Alternative Experience System

Note: The following was taken from the author’s “Thoughts on Fudge” (online at http://www.io.com/~sos/rpg/fudlatest.html).

After a convention game one time, Ann Dupuis and I were discussing how well the game went, especially with the one newcomer to gaming at the table. The woman was not only at her first convention, but was playing her first RPGs that weekend. Fudge was the last game in her schedule that con, and she was blown away by how easy it was compared to the other games. She said she understood the character sheet without having to have anything explained to her and that the single mechanic to resolve all actions was the best she’d seen in the five different games she’d tried.

So we were congratulating ourselves, when I mentioned to Ann (President and Dictator for Life of Grey Ghost Games) that Fudge did have its drawbacks experience being the most glaring. Yes, it’s great for one-shot con games, but it seems to allow characters to develop too quickly or not at all in long-term games.

Ann came up with an idea which we batted around a bit, and it looks something like this:

Instead of awarding Experience Points, the GM awards Fudge Points at the end of a gaming session. These can be turned in for Experience Points, but the ratio in Objective Character Creation  (suggested 3 EP = 1 Fudge Point) is reversed. That is, you may turn in three Fudge Points for one EP.

Raising traits is unchanged from Chapter 5.

What this does is force the player to consider whether he needs to save his Fudge Points to get out of a jam the next session, or convert them to EP to raise a trait.

He can save Fudge Points from session to session, so he can eventually swap 12 Fudge Points for 4 EP to raise a trait or two but he may have to use some of those Fudge Points along the way to survive!

The net effect is that character development is left totally in the hands of the player, but is slowed down from the rate suggested in the book. This means a long-term campaign becomes more viable in Fudge.