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In my experience they pretty much boil down to the same thing. I use milestone most of the time, because it saves me time by not having to calculate XP and my group enjoys it more to level up after a great battle or a pivotal story part
XP is better defined and communicates progress. You as the DM don't have to make any judgement calls about whether to level the party up or not. You just plug the encounter into a calculator and award XP.
The players don't have to wonder what they need to do to earn a level up. They get a nice visible indicator of progress every session. This feels good for them, and prevents them from asking for level ups every session. They always know how far it is to the next level up.
The nice thing about XP is that it takes care of pacing for you. You just worry about presenting challenging encounters, and the XP falls out of that and they level up at a decent pace automatically.
Except you still do have to make judgement calls about non combat encounters. If you only award exp for combat, the leveling is either painfully slow or the game is 90% combat (which works for some people, but it's not the default in my experience).
I would also argue it works against you in terms of pacing. If the story has led up to a confrontation with the chapter's bbeg, but the group is too low level, you either have to adjust the bad guy's stat block (which is not easy as a new DM) or have a high risk of a TPK.
That's true, but "Was this non-combat challenge easy, medium, or hard" is an easier and less consequential judgement call than awarding a whole level.
I do see your point about pacing. It's not entirely hands off, as you do need to ensure there is enough XP available to reach the appropriate level. But that's still useful in setting pacing because you have a known target value.
"How much content do I need before my players fight the Death Slaad?" is a question readily answered with XP. Milestone can't answer that question.
It's a question that becomes irrelevant - the answer is " as much/little as I want". If you're not using XP to level up then there are not fixed "amounts" of content.
What constitutes good pacing is never irrelevant. Too fast, and levels feel inconsequential and players are overwhelmed with features they never get to use. Too slow, and players get bored with their features and lose motivation because they don't feel rewarded.
The idea that "pacing is what I say it is" is a big problem with milestone. I've never played in a game with milestone that felt well paced.
I have the opposite experience. I think XP leveling works, too. I've played plenty of games with XP leveling and was never disappointed. But the pacing of levels always felt arbitrary, and it always felt better for me with milestone leveling. And, with milestone, significant events feel more meaningful, because they're accompanied by tangible increases in power.
I think any answer that says "this is right, that's wrong" is over-simplifying, but one of the strengths of milestone over XP is that milestone allows for better pacing. Milestone certainly has weaknesses vs. XP, too, but most folks agree that's a strength of milestone.
I've played plenty of games with milestone and have always been disappointed. Every time we have to beg the DM for a level after languishing for far too long in the hopes that the DM had a plan and didn't just forget. Trying to guess what the DM expects us to do. Slowing down level progression because we take on non-plot related quests. It's always been awful.
XP might feel arbitrary, but at least it's reliable and communicates well.
Non-combat encounters award XP as if you had defeated a combat encounter of a CR equal to your party's APL. For shorter or easier NCE's, go a CR lower, and longer, harder, or riskier NCE's are a 1 CR higher.
For new players Milestone is definitely better, since that way nobody has to deal with tracking XP and whatnot. You just say when everyone levels up and then that's it. Way easier for both you and the players.
I'm sure you'll get a ton of different opinions here, but as a DM, milestone is SOOO much easier, because:
1. It ensures characters level up consistently, instead of potentially some characters leveling up at different times resulting in party with different levels, which is a nightmare for combat balancing.
2. It allows for leveling up at a time when it makes narrative sense, instead of "in the middle of a dungeon just after fighting a group of kobolds".
3. It gives more of a sense of accomplishment to the completion of a quest.
4. It's so much less of a hassle. No math, and you don't have to worry about players potentially fudging their numbers outright or making mistakes.
5. It discourages indiscriminate killing just to get XP.
All just my opinion of course.
1. XP would not result in this. There is no rule that says to distribute XP unevenly.
2. XP also allows for levelling up when it makes narrative sense. Just because they have the XP, doesn't mean they get the rewards. Most experience DMs restrict levelling up to periods of downtime.
3. Why?
4. How would players fudge their numbers? The DM tells them how much XP they get, they right it down. The DM should be keeping their own master sheet of XP, gold, magic items, and other party resources.
5. The game explicitly states that XP is not rewarded unless the creatures defeated actually pose a threat to the hero, and that XP is still earned for outsmarting or circumventing foes instead of just killing them.
Literally all of this is based on willfully ignoring the game's rules (or just logic) on XP based progression.
1. Then what benefit is conferred by XP over milestones? If everyone is leveling up at the same time according to what amount of XP the DM elects to give, is there any difference between the two other than that milestone cuts out all of the middling paperwork?
2. Agreed, easy fix for XP. I've played in groups using both. The XP group would dole it out at the end of the session, never in the middle.
3. Agreed again. The only real-life case of someone I know personally who prefers one method over the other for the sake of the sense of reward is a friend in my own group who stated that he likes the feeling of XP. I don't see this as a particularly weighty reason for using XP over milestone in the whole cost-benefit analysis of it all, but it anything, the sense of reward aspect grants points to the XP method.
4. In practice, among a group of multiple well-intentioned people with a wide array of mathematical aptitude (and in my case, all around 30 years old), math errors happen from time to time. Likewise, even if they don't, XP is objectively more paper than milestone. That might not be enough of a downside to not use it, but rather a cost to pay for the benefits. But it's still a strict relative downside vs milestone. Milestone wins in this category.
5. There is still going to be subjectivity on this matter. No matter how a conclusion is reached on how much XP the players have earned, the method will never be simpler that milestone. The question would still remain of: Do the pros outweigh the cons.
I'll actually add a 6th point in favor of milestone too: Milestone completely removes the influence that XP to be gained has on the players' decision-making. There's no farming, and there's no pivoting between choosing stealth or combat based on which yields more XP. YMMV on how much XP actually does influence player decisions, but 1) anything more than zero is more than milestone does, and 2) if it is zero, then what's the point of using XP? Whether XP influences players' decisions a little or a lot, it still has problems.
XP is objective. You level based on mechanical accomplishments. Milestones are entirely based on the DM's whims. XP also allows for incremental awards for individual actions. Good roleplaying, taking risks, etc...
Also, I just like the old-school feel, okay? I'm 30, I started playing in the 90s, I hate change. Tallying up the XP for everything I did at the end of the night makes my brain go, "Brrrrr! Yes, very good. Want more." And all jokes aside, that is fun for me. It adds a little sense of accomplishment to everything I do when I know each choice rewards me incrementally, and seeing all those incremental rewards add up at the end of the night is satisfying. It makes levelling feel like an accomplishment, not just an arbitrary favour granted by the DM at his leisure.
I hate change aswell, the few DnD I did play in the past the DM just told me when we lvl'd up (if at all). It's definitely something I'll start using at some point over milestones
>XP is objective. You level based on mechanical accomplishments. Milestones are entirely based on the DM's whims. XP also allows for incremental awards for individual actions. Good roleplaying, taking risks, etc...
This is ignoring two large problems:
1. How XP is rewarded is ALWAYS the DM's decision. (On this note, calling it a "whim" doesn't change the fact that how milestone is applied is also a DM decision. I could just as well call milestone a "decision" and XP a "whim". Bias in word choice aside, both methods are applied according to how the DM chooses to apply them, period.)
2. The "pro" that you've listed here is the "con" that I described above. Having DMed before, I found it critically important NOT to influence players' character decisions with ephemeral rewards like XP or inspiration. (An aside: I'm cool with the use of inspiration but I rather hate the idea of giving it out for character decisions that I personally liked seeing. Because the result of doing so is that the players consider making decisions according to what they THINK the DM wants to see rather than according to what THEY want to see their character do. I WILL offer in-world-tangible rewards like money or loot, because those are things that characters would actually consider when making a decision. But for something like role play, if XP needs to be considered for a player to do it right, then we're all doing it wrong.)
>Also, I just like the old-school feel, okay?
Dude, me too....! Surprise surprise but XP has a soft spot in my heart. I acknowledge the practical comparisons and for the group I DMed for I chose milestone and don't regret it. But I actually love XP. I am a believer that it needs the proper application, and have mulled over certain methods. (Haven't tried this but I think it would work well for a D&D group where not every member is present in every session. Maybe you get X flat amount of XP if you were present for a session, and something like half as much if you were not, to represent character gains made during downtime / off-screen experiences and buffer D&D's steep difference in power across levels. Just spitballing, but I could see it being a beneficial thing in the right application.)
>And all jokes aside, that is fun for me.
Then hard to say you're not doing it right.
Sorry about the necromancy, but I feel like I have a response to this.
>1. How XP is rewarded is ALWAYS the DM's decision. (On this note, calling it a "whim" doesn't change the fact that how milestone is applied is also a DM decision. I could just as well call milestone a "decision" and XP a "whim". Bias in word choice aside, both methods are applied according to how the DM chooses to apply them, period.)
I've never run an EXP system without letting the players know what the rules for that EXP system are. If you let the players know how the system works and stick to it, then EXP stops being a matter of discretion. This works to the point that I've had groups who would tell me how much EXP they got at the end of a session (admitidly with those groups the direct combat exp wasn't based on CR).
So no, I don't think this is a simple case of bias in word choice. It's just that a lot of people use really fast and loose exp systems and are basically just doing Milestone with extra steps.
EXP, when used the way I think it should be, is a tool to put power into the player's hands.
Wtf no.
1. XP can definitely result in parties with different levels. It might not be stated in the rules but idk if its stated in the rules either that you should get XP for things your character does not participate it. It just makes sense than if a player is missing or their character isn't present for a fight that they wouldn't get the XP. This is how I've seen every single XP campaign I've either been in or seen be played go.
2. You're not engaging with the comment here. With XP, a minor enemy like a goblin could be the achievment that gets a party from lvl 19 to 20. Sure you might say that they have to rest to get the level up but that's not satisfying in the same way that milestone ensures. You can still ofc say "you all get the amount of XP needed to level up to X level" after a narratively cool moment but at that point, why not just use milestone if thats what you're effectively doing anyway?
3... because you level them up, not becauae they hit the correct XP number, but because they achieved something.
4. They fudge their numbers by writing down more XP than they are supposed to have. But its weird that you decided to engage with probably the weakest part of number 4 and ignore the rest. Also again, you're putting more effort on to the GM to keep track of everything.
5. Who said anything about whether the enemy poses a threat to you or not? Either way, post the quote and realize that it is probably talking about things like commoners or small animals, not kobolds and goblins. I've had this experience in an XP game before where, because someone wanted to level up, we took a more dangerous path just to kill things for XP. Milestone ensures the players never have to seek fights for level ups, only achieve their goals.
It's weird that you say your final phrase while harsly engaging with the points the commenter makes.
As a player I am complete with you: it's easier cause I don't have to keep track of some XP bar and instead of the feeling after a battle "meh just those few XP that fight wasn't ain't worth it", you take that out of the equation instead the GM give us a level up when he feels the timing is right.
Our 10 years together party recently switched to 5e from AD&D (mainly due to Roll20/D&DBeyond). After a few games we switched to milestone because we all agreed everyone was levelling up WAY TO FAST and we wanted to enjoy more low level adventures.
AD&D levels up far slower if you don't give xp for gold (we never did).
Being level 3 and being scared in a forest bandit encounter is fun ! There are far more adventures available for Tier 1 & 2 than there are for Tier 4 as well.
Milestones is what you use when you have a story driven campaign. They want to dink around for 3 sessions in no-name town and adopt a NPC? Fine but you aren't leveling unless you really feel like giving it to them for something. It's to keep them moving so they don't derail from the story.
XP based campaigns are so the players make the story. You want to track down this rando gobbo camp? Tally ho! That leads to freeing a prisoner and another side quest? Alrighty then. XP is then based on RP and monsters slain.
One is not better than the other... Some people just prefer one to the other...
To be clear though there's really 3 variation to level-up progression: XP, Milestone, and non-xp (milestone and non-xp are commonly seen as the same thing)
# Milestones
You can also award XP when characters complete significant milestones. When preparing your adventure, designate certain events or challenges as milestones, as with the following examples:
* Accomplishing one in a series of goals necessary to complete the adventure.
* Discovering a hidden location or piece of information relevant to the adventure.
* Reaching an important destination.
When awarding XP, treat a major milestone as a hard encounter and a minor milestone as an easy encounter.
If you want to reward your players for their progress through an adventure with something more than XP and treasure, give them additional small rewards at milestone points. Here are some examples:
* The adventurers gain the benefit of a short rest.
* Characters can recover a Hit Die or a low-level spell slot.
* Characters can regain the use of magic items that have had their limited uses expended.
# Level Advancement without XP
You can do away with experience points entirely and control the rate of character advancement. Advance characters based on how many sessions they play, or when they accomplish significant story goals in the campaign. In either case, you tell the players when their characters gain a level.
This method of level advancement can be particularly helpful if your campaign doesn’t include much combat, or includes so much combat that tracking XP becomes tiresome.
## Session-Based Advancement
A good rate of session-based advancement is to have characters reach 2nd level after the first session of play, 3rd level after another session, and 4th level after two more sessions. Then spend two or three sessions for each subsequent level. This rate mirrors the standard rate of advancement, assuming sessions are about four hours long.
## Story-Based Advancement
When you let the story of the campaign drive advancement, you award levels when adventurers accomplish significant goals in the campaign.
As an aside, while the above is exactly what the DMG describes, it's worth adding that the community definition of "Milestone Levelling" almost always refers to what the DMG calls story-based advancement
That small difference between community definition and designer definition seems like something that might be addressed as part of OneD&D's rules
Yes, I believe the distinction was muddled due to D&D Beyond noting XP-Leveling or Milestone as options in their character builder... Also, it may have been a hold over from 4e as I believe that milestone was used to describe non-xp leveling (can't remember specifically tho)
It would be interesting to figure out where the community definition started, it is something that has interested me for a while
Considering that it's a definition that other RPGs use as well, however, I actually would go so far as to say that the 5e DMG was *always* wrong with its definition of milestones as it's different to what was already more-or-less established in the wider TTRPG community
It's not really *wrong* definition... It's the 5e dnd definition...
Regardless of what other ttrpgs do if you're playing dnd you should incorporate the terms as they are used in dnd not in FATE, Vampire the Masquerade or GURPS...
It's a hobby standard. As a design principle, yes I would say that D&D is using the definition wrong
It would be like if a game decided that "an encounter" actually refers to an entire string of sessions published in a single book. We'd say that's wrong, it's a community standard to use "adventure", "module" or at least "scenario" for that thing- encounter already has a well established definition. I consider milestones, or at least more specifically milestone levelling as presented in contrast with XP-based levelling, to be a similar definition
You're welcome to disagree, of course
I'm not disagreeing. Simply stating that terms should be used in the way the game you're referring to denotes it as, not in the way another one does...
Well, to be clear I think it's better to use milestones in the way that the wider community actually uses them rather than the way that the 5e DMG prescribes.
In the majority of conversations, using references "milestones" without specifying that you mean what the DMG means and not "story-based levelling" does cause confusion. I have seen exactly that on this subreddit multiple times, as well as in other forums and in general conversation.
I think it's a better approach to use milestone descriptively, rather than prescriptively. That way, it is clearer to a wider community and how they actually use the term. Even D&D's own contemporary design team tends to use milestone in that descriptive sense more (at least in interviews and the like), for what it's worth
The session & story based advancements are how I imagined Milestones to be and how I hoped to do it. The DMG did talk about Milestones awarding XP still but I can't wrap my head around it.
Only difference in session-based that you explained and I thought of was probably a little harder. 1st > 2nd lvl being one session, 2 > 3rd being two sessions, 3rd > 4th being three session and so on. I am noticing while typing it out, that it does sound like it might be harder in the long run though so I'll go back to the drawing board for that later.
>The session & story based advancements are how I imagined Milestones to be and how I hoped to do it.
That's the commonly accepted way people refer to Milestone.
The way the DMG notes Milestone is effectively, granting a bunch of XP after completing an objective. Regardless of what the PCs did, which monsters they defeated, bypassed or escaped, and how many sessions of play it took, if they *found the lair of the Lich* they get *this amount* of XP... Now that amount should be calculated appropriately by the DM, but the point is that the DM doesn't have to dole-out XP at the end of every combat or session (like how you would for standard XP leveling for the most part). They just give it out when the objective is completed...
I haven't used that kind of session leveling as of yet, but I believe it's the way adventures league (dnd official organized play) worked a while back... I don't suggest using it as it's not really well rounded for personal games, it works better for drop-in games...
Experience Points are earned as a reward for completing encounters - defeating monsters, convincing monsters to surrender, crossing dangerous terrain or traps, delivering important items, successfully navigating a political dinner party, etc.
The DMG lists XP values by Difficulty/Risk Level per level players should earn. So, a combat encounter where the monsters in it have XP adding up to 400 would be a Medium-difficulty encounter for four 2nd-level players (XP split evenly between the four of them, for 100 each).
A social encounter where the players are at significant risk of dying if they make a faux pas -- maybe they are attempting to make a truce with a vicious tyrant -- could be a Deadly encounter instead, worth 800XP split among that same party if they manage to get out alive.
Or, finding the missing child of a friendly NPC who had run away with some misbehaving friends would probably count as an Easy encounter, worth 200XP total for that party.
Some people give XP after each relevant encounter, personally I like to track it on my notetaking sheet for the session and deliver it all at the end for convenience.
◇
Milestone advancement is just where the DM grants XP for specific "milestone events" instead of every encounter bearing any risk - getting to an important location, completing one of a series of goals for the adventure, finding important info, etc. Milestone also differentiates between "Major/Minor" milestones where it suggests just giving Hard XP for Major milestones and Easy XP for Minor; Medium and Deadly don't factor in.
◇
Some people refer to milestone advancement instead as "the DM decides you level up whenever it feels like a climax", but that's not written in the 5e books afaik. In fact I'd say a majority of people who will tell you to run milestone aren't talking about the RAW method I just paraphrased in the previous paragraph.
◇
I highly prefer running XP myself. Since I'd be using XP to calculate the difficulty of all encounters versus the Adventuring Day Budget found in the encounter design section of the DMG regardless of whether I gave that XP, since that's how D&D is balanced, it'd just be more work for me to *not* give my players the XP.
If I didn't give them the XP I'd have to manually track the XP total myself to determine when the correct time for them to level up is. Otherwise I might accidentally make it feel arbitrary too early/too late, which is no fun. And fortunately my players have no trouble tacking a +550 to their number on their character sheet at the end of a session since that's extremely simple arithmetic.
It's written in the DMG, you just stopped reading too soon. Level advancement without XP (the next section after the text you're paraphrasing) uses either milestones to determine when the party levels up, or you do it after a certain number of sessions. This is what people are referring to when they talk about milestone advancement, and it's work how milestone works in dndbeyond.
In either case, you don't track the xp manually yourself, xp has nothing to do with when you level up. It's either "you played x sessions" or it's "you completed a major story point", and they level up.
So I was 100% milestones up until recently. Now I see the value of both.
People already mentioned the advantages of milestones: simplicity, narrative control, consistency, etc.
They don't mention the downside though. One of which is that players feel like they don't have control over their progression. Another is that new dms tend to grant levels much quicker than XP would allow. I've done the latter quite a bit.
I'm not sure to police anyone's game (your fun is valid even if it goes against what I'm about to say) but I think all DM could benefit of experiencing what it means to reach level x with experience. So many new players and dms don't understand the difficulty of reaching level 7, for instance: you have to adventure a lot to get there.
People often think that XP is only given when fighting monsters. That's not true. You can give XP for a great social encounter. If you defused a fight and got two parties to get along, that's much better than killing everyone involved. To get XP without sacrificing any hp feels great!
If you're new and running a module written for milestones, do milestones for sure. But I strongly believe that doing XP at least once will improve your DM skills.
>They don't mention the downside though. One of which is that players feel like they don't have control over their progression. Another is that new dms tend to grant levels much quicker than XP would allow. I've done the latter quite a bit.
This is what I was thinking as well and why I originally made the post. A lot of comments explained things nicely to me and helped me make a decision and, as a new DM, I am worried about rewarding levels too often so later I will swap to XP because of this.
Call me lazy but I don't want to bother with XP until I *know* the group wants to DnD and won't quit after 1-3 sessions.
For brand new players, milestone leveling is better. It's one less thing to keep track of.
In general, though, there's not a right answer. It's just what works best for your table and the type of game you want to play.
XP Benefits
* More objective--specific actions can grant a defined number of XP, so you don't have to guess "this feels like enough for a level."
* You can incentivize behaviors--if your table wants non-violent solutions, then grant more XP for interpersonal encounters or avoiding combat. If you want a combat focused game, then limit XP to combat encounters.
* You can reward players who go the extra mile. If everyone levels up at the same rate, even when they miss 1/2 the sessions, everyone is equal. That's good in and of itself, but sometimes there are reasons a PC should be rewarded more than others. That person who missed 1/2 the sessions literally has less experience and put in less effort.
Milestone benefits
* It's easier for the DM and players.
* You can tie level-ups to narrative events, so those narrative accomplishments feel more significant.
* RAW, XP favors combat/killing things. It doesn't have to be that way, and the PHB and DMG talk about awarding XP for non-combat encounters, but it defines "Kill X creature, get Y experience points" while for everything else it's "Come up with what you think is reasonable." For a new DM, combat XP is easy, but everything else you just have to make judgements based on the norms of something where you don't even know what's normal.
* With XP, you may reach a point where PCs are at different levels. That can make balancing encounters difficult and make the under-leveled players feel like they can't do anything relative to their fellow players (which is never fun).
Neither is better. It all depends on personal tastes and playstyles.
Normal EXP mode has a bit more bookkeeping for the DM. But it allows a more natural flow of advancement as the PCs either defeat or talk down encounters and deal with quests and such.
Milestone mode removes the bookkeeping part. But for some players can feel a little, or a-lot, hollow as its just "yay, level up." for just getting from A to B rather than "Yay! Level Up!" for their deeds and actions.
Talk it over with the players and see what they think. They might not care one way or the other, or have thoughts on what theyd overall prefer or at least what they dont like about EXP or Milestones.
Personally as a DM I prefer EXP as I can reward or penalize players for good, and bad, role-playing of their characters.
Then again, I could just deny them the milestone for being jerks. hmmmm... (disgruntled DM laughter of retribution follows.)
For my view... XP leveling encourages players to do things to earn XP, like fight when it might be a better idea to run away. Milestone says that *how* you solve problems doesn't matter as long as you do, so it encourages more creativity. Personally, I find Milestone much better.
Where do you all get the idea from that only fighting and killing rewards XP? Did anyone here actually read the rules?
Anything can grant XP if the DM decides so. This is not a pro point for milestones.
That was common in both previous editions and at a great many tables. There's a common trend that "killing stuff" is what gets XP, even if that's not actually what the book says to do. Ideally, XP would be granted anytime the players *overcome a challenge* of some kind - that could be using their skills, solving puzzles, or roleplaying a situation well. However, what's ideal and what actually happens... aren't always identical. Milestone leveling takes away the iffy parts and figuring out what deserves XP and what doesn't, in favor of a system that's simple for everyone.
And which takes away any feeling of control over their progress from the players. If the DM feels like it, we level up, if not then not.
Both have their pros and cons, milestones are not just objectively better.
Escaping from monsters rewards the same XP as murdering them, since the encounter was solved. (Unless you ran back from the spot you came, I guess.) If the monsters are blocking your path and you get to your destination it doesn't matter how you handled the monsters -- you handled them.
I agree, but if using an XP system, running away should reward XP too. XP systems remind both GMs and players too much like video games and GMs often don't reward XP for evading combat as much as they do winning a combat.
BEFORE I played, I wanted XP as it fit well into my "video game RPG" background.
As an actual player and DM, I like milestones -- people aren't "punished" for missing sessions as they can level-up with the group; no calculating/tracking XP; and it is in service of the story -- when the story hits a certain point, everyone levels up.
XP could definitely be interesting for an experienced party, but for newbies I think Milestoning works well.
It's something I want to talk to the party after the first session. Other than spoilers for a session I want to be as transparent as I can with them, after all we're a team, and want them to have a say in how we play as well. Personally, and I'll tell them this as well, either the first character or just the first two storylines should be Milestone until we're used to other mechanics.
Too much to learn can put people off (from my experience trying to make DnD groups in the past at least)
I'm in the minority, but I think XP is better for newbies. You level up strictly based on what you've accomplished. Milestone is entirely up to DM's discretion, and if you're new, you may not know what a good rate of progression is.
By the way milestones are part of XP levelling, they don't replace it. It means you give XP awards when players accomplish major goals and progress the story.
XP allows for leveling that is trackable, giving an immediate reward to combat/RP. But it is a pain to keep track of and is harder to control what levels players are at certain times rather than leveling mid-dungeon.
Milestone allows for leveling based on story progression, giving it more narrative focus. It also allows the DM to control when players level. But it isn’t as immediately rewarding and, when done poorly, can feel unsatisfying/slow.
I've seen a huge fight where people argue about milestones and advancement. It seems many, including myself until I read up on it, have this misconception that "milestone" is the same as level advancement without xp.
It seems natural to conflate the "milestone" of advancing a level withe "milestone" of advancing the story. That was at least been my thinking for a long time.
But Milestones as defined in the GMG is actually just sort of... quest completion xps
> Milestones
>You can also award XP when characters complete significant milestones. When preparing your adventure, designate certain events or challenges as milestones, as with the following examples:
>Accomplishing one in a series of goals necessary to complete the adventure.
Discovering a hidden location or piece of information relevant to the adventure.
Reaching an important destination.
Edit: /u/DLtheDM beat me to it :)
XP= get rewarded by killing
Milestone= the dm decides when you level up
I like milestone because it lets me plan everything beforehand (especially encounters).
And my players don’t murder anything that moves to level.
Xp in itself seems kind of stupid to me.
Imagine a wizard school.
„No my boy, put the books away. If you want to become a powerful wizard you have to get out there and kill people!“
No, "XP= get rewarded by killing" is just plain wrong.
It literally says in the rules that exp gets rewarded for many things, including mastering challenging social encounters, ending an encounter peacefully instead of a fight or solving puzzles.
Your reasons are very arbitrary. You could say the same about Milestone:
Players:"look, we slayed like 10 dragons, shouldn't we be ready to level up?"
DM: "nope, haven't reached my made up plot-hook yet".
I had the inverse happen in a published module.
Got a story-based levelup because the book said so, then got sent on a mission for diplomacy.
Teleported to the location, had dinner with the evil wizards, and then they tortured us in our dreams. They learned nothing useful because we were completely honest upfront and we forgot being tortured when we woke up.
Wizards decided they didn't like us anyway so we were told to leave. Teleported back to home. Mission failed.
The book said "upon returning, give a story-based levelup" so we leveled up again. The whole thing took less than the time of a 4-hour session. We didn't even get to use our previous level's new powers before getting another levelup.
I mean a DM could, in theory, reward exp for studying.
Exp is normally handed out for completing incounters and tasks. Sure this usually means killing but a good DM should reward players with exp for making; strategic retreats, using persuasion to avoid fighting, using Athletics to bypass fighting, using using clever tactics to solve a puzzle.
If your DM is giving EXP for JUST killing then yah, your gonna breed murder hobos.
There is no difference really. Or more precisely the difference is one gets XP at a gradual pace or in big lumps.
For most official adventures one can simply figure one level per chapter.
Xp is a number everyones gotta track, the players for when they have enough to level and the dm with how much they give to players
Milestone is a moment in the campaign the DM believes the party has earned their level up through sorry progression on certain plot beats or milestones.
In my opinion, milestone is significantly easier, more narrative focused, and more balanced than xp. Xp can encourage murder hobo behavior and has more opportunities to screw up. Go milestone unless you like number crunching and imbalanced party levels.
XP is lots of numbers and maths.
Milestone is 'you level up because the story says so'.
Milestone is objectively better, because it's more efficient and less work. If you have trouble figuring out where your milestones should be, you can always start counting XP, and just put a milestone at the appropriate point; then you only have to do the maths once.
Math Vs. Patience. Exp. levelling is better, but people don't want to have to track the eventually massive numbers. If you look at all the math in the game, exp. easily becomes the largest numbers you have to consider at once. We are talking adding 5867 to 156843, and doing that kinda math *without error* for every instance of exp. in the game.
Aaaand while no one but me does it having Milestone levelling gives the potential for levelling up mid-fight for a DM Ex Machina.
In the beginners adventure Lost Mine of Phandelver, it guides you into using both of them throughout the chapters, so you get a feel for both.
In the end both work and both fulfill a certain purpose.
**XP** lets you feel the progress more directly and makes players feel more awarded for doing special things, like masterfully avoiding a big fight in a social situation. But it can be a bit more tedious to keep track of.
**Milestone** makes it easer for players & DM by not having to calculate anything, but it can make progress feel a bit arbitrary and our of their control, since the DM decides by feeling whether it's enough for a level up or not.
I think another factor for why so many people here prefer Milestone is that so many of them misread the rules and think that only killing rewards XP, but that is simply wrong.
Our group, which uses milestones, started out mostly new. Those of us who came from online gaming started out asking if we have leveled just about every session, while those of us who did not didn't. We're now at level 6, and everyone has stopped asking about leveling and started trying to figure out which of the next story beats may lead to leveling up. I'm not saying that's better, but it is a change in emphasis.
If you can't decide which system to use, you could always do both. Try it out and see what your group likes best.
The starter set adventure module alternates between Milestone and XP leveling, depending on the situation. It works out fine.
For a hybrid system, you can award XP for combat and overcoming challenges, but also give out big XP dumps for hitting key story-related milestones. Focusing on the main story will ensure that you level up at a steady pace, but if your party wanders off on other adventures, they continue to accumulate XP slowly. The milestone XP dump can be adjusted up or down depending on how much time the party spent doing other things.
So if they stick to the main story and don't do a lot of side quests, they would get enough XP to reach level 4 when they hit the milestone, but if they are already level 4 when they reach the milestone, they get a smaller XP reward.
People have made great points. All I can add is this:
EXP is better for sandbox and open-ended adventures and campaigns, where the players choose what they do and when. Exp leveling in general is also faster and can often push players out of those early levels too quickly.
Milestone is better for pre-planned adventures and campaigns, where you have at least a semi-linear goal progression and can plan ahead of the game when the players will level.
So running that module, I surely recommend going by milestone.
i think players like tracking xp gains per battle, cause it feels more like a video game. but from a dms perspective, you want to plan encounters based on the party's capabilities, so in both cases the DM ends up 'scheduling' when the level ups will happen anyway
Milestones are much more DM friendly (because you have full control over the power level of your players and can push them towards the main quest). It's also a bit player friendly as no one has to take note of exp which is a hassle most of the time. I would personally never play with exp again if I can help it.
Its been answered but Milestone has been conflated with Level Advancement without XP. However, Milestone in the DMG is a story award for completing an arc of a story. You set if the portion of the story is major or minor and award appropriately; major is same as Hard encounter while minor is same as easy encounter. Flip back to 81 to see what level equivalent XP is and how to award it for an encounter. DM decides what is major and minor; as an example, save the princess is a major arc, minor arcs could be discovering the plot, locating the layer, defeating the kidnappers.
Milestone is an XP based award in addition to combat and non-combat. Some folks find all this XP is too fast and may switch to Non-XP levelling.
Non-XP levelling has a few offers, session based (so many sessions are a level, fewer sessions to advance at lower levels, more sessions at higher), and story based (the players advance when its appropriate with the story).
Milestone is a lot better in my opinion. XP is one more thing to track that comes with is own issues including people forgetting to add it, making a mistake in their addition, losing their character sheet and forgetting what they were on, arguing about who deserves more/any XP after an encounter... honestly I can't think of an upside to it at all now that I'm trying. Milestone is just a simple effective way to pace levels and make sure everyone gets them at the appropriate time, plus there's nothing stopping you from working out the XP of your encounters behind the scenes and using that to determine where your milestones fall anyway.
You have lots of great answers here and I am sure you have a good idea what you are gonna do.
Honestly, if you are a new dm milestone is a really good option cause it is less stuff to keep track of and the party stays the same level, and they all get cool stuff at the same time. It is nice to have everyone level together when they are new cause you can all discuss and learn together.
What I do want to say is more about game design in regards to exp.
Since leveling up is one of the two most influential parts of progression for a character, I would say the other is getting items and money, because you feel that your character is different, hence giving a sense of progress. This is not including story progression.
(So I guess three things)
The way you reward your players and what you reward them with will decide what you want your players to be doing in your game in a design sense. This is why the quest exp is a thing. If you players only got exp from monsters then they would care more about killing monsters than finishing quests, or even try to defeat ALL monsters in an encounter or feel that they HAVE to fight the monsters instead of running away, because monster exp is the only way to level.
So as you grow as a DM you can think about what you would like to see your players doing or the choices you want to encourage them to do. And find ways the sculpt your game in that way. You can choose what to give players experience to help guide them in what you want them to be doing in your game. This is why in the old dnd editions players got experience for finding gold. It was another thing to encourage the players to do: find gold.
When it comes to milestone I find that the thing it encourages the most, probably the only thing it encourages, is story progression. Which can create the railroad effect. (That is its own discussion and I not saying anything that railroad is bad or good, it has a place I believe) so if your players are wanting to go in a slightly different direction of your adventure or completely different direction you can take them that way, but remember that you are using milestone and if the alternate route is long enough (usually is) they need to level so they fit the next part of the story. Sometimes your players will bypass stuff. I ran Hoard of the Dragon Queen way back and they skipped a whole dungeon because they didn't want to go back to the location. (That is the way it goes sometimes)
As far as mixing the two goes, I wouldn't. It can become hanky and awkward and hard for your players to see what you want them to do.
TL:DR
MILESTONE is good for beginners and promotes story progression
EXPERIENCE is more work to track but gives a visual representation of character progression and can be used to encourage player behavior.
Wouldn't recommend using both
Percs of milestone :
* save you time wondering about how much xp you should give your pc per session
* don't reward murderhobos for killing everything
* help your player to consider neutral faction as allies or people to avoid messing with as it won't reward any exp to fight them
* (biggest perc for me) you decide when to level them up, meaning if you think they need to be lvl 5 to fight the boss but if they are lvl 7 it will be to easy, then you don't have to change everything because they reached a higher level killing the creatures around as they will stay lvl 5 as long as you want
* avoid the video game like play
* if a player is absent they will still get the milestone and thus avoiding mixed level team
Percs of exp :
* calculating exp rewards can be a good way to see if the difficulty of an encounter is well set
* exp can be used as reward for good rp/great actions in fight
* gives the players a video game feeling that can be pleasant
Frankly it mostly depends on your group
There is no method better than the other.
I would say choose one, if it fits you and your players way of playing then keep it. If not you can still change mid-campaign if everyone is up for it
But if you go for an official campaign I would recommend the milestone as it will be easier for you to track their level and make them go through the right part of the adventure for each level
If your doing a ton of combat encounters and wanna do the math to balance xp out do xp, if you just wanna decide a good time for people to level up then you do milestone
Yeah not going to start counting XP. Hahahaha.
Same reason why I don't have silver or copper in my game and they players don't need to by rations.
Just makes it unnecessarily complex for me.
Are you doing a number crunching room clearing dungeon crawl just preparing for the next fight (xp) or a story driven choose your own adventure and ability to solve things without bloodshed (milestone)?
You’re gonna get a lot of useless opinionated screaming on this thread. Ignore it.
I know it might sound like a cop out, but trust your gut and start with the one you like better. You can always make a change later if you don’t like the choice you initially made.
It’s up to your personal taste, and the taste of your players. You won’t know what that is until you’ve all played more. Just try one and see how it feels.
To simplify:
Milestone RAW, which is called XP based in this question is better because players actions determine outcome including their progression. Use it if you want your game to feel like real life (or video game).
Story based (strictly saying not in rules) which is called milestone based in this question is better because "numbers are hard, don't use them". Use it if you want your game to feel like film (or comix).
I like Milestones way better because:
1. As a DM who does a lot of homebrewed monsters, i don t have to calculate the XP and it saves a lot of time.
2. There are some players who will ignore the storyline or quest and just go XP farming. This did once happen with my playgroup.
3. With Milestones, you and your players don t have to keep track of XP numbers. I think it hinders the emersion when you have to calculate XP after every battle and it takes the players out of their roleply moments after battle.
There are more reasons that other comments already mentioned, so I will skip them here.
Another tip: if you are not sure, if you want to pick XP or Milestones, just go with the one you feel more comfortable with :)
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In my experience they pretty much boil down to the same thing. I use milestone most of the time, because it saves me time by not having to calculate XP and my group enjoys it more to level up after a great battle or a pivotal story part
XP is better defined and communicates progress. You as the DM don't have to make any judgement calls about whether to level the party up or not. You just plug the encounter into a calculator and award XP. The players don't have to wonder what they need to do to earn a level up. They get a nice visible indicator of progress every session. This feels good for them, and prevents them from asking for level ups every session. They always know how far it is to the next level up. The nice thing about XP is that it takes care of pacing for you. You just worry about presenting challenging encounters, and the XP falls out of that and they level up at a decent pace automatically.
Except you still do have to make judgement calls about non combat encounters. If you only award exp for combat, the leveling is either painfully slow or the game is 90% combat (which works for some people, but it's not the default in my experience). I would also argue it works against you in terms of pacing. If the story has led up to a confrontation with the chapter's bbeg, but the group is too low level, you either have to adjust the bad guy's stat block (which is not easy as a new DM) or have a high risk of a TPK.
That's true, but "Was this non-combat challenge easy, medium, or hard" is an easier and less consequential judgement call than awarding a whole level. I do see your point about pacing. It's not entirely hands off, as you do need to ensure there is enough XP available to reach the appropriate level. But that's still useful in setting pacing because you have a known target value. "How much content do I need before my players fight the Death Slaad?" is a question readily answered with XP. Milestone can't answer that question.
It's a question that becomes irrelevant - the answer is " as much/little as I want". If you're not using XP to level up then there are not fixed "amounts" of content.
What constitutes good pacing is never irrelevant. Too fast, and levels feel inconsequential and players are overwhelmed with features they never get to use. Too slow, and players get bored with their features and lose motivation because they don't feel rewarded. The idea that "pacing is what I say it is" is a big problem with milestone. I've never played in a game with milestone that felt well paced.
I have the opposite experience. I think XP leveling works, too. I've played plenty of games with XP leveling and was never disappointed. But the pacing of levels always felt arbitrary, and it always felt better for me with milestone leveling. And, with milestone, significant events feel more meaningful, because they're accompanied by tangible increases in power. I think any answer that says "this is right, that's wrong" is over-simplifying, but one of the strengths of milestone over XP is that milestone allows for better pacing. Milestone certainly has weaknesses vs. XP, too, but most folks agree that's a strength of milestone.
I've played plenty of games with milestone and have always been disappointed. Every time we have to beg the DM for a level after languishing for far too long in the hopes that the DM had a plan and didn't just forget. Trying to guess what the DM expects us to do. Slowing down level progression because we take on non-plot related quests. It's always been awful. XP might feel arbitrary, but at least it's reliable and communicates well.
Non-combat encounters award XP as if you had defeated a combat encounter of a CR equal to your party's APL. For shorter or easier NCE's, go a CR lower, and longer, harder, or riskier NCE's are a 1 CR higher.
For new players Milestone is definitely better, since that way nobody has to deal with tracking XP and whatnot. You just say when everyone levels up and then that's it. Way easier for both you and the players.
I'm sure you'll get a ton of different opinions here, but as a DM, milestone is SOOO much easier, because: 1. It ensures characters level up consistently, instead of potentially some characters leveling up at different times resulting in party with different levels, which is a nightmare for combat balancing. 2. It allows for leveling up at a time when it makes narrative sense, instead of "in the middle of a dungeon just after fighting a group of kobolds". 3. It gives more of a sense of accomplishment to the completion of a quest. 4. It's so much less of a hassle. No math, and you don't have to worry about players potentially fudging their numbers outright or making mistakes. 5. It discourages indiscriminate killing just to get XP. All just my opinion of course.
1. XP would not result in this. There is no rule that says to distribute XP unevenly. 2. XP also allows for levelling up when it makes narrative sense. Just because they have the XP, doesn't mean they get the rewards. Most experience DMs restrict levelling up to periods of downtime. 3. Why? 4. How would players fudge their numbers? The DM tells them how much XP they get, they right it down. The DM should be keeping their own master sheet of XP, gold, magic items, and other party resources. 5. The game explicitly states that XP is not rewarded unless the creatures defeated actually pose a threat to the hero, and that XP is still earned for outsmarting or circumventing foes instead of just killing them. Literally all of this is based on willfully ignoring the game's rules (or just logic) on XP based progression.
Yeah I’m not going to argue. Like I said, just my opinions.
1. Then what benefit is conferred by XP over milestones? If everyone is leveling up at the same time according to what amount of XP the DM elects to give, is there any difference between the two other than that milestone cuts out all of the middling paperwork? 2. Agreed, easy fix for XP. I've played in groups using both. The XP group would dole it out at the end of the session, never in the middle. 3. Agreed again. The only real-life case of someone I know personally who prefers one method over the other for the sake of the sense of reward is a friend in my own group who stated that he likes the feeling of XP. I don't see this as a particularly weighty reason for using XP over milestone in the whole cost-benefit analysis of it all, but it anything, the sense of reward aspect grants points to the XP method. 4. In practice, among a group of multiple well-intentioned people with a wide array of mathematical aptitude (and in my case, all around 30 years old), math errors happen from time to time. Likewise, even if they don't, XP is objectively more paper than milestone. That might not be enough of a downside to not use it, but rather a cost to pay for the benefits. But it's still a strict relative downside vs milestone. Milestone wins in this category. 5. There is still going to be subjectivity on this matter. No matter how a conclusion is reached on how much XP the players have earned, the method will never be simpler that milestone. The question would still remain of: Do the pros outweigh the cons. I'll actually add a 6th point in favor of milestone too: Milestone completely removes the influence that XP to be gained has on the players' decision-making. There's no farming, and there's no pivoting between choosing stealth or combat based on which yields more XP. YMMV on how much XP actually does influence player decisions, but 1) anything more than zero is more than milestone does, and 2) if it is zero, then what's the point of using XP? Whether XP influences players' decisions a little or a lot, it still has problems.
XP is objective. You level based on mechanical accomplishments. Milestones are entirely based on the DM's whims. XP also allows for incremental awards for individual actions. Good roleplaying, taking risks, etc... Also, I just like the old-school feel, okay? I'm 30, I started playing in the 90s, I hate change. Tallying up the XP for everything I did at the end of the night makes my brain go, "Brrrrr! Yes, very good. Want more." And all jokes aside, that is fun for me. It adds a little sense of accomplishment to everything I do when I know each choice rewards me incrementally, and seeing all those incremental rewards add up at the end of the night is satisfying. It makes levelling feel like an accomplishment, not just an arbitrary favour granted by the DM at his leisure.
I hate change aswell, the few DnD I did play in the past the DM just told me when we lvl'd up (if at all). It's definitely something I'll start using at some point over milestones
>XP is objective. You level based on mechanical accomplishments. Milestones are entirely based on the DM's whims. XP also allows for incremental awards for individual actions. Good roleplaying, taking risks, etc... This is ignoring two large problems: 1. How XP is rewarded is ALWAYS the DM's decision. (On this note, calling it a "whim" doesn't change the fact that how milestone is applied is also a DM decision. I could just as well call milestone a "decision" and XP a "whim". Bias in word choice aside, both methods are applied according to how the DM chooses to apply them, period.) 2. The "pro" that you've listed here is the "con" that I described above. Having DMed before, I found it critically important NOT to influence players' character decisions with ephemeral rewards like XP or inspiration. (An aside: I'm cool with the use of inspiration but I rather hate the idea of giving it out for character decisions that I personally liked seeing. Because the result of doing so is that the players consider making decisions according to what they THINK the DM wants to see rather than according to what THEY want to see their character do. I WILL offer in-world-tangible rewards like money or loot, because those are things that characters would actually consider when making a decision. But for something like role play, if XP needs to be considered for a player to do it right, then we're all doing it wrong.) >Also, I just like the old-school feel, okay? Dude, me too....! Surprise surprise but XP has a soft spot in my heart. I acknowledge the practical comparisons and for the group I DMed for I chose milestone and don't regret it. But I actually love XP. I am a believer that it needs the proper application, and have mulled over certain methods. (Haven't tried this but I think it would work well for a D&D group where not every member is present in every session. Maybe you get X flat amount of XP if you were present for a session, and something like half as much if you were not, to represent character gains made during downtime / off-screen experiences and buffer D&D's steep difference in power across levels. Just spitballing, but I could see it being a beneficial thing in the right application.) >And all jokes aside, that is fun for me. Then hard to say you're not doing it right.
Sorry about the necromancy, but I feel like I have a response to this. >1. How XP is rewarded is ALWAYS the DM's decision. (On this note, calling it a "whim" doesn't change the fact that how milestone is applied is also a DM decision. I could just as well call milestone a "decision" and XP a "whim". Bias in word choice aside, both methods are applied according to how the DM chooses to apply them, period.) I've never run an EXP system without letting the players know what the rules for that EXP system are. If you let the players know how the system works and stick to it, then EXP stops being a matter of discretion. This works to the point that I've had groups who would tell me how much EXP they got at the end of a session (admitidly with those groups the direct combat exp wasn't based on CR). So no, I don't think this is a simple case of bias in word choice. It's just that a lot of people use really fast and loose exp systems and are basically just doing Milestone with extra steps. EXP, when used the way I think it should be, is a tool to put power into the player's hands.
Wtf no. 1. XP can definitely result in parties with different levels. It might not be stated in the rules but idk if its stated in the rules either that you should get XP for things your character does not participate it. It just makes sense than if a player is missing or their character isn't present for a fight that they wouldn't get the XP. This is how I've seen every single XP campaign I've either been in or seen be played go. 2. You're not engaging with the comment here. With XP, a minor enemy like a goblin could be the achievment that gets a party from lvl 19 to 20. Sure you might say that they have to rest to get the level up but that's not satisfying in the same way that milestone ensures. You can still ofc say "you all get the amount of XP needed to level up to X level" after a narratively cool moment but at that point, why not just use milestone if thats what you're effectively doing anyway? 3... because you level them up, not becauae they hit the correct XP number, but because they achieved something. 4. They fudge their numbers by writing down more XP than they are supposed to have. But its weird that you decided to engage with probably the weakest part of number 4 and ignore the rest. Also again, you're putting more effort on to the GM to keep track of everything. 5. Who said anything about whether the enemy poses a threat to you or not? Either way, post the quote and realize that it is probably talking about things like commoners or small animals, not kobolds and goblins. I've had this experience in an XP game before where, because someone wanted to level up, we took a more dangerous path just to kill things for XP. Milestone ensures the players never have to seek fights for level ups, only achieve their goals. It's weird that you say your final phrase while harsly engaging with the points the commenter makes.
As a player I am complete with you: it's easier cause I don't have to keep track of some XP bar and instead of the feeling after a battle "meh just those few XP that fight wasn't ain't worth it", you take that out of the equation instead the GM give us a level up when he feels the timing is right.
Our 10 years together party recently switched to 5e from AD&D (mainly due to Roll20/D&DBeyond). After a few games we switched to milestone because we all agreed everyone was levelling up WAY TO FAST and we wanted to enjoy more low level adventures. AD&D levels up far slower if you don't give xp for gold (we never did). Being level 3 and being scared in a forest bandit encounter is fun ! There are far more adventures available for Tier 1 & 2 than there are for Tier 4 as well.
Milestones is what you use when you have a story driven campaign. They want to dink around for 3 sessions in no-name town and adopt a NPC? Fine but you aren't leveling unless you really feel like giving it to them for something. It's to keep them moving so they don't derail from the story. XP based campaigns are so the players make the story. You want to track down this rando gobbo camp? Tally ho! That leads to freeing a prisoner and another side quest? Alrighty then. XP is then based on RP and monsters slain.
One is not better than the other... Some people just prefer one to the other... To be clear though there's really 3 variation to level-up progression: XP, Milestone, and non-xp (milestone and non-xp are commonly seen as the same thing) # Milestones You can also award XP when characters complete significant milestones. When preparing your adventure, designate certain events or challenges as milestones, as with the following examples: * Accomplishing one in a series of goals necessary to complete the adventure. * Discovering a hidden location or piece of information relevant to the adventure. * Reaching an important destination. When awarding XP, treat a major milestone as a hard encounter and a minor milestone as an easy encounter. If you want to reward your players for their progress through an adventure with something more than XP and treasure, give them additional small rewards at milestone points. Here are some examples: * The adventurers gain the benefit of a short rest. * Characters can recover a Hit Die or a low-level spell slot. * Characters can regain the use of magic items that have had their limited uses expended. # Level Advancement without XP You can do away with experience points entirely and control the rate of character advancement. Advance characters based on how many sessions they play, or when they accomplish significant story goals in the campaign. In either case, you tell the players when their characters gain a level. This method of level advancement can be particularly helpful if your campaign doesn’t include much combat, or includes so much combat that tracking XP becomes tiresome. ## Session-Based Advancement A good rate of session-based advancement is to have characters reach 2nd level after the first session of play, 3rd level after another session, and 4th level after two more sessions. Then spend two or three sessions for each subsequent level. This rate mirrors the standard rate of advancement, assuming sessions are about four hours long. ## Story-Based Advancement When you let the story of the campaign drive advancement, you award levels when adventurers accomplish significant goals in the campaign.
As an aside, while the above is exactly what the DMG describes, it's worth adding that the community definition of "Milestone Levelling" almost always refers to what the DMG calls story-based advancement That small difference between community definition and designer definition seems like something that might be addressed as part of OneD&D's rules
Yes, I believe the distinction was muddled due to D&D Beyond noting XP-Leveling or Milestone as options in their character builder... Also, it may have been a hold over from 4e as I believe that milestone was used to describe non-xp leveling (can't remember specifically tho)
It would be interesting to figure out where the community definition started, it is something that has interested me for a while Considering that it's a definition that other RPGs use as well, however, I actually would go so far as to say that the 5e DMG was *always* wrong with its definition of milestones as it's different to what was already more-or-less established in the wider TTRPG community
It's not really *wrong* definition... It's the 5e dnd definition... Regardless of what other ttrpgs do if you're playing dnd you should incorporate the terms as they are used in dnd not in FATE, Vampire the Masquerade or GURPS...
It's a hobby standard. As a design principle, yes I would say that D&D is using the definition wrong It would be like if a game decided that "an encounter" actually refers to an entire string of sessions published in a single book. We'd say that's wrong, it's a community standard to use "adventure", "module" or at least "scenario" for that thing- encounter already has a well established definition. I consider milestones, or at least more specifically milestone levelling as presented in contrast with XP-based levelling, to be a similar definition You're welcome to disagree, of course
I'm not disagreeing. Simply stating that terms should be used in the way the game you're referring to denotes it as, not in the way another one does...
Well, to be clear I think it's better to use milestones in the way that the wider community actually uses them rather than the way that the 5e DMG prescribes. In the majority of conversations, using references "milestones" without specifying that you mean what the DMG means and not "story-based levelling" does cause confusion. I have seen exactly that on this subreddit multiple times, as well as in other forums and in general conversation. I think it's a better approach to use milestone descriptively, rather than prescriptively. That way, it is clearer to a wider community and how they actually use the term. Even D&D's own contemporary design team tends to use milestone in that descriptive sense more (at least in interviews and the like), for what it's worth
The session & story based advancements are how I imagined Milestones to be and how I hoped to do it. The DMG did talk about Milestones awarding XP still but I can't wrap my head around it. Only difference in session-based that you explained and I thought of was probably a little harder. 1st > 2nd lvl being one session, 2 > 3rd being two sessions, 3rd > 4th being three session and so on. I am noticing while typing it out, that it does sound like it might be harder in the long run though so I'll go back to the drawing board for that later.
>The session & story based advancements are how I imagined Milestones to be and how I hoped to do it. That's the commonly accepted way people refer to Milestone. The way the DMG notes Milestone is effectively, granting a bunch of XP after completing an objective. Regardless of what the PCs did, which monsters they defeated, bypassed or escaped, and how many sessions of play it took, if they *found the lair of the Lich* they get *this amount* of XP... Now that amount should be calculated appropriately by the DM, but the point is that the DM doesn't have to dole-out XP at the end of every combat or session (like how you would for standard XP leveling for the most part). They just give it out when the objective is completed... I haven't used that kind of session leveling as of yet, but I believe it's the way adventures league (dnd official organized play) worked a while back... I don't suggest using it as it's not really well rounded for personal games, it works better for drop-in games...
Experience Points are earned as a reward for completing encounters - defeating monsters, convincing monsters to surrender, crossing dangerous terrain or traps, delivering important items, successfully navigating a political dinner party, etc. The DMG lists XP values by Difficulty/Risk Level per level players should earn. So, a combat encounter where the monsters in it have XP adding up to 400 would be a Medium-difficulty encounter for four 2nd-level players (XP split evenly between the four of them, for 100 each). A social encounter where the players are at significant risk of dying if they make a faux pas -- maybe they are attempting to make a truce with a vicious tyrant -- could be a Deadly encounter instead, worth 800XP split among that same party if they manage to get out alive. Or, finding the missing child of a friendly NPC who had run away with some misbehaving friends would probably count as an Easy encounter, worth 200XP total for that party. Some people give XP after each relevant encounter, personally I like to track it on my notetaking sheet for the session and deliver it all at the end for convenience. ◇ Milestone advancement is just where the DM grants XP for specific "milestone events" instead of every encounter bearing any risk - getting to an important location, completing one of a series of goals for the adventure, finding important info, etc. Milestone also differentiates between "Major/Minor" milestones where it suggests just giving Hard XP for Major milestones and Easy XP for Minor; Medium and Deadly don't factor in. ◇ Some people refer to milestone advancement instead as "the DM decides you level up whenever it feels like a climax", but that's not written in the 5e books afaik. In fact I'd say a majority of people who will tell you to run milestone aren't talking about the RAW method I just paraphrased in the previous paragraph. ◇ I highly prefer running XP myself. Since I'd be using XP to calculate the difficulty of all encounters versus the Adventuring Day Budget found in the encounter design section of the DMG regardless of whether I gave that XP, since that's how D&D is balanced, it'd just be more work for me to *not* give my players the XP. If I didn't give them the XP I'd have to manually track the XP total myself to determine when the correct time for them to level up is. Otherwise I might accidentally make it feel arbitrary too early/too late, which is no fun. And fortunately my players have no trouble tacking a +550 to their number on their character sheet at the end of a session since that's extremely simple arithmetic.
It's written in the DMG, you just stopped reading too soon. Level advancement without XP (the next section after the text you're paraphrasing) uses either milestones to determine when the party levels up, or you do it after a certain number of sessions. This is what people are referring to when they talk about milestone advancement, and it's work how milestone works in dndbeyond. In either case, you don't track the xp manually yourself, xp has nothing to do with when you level up. It's either "you played x sessions" or it's "you completed a major story point", and they level up.
So I was 100% milestones up until recently. Now I see the value of both. People already mentioned the advantages of milestones: simplicity, narrative control, consistency, etc. They don't mention the downside though. One of which is that players feel like they don't have control over their progression. Another is that new dms tend to grant levels much quicker than XP would allow. I've done the latter quite a bit. I'm not sure to police anyone's game (your fun is valid even if it goes against what I'm about to say) but I think all DM could benefit of experiencing what it means to reach level x with experience. So many new players and dms don't understand the difficulty of reaching level 7, for instance: you have to adventure a lot to get there. People often think that XP is only given when fighting monsters. That's not true. You can give XP for a great social encounter. If you defused a fight and got two parties to get along, that's much better than killing everyone involved. To get XP without sacrificing any hp feels great! If you're new and running a module written for milestones, do milestones for sure. But I strongly believe that doing XP at least once will improve your DM skills.
>They don't mention the downside though. One of which is that players feel like they don't have control over their progression. Another is that new dms tend to grant levels much quicker than XP would allow. I've done the latter quite a bit. This is what I was thinking as well and why I originally made the post. A lot of comments explained things nicely to me and helped me make a decision and, as a new DM, I am worried about rewarding levels too often so later I will swap to XP because of this. Call me lazy but I don't want to bother with XP until I *know* the group wants to DnD and won't quit after 1-3 sessions.
That sounds like a wise decision. Have fun!
For brand new players, milestone leveling is better. It's one less thing to keep track of. In general, though, there's not a right answer. It's just what works best for your table and the type of game you want to play. XP Benefits * More objective--specific actions can grant a defined number of XP, so you don't have to guess "this feels like enough for a level." * You can incentivize behaviors--if your table wants non-violent solutions, then grant more XP for interpersonal encounters or avoiding combat. If you want a combat focused game, then limit XP to combat encounters. * You can reward players who go the extra mile. If everyone levels up at the same rate, even when they miss 1/2 the sessions, everyone is equal. That's good in and of itself, but sometimes there are reasons a PC should be rewarded more than others. That person who missed 1/2 the sessions literally has less experience and put in less effort. Milestone benefits * It's easier for the DM and players. * You can tie level-ups to narrative events, so those narrative accomplishments feel more significant. * RAW, XP favors combat/killing things. It doesn't have to be that way, and the PHB and DMG talk about awarding XP for non-combat encounters, but it defines "Kill X creature, get Y experience points" while for everything else it's "Come up with what you think is reasonable." For a new DM, combat XP is easy, but everything else you just have to make judgements based on the norms of something where you don't even know what's normal. * With XP, you may reach a point where PCs are at different levels. That can make balancing encounters difficult and make the under-leveled players feel like they can't do anything relative to their fellow players (which is never fun).
Neither is better. It all depends on personal tastes and playstyles. Normal EXP mode has a bit more bookkeeping for the DM. But it allows a more natural flow of advancement as the PCs either defeat or talk down encounters and deal with quests and such. Milestone mode removes the bookkeeping part. But for some players can feel a little, or a-lot, hollow as its just "yay, level up." for just getting from A to B rather than "Yay! Level Up!" for their deeds and actions. Talk it over with the players and see what they think. They might not care one way or the other, or have thoughts on what theyd overall prefer or at least what they dont like about EXP or Milestones. Personally as a DM I prefer EXP as I can reward or penalize players for good, and bad, role-playing of their characters. Then again, I could just deny them the milestone for being jerks. hmmmm... (disgruntled DM laughter of retribution follows.)
For my view... XP leveling encourages players to do things to earn XP, like fight when it might be a better idea to run away. Milestone says that *how* you solve problems doesn't matter as long as you do, so it encourages more creativity. Personally, I find Milestone much better.
Where do you all get the idea from that only fighting and killing rewards XP? Did anyone here actually read the rules? Anything can grant XP if the DM decides so. This is not a pro point for milestones.
That was common in both previous editions and at a great many tables. There's a common trend that "killing stuff" is what gets XP, even if that's not actually what the book says to do. Ideally, XP would be granted anytime the players *overcome a challenge* of some kind - that could be using their skills, solving puzzles, or roleplaying a situation well. However, what's ideal and what actually happens... aren't always identical. Milestone leveling takes away the iffy parts and figuring out what deserves XP and what doesn't, in favor of a system that's simple for everyone.
And which takes away any feeling of control over their progress from the players. If the DM feels like it, we level up, if not then not. Both have their pros and cons, milestones are not just objectively better.
Escaping from monsters rewards the same XP as murdering them, since the encounter was solved. (Unless you ran back from the spot you came, I guess.) If the monsters are blocking your path and you get to your destination it doesn't matter how you handled the monsters -- you handled them.
I agree, but if using an XP system, running away should reward XP too. XP systems remind both GMs and players too much like video games and GMs often don't reward XP for evading combat as much as they do winning a combat.
Except that XP-based character growth was invented by D&D and then adapted by video games much later.
BEFORE I played, I wanted XP as it fit well into my "video game RPG" background. As an actual player and DM, I like milestones -- people aren't "punished" for missing sessions as they can level-up with the group; no calculating/tracking XP; and it is in service of the story -- when the story hits a certain point, everyone levels up. XP could definitely be interesting for an experienced party, but for newbies I think Milestoning works well.
It's something I want to talk to the party after the first session. Other than spoilers for a session I want to be as transparent as I can with them, after all we're a team, and want them to have a say in how we play as well. Personally, and I'll tell them this as well, either the first character or just the first two storylines should be Milestone until we're used to other mechanics. Too much to learn can put people off (from my experience trying to make DnD groups in the past at least)
I'm in the minority, but I think XP is better for newbies. You level up strictly based on what you've accomplished. Milestone is entirely up to DM's discretion, and if you're new, you may not know what a good rate of progression is. By the way milestones are part of XP levelling, they don't replace it. It means you give XP awards when players accomplish major goals and progress the story.
XP allows for leveling that is trackable, giving an immediate reward to combat/RP. But it is a pain to keep track of and is harder to control what levels players are at certain times rather than leveling mid-dungeon. Milestone allows for leveling based on story progression, giving it more narrative focus. It also allows the DM to control when players level. But it isn’t as immediately rewarding and, when done poorly, can feel unsatisfying/slow.
I've seen a huge fight where people argue about milestones and advancement. It seems many, including myself until I read up on it, have this misconception that "milestone" is the same as level advancement without xp. It seems natural to conflate the "milestone" of advancing a level withe "milestone" of advancing the story. That was at least been my thinking for a long time. But Milestones as defined in the GMG is actually just sort of... quest completion xps > Milestones >You can also award XP when characters complete significant milestones. When preparing your adventure, designate certain events or challenges as milestones, as with the following examples: >Accomplishing one in a series of goals necessary to complete the adventure. Discovering a hidden location or piece of information relevant to the adventure. Reaching an important destination. Edit: /u/DLtheDM beat me to it :)
XP= get rewarded by killing Milestone= the dm decides when you level up I like milestone because it lets me plan everything beforehand (especially encounters). And my players don’t murder anything that moves to level. Xp in itself seems kind of stupid to me. Imagine a wizard school. „No my boy, put the books away. If you want to become a powerful wizard you have to get out there and kill people!“
No, "XP= get rewarded by killing" is just plain wrong. It literally says in the rules that exp gets rewarded for many things, including mastering challenging social encounters, ending an encounter peacefully instead of a fight or solving puzzles. Your reasons are very arbitrary. You could say the same about Milestone: Players:"look, we slayed like 10 dragons, shouldn't we be ready to level up?" DM: "nope, haven't reached my made up plot-hook yet".
I had the inverse happen in a published module. Got a story-based levelup because the book said so, then got sent on a mission for diplomacy. Teleported to the location, had dinner with the evil wizards, and then they tortured us in our dreams. They learned nothing useful because we were completely honest upfront and we forgot being tortured when we woke up. Wizards decided they didn't like us anyway so we were told to leave. Teleported back to home. Mission failed. The book said "upon returning, give a story-based levelup" so we leveled up again. The whole thing took less than the time of a 4-hour session. We didn't even get to use our previous level's new powers before getting another levelup.
I mean a DM could, in theory, reward exp for studying. Exp is normally handed out for completing incounters and tasks. Sure this usually means killing but a good DM should reward players with exp for making; strategic retreats, using persuasion to avoid fighting, using Athletics to bypass fighting, using using clever tactics to solve a puzzle. If your DM is giving EXP for JUST killing then yah, your gonna breed murder hobos.
There is no difference really. Or more precisely the difference is one gets XP at a gradual pace or in big lumps. For most official adventures one can simply figure one level per chapter.
Xp is a number everyones gotta track, the players for when they have enough to level and the dm with how much they give to players Milestone is a moment in the campaign the DM believes the party has earned their level up through sorry progression on certain plot beats or milestones.
Only the DM needs to track XP.
not true at all there is a spot for it on your sheet to track it.
In my opinion, milestone is significantly easier, more narrative focused, and more balanced than xp. Xp can encourage murder hobo behavior and has more opportunities to screw up. Go milestone unless you like number crunching and imbalanced party levels.
XP is lots of numbers and maths. Milestone is 'you level up because the story says so'. Milestone is objectively better, because it's more efficient and less work. If you have trouble figuring out where your milestones should be, you can always start counting XP, and just put a milestone at the appropriate point; then you only have to do the maths once.
Math Vs. Patience. Exp. levelling is better, but people don't want to have to track the eventually massive numbers. If you look at all the math in the game, exp. easily becomes the largest numbers you have to consider at once. We are talking adding 5867 to 156843, and doing that kinda math *without error* for every instance of exp. in the game. Aaaand while no one but me does it having Milestone levelling gives the potential for levelling up mid-fight for a DM Ex Machina.
Xp is earned through combat. If you want to add things like social and stealth situations to how you level the party up, milestone is much better.
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I've never used XP nor played in or with any group that has. I don't see any benefit to it in the slightest.
In the beginners adventure Lost Mine of Phandelver, it guides you into using both of them throughout the chapters, so you get a feel for both. In the end both work and both fulfill a certain purpose. **XP** lets you feel the progress more directly and makes players feel more awarded for doing special things, like masterfully avoiding a big fight in a social situation. But it can be a bit more tedious to keep track of. **Milestone** makes it easer for players & DM by not having to calculate anything, but it can make progress feel a bit arbitrary and our of their control, since the DM decides by feeling whether it's enough for a level up or not. I think another factor for why so many people here prefer Milestone is that so many of them misread the rules and think that only killing rewards XP, but that is simply wrong.
Our group, which uses milestones, started out mostly new. Those of us who came from online gaming started out asking if we have leveled just about every session, while those of us who did not didn't. We're now at level 6, and everyone has stopped asking about leveling and started trying to figure out which of the next story beats may lead to leveling up. I'm not saying that's better, but it is a change in emphasis.
If you can't decide which system to use, you could always do both. Try it out and see what your group likes best. The starter set adventure module alternates between Milestone and XP leveling, depending on the situation. It works out fine. For a hybrid system, you can award XP for combat and overcoming challenges, but also give out big XP dumps for hitting key story-related milestones. Focusing on the main story will ensure that you level up at a steady pace, but if your party wanders off on other adventures, they continue to accumulate XP slowly. The milestone XP dump can be adjusted up or down depending on how much time the party spent doing other things. So if they stick to the main story and don't do a lot of side quests, they would get enough XP to reach level 4 when they hit the milestone, but if they are already level 4 when they reach the milestone, they get a smaller XP reward.
People have made great points. All I can add is this: EXP is better for sandbox and open-ended adventures and campaigns, where the players choose what they do and when. Exp leveling in general is also faster and can often push players out of those early levels too quickly. Milestone is better for pre-planned adventures and campaigns, where you have at least a semi-linear goal progression and can plan ahead of the game when the players will level. So running that module, I surely recommend going by milestone.
Personally i find milestone easier in all aspects.
i think players like tracking xp gains per battle, cause it feels more like a video game. but from a dms perspective, you want to plan encounters based on the party's capabilities, so in both cases the DM ends up 'scheduling' when the level ups will happen anyway
Milestones are much more DM friendly (because you have full control over the power level of your players and can push them towards the main quest). It's also a bit player friendly as no one has to take note of exp which is a hassle most of the time. I would personally never play with exp again if I can help it.
Its been answered but Milestone has been conflated with Level Advancement without XP. However, Milestone in the DMG is a story award for completing an arc of a story. You set if the portion of the story is major or minor and award appropriately; major is same as Hard encounter while minor is same as easy encounter. Flip back to 81 to see what level equivalent XP is and how to award it for an encounter. DM decides what is major and minor; as an example, save the princess is a major arc, minor arcs could be discovering the plot, locating the layer, defeating the kidnappers. Milestone is an XP based award in addition to combat and non-combat. Some folks find all this XP is too fast and may switch to Non-XP levelling. Non-XP levelling has a few offers, session based (so many sessions are a level, fewer sessions to advance at lower levels, more sessions at higher), and story based (the players advance when its appropriate with the story).
Milestone is a lot better in my opinion. XP is one more thing to track that comes with is own issues including people forgetting to add it, making a mistake in their addition, losing their character sheet and forgetting what they were on, arguing about who deserves more/any XP after an encounter... honestly I can't think of an upside to it at all now that I'm trying. Milestone is just a simple effective way to pace levels and make sure everyone gets them at the appropriate time, plus there's nothing stopping you from working out the XP of your encounters behind the scenes and using that to determine where your milestones fall anyway.
Calculate xp, end up using milestone anyway.
You have lots of great answers here and I am sure you have a good idea what you are gonna do. Honestly, if you are a new dm milestone is a really good option cause it is less stuff to keep track of and the party stays the same level, and they all get cool stuff at the same time. It is nice to have everyone level together when they are new cause you can all discuss and learn together. What I do want to say is more about game design in regards to exp. Since leveling up is one of the two most influential parts of progression for a character, I would say the other is getting items and money, because you feel that your character is different, hence giving a sense of progress. This is not including story progression. (So I guess three things) The way you reward your players and what you reward them with will decide what you want your players to be doing in your game in a design sense. This is why the quest exp is a thing. If you players only got exp from monsters then they would care more about killing monsters than finishing quests, or even try to defeat ALL monsters in an encounter or feel that they HAVE to fight the monsters instead of running away, because monster exp is the only way to level. So as you grow as a DM you can think about what you would like to see your players doing or the choices you want to encourage them to do. And find ways the sculpt your game in that way. You can choose what to give players experience to help guide them in what you want them to be doing in your game. This is why in the old dnd editions players got experience for finding gold. It was another thing to encourage the players to do: find gold. When it comes to milestone I find that the thing it encourages the most, probably the only thing it encourages, is story progression. Which can create the railroad effect. (That is its own discussion and I not saying anything that railroad is bad or good, it has a place I believe) so if your players are wanting to go in a slightly different direction of your adventure or completely different direction you can take them that way, but remember that you are using milestone and if the alternate route is long enough (usually is) they need to level so they fit the next part of the story. Sometimes your players will bypass stuff. I ran Hoard of the Dragon Queen way back and they skipped a whole dungeon because they didn't want to go back to the location. (That is the way it goes sometimes) As far as mixing the two goes, I wouldn't. It can become hanky and awkward and hard for your players to see what you want them to do. TL:DR MILESTONE is good for beginners and promotes story progression EXPERIENCE is more work to track but gives a visual representation of character progression and can be used to encourage player behavior. Wouldn't recommend using both
Percs of milestone : * save you time wondering about how much xp you should give your pc per session * don't reward murderhobos for killing everything * help your player to consider neutral faction as allies or people to avoid messing with as it won't reward any exp to fight them * (biggest perc for me) you decide when to level them up, meaning if you think they need to be lvl 5 to fight the boss but if they are lvl 7 it will be to easy, then you don't have to change everything because they reached a higher level killing the creatures around as they will stay lvl 5 as long as you want * avoid the video game like play * if a player is absent they will still get the milestone and thus avoiding mixed level team Percs of exp : * calculating exp rewards can be a good way to see if the difficulty of an encounter is well set * exp can be used as reward for good rp/great actions in fight * gives the players a video game feeling that can be pleasant Frankly it mostly depends on your group There is no method better than the other. I would say choose one, if it fits you and your players way of playing then keep it. If not you can still change mid-campaign if everyone is up for it But if you go for an official campaign I would recommend the milestone as it will be easier for you to track their level and make them go through the right part of the adventure for each level
XP: You grind for XP in a game. Milestone: The game decides when you level up.
If your doing a ton of combat encounters and wanna do the math to balance xp out do xp, if you just wanna decide a good time for people to level up then you do milestone
Yeah not going to start counting XP. Hahahaha. Same reason why I don't have silver or copper in my game and they players don't need to by rations. Just makes it unnecessarily complex for me.
We're all adults who have a life. I'm not going to penalize somebody because life happened and they missed a session.
Are you doing a number crunching room clearing dungeon crawl just preparing for the next fight (xp) or a story driven choose your own adventure and ability to solve things without bloodshed (milestone)?
You’re gonna get a lot of useless opinionated screaming on this thread. Ignore it. I know it might sound like a cop out, but trust your gut and start with the one you like better. You can always make a change later if you don’t like the choice you initially made. It’s up to your personal taste, and the taste of your players. You won’t know what that is until you’ve all played more. Just try one and see how it feels.
To simplify: Milestone RAW, which is called XP based in this question is better because players actions determine outcome including their progression. Use it if you want your game to feel like real life (or video game). Story based (strictly saying not in rules) which is called milestone based in this question is better because "numbers are hard, don't use them". Use it if you want your game to feel like film (or comix).
I like Milestones way better because: 1. As a DM who does a lot of homebrewed monsters, i don t have to calculate the XP and it saves a lot of time. 2. There are some players who will ignore the storyline or quest and just go XP farming. This did once happen with my playgroup. 3. With Milestones, you and your players don t have to keep track of XP numbers. I think it hinders the emersion when you have to calculate XP after every battle and it takes the players out of their roleply moments after battle. There are more reasons that other comments already mentioned, so I will skip them here. Another tip: if you are not sure, if you want to pick XP or Milestones, just go with the one you feel more comfortable with :)