Character Advancement
There are three pillars to Dungeons and Dragons gameplay: Exploration, Social interaction, and Combat. These rules offer XP rewards for all three, as well as a guide for DMs on how many challenges to give the players as they level up.
Challenges
Instead of awarding XP based on the monster's CR, it is awarded whenever the player overcomes certain challenges. These will include skill checks, but the key word is challenge. Avoid giving XP rewards for easier skill checks. These challenges are broken down into one of two options:
Minor Challenge
The characters accomplish a small feat relevant to the adventure. This can include overcoming a challenge without large consequences, or after learning something new. For example, crafting a magic item, reaching a previously undiscovered location, overcoming an easy/medium combat encounter, trap, or hazard.
Major Challenge
The characters accomplish a feat with great consequence to the campaign arc, such as reaching an important destination, unearthing a hidden clue important to their quest, or overcoming a difficult obstacle, such as a tense negotiation with a baron, a difficult trap blocking their path in a dungeon, or a hard/deadly combat encounter.
Advancement
Whenever a player overcomes one of these challenges, award XP based on the Minor and Major columns in the table below. The Count columns give Dungeon Masters a number for how many of each challenge the player's will need to level up. For example, you need 7 minor and 4 major challenges to reach level 2.
In campaign terms the DM can say the party need to overcome 4 major plot points before moving onto level 2. These might be along the lines of finding a quest to slay the goblins attacking the village (1), using the Survival skill to find the goblin lair (2), defeating the goblins (3), and finding a clue that points to the next stage of their adventure (4). All the time, minor achievements can be rewarded with XP as well!
Overcoming CR
When using the rules presented here, it is important for DMs to divorce a monster's XP from the XP awarded for overcoming a challenge. The total XP gained from fighting a monster as it is written on page 82 of the DMG can be ignored, unless you want to use it to gauge the challenge of a combat encounter. Instead, think of a combat encounter in terms of its influence over the campaign in general. Combat should always serve a purpose in the grand scheme of things; the question to ask yourselves is are its consequences Minor or Major?
Character Advancement
| Tier | Level | Experience Points | Minor | Count | Major | Count |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 0 | 20 | 7 | 40 | 4 | |
| Local | 2 | 300 | 45 | 6 | 90 | 4 |
| Heroes | 3 | 900 | 80 | 12 | 160 | 5 |
| 4 | 2,700 | 120 | 20 | 240 | 6 | |
| -------------- | 5 | 6,500 | 250 | 18 | 500 | 6 |
| 6 | 14,000 | 280 | 18 | 560 | 7 | |
| Heroes of | 7 | 23,000 | 365 | 16 | 730 | 7 |
| the Realm | 8 | 34,000 | 440 | 18 | 880 | 7 |
| 9 | 48,000 | 535 | 18 | 1070 | 6 | |
| 10 | 64,000 | 655 | 18 | 1310 | 7 | |
| -------------- | 11 | 85,000 | 750 | 10 | 1500 | 5 |
| 12 | 100,000 | 835 | 12 | 1670 | 6 | |
| Masters of | 13 | 120,000 | 1000 | 10 | 2000 | 5 |
| the Realm | 14 | 140,000 | 1040 | 12 | 2080 | 6 |
| 15 | 165,000 | 1250 | 12 | 2500 | 6 | |
| 16 | 195,000 | 1365 | 12 | 2730 | 5 | |
| -------------- | 17 | 225,000 | 1820 | 10 | 3640 | 6 |
| Masters of | 18 | 265,000 | 2000 | 10 | 4000 | 5 |
| the World | 19 | 305,000 | 2085 | 12 | 4170 | 6 |
| 20 | 355,000 | n/a | n/a | n/a | n/a |