Download this new approach to XP (from my newsletter pdf): www.patreon.com/posts/newsletter-mar-101684206

The thing about Esper is, not only is he a clearly talented DM and creative, but he gets into grappling with game design as well! I appreciate the ideas and the perspective!

I like what Shadowdark did with XP: - Smaller numbers, easy to keep track of - XP for securing treasure, not for killing monsters. This encourages the core gameplay loop: you are a treasure hunter, but you want to get out of the dungeon alive. Sneaking past enemies, social encounters and combat are all basically equal As a 5E DM I used milestones because it was easiest for me, but when playing Shadowdark I was surprised how much tracking XP enhanced the experience. I actually wanted to get the treasure we were looking for.

Something that one of my DM does is excellent: he figures out what behavior he wants his players and their characters he wants to incentivise, and then explicitly rewards XP for that behavior. E.g., after every session he asks each player if their character: a) Learned about the Campaign world (encouraging exploration); b) Learned about other characters (encouraging interparty RP); and c) Embodied the values and/or accomplished the goals of their character. Answering yes to each question gets you a scaling amount of XP based on your current level. TL;DR Incentivise the behavior you want by awarding XP for it!

I've got a very simple middle ground xp system I call gearshift XP: 1. All levels require 100 xp. Any extra carrys over to the next level. 2. The GM decides how many average sessions they want a level to last, divides 100 by that number, and awards that much xp at the end of most sessions. 3. Sessions are broken up into 4 levels of challenge, each having a multiplier on the base xp rate: downtime is x0. Working (mostly prep, shopping, banter, etc.) Is 0.5. Adventuring (good average amount of challenge) is x1. Legend making (optional objectives, super deadly encounters, etc.) Is x1.5. 4. If you like, you can hand out the occasional bonus xp point similarly to inspiration. This should be used sparingly though. Not exactly the same, but there's definitely some similarities with what you present here!

Esper simply doesn’t miss on these really cool takes. I now wanna actually use XP for a campaign.

Really interesting topic! I've gone through the same journey as you, from milestone to xp but my system is a little different. My current xp system uses the xp chart in Darker Dungeons (by Giffyglyph) instead of vanilla. To get to level 2 you need 300 xp, to lvl 3 it's 420, lvl 4 is 590 and so on. But every time you level up you spend the xp. So if you have exactly 420 and level up to lvl 3, you now have 0 xp left and need 590 to get to the next level. Any extra xp you can keep in your pool. Xp is not split among the PCs, everyone that contributed gets the same amount - although PCs who are behind in levels get double xp until they catch up. PCs who are absent don't get any xp. I have 3 categories for gaining xp. 1. "Combat and Peril". Any situation where the PCs can die if they fail, and the xp for this is based on CR but I remove one digit. So a CR 5 combat or peril is worth 180 xp. They can use any method to resolve it; sneaking, fighting, talking, tricking, triggering a trap from a safe distance etc. They still get the same amount of xp. 2. "Treasure". This is xp for hauling back treasure and selling it, but my definition of treasure in this instance is a designated art object. No loose coins or magic items. It has to be relatively unique and cumbersome. I will be upfront and just tell my players this. The xp calculation is the objects' bulk x 10. Bulk is a thing from Darker Dungeons, basically a simplified way of calculating weight. A small object is 10 xp (1 bulk) but an object as large as a barrel (9 bulk) can be worth 90 xp. A huge marble statue that weighs a ton can be worth as much as a difficult combat encounter! 3. "Exploration and Roleplay". This is rewarded for exploring the world, uncovering secrets, lockpicking, roleplaying with risk involved, manipulating factions, a PC overcoming a flaw or basically any behaviour I want to encourage at my table. Here I use flat rates. 10, 20, 40 or 80 xp can be gained from any of these. These four amounts can also be added as a bonus to any of the other categories, if a combat was particularly hard for example I might add 20 xp on top of what they already got. I haven't done any math or reasoning behind my rates, it just feels about right and I'm okay with that. It works really well in my hexcrawl game where I hardly ever prep encounters beforehand and nothing is "balanced". It's quick to dole out too and that's always a plus.

Ive been running a 2e dnd campaign with xp and, more importantly, xp from TREASURE. It completely shifts the players' motivations and makes them drive the game more

Here's an idea/method I've been trying out for games. I use XP as normal, but have specific criteria for awarding it. I award it at the end of a session after doing my mental recap of the session for notetaking purposes. There are three criteria: *Encounters* I award XP for encounters (combat, social, and environmental) based off of how "satisfying" the encounter is, applying either a percentage bonus or reduction to a base XP value. For example, a combat encounter where the party completely shuts down and steamrolls a powerful enemy will give significantly less XP then a combat where the party just barely pulls through by the skin of their teeth after the powerful enemy gets to showcase all their cool moves. *Plot Milestones* Additionally, if this is a game with an intended world state or story progression, I will award XP to the players based on milestones reached in the progression of that story. *Personal Milestones* Finally, and I think rather uniquely, I will reward XP based on personal character milestones created or given to me by players of those characters, as well as character development and interesting roleplay moments.

Try my old way. Give the greater level equal or near equal to the party members, but withhold the XP. The levels are borrowed and must be bought with incoming XP. So, a wizard coming into a party of around 6th level, could be granted 5th or 6th level, but cannot advance until they have paid the XP debt. No one complained, seeing this as fair.

I do appreciate the experimentation and the thought prosses behind all of this, I feel like you could have some fun with this, but personally I feel like I'm going to stick with the last milestone system that you had used before. Firstly, and more important personally, I liked the fact that it simplifed milestones and XP that it kinda combined the two together and made progression much easier to track with the smaller numbers. Secondly, I personally don't mind people gaining levels when they show up to a campagin because everyone at the table has an unspoken rule to help eachother out and having everyone work as a team is a core part of TTRPGs. Unless your a realy skilled DM, leaving someone with a lower level when everyone else is higher could lead to the new player dieing really quickly and constently which could sour or ruin a first time experiance, or it leads to the higher level characters steam rolling everything becasue you tried to find a middle ground and the new player didn't get to accomplish anything of value. Lastly, I actually extend rewards to things such as exploration and role play for if a player finds hidden things that actually give significant value and are able to exctract them out of danger for example, or for birllliant role play and convincing and NPC in a way that changes the narrative in their favor. There is always more then one way to win, fighting and killing is the main appeal but it's still not going to be the only solution. That is probably just my opinion and how my edition of dnd is going to run at my tables. I just wanted to make my case for why I liked the older one better. This being said, enjoy the game how you like and don't let some random comment tell you what to do. Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.

Interesting, I look forward to hearing how this goes with longer play.

My 3e DM used 3 levels of bonus xp, and he tracked them by handing out those cheap plastic poker chips (white, blue, and red). He gave them for good play and good rp. One was 25, one was 50, one was 100. And at xp time, everyone got a certain amount for the adventure(s), plus whatever bonus chips they had.

Every game I play I change the rules a bit as an experiment. And leveling reflects the theme of the game. The next campaign I plan -- the players will all be Orcs. They will be part of a tribe where one's effectiveness and leadership and honor are reflected in how you gain levels. So I think I'll do an XP system,, but change the numbers. I'll do 600 XP per level. (No need to expand the numbers like the sourcebook. 600 is a nice even number with a lot of factors). Each player gets 100 XP for showing in the session. The leader gets 200 XP for being the leader. (Players can depose the leader through beating him up and getting him to yield the position -- or knocking him out). MVP gets 200 XP in the session. (Private ballot. The players will vote for MVP, and cannot vote for themselves). Being deposed as leader drops 50 XP (not below zero, but will counteract other rewards earned). Giving loot, food, money, weapons to the tribe earns a reward from 100 to 300. Success in battle or adventuring earns 100 to 300 reward. And that's the highlights. I want it to give players incentives to blaze in glory in battle, to become leader, and overthrow a weak party leader. Which I think would accurately reflect the mind-set of Orcs.

Great thumbnail man!

I like doing a % system rewarding players on their actions session to session. Once 100% they level up and it resets. Will do nothing else but this now

I go for something similar to the milestone stuff of difficulty, but I just have it so you need to fill 5 bars of , loosely represented by coins. On early levels, you earn coppers and it does nothing, but when you get silver coins you fill up those bars. That way, if there is a newbie starting out, you can just give them all the silver while the other claim all the gold, that way the newbie will get pulled up by the other players, and it will reward the entire group because the higher levelled players don't really need the silver anyways, they got their eyes on gold or even diamond levels!

The only campaigns I ever played in, we used a rule of "All characters level up at the end of each session". I still never saw a PC higher than level 9. Sometimes there were also rules that the characters of people who don't play don't gain that level, but sometimes they did. Sometimes characters brand new to the campaign started at the average level, sometimes they didn't. Personally I've grown nothing but distaste for artificial "fairness" rubber banding. Giving everyone the same _starting_ point, like fixed ability score arrays or point-buy, that I can get behind, but some characters should in fact be advancing and improving faster as a reward for the risks they take to get there. There should always be opportunities for player behavior to either facilitate bonus experience or cause setbacks with their characters, so their agency means something. If you're tossing a completely new player into a campaign, his character might not have to start at the same low level as everyone else, but it should at least be no higher than equal to the existing weakest member of the team. Lowest party member's level, minus one, minimum one rather than "average of the entire party". Me, I always _prefer_ starting at first level.

While I appreciate it from a game perspective (and that is what we're doing here, playing games), from a thematic perspective I don't think it's great to award nothing for a failure. A fighter is still swinging his sword, a mage is still blowing things up, if nothing else the characters are experiencing the world and gaining a little insight. And in the real world we can learn more from our failures than our successes. So getting something from the failure state might be warranted - even if it's something as simple as a bonus to a die roll later. "I remember when I tried this before. Didn't work. I'll do it differently this time - differently, and better."

Strict EXP to level was the way to do it when the game started. Initially GP = EXP Earn a gold, get an EXP point too. You could look at your treasure and if you never spent ay, that was your EXP. The change to EXP for kills in some ways was an improvement, in others, not so much. But it is mostly better. Back in the days of 2E, I wrote a PC management program. PC creation, EXP tracking, and full database of equipment and encumbrance. I was about to contact TSR about it when they released the Core Rules CD. I still used my program for my campaigns until I jumped direct from 2E to 5E. The early EXP to level tables were close to 1000 to make 2nd and double your EXP to make each level from there. Changing that was an error in my opinion. I still use EXP and if the player doesn't show up, their PC does not get EXP. "How can you gain EXP if you didn't experience anything?" I have had games where a level 1 was in a party with a level 12. we all know the DM has to avoid the "minion of the high level" in the party to keep from killing them at this large a difference, but the game can still be enjoyed by all and the low level can make useful contributions in the social encounters. I still track encumbrance. I still count arrows. I play using some rules dating back to 1977 when I first became a DM.

One idea I've started goofing with is fractional xp reward. You take the highest level character, take his level's total xp needed to level up, and divide that total by his level. That xp number you get is what you award each person in the group for accomplishing milestones. This helps lower level players/new characters catchup some while keeping the integrity of the core xp system, and makes it a more consistent leveling pace in longer games. And it's great for westmarches. I'll also reward 10% of the highest player's total xp needed for clever ideas and good roleplaying. Just make sure to have the two calculated numbers on a notecard for quick reference during play.

I like the thumbnail style for this video type of yours.

I've been working on a XP system where failed rolls gain you XP. It incentives players to be honest about their rolls and has fast leveling at low levels that slows down the higher you get. Plus it keeps a balance for players. A min/max character will level slower than a regular character which equalizes things out.

I’m just waiting for the day when Esper posts a video titled “Why I switched to Castles & Crusades” (Or some other Old School/ Modern hybrid)

I have always liked the challenge of playing under-leveled. 2 of my best Characters were both behind the rest of the Party's Level, 1 was a Dwarf Cleric / Battlepriest of Moradin who spent XP to Forge the INSANE Armoury of the Party, and my Quaggoth Ftr/Brb/Rgr was behind by Level Adj +2 and 20% XP penalty, and he was still the Wrecking Ball of the Party because of the Mixology of that Class Blend and me as a Veteran Player being able to Max it Out. I find it also very rewarding when I happen to be ahead of everyone as a Fighter or Rogue, because then even if I don't have Spells, I'm so far ahead XP wise that I have access to things at a Higher Level than my DM's would gauge the Encounters for.

I had an idea like this. Someone called it milestone exp with more steps. It made me think I might as well just set exp requirements to 10 per level, and give out 1 or 2 exp for this and that. My solution is that PCs can only level up by pursuing and completing training during downtime.

I like the original Milestone system enough. As long as your party has a definite enough goal, which is not as hard as it sounds, they should naturally work together to achieve this goal. This goal could be to reach another country. Get your hideout. Clear the vault. Defeat the General. Etc If you used Lord of the Rings for example the party would level up when they reached Rivendell and when they reached Lothlorien. The party splits so they have separate goals. Frodo and Sam could level up for Taming Gollum or reaching the Window to the West. Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas for surviving Helm's Deep and Pelennor Fields. The DM is still completely in charge of when it happens. If you think the party is leveling too much, it might be that the party only levels up upon reaching Rivendell and dropping the Ring. If the party isn't leveling up fast enough the DM can either help them achieve their goal faster by potentially giving them a riskier faster option or provide them with at least alternative possible goals. The other reason I like Milestone is that it allows some classes to modify their level up for the next goal. Some classes can switch out spells and features on level up and it is not metagaming to learn and take useful underwater features if the next goal is to reach a treasure at an island or reach Atlantis or what have you.

There's an interesting argument here that advancement at the individual character level is better. Even when I use XP, I still grant it to the entire party and not to specific characters. Even if someone misses a session or encounter, I let them be the same as the party's XP value. That concept can be applied to any version of XP, but I prefer to keep everyone consistent, especially as to not leave behind people with busy real world schedules. Obviously the specific use case of a Westmarches campaign is different, but for most campaigns I'd rather go with consistency.

Thank you for your perspective / approach - I appreciate it good sir 🫡😎🙌

This is very insightful, I have been using milestones for a few years now, just for ease of practice. However I find it incentivizes my players to go after plot hooks and not spend as much time interacting with the world or one another, it's a minor gripe but I miss the days of the players hanging out swapping backstories and getting to know one another. I often think of returning to traditional xp. This might be the final nail.

Now that ive gone back and played 1e im down for different xp tables for different classes too

I'll probably use this method. If it doesn't fit perfectly, I could always adjust the numbers.

Very Old School player here. 1E - RAW: Yes you got the X.P. to level...but you don't just JUMP to the next level. You need to find somebody in your profession to help you advance, somebody of higher level. It's that time away from the wilds and dangerous areas to recouperate and meditate on what could be done better, and to look for the improved skills. So, people weren't going along and leveling up instantly. Also old school: 1 XP per 1 GP that was brought out of the dungeon. It was a mix of "Oh that makes sense" and "Well we don't have anything real to spend gold on so let's make it worth X.P." The way I DMed stayed close to RAW. However the level progression was sloooooooow. Very slow. Once you start to level up too high...regular denizens of the world and denizen monsters that make up most of the monster population become trivial. TAke Orcs, for instance. Straight fights with Orcs are going to taper off and become trivial in no time at all. Yet these are quasi-humans and intelligent enough and with a culture to share battle tactics and learn what didn't get them killed and how to fight better. So much can be done with orcs...but you will NEVER have the chance if the characters are level 8 after several sessions. How do you make Orcs a challenge for Level 10 characters? Terrain. Tactics. Weapons. Things like artillary of some kind. Those force multipliers such as bolstering bad guys giving those Orcs some buffs. How do you award XP for that? I would certainly not stick to R.A.W. but award according to the pacing of the story line and progression and the general vibe I got from the players. Yes, they are anxious to be tougher and have new powers and skills. But prioritize player skill over people that suck at playing and have always sucked at playing but managed to just wiggle their way into having high stats.

Perhaps take a look at the WotC "Unearthed Arcana: Three Pillar Experience" playtest document published back in 2017? That gives guidelines for XP awards for the combat, exploration, and social interaction pillars of the game. Characters have to earn 100 XP per level, and it resets per level up, so not too cumbersome to track. Gives awards for defeating monsters (not just killing them), collecting treasure, discovering secrets/locations, and convincing or manipulating NPCs. Awards are generally in the 5 XP to 10 XP range per "encounter" but large parties (6+ characters) have lower awards. It's only a 2 page document so is very sparse on the details, more guidelines than rules - it's for the DM to flesh out.

I've been meaning to try the Checkpoints used in Shared Campaigns from Xanathar's Guide to Everything.

I actually do something similar, that I call Training Points. I sometimes do 1 Training Point when a Player rolls a Nat 20 (there's a check tied to it), but nowadays, I'm starting to say: "Oh, yeah, you're pretty beat up, sure take 2 Training Points, oh, you solved the problem creatively? take 1 Training Point. Oh, you won the fight in a boring way without taking a hit? Yeah, no Training Points for you."

Some people are very very concerned about every single PC being on the exact same playing field...and a part of me gets it...but another part of me remembers the hundreds of other game systems I've played that just don't have levels, everyone is constantly on a different playing field in a non intrusive way, and new PCs start completely fresh and have to catch up. So yeah I think it depends on the group and if that frustrates players don't use it, but if it successfully insentivises cool moments and teamwork and the like, hell yeah. I remember in 5e for a group, getting the last hit on a boss and getting to narrate how you kill them was like the pinnacle of gaming...and they all meta turned on eachother in a really obtrusive way that frustrated me as a GM. So I introduced a "rule" where no matter who dealt the last point of damage, everybody got to describe how they helped take the boss down working together. After a while, without my prompting, the player who killed a boss or even a mini boss or random strong monster, would describe the enemies death and bring up how another PC helped in a cool team up attack.

My current system consists of a small participation reward (10xp for making it to the session) and a bigger xp reward for meeting goals and fulfilling objectives (30-50xp per goal usually). This works best in a long-running sandbox campaign.

It isn't a very popular system anymore, but I always preferred both the XP and alignment systems from Palladium over D&D's versions. XP for defeating a foe (whether you kill them or defeat them in some other way) XP for using skills XP for playing in character XP for avoiding unnecessary violence XP for clever ideas (even when they don't work) XP for self-sacrifice ...

I like doing XP as well, i just just the base XP for a given encounter (so the thresh hold) rather than calculating the amount of monsters etc. This allows me to tweak it and I like experience tracks how the game is going. Stops it stalling and helps you move things along as well - Edit I also grant xp for social and exploration stuff too (not just combat)

I award XP through encounters either social, combat, puzzle etc. I also award XP for quests but i also did the math for each chapter, so this many odds & ends plus this many quests would put them at so so level. There's wiggle room for them to exceed the optimal level for any given encounter but i think that's an award in of it's self.

Excellent video as always! Thank you!

Great video Esper! I've always avoided XP systems due to the ease of milestones but this has certainly given me a lot to ponder.

As the player who usually makes the plans to get everyone through relatively unscathed and if that fails the plans to get us (well usually the other characters) out of trouble I definitely like this idea

My two thoughts are: • I want PCs to always start at 1st level and be able to basically Magikarp their way up to the same level as the rest of the party by gaining equal XP amounts to the rest of the party •And I do want challenges besides combat to award XP because having only combat XP causes players to think that NPCs above level 1 must have killed (also rewards murderhobos)

Interesting system, thanks for the video! It will be food for thought.

I´m using the XP based on the chalenges+roleplaying and not based on combat, since early 3.5, it works realy good (I algo give a bonus for snacks)

Solidarity vs justice is the tension in all organizations, groups and states etc. To find the right mixture is not set in stone and needs to be adjusted for different groups.

You said when you have can even levelling system you can punish players who contribute more. I feel this is a glaring difference between how I play the game and you play the game. For me contributing more is the reward in and of itself, you get to play DnD and have fun. For you the goal isn't to play the game and have fun, it is to play the game to be more powerful than the other players, and that is where you derive your fun.

Your fashion choice reminds me of my high school days in the 1990s.

In AD&D we tracked XP in full detail according to the books. It was not fun by the time characters ended up two levels or more apart. It also created an unhealthy competitive attitude between players. Players felt left out if their character got fewer opportunities to interact. Having everyone at the same level and progress at the same speed is much easier, also when you have different players and characters in the group over time.

i have never used milestones or had everyone at the same level. way more fun with mixed level party and lots of role-playing opportunities. having started in basic dnd then moved to 1E and finally 2E which i still play due to familiarity and amount of lore and books available. math and XP is second nature once you learn the systems and like the book says rules are guidelines only not set in stone. have fun and change it as needed. xp plus situational rewards are what we use at our table. also i still run lots of 1 off adventures and older modules i have on hand.

I tend to find few actually *good* points in Milestone's defence, other than "simplicity" and "ease of use", vs XP's "tedious" and "time consuming". But the intuition a DM needs is only really attained through the experience of DM-ing itself (running the game for a length of time). I also like the idea that older editions award XP for gold successfully looted. I think both gold looted and monsters killed *should* have a place, just like monsters snuck past, roleplay encounters talked through, and traps disarmed, as any one of those *can* go wrong and then it's flight-or-fight. I've always thought XP should be increased or decreased based on a few factors, like how much preparation the party does, how much stealth they employ, and the levels of characters relevative to the dungeon. I'm curious to see this system in full, so I've followed on Patreon for when that is published.

I have primarily use XP in my campaigns and try to give XP for none combat objectives. I like the idea in the video for simplifying and controlling XP progression. I will add that as a player I feel cheated if we defeat a monster and don’t get the XP. I suppose you can use the XP amounts as a budget when building encounters. But it still might be frustrating for some players.

Adopt the OSR Method. XP earned to treasure brought back to town. able to double dip treasure XP by spending that gold entirely on flavor things that don't make your character better at adventuring. for example, bringing back 2,000 gold pieces in treasure to the market is 2,000 XP. spending 1,000 of that gold to buy your niece the finest hand made spidersilk dress as a gift to wear at her wedding to the local goldsmith earns you an extra 1,000 XP. spending that 1,000 carousing at the tavern or donating to the church also earns 1,000 xp. what matters is the double dipped gold isn't spent gearing up or preparing for the next adventure. you can also spend gold on an ally's behalf to train them instead. spending gold on thier behalf for thier benefit.

I'm thinking about switching from milestone to xp again also, but I think I'm gonna make it a 1 to 1 ratio of gold instead of xp to level up. Starting it with my next campaign, we'll see how it goes.

Awesome!

Use a classic milestone. But I also reward inspiration, and let my players stick up with it, and at different levels they can buy proficiencies, feats, and eventually levels. Those stages of using inspiration stay with the party, and costs are tied to character level

I don't track XP during the session because I don't plan my sessions that closely. I'm fairly improvisational as a GM. I mentally go through the session afterwards, listing out all the encounters, traps, goals achieved, and other challenges and assign XP values for each one. If I can do this before the players leave at the end of session I will. If not I award XP in our discord channel the day after. Judging by my experience the players get a weekly endorphin rush from XP awards similar to the endorphin rush from leveling up and more frequent.

I like the simplicity of the system. I was doing Milestones which I liked but the players get excited about earning extra do.

Long time player, but just DM'ed my first time this week. I loved XP back in 3e and plan on continuing to use it in 5e. I may round up or down when I feel like it though. I've played with DM's essentially giving us a level up for roughly every hour of play. I did not enjoy it. It felt cheap and artificial. I like numbers. I like it to be earned like Esper said. So I think I'll implement xp for goals and ingenuity. Kind of like Baldurs Gate 3. Excited to try it out.

I think id depend on system. If this is a game like D&D it require o have player on the same power level of people will feel bad when can't help enough in situations and combat. And their are systems where power level is not that important like more story situations. I was play in Warhammer with players around 3'rd profession and with fresh characters and everyone have lot of fun.

I like it pretty well. It is good that it discourages players from wiping out all monsters just for the XP. However, I think it has some weaknesses. This kind of seems to work more for strictly-prescribed adventures, not for sandbox gameplay. I had an idea for a system that's a little closer to your previous system. I'd award XP for fight difficulty, whether they bypassed it or fought it out (but not if they never encountered it). You can't proactively double-dip the same enemies for experience multiple times. Trivial would be 0 XP, Night-Impossible might be 4 or 5. But I'd also give out EXP for discovering secrets, entering a certain number of new hexes, accomplishing goals, or finding treasure. Some of these might be level-adjisted to allow players who are behind to catch up a bit faster. So maybe a dungeon doesn't have much treasure, but each villager rescued might be an objective completed for 1 XP. The XP between levels might be something like 10 + X or maybe 10 + 2X (where X is the next level). But my way has weaknesses, such as encouraging players to thoroughly clear dungeons, even if it's not for combat. Yours is also better for allowing players to catch up.

I want to specifically address your Kobold example, with a question. Which encounter is worth more? My point is that IMO those encounters _are_ the same XP value. If you give more for the "harder" (second) encounter, your dis-incentivizing being careful and sneaky. If you reward more XP for the first encounter, you're excessively penalizing screwing up a single group Stealth check. Thoughts?

The Seer spoke of this Esper but I was hoping he was wrong... You'll be hunted... And you're admittedly dope jacket will be stripped from you!!!

I really enjoy the Cyberpunk 2020's and Cyberpunk RED's System for improvement. However; both those systems are Skill-Based games and no 2 characters have the exact same Improvement Point (IP) amounts, sot to mention some skills are 2x the cost, and a Rank Up is 3x the cost. You could be a Rank 4 Solo and Rank 2 Techie, with a Base 12 in your Autofire Skill. while the Rank 6 Solo has 12 in Autofire, but while the Solo/Techie can make weapons or cybernetics, while being better than average in Combat with the Solo's: Combat Awareness, Role Ability. While the Rank 6 Solo has more Combat Awareness Points, so they are even stronger than the Multi-Rank Solo in terms of their Combat Awareness. Both XP and IP systems are usable. But for D&D our table prefers Milestones. we usually have levels 1-3 in the first 4 sessions. then slow the roll for 4-9 to about 10 sessions, 10-14 is 15, and 15-20 is At Purely Story beats. XP is simple to track with Math, and IP is good for the Skill Systems. All of the systems DO work, and your Milestone system might be one I try to insert into out Table. But as always, you're videos are always an Inspiration and always keep me company at work/home.

I live gold for exp. It is the way d&d should be run. Old school!

If you have a great group of players who are committed and are energized by the story, a simple milestone approach is sufficient IMHO.

Interestingly, I was totally with you for the first half of the video. Agree with the mindset completely. But I am not on board with your actual method. I am just starting a keep on the borderlands 5e, and I’ve settled on xp, with half xp for enemies defeated, half xp for gold value acquired.

Have you considered old school xp by gold method?

My biggest concern with this method is that it (at least heavily sounds like it) could incentivize far more spitting of the party, something that i as a GM simply do not like. There are greater rewards to going solo and at least some players will always chase that feeling of simply being better, having better numbers, than their peers. And on the flipside, if the party is never slitting up, how does this meaningfully change anything compared to miiestone? Hell, one could very easily create a milestone system that is even more conducive to getting people to do interesting things with their characters by simply giving each player different milestones for the adventure.

I've never seen players feel like they weren't being rewarded for being daring without xp. Level shouldn't be the only thing driving characters foward.

I'm using milestones for the first time, it's objectively better for my game. I have been throwing absolutely bat shit bonkers stuff at my party that was way over leveled for them, even using success instead of monster xp they'd still have leveled up way too quickly since they have been fighting tooth and nail through the post apocalytic wasteland. As for having a player join later, why the hell would an adventuring party even consider taking on someone who's far lower level than them? If you have a player who wants to join the campaign in progress then just let them meet another adventurer who's the same level but currently doesn't have a party. Never understood why DMs will be like "Yeah the party is level six but since you didn't adventure with them you'll be starting as a level one character" as if anyone at the table would enjoy that.

I use XP but I give all the players the same now. I like keeping the party on the same level. 3.5 has enough math as is, which is what I run

XP for gold is the only way to go, lets the players self-direct their advancement. Fiat advancement makes players into whipped dogs.

Flavor Text Adventures... KS Seriously, if DnD fan.

I wish there were more like buttons for reinstituting XP.

Have you considered just cutting it down to groups of 10 per level? A 1st level player has to gain 10 X.P. to advance and an 8th level character has to earn 80 X.P. to advance. I'm being lazy and not doing the math but it seems like they could catch up. So if a 1st level character is in a party of 5th level characters gets 50 X .P. they shoot from 1st to 3rd level and have 20 X.P. left over to save for later.

Most people in real life can learn from their own mistakes. I wonder if leveling up after defeat has more sense than leveling up after victory. After all, when we have obstacles we learn to adapt while when we get things our way all we learn is to keep doing exactly the same thing.

I agree with most of your argumentation, but I'm not entirely certain why bonus XP is given out at the GM's discretion if, simultaneously, milestone is a problem because of GM fiat- I agree that GM fiat is an issue, but retaining it anywhere seems like working at cross purposes. I'd also argue that every adventure has the same amount of content: content is necessarily whatever the player characters involve themselves in, not what's written in the book. If an adventure is 500 pages and none of the players at the table strongly engage with it, then it's more "sparse" than a three page one shot in which they're jumping at every opportunity to interact with the world. I think a combination of a player-created world (with something like Microscope, which builds player engagement unlike anything else in the hobby) and player-defined goals (and corresponding advancement based upon those goals) obviates the need for high-complexity tables, categorization of adventures, and tracking large, precise numbers for advancement. That's certainly what's worked best at my table, and its worked so well since I implemented it that I can't imagine ever using a different advancement system again. Every table's different, of course, but I think tracking numbers is something a video game is good at and ttrpgs struggle with, and advancing based upon player goals is practically impossible in video games, but makes ttrpgs shine; table top games should do things they're good at, and leave everything else to other mediums.

can i use my catapult?

IMO EXP (or it's variations) as a concept is unnecessary in a TTRPG. levels represent how powerful and competent a character is, therefore it should go up when a character experiences noticeable growth or learing. by this logic EXP represents how close a character is to achieving this growth, but in a TTRPG making it a numerical value is completely unnecessary. if we understand that a considerable challenge is needed to achieve that growth, why use numbers to measure it at all? why not skip that middle man entirely? the system I'm working on simply states (work in progress): "Levelling up: A player character gains a level after surviving an encounter that proved difficult or impossible to overcome with it's current abilities. Such encounters are usually defined by (but not limited to): -1 or more player characters falling unconscious. -the party fleeing a battle they participated in but could not win. -the party's health or resources being heavily strained. Based on these factors, the GM may grant characters 1 or more Levels." granted, this system's levels aren't quite as big power jumps as DnD's can be. but I think the principle still stands. that's the beauty of TTRPGs, unlike videogames you don't need to abstract EVERYTHING into numbers.

I like that your showing your face now Esper. You have a potential to be a really successful DND youtuber but its gona take some modification to your presentation. here are a few things immediately: 1. Having an editor will make you less focused on the quality of the video when on the screen. 2. Stop trying to tell me something and tell me something- be direct and concise in your ideas. Dont conflate content with entertainment. You are entertaining already. 3. Express yourself a bit more in your facial expressions, feel free to look away and tilt your head, take who you are an visually make him a bit more characterized , just a bit. It will make you seem more natural on camera. Tldr: your doing a really good job, just spend some time learning from other youtubers in how they present the content - particularly outside of dnd (think science youtubers or drama youtubers).

Here’s an interesting thought… gold for xp

Your frontline fighters and your offensive spellcasters will love this. Your healers won't keep up with the party, so your healing will not keep up, and did your rogue find that deadly trap that would've killed at least a couple of the party .. too bad he didn't do anything exceptionally brave to get some exps. It still will not be fair, and I'm not sitting down with 3 books and a calculator for an hour and a half to figure exps. If somebody is hanging back and riding the party they didn't make their milestone, or was it because that one barbarian player hogged all the play time. I will never go back to exps, it will not be fair .. except to game hogs. Oh well I guess some of us pigs are a little more equal than the others.

XP for gold is the best

Bump

"Maybe it includes a long rest, maybe not." That's nuts. You're saying that a regular adventure may well take less than a day, and one tough adventure could level up the party? You are designing adventures that don't challenge their resources unless they do something "wrong." This is the #1 problem with 4e/5e self healing: no resource management. You've been beaten, stabbed, slashed, scorched etc to an inch of your life? Rest up for an hour or so, and, POOF, it all goes away. Oh, you rolled lousy recovery dice on that short rest? Maybe you're just hangry. Sit down to a meal, take a long nap. POOF, all better, guaranteed! One of the great aspects of Old School style is what happens when you take a drubbing. That 2nd level cleric has 5 dice of healing, total, per day. If your wounds are properly treated and bound you self-heal 1 point per day. On top of that, your archer could only recover three arrows after that last fight. Your wizard failed a save, managed to not die, but his pocketed vest with spell components was destroyed. You have to make it back to town, praying you don't encounter a random you can't handle.

11:00 - Everything you just said was thought of and covered in old school D&D. Just ditch 5e and the problems go away. WoTC's vandalism just creates problems.

THe best xp system is in 1e. You give xp for gold, and they have to spend gold to go up a level!

I find your perspective rather interesting, but it sounds like a nightmare. Your style of dming incentivizes a player vs. player mentality that just doesn't sound all that fun.

Your opening statement is interesting as it is completely opposite to what works for me. So allow me to offer a counterpoint with the obvious caveat that I'm not trying to invalidate your view or your proposed system, but just giving my two sent. XP in D&D is part of the larger progression system that is "class leveling" and as such it is meaningless until you get enough to reach the next class level. This is why I much prefer to do away with it entirely and work with milestones, it has the advantage of lessening the bookkeeping workload and homogeneous party level is easier to design encounter for or if using a module adventure you ensure the PC are always at the "right level" for the story. That is on the technical side, but on the narrative side I find XP to be a bad incentive for action too. It leads the players to see everything through the lens of "XP gain" and I find that more often than not, this numb role play creativity. For me XP is a concept too far removed of the game world where the very daring action and risks you speak off are taking place, it create a dissonance between player and character, which is why as you said it is well laid out for combat but not at all for exploration and RP. Far better is for the players to reflect on their character's goal and for the recompense of their action to be the very accomplishment of these goals. These can take the form of advantageous position, intel, items, allies, favors, even some bonus power out of the class leveling system, anything as long as it is happening concretely in the game's world supported by the narrative. In your exemple of the Kobold fight, that the PC manage to sneak up on the the Kobold or have to deal with them in a defensive position stem entirely from how they approach the fight and. The easier fight is in and of itself a very satisfying reward to managing to sneak up and should have nothing to do with the xp rating as it's like saying "you made it harder on yourself so here is a reward". Now not all progression system using XP are equal and the more granular the progression can be, the less problematic it is to have some players be a little ahead on the progression. L5R or VtM gives XP point that are spend immediately to improve your character little by little, in this kind of system it is way easier to link the XP gain to the narrative and the character development so in those I don't mind XP being used as a recompense. On the other side of the spectrum Ars Magica have an XP leveling system, but rather than classes it is applied to every single skill which level up separately and the main way to gain said "skill xp" is to use or train the said skill. So you're always progressing little by little in the things you are actually doing which the ultimate expression of linking the progression system to the actual actions of the players. In this case I also don't mind some bonus free xp being handed here and there as it will never be the bulk of the xp gain anyway, on the other and it overall sure doesn't ease the bookkeeping workload. In regard of all this I can say that your proposed mixed system of "xp goal" is already a vast improvement on the basic system of D&D, it goes in the right direction of tying the progression system to the goals of the characters. There is still the inherent problem of the class system with it's big discret and far in between advancement, but it's not like we can do away with it and still call this game D&D, so with all that said I give your system the note of holy avenger out of ten.

And by dividing it evenly among the characters youve gone right back to punishing some and rewarding others, the same as milestone. This really isnt all that different from milestone. i dont know why modern DMs are so concerned about the small amounts of bookeeping needed for xp.

Xp is bar non the best. the original system from Ad&D first ed, xp= treasure+ monsters defeated+ dm bonuses+ any other bonus from stats or magic or RP. Also xp system is a reason your players will actually search around after the "Goal" is found on the first day of lucky gameplay in a castle the dm fleshed out way more!.

The very reason you give against the milestone system and for the xp, is also the reason why I would argue against it. You want to reward players that do more awesome stuff and take risks, and it feels like you're 'punishing' them for doing so. However, rewarding them punishes the people that aren't outgoing. The issue here is that not everyone is outspoken and able to do what they want. Wallflower players exist and are valid, and in some groups some people don't even get to talk a lot because there are other people that talk faster or louder and thus are the ones talking the most. Especially online with Discord, talking at the same time is just a difficulty that leads to many people just letting the other speak first because of how that whole system works. One thing that will happen a lot, is that you'll be rewarding the people that simply talk the loudest and punish the people that let others talk too. I can talk a lot during a session, or barely get a word in when the other players do talk a lot instead of being followers/watchers. It all depends on the group, and in many groups there will be people that just can't do their thing because they will let someone else take the mike when they speak up too. This also leads to a none too insignificant chance that you'll actively promote friction in the group, now that getting the spotlight is actively important for levelling up faster than the rest. There are already players that compete with others for most damage or optimisation, you do not want to add this rule to a table with two or more of those (and you don't know if you have them until you're several sessions in). Then we get to the details. What is an important event, taking a risk or being 'better' than the rest? If we're talking about most kills, most notable actions or damage, you're actively promoting and supporting the 'I didn't ask how big the room is, I cast fireball' kind of mage. They and other nova-damage PCs would see fit to not only do it, but might even get competitive and increase acceptable splash damage, just to be the one that does the most and levels the best. If we're instead looking at creative events, then we'll start seeing players try whatever they can think of and giving the DM a migraine of trying things that are just within the rules as written, and making most battles a joke. Meanwhile players that aren't too creative, familiar with the rules or just want to be the fighter that bonks, are punished for not being 'creative'. Then there are certain approaches. The rogue might want to sneak in, but the barbarian will now declare that he kicks in the door before the rogue can stealth in to make sure that the rogue can't pull ahead in xp and hog all the glory. And if the rogue declaring that they'll stealth overrules the other PCs' player agency, then what's stopping them from always declaring and enforcing their right to go in solo and farm stealth kills? What about social encounters? Worse than combat, because there's no initiative here and players 'getting the spotlight' by trying to be the one talking or pitching into conversations, will only get worse when being the one talking/getting that successful social skill check gets something for it. I'm seeing players try to out-scream each other, argue out of game about one of them hogging the conversation or sabotaging the others talking, the high-charisma trying to monopolise it, etc. Every other form of favouring the players that so something better, can lead to the same results and/or players feeling like the DM is favouring someone (which many DMs can unintentionally do). Add to this that DMs would have their own idea of what matters, so social encounters might be huge or barely matter at all. Same for perception checks to notice traps, and skill checks. Someone might specialise in something they think will be important, and lag behind. I know that this is assuming the worst, but then again you should assume Murphy's players when introducing a new system to a yet unknown group of players. And this system is rife with seeds for campaign-breaking player conflict, problem players and arguments that made you wish that you never introduced the system in the first place. I know that in practice, you'll be more experiencing minor issues such as players who didn't keep track of their xp because someone else usually does it, someone missing several sessions and lagging behind enough to get demoralised and excuse themselves from the game, and players who'll be xp-fishing. The milestone system has an evolutionary benefit over the xp system in this regard however. Not only is it easier to keep track of, but it does not disadvantage the players that can't or won't be more exemplary while the ones that want to do great roleplay things and take great risks, already do so. Players play this game for fun, heroics and that rare amazing moment of the rest of the party losing their minds over their well-timed action or good roll. It doesn't actually matter if they get more xp for it than the rest. If you want to reward the players that are doing exemplary things, I would instead reward them on top of the regular levelling. They get some kind of boon, ability or item for doing something really good, without you having to worry about rewarding the mediocre session events or keeping track of regular extra xp. Once a player has such a boon, they cannot get another until the rest of the party has managed to get one too, preventing boon-fishing and perhaps even encouraging the party to help the wallflower do something amazing or personal-quest related. I for example have personal quests for each of my players, and when they succeed they get a Grim Hollow transformation boon. If they don't, then that's fine. But if they do, then they will notice the benefits for being their character more and better.

Just use gold instead of XP

This is a cooperative game, not a competitive game. There aren’t very many games that are cooperative without competitive aspects. I think equal XP across the party is necessary or else players will be competing for xp/levels, you dont want that. Players who take risks and contribute more are more important to the game world which SHOULD be motivation enough.

when you only level up by milestone then you dont give a crap about exploring or fighting monsters because its useless and unneded

If someone new joins an ongoing game, or someone's character dies and they need a replacement, they absolutely should be the level of the party. Anything else is just bad gming. No one wants to be a first level character when everyone else is level 5. No one enjoys that. You're just going to push that player away and cause them to quit. Besides which, why can't there be someone else who is travelled and experienced? Why can't the party find someone who is already leveled up to join them? It's really not that contrived, but even if you think it is, these contrivences are necessary for the game to function. For everything else I pretty much aggree. I use milestone leveling, in that I tell the players when they level, but that's primarily because I run adventure paths, and multiple per week at that, which assume the party is all the same level and that they are a specific level at specific times. Quite frankly, I don't want to have to change encounters to account for players not being the assumed level, and again, facing challenges you're not high enough level to face isn't really fun, which is the primary purpose of the game, and should remain so. Then again, I run Pathfinder 1e, which is far crunchier where every level matters a lot more than they do in 5e do to the lack of bounded accuracy. I think this idea could work, but only for a system like 5e where all the number are smaller throughout all levels of play, and only really in this style of West-Marches-esq campaign, where the goal isn't to tell a single, ongoing story with a single group of indiviuals as the heroes, rather an entire living, persistent world

I can't help but sneer whenever these modern gamers act as if math is so difficult. Like adding is college level or something.