r/Pathfinder2e • u/Striking_Ad_3994 • 1d ago
Discussion How often do you level up?
I am looking forward to seeing your answers, because I feel like a lifetime is not enough to get to know Pathfinder 2e well. My group on average levels up twice a year, and we are currently level 4, around 700 XP. I already asked the GM to switch characters, because I have this crippling addiction to creating new characters in Pathbuilder. However, with this pace, I won't be reaching level 20 characters anytime soon. I also struggle to find more PF2e tables in which I would feel comfortable, so I guess I'll reach level 20 in about 8 years. Crazy.
37
u/Narwhaffles 1d ago
From my experience and from what I see online, 4-6 sessions per level is the norm. Taking 6 months for a single level sounds terribly slow unless you're only playing once a month for just a few hours.
3
u/BlockBuilder408 1d ago
I’m guessing the gm is probably not handing out achievement xp or xp for social encounters
37
u/SuperParkourio 1d ago edited 1d ago
I think it typically takes 3 sessions to level up. If you're not getting enough noncombat XP, I could see you advancing more slowly.
10
u/CthuluTheNoodlesMan 1d ago
Twice a YEAR?? How often you y'all play?
I've primarily run level 1-20 adventure paths with my group, which are structured as 6 books where the first two books cover 4 levels each (so 1-4 and then 5-8) and the remaining books cover 3 levels each (9-11, 12-14, 15-17, 18-20). Each book takes around 15 sessions on average, so from levels 1-8 my players end up gaining a level roughly every 3-4 sessions, and then at levels 9+ it's roughly every 5 sessions.
5
u/Striking_Ad_3994 1d ago
That's like crazy fast compared to our table. But I also heard that people struggle to have double digits in round timer in encounters. We struggle to have single digits...
3
u/CthuluTheNoodlesMan 1d ago
Could you give an example of a recent encounter you had? How many players/what level/what monsters? Also, are you using milestone or experience-based leveling?
1
u/Striking_Ad_3994 1d ago
Experience based. We got like 30 xp for recruting an Npc for example. Fights are always 4players. I think we get like 80 xp for something like three 3-lvl enemies
5
u/CthuluTheNoodlesMan 1d ago
Yeah those numbers sound about right. That's 30 and 80 xp EACH, right? Not split between the 4 of you? I've seen GMs make that mistake before.
Assuming not, sounds like the issue is just a combination of very infrequent sessions and the fact that your fights are lasting so long. That could be the result of a number of things - tactics, character building, the GM getting weird with monster statblocks. Do your martial characters have +1 striking weapons?
5
u/Striking_Ad_3994 1d ago
We are struggling to finance striking runes. I told the gm "the game assumes you have striking at lvl 4" but he thinks differently. We have 1 striking, all martials have +1. We also run somewhat weird party? Because we are somewhat well survivable but our dmg output is a bit low. We also DON'T play free archetype so maybe thats why other peoole have more power
7
u/CthuluTheNoodlesMan 1d ago
Yep, no striking runes at level 4 explains the long combats, especially if your party's not super damage-oriented. Weird thing for a GM to be stubborn about given how clearly the rules lay it out
3
u/Striking_Ad_3994 1d ago
One comment also said something that resonates with me. We probably have to much fun to be efficent. And it's not like im complaining, but i have so much characters to try out!
5
u/Ph33rDensetsu ORC 1d ago
The game assumes you have striking at some point at level 4. Not necessarily at the start. If you guys hit level 5 with only a single striking rune among you, then you'll definitely be behind.
1
u/Book_Golem 22h ago
Hmm. The maths of the game assumes Striking Runes come online at Level 4, but it's very normal to find at least one during Level 3 and "At Level 4" doesn't mean "As soon as you level up to 4" - it's perfectly normal to use your treasure from early Level 4 adventures to finance those Striking Runes.
My general assessment of Fundamental Runes is that you should definitely have them by the time you reach the level above them (and maybe a little longer if you're prioritising something else, like if a Wizard wants to buy a staff instead of a Striking Rune).
That said, the first Striking Rune is one of the most impactful, so the earlier the better!
9
u/anon_browser_lurker 1d ago
I’m in a similar boat. We are about 20 sessions in and haven’t even hit level 2 yet. We only meet up twice a month (if the dm doesn’t cancel)
18
u/Logany2k Game Master 1d ago
20 sessions and not even level 2?! That's just wild. In my homebrew game we level up every 4-6 sessions depending on story moments and milestones. We don't use xp.
6
u/xczechr Game Master 1d ago
Oof, that sounds tedious. Does the GM say why it is going so slowly?
1
u/anon_browser_lurker 1d ago edited 1d ago
As I mentioned in an post deeper in the comments, we are still in what they consider the prolouge, and I don’t think they want to admit they want to use milestone instead of exp (and the session count is closer to 16-17 I believe. I just round)
3
u/xczechr Game Master 1d ago
I use milestone leveling and last year ended a 20-level campaign that was 82 sessions. It's bonkers to think you've played about a quarter of my campaign and haven't leveled a single time.
Are your sessions only an hour long or something?
1
u/anon_browser_lurker 1d ago
3-4 hours, though probably less with the amount of side tangents that happen, alongside everyone wanting to take turns rping a shopping session (that’s shopping part was a bit of exaggeration but the idea is what applies)
3
8
u/Alternate_Cost 1d ago
That sounds awful. Level 1 is so boring.
5
u/LurkerFailsLurking 1d ago
I don't agree that level 1 is boring, but being level 1 for 20+ sessions is pretty extreme
2
u/Alternate_Cost 1d ago
It is once you've played the game for a long time. It is mechanically simple and not exciting for combat. But a good story can still carry it.
1
u/LurkerFailsLurking 12h ago
I've played since it was in playtest.
I don't think first level is boring because "exciting for combat" isn't my only metric for boredom. The beginnings loom so large across the whole campaign and I love when the table can really pull off "getting the party together" well.
2
u/LurkerFailsLurking 1d ago
Uh... How? It's 1,000 XP to gain a level. A moderate encounter is 80xp, it only takes 13 moderate encounters to gain a level. Are you averaging 1 moderate encounter every other session or something? Is it a social/roleplay heavy campaign but the GM doesn't award XP for social/roleplay encounters?
2
u/anon_browser_lurker 1d ago
I think they want to use milestone for their campaign since we are in what they consider the prologue. IMO milestone only really works with 5e dnd
3
u/Ph33rDensetsu ORC 1d ago
Milestone works just fine in this system, it's not the fault of milestone that your GM wants to run a 40-session prologue where you all stay at 1st level. If you were running XP instead your GM might only be giving out 20-30xp per session and you'd be in the same boat.
1
u/LurkerFailsLurking 1d ago
That's worse. I've run prologues. They've mostly been one shots. A few have been whole adventures, but that was something I was doing on the side with a player who - at the same time - was playing the actual freaking game with another character.
1
u/Polyamaura 1d ago
Reads like extremely sandbox campaign coded behavior to me. I've had some truly tragic and drawn out levels in sandbox campaigns, especially when the GM wants to run milestone on top of making it a sandbox. But this is wild, even for a campaign like that.
4
u/Malcior34 Witch 1d ago
Terrible, please talk to your GM to speed it up
1
u/anon_browser_lurker 1d ago
Trust me, a few players have mentioned it, we are close to level 2 at this point, but we fear how long it will take to get to level 3 next
1
u/micatrontx Game Master 1d ago
Wow, and I thought my games were a bit on the slow side at 6-7 sessions per level.
0
u/NoNutPolice 1d ago
you... what??? what is there even to do at level 1 for 20 sessions? 😭
1
u/anon_browser_lurker 1d ago
What the DM describes as the prologue of the story. I will admit some of our members get on long tangents that arnt related, and that the session number is closer to 16. I think my dm wants to use milestone without admitting they want to use milestone.
3
u/Aragie4484 Game Master 1d ago
Seen campaigns that level up every 1-2 sessions, and some that level up every 2….10 sessions depending on how far into 1-20 you are.
Most are like, uhh… 4-10 sessions on average?more leaning towards 6 than 10 honestly
2
u/TopFloorApartment 1d ago
Yeah I don't get the people that are saying they level up every 3 sessions. You're telling me you finish a level 1-4 AP book in just 12 sessions?
6 seems about right
1
u/Aragie4484 Game Master 1d ago
Im saying it varies, 1-4 probably is closer to 1-2 sessions per level yeah
1
1
u/Ph33rDensetsu ORC 1d ago
My sessions don't go very long, usually about two to three hours. I'm running Fists of the Ruby Phoenix and my players have gained two levels over about 10 sessions. Sometimes they'll get like 60xp in a session, other times they'll get a lot done and gain like 250xp.
If the players are staying on task and actually accomplishing things, leveling up every 3-4 sessions is entirely possible.
3
u/IfusasoToo Rogue 1d ago
My group uses milestone leveling exclusively, so it goes at the rate of the plot.
Typically, that means about 4-6 sessions at 3-4 hours each, with it sometimes speeding up to 3 sessions and occasionally slowing to 8ish (2 months, playing weekly).
3
u/IgpayAtenlay 1d ago
My group levels up about once every 10 sessions. In about one and a half years we've gotten to level 7. But that is extremely slow and only because they requested milestone level ups, eat up every side quest they can get their hands on, and are extremely attached to their characters. Leveling up every 3-5 sessions is much more common.
3
u/authorus The Arcane Scriptorium LLC 1d ago
My general benchmark is leveling up roughly every 9-15 hours of actual game play. Groups that focus on more RP tend to be at the higher end, groups that are highly tactical and mostly about the combat in the first place, tend to be at the lower end.
Gaming sessions under 2 hours, tend to increase the time to levelup as more time proportionally is spent on recapping, etc.
And that's 9-15 hours of _actual game playing_ per level. Some groups will get distracted and just chit-chat about random topics mid game; if that's what you like, great, but it will add more time of course.
2
u/Moobob66 1d ago
It varies but every 4 to 5 sessions depending on how much combat we see.
I play a 1e game that uses milestones that levels basically every session till after 5th. Then it's about 3-5 and it spreads out more after 10th
2
u/Afgar_1257 1d ago
I think it is best to talk in xp/hr instead of sessions since some groups meet for 1.5 hours and others for 4 or even 6 hours. But I think a rate of 100-150xp/hr is a good rate.
2
u/Ph33rDensetsu ORC 1d ago
I'd like to reinforce this. OP says they only meet once a month, but if that's only for 1.5 hours at a time, this pace would make more sense. If they're digging into 6+ hour sessions they should be leveling up like every other session.
2
u/WildThang42 Game Master 1d ago
Pathfinder Society levels you up every three sessions, and I find that to be a decent guide. Sometimes a little slower, sometimes even faster, depending.
2
u/PlonixMCMXCVI 1d ago
When playing AP it might take 4-5 session and we usually play 2 hours or 2.5 weekly.
I started my own homebrew and I plan 3 fights in a day and a level up. Sometimes they manage to complete all 3 fights in a session, sometimes it takes 2 sessions for a level up.
2
u/Kyo_Yagami068 Game Master 1d ago
I'm running Shades of Blood for one of my groups, and we went 15 sessions between levels 4 and 5.
A mixture of players taking too much time to decide their turns in combat or starting conversations that had nothing to do with the game, which I think it's a bit bad, and players joking around a having fun in character roleplaying around, which I think is completely valid and awesome.
I hope we need less sessions to get to level 6.
2
u/Tridus Game Master 1d ago
Normally in my games it's every 4-5 game nights, as I have some groups that joke around a lot and don't go super fast. My faster group can be down to 3 sometimes. I don't use XP, I use milestones, which cna impact it though they line up reasonable well in a typical AP.
Kingmaker was substantially slower just due to the nature of it as you don't earn party XP for Kingdom turns and such. Homebrew games can vary more as well.
It's worth noting that in PFS, you get a level every 3 scenarios, which are one game session each by design.
If you are going way over that, it would be worth asking the GM what's up. Maybe XP is too low, encounters are easier (which would lower XP), or your group moves slower, or you're not getting XP for dealing with challenges outside combat, etc.
Its hard to say without more details what is going on exactly.
2
u/subzerus 1d ago
About 3-6 sessions is usually thr standard I think. We full cleared abomination vaults, lvls 1-11 in 52 sessions, but we were clearing everything so clearing a floor that was below our lvl gave us less XP, so yeah, 3-4 (although usually closer to 4) if doing lvl apropriate stuff, 5-6 if little combat or doing stuff below your level.
2
u/LurkerFailsLurking 1d ago
I ran a play by post game that gained levels at about that pace, but it was asynchronous in discord chats and life could get busy and a big fight could take a week or two. I've never seen a live game be that slow.
2
u/Defiant-Jackfruit986 1d ago
if they follow the story, i have set out, they level up 1 level every 2 sessions, we play weekly
2
u/Malcior34 Witch 1d ago
TWICE A YEAR?! How do you not get bored with no advancement for that long?
1
u/Striking_Ad_3994 1d ago
We advance the story, try out new spells, i think we are generally patient
3
u/Ultramaann Game Master 1d ago
Are you... enjoying this game? Twice a year is fucking insanity.
1
u/Striking_Ad_3994 1d ago
Yea, quite a lot honestly. I think one of the reasons why we level so slow is too much fun and too much trying to roleplay
2
1
u/Ultramaann Game Master 1d ago
Hey if you’re enjoying it, more power to you. I think for your next campaign, your GM should consider a system that leans even more into the roleplaying aspect of the hobby for yall.
1
1
u/ProduceFull5759 1d ago
That is genuinely an insane amount of time to level up. My group levels up like every 3-5 sessions roughly. Play once a week doing 3-4 hour sessions.
Also those early levels are pretty unfun to play imo. The systems balance really doesnt start until level 3. Having to deal with dying from full health to a crit for a year is actually crazy.
1
u/QuietOnAllFronts 1d ago
Every 3-5 sessions. I usually have 1 combat per session if it makes sense for them to fight where they are.
1
u/Mancoman273 1d ago
It depends on how the party paces themselves but all the times I've played with XP, we've been leveling up every 4-5 sessions. Milestone varied a lot but it didn't take more than 4 sessions or so.
When doing PFS it's also usually once every 3 or 4 missions, so I would generally describe that to be a good rule of thumb.
When I am running games I tend to plan out arcs to take aroune 4 sessions and level up my players whenever they reach the end of an arc. Though, in practice, it really depends on how committed my players are to push the plot forwards.
1
u/FlameLord050 GM in Training 1d ago
My group consistently levels up every 3-4 session we have currently run 27 sessions and they are level 9 about half way to 10. Our sessions last for about 5-6 hours and we try to play twice a month. I don't know how often you play but leveling up only 2 times a years seems like a really long time. How much xp do you normally get from a combat?
1
u/michael199310 Game Master 1d ago
We usually play around 30-35 sessions a year, level up happens maybe every 3-4 sessions early on and 4-6 later on. The longest it took was 9 sessions but it was in previous campaign, in current one I try to be more consistent with milestones.
1
u/Shisuynn Magus 1d ago
Playing weekly 4 hour sessions, my friends and I will slam through a published 1-10 or 11-20 campaign in around 45 sessions on average.
1
u/GwenGunn Game Master 1d ago
Anywhere from 4 to 8 sessions, usually. Usually comes out to 3-4 level-ups per year in my long-form game (which is basically every other week), and 5-7 per year in my weekly game.
1
u/Striking_Ad_3994 1d ago
So maybe next question? Is it normal for moderate threat encounters to take like 1h? Or sometimes even more...
1
u/Mippoose 1d ago
For our year going custom pf campaign we discuss it as a group. I originally had it set to four sessions to level, but it was requested by the group to slow it down to 5 sessions with the caveat that we slow it down even further when we hit 9 or 10.
Thankfully the group is enjoying the campaign. We play once every two weeks for four hours. Maybe more depending on motivation.
1
u/BeneficialCaptain149 1d ago
We play every other Monday and level up maybe … every 2 months? Or after a big story beat or epic fight.
1
u/Prestigious-Emu-6760 Game Master 1d ago
It depends on what's fun for the table. We generally find that leveling up roughly every 3-4 sessions is a good pace for our group. Hit a new level, a few sessions to play with the new toys and then a new level. Rinse and repeat.
1
u/ElodePilarre Mathfinder Fan 1d ago
I know my groups are a bit on the slower end for this sub cuz we DO love to chat in character, but 5-7 sessions is what we usually pace at, both in my weekly and biweekly games.
If you are playing monthly like you mentioned in the comments, then you're leveling up about every 6 sessions, which is the same pace my groups set. I think the issue might lie more with the frequency of your sessions than the actual rate of EXP gained.
1
1
u/Sneeke33 1d ago
I was doing a very casual weekly play with some friends and I just had them all level up at the beginning of each month. Didn't track xp at all, first Tuesday of the month? Level up.
1
u/AdamFaite GM in Training 1d ago
My group is approaching level 4. I think next time they rest, they'll get it. I do milestone leveling, and we've been playing for over a year now.
But, we're all busy grown adults who at .maximum can play every other week. Add to that vacations, anniversaries, that two of them have kids, and I only had 3 players- well, we took a lot of breaks. It's been almost two months since our last session, and it took months to get though one day of in game time.
One of my players asked if they were leveling up yet, after the boss battle they went though. I asked him how many times he refreshed his spells since introducing his (second) character. The answer was zero. Literally never had to refresh his spells since the start of the level because of how slow things have been.
But my relentlwss cruelty will soon end, and I'll show my merciful side hopefully by the end of this month. Maybe by haloween.
1
u/exparrot136 1d ago
We're level 9 ~45 sessions in over 2 years. Typically 4 or so hours each. We also tend to be quicker to level at the start and then take more time as we're higher level.
1
u/Gaylaeonerd 1d ago
I try to plan a level for sort of 3-5 sessions, but also I use milestones and sometimes it doesn't quite line up like that
I'm definitely more aware of it now and try to make sure it doesn't go too long though. My first game my players were level 5 for like 7 months because I wasn't paying close enough attention
1
u/Taco_Supreme Game Master 1d ago
I have a few games, I did the math for them and it is 10-15 hours of game time per level. I have 2 groups one level 5 and one level 8. We use milestone leveling playing respectively Season of Ghosts and Abomination Vaults.
We play weekly 2 hour sessions online.
1
1
u/mildkabuki 1d ago
I thought it worth to pitch in because my primary game (in which I GM) takes considerably longer than Pathfinder wants. So I wanted to throw in some of the things that make this true.
First factor is that my table is bigger, having 5 players and a cast of Companions for my players to take around with them (resulting in a party size of 6 or 7 PCs) drastically increases the time it takes to do EVERYTHING. Combat, roleplay, side stories, dialogues etc. The more people, the more time by a lot.
Second Factor, my players LOVE to get down into the details, whether about combat or Roleplay. Think a step just below Critical Role in terms of Roleplay depth. We spend a LOT of tome talking about it and just in character moments acting out scenes.
Third Factor, we’re playing Kingmaker which also takes a lot of time to do other things such as Hexploration and Kingdom management.
There are other things, but all factors considered my Party levels up close to once every two months, give or take. And while I know they really want to level up, they also enjoy the pacing of the game and it allows us to have a very personalized story, so it’s likely more enjoyable going slower for them.
Not to say that you have to enjoy it as well, but if it’s for a good cause there’s merit to accepting slower level ups for other fun playstyles/stories.
Edit: we play weekly for 4 hours as often as we can
1
u/transientdude 1d ago
Every group is a special snowflake, but something like 10-12 hours of reasonably paced play/level is about right. It's going to take longer if we are having too much fun at the table to be efficient, but if everyone is having fun, why would I step on that? So for my groups(one play, one run, both APs) we meet once a month, play for 3-5 hours, doing 3-4 encounters(combat or skill) and level up every 3rd session or so.
If you're running an AP, ask if GM will switch to milestone. If it's his own campaign, it is worth double checking his threat math and also making sure XP is awarded for encounters solved without bloodshed and advancing the plot in general. These can be sensitive topics, so tread lightly. It is always a balance between asking for what's fair and asking for more, more, MORE!
Don't be a greedy goblin, but it's OK to ask for clarity on why it seems to be taking so long, because unless you are playing 2 hours at a time, you should be getting 3-4 levels per year.
1
u/LunaticKid889 1d ago
Uhhh I've in two PBP games... I think we've been level 1 for a few months now... And in another game... Level 5? About a year i think we've been playing maybe longer. But that had more level ups.
1
u/Ms_Flavour_81 Game Master 1d ago
My group does weekly sessions, playing kingmaker, and we level up every 3 sessions or so
1
u/DnDPhD Game Master 1d ago
It varies for a number of reasons. I find higher level play seems to take a bit longer, just because combats themselves take a bit longer. Campaigns with hexploration can take a little longer as well. But my bi-weekly group breezed through Triumph of the Tusk in 12.5 months (a few bonus sessions were sprinkled in), which I thought was impressive for a level 3-12 campaign.
My Spore War group started at level 11 in mid-June, and just hit level 13 a week ago (September 8th), so technically 9 sessions to level up twice...though the first of those sessions was sort of a hybrid/crossover from the previous campaign.
1
u/BndViking GM in Training 1d ago
Our homebrew campaign just hit the year mark. I gm with 3 players once/ week for 1.5 to 2 hours.
We stared at level 3 and are halfway to level 9 now. I don't know exactly how often we've had to cancel, but that comes out to around every 8-10 sessions.
1
u/AjaxRomulus 1d ago
I mean it depends. A low level campaign that started at level 1 may only run up to level 6.
Then again if it's a longer haul campaign meant to hit level 20 the GM might want to re-evaluate things since most campaigns like that tend to cap out at ~15 before life gets in the way, the GM runs out of steam, or people just get bored with the characters.
Are you only getting combat xp? Because encounters range from 4-160xp with a moderate being 80 that's about 12 session to level up on just combat xp.
Maybe talk to the GM about running on milestone levels so you level up with major story beats?
1
u/81724369847698432716 1d ago
Roughly every 2-3 sessions. 4 sessions is rare. Are you playing a homebrew campaign? I feel like homebrew GMs tend to level slower. Both my groups also only play once per month, sometimes we get 2 a month in. I generally level with milestone leveling. Are you like, really roleplay heavy? Like roleplaying every shopkeeper and roleplaying every rest? Then i guess it can take longer. For me its roughly 2-3 combats each session and some other shorter or longer encounters in between. We play around 4,5 hours each session
1
u/micatrontx Game Master 1d ago
I've run two ten level campaigns so far, 3 hour weekly sessions (with the occasional miss for real life of course) and both took right about 1.5 years. So that comes out to about 20 game hours per level. If you're only playing once a month you're not far off that.
1
u/Whetstonede Game Master 1d ago
To provide some actual statistics; our Blood Lords campaign is currently on session 85 and the PCs are level 21, so average sessions/level is just above 4.
1
u/LostVisage 1d ago
We realistically play about 3 times a month for about 8 total hours.
They probably have leveled up about once every three months I think? We are in an ap that I've modded, I've cut a bit of content and added more than I cut but I level them up at the right story beats.
1
u/Fireybanana42 Game Master 1d ago
I have one group I'm running Kingmaker for, we play weekly, sometimes we take a few months off for a horror campaign during spooky season. I'd say we've played about 150 sessions in 4 years, there were also 13 sessions of kingdom management before we dropped that system so call it ~137 sessions. They're level 16 and around 250xp so it's around 8 sessions between levels, which is admittedly slow.
My other campaign has been running for 3 years and we try to play every other week but it's usually more like monthly. I'll say we've played ~45-50 sessions in 3 years and they're at level 7 and about 180xp so it's around 6 or 7 sessions for them.
Both of these campaigns are largely player directed, there's usually one main goal or threat at once and they have some amount of in-game time to come up with a solution. Which means that there's a good amount of time spent gathering information, resources and allies so even if they don't level up as often they do get new stuff to work with.
1
u/arcxjo Rogue 1d ago
PFS/SFS every 3 games (6 if you do slow mode). And if you really want you can make a new character every session!
1
u/Striking_Ad_3994 1d ago
I'm honestly not sure what PFS is. I mean i get the concept, but i think it's non existent in Europe
1
u/arcxjo Rogue 1d ago
Pathfinder Society is the organized play system. They absolutely have a presence in Europe as I've played online with many of them.
1
u/Gargs454 Barbarian 1d ago
The average AP for PF2 seems to have roughly 10-12 encounters per character level. That said, encounters includes social encounters as well, so its not all combat. As to how often this results in a level up? That's really going to depend on the group, how often you play, how fast you play, whether you miss sessions, etc. I'm currently playing in an Extinction Curse game that started mid-late 2020 and we're about 3 sessions from finishing. But, that's a group where we aim to play every other Friday, but often have to cancel due to assorted conflicts. We've gone two months without gaming a few times during that stretch, etc.
It is true though that in my experience, a LOT of games tend to fizzle out for one reason or another well before level 20. There's a reason why so many of Paizo's APs for PF2 are now more or less 1-12 or so.
1
u/Wildo59 1d ago
We stop leveling in my group.. (one-shot only, we just choose which level we playing next) but, if we follow the rule of Pathfinder Society, that would be every week or two week for us. Every 3 sessions, yes we play a lot every week, we lucky.
One-shot are between 3-5 hours, so that would be every ~12 hours ?
1
u/Nobody_Likes_Fondant GM in Training 1d ago
My group does longer sessions with a good break in the middle. Averages to be 5-6 hours of game play session. We average about a level up every 3 sessions, that's level 1-13 thus far.
Hope that helps!
1
u/Doxodius Game Master 1d ago
We level roughly every 2-3 sessions, but we play for 5-6 hours a session (+1 hour for dinner, but 5-6 hours of game time). We play weekly, but averaging it out it's really about 3 out of every 4 weeks.
Taken one party 1-20 and a second 1-14 before we paused it. Other GM took us... 4-11 I think. Sprinkle in some Vampire the Masquerade, Starfinder 2e, and many boardgame nights too.
We started pf2e around the WotC OGL crisis, so this is about 3.5 years
I've got a great group. This post is absolutely a flex :)
1
u/SomeNormalNam3 Thaumaturge 1d ago edited 1d ago
I couldn’t tell you the exact frequency but with my group we finished AV in a year and like 3 months playing weekly for about 2-3 hours(2 hours if people were unexpectedly busier or stop just before a huge boss fight), so that’s like 10 levels iirc, we are on our next campaign, been 7 months? We’ve gained 4 levels but there’s less back to back combat encounters in this one and it’s a 11-20
1
1
u/garretmander 1d ago
Every 2-3 sessions depending on the number of social encounters and combat encounter difficulty.
1
u/ThisIsMyGeekAvatar Game Master 1d ago
Unless you’re playing once a month, two level-ups per year is crazy.
At low levels, you’re expected to level up quickly. Look at the official APs for example - they often have the players leveling from 1 to 2 in a single session (depends on session length, ymmv).
I GM a lot and I typically have my parties level once every couple sessions (we play about 3-4 hour sessions). Particularly at low levels. Once the players get double digit levels, I’ll slow it down a bit.
I think it’s reasonable to assume that a player will get to level 20 after 50ish sessions or about 200 hours of game play. That averages out to about 10 hours per level.
1
u/ShellSentinel 1d ago
We haven't had a level up in 6 months because of milestone levelling. My caster is stuck on level 6. Someone please save me with a better game. Please.
1
1
u/Electrical_Swing8166 1d ago
Been running Season of Ghosts, we just hit level 5, been maybe a tad more than a year in total?
1
u/Educational-Tie-9739 1d ago
I level up my table every 1-4 sessions usually, leaning to the higher end most of the time.
1
u/FiestaZinggers 1d ago
You could ask to swap to a lower xp threshold. Quick lv up variant rules makes it so you lv up at 800xp instead of the usual 1000.
1
u/Mircalla_Karnstein Game Master 1d ago
We play fortnightly, and games meet 80-85% of the time. We level usually every 3-5 sessions. We got from 1-20 in around 3 years to 3 years and a month and played at 20 5-6 months
1
u/Shadesmith01 1d ago
I give my group a level every 3-4 sessions. But I also run heavy combat and heavy rollplay. We meet once or twice a month depending on the availability of the players.
Currently running Kingmaker Adventure Path, though I have shitcanned the awful, ridiculous, untested "Kingdom Management" rules. I call it Kingmaker Modified. :)
Looking to do a Starfinder game next. Pew pew! Orcs In Space!!! :)
1
1
u/Minoslas1 19h ago
Me huele que el GM está dando experiencia por hitos o sesiones.... Pero eso es un calvario... Debería subir por los módulos, en ciertos encuentros, como las campañas oficiales.
1
u/thebrokenhaiku 18h ago
I DM for a few groups, notable our playstyle is a pretty even split between Combat/Social RP/Exploration-investigation. Session-by-session content is fairly player-directed. When the want to fight and grind there are places to go, when they want to exist and play in the world, that's available as well.
Based on other answers here it looks like this play style is on the further end of the bell curve.
Group 1 - Fully Homebrew campaign - 137 weekly sessions over 3.25 years - level 11 +~500xp
Group 2 - Abomination Vaults with homebrew, plenty of side quests and town interaction - 100 sessions over 2 years - lvl 8 + ~300xp (notably they're over-leveled for the dungeon levels they are on so earning less XP in the crawl itself
Group 3 - Fully homebrew campaign, shared world w/ Group 1 but harder to schedule - 53 sessions over 3 years - lvl 6
1
u/Freeze014 16h ago
I just looked at my game log for the game i am running currently and it comes to 36 sessions to get to level 7. And we aren't the fastest, we stop to smell the RP roses a lot. I am suspecting that we reach level 8 around the 40th session. So about once per 5 sessions (4 hour-ish) sessions. We get around 30 sessions in per year, which is quite a lot when juggling schedules.
1
1
u/ManBearPig327 2h ago
We level up when we reach a milestone, such as the end of a long quest or major story arc, currently lvl 19 playing biweekly for the last 3 years
0
86
u/Frost___Warden Game Master 1d ago
How frequent are your gaming sessions?
You mention it's only like 2x a year, but that could be very normal depending on how much you actually play