each session that contains the names of the players present, a one sentence synopsis of what happened and the amount of experience that I awarded for the session). I do not look in a book, I don't give experience for treasure, I just pick a number that seems right.
I use standard experience points for monsters and treasure, with the occasional bonus for accomplishing something worthwhile. (Yes, that's highly subjective) Usually, bonus awards are related to exploration, especially if we have a session where they explored or did problem solving, but there weren't any monsters or treasure (or there were monsters but they circumvented all combat.)
ReplyDeleteI haven't been counting sessions, but we've been playing once a week since June 9th of this year and have only missed one week. The characters are all around 5th level, but one of those 5th level characters is a magic-user who is nearing 6th level if that's any indication. (Everyone else in the group has lost at least one character, for which I assign an experience penalty. One character also abandoned his class, which effectively restarted him.)
I do think that levels come more slowly in the older editions, and individual levels carry less reward than latter editions of D&D. However, for some reason, this group doesn't seem to be as...antsy... about leveling up as prior groups. I would suggest that the lighter mechanics of the older rules and my current campaign's emphasis on exploration might have more than a little to do with that.
Someone in the blogosphere suggested a method that keeps sticking with me. One adventure per level being attained. e.g. 2 adventures gets you to 2nd level from 1st; another 3 adventures gets you from 2nd to 3rd, and so on.
ReplyDeleteDefine adventures as you will. Looking at a hole and swinging a sword at its resident might be one adventure or a half. A big epic game session might count as two adventures or even three. And I suppose losing your virginity, or a truly excellent attempt should count as one as well.
Your post inspires a couple of thoughts...
ReplyDeleteFirstly, I've only found a problem with by-the-book experience in campaigns with low amounts of combat. Though a small amount of fudging of XP has been common in pratically every campagin I've played in.
Secondly, your comment about a female PC lossing her virginity and about rewarding a male character more ...
Such casual sexism does no one any favours. It just makes you sound like a jerk which is a shame because the rest of the article is really good.
Did you consider awarding the female PC more XP for not getting pregnant? After all, it is so much easier for a male PC not to get pregnant.
Would you award more XP to female PC geting married than a male PC as it is far harder to get a man to commit to a relationship than a women?
RPGs is a male dominated hobby with a very poor image. Casual sexism does not help this situation.
Here's a suggestion:
ReplyDeleteFigure out how much XP is required to take the characters one quarter of the way to the next level. Let's call this total our Minimum XP Goal (MXG).
If they earn less XP than the MXG, then they get the MXG instead. If the XP earned is greater than the MXG, the characters get the actual earned XP.
Under this method, you are guaranteed an advancement every four sessions, if not more frequently.
Just a Thought,
Flynn
tregenza, no offense, but first get a sense of humor, and second try to look at the world with a sense of what really goes on in it, rather than some left wing "we are all the same" perspective.
ReplyDeleteAnybody in the real world who doesn't think that a woman can get laid whenever she wants to, and that most guys no matter their looks have to at least put some work and effort into it, is deluding themselves. Big time.
Flynn: I like that idea.
ReplyDelete