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Over at the RPG Bloggers Network there is a lively discussion on experience points and the rewarding of it therefore. One interesting debate is going on about the murdering of villians and why do it and why not (the article points out that recurring villains are hard to introduce and it’s not necessary the fault of XP system why players want to kill them)

My point of view? The experience points mechanic is the most potent of all Meta Plot. Yes, the experience points system is a Meta Plot too. How so? For it also influences how your players think in game. Remember the Meta Plot being able to guide players’ decisions, restrict their actions and so on? The experience points mechanic is a double whammy – for besides just guiding players’ decision, it also rewards them immediately with tangible stuff for their characters.

Meta-Gaming with Experience Points

The Order of the Stick had an arc dealing with experience points. After coming back from an adventure, most of the party levelled up except for Belkar, the halfing ranger. Roy, the leader (and ultra-intelligent Fighter) of the group explained that it is very likely that Belkar joined the group too late and was a few experience points behind. Belkar’s response? He began to kill bugs left and right in hope to rake up the XP.

Elan, the party Bard, then informed a frustrated Belkar that what he was doing was futile, for according to D&D 3.5 rules, Belkar will need to kill something closer to his level. And that when Belkar took a look at Elan and with daggers drawn sprung after him. When restrained later, Belkar went into a rant on how as halfing he had things difficult etc. etc. etc. when suddenly he levelled up. For roleplaying.

Although this may be a paradoy of the experience points system, this is how I view it. It is a Meta-Plot breaking Meta-Plot device. It is so, because precisely it is the most powerful Meta-Plot ever. And even stranger, it is a Meta-Plot that has no story elements whatsoever , by default, unless the plot creator put in something explictly.

For me, the usual experience points mechanic don’t make sense. How does killing someone, as a thief, eventually improves your chances at picking locks?

Experience Points as part of a Character’s Meta-Plot

Artesia has done something interesting for its experience points mechanic. Each character belongs to a specific card from the tarot, and it describes the actions that the character would have to take or story elements the character would have to experience to gain experience points. It could be betraying someone, falling into love and so on. This makes it such that the experience points mechanic becomes the meta-plot of the character.

Well the idea is good and novel, my concern is that of party cohesion. I don’t usually get to game, when I do, I would like players to focus on working as a team and not just fighting among themselves (I’m sure my players would rather not to – they got enough stress in their life). However, this is a play style. I don’t like inter-party conflicts; but some other players and GMs find they like it. If so, I find Artesia’s Arcana system of experience points a good alternative to alignments. Players would not be doing random stuff just to get XP.

My take on the Ultimate Meta-Plot

I completely remove it. That’s for me. I am a GM, not an accountant! Star Trek jokes aside, the purpose of experience points is to reward players for doing stuff. However, no matter how I look at it, it just doesn’t fit into my framework of play. Systems in which when you level up and suddenly you become better at everything bothers me. Role-playing goals which give XP, like Artesia, may lead to inter-party conflicts and could lead the game to be a sandbox one in nature (there are, of course, exceptions or as a GM, you design encounters that would allow everyone to meet their arcana’s requirements to get XP).

My solution. There is no experience points. It’s a big Meta-Plot with too much influence on play but too little impact on the story. Even role-playing experience, scenario experience and so on sometimes are too wishy-washy for the more merecenary players (and if you could get a big chunk of XP now, why wait?) and sometimes relies on GM’s fiat. So for most of my games, I take it out. In fact, my gaming preferences show that too:

Advanced Fighting Fantasy has a XP system where at the end of each adventure, players are judged on different criterion. Did they meet the objective of the scenario? How much role-playing and team-work were shown? How about monsters killed? Each category has a upper limit, so it promotes holistic play.

Nobilis has no explict XP mechanic. You get a few points at the end of each a story, and more if you perform a nettle rite. Nobilis is one of the games I know which weave the XP mechanic together with the plot. The Nettle Rite allows a player to suck the comsic energy of a concept, an item or anything which is important to the enemy for miracle points which could be used (in my campagin) to get character points.

Call of Cthulhu does away with XP gains all together, instead having skills increasing as they are used and giving away Sanity rewards at the end. Another example of the experience Meta-Game device tied in with the Meta-Plot.

I once have a D&D GM who have everyone goes up a level at the end of each adventure.

Of course, XP is the competitive score which some players use to measure their accomplishments and secondly, it also gives them the mojo to improve their tangible abilities inside the game. Let’s try an interesting experiment though. What if we still have XP, but it has nothing to do with character advancement, but just a score?

The XP as Carrot

However, another perspective is this : most of the meta-plot is the stick – don’t do this, this is the law, the gods frown upon such actions blah blah blah. The XP Meta-Plot Meta-Game mechanic could be see as a carrot, with the Meta-Plot being the stick. Completely removing XP from a restrictive meta-plot heavy game could dampen the fun.

I wonder if any GM has done this before. In Fate, it is possible to give a Fate Point (which allows the character to perform special actions or just to be extra lucky) to make a character do something. The player, if he wishes to reject the GM, must give up a Fate Point. Of course, the GM cannot just do this at whim. The player must has some Aspects, maybe a personality trait or background element, that the GM can ‘tag’ to do this. For example, a character with “Curious as a Cat” Aspect may be tagged by the GM to have her exploring the alley way. If she does so, she gets the Fate Point.

Why not adopt an approach for this for XP? Not the “do this or else no XP!” but rather announce up-front the XP-worth of the actions. Sure, gutting the wizard who is trying to get the players for help may be worth this amount of XP, but doing the quest will net 3x or 4x more XP.

If players go overboard with XP grinding, this is also a good time to see if the Meta Plot stands up. Does the Meta Plot specify anything for crimes and punishment? In a world where powerful adventurers who go about, are there check and balances against them?

Back to the recurring villain problem: While there is a good reason to kill a recurring villain, it is the GM’s responsbility to make him recurring, not the player’s. Those types of villain usually stay out touch – the mastermind behind the scene, having the ability to escape when the fight looks lost or are protected by some elements of the Meta-Plot (for example, he’s of the Church, belong to a high caste in society and etc.) But I would like to remove XP out from the reasoning, and make the players’ sole motivation for killing the villain a personal one, a story-based one.

Conclusion

The experience points system is the most powerful Meta Plot ever. If not properly considered, it is also the one that is likely to wreck havoc. It has lots of influence on style of play, but could have no influence on the story whatsoever. Some games managed to integrate the experience system with the plot, such as Call of Cthulhu and Nobilis, and others give out rewards only at the end of the game session.

The point is – experience points mechanic would influence how a player would act. If you want your story to be plot-driven, it may be a good idea to house-rule the experience point. If you are running a competitive game, then it is something you just have to live with. You could temper the party’s behaviour by announcing upfront in what ways they could get more XP, and use the other elements of the Meta Plot to keep them in check if their ways of grinding XP gets too absurd.

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