Points per each Game Session? What is average or normal?

[benz72]

Originally Posted by Kromm

To be clear, I'm not a "participation trophy" kind of guy. I think that's silly. But RPGs aren't a competition, so there are no losers to receive participation trophies. RPGs are cooperative and collaborative.

I think MVP trophies have their place, but I handle that through opportunity, not payment: Those who play well get to spend their points on a wider range of stuff than those who do not, because they were implicated in more things that could justify interesting improvements.

In my last campaign I let the players vote for an MVP who gets the bonus point for each session. The theory was that it would drive collaborative play and make the PCs more supportive. I think it had mixed success.
At one point I'm pretty sure the group just gave it to the guy with the lowest total to help even up the numbers... which I suppose is a different kind of teamwork win.
I think it did help me get a better look at the players perspective on what they consider important and I think it also helped them remember the good things their teammates did.
I certainly didn't prevent all conflict though, but that would be a tall order.

[benz72]

Originally Posted by Christopher R. Rice

• Game Bounties (this is doing things for me for the game itself, like you creating a template I need done, working on a map, etc. I will send out emails and you guys can decide if you want to do them or not): 1 to 20 points.

I did this on the front end by offering players the option of having their PC be an OCD record keeper. I think I made Compulsive Chronicler a [-10] disad where the player had to write and post session summaries every time. I really heled me with note taking and gave us a useful recap to start off the subsequent session.

[Prince Charon]

Originally Posted by benz72

In my last campaign I let the players vote for an MVP who gets the bonus point for each session. The theory was that it would drive collaborative play and make the PCs more supportive. I think it had mixed success.

In a lot of my own games, I recall having a rule that 'if the other players think you deserve a point for something, you get it.' I'm not sure how well it worked, but I don't recall anyone saying that it detracted from the game.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Kromm

I think you need one or the other, but not both. I prefer thoroughly vetting players to having an open-door policy that forces me to engage in a complicated system of rewards and punishments. As discussed above, that's privileged in that it's a practical option only if you have a deep pool of potential players. At the same time, reward-and-punishment systems get dangerously close to running a railroad – though less "You must do this to complete the adventure" and more "You must play like this to achieve anything in my campaign."

Of course that answer reflects my own biases, which aren't so much Geek Social Fallacies as an almost political belief in inclusiveness, along with an intellectual or artistic tendency to believe that diversity and challenges to my way of thinking make me smarter and/or more creative. I dislike "yes men" and cheerleaders.

For instance, while I'd have no truck with a fascist of any stripe, someone who's merely very far right of my rather far-left self would be welcome if they were polite enough and not in my face all the time. Similarly, while I'm an atheist, I have no problem with religious gamers at my table as long as they don't proselytize. And this extends to artistic preferences; I'm more of a shades-of-gray, antiheroes-are-still-protagonists storyteller, but I don't close my games to people who prefer the Big Damn Heroes model.

In parallel, I'm a hard core libertarian (though not quite an anarchist), but I run games for people of varied views; the majority of my players are progressives with whom I disagree fairly strongly on many issues (though not always the ones that "right" and "left" might suggest). I have had two players effectively voted off the island by the other players not wanting to be in campaigns with them; one is a conservative, but the other is strongly progressive—but my many women players, in particular, have lost patience with him. But such issues don't arise in my campaigns; when my game worlds have politics, it grows organically out of the nature of the game world, rather than being an allegory for real world debates.

What I do believe in is that it's a virtue to be open to new players, and to have space for players who may not be first or even second rate roleplayer—and encourage them to do more roleplaying.

But I don't find the problems with what you call "reward and punishment" systems that you are concerned with. Of course, there's not much "punishment" in what I do; in the years since, say, 1992, I've only once given out a single negative experience point. But it seems to me that singling out players who made unusually good contributions to roleplaying in a single session doesn't necessarily do harm, and is a way for me to express my appreciation for a player's efforts and creativity. I wouldn't say that you or any GM need to do this, but I don't think your concerns have been borne out by my experience. I think I would actually say that what is most likely to inspire me to grant an extra point is not a player's having figured out what I'm hinting for them to do, but their coming up with something I never thought of but that extends the storyline in an unexpected but logical way, like a good mathematical result.

Of course, I could be misjudging the impact of my own approach. But at any rate, it doesn't seem to be driving away players; all but one of my current sets are returnees, some of whom have been with me since the previous century.

"There are nine-and-sixty ways of constructing tribal lays,
And every single one of them is right!"

[RedMattis]

I think giving out points for role-playing is a good carrot for players. Similar with the ship that is handing out a negative point for going against character.

The latter I never really hand out, its purpose is just to exist as a vague reminder to not do stuff your character really wouldn't.

I also hand out additional character points if someone did particularly good role-playing, but this is, again, rare. Mostly reserved for when someone did something unusually cool and in-character.

[RyanW]

I like to give out a small trickle of CP, but be more generous with Impulse Points (which I particularly like for the good roleplaying, took one for the team, play of the game sort of rewards). It feels much more flexible, as Impulse Points are inherently transient. You don't have to be quite as worried about any balance being upset by giving out too many.

[Refplace]

Originally Posted by RyanW

I like to give out a small trickle of CP, but be more generous with Impulse Points (which I particularly like for the good roleplaying, took one for the team, play of the game sort of rewards). It feels much more flexible, as Impulse Points are inherently transient. You don't have to be quite as worried about any balance being upset by giving out too many.

That is an interesting idea. Rather like Fate Points in Fate.
I do not really penalize players for bad roleplaying, its subject to thier personal skills. I feel that my job as GM is to provide an interesting enough campaign that they do thier best because they enjoy it rather than seek a reward.
Impulse Points though gives them a meta currency they can use to offset bad luck or issues where they made a good roleplaying choice but a bad tactical or strategic one. Sort of giving them plot armor for good behaviour.

[Agemegos]

Originally Posted by RedMattis

I think giving out points for role-playing is a good carrot for players.

I don’t think it’s necessary or effective. Roleplayers roleplay as best they can because it is fun, they don’t need an exogenous incentive to do their best. And getting a character that is OP compared to everyone’s else is not more fun anyway.

Besides, I am far from being convinced that getting into the GMing chair makes me a better judge of RP than I am as a character-player.

[RogerBW]

If the players don't do it without the incentive, will they have more fun doing a thing they need to be bribed to do? (I mean, the answer may be yes, if it's a case of "didn't bother, tried it because of the bribe, found it was easy and fun".)

I always give out a point for corpsing the GM, i.e. causing me to be overcome with laughter, but only one per session.

[Kromm]

Originally Posted by RogerBW

I always give out a point for corpsing the GM, i.e. causing me to be overcome with laughter, but only one per session.

I confess to being somewhat bribable on the meta-game level, too. Points are a meta-game construct, after all, no different from any other fiat currency . . .