¶ Experience & Class Advancement
The methods to gain experience points in Haze are summarized below, along with availability limitations:
- XP from creature kills: Available up to a threshold, based on unique creatures, and broader creature type.
- XP from training dummies: Available per in-game day (12 real-world hours).
- XP from hourly ticks: Unlimited (Stops at level 5)
- XP from DMs: Unlimited.
- XP from other player eminence wand (or
!reward) granting ('bonks'): Unlimited. - XP from exploration: Unlimited.
Note that the Commoner class has its own system and method for gaining experience. See the Character Classes page for further information.
¶ Adventuring & Optimizing XP Progress
Haze is designed to reward players who contribute to the survival system early.
If you are a player interested in the fastest possible progression, 'farming' of dungeons early will hinder the speed at which a character progresses over the long term. This is only impactful when and if you want to advance as fast as possible. Note that in the long run, it is more detrimental to your overall progress.
¶ Exploration Experience Nodes
There are hundreds of experience nodes around the island of Narumer. Every reset, a select amount of these nodes become active at random. When your party expores the world, including places you have been before, you may find one of these nodes. As long as your party is not too large, you will gain experience according to the difficulty of the node found.
- Minor (10 XP): Typically found in paths or out-of-the-way areas, and are not overly difficult or dangerous to get to.
- Average (25 XP): Typically found in more dangerous or risky areas, and usually involves relatively dangerous combat scenarios.
- Greater (50 XP): Typically found at the end of dungeons, in the camps of enemies, guarded by some of the stronger enemies, lairs of boss creatures, or other similarly dangerous locations.
Exploration nodes give reduced XP if your party size is over 6. A big enough part will eventually gain no experience points at all.
Exploration nodes give double XP to any level 5+ that is the only level 5 leading the party.
Any form of exploration done by something that is not a player character directly will not trigger the XP rewards from exploration nodes. This includes stealthed or invisible players. E.g. familiars, companions, or magical sensors.
¶ Creature XP & Party Size
Each monster type and its Challenge Rating (CR) determine a maximum number of kills from which players can earn XP, irrespective of the XP amount.
The XP gain from defeating a monster is finite and varies based on party size, each player's level relative to the monster's CR, and creature type.
Parties of 4-6 players will see best return on XP per kill.
¶ Example
Consider a scenario with a rat that can drop XP a maximum of 50 times, irrespective of the XP amount.
In a large party of 12 players, the XP per kill is distributed thinly, possibly resulting in each player earning minimal XP per kill.
Given the limit is on the number of drops and not the total XP, each rat kill is less efficient in large groups. Thus, with the rat capable of dropping XP only 50 times, the group will exhaust these opportunities with lower individual gains.
Conversely, a smaller party of 4-6 might ensure a higher XP share per kill. Since the cap is on the number of times XP can drop rather than the total XP amount, players in smaller groups maximize their gains, making the most out of the 50 available XP drops.
This is only an example, details about specific numbers and limits are not available to players.
¶ Multiclass XP Penalty
Haze uses a modified version of the standard NWN Multiclass XP Penalties. There is no such thing as a "Favored" Class for Multiclass XP Penalties. This removes the need to choose specific race/class combinations to maximize your XP gain. However, the standard rule still applies: you must keep your classes within 1 level of each other to avoid penalties.
If your classes are not kept within 1 level of each other, or if you have 3 classes regardless of level balance, you will incur a 20% XP penalty per class after your first class.
Commoner, is not counted for XP penalties if you have 2 or less classes.
¶ Example
If you have 3 levels in Fighter and decide to pick up a level of Cleric, you will now receive 20% XP penalties until you get your 2nd level of Cleric, once at Fighter (3)/ Cleric (2) the XP penalties will stop unless you then take another level of fighter, making your levels more than 1 level apart again at Fighter (4) / Cleric (2)
If you pick up a 3rd class, no matter how close in level together they are, you will receive a 40% penalty to all XP gains. This means if you pick up Fighter (1) / Cleric (1) / Druid (1), you will now receive a 40% XP Loss on all experience gained (including from exploration nodes.)
¶ Standard NWN Penalties
In the standard NWN rules, each race has a "favored" class that allows players to avoid experience penalties when multiclassing. As long as one of your classes is the favored class or your levels in each class remain within one level of each other, there is no XP penalty. However, if you have two or more classes that exceed this balance and your favored class is not the highest-level class, you incur a 20% experience penalty on earned XP.
For example, a human character’s favored class is the highest-level class, allowing flexibility in multiclassing. Meanwhile, other races have specific favored classes, such as Fighter for Dwarves or Wizard for Elves. In Haze, this restriction is modified so that no race gets a favored class.