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Old 05-09-2019, 02:59 PM   #41
larsdangly
 
Join Date: Dec 2017
Default Re: New Xp System: Not a Fan

The LE progression leads to a sort of 3-tiered distribution players are likely to encounter:

- Youths and the great mass of stay at home people who never get any XP: ~30 points

- Inexperienced risk takers: 32-34 points

- Seasoned risk takers: 38-40 points

I.e., people move so quickly from 32 - 38 points that if you blink you'll miss the transition. Anyone who has lived on the edge for 5+ years is sure to have near max stats and who-knows what talents and spells...
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Old 05-09-2019, 08:27 PM   #42
TippetsTX
 
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Default Re: New Xp System: Not a Fan

Quote:
Originally Posted by RobW View Post
OK updated. Graphs assume all XP invested in attributes.
The graphs show number of attributes as of the start of the figure's birthday.
The one flaw I see in this analysis is the assumption that the rate of earned XP remains flat throughout the character's lifecycle. I believe that rewards should scale upwards as the challenges increase in difficulty and/or frequency.
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Old 05-10-2019, 06:10 AM   #43
Axly Suregrip
 
Join Date: Jun 2018
Location: Durham, NC
Default Re: New Xp System: Not a Fan

My biggest complaint against the new system is the rewards (XP) don't increase with the achievement. The system in the new ITL says "A rate of 25 to 100 experience points per player per session..."

For example, this means a new character goes out and after an evening of playing gains 75 XP. And the same is true of a very advanced character: for an evening of playing gains 75 XP. While the prior "old" ITL the XP was based on damage done and saving rolls made, so a very advanced character in the same evening will have gained double or more than a beginning character.

An advanced character achieves more, so it just should look like he gains more. He will not keep pace with the increase scale needed to upgrade, nor should he. Specifically attribute increases should slow down. There just should be more rewards for more achieved.


My second grip is the 500 XP needed per point of talent gained seems too slow. Say you want to gain a 3 point talent, this means A LOT (20) of game nights to see one change in your character. And that is assuming you did not also need to raise your IQ (which in itself does not help increase talent points). This too slow.


Part of the fun of a RPG is advancing your character. The current system does not give me that feeling.
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Old 05-10-2019, 07:58 AM   #44
larsdangly
 
Join Date: Dec 2017
Default Re: New Xp System: Not a Fan

My interpretation of the LE version is that you are provided with very concrete rules governing the relative costs of various character advances, and only the vaguest of suggestions regarding how fast and on what basis you should award XP. It really is up to you. I have been doing a session-based award that so far ranges from 50 to maybe 150 per ~1-2 hours of play. But you could reasonably vary that for any number of reasons, or replace it with something based on stat values or other qualities of foes, or die rolls, or treasure. I was a little surprised that something like that wasn't included, but on further consideration it's the only inclusive thing they could do. Any rigid award system would lock everyone into the same rate of advancement and maximum abilities, and it is clear that people vary widely in how they want that to work. I think you could make a case that the game 'works' best, just in purely mechanical terms, with no advancement at all. Other people want to play with 60 point PC's who have tons of spells, talents and items. Obviously neither extreme is right or wrong, but they do have to come up with a way to get there that works for them.

p.s., it sounds to me like your table would work best with 200-500 pts per session. If you would like that award to be linked to specific accomplishments, you might pre-assign awards to specific plot points, recovered McGuffins, murdered foes, etc.
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Old 05-10-2019, 11:44 AM   #45
Skarg
 
Join Date: May 2015
Default Re: New Xp System: Not a Fan

Per session is either a rough guideline for whatever you think a typical session is, or for players who demand character improvement regardless of what they do.

High-level characters are perfectly capable (maybe even more than less experienced characters) of spending entire sessions doing nothing in-game that really warrants any XP for the PCs, if all they do is relax, sight-see, plan, shop, etc.

Sessions also don't even exist in any way in the game world, or map to character time at all unless you somehow dictate a fixed amount of down time between sessions.

So GMs are left to figure out for themselves not just what rate they want, but what sorts of things they want to base those rates on.

Last edited by Skarg; 05-12-2019 at 12:03 PM. Reason: added missing word "capable"
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Old 05-10-2019, 12:43 PM   #46
larsdangly
 
Join Date: Dec 2017
Default Re: New Xp System: Not a Fan

The old system of XP was very concrete (for damage done, DX of foes defeated, spells cast, time on the clock, passing difficult die rolls). It was also kind of a pain, and we often missed points by not paying enough attention to this during frenetic episodes. I understand the appeal of something specific, so the players can set XP-based goals if they wish. But I don't think I'd want to go back to the previous system.
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Old 05-10-2019, 01:43 PM   #47
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Default Re: New Xp System: Not a Fan

Quote:
Originally Posted by larsdangly View Post
The old system of XP was very concrete (for damage done, DX of foes defeated, spells cast, time on the clock, passing difficult die rolls). It was also kind of a pain, and we often missed points by not paying enough attention to this during frenetic episodes. I understand the appeal of something specific, so the players can set XP-based goals if they wish. But I don't think I'd want to go back to the previous system.
I agree that the old system focused a bit too much on the minutiae of gameplay, but as I've stated elsewhere, I strongly believe that the best approach to XP must include a balance between objective/quantitative rewards and subjective/qualitative adjustments to encourage teamwork, creative problem-solving, and other desired player behaviors.
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Old 05-10-2019, 02:48 PM   #48
Axly Suregrip
 
Join Date: Jun 2018
Location: Durham, NC
Default Re: New Xp System: Not a Fan

Yes I agree the old system had its problems. I was one of the critical voices of the old system. The book keeping slowed the game down and was a distraction. And the old system failed to take into consideration the foe's IQ and armor and special abilities.

It did have the upside of driving folks to steal someone else's kill instead of doing what was best for the party. ;-)

The new system needs more guidelines. A lot more examples of how much to reward for kinds or actions. Something a GM can use without feeling like he is just houseruling the XP system.

In some ways the original Melee and Death Test achieve this. "You get x experience per fight if it was roughly even, y if you were over matched" or "count up your wins and get a for bears, b for hobgoblins, etc".

Maybe a better way would be each critter has two XP values on it. First for defeating it and second for escaping/tricking it. Total to be divided across the party. At the end you can do the book keeping: we slew 2 giants and 1 troll and some how managed to escape the dragon... so we earn X, and we started with 5 guys so we divide by 5"... And afterwards add individual rewards for brave acts, roll playing, saving the day, etc (with some examples of how much to give for these)

Something like that seems to give both players and GMs a better idea of what to expect.
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Old 05-10-2019, 03:13 PM   #49
larsdangly
 
Join Date: Dec 2017
Default Re: New Xp System: Not a Fan

Perhaps a good topic for a Hexogram article.
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Old 05-12-2019, 12:13 PM   #50
Skarg
 
Join Date: May 2015
Default Re: New Xp System: Not a Fan

A problem with any fixed amount of XP for doing something, is accounting for the difficulty for the characters, in the situation they faced, to do that thing, both of which are huge factors determining whether something is trivial or challenging in actual play.

The basic Melee awards are the only system that takes that into account at all.

We made our complex system to do that out of perceived necessity to counter the inappropriate results we saw more and more clearly the more we played (and the more powerful the surviving PCs became). For a figure that does high damage, has high adjDX, and high armor, typical people who don't have all of those, tend to be trivial to defeat in many situations. And, truly challenging situations don't get rewarded much or any more than easy ones. That's the sort of guideline I'd think would work best - assess how difficult the challenge was, and whether it took something special to overcome it that seems like a learning experience.

i.e. not "I killed another wolf who had near-zero chance of hurting me - where's my XP?" and not "I showed up and sat through the session, so I should get my XP per session".
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