The level up move requires “downtime (hours or days)”. My players have been in a dungeon for two sessions, and will probably be there for the next one as well. It’s on a timer(stopping a blood ritual) , so no rest or downtime. They’ve been in there for maybe an hour or two, but acquired a lot of XP. Next session is going to be a major showdown, however.
Would you allow them to level before this showdown? What fictional justification would you require? There’s little time to reflect on your experience, after all. But perhaps some flashback showing how they’ve practised their new move before?
We kind of just levelled up when we needed to, forgetting about the downtime rule really. Didnt see any potential game problems by doing this.
If they can make camp inside the dungeon, they can level up. Otherwise, I won’t allow it.
If you need to have them lvl up before the fight, then go ahead! No need reasons. Needing to take few hours or days downtime to level up doesn’t make more sense than lvl up right away in the middle of a fight. They are both artificial and not meant to be simulationists.
My feeling is that the move exist so NOT to allow characters to lvl right in the middle of the dungeon, but if that’s what feels cool, then I’d do just that, forget about the downtime.
Maybe at the start of the next session, you do a flashback with each of them… about life before all this craziness started.. who’s important to you? What’s unfinished? Who are you worried about seeing again now that you’ve grown so much and see such awful things? That sort of thing. Maybe make a love letter out of it.
Then let everyone level up. And then frame the scene hard back into the action, in media res, “What do you do?”
Bonus: if you’re pretty sure you’re on the last session (or at least the last level up), let them burn XP for +1 to a roll they’re about to make, or 3 XP for a +1 after they roll. Give them something to do with that XP and get things moving a little more quickly/smoothly.
Aviv Manoach that was my initial ruling. I was just wanting to hear whether someone have made modifications to that, for instance when there is a lot of intense action in a short time.
I think my players might have almost two levels worth of XP stored up.
Jeremy Strandberg yeah, something like that was what I was considering!
I had that exact same situation up until 2 sessions ago, my players almost went up two levels when they finally had a chance to rest. I think it’s fine.
Oooh yeah, haven’t though about possibility of gaining 2 lvls. Well, as a player I’d be excited to gain 2 lvls, so I guess it’s a good thing 😛