Problem with LP awards and short sessions: Need advice

Discussion on game mastering Earthdawn. May contain spoilers; caution is recommended!
User avatar
Mataxes
Posts:745
Joined:Sat Nov 26, 2016 10:39 pm
Location:The Great Library
Contact:
Re: Problem with LP awards and short sessions: Need advice

Post by Mataxes » Wed Aug 28, 2019 3:14 am

Michael wrote:
Tue Aug 27, 2019 2:22 pm
so let me further explain my question. The players are 2nd circle at the moment and we play about 4 hours. Let's say we do 1 social and 1 combat encounter with 1 goal. According to the chart, it's about 800 average give or take.

If we played 8 hours and did 2 social, 2 combat and 1-2 goals, its about 800 average. Or am I supposed to double it up to 1600 on average?
Is 4 hours your typical session length? If so, then giving a "double" award for an 8-hour session might be a nice benefit. Otherwise... don't worry about tying award size to how many hours you play in a given session.

Also, the Fibonacci scaling of costs means advancement slows as characters gain power. Getting to Circle 3 quickly is normal -- especially if you don't spend Legend on Attribute increases or thread items.

To provide an example: the character I play in the Legends of Earthdawn podcast is a troll Nethermancer (and so has spell learning costs on top of normal talent advancement). We play monthly, the game has been going on more than two years now and I just reached Sixth Circle. In my log of awards and spending, I reached 2nd Circle in the first bit of downtime (July 2017), and 3rd Circle in the third one (Dec 2017 -- we were really hurting for downtime in our early days). Fourth Circle came in our downtime break in the August 2018 session, and Fifth in Feb 2019.

Because we play monthly, our awards have been intentionally on the higher end (so that we feel like we're making progress), but you really start to notice a bit of slowdown once you hit the Journeyman tier.
Josh Harrison - josh@fasagames.com
Earthdawn Developer, Forum Admin

Personal Website: www.loremerchant.com

Qwazi
Posts:9
Joined:Mon Oct 07, 2019 8:53 am

Re: Problem with LP awards and short sessions: Need advice

Post by Qwazi » Mon Oct 07, 2019 9:11 am

I reward my group with the LP equivalent of the cost for raising a talent from the circle they're at to the next circle.

Circle 1: 200
Circle 2: 300
Circle 3: 500
Circle 5: 800
Circle 6: 1300
Circle 7: 2100
Circle 8: 3400

That way I know approximately how many sessions there are between each circle up, as they require (New Circle + 3) talents at the new circle rank to advance. So, at Circle 5 they need at a minimum 8 sessions to advance a circle, but then they spend LP on thread items, skills, other talents, spells, etc. too so it may in fact be 11 or 12 sessions for a circle advancement. In any case I feel this is pretty good pacing for our group.

Belenus
Posts:225
Joined:Fri Nov 16, 2018 5:27 pm
Location:Germany
Contact:

Re: Problem with LP awards and short sessions: Need advice

Post by Belenus » Mon Oct 07, 2019 10:04 am

Qwazi wrote:
Mon Oct 07, 2019 9:11 am
I reward my group with the LP equivalent of the cost for raising a talent from the circle they're at to the next circle.

Circle 1: 200
Circle 2: 300
Circle 3: 500
Circle 5: 800
Circle 6: 1300
Circle 7: 2100
Circle 8: 3400

That way I know approximately how many sessions there are between each circle up, as they require (New Circle + 3) talents at the new circle rank to advance. So, at Circle 5 they need at a minimum 8 sessions to advance a circle, but then they spend LP on thread items, skills, other talents, spells, etc. too so it may in fact be 11 or 12 sessions for a circle advancement. In any case I feel this is pretty good pacing for our group.
Don't forget, that the LP costs increase for talents learned at circle 5 and later.
An other big factor would be a second (third, forth :shock: ) discipline.
I also would give some range and not a fix amount based on the time you played and the difficulty of the adventure or even for good roleplaying.

Qwazi
Posts:9
Joined:Mon Oct 07, 2019 8:53 am

Re: Problem with LP awards and short sessions: Need advice

Post by Qwazi » Mon Oct 07, 2019 10:12 am

Belenus wrote:
Mon Oct 07, 2019 10:04 am
I also would give some range and not a fix amount based on the time you played and the difficulty of the adventure or even for good roleplaying.
While I do occasionally reward a little bit more if they've accomplished something extraordinary I do not need to dangle LP rewards for excellent roleplay etc. since I have been blessed with a group that is in character like 95% of the time and, at the risk of not advancing the narrative much, they roleplay internally A LOT. We have a lot of fun though, even if they accomplish hardly anything apart from causing a ruccus with each other in some meetings.

You are right about the talent cost at circle 5 increase though, and I will probably start giving them 2100 LP per session soon I guess. (Only the 5th circle talents increase in cost though, so the majority of the talents they are improving at circle 5 are still below circle 5 talents).

Post Reply