possible to level sovereign outside of combat?

There are items that will give you experience when you consume them.

Of course, you have to use your Sovereign to get them... through combat... so...

This is a good question.  I usually try to play peaceful games, so my Sovereign will always be low level?

 You can find various potions and tomes in the goodie huts that grant experience. Beyond that you need to fight. But then why would you want to level your sovereign if you're not using them in combat in the first place? Drop strength, dexterity and constitution on the design screen, pump intelligence, wisdom and charisma instead.

Because 15 Int/Wis won't be enough to deal with the higher level spells?

He/she may want to level for the essence. Get to level 3 and that's a few extra points available. Plus, as mentioned, for higher level spells. While one can rely upon shards and essence bonuses, having more base essence can help make the spells available sooner. For instance, Summon Fire Giant takes 16 essence to case. And, if one is imbuing champions with essence, more is good there too.

I know this brings your Sovereign into combat, but my suggestion is to bring them along with a group of adventurers/army exploring the wastes. Even if it's only for a few goodie huts/quests/encounters, you'll probably hit 3 or 4 without having to have your mighty leader stoop to actual combat. If you need essence, there're researchable ways to improve it, and of course the elemental shards...

There might be a trick with Imbue Champion/Create Spellcaster by which one can send out adventurers to level up for you, then cast the spell and give you the essence... (But don't quote me on that, it's just a theory.)

Other than that, you can always store up gold and buy items to improve your Sov. When the crafting system comes out, I imagine there'll be some crazy stat-boosting stuff.

While playing earlier this morning I encountered something peculiar. My sovereign was parked at my first city for whatever reason. Meanwhile, another champion of mine was exploring an area far to the south of two other cities of mine. After one of the combats he encountered down there, the character level-up screen popped up. It took me a second to realize that it was not for the adventuring champion but my idle sovereign!

How, or why, I'm not sure. Perhaps it was a bug? Perhaps the sovereign actually receives a small amount of experience, either as the result of actions taken by other champions or as some sort of trickle-o'-experience over time? Not sure, but I was certainly surprised.

Still, I'd be very interested in hearing if others have encountered this situation as well, and under what circumstances. I wish I had payed a bit more attention at the time but I didn't really recognize what had happened right off the bat. 

You sure there wasn't a bandit or something attacking your city?

I'd pretty much say 99% sure. It was fairly early into the game and not much was going on near my northern city. Further, if it *did* happen to be a bandit (or whatever), the event happened extremely fast and simultaneous with the end of the combat my other champion was wrapping up. After I realized what happened I more or less chalked it up in the "BUG" category, but given my experience with the game so far that is something I won't say I'm 99% sure about.

Just wanted to note, I've experienced the "sovereign level-up while parked in city" bit a second time. In this instance I'm 100% sure there were no creatures around to attack my city-stationed sovereign. As well, in this case both the adventuring/attacking hero and my sovereign received level-ups--one screen popping-up right after the other.

What I'm wondering, probably like many of you, is if this is a bug or if sovereigns do share in adventurer gained experience, however small.

I noticed that too today.  My champion and army attacked an enemy sovereign while my sovereign was exploring elsewhere (and on empty terrain).  After I defeated the sovereign, my champ leveled up, and my sovereign leveled up too.  So it seems there is sharing going on.

If, as it appears, a sovereign can gain experience from the actions of his stalwart champions it certainly opens up an interesting strategic possibility. Depending on how much experience is shared, it may be possible to rouse several imbued champions--constantly adventuring--to decent spell-casting potency while the sovereign slouches back, eh ... doing research, lets say ... in whatever fabtabulous city he desires.

Going that direction would suggest shooting for a sovereign with maximum starting Wisdom and/or Essence, imbuing it all out to the up and coming champions. I think I'm going to give that a run in my next game.

question about the charisma stat. does the stat matter only on the sov? as in.. will you recruit the same npc at different price depending on who's near it?

(so.. up wis/ess and cha for lots of imbue?)

I've noticed several times that my sovereign has leveled up through combat of his champions. Not sure why. Also you can gain books that give experience in the wild. These can be traded.

Well, in terms of the lore, it kinda makes sense seeing as the Sovereign imbues part of himself in the champion, so when the champion levels up, a part of the Sovereign levels up too.

As i was going through the XML i noticed something and remembered this thread, so to quote

<!-- when trained units get XP, they use it towards leveling up, but also give this percent to the sov. --> <XPPercentTrainedUnitsGiveSov>10</XPPercentTrainedUnitsGiveSov>

Your sovereign seems to gain XP for every battle your kingdom wins at a slightly reduced rate.

I've had my sov level up numerous times from battles he was on the opposite end of the continent from.

Edit: Damn, Terra beat me to it.

I've confirmed this now. My sovereign had 85 experience while sitting in a city, one of his champions with an army started/won a fight, then he had 91 or so exp afterwards. You can check this yourself. All your people have exp bars you can monitor.

So you can sit in the seat of your empire and send out champions to do your bidding.

That is very interesting, Terraziel. Do you happen to recall from which of the XML files you located that?