Quote from: Chris24601 on March 22, 2025, 05:59:47 PM

Quote from: Ruprecht on March 22, 2025, 05:07:38 PMCurrently in my game the players are in a city playing one faction off against another. There is combat but not a ton of it. There is treasure but not a ton of it. Without milestone leveling they'll never advance which seems a bit lame.

Seriously, use Palladium's xp awards.

Here's a summary...

Wow, that's similar to the system I use. I pretty much lifted the system from HM 4E:

Quote from: PencilBoy99 on March 22, 2025, 11:34:46 AMIDK I've only run games with "standard XP" for decades and never had an issue. I only play with people that create characters that are motivated to engage w/ the setting, so I'm not sure what the benefit would be of carrot/sticking them.

If by "standard XP" you mean xp for gold/killing-monsters, then are we to surmise that you've never run a campaign where certain characters shouldn't be going around murdering everything in sight and taking off dead men's boots to check for copper pieces inside?

Quote from: capvideo on March 22, 2025, 12:01:07 PM

Quote"Show up to receive XP" is certainly not a bad approach.

My experience with it is pretty bad. I implemented it several years ago in our local game while playing Gods & Monsters for the first time. After several sessions, I started hearing from the players that nothing was happening. It was very obvious that they weren't having fun and we would soon stop getting together. They wanted more excitement; more conflicts. Rather than argue with them about why they weren't taking advantage of adventure opportunities I "ignored" their complaints and in a completely unrelated move, I took apart AD&D's experience system (and others) and put it back together as: (a) experience for defeating named encounters; (b) experience for gaining and then losing treasure; (c) experience for engaging named encounters.

I announced the change at the start of the next session. Within four sessions as they saw how XP happened, they were having more fun: talking to more NPCs and fighting more NPCs. The campaign lasted another seven years, until I moved to another state.

Pavlov lives in the hearts of men.

Why does the level of action vary depending on whether you're assigning XP for it or not? My campaigns are highly dangerous, and the PCs motivated to fight those dangers, without needing the calculation of xp for fighting.

Quote from: blackstone on March 26, 2025, 01:36:49 PM

Quote from: Fheredin on March 21, 2025, 07:50:51 PM"Show up to receive XP" is certainly not a bad approach.

No, it's fucking terrible.

Rewarding XP just because you just...showed up at the table?

No way. You don't play, you don't get XP. Either you participate in some fashion or don't bother showing up. I don't care if it's even just doing combat or disarming a trap. You participated.

But if you start fucking off at my table, then I will ask you to either DO SOMETHING or leave.

Players, as a rule, want to play. I don't quite get the notion people have that if their characters don't get experience points for gold, they won't want to get gold; much less that some theoretical player will show up at your house to game and then when they find out that they don't have to do something hyper-specific to get xp, they just won't do anything at all.

In years and years of running my games with "XP for showing up", I have never met a player who behaved that way. Instead, what DOES happen is that players stop feeling like they have to have their characters focused solely and entirely on getting as many GPs or Corpses as possible just to level up, and instead start doing a bunch of more creative things, based on what their character should actually do (for quite a lot of course, that still means getting as much money and killing as many monsters as possible).

Quote from: RPGPundit on March 28, 2025, 06:16:26 AMIn years and years of running my games with "XP for showing up", I have never met a player who behaved that way. Instead, what DOES happen is that players stop feeling like they have to have their characters focused solely and entirely on getting as many GPs or Corpses as possible just to level up, and instead start doing a bunch of more creative things, based on what their character should actually do (for quite a lot of course, that still means getting as much money and killing as many monsters as possible).

That's been my experience too--except what most of the players want to do is not compatible with what anyone else is doing, and bores the hell out of me and the rest of the group.  Yeah, they'll eventually get around to doing something useful, but only after playing Fantasy Medieval Sims for 4 hours.  Or they want to play Fantasy Arts and Crafts.  Or Fantasy Merchants and Traders.  Now, I don't mind a little of that for flavor, but a game with no real conflicts doesn't do it for me.  And the reality, is that it doesn't do it for them, either.  They are happier with the game when I don't let them pull that stuff, but not introspective enough to realize dragging their 5 minutes of flavor into 30-60 minutes of drudgery doesn't work when every player chases something different.

And lest you think it just me, I usually have 2 to 3 players in the group who are aware that this is a potential problem.  You'd think that would be a enough to keep it moving, except these players are not very assertive.  And you'd also think after years of teaching them that they actually prefer the way I do it to the way they naturally want to go, they'd learn.  But nope, give them the reins, they go right back to chewing the cud in a field all day and watching the world go by.

Quote from: RPGPundit on March 28, 2025, 06:16:26 AM

Quote from: blackstone on March 26, 2025, 01:36:49 PM

Quote from: Fheredin on March 21, 2025, 07:50:51 PM"Show up to receive XP" is certainly not a bad approach.

No, it's fucking terrible.

Rewarding XP just because you just...showed up at the table?

No way. You don't play, you don't get XP. Either you participate in some fashion or don't bother showing up. I don't care if it's even just doing combat or disarming a trap. You participated.

But if you start fucking off at my table, then I will ask you to either DO SOMETHING or leave.

Players, as a rule, want to play. I don't quite get the notion people have that if their characters don't get experience points for gold, they won't want to get gold; much less that some theoretical player will show up at your house to game and then when they find out that they don't have to do something hyper-specific to get xp, they just won't do anything at all.

In years and years of running my games with "XP for showing up", I have never met a player who behaved that way. Instead, what DOES happen is that players stop feeling like they have to have their characters focused solely and entirely on getting as many GPs or Corpses as possible just to level up, and instead start doing a bunch of more creative things, based on what their character should actually do (for quite a lot of course, that still means getting as much money and killing as many monsters as possible).

As you can see, I largely use the XP rewards table from HM4E. XP rewards are base upon:

-class achievements
-monsters killed/defeated
-individual rewards

this doesn't factor in XP for magic items.

I'm currently using Adv LL for my rules, which doesn't have XP for magic items. I therefore use XP for gold and gold value of items sold, along with the aforementioned list.

So far, I haven't had any issues.

Quote from: RPGPundit on March 28, 2025, 06:16:26 AMPlayers, as a rule, want to play.

This is what happens at my table. My players want to do cool things: have fun battles, solve tough mysteries, beat a bad guy they hate. They don't play to earn XP, they play to have fun. Now, XP is part of a lot of the systems we play, so I can't withhold it - they eventually want their wizard to be able to cast fireball - but it's not the currency that works at my table to have fun. So milestone has worked pretty successfully.

Quote from: Shteve on March 28, 2025, 01:07:14 PM

Quote from: RPGPundit on March 28, 2025, 06:16:26 AMPlayers, as a rule, want to play.

This is what happens at my table. My players want to do cool things: have fun battles, solve tough mysteries, beat a bad guy they hate. They don't play to earn XP, they play to have fun. Now, XP is part of a lot of the systems we play, so I can't withhold it - they eventually want their wizard to be able to cast fireball - but it's not the currency that works at my table to have fun. So milestone has worked pretty successfully.

There's very solid research that incentives work in just about any field of human endeavor.  People do what they're rewarded to do because they like being rewarded.  It feels good.  In D&D it makes the game more fun.  And as a DM its an opportunity to move play towards something that's fun for you without impinging on player agency

Quote from: Mishihari on March 28, 2025, 03:38:58 PMThere's very solid research that incentives work in just about any field of human endeavor.  People do what they're rewarded to do because they like being rewarded.  It feels good.  In D&D it makes the game more fun.  And as a DM its an opportunity to move play towards something that's fun for you without impinging on player agency

Yes.  Every player I've ever encountered who wasn't motivated by the particular XP system was motivated by getting kudos from the other players or by driving the game aggressively towards something he wanted. Often, it's both motivations working in concert, which is extremely powerful.  Invariably, they were socially assertive but not obnoxious about--quite the opposite, charismatic even.  I had a game once where 3 of the players were like that, and willing to effectively negotiate on the fly to get what all of them wanted.  The game always went where they took it, which was fine by me and enjoyed by the rest of the players. 

Quote from: RPGPundit on March 28, 2025, 06:16:26 AM

Quote from: blackstone on March 26, 2025, 01:36:49 PM

Quote from: Fheredin on March 21, 2025, 07:50:51 PM"Show up to receive XP" is certainly not a bad approach.

No, it's fucking terrible.

Rewarding XP just because you just...showed up at the table?

No way. You don't play, you don't get XP. Either you participate in some fashion or don't bother showing up. I don't care if it's even just doing combat or disarming a trap. You participated.

But if you start fucking off at my table, then I will ask you to either DO SOMETHING or leave.

Players, as a rule, want to play. I don't quite get the notion people have that if their characters don't get experience points for gold, they won't want to get gold; much less that some theoretical player will show up at your house to game and then when they find out that they don't have to do something hyper-specific to get xp, they just won't do anything at all.

In years and years of running my games with "XP for showing up", I have never met a player who behaved that way. Instead, what DOES happen is that players stop feeling like they have to have their characters focused solely and entirely on getting as many GPs or Corpses as possible just to level up, and instead start doing a bunch of more creative things, based on what their character should actually do (for quite a lot of course, that still means getting as much money and killing as many monsters as possible).

I suppose it really comes down to should PC development be an in-game reward or given by the GM as a reflection of natural growth. 

Because of the nature of my employment, long term multi year campaigns are extremely difficult.  When I get on a ship and get a handful of players together, I can use "xp for gold" as shorthand for "here be the adventure."  I can then offer up multiple types of adventures they can go on like bounty hunting, running trade routes, and taking on contracts to clear out vermin.  Players can tell me that they are looking for certain kinds of jobs too.

In my experience, I find that some players love this and will simply do the contract for pay loop and others will branch out and really explore the setting and events happening in it.  I do my best to make sure that both types have a good time.  I like to make sure the setting is something worth growing into for those that want to do so.  So far, players respond well with some even keeping in contact to try and get in on new campaigns via Discord.

Quote from: RPGPundit on March 28, 2025, 06:10:13 AMWhy does the level of action vary depending on whether you're assigning XP for it or not?

It confused me too. I assumed they were choosing the level of action that they wanted, until they complained about the level of action. Perhaps they independently decided to stop avoiding more challenging encounters and locations at the same time I made the change. But that seems unlikely to me.

The last game I played in with this group was a 5e game where the DM gave out level increases when he felt it was time. I got to see the effect from a player perspective. The other players often complained about how long it took to do things, yet still tried to plan well past the point where more planning helped and avoid well past the point when a little initiative would have brought great reward. There were times, of course, when events took over and avoidance/overplanning was impossible, and those tended to be the times when everyone got engaged and seemed to be having more fun.

My character was generally the one who would open the door, or step onto the platform, or whatever, when that kind of action was possible to get us moving again, which got me a reputation as headstrong and a loner.

That game is currently on hiatus. Has been for over a year.

Quote from: Steven Mitchell on March 28, 2025, 09:32:24 AM

Quote from: RPGPundit on March 28, 2025, 06:16:26 AMIn years and years of running my games with "XP for showing up", I have never met a player who behaved that way. Instead, what DOES happen is that players stop feeling like they have to have their characters focused solely and entirely on getting as many GPs or Corpses as possible just to level up, and instead start doing a bunch of more creative things, based on what their character should actually do (for quite a lot of course, that still means getting as much money and killing as many monsters as possible).

That's been my experience too--except what most of the players want to do is not compatible with what anyone else is doing, and bores the hell out of me and the rest of the group.  Yeah, they'll eventually get around to doing something useful, but only after playing Fantasy Medieval Sims for 4 hours.  Or they want to play Fantasy Arts and Crafts.  Or Fantasy Merchants and Traders.  Now, I don't mind a little of that for flavor, but a game with no real conflicts doesn't do it for me.  And the reality, is that it doesn't do it for them, either.  They are happier with the game when I don't let them pull that stuff, but not introspective enough to realize dragging their 5 minutes of flavor into 30-60 minutes of drudgery doesn't work when every player chases something different.

And lest you think it just me, I usually have 2 to 3 players in the group who are aware that this is a potential problem.  You'd think that would be a enough to keep it moving, except these players are not very assertive.  And you'd also think after years of teaching them that they actually prefer the way I do it to the way they naturally want to go, they'd learn.  But nope, give them the reins, they go right back to chewing the cud in a field all day and watching the world go by.

If you're running a sandbox game, the world shouldn't just 'go by'; there will be events happening around them, some of which presumably will either have enough of an interest level or danger level to oblige the PCs to take some kind of action.

Quote from: capvideo on March 28, 2025, 10:20:32 PM

Quote from: RPGPundit on March 28, 2025, 06:10:13 AMWhy does the level of action vary depending on whether you're assigning XP for it or not?

It confused me too. I assumed they were choosing the level of action that they wanted, until they complained about the level of action. Perhaps they independently decided to stop avoiding more challenging encounters and locations at the same time I made the change. But that seems unlikely to me.

The last game I played in with this group was a 5e game where the DM gave out level increases when he felt it was time. I got to see the effect from a player perspective. The other players often complained about how long it took to do things, yet still tried to plan well past the point where more planning helped and avoid well past the point when a little initiative would have brought great reward. There were times, of course, when events took over and avoidance/overplanning was impossible, and those tended to be the times when everyone got engaged and seemed to be having more fun.

My character was generally the one who would open the door, or step onto the platform, or whatever, when that kind of action was possible to get us moving again, which got me a reputation as headstrong and a loner.

That game is currently on hiatus. Has been for over a year.

It sounds like you need a different group of players. Or maybe a different kind of campaign; one where the SETTING provides players with motivation. If your characters are all servants of a noble, or crusaders of some kind, or investigators, etc. where they have a built in motivation for their characters.