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What does this add to the game?
How do you roleplay this? Do the players sit around for one session not doing anything?
If you simply state that the characters need downtime, then they just take downtime and the game continues.
Essentially, unless they level in the middle of a dungeon, it means nothing.
Denying them levels in the middle of a dungeon is mean, expect resistance and resentment.
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I like to think that the wizards have been studying and researching spells at night just before the party rests, and when he finally understands the spell is when he gains the level, not the other way around.
same with fighters, they spar during mealtime and when they master some new move is the aha moment that gives them the level, it just so happens to be timed exactly when their XP hits the level mark as well.
I'm with Andrew and alexd. Don't drag the leveling out unnecessary.
Only thing I impose in that regard is that it doesn't happen during the adventuring day, but players can use it after a typical rest.
So, yeah. It does happen over night.
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I'm with Andrew and alexd. Don't drag the leveling out unnecessary.
Only thing I impose in that regard is that it doesn't happen during the adventuring day, but players can use it after a typical rest.
So, yeah. It does happen over night.
I make a point of ending each game session at a point where they can rest...
On the rare occasions that they level mid-combat (ending a session prematurely, for example), they get HP, saves, BAB increases and so on, but still need to rest to regain spells/daily abilities.
No training time though. That's what adventuring is, training.
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I've never thought that it brought anything to the ease of play or enjoyment at the table. You gain a level? Ding! Done and dusted.
It almost always happens between sessions, anyways. Usually I bring the party up a level at the end of a story, plot, or area, so that there's a little bit of time passing before they are next "in action", however it doesn't feel like a requirement to me.
I was in a Way of the Wicked game where we had to spend a week training (easy enough when we were in a portion that mostly passed by a week at a time.) It made for minor frustrations when combined with XP leveling and one member wasn't quite ready to take a week off and level with the rest of us.
We also had the option to spend a hero point to level immediately, though.
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hey OP have them roleplay going to the bathroom and sleeping and eating meals too in real time
I'd say that adventuring is training, sometimes. I prefer but do not demand that my players let me know what they are training for or otherwise doing. When you're RPing one thing and suddenly veer off in a different direction it might be jarring to the GM or the other players. So you were training to be a wizard and suddenly are going to be a cavalier mounted on a rhino? When did that come up? When did you even hear about rhinos!?
Course, I grew up on training and finding teachers and all that jazz and have a fond place for it in my heart.
It's really just a question of bookkeeping, after all.
Like encumbrance, or arrow usage. One often begins with the best intentions, but at some point you inevitably lose track.
So either you handwave it, and simply require PCs to rest for the night (or return to the inn, or whatever) to level, or else you posit some draconian system. Just ask yourself: does this increase the fun or detract from it?
Some games like Pendragon assume you have *one* adventure per year, or per season. Over the course of such a campaign, years pass. You end up running not just one PC, but a whole dynasty.
Whatever works for you and your players.
Training used to be more of a process back in the early days of D&D. Making leveling up automatic is one of the best design choices of Pathfinder. No one wants to spend too much time in game having to work to just get their spells or abilities.
The only time I have my players RP acquisition and learning new things is languages taken with ranks into linguistics. If they haven't come across a language in game, or have never heard it spoken or seen it written, they cannot feasibly take the language. Things that are uncommon like Ancient Thassilonian, Undercommon (for the average surface dwellers), etc.
In a Rise of the Runelords game I am running, I am allowing players to learn Thassilonian. Currently, the players have come across the written language and have a couple books/notes with some translations, (Also works with comprehend language spell on if no translation is available). They have to state that they spend time trying to learn the language. Because they have never heard the language spoken and have no known phonetic equivalent, they cannot speak the language, they can only decipher/read it. I also rule that putting one point into linguistics to gain a language doesn't mean they are immediate masters of that language. Once the characters hear the language spoken a few times, then I would rule that they can speak it, though it would be a very broken version of it.
I find doing this gives the game a sense of verisimilitude. It also encourages certain bits of RP which have helped the party a lot.
Training used to be more of a process back in the early days of D&D. Making leveling up automatic is one of the best design choices of Pathfinder. No one wants to spend too much time in game having to work to just get their spells or abilities.
Back in the early days (mid to late 70s) there were no special provisions for training time. Once you had the xp, you advanced in level.
You must be thinking about 1st edition or 2nd edition. Never played those versions, so I can't really say.
However, these days with PF everything is up to the DM. The DM decides when to award xp to the players, and indeed many DMs do away with xp entirely and advance PC levels automatically on a chapter-by-chapter basis.
I agree with Artlessknave that some skills like linguistics require plausible access.
Spellcasters learning new spells (one of the OP's sticking points) is posited as taking place continuously, from one level to the next. Admitedly, this concept doesn't really hold water if you advance several levels in a short period of time.
Having some elaborate requirement to get the benefits of leveling just seems wonky to me. The DM can just as well stitch in downtime when it feels right, and the verisimilitude of advancing levels won't feel like much of an issue.
Think of it as wizards working on developing spells (even ones they've seen before) until it finally clicks when they level. They're basically 'researching' an extant spell and trying to figure out over time exactly how to make it work for themselves.
Huh... I've come to think of the adventuring and EXP-gathering to be the actions Players/PCs took to achieve their new talents. IE at the preceding level the Sorcerer was already beginning to feel/conceptualize their upcoming spells, which wouldn't be available until they finally levelled. Likewise, a PC could already be practicing new forms and techniques in-game/in-between that turns into that feat once they level.
As a mechanic, its flavorful but clunky and I think that's why it's not in the current games anymore. It just feels like bloat, particularly if it escalates to Skills and other Class Features.
"All right, Druid, Imma need you to succeed at three consecutive Handle Animal checks today to see if you DID increase in that skill."
*Sips Coffee*
"Yeah..."
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In my home game, I bypassed EXP and handed out levels after the completion of each 3-4 session story arc. Between arcs, there was downtime, allowing PCs to discover their new toys in whatever way player desires and class fluff would imply.
It helps that there was a semi Kingmaker vibe, with heroic PCs rebuilding society after the land was ruined by monsters, and each arc tied into restoring or protecting their village.
It's one of those vague mechanical quirks that work best when you either agree to ignore it or work it into the plot.
I generally treat it the way Andrew does. Levels are an abstraction of slowly improving over time.
But I also tend to do what Rosc does to a degree and give out levels based on the flow of the story and events rather than using EXP.
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Think of it as wizards working on developing spells (even ones they've seen before) until it finally clicks when they level. They're basically 'researching' an extant spell and trying to figure out over time exactly how to make it work for themselves.
The way I look at it, using a sort of real world example, is martial arts.
You have a student that can execute a particular punch or kick perfectly, but not at full speed, and with a few moments to set up - he knows the move... but he isn't at a place where he could use it in combat. I see levels and gaining spells like that. Fairly similar.
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Experience is just one more thing for PCs to track, and for the GM to calculate. It's a whole complicated system designed to keep characters on track to level when the story needs them to (in published adventures, at least).
Seems simpler to just bypass all that and use story-based leveling.
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Think of it as wizards working on developing spells (even ones they've seen before) until it finally clicks when they level. They're basically 'researching' an extant spell and trying to figure out over time exactly how to make it work for themselves.The way I look at it, using a sort of real world example, is martial arts.
You have a student that can execute a particular punch or kick perfectly, but not at full speed, and with a few moments to set up - he knows the move... but he isn't at a place where he could use it in combat. I see levels and gaining spells like that. Fairly similar.
That's an excellent way to generalize it.
Spells Gained at a New Level: Wizards perform a certain amount of spell research between adventures. Each time a character attains a new wizard level, he gains two spells of his choice to add to his spellbook. The two free spells must be of spell levels he can cast.
"Between adventures" can be read in two ways, both of which cut out the need to stop and research after you get the XP needed to level up.
1) Literally between adventures. Unless the player specifies that his PC spends every possible second doing something specific (like crafting an item), you assume in his free time he does some "Wizard stuff", which doesn't necessarily need laboratories or instruments, unless, perhaps, the character is planning to learn something like Clone.2) "Between adventures" as in "while adventuring", meaning that everything the character does (related to magic and her own powers) matters for progress. Basically, like a programmer gets better and learns something new with each bit of code he writes, so a Wizard gets a better grasp of magic's little workings each time she casts a spell, studies her book, or whatever. Maybe now and then she scribbles notes (or pieces of magic code) in her book. Leveling up sets the milestone at which those notes take the shape of a full spell. Besides, this is the mental equivalent of swinging your sword till you get better at it.
In addition, Sorcerers gain power from within, they don't have to make research at all, so yes, they just gain the new spells overnight anyway. Which would leave only the Wizard to suffer the burden of having to spend additional time on research.
Since it makes no sense from a game perspective to leave that burden on her and the "sudden" acquisition can be explained in fluff decently enough, I don't see the reason to add that time.
HackMaster 5E has a system similar to what you're asking about where PCs need to spend some time training up their new level after they earn it. The system in use there is complex, but it can be distilled to "spend 2 weeks of in-game time doing nothing but training and after that boom new level" -- if I were to port the system to Pathfinder that's about as far as I'd go. The other complexities just really don't fit with how PF does things.
That said, not letting people level up immediately also goes against how PF does things, so if you're planning on using such a system I'd strongly recommend that you get all of your players on board with it before it's introduced.
So where do we stand?
Firmly on the neck of the idea that special stuff needs to happen to gain a level.
So where do we stand?
Firmly on the neck of the idea that special stuff needs to happen to gain a level.
Well, you do have to go out and earn that experience, no matter whether it's tracked with the usual XP system or 'you level after 3 or 4 chapters' (isn't that how PFS works?). Which makes sense, too. Unless you're trying to take advantage of retraining, of course.
You might want to try a point based game, like GURPs, rather than level based.
Level based games have rules, and a carrot and stick approach to rewards, yet breaks down fast when you compare it to reality. Suddenly gaining spells, class abilities, or even hit points makes no sense with the various justifications in level based games. It still gives players the carrot needed to continue your game, though. Deny players a carrot, bad things might happen.
One problem is that spontaneous casters don't study, they just intuitively know. How can a sorcerer or bard "study" new spells? Wizard, magus, alchemist, and similar makes some sort of sense - yet it punishes players for playing prepared, arcane casters. If such a rule were imposed on me if I was a player, I would only agree to it if the following conditions were met -
1 - That a chance to come across spellbooks, or other material would likely happen. Either through purchasing, or from fallen foes, or gifts as rewards.
2 - If it was somehow integral to the plot of your world, and had some significance that would grant such PCs some sort of boon to compensate for it.
3 - Opponents are likewise hampered. Meaning that enemy wizards might have far fewer spells known as well.
Really, the only reason to guarantee knowing two more spells per levels is to protect caster characters from very draconic GMs that deny PCs the chance to gain any new spells at all. It gives elbow room to guarantee a caster gains at least two spells per level, rather than none at all.
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In my games it is after gathering the EXP and then spending one night resting.
This mean usually they wont be doing it just before the boss battle and so on, but it is still quite easy to level and doesnt require downtime.
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Ok Z-dawg, the main gist of your concern seems to be: how do I justify spontaneous NEW knowledge that the PCs get in their new level that they didn't do anything to practice for previously?
Imagine a POTENTIAL day in the life of a PC:
1. you wake up
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2. you fight evil for 15 minutes
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3. you go to bed
So for this particular guy, this particular day, there's a lot of unused time in an 8 hr day. What's he doing with all the time you DON'T see on "screen?" Well, practicing techniques that will develop into feats, studying notes and formulae for potential new spells, etc.
Pathfinder is an abstraction at heart, from combat to crafting items to disarming a trap. The training needed to gain a level is just another abstraction.
I don't remind my players to practice anything for new feats/spells/powers etc. I figure it like this:
For an hour each morning Blasto the Magnificent has to study his wizard spells. Included in that spellbook are notes on how the arcane energies behind the spells are tapped and controlled. Blasto thinks "So with an Acid Splash spell, I'm conjuring a nanojule of Earth energy, using hand gestures #3 and #7 to keep the energy flow in check and then directing that purely by will which gives it a short duration and manifestation time (Instantaneous damage effect at Short range). What if, instead I used some foci to direct and enhance manifestation? Old Master Flimfart at the Akademie used to say that an adder's stomach was good for such things, but I'll need a catalyst to activate it. Perhaps... RHUBARB LEAF of course! I still need something to direct the enhanced energies. A dart should do. Now I just need to practice summoning larger quantities of energy..."
Meanwhile Sir Squarejaw, the mighty fighter, is just standing around. Realizing that the wizard is lost in his book and that the ranger just went out for her morning hunt and that the cleric is praying to the dawn, Squarejaw is kind of bored. Seeing that the fire is down to embers and knowing that the ranger will need a cooking fire when she returns, the warrior decides to chop some more. Taking his axe to a couple logs he wonders aloud "How can I keep my Power Attack swings from being so wild and uncontrolled. That last battle with those goblins my accuracy was way off; if I don't get this handled it might mean life or death! Wait, there was a technique Sir Stonealecrafterbeard the dwarven battlemaster showed us once: the Focus of the Furious he called it. Let's see, grip the axe like so... sideways stance, bouncy knees... and GO!" Suddenly all the energy in his Power Attack is controlled into a single, focused blow to the log splitting it mightily and sending the pieces flying. "Great!" Sir Squarejaw thinks, "But can I do that again, in battle? When it really matters? I better keep practicing with different attacks..."
I imagine all of the above happening retroactively when my players tell me that the wizard is going to take Acid Arrow at level 3 and the fighter is picking up Furious Focus. Now, if the players want to RP all of that in some way, I'm game. Anything that makes them more engaged in the story and setting and gets us away from only saying "I attack; hit AC 23; 21 damage" at the table is good for me.
For example I have a game I'm a player in. I know my character is going to next take a dip into the Hunter class even though his Favored Class is Warpriest. I know my GM doesn't care but I like roleplaying such changes so the last couple games while our characters have been traveling, during in between moments I've been telling the other players my character feels drawn more to the energies of nature here and how his mount seems more wild but also more alive than ever before. My PC has also described how his father once dwelt in these lands as part of a pseudo-druidic sect; my PC feels the energies of sect calling to him.
In other words: ask your players what they want and let that be your guide.
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I sometimes roleplay training for my characters. For example, my investigator took a liking to whips since they were reach weapons she could use with finesse (the party had some fun with longspears and orcs a few levels back) so she practiced with it during camp time...only to promptly roll a natural 1 on the first practice roll and smack herself in the face. Thankfully there was a Calistrian inquisitor to teach her how not to do that.
For my oracles I give them a bit of a dizzy spell before getting a vision filled with their new revelations, spells, and sometimes feats and skills.
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i would not say no to pc wizards who plan ahead and have a scroll or two with the spells they wanted on them. then it is just a matter of them copying them into their spell book.
Ok, I'm gonna have to raise a flag on this one. The 2 spells a wizard gets upon advancing a level are supposed to be free. As in, no cost in gp or time. There are specific mechanics for scribing a scroll into the wizard's spellbook, including the cost of that scribing in gp and time required. While many would say it's a small price to pay for being such a powerful class, it is still against RAW.
Training / Practicing / Spell Research is supposed to be going on when taking a rest, in the background.
Just like eating, cleaning and relieving yourself is not played out explicitly in the spotlight.
This background stuff is where the preparations happen for your new abilities that are finally ready to be used properly when you "level up".
what is RAW? rules as written?
Yeap.
Ofc being the GM you can change that , but it is better to tell the player any house rule you have before the game starts and they make their sheets.
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I grew up playing 1st edition AD&D, and the biggest shock I had when I started playing Pathfinder a year or so ago (well, second biggest, right after "What? Armor Class goes UP now?!?") was this business about leveling up in the middle of an adventure. It seemed completely nuts to me, and still seems awkward. OTOH, given that I'm DMing Rise of the Runelords for four novice gamers, three of whom are kids, the idea of forcing the kind of training I remember from back in caveman times seemed like a good way to aggravate everybody. So instead I handle most of the leveling up at the end of a chapter or - if appropriate - the end of an adventuring day, but every four levels the characters take a week or two of downtime to roleplay training. Mainly it's an excuse to let them meet new NPCs, learn some of the backstory to the AP that they may not have picked up along the way, and have a session that is more roleplaying than combat and trap-finding. They get the opportunity to earn minor bonuses (like an extra skill rank or two in a particular area of knowledge), so there's an incentive for the PCs not to spend all their time at the Rusty Dragon.
Ok, I'm gonna have to raise a flag on this one. The 2 spells a wizard gets upon advancing a level are supposed to be free. As in, no cost in gp or time. There are specific mechanics for scribing a scroll into the wizard's spellbook, including the cost of that scribing in gp and time required. While many would say it's a small price to pay for being such a powerful class, it is still against RAW.
i would not say no to pc wizards who plan ahead and have a scroll or two with the spells they wanted on them. then it is just a matter of them copying them into their spell book.
Actually, there's nothing that says that they're "free," as in "no cost in gp or time." Here's the entirety of the rule:
"At each new wizard level, he gains two new spells of any spell level or levels that he can cast (based on his new wizard level) for his spellbook." {CRB}
That's totally it, not out of context or anything. The sentence before talks about spells gained at 1st level, and the sentence after adds that the wizard can copy spells from other wizards' spellbooks.
I don't see any possible way to interpret that as anything other than "he gains two new spells of any level or levels that he can cast for his spellbook". He has them, he knows them, they're in his spellbook. There's no time requirement or cost requirement - they're just there. If that isn't "free" then the word is meaningless.
Denying them levels in the middle of a dungeon is mean, expect resistance and resentment.Why?
How are the players to know when they've accumulated enough exp to level up?
My players can do basic math.
Depends on the campaign
My current campaign is a sandbox game where how the PCs manage their downtime is an important factor. So gaining a new level involves training and expenses.
On the other hand If I am running a globe trotting adventure path where the PCs are racing to hidden dungeons to prevent evil warlords from amassing a powerful artifact of doom. Training times would get in the way so Auto level up would be the best choice.
All depends on the style of game you are running.
Training time means lots of breaks between adventures, you cannot run a campaign that puts your group on a clock. It's also something that encourages a base of opperations because they want to set up someplace they can go for supplies and research and teachers and so on.
Use whatever fits best in your game. Don't use it if it'll be a hindrance
In my most recent home game we would do what others have suggested, basically roleplaying the choices we intend to make at the next level.
One example: We had a hungry ghost monk in an evil game that involved holding down an ancient base for a dead cult, and performing a ritual to gain a powerful weapon. One of the failed cultists had turned into a wraith, and we had convinced him not to kill us because we were on the same side. (And, after he killed a prisoner, we had to convince him to only kill things we put in a certain room). The monk was about to get to the level where they could steal Ki from living creatures, and roleplayed that knowledge as tossing small animals into the room and watching as the wraith devoured them. Next level, she figured out how to do that herself after adapting the technique.
My own Red Mantis Assassin spent time practicing her sword dance before she gained her second level in the prestige class. When it paid off (in a glorious assassination), she was excited and immediately went to pray and thank Achaekek for his guidance.