Greetings,
the other creators plus myself of our RPG are rather undecided of where to take rewards for advancing in character levels. As of our last discussion, this is how the whole system of leveling up works. We were able to make leveling up your character based off leveling up skills.

Our skills are divided by what you personally need to achieve/cast attacks/spells. Dexterity and Magic. Skills would follow as Ranged, One-Handed, Martial Arts, etc. for DEX. Evocation(Destruction), Restoration, Illusion, Nullification, etc for MAG.
Each skill starts at 0, and as you use X attack/spell for whatever skill, you add a "use" to that skill. Whether you achieve or fail to hit. The theory here is that whether you achieve or fail, you learn what does and doesn't work. Thus giving you experience with that skill.

For the sake of terms, I'm replacing "uses" with "EXP points."

To level up a skill, we started at 4 squared and went up(5, 6, 7, . So the EXP required for each skill point go up as: 16, 25, 36, 48, 64, 81, 100, etc.
So here we said "Ok, lets use skills to level up your character. Level up any two skills and you level up your character." We're going to beta test leveling up at 2.

So if your "majoring" in Ranged, One-handed, Two-Handed as a tank unit. Here' what it would look like.
Ranged: 1
One-Handed: 1
Two-Handed: 0
Then you level up. That's 32 EXP first off,
So next, you do Two-Handed and Ranged again
Ranged: 2
One-Handed: 1
Two-Handed: 1
This time your level up took 41 EXP.
Doing this will keep the EXP relatively low for possibly 4-5 skills(If that's how many you plan to major).  
With this, you can try being a "Jack of all Trades" and level up super quick, by bouncing every skill(there's about 15 so far) to get the lowest skill in all of them. However, by that time in the game, this player would be horribly behind in skills, ultimately not helping him or his party. He would just have some nice "toys."

Now I believe our leveling system is summed up.
As "rewards" we have a few things. Your HP will always increase by 5 every character level up. Then you get two points to spend.
You may either:
- Buy +5HP(more)
- Increase your Spell Channels(Spell Channels are slots in where you, the "server" are hosting "players" or in this case, spells or elements. We have buffers and other abilities that last multiple turns. So you have to be able to host them on your magic. More slots, the more you can handle.)

Then we were thinking of having two trees you can go down.

One is unlocking more unique skills(or perks). To increase your uniqueness or value to the party.

The second is increasing your actions per turn. Right now you are allotted 2 actions every turn. These actions are either a movement, attack, or ability. Any action cannot be repeated.
Unless you go down this tree. Then we created sub-trees. You can either:
- Repeat the same action (doing 2 movements, 2 attacks, 2 abilities)
- Add a whole new action (+1 Attack, +1 Movement, +1 Ability)

And this is where we stopped.
What I would like is:
- A professional opinion
- Tips
- What could be added as a reward
- What should go or change.

Thanks!

Generally the idea of blanket levels is a terrible one, it creates a lot of baggage that needs endless patching to fix the various problems it causes. Case in point fixed damage versus high level hit points. Something that does fixed damage like say falling will have much less of an effect on a high level character than a low level character, despite there being no apparent physical reason for this. Set HP at a reasonably survivable level and have the players compete on something other than being able to soak up damage. This has enormous effects on gameplay too I find, leading to a more nuanced experience.

Levels within skills makes much more sense, I'd pick up the Lone Wolf gamebooks (freely and legally available online) and see how they work it. Not technically RPGs but very clever nonetheless - there were eight or nine basic powers and as you became stronger more effects were unlocked within these powers. It's something I'm experimenting with myself at the moment, rather than the Vancian ideal of huge swathes of spells you can learn more of as time passes. Although I do love me some huge swathes of spells.

Your skill advancement system is very similar to the increment point system used in CP2020, and I suspect it would be just as much of an accounting nightmare. You get around this problem by associating skill advancement with the actual skill roll according to your scaling, so in your case you want:

Level 2: one advancement every 16 rolls on average
Level 3: one advancement every 25 rolls on average
Level 4: one advancement every 36 rolls on average
Level 5: one advancement every 48 rolls on average

and so on. Using this zero accounting method the average player should advance at approximately the same rate as one using the laborious accounting method, there should be little effective difference in gameplay.

Of course these odds don't lend themselves to readily available dice, we don't have a d16 or a d25 for example. I'm assuming you're working from a d20 basis here so let's round off to something more useful:

Level 2: one advancement every 20 rolls on average - 5% chance
Level 3: one advancement every 30 rolls on average - 3% chance
Level 4: one advancement every 40 rolls on average - 2.5% chance
Level 5: one advancement every 50 rolls on average - 2% chance

So someone with level 1 in a skill automatically advances to level 2 when they roll a 20 on a d20 (1 in 20 chance, 5%). To advance from level 2 to level 3, roll a 1d6 on a natural 20 and advance them if they roll a 1-4. To advance from level 3 to level 4, roll a 1d6 on a natural 20 and advance them if they roll a 1-3. And for level 5, they advance on a 1-2 on a 1d6 after a natural 20.

It would be easier if you were using d10s, it's simpler overall, and my odds may be a little off above, but I hope the general idea is coming through. Zero accounting natural skill advancement through skill use, requiring only one extra roll very rarely. You may get someone that reaches level 3 in 3 rolls, you may get someone that stays at level 1 even after 60 rolls - for the former, that's quite a rush for everyone (although runs of extreme luck never last), for the latter have an optional training track which takes longer but is far more certain.

Implementing this would probably involve a skill advancement table which would look something like this
Level Roll
2 - --
3 - 1-4 on a 1d6 ---> where this is the roll needed after a natural 20 to advance
4 - 1-3 on a 1d6
5 - 1-2 on a 1d6
6 - 1 on a 1d6
7 - 1 on a 1d8 etc.

This can also be adjusted if you wanted to introduce skill difficulties:
Normal skill: use advancement table
Difficult skill: treat advancement roll as if 1 higher
Very difficult skill: treat advancement roll as if 2 higher

so for a very difficult skill, if someone was at level 3 and wanted to advance to 4, they would have to roll a 1 on a 1d6 rather than 1-3 on a 1d6 after a natural 20. Sooo much easier using d10s as a basis for this.

That's pretty clever!

Thanks if that's aimed at me! I started out using increment points but everyone was heartily tired of them after a few campaigns so after much paper crumpling I eventually figured out that you get almost the same effect just using probabilities. I normally use the current level of skill+skill difficulty as a rollover target though so it auto-adapts itself to whatever level of skill you're at without needing a table. Again, the advantages of using a d10 base.

The skill advancement system I think would work for active combat abilities like Magic or Two-handed weapon to an extent, since the player chooses whether they want to zap or greatsword. As soon as you try to add in defensive or environmentally-driven skills (like Lockpicking or Knowledge: Demons) you may have problems since at that point whether a skill can be advanced is determined by how many locks or demons (or whatever) the DM puts in the dungeon or city, or whatever.

Its realistic from a development POV but at the very least you'd probably want to at least give characters a big allotment of skill points initially to realize their character concept, since their growth after that is completely organic. Basically the complete opposite of say, 3E D&D, where you can go up level and get ranks of Sailor to become a Pirate despite the adventure being mostly inland stabbing orcs.

Quote from: Exile;682288Greetings,
the other creators plus myself of our RPG are rather undecided of where to take rewards for advancing in character levels. As of our last discussion, this is how the whole system of leveling up works. We were able to make leveling up your character based off leveling up skills.

Our skills are divided by what you personally need to achieve/cast attacks/spells. Dexterity and Magic. Skills would follow as Ranged, One-Handed, Martial Arts, etc. for DEX. Evocation(Destruction), Restoration, Illusion, Nullification, etc for MAG.
Each skill starts at 0, and as you use X attack/spell for whatever skill, you add a "use" to that skill. Whether you achieve or fail to hit. The theory here is that whether you achieve or fail, you learn what does and doesn't work. Thus giving you experience with that skill.

For the sake of terms, I'm replacing "uses" with "EXP points."

To level up a skill, we started at 4 squared and went up(5, 6, 7, . So the EXP required for each skill point go up as: 16, 25, 36, 48, 64, 81, 100, etc.
So here we said "Ok, lets use skills to level up your character. Level up any two skills and you level up your character." We're going to beta test leveling up at 2.

So if your "majoring" in Ranged, One-handed, Two-Handed as a tank unit. Here' what it would look like.
Ranged: 1
One-Handed: 1
Two-Handed: 0
Then you level up. That's 32 EXP first off,
So next, you do Two-Handed and Ranged again
Ranged: 2
One-Handed: 1
Two-Handed: 1
This time your level up took 41 EXP.
Doing this will keep the EXP relatively low for possibly 4-5 skills(If that's how many you plan to major).  
With this, you can try being a "Jack of all Trades" and level up super quick, by bouncing every skill(there's about 15 so far) to get the lowest skill in all of them. However, by that time in the game, this player would be horribly behind in skills, ultimately not helping him or his party. He would just have some nice "toys."

Now I believe our leveling system is summed up.
As "rewards" we have a few things. Your HP will always increase by 5 every character level up. Then you get two points to spend.
You may either:
- Buy +5HP(more)
- Increase your Spell Channels(Spell Channels are slots in where you, the "server" are hosting "players" or in this case, spells or elements. We have buffers and other abilities that last multiple turns. So you have to be able to host them on your magic. More slots, the more you can handle.)

Then we were thinking of having two trees you can go down.

One is unlocking more unique skills(or perks). To increase your uniqueness or value to the party.

The second is increasing your actions per turn. Right now you are allotted 2 actions every turn. These actions are either a movement, attack, or ability. Any action cannot be repeated.
Unless you go down this tree. Then we created sub-trees. You can either:
- Repeat the same action (doing 2 movements, 2 attacks, 2 abilities)
- Add a whole new action (+1 Attack, +1 Movement, +1 Ability)

And this is where we stopped.
What I would like is:
- A professional opinion
- Tips
- What could be added as a reward
- What should go or change.

Thanks!

One thing I would be mindful of is the impact of extra actions. They would likely need to be 'more expensive' than many other options.

Unless everyone gets extra actions.

Burning Wheel (and doubtless other use-it-to-advance-it games) has good practice and instruction rules so that you can beef up on things that you don't encounter during adventures, or to put you over the edge if you're close to advancing.

PCs can instruct one another, and you can of course seek out mentors and convince or bribe them to teach you.  It takes a while, but this is offset somewhat by the cost of living, and the fact that during-adventure skill gain is a fair bit faster than practice.

@The Traveller Thanks man. Our idea is that as the PCs increased in skill, bosses and NPCs would become equally or more hard to beat. But not making it too easy, already the party will be facing harder NPCs when they begin. But with a few more cannon fodder units. I had not considered the idea of keeping every PC at a fixated HP count. However that is a good idea; then we would make PCs more unique to what strength they have to benefit the party in a battle.

Accounting them? We thought a tally system on a separate piece of paper. If someone fails to keep track of their own use, that's their fault. Is how we've approached that. Above anything else, we want to avoid unnecessary baggage.

I like the roll idea, thanks a ton. My team may or may not be so familiar with the idea. But I understand it.

Thanks, man!

@Bloody Stupid Johnson
Indeed. At this point we don't have much for environmentally-driven abilities outside of enchanting and smithing. At this point in the game development, we haven't explored the full capabilities of adding locks and etc.
Since we have a slightly different system for using d20s, we've given PCs the ability to have one Mastered Skill, two Supreme Skills, and four Honed skills. What we've done is taken DEX and Magic and given them numbers as attributes. For example, using the d20 system; say your a warrior and your main focus is dealing more damage by weapons.
So you have:
DEX: 10
MAG: 8
With having your DEX at 10. You have a solid 50% chance of successfully being able to hit your target. Not chances of hitting, like you would normally roll against your target. But your ability to hit the target. We do realize that there isn't much for dodging an attack this way. We're working on that.
However, we're counting down. So if your DEX is 10 on the d20 scale. 1 is the best you can do, while at 10 you're just getting by with being able to hit your target. If you roll above 10, you miss.
With that established, you have Ranged and Two-Handed skills that you desire to focus. Currently they are:
Ranged: 1
Two-Handed: 0
If you plan to use Ranged. Then the formula is (DEX+Skill vs Roll) 10+1=11 vs your roll. Giving you more chances of being able to hit your target.
So, what's with the mastered and supreme stuff?
You're allowed to have one mastered skill. This means that your attribute(DEX) and highest skill(say now that's ranged) makes 20. So at this point. You never miss when you attack a target. There is no rolling required. So we've allowed only one mastered skill. And then Supreme is 18, Honed is 15. DEX+Skill.

@Bill We are trying to be very careful when approaching using extra actions. I'm considering suggested we don't use an extreme amount of extra abilities, and if we do. A player can only choose one way. Or extra actions are put into a certain skill tree that the player may choose.

@fuseboy Indeed. I also considered mentors/trainers in game.

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;682494As soon as you try to add in defensive or environmentally-driven skills (like Lockpicking or Knowledge: Demons) you may have problems since at that point whether a skill can be advanced is determined by how many locks or demons (or whatever) the DM puts in the dungeon or city, or whatever.

That's where the training track comes in handy, or self training if the PCs are on a ship for a long voyage or whatever. Much weaker than being trained by someone or being in a library, but your skills can improve even without using them in the line of duty as it were. I like to start out the PCs at an impressive level of competence in their chosen skills anyway, on the assumption that they've already done the work beforehand. Not every skill of course, just the ones they want to shine at.

Quote from: Exile;682547@The Traveller Thanks man. Our idea is that as the PCs increased in skill, bosses and NPCs would become equally or more hard to beat. But not making it too easy, already the party will be facing harder NPCs when they begin. But with a few more cannon fodder units. I had not considered the idea of keeping every PC at a fixated HP count. However that is a good idea; then we would make PCs more unique to what strength they have to benefit the party in a battle.

Keep in mind though that associated with this idea is that you'll have to readjust the stats for all of your monsters, weapon damage, and so on to accommodate the new system if you've built them around power levels. A powerful dragon might have 20-30 times or more the average hits of an orc in D&D, whereas in my system it would be more like 5-10 times the average hits of an orc. 10 times would be a monstrous beast indeed, 70 hit points or so. Even the mightiest of heroes is going to have a hard time getting more than 10 points at a go past that armour, and the dragon is hitting back with Tyrannosaurus-level jaws, claws and tail whips, to say nothing of breathing lit napalm. Plus, the bastard flies. Not for the faint hearted - unless you've got a crafty plan.

The encounters are balanced more or less by the group going "jesus fuck that's a big dragon, we need a ballista!" or just staying out of the haunted forest nobody has ever emerged from, unless they have good reason to do otherwise, you know, common sense stuff.

The tactical thinking that this inspires in the group is a joy to behold but it also means the outcome of combats can't be predicted or indeed balanced except in the broadest, roughest sense.

It also means heroics actually feel heroic. When a character sees that it doesn't look good but wades in anyway without being able to run a cost-benefit analysis beforehand, and without a thick blanket of hit points to soak up the opposition, you know they're taking a big risk but will see it through anyway. It's fightin' sweat time!

Quote from: The Traveller;682735That's where the training track comes in handy, or self training if the PCs are on a ship for a long voyage or whatever. Much weaker than being trained by someone or being in a library, but your skills can improve even without using them in the line of duty as it were. I like to start out the PCs at an impressive level of competence in their chosen skills anyway, on the assumption that they've already done the work beforehand. Not every skill of course, just the ones they want to shine at.

Yep - that works.

Quote from: The Traveller;682735Keep in mind though that associated with this idea is that you'll have to readjust the stats for all of your monsters, weapon damage, and so on to accommodate the new system if you've built them around power levels. A powerful dragon might have 20-30 times or more the average hits of an orc in D&D, whereas in my system it would be more like 5-10 times the average hits of an orc. 10 times would be a monstrous beast indeed, 70 hit points or so. Even the mightiest of heroes is going to have a hard time getting more than 10 points at a go past that armour, and the dragon is hitting back with Tyrannosaurus-level jaws, claws and tail whips, to say nothing of breathing lit napalm. Plus, the bastard flies. Not for the faint hearted - unless you've got a crafty plan.

The encounters are balanced more or less by the group going "jesus fuck that's a big dragon, we need a ballista!" or just staying out of the haunted forest nobody has ever emerged from, unless they have good reason to do otherwise, you know, common sense stuff.

The tactical thinking that this inspires in the group is a joy to behold but it also means the outcome of combats can't be predicted or indeed balanced except in the broadest, roughest sense.

It also means heroics actually feel heroic. When a character sees that it doesn't look good but wades in anyway without being able to run a cost-benefit analysis beforehand, and without a thick blanket of hit points to soak up the opposition, you know they're taking a big risk but will see it through anyway. It's fightin' sweat time!

Thanks. Yeah, I've been taking into account GMing and creating various creatures to battle. Right now I don't have any preset profiles for bosses. Me and my co-creators will be coming up with many different presets to pick and choose from, based on the development of the party.