Is D&D 3.5 that Munchkin?

[Spike]

Are there any other GMs out there who give out experience points based on individual character performance/roleplaying as opposed to doling them out equally among all characters?

 

The XP bonus or penalty might only be ten percent of the total XP earned by the party, but suddenly when one player advances a level a few encounters ahead of the others or somebody falls a level behind because they only show up to every fifth game session, players start to take notice and get more involved in the game.

[kristof65]

Are there any other GMs out there who give out experience points based on individual character performance/roleplaying as opposed to doling them out equally among all characters?

 

The XP bonus or penalty might only be ten percent of the total XP earned by the party, but suddenly when one player advances a level a few encounters ahead of the others or somebody falls a level behind because they only show up to every fifth game session, players start to take notice and get more involved in the game.

I used to. I had a nice spreadsheet I found somewhere online that would track everything and let me assign XPs based on who was in the combat, encounter, etc, plus bonus, etc and then would let me print nice little XP sheets for each player telling them what they earned, and why.

 

The biggest problem with it, and the reason I abandoned it was my ability to sit down and fill it out. As time went on, I got sloppier and sloppier about doing it right after the session. The players never had any objections about the amounts, because they had a little detailed sheet telling them where each set of points came from, so they did tend to stay involved more.

[Reaperbryan]

I award XP in sets - example:

Everybody gets 2,300 XP for tonight's combats. Joe, Bill, Scott, you each get 100 xp for roleplay. Shannon, you get 100 XP for solving the gate puzzle. Joe, you get another 100 for bringing brownies.

 

My players know who gets the RP XP and why.

 

Also, yes, I take bribes. If a player wants to give me something real for something pretend, I have no objection. And I have never had a player say it wasn't fair. Most of them figure if Joe went through the effort, he deserves a reward.

 

Then again, my group plays RPGS as a GAME. Its for enjoyment, so if the brownies were part of the good time, they deserve XP as much as the critical 20 that decapitated the cleric as the sacrificial blow was coming down . . .

[eastman]

Are there any other GMs out there who give out experience points based on individual character performance/roleplaying as opposed to doling them out equally among all characters?

 

The XP bonus or penalty might only be ten percent of the total XP earned by the party, but suddenly when one player advances a level a few encounters ahead of the others or somebody falls a level behind because they only show up to every fifth game session, players start to take notice and get more involved in the game.

 

In the Deadlands system, where poker chips are used to gain re-rolls, add dice to rolls, heal (prevent) wounds and also spent for character development (like XP), there is a definite structure in place for group rewards for completing tasks and individual rewareds (for good roleplaying, brilliant solutions to the problems, exception acts or just amusing the GameMaster). I've thrown white chips (the least valuable) for good character playing and even gone as far as a blue (the most valuable of the standard chips) for a character's RP-driven solution to what could have been a bloodbath (for no real good reason).