Are You Experienced?

You are probably wondering when that next batch of experience points will be showing up. We haven't been playing long enough for you to know the pattern, but basically I hand out experience whenever the party arrives in a town or place where the game can pause -- where we can pick up the action in a week, or a month from now.

That means that if you are exploring a large dungeon, and retreating to the nearby village at the end of each session, then every session you'll see an experience point award. Likewise, if you are adrift at sea, you're not likely to see an XP award until you arrive at some sort of inhabited settlement.

If you are trying to estimate your next expected award, you may find it larger than you calculated from the killing of monsters alone. That's because I give substantial bonuses for roleplaying. This is partially to compensate for a design decision behind the 3E rules... they made the decision that the average party of gamers games roughly twice as much as we do (in hours). The XP awards as given will theoretically raise the party about 1 level every month or so. Besides, solving puzzles and making a good story are worth more to me than killing prowess (although the 50 skeletons was a good feat!).