I have always liked to give a little extra experience points towards the end of a D&D campaign (or for any game that involves XP, really). Not a ton of it mind you, but usually a decent chunk to award the MVP character or player of the campaign.
In last weekend's rainy day game, I decided to have a little fun with it. I would let the players vote on a 10,000 experience point award (not really a lot in this now high level campaign) for one character. I gave them each a scrap of paper with their name on it, and told them to write down a character other than their own. The pieces would then go in a cup and a reading of votes (like on Survivor) would take place. They would use whatever reason they wanted. They could vote for Andy's Vaidno the Bard because Andy is our usual host (although Dan had us over that day). They could vote for a PC who was close to going up a level. They could vote for whatever reason struck their fancy. No group discussion was allowed.
It was fun reading off the votes. It was less fun when three characters each got two votes; Andy's Vaidno, Big Ben's high elf MU Lumarin, and Little Ben's gnome Ormac. I could understand the first two; these were usually the forefront leaders of battle and decision making. But little Ormac, run by fairly quite Ben, was a head scratcher for me. Everybody had a good laugh around the table at the three-way tie, but I just sighed and said "Ok, I have checked-out emotionally from this." That got another thunderous round of haw haw's.
Anyway, I made the popular decision of awarding 6,000 to each PC voted for, which was enough for little Ormac to go up. Then we got on with the game.
So...have you ever awarded XP at the end of a campaign, or in my little dramatic fashion as in this last game?
Still Out There, a Short Update
8 years ago
I've awarded chunks of XP to players in my current LL campaign based on avoiding very stupid decisions. They're newbies and I want to explicitly reinforce good decision making.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was a kid, our DM (also a ~13 year old) would give us XP for going across the street and ringing the pretty girl's doorbell, so that the rest of the group could watch her come to the door. The bonus wasn't much, and it didn't have anything to do with the game, but it kinda made you a mini-legend. :)
From time to time I have awarded XP to players after a long campaign or adventure. It's a great way to boost morale and give them a little more flexibility with training.
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