Earning Experience

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SmootRK
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Earning Experience

Post by SmootRK »

I use a few different techniques for giving out XP. But I would like to hear some other creative ways that Game Masters award experience points. FYI, some suggestions will likely get inserted into my House Rules Document if they work well with my other tweaks.

Here are a couple that I use (other than the general fighting of monsters).

- I award XP for the encountering of a monster, and not necessarily the killing of the monster (with interaction, even if that interaction is stealth to avoid/bypass). This allows a party with strengths other than pure fighting power to be successful too.

- I award XP for creation of magical items. roughly 1xp for 10gp spent to create, but some variance exists. Some (rich) players will dump excessive amounts into the process - so I base it on a subjective value instead. 1/2 experience for a failed attempt, as something is learned in the process... think Thomas Edison failed hundreds of times before making a commercial light bulb possible.

- I award XP for spell research. Pretty much the same process as magical item creation. 1/2 for failures.


So, what are some other ways to get XP into the hands of the players?
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Dimirag
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Re: Earning Experience

Post by Dimirag »

Overcoming difficulties: Killing/avoiding a monster (but only once in case of multiple evasions or evade and later kill the monster).

Role-play: Making conversations with NPC's and smart/fun thinking rather than use only blunt offensive force.

Training: If the character finds a suitable teacher he can pay money and spend time training (this is some kind of alternate "treasure/gold XP" mechanic.

Adventuring/Completing Quests & Tasks: For adventures that doesn't have monsters and relies on gathering info, acquiring objects, etc.

Traps & hazards: Overcoming a Trap or Hazard (when found and not activated)
Sorry for any misspelling or writing error, I am not a native English speaker
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Joe the Rat
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Re: Earning Experience

Post by Joe the Rat »

Achieving goals and objectives (regardless of combat or treasure) is always a consideration.

The real fun here comes in that said objectives can be personal. To borrow a term, Subplots. You're looking for your long-lost sister. You owe someone a debt. You have a secret identity to maintain. You've caught a magical malady with is having odd effects on your spellcasting. You have to find the man who killed your father. You want a cappuccino. This overlaps significantly with roleplaying, obviously.
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Dimirag
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Re: Earning Experience

Post by Dimirag »

Yes, it allows for other adventure types like making a Cleric do religious workings, charity work, etc. a Thief do community work or infiltrate into some secure place, a Magic User travel to acquire some rare magical ingredients or study some obscure books...
Sorry for any misspelling or writing error, I am not a native English speaker
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SmootRK
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Re: Earning Experience

Post by SmootRK »

I like that personal goal thing (or group sort of thing). I will be adding in some language to describe this sort of way of awarding xp. I think that I am specifically going to say something that the rewards (xp) come from the interaction with the world, npcs, and each other. Goals can be small or large, and should have commensurate awards although goals to acquire certain aspects of personal power o things such as specific magical items may have smaller rewards (as the acquisition of the magical item itself generally empowers the character).

I would love to see a fairly lengthy list of some example 'goals' and their rewards. This will help to form a baseline of what to expect for the efforts and to provide a set of ideas that players can expand upon.
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MedievalMan
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Re: Earning Experience

Post by MedievalMan »

When I use quest style rewards (very rarely these days) I use a simple formula to determine XP gained.

Easy Quest: 50 x average party level
Moderate Quest: 100 x average party level
Hard Quest: 150 x average party level

Actually determining what difficulty the quest is the hardest part of course.
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Dimirag
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Re: Earning Experience

Post by Dimirag »

Instead of Alignment (never really like it) I'll use Concept and Drive.
Concept is basically the general character idea, playing against your Concept can make you loose some XP
Drive is the character motivation, and if you follow your drive at the expenses of some harm or risk you'll get some extra XP
Sorry for any misspelling or writing error, I am not a native English speaker
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Steveman
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Re: Earning Experience

Post by Steveman »

I use XP for treasure found (and returned to a reasonably safe place) as the source of the lion's share of an adventurer's Experience, however, in The Shining Empires that shifts slightly to XP from treasure presented to the character's Lord, family or the gods of their shrine.

Combat and Roleplaying Experience are still gained, but most levels comes from prying the gemstone eyes out of the cursed idol than from killing the lizardmen who guarded it.
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SmootRK
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Re: Earning Experience

Post by SmootRK »

Steveman wrote:I use XP for treasure found (and returned to a reasonably safe place) as the source of the lion's share of an adventurer's Experience, however, in The Shining Empires that shifts slightly to XP from treasure presented to the character's Lord, family or the gods of their shrine.

Combat and Roleplaying Experience are still gained, but most levels comes from prying the gemstone eyes out of the cursed idol than from killing the lizardmen who guarded it.
Your 'tribute XP' is sorta like 'buying xp/training' that I do. I like that... but I think it fits better in that milieu (Asian setting where family/clan/organization and honor).

However, I think that I will add it to the mix for my house-rules, but stipulated that one must be a Knight (subclass) or have sworn some allegiance in a similar way... which carries its own burdens/responsibilities. I think the big difference between the tribute xp vs training xp is time (and/or trainer). Being able to pay it in tribute removes the time factor that must be dealt with in training situations... but one must be able to somehow pass the treasure on to the appropriate NPC/Lord to acquire the XP... preferably in a symbolic or ceremonial way (ie in the lord's court).

Nice Idea!
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purpleplatypus
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Re: Earning Experience

Post by purpleplatypus »

GP spent (not just found), and spent on things that don't directly contribute to adventuring at that, are planned to be the main source of XP in my forthcoming BFRP game. Players always have the option of simply calling this "training", but I'm hoping my players will come up with some more interesting and character-revealing explanations for this conversion of money into XP.

I'm thinking of adding a series of exploration-based goals along the lines of "reach the second level of the Caverns of Thracia two different ways" or "Find the secret room that connects areas B and C of the Caves of Chaos". Sort of like quests, but the players may or may not even know they're on them, though they'll be aware of the general idea that such goals exist.

Monsters will be worth the usual XP. That's for neutralizing them as threats, which doesn't have to mean killing them (though I anticipate that will be the most common method).
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