Brainstorming - Experience Gain in a megadungeon campaign.

((Edit: You can find a sort of Part 2 to this here.))

This is going to be a much much looser post than I usually do, as I am going to use this to go through a brainstorming process regarding, well, experience gain in the context of a megadungeon-focused campaign.

I am planning on my next in-person game that I organize to be in my Greylands world, and focus on megadungeon exploration. My goal is to not use a published one, but actually work on creating the tools and procedures to create, stock, restock and run my own megadungeon. 

As part of this process I am also going to be doing a whole bunch of rewrites of the OSE house rules I used for my previous and current Greylands games. Stuff like how encumbrance works, tweaks to armor and armor class, maybe use a different magic system than the standard B/X spell list (but also not just use W&W again, I tried that already), the list goes on. 

One of the things on my mind in that vein is experience gain. I am definitely not the first( nor will I be the last) person to observe that with the amounts required to level up in B/X and with the consideration that 75 to 90% of that experience comes from recovering treasure, the amount of money the party builds up after 1-2 levels is just absurd to the point of rendering it meaningless. Things like carousing, training and conspicuous consumption are ways the OSR has dealt with this conundrum.

My thought was to keep the 1 moneys worth of treasure = 1 experience point (probably not gp, I want to move to silver in the Greylands setting, with gold coins essentially being an alternate resource you need for certain services or items),  but slash all the numbers involved by 10. So a Fighter now needs 200 experience points to get to level 2, but also the treasure is slashed by 10 as well. This way money does not become as useless as fast. 

But I have also had another thought - is money for exp actually the way I want to handle experience gain and advancement in this game? After all, there are many other ways to gain levels in an OSR game. While I have been sticking to money for exp so far in my campaigns, I have been thinking what else could I do.

First off, I want to make sure I stick to goal-focused experience gain. What does and what doesn't give experience needs to be clearly defined and written out so that players at any point know exactly what action will or will not garner them experience, and how much if it does. To me this is a non-negotiable aspect of the process. 

However, as you can see from the links above, there are plenty of other goals. I also did some of that in my BSSS campaign when the players stormed the gatehouse. That worked fine for a single very focused mission, but for a megadungeon? A location you are supposed to revisit again and again and again during a campaign? I dunno.

Money and treasure are still going to be important - after all resources get expended and need replacing, hirelings need to be paid, food and shelter must be secured and so on. 

Another option I have considered is one I've heard of or seen mentioned in passing used in other games - experience for exploration. Be it every hex or point on a map, or perhaps every room or floor or section of a megadungeon? That could work! This provides a good and clear goal, however it is a tad wishy washy. After all, what counts as "exploring" a room? If a room has a secret door and a treasure, do the players get experience for finding either or only if they find both? If the latter, wouldn't that just lead to overly slow and boring gameplay? Methodical exploration is cool and all, but it still needs to be enjoyable, this is a game after all.

I have had it suggested to me (on discord, I think?) that maybe instead the party gets experience for each room they visit, but it starts low and grows from there. So the first, say, 2 rooms give nothing. The third gives 10 exp. The fourth 20, the fifth 30, the sixth 40, etc. But once the party leave the dungeon, the count is reset. This in turn I think would incentivize riskier delves into the dungeon, trying to cover as much ground as possible, but it might lead to ignoring a lot of the actual dungeon that's around. It does provide a clearer goal than the previous exploration method though!

Yet another option - zones cleared and secured. The megadungeon in my game is (at least as of time of writing) going to be of the supernatural incursion type. A common trope, sure, but one that I enjoy, the dungeon as an alien thing intruding upon reality.  I hope to have thematic sections in my megadungeon, since those are always fun, and I figure each section would be between 5 and maybe 10-12 rooms each, and so securing that section, clearing it of monsters and making sure they can't really reestablish a foothold in it can provide a big and solid chunk towards leveling. 

That works, but...again - the goal is vague and ultimately depends on my fiat as a referee to declare when a section is or is "cleared". I don't like that. Plus, this means that I can't simply restock and refill and rearrange things in the megadungeon, as that would negate the progress of the PCs. 

A separate question to ponder - experience for killing enemies. A possibility, though one I don't really plan on entertaining too much. It turns a lot of gameplay into a near constant combat, and I have written a few words about my opinion on combat in dungeon crawling games.

What else then...perhaps each level of the dungeon has a certain number of special elements - idols, objects, altars, weird alien dungeon organs, winged monkeys whatever, that if destroyed will both help weaken that level (or sector?) of the dungeon and provide experience, and most importantly - will not return even during restocking. A bit better in terms of goals, as it provides a clear and non-ambiguous object and interaction with that object (loot, destroy, desecrate, whatever).

These can also be different - perhaps the underground garden's experience can be gained only if you find and cut out the central root core of the trees in it. But in order to get the experience for the halls of marbled salt you need to destroy the crystal that spawns the salt golems? That could be interesting and provide me with potential ways to make the dungeon fresh for the players.

Another issue entirely is that of numbers. Even if I just stick with money for exp, how much treasure do I put in the dungeon? That's a huge question and one who's answer can have major repercussions about the campaign. To a smaller extent this also goes for the exploration EXP - how much do you earn for that?

Obviously this doesn't have to be a single form of advancement. I will probably combine some of these, giving 2 or even 3 different sources of advancement (though I'll probably just stick to experience points for the time being), but as you can tell from the text you read - I am not sure where to go with it. 

So, if you have any experience (hah!) with alternate experience methods, please tell me about it and about how it's worked out in your own game. I don't care if it's in a comment here, on discord, email, a postcard...whatever. I am curious as to how you've tackled this if you have. 

Because for me there is no right answer in this, there simply is an answer and the implications it brings with it.