PCs can gain experience without fighting enemies. There are lots of adventure paths that say things like, "If the PCs befriend the azata, award them 3200 experience as if they had beaten her in combat."
Why shouldn't NPCs get experience for achieving their own goals?
Also, you get a hundred experience for killing a cat. The guy who wants to open his own restaurant can level up that way.
If they haven't earned the levels, they shouldn't have them.
The only problem with this is that according to the rules, you can earn levels by facing challenges. Not only is it not stated anywhere that the challenges must be combats, or even that they must be life or death, but the AP are full of possibilities for xp by persuading someone to do something that helps you.
* If you find the secret room, gain 250 xp
* If Jeremiah is made friendly, gain 350 xp (and some wine)
* If you successfully persuade the Colonel to give you his chicken recipe, gain 750 xp.
et cetera.
So Matthew is correct that Jamie the sous-chef can get xp by killing cats -- but he should also get xp by negotiating a good deal with the miller for flour, by impressing the Lord Privy Toastrack by successfully catering Lord Sandwich's bridal shower, or simply by practicing saucisse minuit until he gets it right. Basically, by facing the ordinary challenges of his ordinary life, which will nevertheless allow him to master the skills of a second-level (and higher) character.
AP assumes fast. Seems just right for my group.AP's use medium. The only one that uses fast now is RotRL Anniversary Edition
Really? Hmm. That might pose a problem. Anyway, I'm in my early 30s, been playing for over 25 years (started at age 7) and medium track is too slow for me or anyone I play with tbh. A level every 2ish sessions averaged out over 20 levels is the ideal pace and that's slow compared to the old days. Does this mean I have to re write reign of winter if I use fast advancement?
Does this mean I have to re write reign of winter[...]?
I have never seen a published adventure that pleased everyone. I have never seen a published adventure that pleased anyone perfectly.
So without bothering to comment on any other aspect of your question, you will need to rewrite any published adventure that you run.
A business leader gains cleric levels?
I am confused.
The monasteries and abbeys were businesses. At Rievaulx Abbey for example the Cistercians had 10,000 sheep (wool being the big business of thee early middle ages), they developed land management to optimise the number and the iron industry to shear the wool. They also had hunting and fishing interests.
The point I was making was that a non-adventuring cleric would develop experience and expertise outside of life and death scenarios. These would inform and add to character 'level'.
No, I know that. How does managing the bookkeeping around sheep, make you into a powerful cleric?
It doesn't make sense to me. If you want to blend irl into the game, it has to make sense. Are you saying doing bookkeeping for a church should level someone in cleric in your setting? Overseer of the wool industry as unlocking flame strike? I don't follow.
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If they haven't earned the levels, they shouldn't have them.The only problem with this is that according to the rules, you can earn levels by facing challenges. Not only is it not stated anywhere that the challenges must be combats, or even that they must be life or death, but the AP are full of possibilities for xp by persuading someone to do something that helps you.
* If you find the secret room, gain 250 xp
* If Jeremiah is made friendly, gain 350 xp (and some wine)
* If you successfully persuade the Colonel to give you his chicken recipe, gain 750 xp.et cetera.
So Matthew is correct that Jamie the sous-chef can get xp by killing cats -- but he should also get xp by negotiating a good deal with the miller for flour, by impressing the Lord Privy Toastrack by successfully catering Lord Sandwich's bridal shower, or simply by practicing saucisse minuit until he gets it right. Basically, by facing the ordinary challenges of his ordinary life, which will nevertheless allow him to master the skills of a second-level (and higher) character.
The normal challenges of everyday life, should not make high levels common as dirt. Unless you want a game where everyone that is 40 is level 15. If high levels are so common, then it can make adventuring and low level adventurers seem insignificant and really weak. Why don't all these level 15s solve all the problems hmmm? A pack of middle aged level 15 experts could deal with a goblin problem.
An abstraction that should make some sense. If you want all the middle aged to have a great level, well, the players aren't going to be exceptional for a very very long time.
If you want them to be skilled, commoner or experts. If you think they deserve heroic abilities, pc classes. If they have not earned such exemplary abilities, a dm could think carefully about whether they should have them.
The normal challenges of everyday life, should not make high levels common as dirt.
True. But the solution to that is to not have high levels as common as dirt, not to say that the only way to make someone high level is through combat.
So the best swordsman in the kingdom, hasn't done adventuring?
The mightiest barb has not raided dungeons and tombs?
The greatest paladin has not gone on a crusade against evil liches?
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If you want them to be skilled, commoner or experts.
But, as you just pointed out, a pack of 15th level experts can deal with the goblin hordes.
The problem isn't with leveling out of combat, it's with excessive leveling. If everyone's level 15, then being 13th level isn't impressive. If you want characters to feel special at 6th level, then no one around them should be higher than about 8th, and most people should be 3rd or below. I consider that to be appropriate and also realistic.
But the flip side of that is that if the players are special at 6th level, by 15th level they will be GODS and that needs to be accounted for as well. If the highest level expert in the world is 8th, then I can easily be the best tailor in the world by a huge margin simply by maxing out the appropriate Craft skill.
So the best swordsman in the kingdom, hasn't done adventuring?
Well, if he's been running a fencing salon in Paris for the past twenty years, he's not had time to go adventure.
The mightiest barbarian has probably been sitting on the throne collecting tribute from the lesser tribes, precisely because they don't want him to start raiding them.
The normal challenges of everyday life, should not make high levels common as dirt. Unless you want a game where everyone that is 40 is level 15.
I think there are some numerical issues here that might help. Basically, "how fast do you level without adventuring?" I agree you don't want a game where everyone who is 40 is level 15, but neither do you want a game where everyone who is 40 (or 70) is level 1. Somewhere between those extremes lies common sense.
For an illustrative example, I could propose that (human) NPCs gain one NPC level every five years of normal life, starting at age 15. This would make your 40 year olds level 8, and the 75 year old sage is a level 13 adept. If you think that's too fast, make it one level per ten years and Jamie will hit level 2 at 25, level 3 at 35, and will be a 7th level expert at 75.
Or we could follow some sort of quadratic progression; it takes X years to go from level X to X+1. This means that Jamie is level 5 by the time he hits 25 (almost everyone you meet is level 5 or more, basically), but that you only hit level 10 at age 60, and almost no one lives to level 12. If you don't like that, adjust the numbers accordingly.
What kind of level distribution do you want in your world? If you want the average level to be three or below, you can still make sure that journeymen are level 1, masters are level 2, and legendarily skilled master craftsmen are level 3. If you want the average level to be 10, adjust as you see fit.
I think that some kind of numerical progression for ordinary life makes a lot of sense and solves the problem of "only ex-adventurers can be good enough cooks to work for the Royal Kitchen," while simultaneously limiting the number of 18th level fry cooks and night watchmen. Most importantly, since none of these limitations apply to adventuring levels, this still explains why PCs are special; a PC wizard can cast 9th level spells after a year of adventuring, or a century of study in the tower.
Really? Hmm. That might pose a problem. Anyway, I'm in my early 30s, been playing for over 25 years (started at age 7) and medium track is too slow for me or anyone I play with tbh. A level every 2ish sessions averaged out over 20 levels is the ideal pace and that's slow compared to the old days. Does this mean I have to re write reign of winter if I use fast advancement?AP assumes fast. Seems just right for my group.AP's use medium. The only one that uses fast now is RotRL Anniversary Edition
Fast takes about 10 fight, and medium takes about 13 fights to level assuming you only fight APL=CR opponents IIRC.
The slow progression has is about 17 fights I think...
Well since I am bored I guess I can pick a level and do the math to be sure. If you use Reign of Winter you should be ok with medium. Most books give you about 2 levels before the next book starts. The fast progression might have you rewriting boss fights and adjusting treasure depending on how good your group is.
The math for going from level 9 to level 10
CR 10 monster = 9,600 4 man party= 2400 per character 5 man party=1920 per character
Slow 160000-115000=45000 4 man 18.75 fights 5 man 23.4
Medium 10500-75000=30000 4 man 12.5 5 man 16.625
Fast 71000-50000=21000 4 man 8.75 5 man 10.9275
Now of course this assumes all APL=CR fights. Traps and some social encounters award XP so it will go up and down at times.
Does this mean I have to re write reign of winter[...]?I have never seen a published adventure that pleased everyone. I have never seen a published adventure that pleased anyone perfectly.
So without bothering to comment on any other aspect of your question, you will need to rewrite any published adventure that you run.
Good point.. :)
Or don't. Make your NPCs at levels appropriate for the game and the world and don't focus too much on how the rules abstractions govern it. People learn things at different rates. Most settle into a rut and probably don't gain much more. Some keep learning.
It seems kind of silly to backfit rules about how fast people level so that you get the right distribution of levels in your world. Just make them up.
Fair enough. The main reason I proposed numerical rules is because there seems to be a huge middle ground between "15th level railway guards" and "no one levels without combat EVAR," that would provide a much more satisfactory and realistic world. And numerical rules can provide a slightly more principled explanation for why the Royal Astronomer has a zillion -- or five -- levels of diviner without ever leaving his observatory.
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I am enjoying the side paths that people have taken this discussion. Especially the comments about NPCs "leveling up" without adventuring. Some great posts there.
As far as my comment about being "the best swordsman on the continent" being hostile to players, I find that somewhat humorous. If a player wants to view themselves as an "awesome swordsman" and strut around bragging about their mastery of the sword, that is an entirely different thing than actually being the actual "best swordsman on the continent."
Assuming that we are talking about Pathfinder here, it should be assumed that there is a level 20 fighter, ranger or other character swinging a sword around somewhere on the continent. So if your character isn't level 20, it should be assumed that your character isn't close to the "best swordsman on the continent" and probably not even the "best swordsman in the city" if the city is of any significant size.
As far as the whole discussion around how NPCs develop their own levels, this is one of my issues with some of the game assumptions that people have. The idea that NPCs must have, or even should have developed skills, abilities, even LEVELS the same as PCs.
This is a sort of fundamental game design assumption issue where some people feel that NPCs should be treated exactly the same as PCs. I don't feel that way. NPCs are not PCs, and how they got their skills or abilities, in my humble opinion, is really not relevant to how the players develop the skills or abilities of their characters. The rules for PC development are too restrictive for my purposes of NPC development. I might have an NPC who became a great warrior by making a pact with a demon, for example. Or who was granted powers by a deity. Or who is some sort of mutant.
I feel no compulsion whatsoever to have my NPCs follow any rules about how they got to be what they are. They just need to be consistent with the story line and a challenge to the players. Everything else is just bookkeeping.
If you want them to be skilled, commoner or experts.
But, as you just pointed out, a pack of 15th level experts can deal with the goblin hordes.
The problem isn't with leveling out of combat, it's with excessive leveling. If everyone's level 15, then being 13th level isn't impressive. If you want characters to feel special at 6th level, then no one around them should be higher than about 8th, and most people should be 3rd or below. I consider that to be appropriate and also realistic.
But the flip side of that is that if the players are special at 6th level, by 15th level they will be GODS and that needs to be accounted for as well. If the highest level expert in the world is 8th, then I can easily be the best tailor in the world by a huge margin simply by maxing out the appropriate Craft skill.
I agree, yep, a lot to factor in.
Forgotten realms did it its way, people spread out over the levels, mostly low or middle for those of note, a surprising number of level 9s but there is only a small group of badasses at the truly high levels.
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I think that for me, it depends on how many levels it takes for my build to begin to resemble my intended concept.
I generally have a solid thematic idea, though not necessarily a set-in-stone roleplaying direction, when I begin to play a character.
While I have a blast in implementing and/or refining my chosen roleplaying concept right from the get-go, I find that at times I am chomping at the bit when I feel like it will jusssst take another level or two to get my build concept firing on all cylinders.
It is at those times, when I just don't quite have the feats to turn my barbarian into the feral archer concept I had built up in Herolab, or my Tetori Monk just doesn't yet have enough grappley stuff to get fully grappley, that I begin to want to level rather than just play my character.
Pretty much exactly this for me. When I create a character, it usually involves a concept/capability "shtick." The character feels half-done until the shtick kicks in. For example, for my current Crane MoMS/sohei monk/samurai, the shtick didn't kick in until the first samurai level at 3. Before that he was kind of a mook--fun to play, just not there yet.
As for NPC's it only has to make sense within the world for me.
In my games the warriors are your normal soldier/cops. The fighter is more like someone in special forces in our world or someone who might be on a SWAT team. They have had special training. Most of them(lower level NPC's) will be level 1 or 2.
The ones in charge such as Captains of the watch or a seargent will be anywhere from 5 to 11 depending on the size of the city. Most that are outside of that level are adventures or former adventurers.
The same idea applies to other classes.
I am enjoying the side paths that people have taken this discussion. Especially the comments about NPCs "leveling up" without adventuring. Some great posts there.
As far as my comment about being "the best swordsman on the continent" being hostile to players, I find that somewhat humorous. If a player wants to view themselves as an "awesome swordsman" and strut around bragging about their mastery of the sword, that is an entirely different thing than actually being the actual "best swordsman on the continent."
Assuming that we are talking about Pathfinder here, it should be assumed that there is a level 20 fighter, ranger or other character swinging a sword around somewhere on the continent. So if your character isn't level 20, it should be assumed that your character isn't close to the "best swordsman on the continent" and probably not even the "best swordsman in the city" if the city is of any significant size.
As far as the whole discussion around how NPCs develop their own levels, this is one of my issues with some of the game assumptions that people have. The idea that NPCs must have, or even should have developed skills, abilities, even LEVELS the same as PCs.
This is a sort of fundamental game design assumption issue where some people feel that NPCs should be treated exactly the same as PCs. I don't feel that way. NPCs are not PCs, and how they got their skills or abilities, in my humble opinion, is really not relevant to how the players develop the skills or abilities of their characters. The rules for PC development are too restrictive for my purposes of NPC development. I might have an NPC who became a great warrior by making a pact with a demon, for example. Or who was granted powers by a deity. Or who is some sort of mutant.
I feel no compulsion whatsoever to have my NPCs follow any rules about how they got to be what they are. They just need to be consistent with the story line and a challenge to the players. Everything else is just bookkeeping.
Deity makes them good, they don't have to work at it, oh those never get old.
As for NPC's it only has to make sense within the world for me.
In my games the warriors are your normal soldier/cops. The fighter is more like someone in special forces in our world or someone who might be on a SWAT team. They have had special training. Most of them(lower level NPC's) will be level 1 or 2.
The ones in charge such as Captains of the watch or a seargent will be anywhere from 5 to 11 depending on the size of the city. Most that are outside of that level are adventures or former adventurers.
The same idea applies to other classes.
The size of the city thing always struck me as a bit odd. Wouldn't the guards in a keep on the borderlands be tougher and higher level than the guards in the safe lawful capital city?
The border patrol that gets into a lot of fighting, should be a lot 'arrrder than the patrol of the peaceful wheat cities.
This applies heavily of course to npc rangers and barbs that are likely to be far from cosmopolitan cities, but a part of warbands and warrior tribes (that do a lot of fighting, hunting, and risky business).
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As for NPC's it only has to make sense within the world for me.
In my games the warriors are your normal soldier/cops. The fighter is more like someone in special forces in our world or someone who might be on a SWAT team. They have had special training. Most of them(lower level NPC's) will be level 1 or 2.
The ones in charge such as Captains of the watch or a seargent will be anywhere from 5 to 11 depending on the size of the city. Most that are outside of that level are adventures or former adventurers.
The same idea applies to other classes.
The size of the city thing always struck me as a bit odd. Wouldn't the guards in a keep on the borderlands be tougher and higher level than the guards in the safe lawful capital city?
The border patrol that gets into a lot of fighting, should be a lot 'arrrder than the patrol of the peaceful wheat cities.
This applies heavily of course to npc rangers and barbs that are likely to be far from cosmopolitan cities, but a part of warbands and warrior tribes (that do a lot of fighting, hunting, and risky business).
The way that the military works is that the most experienced and capable units are supposed to be deployed to the most critical areas that need to be defended.
So if that's the Keep on the Borderlands, then fine. But if it's the city, then that's where the best guards should be. That's a decision made by the military brass. In many cases the Keep on the Borderlands might well be considered to be a training ground for new recruits to weed out the dead weight and find the best soldiers to promote.
If I were the military brass making the decision myself, I'd probably have a mix of troops in both locations, and rotate them about fairly regularly. However, I'd also have an elite set of guards in the city whose primary job was to protect the city's rulers.
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The math for going from level 9 to level 10
CR 10 monster = 9,600 4 man party= 2400 per character 5 man party=1920 per character
Slow 160000-115000=45000 4 man 18.75 fights 5 man 23.4
Medium 10500-75000=30000 4 man 12.5 5 man 16.625
Fast 71000-50000=21000 4 man 8.75 5 man 10.9275
This is a bit of a quibble, but RAW the split is the same for 4 or 5: Table: Experience Point Awards.
As for NPC's it only has to make sense within the world for me.
In my games the warriors are your normal soldier/cops. The fighter is more like someone in special forces in our world or someone who might be on a SWAT team. They have had special training. Most of them(lower level NPC's) will be level 1 or 2.
The ones in charge such as Captains of the watch or a seargent will be anywhere from 5 to 11 depending on the size of the city. Most that are outside of that level are adventures or former adventurers.
The same idea applies to other classes.
The size of the city thing always struck me as a bit odd. Wouldn't the guards in a keep on the borderlands be tougher and higher level than the guards in the safe lawful capital city?
The border patrol that gets into a lot of fighting, should be a lot 'arrrder than the patrol of the peaceful wheat cities.
This applies heavily of course to npc rangers and barbs that are likely to be far from cosmopolitan cities, but a part of warbands and warrior tribes (that do a lot of fighting, hunting, and risky business).
That is a good point, but I think the city has more of a chance to have problems with adventures, and more key assets would be there, so it might balance out depending on how dangerous a GM's world is. If monsters are common then the outlying areas will have higher level NPC's, but if monsters are scarce then probably not.
This is a bit of a quibble, but RAW the split is the same for 4 or 5: Table: Experience Point Awards.The math for going from level 9 to level 10
CR 10 monster = 9,600 4 man party= 2400 per character 5 man party=1920 per character
Slow 160000-115000=45000 4 man 18.75 fights 5 man 23.4
Medium 10500-75000=30000 4 man 12.5 5 man 16.625
Fast 71000-50000=21000 4 man 8.75 5 man 10.9275
I know but most GM's I know do it the exact party size even if the book says don't worry about it until you get 6 people.
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I think a huge factor is how often and how long you play, my apologies if this has been brought up before.
Our group meets 1/month and plays 12 hours so we level up after each session. I agree with Vincent Takeda that I would love to stay at 17th or 18th level for extended periods of time.
I notice that at early levels there tends to be more roleplaying, one of my favorite parts of the campaign is when we all meet at "Ye Olde Drag Inn" and introduce ourselves to each other.
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Really? Hmm. That might pose a problem. Anyway, I'm in my early 30s, been playing for over 25 years (started at age 7) and medium track is too slow for me or anyone I play with tbh. A level every 2ish sessions averaged out over 20 levels is the ideal pace and that's slow compared to the old days. Does this mean I have to re write reign of winter if I use fast advancement?AP assumes fast. Seems just right for my group.AP's use medium. The only one that uses fast now is RotRL Anniversary Edition
Of course, if you're doing an AP, you can always ignore xp entirely and level up at the appropriate story points. Then you know that you're at what the authors considered the appropriate level for each challenge.
Of course, if you're doing an AP, you can always ignore xp entirely and level up at the appropriate story points. Then you know that you're at what the authors considered the appropriate level for each challenge.
The issue there is that you have to cut the AP substantially. If there are twelve encounters planned between when you storm the castle at level 5 and when when you kill the BBEG at level 5, that'll take you three weeks. You'll probably need to cut them down to 8 encounters -- meaning cutting one floor out of the castle -- to do it in two.
I've tried a level boost at certain points in the story arc system. It worked well. If players missed too much and some games, they just miss one of these, but get the next one.
So wait what is this thread about now
