>I'm not sure I get this: are you applying Adv. Exp. per game year, or
>something like that? I hadn't considered using it in that way. Very
>sensitive to how game time is being managed, clearly.
I think that's precisely what he's suggesting. And it's how I'd do it, too, in general. Basically, the way I see it, you're "recreating" the character for another story during any long periods of downtime to an extent. Therefore I don't think you need the metered development of the normal system, you just have to start again with the character at an "appropriate" level of ability. Just like in chargen at the start.
>I rather feel we've gone from one extreme in HW (follower feeding
>frenzy) to the other in HQ (it's as expensive to increase a follower
>ability as one of your own, and less useful). I feel there must be an
>Obvious Compromise here. Or at least, a feasible one. Perhaps
>something like 1HP to increase a follower keyword, or two ability by
>one/one by two? (Subject to sanity constraints relating them to level
>of the 'base' character.)
I'd agree that limiting a player this way would be a tad overdoing it. But I don't like this solution any better. I'll just be adjusting the NPCs the same way that I adjust the PCs, adding an appropriate amount to their keywords depending on downtime. Yes, this means that the player with a lot of followers gains more than one without in some ways. But, again, I don't think this is a time for "balancing" so much as for coming up with characters that make sense. In any case, as pointed out, keywords for a follower aren't quite as accessible, so it's not that big a bump - they're just "keeping up" really. If you didn't increase their keywords somewhat, then I think there'd come a time when the follower was no longer on the same level of capabilty as the hero, and would have to be left behind. Lastly, this balances out, to a small extent, the cost problem that you point out, Alex, in that while a character with a follower gets less bang per buck in theory for HP spent on follower abilities (I mostly agree with Roderick that it's not that big a thing), the player gains a bump on long term development.
These things seem pretty small to me, and I think it's a wash. I've spent HP on my followers already. The biggest bump, of course, when taking a sidekick is the initial abilites that he gets. That's a lot for just a few HP. IOW, in play it seems to all work well as written. So far. I'm really looking forward to doing some actual Advanced Experience gains. I think that the inter-adventure play that it represents is really nifty. It makes so much more sense for adventures to be spread out in a character's life than all just happening one after the other.
Mike
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