Troll Lord Games

Lurkers thread and serle's comment about XP awarded to a thief got me thinking about what I do in my game with regard to failure.

I award XPs for some failed attempts. For instance, a thief attempts to disarm a trap and it blows up and he gets damage and a singed beard. I award XP for the attempt, not a lot but.
I did this in my ftf game but not in my online game as I recall.

Anyway, do you award XP for failures in your game?

Thanks.

Rhuvein wrote: Anyway, do you award XP for failures in your game?

Thanks.

No. Failure is its own reward. Seriously though, I just don't cotton to the idea of PC's failing their way to higher level; even if it could happen.

Rhuvein wrote:Anyway, do you award XP for failures in your game?

Thanks.

BITD I used to award 1 XP for failing this-n-that. Currently I'll award 25 XP on-the-spot for a combat fumble since it usually ends up quite entertaining for all involved.

I wouldn't say I award XP or reward "failure". If I'm giving XP for things besides monsters and loot then usually I'm giving it out for story reasons or for learning things about the world. So, I might give XP for the entire activity, clearing a room, surviving the trapped treasure room, etc. So, maybe they triggered a trap, they don't explicitly get experience for triggering it or even for attempting to disarm it, but they might get XP for the situation and getting past it, even if the trap was triggered. A comparison might be "do you give experience for missed attacks in melee?". Well, if they eventually kill the creature, sure. "Well then you're rewarding failure right?". No the thing is that the XP comes from the bigger picture stuff, not every hit or miss or trap attempt is what I'm basing the awarding of XP on. It's bigger picture. Did they kill or route the creature? Did they survive the room/corridor or whatever? I just don't have the time or desire to divy out XP on such a minute scale. I'm sure some love doing it, but I just don't find it, heh, rewarding. To use a pun.

Arduin wrote:

Rhuvein wrote: Anyway, do you award XP for failures in your game?

Thanks.

No. Failure is its own reward. Seriously though, I just don't cotton to the idea of PC's failing their way to higher level; even if it could happen.

Even in failure, do we not learn?

R-

Never never ever. I do not get that granular with XP awards. I give it out for monsters defeated, treasure acquired, and for completion of adventures/missions. I am not about to start giving XPs to individual PCs for every little thing they do (or, in the case of this thread, fail to do).

Rigon wrote:

Arduin wrote:

Rhuvein wrote: Anyway, do you award XP for failures in your game?

Thanks.

No. Failure is its own reward. Seriously though, I just don't cotton to the idea of PC's failing their way to higher level; even if it could happen.

Even in failure, do we not learn?

R-

Even in reading, don't you continue until the END of a sentence?

Arduin wrote:

Rigon wrote:

Arduin wrote:

Rhuvein wrote: Anyway, do you award XP for failures in your game?

Thanks.

No. Failure is its own reward. Seriously though, I just don't cotton to the idea of PC's failing their way to higher level; even if it could happen.

Even in failure, do we not learn?

R-

Even in reading, don't you continue until the END of a sentence?

I did. "No." The period indicates that it is the end of a sentence (fragment actually).

R-

Rigon wrote:

Arduin wrote:

Rigon wrote:

Arduin wrote:

Rhuvein wrote: Anyway, do you award XP for failures in your game?

Thanks.

No. Failure is its own reward. Seriously though, I just don't cotton to the idea of PC's failing their way to higher level; even if it could happen.

Even in failure, do we not learn?

R-

Even in reading, don't you continue until the END of a sentence?

I did. "No." The period indicates that it is the end of a sentence (fragment actually).

R-

So, you didn't read past the first word in the paragraph? Brilliant! I DO explain if one cares to read further than that.

Arduin wrote:

Rigon wrote:

Arduin wrote:

Rigon wrote:

Arduin wrote:

Rhuvein wrote: Anyway, do you award XP for failures in your game?

Thanks.

No. Failure is its own reward. Seriously though, I just don't cotton to the idea of PC's failing their way to higher level; even if it could happen.

Even in failure, do we not learn?

R-

Even in reading, don't you continue until the END of a sentence?

I did. "No." The period indicates that it is the end of a sentence (fragment actually).

R-

So, you didn't read past the first word in the paragraph? Brilliant! I DO explain if one cares to read further than that.

I did read to the end. I choose to redefine the meanings of the words you used.

R-

I don't give XP these days, but when I did, if you encountered something like a monster and had to flee from it, you were awarded 1/100th the normal award, or 1 XP, whichever was higher. There were caveats, of course, so that you could not be Brave Sir Robin and get to level 10 by fleeing, but the engagement and loss was still important.

For non-monster-y things, usually failure has its own rewards... which are RP opportunities that contribute to exploitation events, like the thief who loses two fingers and his thumb. Rolling with the loss earns more XP overall than simply giving one-offs for having failed a single time.

I have never awarded XP for failed anything. I am not against such a practice but I never conceived of it. What I have done is award bonus XP for certain things that players have done. Things like keeping detailed adventure records, general good book keeping, and decent map making. Obviously this is the player doing to and not the character but I do award them for these good deeds.

I'd argue for exp even for a failure (assuming the player survives). Like Rigon said, you learn from your failures too.

Real life example for me, I failed SL JM school -3 seconds too slow to meat the standard and I missed major-minor error - I had the opportunity to go back and retry the school a year later, and I passed easily. The experience of failing at it set me up for success on the second try. Plus I'd argue I was a better JM overall because I failed the first time. I knew my faults/weaknesses, knew how to work thorough them and was more confident for passing despite a no joy first go around.

Now after saying that, I will agree that Serleran's 'Brave Sir Robin' example fits. You can't run away and avoid things and still make rank. Furthermore, Mbeacom's 'not diving out exp on a minute scale' is spot on.

Wow, I've talked myself squarely onto the middle of the fence ... I failed at defending my point of failing getting a player exp, but I gained exp so did I fail ...

Depends on what they are trying to do. If I think they could have learned something I'll award it. Like if they run to live and fight another day, thats an important thing to learn. So I will award some XP for realizing the importance of retreating.

Success is built on the back of failure, learning is learning, only giving experience to the "lucky" seems like double punishment... but I rarely get that refined in exp

This is an interesting thread. As a behaviorist, learning is the corner stone of the psychological theory to which i subscribe. I find it interesting because learning behaviors come from a combination of successes and failures. Personally, I think we humans learn more from failures than from success. If you watch some of skinner's experiiments, the pigeons he worked with learned that performance of a behavior resulted in a reward, but the real *learning* took place as the pigeons failed and guessed thru trial and error to determine the exact behavior they needed to complete to earn another reward.

Then again, rpg's aren't psychological experiments, and xp doesnt reflect learning alone, but a wider range of personal development.