I would say "Gold tithed to a character's guild or other professional society" earns XP. Even better, break up the benefits of the next level, and make those individual benefits available as training services at the guild. Next level is, say 5000XP, next level is +1 to hit, +1d6 HP, and +1 weapon specialization. So each of those characteristic advances cost 1666 GP to purchase. Each requires a third of the whole level training time dedicated to training to achieve.
I am increasingly admiring a game design philosophy that separates combat effectiveness into its own category of progression. I daresay that the likes of traveller or runequest might have more to teach us about character skills and progression than previously expected.
But it still feels at odds with D&D foundationally. I can't tell if that is a lingering bias or a legitimate concern.
It is an exciting time to be surrounded by so many who are willing to hammer away at default expectations so honestly to test their merit.
Levels broken up into chunks of "advancement" is how Warhammer Fantasy RPG does it, but this would be using GP instead of XP to purchase them and reify their achievement into the game world by requiring the use of training time.
The overarching question to be answered is if these types of changes encourage more interaction with the factions, and if that interaction also results in more player driven conflict.
What I'm envisioning here is to wrap up each type of character into the faction that is his professional guild. Mayhap he does not always see eye to eye with his guild maesters on matters of policy. But burning those bridges means loss of access to advancement training. These guilds might then drive characters into conflicts that otherwise conflict averse players would avoid. Rather like the subfaction rivalries in World of Darkness style games.
The primary issue in view is to encourage player driven conflict. I am not sure if that actually accomplishes that. Just handing money to factions might not actually be a big change from the current modality of play. Unless you mean giving funds to specific sects inside a faction to push one side over another. Maybe that results in player driven conflicts.
Not by itself no, but if we assume each of these guild houses, the locals, are local power players in the homebase town and they have goals which are likely not entirely reconcilable, then we get something.
I would say "Gold tithed to a character's guild or other professional society" earns XP. Even better, break up the benefits of the next level, and make those individual benefits available as training services at the guild. Next level is, say 5000XP, next level is +1 to hit, +1d6 HP, and +1 weapon specialization. So each of those characteristic advances cost 1666 GP to purchase. Each requires a third of the whole level training time dedicated to training to achieve.
I am increasingly admiring a game design philosophy that separates combat effectiveness into its own category of progression. I daresay that the likes of traveller or runequest might have more to teach us about character skills and progression than previously expected.
But it still feels at odds with D&D foundationally. I can't tell if that is a lingering bias or a legitimate concern.
It is an exciting time to be surrounded by so many who are willing to hammer away at default expectations so honestly to test their merit.
Levels broken up into chunks of "advancement" is how Warhammer Fantasy RPG does it, but this would be using GP instead of XP to purchase them and reify their achievement into the game world by requiring the use of training time.
https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/203666/how-does-career-advancement-work-with-xp
The overarching question to be answered is if these types of changes encourage more interaction with the factions, and if that interaction also results in more player driven conflict.
What I'm envisioning here is to wrap up each type of character into the faction that is his professional guild. Mayhap he does not always see eye to eye with his guild maesters on matters of policy. But burning those bridges means loss of access to advancement training. These guilds might then drive characters into conflicts that otherwise conflict averse players would avoid. Rather like the subfaction rivalries in World of Darkness style games.
The primary issue in view is to encourage player driven conflict. I am not sure if that actually accomplishes that. Just handing money to factions might not actually be a big change from the current modality of play. Unless you mean giving funds to specific sects inside a faction to push one side over another. Maybe that results in player driven conflicts.
Not by itself no, but if we assume each of these guild houses, the locals, are local power players in the homebase town and they have goals which are likely not entirely reconcilable, then we get something.