Quote from: Phillip;785227Having fun can be actually playing a game in a way that is effective at scoring points! It's amazing that these should seem opposed.

Scoring  by team certainly can make sense when there is a set team, but that is not the case in the old "grand campaign" form. Your "everyone goes up a level when I say so" approach makes even more sense, when the whole strategic context that would make x.p. other than moot has been abandoned.

I can't answer for BtB, but a couple of my reasons I dropped XP from level-based RPGs:
It takes me out of the equation.  I don't want the players playing to me.  I want them playing their characters how they see fit and not having to worry about what I like, like to see, etc.
I don't want them chasing XP.

Quote from: Sommerjon;785228The problem with this for me is that dice are fickle.  I get less XP only because the dice was rolling bad for me?  That to me is an award for good dice rolling.

It would seem then that you want a different game, one that does not involve dice. For the point of tossing dice, as much in D&D as in Backgammon, is that it makes a difference. One might win despite bad luck, or lose despite good, but the random element is non-trivial.

QuoteXP charts aren't equal, I would go ape shit over this. I don't see a merit based method here.  Tenure perhaps.

Division of treasure is obviously up to the characters/players involved. That may (per usual in AD&D) also divide associated xp potential. If you don't like the division, then that's something to address in character (by means that may vary by role, alignment, etc.)

QuoteThere is a difference between Authority and Leadership.  Far too often GMs are all about the Authority and haven't a friggin clue about Leadership.

Quote from: Sommerjon;785232I can't answer for BtB, but a couple of my reasons I dropped XP from level-based RPGs:
It takes me out of the equation.  I don't want the players playing to me.  I want them playing their characters how they see fit and not having to worry about what I like, like to see, etc.
I don't want them chasing XP.

No, apparently you want them chasing "power ups" that come at your whim or else as an entitlement for time served. The dishing out of the drug is in place, but no longer as a game in the strategic sense. Everyone gets to be a Hall of Famer on schedule, regardless of actual play.

Quote from: Will;784964You know, I've often considered a game where advancement is mostly in breadth/flexibility rather than power level.

In a game like that, where more xp is, say, nice but not _necessary_, I might have less problem with player-specific xp.

It can address or avoid a number of issues, such as what lies beyond the dice scale (too often just contrived penalties, rather than qualitative differences).

Quote from: Will;785223To me, it sounds like the Protestant Work Ethic wringing its hands about people not EARNING their place in the world.

Giving the same XP to everyone? Socialism!

One of the dumbest rules in any edition of D&D is the 10 per cent XP bonus for having high attribute scores in AD&D. Naturally gifted and inherently superior to your peers? Then the gap will widen and widen over time even if your peers accomplish as much as you do. Lame.

Quote from: Blacky the Blackball;785252Giving the same XP to everyone? Socialism!

Bullseye. Even more, it's like a holiday with Intourist: If it's Tuesday, this must be Leningrad (and we must all be 10th level).

The view that it would be a fine game if only it were not a game naturally seems to some fans rather to miss the point.

Quote from: Haffrung;785256One of the dumbest rules in any edition of D&D is the 10 per cent XP bonus for having high attribute scores in AD&D. Naturally gifted and inherently superior to your peers? Then the gap will widen and widen over time even if your peers accomplish as much as you do. Lame.

I think it's somewhat short  of justification in AD&D, but not in the original. In that, it was just about the only way that a high strength score made a figure a better fighter! Since there's a pretty big consensus that this ought to be so, what's really notable is how insignificant the bonus is compared with the bonuses to hit and (especially) damage added later.

With xp amounts roughly doubling each level up to "name," a difference of 5-10% hardly makes a difference at all. Even with a penalty, you could start at 1st and attain 7th before a 7th-level figure reaches 8th.

Individual accomplishment easily washes out such advantages, which mean at most perhaps a difference of a single adventure. Variation in the lives of characters is, by the old ethos, a big part of what makes the game interesting. Had stamping out cookie-cutter figures been what was desired, that would have been (and remains) very simple to accomplish.

Quote from: Phillip;785257Bullseye. Even more, it's like a holiday with Intourist: If it's Tuesday, this must be Leningrad (and we must all be 10th level).

The view that it would be a fine game if only it were not a game naturally seems to some fans rather to miss the point.

What a patronizing bullshit statement.

People have advocated giving XP to players for things like bringing pizza. People have suggested its role to 'shape proper behavior.'

How exactly are those things 'part of a game'?

If you play poker with friends, does whomever wins get extra cards next time? Is suggesting otherwise SOCIALISM ?

Quote from: Phillip;785230Is that the one on which some novels, the first called Wargamer's World in English translation, were based? I had the impression it got started in the 1970s, but in any case it's neat to learn more about it.

Not familiar with Wargamer's World novels, and google doesn't teach me anything about them either.

There was however a series of German novels by Hugh Walker/Ray Cardwell/Hubert Straßl (all the same guy using different pseudonyms) for the original setting of Magira. If it is the same author and the same setting name, then WW was probably the translation of them.

Magira itself dates back to 1966, evolving from the wargame "Armageddon" played by the fantasy club "Follow e.V.".

In 1978, the role-playing game for it emerged as an EPT mod called "Empires of Magira" of which 20 copies were produced on a typewriter and handed to a handpicked audience.

It was followed up in 1981 by the 1st edition of "Midgard", which was a stand-alone role-playing game and came into wider circulation, and thus the very oldest commercial German role-playing game.

By 1983, the creator of Midgard was forced to stop using Magira as the game's default setting. The current setting Midgard was still very much Magira but for the names, but has since more strongly diverged over the last 3 decades.

Quote from: Phillip;785237It would seem then that you want a different game, one that does not involve dice.

No I don't want my XP hitched to how well I roll or are rolled against.
I roll like ass against a creature and keep it occupied.  Why am I being punished for not dispatching the creature in a timely manner?

Quote from: Phillip;785242No, apparently you want them chasing "power ups" that come at your whim or else as an entitlement for time served. The dishing out of the drug is in place, but no longer as a game in the strategic sense. Everyone gets to be a Hall of Famer on schedule, regardless of actual play.

Actually it comes at their whim, not mine.  When I run a level based game I am upfront about how the gaining of levels is accomplished.  Sometimes that is X number of sessions per level, other times that is accomplishing something impactful in the game world.

Never found 'game in the strategic sense' to be worth much in D&D.  Rarely is both the players and DM on the same level in the strategic sense.  Actual play ends up turning into what's the easiest way to gain the most XP with no regard to the actual setting.

If you want to play competitive D&D, you go girl.

Quote from: Will;785261What a patronizing bullshit statement.

People have advocated giving XP to players for things like bringing pizza. People have suggested its role to 'shape proper behavior.'

How exactly are those things 'part of a game'?

If you play poker with friends, does whomever wins get extra cards next time? Is suggesting otherwise SOCIALISM ?

I have no idea what sense your reference to some people giving points for pizza is supposed to make; I am certainly not among them.

As to "socialism," I think a response to obvious hyperbole is due the same grain of salt as the post to which it responds. Sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. Junta is thoroughly a banana-republic dictatorship-for-life game; and a load of fun! If you are genuinely unclear on the difference between banter about an evening's entertainment, and protests against Soviet gulags, then you need a checkup from the neck up.
 
In the 1970s-80s, it seemed a widely held view that maturity in role-playing entailed not being worried that another player happened to have a mechanically "better" figure. A character might well envy those seemingly more fortunate; but to a player, that should be just as rich in role-playing potential as the conflicts presented when the shoe is on the other foot.

The latter-day demand for a Procrustean comissariat seems to reflect the opposite view: an assumption that resentment among players is a fundamental and profound problem, to be solved only by abolishing such differences.

I'm pretty sure this shift, both in prevalence and vehemence of the latter attitude, is due to a change in the demographic of players. In the early days, it was taken for granted that the field of hobby games was geared more to those who delighted in the challenges offered by vagaries of chance.

Historical games have not recovered from the decline that wiped out the former giants of the hobby game industry. One might have expected a transition from miniatures and board games to computer programs, with ultimately brighter prospects; but this does not appear to be what happened.

Clearly there are larger cultural factors at work.

Yeah, one larger factor is maturity.

After decades of experience, I've realized a lot of pie-eyed 'oh, embrace the roleplaying CHALLENGE of happening to be useless' is a lot of juvenile hooey, that often masqueraded as a gambler-esque 'I want randomness but I'm counting on ME getting lucky.'

Really? I can roleplay differences and cool stuff without being handed a pile of shit and going 'IMAGINE THE POSSIBILITIES.'

You know, if I WANT to play a scrub newbie, I can... choose to.

I suppose another factor is not accepting patronizing stuff from other gamers or games.

Quote from: Phillip;785334In the 1970s-80s, it seemed a widely held view that maturity in role-playing entailed not being worried that another player happened to have a mechanically "better" figure. A character might well envy those seemingly more fortunate; but to a player, that should be just as rich in role-playing potential as the conflicts presented when the shoe is on the other foot.

The latter-day demand for a Procrustean comissariat seems to reflect the opposite view: an assumption that resentment among players is a fundamental and profound problem, to be solved only by abolishing such differences.

I'm pretty sure this shift, both in prevalence and vehemence of the latter attitude, is due to a change in the demographic of players. In the early days, it was taken for granted that the field of hobby games was geared more to those who delighted in the challenges offered by vagaries of chance.

You're conflating two things: parity in PC power and parity in XP awarded. A lot of people are fine with power disparity in PCs, while disliking awarding XP independently. Several DMs in this thread have already commented that they only award XP when the player attends the session, and they're okay with PCs not getting XP when they don't attend.

Awarding XP to suit effective or desirable behaviour is another matter. As we saw in the thread about the 5E inspiration mechanic, a lot of people aren't comfortable with determining what 'desirable' play is, and then awarding players for adopting that behaviour like trained monkeys. Handing out candies and patting on heads is what bothers most of us, not power disparities.

Quote from: Phillip;785334Historical games have not recovered from the decline that wiped out the former giants of the hobby game industry. One might have expected a transition from miniatures and board games to computer programs, with ultimately brighter prospects; but this does not appear to be what happened.

Clearly there are larger cultural factors at work.

Yes. The historical wargame boom was short-lived (just as the D&D boom was). A generation of young boomers, many of whose fathers were of the WW2 generation, grew up with war on TV and movies. WW2 was everywhere in pop culture when they were growing up. And fantasy was still a weirdo, fringe interest.

Today, it's the reverse. It's perfectly normal for kids growing up today to watch fantasy movies, TV shows, and play fantasy games. As a society, we've largely turned away from history and embraced fantasy for our escapism. Part of it is a distaste for real-world war. Part is a new romanticism that turns to fictional worlds for escapism. You can take a simple wargame and repackage it with a fantasy theme and it will sell more. Because most of the geek market today finds history surpassingly dull.

As for the games themselves, the wargaming hobby did itself no favours by turning to ever bigger and more complex games in the 80s. The hobby became the purview of hardcore gamers who had no problem spending 2 hours simply setting up a game with 2,000 counters, that took 20-30 hours to play. Even today the boardgaming hobby still relies on middle-aged men who have a couple gaming tables in their basement where the keep monster games set up for months on end. That was never going to be a popular pass-time. And today, the mini-renaissance in historical boardgaming is being driven by the simpler, more casual end of the spectrum. Games like Twilight Struggle, Command and Colors: Ancients, and Combat Commander. Wargame publishers finally twigged onto the fact they needed to sell games to more than just the 58 year old solitaire player who keeps two-map, 2,000 counter games set up in his basement.

And it's not as though young gamers today are sheltered from competition. Tabletop fantasy miniatures and CCGs are ferociously competitive. And that's not even mentioning the savage world of online multiplayer gaming. Young gamers love head-to-head competition. But they'd rather it be between the orcs and elves, or House Stark vs House Lannister, than the Russians vs the Germans.

So yeah, society has changed. But it hasn't become the coddled, socialist world you seem to be implying. It's a matter of broad cultural changes regarding history and fantasy. And just as it's unlikely D&D will ever see another boom like the 80s, it's unlikely historical boardgaming will ever see another boom like the 70s.

I came across this on another forum.

Quote from: MepherI am curious how everyone awards XP in their groups. I am back to playing again after about an 18 year hiatus and we are playing 1st edition. The way they award xp is whoever lands the killing blow on a creature gets the xp for that creature. Everyone gets the bonus xp/hp damage done. Casters get 100xp/level of spells cast. Its the first part that I find really broken. Almost everyone in the party wanted to play multiclassed characters while I opted to go with a Human Ranger with Bow Specialization. Most of our combat ends up being within the point blank range and most everything we have fought has been humanoids so I am getting bonuses. As a result I usually easily clear half the creatures in any given encounter thus I end up taking the lions share of the xp. While some people might love it, I think its a little ridiculous. Forget the fact that I think the 1E ranger + bow spec is way overpowered, that is another conversation entirely.

...

The problem I have with the first method is that it does everything possible to discourage playing your character and just seems to push everyone to do everything in their power to get kills for the xp. In over 2 months now I have NEVER seen our Cleric cast a cure light during combat and have seen many players fall. I couldn't tell you what spells our Magic User has because all I have seen him cast is Magic Missile. Rather than sneaking around to try and get a backstab during combat our Thief spends most combat sneaking around trying to pilfer corpses DURING combat to pocket as much treasure as he can for the xp. It really is a mess imo. I think my method of awarding the combat xp to all players regardless of what they did works better because it allows the Cleric to fall back and wait to support the fighters, it allows the Wizard to cast other support spells that might not damage the monsters but will negatively affect them, thus helping the party as a whole. My plan when I take over DMing is to make a course correction with this group starting with XP and attempt to re-teach them how to better play their characters.

...

I've bolded the part that's key to me.  I don't divide xp evenly out of any kind of "everyone gets a trophy" impulse.  That's such a far-fetched strawman, and so far away from what anyone else is talking about, I'm having a hard time taking it as a good faith argument.

I divide xp evenly to reward the players who back up their teammates, who set someone else up for the killing blow, who can agree to another player's plan without demanding credit if they were thinking of someone similar, or can recognize when a fellow player has something under control and think "yeah, he's got this, I'll let him have the spotlight until he needs help" without being penalized for it.  In short I do it to incentivize smart, tactical play.