TEXT: BEYOND EXPERIENCE POINTS…
  Alternative Experience Rules for Chivalry & Sorcery 3rd Edition
  Version 1.0
  By Peter White and Nigel Clarke
  INTRODUCTION
  The goal of these rules is to completely remove experience points and the last vestiges of experience levels 
  from the C&S3, bringing the game more in line with modern skill systems. The end result is a simpler, more 
  elegant system with less bookkeeping for both character creation and play.
  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  The general mechanics used here have been 
  inspired by ideas found in RuneQuest, and N. R. 
  Crossby’s HarnMaster. Thanks also to Ian Holland 
  for specific suggestions.
  SKILL IMPROVEMENT
  Skills are improved by a successful Improvement 
  Roll. Success increases the PSF of a skill by +1%. 
  Failure results in no change. An IR is successful if:
  d100 + {Attribute Bonus} – 2x{Difficulty Factor} > 
  TSC%, and CritDie > DF
   
  AWARDING IMPROVEMENT ROLLS
  The GM has great discretion in awarding 
  Improvement Rolls during play. Typical activities 
  that earn an IR are using a skill many times 
  usefully, a Critical Success in a stressful situation, 
  or training for 2 weeks under the tutelage of a 
  Master. A generous GM might occasionally award 
  an IR for a Critical Failure in a stressful situation, or 
  suffering at the business end of a greatly more 
  skilled opponent.
  An award to a valiant character after a tough sword 
  fight might be an IR for a Slashing Swords skill, 
  and one more IR for any combat skill that she used 
  during the engagement. 
  The GM should keep in mind that 9 IRs in this 
  system is very roughly comparable to 500 xps in 
  the standard system.
  DOWNTIME SKILL IMPROVEMENT
  A character performing his normal duties is 
  awarded two Improvement Rolls per month of 
  downtime, one Occupational and one Free. 
  The Occupational IR is usually restricted to skills 
  the character actually uses in her occupation. In 
  other words, "What do you do for a living?" Note 
  that a character’s vocational skills and 
  occupational skills do not necessarily overlap. 
  Initially the occupational skills will generally be 
  background skills or other skills closely related to 
  her specific background. Over time a character’s 
  effective occupation may well shift with changing 
  fortunes.
  The GM determines which skill the occupational 
  improvement attempt is made in based on the 
  character’s activities through the course of the 
  month. The player is encouraged to offer reasoned 
  suggestions. 
  The GM should choose skills for Occupational 
  Improvement Rolls that reflect the day to day lives 
  of the characters and the world they live in. A 
  peasant character may end up with an IR in Pig 
  Raising or Field Crops. A journeyman practitioner 
  of the arcane arts could gain an IR for a 
  spellcasting Method skill, or could be busy 
  researching for the Master with an esoteric Lore 
  skill instead. A knight character regularly trains in 
  war craft, so his Occupational IR will usually be in 
  a martial skill. Characters higher up the social 
  scale generally have more flexibility in and 
  influence on what skills will be improved with the 
  Occupational IR.
  The Free IR represents time the character finds to 
  hone skills on the side. The player determines 
  which skill for which the Free improvement attempt 
  is made, while GM discretion still applies, of 
  course. Here is where the player has opportunity to 
  improve the character’s vocationally oriented skills 
  although his choice is not, in fact, restricted to only 
  those skills.
  Naturally, the skills a character may improve will be 
  limited by opportunity, what that character actually 
  spends time doing, for both Occupational and Free 
  IRs. A noble who attends court for a month is much 
  more likely to be able to work on social skills than 
  combat skills.
  A few very difficult skills, such as Alertness: Sight 
  and Alertness: Sound are generally not appropriate 
  for improving during downtime. Always keep in 
  mind that training in some skills requires access to 
  certain equipment, libraries, etc. The GM should be 
  somewhat stingy about allowing a downtime IR for 
  the highest DF skills unless training conditions are 
  advantageous.
  Consideration should be given to characters who 
  make extra efforts to improve their skills when the 
  opportunity arises. A mage that gains access to 
  
  very valuable tomes and spends long hours in 
  studying them should be awarded extra IRs. A 
  knight who trains extra hard with very skilled 
  sparring partners should as well, although the GM 
  might want to make some kind of roll for random 
  injuries. 
  LEARNING NEW SKILLS
  For learning new skills during downtime the GM 
  can still use the rules given in C&S pages 187-188. 
  The following are supplementary rules.
  A character using a skill he has not yet learned 
  opens that skill with the normal Unlearned BC% 
  and the Attribute Bonus is halved. Full penalties 
  apply if Attribute Bonus is negative. 
  The player can improve his character’s unlearned 
  skill in basically the same manner as his learned 
  skills, with two differences: (1) a successful IR 
  improves the BC% by +1%, not the PSF, and (2) 
  the GM should be more stringent about awarding 
  an IR the higher the DF of the skill.
  When the BC% improves to the standard Skilled 
  BC% for that difficulty of skill (a +10% 
  improvement in most cases), the character has 
  learned basic knowledge in that skill. Until then, the 
  character suffers the usual penalties for using an 
  unlearned skill, including the –2 Crit Die modifier 
  for failed attempts. Skills that normally may not be 
  attempted without basic knowledge are still so 
  restricted under these rules.
  The GM should be more strict than normal about 
  awarding IRs to unlearned higher DF skills. A 
  Simple (DF2) skill is easier to teach oneself than a 
  Very Difficult (DF7) skill. A success with an 
  unlearned skill is required before awarding an IR 
  Tutelage under a Master is skill sufficient to award 
  an IR, however.
  NON-STANDARD SKILLS
  Improvement Roll mechanics are inherently 
  "percentile skill-based" oriented, so no simple rules 
  will exactly translate all non-standard skills. 
  Presented here is a toolkit; the dirty work is left as 
  an exercise for the reader.
  (1) Single successful IR increases skill by +2% or 
  more. (E.g. Languages)
  (2) +3% is equivalent to "1 level" (e.g. 
  Conditioning)
  (3) Forget the IR; the GM awards each "level" as 
  he sees fit (e.g. Conditioning)
  (4) Keep the DF fixed at the standard value for the 
  TSC%, but use the altered DF for the IR modifier.
  (5) PMF BC% is zero.
  (6) Aspect Bonus treated as additional Attribute 
  Bonus.
  CHARACTER CREATION
  A character earns starting skills through social 
  background as normal. Mastery and Horoscope 
  slots are spent in the regular manner, a +3% 
  added to the PSF if the character already has 
  basic knowledge as normal. Attribute Bonus 
  contributes to starting PSF as is usual. Skill levels 
  are ignored. All the Vocational and Mastery DF 
  discounts are applied normally
  Acquire additional starting skills with default of 30 
  Difficulty Levels. Expenditure of DLs equal to the 
  DF of a skill buys basic knowledge. Spend 3 DLs 
  to buy basic knowledge in a DF 3 skill, etc.
  Once a character has basic knowledge in a skill, it 
  may be further improved by +3% through spending 
  DLs equal to the DF. So the PSF of a DF 4 skill 
  which a character already has basic knowledge 
  can improved by +3% with the expenditure of 4 
  DLs. Spending a further 4 DLs would improve the 
  PSF an additional +3%.
  The DL system is very flexible and open to some 
  abuses. To keep starting characters within 
  reasonable bounds, the player may not spend DLs 
  for any of the following without the GM’s explicit 
  permission:
  1. Increase the PSF of a Secondary skill beyond 
  that of the highest vocational skill.
  2. Increase any skill beyond 70% TSC.
  3. Increase a PSF by more than +9%.
  The above guidelines are most appropriate for 18-
  year-old humans. The GM is, of course, welcome 
  to allow the player to ignore these limits if the 
  character concept and background justify it.
  For characters that start younger or older than the 
  (human) base age of 18, the following chart is 
  suggested:
  
  d100
  Human
  Dwarf
  Elf
  DLs
  Cost
  01-05
  13
  14
  15
  12
  +5
  06-10
  14
  16
  17
  15
  +4
  11-20
  15
  18
  20
  18
  +3
  21-30
  16
  21
  25
  21
  +2
  31-40
  17
  26
  35
  25
  +1
  41-60
  18
  27
  50
  30
  0
  61-70
  19
  30
  55
  36
  -1
  71-80
  20
  33
  60
  42
  -2
  81-85
  21
  36
  65
  48
  -3
  86-90
  22
  39
  70
  55
  -4
  91-95
  23
  42
  75
  62
  -5
  96-99
  24
  45
  80
  70
  -6
  00
  25
  48
  85
  80
  -7
  
SOURCE: textdata/thevault/Chivalry & Sorcery (osr)/Chivalry & Sorcery 3e/C&S 3e Beyond Experience Points (v1.0).pdf