In the D&D5 group I play in, we have one player whose job now forces him to travel regularly. He is not at all a flake, and is a good player, but he just can't maintain our weekly schedule at this time because of his travel schedule. So far, he has only made it to about half the sessions, and thus he lags far behind everyone else on XP.

We've boosted him up so that he's up to the player with the next-lowest XP. Still, it seems a bit unfair.

In some other systems, the effect is still there but can be less glaring. So, for example, in GURPS or Amber the difference between a 115 point character and a 130 point character isn't all that glaring - but the difference between 3rd level and 6th level in D&D is.

How do other people deal with a situation like this?

Quote from: jhkim;813881In the D&D5 group I play in, we have one player whose job now forces him to travel regularly. He is not at all a flake, and is a good player, but he just can't maintain our weekly schedule at this time because of his travel schedule. So far, he has only made it to about half the sessions, and thus he lags far behind everyone else on XP.

We've boosted him up so that he's up to the player with the next-lowest XP. Still, it seems a bit unfair.

What about it do you think is unfair? Who do you think is getting the short end of the stick?

Some possible solutions:

1. Play something less reliant on characters being at the same level of experience / capability
2. Say "fuck it" and just give him the average XP the group earns
3. Say "fuck it" and just give everyone the same amount of XP

If everyone involved is cool with it, I'd just let the player's character always get levelled up to:

- the party average, if everyone has different levels

- one level lower than everyone else, if they're all at the same level

That way they should still be able to keep up and the rest of the players still feel like their regular attendance meant something.

EDIT: As Ladybird suggested with option 2 or 3 and simply give other kinds of rewards to players who are present (loot, reputation etc...).

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Quote from: Necrozius;813887give other kinds of rewards to players who are present (loot, reputation etc...).

That works too (And it'll happen inevitably anyway), but I'm also kinda of the opinion that getting to play more is it's own good reward.

If the player was a flake, this would be different.

I split experience evenly even for absent players. I figure it sucks enough they can't play. I don't see how "Earning" Imaginary experience is unfair to everyone. I have been in the same situation and it is enough that you feel like you are missing everything important.

Is the character still available to the players? If they are then it is easily justified.

I think that the Player having fun is the important part and as long as he is not hurting anyone else's fun then keep him even.

To clarify: Right now, we have individual XP. You get XP when you show up for the adventure you participated in. So players who miss sessions normally get less XP. It's a casual weekly game, and everyone is reasonably reliable but we do have misses, so people are different levels - but this player is the outlier.

If we give reliable-but-traveling-player XP equal to the rest of the group's average, that means that he gets more XP than another player who has missed fewer sessions. That seems weird, and feels like we're judging his work travel as being more valid than someone else's reason for missing.

Quote from: Necrozius;813887As Ladybird suggested with option 2 or 3 and simply give other kinds of rewards to players who are present (loot, reputation etc...).

I like this a lot, and will suggest it to the group. XP can be a group thing where we just advance everyone, and there can be individual rewards of other stuff.

Quote from: jhkim;813895If we give reliable-but-traveling-player XP equal to the rest of the group's average, that means that he gets more XP than another player who has missed fewer sessions. That seems weird, and feels like we're judging his work travel as being more valid than someone else's reason for missing.

Glad to see you caught that.

What it could have said was give him (and anyone else who missed the session) the minimum XP received by anyone who attended the session. Presumably different people receive the minimum award at different sessions. So this ensures that over time, missing sessions is less lucrative XP-wise than attending sessions.

Or just go with the suggestion you liked.

Yeah, stuff like this really makes you consider/reconsider the point and place of XP in your games.

3e was a major breaking point for us, because the power disparities were so severe. A game like Call of Cthulhu, not so much, because 'power' is kind of a joke when anyone might be '1d6 investigators eaten per round' and whatnot.

I think in a heavily power-by-level game, XP by achievement/by character really fails.

What sort of campaign are you running? Sandboxes tend to handle a Stable of PCs better than other forms.

Oh, one approach we've sometimes used is that a missing player, their character is assumed to 'be there' and affects events to a degree. But they just are mostly out of the spotlight and don't do anything super special.

Quote from: Ladybird;813891That works too (And it'll happen inevitably anyway), but I'm also kinda of the opinion that getting to play more is it's own good reward.

Quote from: Artifacts of Amber;813893I split experience evenly even for absent players. I figure it sucks enough they can't play. I don't see how "Earning" Imaginary experience is unfair to everyone. I have been in the same situation and it is enough that you feel like you are missing everything important.

What these folks said.
Everyone in our group has to be away sometimes, for some reason or another, usually work. I'd never bitch that the guy who wasn't there got the same XP.
Truthfully, the accumulation of XP is the part of the game that I really could care less about... I've never been a big fan of the zero-to-hero... but I know I'm over in the corner by myself on that one.

Simlasa: Well, in a system where power level isn't quite so exponentiating, getting more XP would be a perk rather than turning the game into The BMX Bandit and the Angel Summoner.

Witness all the commentary about random chargen and so on.

Yes, the privilege of actually gaming at all is it's own reward.

Right now, I just level up all the characters after each session (my campaigns never last that long). If someone misses a game, they'll keep up, but won't auto-magically receive loot, connections or reputation bonuses just because the others did. They earn that stuff while actually playing. This isn't a punishment for missing a game, for christ's sake.

I like the idea of in game rewards favoring your most reliable players, or those who play their character well. The way D&D works, you get too much disparity in levels and things start to become hard to eyeball. Frankly, I want everyone to enjoy their characters at the same level, tier of play, etc. as it makes it easier for me to create encounters on the fly.

What could some different in game rewards for D&D? I'm running 5e right now. Inspiration is nice to a small extent but it's a switch (you either have it or you don't). Awards need to be more granular to differentiate between 6 players at the table.