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Pathfinder seems too combat heavy, but there are ways around that.
1: Full XP for social interaction. Everybody and everything should have an XP level. Convincing someone to let you join a caravan, act as their body guard for an expedition, or make friends with a monster could be worth as much as murder hoboing.
2: Advanced item making. If you gather all the ingredients for that potion of cure light wounds it not only won't cost gold pieces, but it will give you 1 XP for each GP you save.
3: On the job training. You have crafts and a profession. If you role play that job, you can get XPs in addition to your GPs paid. Charity work, by clerics and paladins get them just XPs of the full value. This is especially useful if the entire party lost levels from being raised or fighting undead.
Pathfinder seems too combat heavy, but there are ways around that.
1: Full XP for social interaction. Everybody and everything should have an XP level. Convincing someone to let you join a caravan, act as their body guard for an expedition, or make friends with a monster could be worth as much as murder hoboing.2: Advanced item making. If you gather all the ingredients for that potion of cure light wounds it not only won't cost gold pieces, but it will give you 1 XP for each GP you save.
3: On the job training. You have crafts and a profession. If you role play that job, you can get XPs in addition to your GPs paid. Charity work, by clerics and paladins get them just XPs of the full value. This is especially useful if the entire party lost levels from being raised or fighting undead.
I broadly agree with item 1 but not with items 2 and 3 as explained below.
Item 1 - Combat is one way that an encounter can be successfully resolved. Any other method that overcomes the encounter, including social interaction, active avoidance e.g. stealth or deliberately choosing an alternative route should also be rewarded. Perhaps not equally depending on the circumstances.Item 2 - This is applying skills to make resources go further, awarding XP as well is getting into the realms of double counting. Without awarding XP they have the potion and they still have the gold (and may have earned XP collecting the ingredients). If XP is awarded for crafting as well then they are gaining experience as a craftsman not as an adventurer, though see item 3 below.
Item 3 - You could ringfence XP awards for crafting to a separate Commoner or Expert class. I have homebrewed those classes so they don't gain any BAB, improved saves or hit points but do gain skill points and feats and ability score increases that in turn are used to further improve the skills. I have an age - level chart that I created but I believe some people have found 2XP per day works as a nice average for crafting. Finally, I have homebrewed my crafting system the outline of which is here.
I agree that pretty much any success should be awarded, how to do that in a fair and balanced manner is up for discussion.
I think crafting is part of adventuring. It supplies you with the things necessary for a successful adventure. If a PC successfully used diplomacy or other social skill to haggle down the price of gear, or steal a scroll, or such, I'd award that too. Basically, if you are using mechanics to overcome a problem, XP is rewarded.
Background skills could have their own separate pool of XP if you wanna go that route.
I guess it gets tricky if some PCs in a party are leveling faster than others if they have more skills at their disposal to creatively earn their XP.
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I’m in the “XP is already arbitrary, so just ditch it and level characters up when it makes sense for them to level up in the campaign” camp myself.
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I’m in the “XP is already arbitrary, so just ditch it and level characters up when it makes sense for them to level up in the campaign” camp myself.
Same here, as I think that XP are too much of an abstraction to be a good measure of roleplaying progression. Removing them already removes all those combat encounters from the table that you only have to gain XP without advancing the storyline in any meaningful way.
This said, if you want to use them, there's nothing to be said against using them for story awards or to give them out for other non-combat endeavors. You could also take a page out of 4Es skill challenge system and build non-combat encounters on that base.
I just read through a published module where the PCs are awarded 400xp for basically starting the adventure. This is the first published adventure I've read, not sure if that's the norm, but I did read a few reviews of the module that felt that the PCs level at an unrealistic rate compared to the pace of the story.
I'll just come out and say it. If the GM doesn't want to be there for crafting sessions, then they feel the PC doesn't need the XPs.
If a TPK puts the characters 2 levels behind the adventure path, then you can indeed handwave the missing levels. Put events on hold, have the characters craft and work for 2 weeks off screen, and rebuild their characters for 2 levels. But you can't blame the game if you pass up the roleplaying opportunities like that.
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I just read through a published module where the PCs are awarded 400xp for basically starting the adventure.
Don't know which module you're talking about, but I don't think that that's the norm for published modules. I think there has been a development to give out more story awards where PCs get experience without necessarily fighting, but even those take often the form of "if the PCs do this, then reward them with the same amount of XP as if they had beaten the NPC or monster in combat." Which means that they offer an alternative way to get those XP, but they aren't just dishing them out.
For example, in the first adventure of the Ruins of Azlant adventure path, the characters are expected to reach level 2 at the end of act 1. I just skimmed through the adventure (so I might have miscalculated), and from my read, a group of 4 PCs would exactly get the 8000 XP needed; from those, 2.200 XP are story awards (and I think none of them has the form I mentioned before) and there are still 11 possible combat encounters.
So I don't think that this adventure rushes you through level 1, and that's how I find it to be with most adventures I read.
There is a difference between roleplaying the events leading up to the adventure and hand waving it. Hopefully the module gave the GM the choice.
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Seems easier and more effective to get rid of XP.
Tying experience to crafting savings has some unpleasant side effects. Consider a dwarf wizard and a dwarf cleric of a crafting deity. The dwarf wizard puts their favored class bonus into speeding up crafting, gives their familiar the valet archetype to double crafting speed, and has a high Int bonus in order craft at double speed. The cleric can do none of those things, so the wizard earns way more XP.
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While I rarely use XP now, when I do I move to Quest or Goal based experience.
You gain experience for accomplishing objectives for example:
Goblins are attacking the town, make them stop.
Whether you make them stop by murdering goblins, finding the the evil that is organizing them and eliminate it, forging peace with the goblins through RP and Diplomacy doesn't matter. You only gain the XP reward when the job is done.
This has two effects:
1) Shifts the reward structure from individual challenges to larger goals.
2) Discourages players from trying to kill every single thing for experience, because you won't gain anything extra for doing more fighting. In fact, by being clever and bypassing encounters you maximize experience while minimizing resource costs.
I’m in the “XP is already arbitrary, so just ditch it and level characters up when it makes sense for them to level up in the campaign” camp myself.
I'm in a very similar camp, however while I (loosely) calculate XP progression it is not awarded unless 3 aspects of the game are met:
1) Did you defeat the bad guy / overcome the obstacle?
2) Did you work together and play the character as it was designed? IE: Were the players actively looking for ways to synergize skills, abilities, spells and whatever to create stronger win-win situations for each other, or were they only using these things for themselves? Was your 1/2 orc with an Int of 4 trying to playing chess and debate the fine points of theology or politics?
3) Did the actions of the player (and ultimately the party) drive forward the campaign in some way? Just because you killed a bunch things, does not make the battle significant.
At my table, it is only when all these conditions are met that the xp are awarded, typically at a lull point in action (which are staged to happened periodically anyway). At these points the players are allowed to visit their hometown (or similar down time opportunities) during which point they can upgrade or replace equipment, replenish supplies, level up, spend feats, etc.
I'm a little confused, here. Isn't experience awarded for overcoming a challenge? As in, in any way the players can manage?
There's a giant sleeping in the next room. The characters could try to sneak up on him and hack him to pieces. They could try to sneak past him and avoid him all together. They could try to hide his club in thd other room before they fight him, or maybe they could try and get him to surrender. They could set up some impromptu traps or illusions.
Whatever works, they overcame the challenge, and they should get the reward.
The 3rd edition Dungeon Master's Guide was very clear about this. Is Pathfinder not?
I like the idea of getting rid of experience all together, but my players usually like a tangible way to measure their progress from session to session.
Subsystems that involve downtime, whether they make it more efficient or more rewarding, are one of my least favorite aspects of tabletop role playing that have developed over the years. In my opinion, if characters have enough free time on their hands that they can seek out formal training or open up their own business, then the pacing of the story is too slow. All the great fantasy tales clip along too quickly for that; the enemy is hot on their heels, the fate of X is hanging in the balance, the planets are aligning.
I'm all for giving characters a chance to catch their breath and make reasonable preparations, but as a rule, I think you've got to keep the pressure on.
Where's that GM who's adventure path was ruined by an idiot undead who drained the party back 3 levels?
I guess if you don't use experience you can just say,"The game can't go forward unless I give them back the levels." so...that works.
Just don't plant your feet and say nothing exists outside the official adventures. You may paint yourself into a corner.
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Negative levels are easy enough to simulate with similar but different things like imposing a flat "global" penalty such as a - 1 to EVERYTHING, skills, hp/ level, AC, BAB, saves, etc. If that isn't enough raise the penalty to a -2 per negative level. These add up FAST and can really make you party take notice. Just don't over use this. It is irritating as hell watching something take apart your character if you cant do anything about it. One way to minimize this effect is to simply spread this around your party instead of your negative energy bad guy focusing on one party member, have them try to hit everyone within striking distance. Also don't use an AOE level drain, make it single target and only have it hit one guy per round. This allows for something to do after the fight (healing the guys which got screwed over by this attack) without devastating your whole party.
Now as for XP & Downtime it is entirely up to you. Quixote has stated he like games which never slow down, which is fine if that is the style of game play you are looking for. Dropping the XP however is simply another way of the DM saying "I'll keep track of all XP and let you know when you level." It is really no different.
The advantage of the DM controlling distribution of XP is you don't have party members at different levels which can really throw off trying to plan your adventures.
If you are looking for a RAW campaign I can tell you that such games play just fine. The real question is in trying to decide if you are happy with the way that such a game is played and what (if anything) you don't like about before you really set about the task of changing things.
One the topic of level drain, I'd also suggest making it VERY dramatic "I'll tear your soul apart!!". Maybe the level drain comes from getting hit with a cursed weapon such as seen with the Nazgul weapon from LOTR which really did a number on Frodo.
Where's that GM who's adventure path was ruined by an idiot undead who drained the party back 3 levels?
I guess if you don't use experience you can just say,"The game can't go forward unless I give them back the levels." so...that works.
Level drain doesn't work like that in Pathfinder.
You don't actually lose the levels. As Lazlo said, it's a status effect that imposes a penalty on the player per level drained, but those levels are still there.
The players don't have to "be given their levels back" because they've never been lost. They just need to scrounge up the money for a few Restoration spells.
Raise Dead, Reincarnate, and Resurrection work the same way, again changed from the way they functioned in 3rd Edition D&D. You don't actually lose a level when you come back from the dead, you just have the status effect of "level drain" permanently applied to you (as in, it doesn't go away on its own) until you spend the time, money, and spells to cure it.
Bestiary Energy Drain says,"If an attack that includes an energy drain scores a critical hit, it bestows twice the listed number of negative levels". Then it says'"On a failure the negative level becomes permanent. A separate saving throw is required for each negative level." I think the PCs had to make the throws at the reduced level and the dice were evil that day.
Getting back to the topic, let them roleplay seeking out an alter of Sarenrae, and placing their right hand, palm down, on the alter, till they take iD4 burning damage per negative level. The negative levels are removed, and the burns can be healed normally.
Why stop there? Personally I'm a fan of consequences and long term injuries and effects. Now don't get me wrong, these should always be plot line driven and never random. Getting perma-f**k'd because of a bad dice roll is not only dumb, but a fast way to have your players tell you to go screw yourself as they leave your gaming group.
That said, try this one on for size: You place your hand on the alter...and nothing happens, but you do get the distinctive feeling that the god / spirit / etc in quest has heard you and is judging you. That night you are visited by the deity in a dream asking what you are offering in return for the gift of their bless? Should the PC agree, they awaken the next morning to discover they are feeling better (up to the DM how much better). Perhaps 100%, perhaps only partially healed with the remaining portion being withheld until the PC's hold up their end of the bargain.
In the best <my PC's are whining voice> "But the book says I recover X number of stat damage per day of rest"... yeah, that sure is a mystery of why these wounds are not healing.
This is a great opportunity for a DM to get a wayward campaign back on track fast!
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Bestiary Energy Drain says,"If an attack that includes an energy drain scores a critical hit, it bestows twice the listed number of negative levels". Then it says'"On a failure the negative level becomes permanent. A separate saving throw is required for each negative level." I think the PCs had to make the throws at the reduced level and the dice were evil that day.
Getting back to the topic, let them roleplay seeking out an alter of Sarenrae, and placing their right hand, palm down, on the alter, till they take iD4 burning damage per negative level. The negative levels are removed, and the burns can be healed normally.
I highly suggest you looks up the definition of negative levels in Pathfinder. "Permanent" negative levels still do not actually decrease your level. They can also still be removed by restoration.
Crafting and working your profession are only nothing if you do not do the die rolls with the GM. If you consider taking 10 doing nothing, then don't allow it.
Doing it over the phone and online is ok, only if both parities agree to it. If the entire campaign is online chat, then of course that's ok.
If you craft or do a profession with others, you can roll for rumours. You can also make contacts. If the dwarf works the bellows at his cousins forge, the spellcasters have a place where they can get masterwork bracers at a modest discount.
To recap, roleplaying is not doing nothing. Combat is not the only roleplaying.