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Ziegander
2013-04-20, 08:48 PM
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Image credit: Leonardo da Vinci

d20 Reality. Where Fantasy is what you make it.

Projectlog (links):

Thread #1 (The Basics). (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=278249)
Thread #2 (The Abilities). (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=279120)


Changelog as of Part 2:


The core mechanic is left unchanged, but automatic success/failure is more uniformly used by all d20 rolls. Degrees of success/failure will also be used throughout the system for less binary results.
Modifiers are being reduced (for the time being) to Circumstance, Competence, Enhancement, Inherent, and Item.
Ability modifiers cap at +5 though "superpowers" can be accessed by scores that would normally have a higher modifier. This helps keep the RNG reigned in tight.
The Strength score modifies physical damage rolls and save DCs, encumbrance, and climb, jump, and swim.
The Agility score modifies defense and balance, escape artist, hide, move silently, and tumble.
The Dexterity score modifies all attack rolls and disable device, open lock, sleight of hand, and use rope.
The Intelligence score modifies skill points per level and arcana, architecture & engineering, decipher script, history, religion, search, and speak language.
Wisdom is replaced by Cunning which modifies initiative, dungeoneering, listen, nature, sense motive, spot, and wild empathy.
The Charisma score modifies magic damage rolls and save DCs, and bluff, diplomacy, disguise, handle animal, perform, and ride.
Reflex saves are a thing of the past. They are merely attack vs defense. An area effect deals half damage on a missed attack. Other things previously a Reflex save, such as catching one's self to avoid a fall, are merely Agility checks.
Constitution and Willpower represent two derived scores. Constitution derived as the average of the three physical ability scores (Str, Agl, and Dex) while Willpower as the average of the three mental ability scores (Int, Cng, and Cha).
Constitution modifies hit points and damage reduction. Poisons and other such things offer a character the chance for a Constitution check to reduce their effects (or negate them entirely).
Willpower modifies mind points useful for mitigating mental manipulation and debilitating stress but also as a resource for magic-based powers. Charms, Illusions, and many others offer a character the chance for a Willpower check to reduce or negate their effects.



At the heart of every creature in the basic d20 game are bonuses dependent on class level and character level. Hit Dice per Level, Base Attack Bonus, Base Save Bonuses, Skill Points per Level, and also Max Skill Ranks, Feats, and Ability Score Increases. This is The Chassis that each creature is built on.

A failing of the d20 game is how binary the attacks and defenses (defenses especially) of characters become after a few levels and The Chassis built into the system is at least partially to blame. At 10th level, for example. a Wizard will have +5 attack bonus, +3 Fort bonus, +3 Ref bonus, and +7 Will bonus. A Fighter will have +10 attack bonus, +7 Fort, +3 Ref, and +3 Will. Assuming they have the same ability score array (20, 17, 16, 15, 12, 10) we'll assign the following:

Wizard 10
Str 12, Con 17, Dex 16, Int 20, Wis 15, Cha 10
MW Staff: +7 to hit, MW Crossbow: +9 to hit
Fort Save: +6
Ref Save: +6
Will Save: +9

Fighter 10
Str 20, Con 17, Dex 16, Int 12, Wis 15, Cha 10
+1 Greatsword of Something Special: +16 to hit, +1 Composite Longbow: +14 to hit
Fort Save: +10
Ref Save: +6
Will Save: +5

At 10th level, the average AC is 21, and your average save DC is 19. Our Wizard has to roll a 14 or higher to hit in melee and a 12 or higher to hit at range (unless he's using spells with Touch Attacks), a 35% chance and a 45% chance respectively. Our Fighter a 5 or higher in melee and a 7 or higher at range, 80% and 70%. With the Wizard's best save, Will, he has a 55% chance of success, on average. With the Fighter's, Fort, he has a 60% chance. But against their worst saves, the Wizard has only a 40% chance and the Fighter only a 35% chance.

Now, of course all of these numbers can be wildly tweaked with varying equipment, but there's already a massive variance in character success rates and, as level increases and characters do use equipment to tweak these numbers, it becomes more and more likely that characters begin to fall off the RNG entirely. What is impossible for some characters is trivial for others. This is always somewhat mitigated if we use the rule that a 1 is always a failure and a 20 is always a success, but do we truly want a game where some players have a 5% chance to succeed at a given action while the player across the table has a 95% chance? Is that sort of variance that we're aiming for?

In a game where the difference between "Good" attack bonus is, at base, 50% higher success rate over "Poor" and "Good" save bonus is 30% higher over "Poor" it becomes increasingly easy to push characters over the edge of the RNG one way or the other. Strong ability scores going toward already "Good" base bonuses, while weak scores being used for the "Poor" bonuses exacerbates this issue.

I propose ridding ourselves of this version of The Chassis. No longer does base attack bonus, base saves, etc vary by class. They will still vary by character, certainly, based on player choices, but I propose that in place of the old Chassis we declare, similar to the 4e approach, that characters simply add a +1 bonus to all d20 rolls once every two character levels.

Beyond these bonuses, what remains of the former d20 Chassis are Hit Dice per Level (which would now probably be accompanied by Mind Dice per Level as well), Skill Points per Level, Max Skill Ranks, Feats, and Ability Score increases. To that end, only Max Skill Ranks, Feats, and Ability Score increases do not vary by class, so lets speak of those first.

I proposed earlier a new way to look at Proficiency. It would be handled in five tiers, or six technically, Non-Proficient (+0 competence), Basic (+2), Expert (+4), Master (+6), Paragon (+8), and Legend (+10). This would be my way of replacing Max Skill Ranks. These tiers would be capped by level and bought with Skill Points, or perhaps renamed Proficiency Points (but that's neither here nor there), and could even be extended to include such things as Weapon Groups. The breakdown would be Novice for 1st - 4th level, Expert at 5th - 8th, Master at 9th - 12th, Paragon at 13th - 16th, and Legend for 17th -20th level. Skills would not automatically increase to the next tier during these levels, but could be bought up to those tiers as appropriate to the character's level.

At this point our new Chassis looks like this:

{table=head]Level|d20 Rolls & Defense|Max Rank|Feats|Else

1st|
+0|Novice (+2)|
?|
?

2nd|
+1|Novice (+2)|
?|
?

3rd|
+1|Novice (+2)|
?|
?

4th|
+2|Novice (+2)|
?|
?

5th|
+2|Expert (+4)|
?|
?

6th|
+3|Expert (+4)|
?|
?

7th|
+3|Expert (+4)|
?|
?

8th|
+4|Expert (+4)|
?|
?

9th|
+4|Master (+6)|
?|
?

10th|
+5|Master (+6)|
?|
?

11th|
+5|Master (+6)|
?|
?

12th|
+6|Master (+6)|
?|
?

13th|
+6|Paragon (+8)|
?|
?

14th|
+7|Paragon (+8)|
?|
?

15th|
+7|Paragon (+8)|
?|
?

16th|
+8|Paragon (+8)|
?|
?

17th|
+8|Legend (+10)|
?|
?

18th|
+9|Legend (+10)|
?|
?

19th|
+9|Legend (+10)|
?|
?

20th|
+10|Legend (+10)|
?|
?
[/table]

What becomes clear after looking at this table is that each even level is given a boon, while only half the odd levels are. Levels 1, 5, 9, 13, and 17 are important for Proficiency, or Skill Rank, while Levels 3, 7, 11, 15, and 19 remain empty or "dead." With the very good suggestion someone had in a previous thread regarding Ability score increases being handled by an ever-increasing point-buy we still have Feats to portion out over the course of a character's career. Those odd levels are certainly prime real estate for something.

Something else to note is that, with our change of how ability modifiers work, capping at a max bonus of +5, we can know that between the best and worst at any task, characters will have a minimum of a +0 bonus (1st level, Non-Proficient, with a -5 ability penalty) and a maximum of a +25 bonus (20th level, Legend with a +5 ability bonus). Now, that's a difference of 125% success rate that is only mitigated by character level by a maximum of 25%, which can still put characters off the RNG relying on 1s or 20s, but it's more predictable and it's only like that in the most extreme of cases.

The plan from here out is to move on to Skills next and then either Environment/Exploration or Combat.

necroon
2013-04-20, 09:48 PM
Interesting... Usually I'm content lurking but I'm far too intrigued.
I know, at least in my circles, people tend to shy away from 4th edition's concepts as if they were poison however the 1/2th HD + relevant stat was one of the stronger points (at least in my opinion).
For the sake of argument: Would you consider using a Will Defense and a Fortitude Defense as opposed to saves? 4th Edition utilized a similar method and Star Wars SE (which seems to be rather well-liked in the GITP community) makes use of it as well.

Zelkon
2013-04-20, 09:55 PM
Another 4e innovation: adding STR or CON to Fort, DEX or INT to Relfex, and WIS and CHA to Will. Works great.

Ziegander
2013-04-20, 10:04 PM
Interesting... Usually I'm content lurking but I'm far too intrigued.
I know, at least in my circles, people tend to shy away from 4th edition's concepts as if they were poison however the 1/2th HD + relevant stat was one of the stronger points (at least in my opinion).
For the sake of argument: Would you consider using a Will Defense and a Fortitude Defense as opposed to saves? 4th Edition utilized a similar method and Star Wars SE (which seems to be rather well-liked in the GITP community) makes use of it as well.

I would consider it. However, one of things I liked least about 4e was that, if the attack hit you, you were automatically effected by riders such as poison, paralysis, knock-down, confusion, fear, etc. I would like to avoid such outcomes as much as possible. A minor thing, but I will probably just call them Constitution and Willpower checks, rather than saves.


Another 4e innovation: adding STR or CON to Fort, DEX or INT to Relfex, and WIS and CHA to Will. Works great.

With the new ability scores and how they work, something like that doesn't work (and isn't necessary). Now all of the ability scores are important for defenses and a specialized character is (on the most basic level) no stronger than a well-rounded one. See the changelog to get a better feel for how Fort/Ref/Will now work.

Just to Browse
2013-04-20, 10:28 PM
On d20 Bonuses
I disagree with your not-falling-off-the-RNG idea, on two premeses:

Firstly, higher levels means more options. As you rise in level, if you remain competent at all things, you have progressively worse option paralysis. If characters fall off the RNG in certain areas, you have a "soft" loss (as opposed to a hard loss, like "wizards can't use spears") which can significantly narrow down options without making the characters feel like they're in a video game (which a hard loss would do).

Secondly, huge differential bonuses does well to make players feel distinct. Under a system where the wizard and barbarian are so tightly restricted that you can't pull either off the RNG (meaning the total of bonuses and penalties for either cannot exceed 10 at any given level), the average quick-rolled characters will feel rather homogeneous, which generally makes them boring. Out of all the complaints about 4th edition, homogeneity = boredom is the one I hear the most, and I really think a universal chassis goes too far in that direction.

On Skill Ranks
This seems like a step in the opposite direction. Currently, we have a system where you can add 1 at every level to some skill, or 1 at every other level. You have a system where you can add 2 at every 4th level, which is literally already under the previous system but with half the resolution. I don't see any reason we should make skill ranks clunkier than they already are--just label certain DCs are "heroic" or "novice" or what have you.

On Number Scaling
Unless there are a whole lot of new numbers to pick up from abilities and whatnot, I really don't think scaling from levels 1 to 20 should grant only half an RNG. That means police officers (trained at level 1) are still a reliable threat against superheroes and supervillains an order of magnitude above them in level, and that really bothers me (reminiscent of the harsh scaling restrictions of 5e). If anything, I think each chassis should scale faster, that way you don't need to hand out clumps of tiny bonuses like magic items or ability score boosts.

Feats
Either they should be bigger or they should come more often. Regardless of which we pick, they need to have much better quality control because they work as the glue that keeps things together.

Mind Dice
I don't know if this was discussed in thread two, but if that means "hit dice for the purposes of things involving your mind" it should not exist. Hit Dice is already an confusing name for level, we shouldn't have to add yet another term to that.

Ziegander
2013-04-20, 11:05 PM
On d20 Bonuses
Firstly, higher levels means more options. As you rise in level, if you remain competent at all things, you have progressively worse option paralysis. If characters fall off the RNG in certain areas, you have a "soft" loss (as opposed to a hard loss, like "wizards can't use spears") which can significantly narrow down options without making the characters feel like they're in a video game (which a hard loss would do).

This is just a personal preference for me, but I would rather design a game where there are as few restrictions to character build options as possible, so this part is a feature to me not a bug.


Secondly, huge differential bonuses does well to make players feel distinct. Under a system where the wizard and barbarian are so tightly restricted that you can't pull either off the RNG (meaning the total of bonuses and penalties for either cannot exceed 10 at any given level), the average quick-rolled characters will feel rather homogeneous, which generally makes them boring. Out of all the complaints about 4th edition, homogeneity = boredom is the one I hear the most, and I really think a universal chassis goes too far in that direction.

Sure, but that "distinctness" can be very destructive to game balance. We'll touch more on this later, but for now let me just add that I would much rather characters feel distinct because of the different things they do rather than because of night and day differences in their raw numbers.


On Skill Ranks
This seems like a step in the opposite direction. Currently, we have a system where you can add 1 at every level to some skill, or 1 at every other level. You have a system where you can add 2 at every 4th level, which is literally already under the previous system but with half the resolution. I don't see any reason we should make skill ranks clunkier than they already are--just label certain DCs are "heroic" or "novice" or what have you.

1 rank every level is considered by many to be a piddly little thing that is annoying to worry over tracking. Note that under my proposed system rank will also mean access to things like Skill Tricks or Maneuvers.

As far as being clunkier, I definitely don't see that. Less things to keep track of is less clunk. Now labeling DCs appropriate to their Tier? That I would certainly do (also, perhaps Heroic is a better name for the Tier than Paragon).


On Number Scaling
[...]
If anything, I think each chassis should scale faster, that way you don't need to hand out clumps of tiny bonuses like magic items or ability score boosts.

See, this is where that "distinctness" you were talking about gets destructive. Faster scaling is precisely why clumps of magic items are needed by D&D 3.5 characters in the first place, to shore up their sorely lagging numbers as much as they possibly can. Those that they can't get dropped off the RNG. Having more extreme differences between characters in basic numbers for the sake of "distinctness" creates the Christmas Tree Effect almost entirely on its own.

I do note your misgivings on rookie police officers vs superheroes, however. It will certainly be something to keep an eye on as design goes forward.


Feats
Either they should be bigger or they should come more often. Regardless of which we pick, they need to have much better quality control because they work as the glue that keeps things together.

Or they don't even have to exist at all, really. I definitely agree that if they are coming only five times per character (at 3rd, 7th, 11th, etc) that they need to be bigger and more important. And I also wish to include a part of character generation that is something like Perks (to reference Fallout and Skyrim).


Mind Dice
I don't know if this was discussed in thread two, but if that means "hit dice for the purposes of things involving your mind" it should not exist. Hit Dice is already an confusing name for level, we shouldn't have to add yet another term to that.

Mind Dice would help to determine a character's mind points, which, to quote the changelog, "are useful for mitigating mental manipulation and debilitating stress but also as a resource for magic-based powers." They are the MP to go with HP that were long a staple of your old, traditional RPGs for decades. My thoughts on them include such things as psychic and "nonlethal" or stress damage as well as something like the Taint subsystem from Heroes of Horror and even 5e principles like MP thresholds required to affect a creature with certain mental effects such as Charm, Confusion, etc.

As far as "a confusing name for level" is concerned, well, it would be my intention to decouple Hit Dice (and Mind Dice as well for that matter) from Creature Level. They would no longer be interchangeable. For most PCs they would be equal, but it would certainly be possible for a creature to have less or more HD than its Level. A creature could have 20 HD and still be a Level 10 creature with only +5 to d20 rolls but lots of hit points.

Blightedmarsh
2013-04-20, 11:49 PM
I like degrees of success. So for example:

Every degree of success you beat your to hit roll you get a cumulative bonus to the damage, or perhaps more hits depending on the attack (power attack V flurry of blows) .

For every degree of failure you fail a save by the effect is worse.

If we say that 1 and 20 are still auto success/failure then if only a 20 would do it would scrape success by 1 degree. If you can only fail with a 1 then a roll of a 1 would be a near miss.


I never really got behind the idea of hit die; they never made sense to me as is. I propose that racial hitdie replace class based ones, possibly with class based rider on top of that. Constitution bonus + Racial hitdie + class rider.

I also propose that when you heal lost hitdie you reroll them.

Kobald D6
Goblin 2D3
Hobgoblin D8
Orc 2D4
Ogre D12
Troll 2D6



I think that certain feat chains should be amalgamated in some way.

Two weapon fighting: For example say if you take TWF at level one it will gradually improve as you level without you having to invest further character resources. I feel that this would make certain feat intensive styles more viable.


Gish:

I think that gishes should be built in at the ground floor. That the various class features should have a far greater level of compatibility. For example Psionics is equivalent to Invocations is equivalent to magic spells for the purposes of prerequisites.

erikun
2013-04-21, 12:36 AM
I am just running across this thread now, so this is my first comment. I hope talking about re-treaded ground isn't a problem here.


My first note is that Strength-to-hit was based off the idea that AC was the prevention of damage to a target. Thus, THAC0 was not the ability to hit a target but the ability to damage a target, and Strength was involved with punching through armor/hide/shield blocks/parrys.

Redefining the "to hit" roll to actually mean making contact rather than causing damage means a pretty big redefinition of the whole system. Your "AC" actually becomes a dodge or evasion stat, armor becomes a reduction of damage (counter to Strength) and you'll end up needing to rethink how damage works entirely.


My second note is that "Charisma" probably needs a new term. The connection between D&D3's "force of personality" and actual charisma. The current ability is really more something like Presence or Determination than anything else. (I'd be inclined to say willpower, but you are already using that term elsewhere.)


Third, degrees of success/failure don't work that well on flat rolls. They look far better with dice pools. I wouldn't recommend a degree of success on a d20, but it might be an interesting idea for damage rolls.


I generally like the idea of using skills for weapons and combat. However, D&D has generally incorportated weapon "skills" automatically into the leveling system so as to prevent a combat/noncombat conflict of choices. A large part (a LARGE part) of D&D ends up being about combat, and when a player is asked to choose between sword proficiency and underwater basket-weaving, the latter tends to become ignored, even when relevant.

Novice-Legend weapon grades sound like a good idea, although perhaps not in the same category as non-combat skill grades. Perhaps use something like AD&D2 did with a weapon skill/nonweapon skill split, or grant them automatically. I kind of like the idea of a weapon/nonweapon split, because this means an intelligent fighter would have skills in far more weapons.


I will stay out of the MP discussion until I see it used for something. Being able to "spend" MP to solve situations like confusion sound interesting, but it feels somewhat reminisce of the old 3.0 Psionics system where you needed to spend PP for the "benefit" of being psychic. You could spend PP so frequently that you didn't have much left to actually use psionic powers.

nonsi
2013-04-21, 01:12 AM
Skill Ranks
(also, perhaps Heroic is a better name for the Tier than Paragon).

You're supposed to be heroic by 6th level, not 13th.
I suggest sticking with "Paragon" or finding another term.




Feats
Or they don't even have to exist at all, really. I definitely agree that if they are coming only five times per character (at 3rd, 7th, 11th, etc) that they need to be bigger and more important. And I also wish to include a part of character generation that is something like Perks (to reference Fallout and Skyrim).

Feats are the only solid means for 3.Xe characters of gaining class-disassociated features (I'm guessing this new system is not gonna have PrCs... I very much hope not).
Are you really sure you want to take those out of the equation ?




Mind Dice would help to determine a character's mind points, which, to quote the changelog, "are useful for mitigating mental manipulation and debilitating stress but also as a resource for magic-based powers." They are the MP to go with HP that were long a staple of your old, traditional RPGs for decades. My thoughts on them include such things as psychic and "nonlethal" or stress damage as well as something like the Taint subsystem from Heroes of Horror and even 5e principles like MP thresholds required to affect a creature with certain mental effects such as Charm, Confusion, etc.

You already have DC vs. Willpower.
1. Why do you feel the need to add another level of complexity ?
2. Will that not make mental manipulation attempts eventually worthless ?
3. How do you intend to combine MPs into mental attacks without making things clunky ?
4. How will this affect conditions ?




As far as "a confusing name for level" is concerned, well, it would be my intention to decouple Hit Dice (and Mind Dice as well for that matter) from Creature Level. They would no longer be interchangeable. For most PCs they would be equal, but it would certainly be possible for a creature to have less or more HD than its Level. A creature could have 20 HD and still be a Level 10 creature with only +5 to d20 rolls but lots of hit points.

In theory, this makes a lot of sense.
You'll need to handle that one with care.




Also, since we've come to the point where skills are brought into the discussion, how do you Calibrate Your Expectations (http://thealexandrian.net/wordpress/587/roleplaying-games/dd-calibrating-your-expectations) ?


Lastly, what are your intentions regarding conditions ? (the one thing 3.5 did right)

Just to Browse
2013-04-21, 01:33 AM
This is just a personal preference for me, but I would rather design a game where there are as few restrictions to character build options as possible, so this part is a feature to me not a bug."Few restrictions to character builds" does not equate to "Few restrictions in the middle of a fight". Builds run off character resources, so if you invest character resources into something, you will stay on the RNG. That is the same regardless of the system. The difference is that when you don't invest character resources, and I think not investing means it's OK to fall off the RNG (for the reasons I listed).


Sure, but that "distinctness" can be very destructive to game balance. We'll touch more on this later, but for now let me just add that I would much rather characters feel distinct because of the different things they do rather than because of night and day differences in their raw numbers.I don't see how it can be destructive. For example (and this is a theory taken to the far reaches of hyperbole), let's say that the game is such that the specialized warrior can hit a wizard who puts nothing into defense 95% of the time for 80% of his HP. If the wizard hasn't put anything into defense, then he's putting that in offense and he should be able to chunk the fighter right back 95% of the time for 80% of the fighter's HP. Game balance is preservable with RNG modification because game balance hinges on bonus symmetry, not specific bonus locations. Characters can certainly feel different in the things they do, but at the very core of things (make an attack roll -> deal damage) different characters need to perform significantly different or else each time you play feels like a re-do of the same old thing.


1 rank every level is considered by many to be a piddly little thing that is annoying to worry over tracking. Note that under my proposed system rank will also mean access to things like Skill Tricks or Maneuvers.

As far as being clunkier, I definitely don't see that. Less things to keep track of is less clunk. Now labeling DCs appropriate to their Tier? That I would certainly do (also, perhaps Heroic is a better name for the Tier than Paragon).This system is even more piddly (+2 every four levels is lower than in D&D 3.5) and also more annoying to track (you can only gain bonuses at certain levels). It's definitely clunkier, because in addition to memorizing the pattern at which skills show up, I also have to memorize the pattern that they provide benefits at, and I need to memorize their names for reference with skill tricks. Blag.

Skill tricks and maneuvers being linked to skill ranks is a good idea, but the system can be kept simpler by simply putting rank minimums on different skill tricks. It can have exactly the same resolution you want, exactly the same names, but it will be neater and it'll make the RNG advancement nicer.


See, this is where that "distinctness" you were talking about gets destructive. Faster scaling is precisely why clumps of magic items are needed by D&D 3.5 characters in the first place, to shore up their sorely lagging numbers as much as they possibly can. Those that they can't get dropped off the RNG. Having more extreme differences between characters in basic numbers for the sake of "distinctness" creates the Christmas Tree Effect almost entirely on its own.That's incorrect. The magic items are necessary because the abilities that the characters specialize in still aren't high enough. When I roll characters, I get a +1 weapon when I'm specializing in attacking things and not when I'm dropping spells. As a character, my defense and initiative can always be higher so I always add things to them, and meanwhile I don't add bonuses to things that don't matter like Craft (Basketweaving) which I only have one rank in. The christmas tree effect is due to the opposite problem to which you have described, namely characters need bigger benefits to face on-par opposition.

There's even a Races of War article about this. Letting people drop off the RNG in certain places doesn't do this at all, because no one will specialize in something they don't feel is important.


I do note your misgivings on rookie police officers vs superheroes, however. It will certainly be something to keep an eye on as design goes forward.Thankyoosir.


Or they don't even have to exist at all, really. I definitely agree that if they are coming only five times per character (at 3rd, 7th, 11th, etc) that they need to be bigger and more important. And I also wish to include a part of character generation that is something like Perks (to reference Fallout and Skyrim).You could call them whatever you'd like. I'd recommend calling them "Feats" at least for the duration of the forum discussion, that way people have an immediate association as to what the topic is about.

I wouldn't mind a tighter-reigned RNG for BAB, AC, DC's, etc. that gives you bonus tricks much like the ability scores.


Mind Dice would help to determine a character's mind points, which, to quote the changelog, "are useful for mitigating mental manipulation and debilitating stress but also as a resource for magic-based powers." They are the MP to go with HP that were long a staple of your old, traditional RPGs for decades. My thoughts on them include such things as psychic and "nonlethal" or stress damage as well as something like the Taint subsystem from Heroes of Horror and even 5e principles like MP thresholds required to affect a creature with certain mental effects such as Charm, Confusion, etc.So "Mind Dice" are the willpower stat? I thought the willpower stat was already determined?

*reads a third time*

OH MIND POINTS! Goodness, I'm terrible at reading.

Well, this also bleeds into classes, but I recommend rolling Mind Dice and Hit Dice into one thing, so that tough heroes are always tough and players (and DMs!) don't have to track yet another resource in combat. I hate having to track the penalties and HP on groups of 5 monsters in a fight, don't make me track 50% more stuff in every combat.

Instead, Con and Wil could be passive mitigation tools, like subtraction thresholds (e.g. damage that deals less than Con/2 is ignored, spells that cost less than Wil/2 are free, something like that). I'd honestly be in favor of pitching Wil and Con completely, but that appears to not be changing.


[snip]They would no longer be interchangeable.[snip]
I'm totally cool with this.

erikun
2013-04-21, 01:54 AM
Also, since we've come to the point where skills are brought into the discussion, how do you Calibrate Your Expectations (http://thealexandrian.net/wordpress/587/roleplaying-games/dd-calibrating-your-expectations) ?
This makes an interesting point, and one that I would like to address.

A lot of game designs I've seen use small bonuses like Ziegander is suggesting, in order to "keep the numbers low". However, it doesn't really keep the numbers low at all - it just determines how the abilities will scale to the numbers presented. Mathematically, there is little difference between a 40th level character in this system and a 20th level character in D&D. Or, alternatively, a 20th level character in this system and a 10th level D&D character.

This is kind of important, because what a character could reasonably accomplish on a d20 depends on their bonuses. What abilities are you planning on handing out at 10th level? At 20th? If a character can fly and spit fireballs (10th level, +16 rolls) but is still threatened by a pair of common thugs (1st level, +7 rolls) then that is something you'd strongly want to consider. When your 10th level olympic athlete gets outperformed by a 1st level prodigy a significant amount of the time, then they won't necessarily feel very "high level".

And before someone says "But the character is a prodigy!" there are plenty of creatures that qualify for a 20-stat without feeling that amazing. Your 10th level barbarian getting routinely out-muscled by first level orcs or gnolls is not going to feel too impressive.

Just to Browse
2013-04-21, 02:33 AM
This is kind of important, because what a character could reasonably accomplish on a d20 depends on their bonuses. What abilities are you planning on handing out at 10th level? At 20th? If a character can fly and spit fireballs (10th level, +16 rolls) but is still threatened by a pair of common thugs (1st level, +7 rolls) then that is something you'd strongly want to consider. When your 10th level olympic athlete gets outperformed by a 1st level prodigy a significant amount of the time, then they won't necessarily feel very "high level".

And before someone says "But the character is a prodigy!" there are plenty of creatures that qualify for a 20-stat without feeling that amazing. Your 10th level barbarian getting routinely out-muscled by first level orcs or gnolls is not going to feel too impressive.

I cannot agree with this enough. This is my biggest problem with just about every d20 game I've ever played.

Ninjadeadbeard
2013-04-21, 04:31 AM
Wait, so...are there Chassis at all? It seems like Z's saying all characters simply add their character level to D20 rolls, as well as their related ability modifier and then a bonus depending on their level's Tier.

I'm probably reading that wrong, but I want it spelled out real quick for people like me who get confused by percentages :smalltongue:. Also, if that is the case, then "Feats" would need to be expanded (numerically as well) to include at least some of the traditional Class Features, like Sneak Attacks, Favored Enemy and Spell Levels.

I would also like to submit the idea that we divorce Skill Points from Class and leave it up to the ability score. A smart Warrior is going to be more "Skillful" than a thuggish Rogue, after all.

Morty
2013-04-21, 08:04 AM
I'm just going to make a note about Hit Dice. Namely, I don't think that the automatic increase in Hit Points every level makes any real sense. Not only that, but it leads to HP inflation. I think increasing your Hit Points should require investment just like everything else.

In general, I'm in favour of higher power levels being expressed through new, previously unavailable options rather than just numbers. It's more interesting and easier to keep in check. Number inflation tends to go off the rails really quickly, as 3.5 D&D, oWoD and Exalted 2e show.

Ziegander
2013-04-21, 10:29 AM
You're supposed to be heroic by 6th level, not 13th.
I suggest sticking with "Paragon" or finding another term.

Good point.


Feats are the only solid means for 3.Xe characters of gaining class-disassociated features (I'm guessing this new system is not gonna have PrCs... I very much hope not).
Are you really sure you want to take those out of the equation ?

I never said I want to take them out of the equation. I fact, I thought I'd said the opposite. What I meant was that they could be taken out. I still want some sort of class-disassociated advancement options.


"Few restrictions to character builds" does not equate to "Few restrictions in the middle of a fight". Builds run off character resources, so if you invest character resources into something, you will stay on the RNG. That is the same regardless of the system. The difference is that when you don't invest character resources, and I think not investing means it's OK to fall off the RNG (for the reasons I listed).

Can you explain this again, in a different way? I'm not following you. I understand there's a difference in build options vs in-play options. Having in-play options naturally "fall off the RNG" or otherwise become unviable in game is a good way to limit in-play option paralysis. I'd rather not use that same metric to limit out-of-play//off-screen build options.


I don't see how it can be destructive.

That's because you and are I looking at two different things it seems.


For example (and this is a theory taken to the far reaches of hyperbole), let's say that the game is such that the specialized warrior can hit a wizard who puts nothing into defense 95% of the time for 80% of his HP. If the wizard hasn't put anything into defense, then he's putting that in offense and he should be able to chunk the fighter right back 95% of the time for 80% of the fighter's HP. Game balance is preservable with RNG modification because game balance hinges on bonus symmetry, not specific bonus locations.

Sure, that specific scenario is balanced, but I'm not talking about PvP. I'm talking about Players (the plural is significant) vs The Environment and Players vs Monsters. What becomes destructive is when only certain characters can possibly hope to contribute in specific encounters. Moreover, in combat, too-rapid scaling can lead to characters who can't possibly defend themselves against certain level-appropriate attacks (Fighter vs Mind Rape or Rogue vs Poison, etc). Keeping the numbers tighter means fewer characters get left behind.


This system is even more piddly (+2 every four levels is lower than in D&D 3.5) and also more annoying to track (you can only gain bonuses at certain levels). It's definitely clunkier, because in addition to memorizing the pattern at which skills show up, I also have to memorize the pattern that they provide benefits at, and I need to memorize their names for reference with skill tricks. Blag.

Personally I would rather just tally 1-5 +2 bonuses than tally +1 every level for 20 levels. That seems less clunky to me. I can sort of see how you think it's "annoying" to track the tiers, but I'm giving thought into baking them more completely into the system so it wouldn't become a thing that's too difficult to remember. If it's a major part of the game, that is. And while it's true, you can only increase the bonus to the d20 roll every few levels you can buy up proficiency in other skills at any level OR you can purchase skill tricks or maneuvers or whathaveyou.


Skill tricks and maneuvers being linked to skill ranks is a good idea, but the system can be kept simpler by simply putting rank minimums on different skill tricks. It can have exactly the same resolution you want, exactly the same names, but it will be neater and it'll make the RNG advancement nicer.

I see the merit in this as well, but I disagree that it would make the RNG advancement nicer. At +1/level, that's eventually a full 10 points on the RNG higher than my proposal. It means, again, that many characters fall completely off the RNG after a few levels. I'm trying to err on the side of caution (and also to make rank more significant in those early levels).


That's incorrect. The magic items are necessary because the abilities that the characters specialize in still aren't high enough. When I roll characters, I get a +1 weapon when I'm specializing in attacking things and not when I'm dropping spells. As a character, my defense and initiative can always be higher so I always add things to them, and meanwhile I don't add bonuses to things that don't matter like Craft (Basketweaving) which I only have one rank in. The christmas tree effect is due to the opposite problem to which you have described, namely characters need bigger benefits to face on-par opposition.

There's even a Races of War article about this. Letting people drop off the RNG in certain places doesn't do this at all, because no one will specialize in something they don't feel is important.

Okay, so you have a point, but so do I. I'm not incorrect. BOTH issues together force the christmas tree issue. I don't understand how you're failing to see that. No, the Wizard isn't (probably isn't) going to specialize in increases his attack rolls in D&D 3.5 because they have absolutely no significance to him whatsoever. No, no one is going to specialize in the Profession skill because it doesn't do anything. But there ARE things that all characters have to invest in that aren't considered "specialties" in order to not get steamrolled by level-appropriate challenges. Armor Class, Fortitude saves (for non-Warriors), Will saves (for non-Casters), and Ability Scores for example. These aren't specialties (not for most characters anyway) and yet, without playing an arms race to increase them, you still lose the game.


You could call them whatever you'd like. I'd recommend calling them "Feats" at least for the duration of the forum discussion, that way people have an immediate association as to what the topic is about.

Oh, certainly.


You already have DC vs. Willpower.
1. Why do you feel the need to add another level of complexity ?
2. Will that not make mental manipulation attempts eventually worthless ?
3. How do you intend to combine MPs into mental attacks without making things clunky ?
4. How will this affect conditions ?


Well, this also bleeds into classes, but I recommend rolling Mind Dice and Hit Dice into one thing, so that tough heroes are always tough and players (and DMs!) don't have to track yet another resource in combat. I hate having to track the penalties and HP on groups of 5 monsters in a fight, don't make me track 50% more stuff in every combat.

Instead, Con and Wil could be passive mitigation tools, like subtraction thresholds (e.g. damage that deals less than Con/2 is ignored, spells that cost less than Wil/2 are free, something like that). I'd honestly be in favor of pitching Wil and Con completely, but that appears to not be changing.

Mind Dice and MP are controversial. I kinda figured they would be. Let me try to more clearly outline what I expect them to do:


1) They are the primary resource for Clerics, Druids, Wizards, etc. They function in this respect similarly to spell points; however I may also borrow some of the concepts from here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=227916).

2) Like Hit Dice, the size of Mind Dice may vary, from class to class and all classes get them. Even the Fighter with no (or very few) magical/supernatural powers gets a d4 MD and may find some ways to spend his points as a resource without resorting to spellcasting.

3) MP are important to all characters however even without taking them into account as a resource. MP track non-lethal damage, for example, and attacks like Sleep and Color Spray can deal psychic damage.

4) Furthermore, mind-affecting abilities are more or less effective against creatures based on how many of their MP are remaining. Perhaps using a simple "Bloodied" style mechanic based on less than half and more than half, or perhaps dividing MP into fourths and gradating effects that way. This could be as simple as not allowing a save if the creature has less than half its MP or offering a reduced effect if the creature has more than half its MP, or other more complicated methods. This sort of effect scaling could also be used for physical attacks and effects with HP.

5) So, casters have higher MD than non-casters and more MP than non-casters. This naturally makes them more resistant to mental attack. However, they must also spend the MP to use their primary class features bringing them back into balance in that respect with non-casters (hopefully).


A lot of game designs I've seen use small bonuses like Ziegander is suggesting, in order to "keep the numbers low".

Note, I'm not doing any of this to "keep the numbers low." That's not a priority it's just a side effect. The point is to keep the numbers on the RNG. There shouldn't be a situation where two 20th level characters make the same roll but one of them has a +1 bonus and the other has a +44 bonus. I'd like to work the math out so that the biggest difference in success rate between two characters is 70-75% so that unspecialized Player A can have a 25% chance to succeed while specialized Player B can have a 95-100% chance.


However, it doesn't really keep the numbers low at all - it just determines how the abilities will scale to the numbers presented. Mathematically, there is little difference between a 40th level character in this system and a 20th level character in D&D. Or, alternatively, a 20th level character in this system and a 10th level D&D character.

This is kind of important, because what a character could reasonably accomplish on a d20 depends on their bonuses. What abilities are you planning on handing out at 10th level? At 20th? If a character can fly and spit fireballs (10th level, +16 rolls) but is still threatened by a pair of common thugs (1st level, +7 rolls) then that is something you'd strongly want to consider.

Comparing to D&D at this stage is pretty irrelevant since we're just talking about The Chassis and the expectation from here on out seems to be that little will remain the same. Also, do you not think that if you can fly and breath fire between 1st and 10th level that you will continue to threatened by creatures that cannot fly or breath fire? Wouldn't you expect that you'll also be capable of doing other things besides fly and breathe fire that those 1st level creatures also can't do. Feeling powerful should come from having more powers. Not from having massively bigger numbers. Sure, bigger numbers are a part of advancement, but they shouldn't be the most important part by a long shot.


I'm just going to make a note about Hit Dice. Namely, I don't think that the automatic increase in Hit Points every level makes any real sense. Not only that, but it leads to HP inflation. I think increasing your Hit Points should require investment just like everything else.

I would have no problem whatsoever in requiring some investment to increase HP. Hit Dice were always a little clunky and the automatic HP increases of 4e never really dealt with the issue satisfactorily either.

Something I'd considered was limiting HD and MD based on Constitution and Willpower modifier. So, while a class might have d10 HD and d6 MD, you only get one per level until you meet the associated modifier. So a 10th level character with Constitution 18 and Willpower 14 has only a baseline of 4d10 (+16) HP and 2d6 (+4) MP. Toughness and similar options could increase those numbers. But that's just a thought.


In general, I'm in favour of higher power levels being expressed through new, previously unavailable options rather than just numbers. It's more interesting and easier to keep in check. Number inflation tends to go off the rails really quickly, as 3.5 D&D, oWoD and Exalted 2e show.

Exactly. I'm still not 100% sold on the "ability modifiers cap at +5" rule, but I think it's got enough going for it that it's worth exploring. I want to move forward with a really tight RNG, at least at first, to see if I can still design a game that feels right with those limitations. If not, well I can always open things up some more and try again.

erikun
2013-04-21, 01:38 PM
Note, I'm not doing any of this to "keep the numbers low." That's not a priority it's just a side effect. The point is to keep the numbers on the RNG. There shouldn't be a situation where two 20th level characters make the same roll but one of them has a +1 bonus and the other has a +44 bonus. I'd like to work the math out so that the biggest difference in success rate between two characters is 70-75% so that unspecialized Player A can have a 25% chance to succeed while specialized Player B can have a 95-100% chance.
Well the first thing I notice is that the d20 Rolls (bonuses) category does not factor in at all when comparing two equal-level characters. The greatest variance at 20th level is a twenty point spread, from +5 to +25, based entirely on ability score and skill rank. The bonuses to d20 rolls based on level are entirely for the purposes of determining the change in difficulty when comparing levels. D&D3 roughly considered +4 (four levels higher) to be about doubling a challange. This system would consider the equilivant to be eight levels higher.


Comparing to D&D at this stage is pretty irrelevant since we're just talking about The Chassis and the expectation from here on out seems to be that little will remain the same. Also, do you not think that if you can fly and breath fire between 1st and 10th level that you will continue to threatened by creatures that cannot fly or breath fire? Wouldn't you expect that you'll also be capable of doing other things besides fly and breathe fire that those 1st level creatures also can't do. Feeling powerful should come from having more powers. Not from having massively bigger numbers. Sure, bigger numbers are a part of advancement, but they shouldn't be the most important part by a long shot.
The comparison to D&D is because D&D is a completed system and we can see how various parts of it work together and interact; it can sometimes be difficult to see how different parts of an incomplete system might work together, especially with parts that haven't even been written.

Also, I note that a system where a 1st level character is a credible threat to a higher-level opponent is a lot different than a system where a 1st level character is nothing more than a speedbump. Neither is wrong, or even bad, with using one or the other. You'd want to be aware of it, though, to at least ensure you aren't giving the wrong impression to players of the sort of game you are making.

Vadskye
2013-04-21, 02:15 PM
I completely disagree with your assessment of the nature of randomness. It is okay - even desirable - to have great discrepancies between the power of characters in specific areas. If a barbarian chieftan from a savage tribe tries to play chess with a wizard, the wizard should be disappointed if he loses more than a few pieces.

By the same token, if a powerful barbarian wants to walk up to a commoner or some sissy wizard and kick him in the nuts, then by Crom those nuts will be kicked.

nonsi
2013-04-21, 02:26 PM
4) Furthermore, mind-affecting abilities are more or less effective against creatures based on how many of their MP are remaining. Perhaps using a simple "Bloodied" style mechanic based on less than half and more than half, or perhaps dividing MP into fourths and gradating effects that way. This could be as simple as not allowing a save if the creature has less than half its MP or offering a reduced effect if the creature has more than half its MP, or other more complicated methods. This sort of effect scaling could also be used for physical attacks and effects with HP.


Complicated is bad (reminder: grappling rules).
Always KISS whenever humanly possible.

Realms of Chaos
2013-04-21, 04:13 PM
Hmmm... has anyone considered a level discrepancy bonus yet? Not necessarily using that name, of course, but if you need to keep numbers tight against level appropriate challenges and others are complaining that the gap between high level and low level bonuses is too small, why not give a bonus (or a penalty) for level inappropriate challenges so that a level 1 party will NEVER defeat a dragon and a a level 10 knight will NEVER lose at arm wrestling to a peasant?

If you want hordes of minions to remain a "viable" threat, maybe have large group sizes mitigate or destroy the penalty to represent the exhaustion of a battle of attrition and the difficulty of keeping track of large numbers of foes.

Morty
2013-04-21, 04:35 PM
I would have no problem whatsoever in requiring some investment to increase HP. Hit Dice were always a little clunky and the automatic HP increases of 4e never really dealt with the issue satisfactorily either.

Something I'd considered was limiting HD and MD based on Constitution and Willpower modifier. So, while a class might have d10 HD and d6 MD, you only get one per level until you meet the associated modifier. So a 10th level character with Constitution 18 and Willpower 14 has only a baseline of 4d10 (+16) HP and 2d6 (+4) MP. Toughness and similar options could increase those numbers. But that's just a thought.

That would solve some problems, I suppose. Hit points would be tied to your attributes more than your level.

Mind you, another problem with hit dice is their randomness. One thing 4e's approach to HP did fix was that characters had consistent HP values and that your HP didn't potentially double as you hit level 2.


Complicated is bad (reminder: grappling rules).
Always KISS whenever humanly possible.

Just because there's one system that's complicated and all-around terrible doesn't mean that all complexity is bad.

Grod_The_Giant
2013-04-21, 06:12 PM
Hmmm... has anyone considered a level discrepancy bonus yet? Not necessarily using that name, of course, but if you need to keep numbers tight against level appropriate challenges and others are complaining that the gap between high level and low level bonuses is too small, why not give a bonus (or a penalty) for level inappropriate challenges so that a level 1 party will NEVER defeat a dragon and a a level 10 knight will NEVER lose at arm wrestling to a peasant?

If you want hordes of minions to remain a "viable" threat, maybe have large group sizes mitigate or destroy the penalty to represent the exhaustion of a battle of attrition and the difficulty of keeping track of large numbers of foes.
My homebrew system uses something similar (I call it "Scale"). A basic human does not have to roll to pick up a milk carton, because the Scale of his strength is higher. Similarly, he cannot pick up a car, no matter how well he rolls, because the Scale of his strength is too low.

Ziegander, I can't tell how skills would work under this system. Could you explain?

Just to Browse
2013-04-21, 06:12 PM
I'd say that, in a game like D&D (which this is effectively a rewrite for, so it should follow similar themes) the lowest players are fighting wolves and rats and the strongest players are battling gods or at least the avatars of gods.

Thus, at the very least, even the lowest players should be at least a full RNG away from the highest even if the high players fail to specialize and the low players specialize as hard as they can. So even if bonuses get hard caps at every given level, they should still scale much faster than they do now.

PairO'Dice Lost
2013-04-21, 10:16 PM
Something else to note is that, with our change of how ability modifiers work, capping at a max bonus of +5, we can know that between the best and worst at any task, characters will have a minimum of a +0 bonus (1st level, Non-Proficient, with a -5 ability penalty) and a maximum of a +25 bonus (20th level, Legend with a +5 ability bonus). Now, that's a difference of 125% success rate that is only mitigated by character level by a maximum of 25%, which can still put characters off the RNG relying on 1s or 20s, but it's more predictable and it's only like that in the most extreme of cases.

I believe you mean characters have a minimum of -5 with +0 from level, +0 from non-proficiency, and -5 from stats, making the maximum difference +30 rather than +25, unless I overlooked something?


I'm just going to make a note about Hit Dice. Namely, I don't think that the automatic increase in Hit Points every level makes any real sense. Not only that, but it leads to HP inflation. I think increasing your Hit Points should require investment just like everything else.

One of the points of a class-based system is that everything advances to some extent as opposed to letting players buy up one thing while totally neglecting another. Hit points should definitely increase automatically with level like everything else, I feel, for consistency's sake and because the problem of a character who is too weak at a given level because he doesn't invest in HP is just as bad as one who doesn't invest in a skill.

That doesn't mean they have to increase at the same rate, though. In 1e you got HD up to name level and then 1 HP per level after that. I think doing something like that, where you have a baseline of X HP per level but also get HD at certain intervals and can buy HD if you're a barbarian or take Toughness or whatever, would work well. That also helps solve the "housecat vs. wizard" problem of challenges that should be below CR 1 being a threat due to numbers not being able to physically get any smaller: if such critters didn't get HD while all PCs started off with HD and creature damage was recalibrated to assume no-HD opponents, that would fix that issue nicely.


I'd say that, in a game like D&D (which this is effectively a rewrite for, so it should follow similar themes) the lowest players are fighting wolves and rats and the strongest players are battling gods or at least the avatars of gods.

Thus, at the very least, even the lowest players should be at least a full RNG away from the highest even if the high players fail to specialize and the low players specialize as hard as they can. So even if bonuses get hard caps at every given level, they should still scale much faster than they do now.

I disagree that a high-level character who invests zero resources in something should be a full RNG above a low-level expert; levels make you better all around, certainly, but a low-Str wizard shouldn't necessarily be able to beat a 1st-level duelist-spec warblade in a swordfight just because they're about 10 levels apart. There should definitely be a noticeable and significant gap, though, maybe 10-15 points or so with a large gap, so the higher level amateur does stand a good chance against the low-level expert.

Bezzerker
2013-04-21, 10:16 PM
For the skill tiers, I would suggest renaming "Expert" to "Journeyman". This would smooth out the progression naming-wise; as right now a character has what seems to be a large jump in proficiency at fifth level, but a much smaller jump at every other skill increase. It's mostly just a perceptual difference, but one that I feel is easily addressed without any issues.

As for Fighters using MP, I would think the skills that would use them would be basically adrenaline-fueled, allowing a Fighter to utilize the boosted physical capabilities granted in a tactical manner.

Grod_The_Giant
2013-04-21, 10:32 PM
"Action Points" would, perhaps, be a better name for some universal ability fuel.

Pyromancer999
2013-04-21, 10:32 PM
Hmm....not sure of how well I can comment on how well the current chassis idea is, but one thing I think would be interesting to implement would be one class concept from Monte Cook's Iron Heroes.

Iron Heroes is a d20 variant that's very low on magic, but one thing I like that was implemented was a scaling AC bonus. Every class had a scaling AC bonus, making it so that everyone had improved defenses that scaled with level. I think this would be a pretty good thing to implement.

Realms of Chaos
2013-04-21, 11:21 PM
I disagree that a high-level character who invests zero resources in something should be a full RNG above a low-level expert; levels make you better all around, certainly, but a low-Str wizard shouldn't necessarily be able to beat a 1st-level duelist-spec warblade in a swordfight just because they're about 10 levels apart. There should definitely be a noticeable and significant gap, though, maybe 10-15 points or so with a large gap, so the higher level amateur does stand a good chance against the low-level expert.

Wait, if high ability scores are currently rewarded with superpowers (I'm pretty sure I read that), why not make a generic superpower for each ability score called "peerless" or something like that. For example

"Peerless (Ability score X): Whenever you would add your (Ability score X) modifier to a d20 roll made to attack, defend against, or otherwise compete against a creature, you automatically succeed if that creature has at least two fewer levels than yourself."

Alternately, give something like that out for free the moment you hit 20 with an ability score.

Just to Browse
2013-04-21, 11:50 PM
I disagree that a high-level character who invests zero resources in something should be a full RNG above a low-level expert; levels make you better all around, certainly, but a low-Str wizard shouldn't necessarily be able to beat a 1st-level duelist-spec warblade in a swordfight just because they're about 10 levels apart. There should definitely be a noticeable and significant gap, though, maybe 10-15 points or so with a large gap, so the higher level amateur does stand a good chance against the low-level expert.

Hmhm, that's not quite what I meant. I meant that if a fully trained lvl1 swordsman were to attack a wizard's lowest defense (as in he put literally 0 points into), then that swordsman should still have no chance of hitting. The idea of a wizard picking up a sword and regularly hitting the swordsman is actually incompatible with the rest of my arguments. :smallredface:

PairO'Dice Lost
2013-04-21, 11:59 PM
Wait, if high ability scores are currently rewarded with superpowers (I'm pretty sure I read that), why not make a generic superpower for each ability score called "peerless" or something like that. For example

"Peerless (Ability score X): Whenever you would add your (Ability score X) modifier to a d20 roll made to attack, defend against, or otherwise compete against a creature, you automatically succeed if that creature has at least two fewer levels than yourself."

Alternately, give something like that out for free the moment you hit 20 with an ability score.

Though I generally dislike having "No" buttons like that, that would certainly solve the "thugs are a threat to Superman" problem. Two levels isn't really a big enough gap given the presence of cohorts and boss monsters being ECL+4 or so, but a five-level gap should work nicely and if you're fighting lots of ECL-5 enemies they're probably meant to be mooks anyway.


Hmhm, that's not quite what I meant. I meant that if a fully trained lvl1 swordsman were to attack a wizard's lowest defense (as in he put literally 0 points into), then that swordsman should still have no chance of hitting. The idea of a wizard picking up a sword and regularly hitting the swordsman is actually incompatible with the rest of my arguments. :smallredface:

I was wondering about that. Yes, limiting that scenario to swordsman's strongest offense vs. wizard's weakest defense would make more sense.

Ninjadeadbeard
2013-04-22, 12:36 AM
Hmm....not sure of how well I can comment on how well the current chassis idea is, but one thing I think would be interesting to implement would be one class concept from Monte Cook's Iron Heroes.

Iron Heroes is a d20 variant that's very low on magic, but one thing I like that was implemented was a scaling AC bonus. Every class had a scaling AC bonus, making it so that everyone had improved defenses that scaled with level. I think this would be a pretty good thing to implement.

I'm always wondering why no one brings up Iron Heroes here often when it has so many good little ideas like that.

As to the Scaling issue for ability scores, why not write up a series of "powers" similar to PF's Rage Powers that are unlocked by an ability score hitting, and then exceeding 20?

Example: Lidda has just raised her Agility to 20. She is allowed to choose a power from a small list of Agility-related abilities. She chooses to gain an ability that allows her to Take 20 on any one Agility check per day. When she raises Agility to 22, and thus moves her modifier up +1, she then picks a power that emulates "Feather Fall", allowing her to run on water or use thin tree branches as though they could hold her weight normally. Raising Agility to 24, she could increase that second power to emulate "Wind Walk".

Thoughts?

nonsi
2013-04-22, 12:49 AM
I'd say that, in a game like D&D (which this is effectively a rewrite for, so it should follow similar themes) the lowest players are fighting wolves and rats and the strongest players are battling gods or at least the avatars of gods.

Thus, at the very least, even the lowest players should be at least a full RNG away from the highest even if the high players fail to specialize and the low players specialize as hard as they can. So even if bonuses get hard caps at every given level, they should still scale much faster than they do now.


That (each class within its niche, off course)

lesser_minion
2013-04-22, 12:29 PM
I think I'm very much in the anti mind-point crowd. I can see the appeal -- as I said last thread, I'd like to see characters with a solid skeleton of defensive abilities, who are capable of surviving even if a designer or a DM throws them something totally nuts.

But I think there are probably more elegant ways to get there.

I would consider starting with something along these lines:

There are no hit points -- attacks and effects that would have done hit point damage in the past now inflict 'wounded' conditions on their targets.
Any character may, as a reaction, spend some of their class resource to mitigate a harmful condition.
Any character may commit some of their class resource to cancel out a harmful condition.



As to the Scaling issue for ability scores, why not write up a series of "powers" similar to PF's Rage Powers that are unlocked by an ability score hitting, and then exceeding 20?

That's already planned, IIRC.

Carl
2013-04-29, 01:53 PM
Hopefully i won't get totally ignored like last thread :smallfurious:.

I'm with just to browse here. Whilst there are certainly countless examples of do everything characters in heroic fiction, there are just as many with obvious weakness of some kind. Whilst much of this can be covered by skills, many examples, (e.g. the very old warrior vs wizard in a pure melee weapon fight), cannot. These sorts of characters nearly always have a fair list of things their totally and utterly useless at. Another large list they have a basic idea of how to do but are still terrible at, a medium sized list of things their OK at, not special but they at least know a bit more than the basics. A typically very small list of things they're quite good at, these are some of their greatest strengths. And then usually their are one or two that they're absolutely brilliant at, their strongest and greatest capabilities.

Right now your system is totally unsuited to representing this because there's little if anything between the various classes. The obvious example that i brought up earlier. The wizard vs the warrior example from earlier is especially bad as they have the same feat, ability score, and equipment access. It's only really class dependent stuff, (so probably class features and HP's), that separate them. So unless your willing to make class features an order of magnitude, (or greater), more powerful than they are now your going to have a situation where a wizard can actually set himself up to be a decent threat to the warrior. He's probably not going to win, RNG and all that, but he's definitely going to push the warrior a fair amount. Despite that fact that as a class he's a total numpty in a melee fight, (supposedly), he's actually a credible if ultimately beatable threat to the super specialists. And based on all this talk of no more than half an RNG out of line in the OP i don't get the impression you intended to hand out class features powerful enough to offset this.

Your also totally off base on the whole saves arms race. I've said it before and i'll repeat it here the big issues was always spells being too powerful. A failed save should never induce an "omg what did he hit me with" moment. But even non-literal Save or Die effects, (i.e. effects so powerful they where virtually save or die, but not literal death effects), in 3.5 where this. So you had to make sure you never failed a save. This induced a tendency to focus on save boosting elements. Coupled with the way not every class had primary stats focused on the 3 save influencing stats this just exacerbated things, (you could almost argue that having ability modifiers apply to saves at all was probably a mistake TBH). The problem wasn't and isn't variable saves, it's failing a save being a catastrophic game over rather than a merely pain inducing experience. Make targeting weak saves the only way to be effective with save allowing skills and the rest will attend to itself. Well assuming you hit other caster specific issues as well.

Grod_The_Giant
2013-04-29, 02:09 PM
I fully agree that the binary nature of saves is one of the biggest issues in 3.5. On the plus side, yeah, it's easy to remember. On the downside, every single spell that instantly ends encounters. Something like (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=257689)M&M's Affliction power (http://www.d20herosrd.com/6-powers/effects/effect-descriptions/affliction-attack) works much better-- the penalty is based on how badly you fail, so that "nearly made it" and "failed by a mile" actually mean different things.

Pyromancer999
2013-04-29, 08:24 PM
@Carl: This discussion about saves probably belongs more in one of the previous threads(most likely the first), or perhaps one to come. This system is still early in the making, and it would seem you do not have a complete understanding of the system as it is so far, nor realize that it is still in the making.

Carl
2013-04-29, 10:00 PM
I was replying to this specific statement.


Armor Class, Fortitude saves (for non-Warriors), Will saves (for non-Casters), and Ability Scores for example. These aren't specialties (not for most characters anyway) and yet, without playing an arms race to increase them, you still lose the game.

This whole phenomenon is entirely and totally down to the fact that so many spells exist that are so powerful you cannot afford to fail a save. It doesn't matter what you do to the rest of the system such spells will always be a problem so long s they exist and work on even vaguely on level targets. Conversely nerf the everliving hell out of them so you can afford to take several and it no longer matters that one or more of your saves is weak.

Also i did go over some of this in the last two threads, i got replies in thread 1, but got totally ignored in thread 2.

Blightedmarsh
2013-04-29, 11:20 PM
I think that save V suck has to be something that:

A) Has a short duration. This is so you have to think tactically about when is the best time to use them to maximum effect.

B) Is something you can not just spam over and over. (see A)

C) Each type of status is a tool you would want to use for a different job.

Just to Browse
2013-04-30, 05:08 PM
As much as I dislike going off topic... That's a lie, I love it.

I just want to say that Save or Die is by definition not a short thing. You save or the fight is over for you. Making SoDs short-duration effects is just getting rid of SoDs.

I think that SoDs should be explicitly used as "You must be this tall"-style benchmarks. Like you can't fight medusa and expect to win unless you have blinsight or immunity to petrification, because she'll either stone you or kite you till you break. Players could even get them too, and it would make minion-infested combats quicker and easier.

Ziegander
2013-05-03, 04:50 PM
This whole phenomenon is entirely and totally down to the fact that so many spells exist that are so powerful you cannot afford to fail a save. It doesn't matter what you do to the rest of the system such spells will always be a problem so long s they exist and work on even vaguely on level targets. Conversely nerf the everliving hell out of them so you can afford to take several and it no longer matters that one or more of your saves is weak.

One step at a time, Carl, one step at a time. Making sure offenses and defenses scale at an appropriate rate with level is the first step. Making sure offense is decidedly NOT binary and defenses are more ablative are steps to be taken later as the system is more fully fleshed out. Degrees of success are one part of that.

Nerfing spells is something that will be done later, with a scalpel. Right now we are working with much more crude tools, and laying the framework and foundations down.

Ziegander
2013-05-03, 05:09 PM
Ziegander, I can't tell how skills would work under this system. Could you explain?

Well, I have two ways to approach this, so let me explain both of them:

1) Design skills in much the same way as D&D 3.5, but make them much more important and potent at higher level and utilize a much more robust "skill trick" system.

2) Fully rewrite the skill system and recalibrate what it means for the system using the five ranks I outlined earlier and incorporating maneuvers/stances as well as various forms of spellcasting into the skill system itself rather than baking those into the classes, requiring skill investment and skill point expenditure to learn these powerful and useful tricks.

For example, a character with 3 ranks in Arcana has to be at least 9th level, but with those ranks, whether he's a Wizard or not, can learn to cast a spell or a few even, by spending the skill points. Class skills and cross-class skills would obviously play an important role, and the Wizard would have class features that make it "the best" spells class, but there you go. In the same manner, if a Wizard wanted to cross-train in some fighting styles, it might cost him double the points, but he could get an attack bonus equal to the Fighter in maybe one weapon group and pick up a couple maneuvers too.

This second option is still vary up in the air right now and not heavily thought through, but I think it's got a lot of cool promise to it if I can figure out a way to make it all work out.

Morty
2013-05-05, 05:53 AM
I would be in favour of the second option, but I'm not sure if making everything dependent on skills is a good idea. But then, maybe it could work. It would certainly introduce some internal consistency, as opposed to opening doors and swimming being skills but fighting with weapons and casting spells being something entirely different.

Ziegander
2013-05-05, 09:20 AM
It also, potentially, makes Intelligence THE most important stat (or, if not, a really, really important one). What I would do to help to avoid that includes the five +2 parcels, the proficiency tiers, which would cost just 1 skill point to buy and would make sure that the vertical advancement is really easy. Five skill points gets a character the best bonus to their roll that they can get (+10, double the bonus per skill point spent when compared to 3.5). On the other hand, skill tricks, maneuvers, spells, these cost more than 1 skill point and are things you can do with that bonus and do nothing by themselves to increase the bonus.

So smart characters can afford more options, but less intelligent characters can get by with the same attack bonus/caster level/etc and fewer things to do. Does that sound okay? I would think that all characters would need to get the same number of skill points per level aside from Int bonus for this to work best. Or, maybe better than that, classes with more Int-based skills get fewer skill points per level than classes with little to no Int-based skills.

Morty
2013-05-05, 09:47 AM
You could also divorce the number of skill points from Intelligence. It's quite a departure from 3rd edition D&D, but I think it would be appropriate if skill points became a more important part of character advancement.

Ziegander
2013-05-05, 09:55 AM
You could also divorce the number of skill points from Intelligence. It's quite a departure from 3rd edition D&D, but I think it would be appropriate if skill points became a more important part of character advancement.

There's always that option, but as far as I'm concerned no one has come up with a suitable "thing to do" for Intelligence if not modifying skill points. I think I'll work out a skills system draft soon and run with the "ranks are cheap, powers less so" model and see how it works out. Hopefully it should make high Intelligence a perk and not a requirement.

Ziegander
2013-05-05, 11:01 AM
I'd say that, in a game like D&D (which this is effectively a rewrite for, so it should follow similar themes) the lowest players are fighting wolves and rats and the strongest players are battling gods or at least the avatars of gods.

Thus, at the very least, even the lowest players should be at least a full RNG away from the highest even if the high players fail to specialize and the low players specialize as hard as they can. So even if bonuses get hard caps at every given level, they should still scale much faster than they do now.

Well, I have no real problem with the lowest level characters being a full RNG or more away from the highest level characters. I just never want characters of equal level to be much more than half an RNG away from each other.


Hmm....not sure of how well I can comment on how well the current chassis idea is, but one thing I think would be interesting to implement would be one class concept from Monte Cook's Iron Heroes.

Iron Heroes is a d20 variant that's very low on magic, but one thing I like that was implemented was a scaling AC bonus. Every class had a scaling AC bonus, making it so that everyone had improved defenses that scaled with level. I think this would be a pretty good thing to implement.

To be included in the 1/2 level bonus to d20 rolls, characters would also gain + 1/2 level to their Defense, yes. I meant to have that included from the beginning, but I forgot about it.


As to the Scaling issue for ability scores, why not write up a series of "powers" similar to PF's Rage Powers that are unlocked by an ability score hitting, and then exceeding 20?

Example: Lidda has just raised her Agility to 20. She is allowed to choose a power from a small list of Agility-related abilities. She chooses to gain an ability that allows her to Take 20 on any one Agility check per day. When she raises Agility to 22, and thus moves her modifier up +1, she then picks a power that emulates "Feather Fall", allowing her to run on water or use thin tree branches as though they could hold her weight normally. Raising Agility to 24, she could increase that second power to emulate "Wind Walk".

Thoughts?

These sorts of abilities are definitely possible, and I think what Amechra was intending from the get-go, if I decide to keep the ability score cap. It's sort of odd, but from a math standpoint it's very beneficial, so I want to, at least explore ways of making it work. If it just feels too wrong from a simulationist and gamist perspective, then I'll have to go back and rework things.

Amechra
2013-05-05, 01:31 PM
Yep, that is closer to what I was suggesting.

Carl
2013-05-05, 06:02 PM
Ziegander. Your not getting it.

If any spell is cable of becoming a SoD through any degree of failure against "on level" targets it is going to be a serious and massive issue no matter what, the problem might not be as severe as 3.5, but it will exist. If you want to eliminate it you have to eliminate the possibility of it happening. DO that and you don't need to change how offence and defence

I'd also point out that talking about spells now isn't getting ahead of myself. You don't design a system by designing a bunch of cool components and slotting them together at the end. You do it by designing all interconnected elements. That means before you even sit down and think about how the save system is going to work you've got to sit down and consider how each elements of the system is going to work. This includes spells and all their interrelated elements. A system isn't generally something you design a piece at a time. It's something you design all at once. Ushually by coming up with a set of core concepts and design goals for each elements, then start by fleshing out one element to full rules. Then sit down and think about how that's going to interact with the other elements of the system you only have core concepts for but no rules. Now you figure out and make any changes to that first element that might be necessary. Once done move onto one of the directly related elements and repeat the process.


As such if "no on level SOD's" is a design goal for the spells system you don't just sit down and design the saves. You also sit down and design the core principles behind spells. A sort of short list of what kind of effects they can do and a list of effects they can't do. (possibly sorted by level difference where appropriate). You then have top lay out the attack roll, damage, nd HP systems around these in core concepts so that you can figure out at final design exactly how much damage is a SoD and how much isn't, what kind of attack rolls wizards need to make and what kind of attack rolls mundanes need to make, (the two will be loosely connected in many systems though you could make the dispensate). And so on and so forth...

Ziegander
2013-05-05, 06:47 PM
Ziegander. Your not getting it.

If any spell is cable of becoming a SoD through any degree of failure against "on level" targets it is going to be a serious and massive issue no matter what, the problem might not be as severe as 3.5, but it will exist. If you want to eliminate it you have to eliminate the possibility of it happening. DO that and you don't need to change how offence and defence

I'm sorry, but, no, you are not getting it. At all. I will try to explain it to you. Right now, as far as my system is concerned, spells do not exist. There are no save-or-die spells, because there are no spells. Changing the way offense and defense work is a solution to several more broad issues with the system. At this point in the design, how the changes to offense and defense interact with spells is nothing more than a twinkle in my eye.


I'd also point out that talking about spells now isn't getting ahead of myself.

Except that it most certainly is. There aren't spells yet. Talking about balancing the spells when there aren't spells is basically the definition of getting ahead of yourself.


You don't design a system by designing a bunch of cool components and slotting them together at the end. You do it by designing all interconnected elements.

You don't design anything either of those ways. You design everything by laying out the simplest elements of the final product first, the elements which the other interconnected and more fine-tuned elements rely on to do anything. And then you continue to build on those simple elements until you have a standing structure. You don't decide whether the color scheme in the bathroom is jarring before you've finished laying the foundation of the building. In the same way, you don't worry about the balance of spells that don't yet exist before you've finalized the rules that dictate whether spells have any effect or not.


That means before you even sit down and think about how the save system is going to work you've got to sit down and consider how each elements of the system is going to work. This includes spells and all their interrelated elements. A system isn't generally something you design a piece at a time. It's something you design all at once. Ushually by coming up with a set of core concepts and design goals for each elements, then start by fleshing out one element to full rules. Then sit down and think about how that's going to interact with the other elements of the system you only have core concepts for but no rules.

You are contradicting yourself. Do you design it all at once or do you do it one piece at a time, constantly building from one thing to another?


Now you figure out and make any changes to that first element that might be necessary. Once done move onto one of the directly related elements and repeat the process.

And this is precisely what I'm trying to do. Right now, I'm designing the parts of the system that need not ever change regardless of what style or genre of game the DM and players want to run. Later I'll build other elements onto the skeleton of the game that are more campaign specific, such as character classes, magic, creatures, and setting-specific skills.


As such if "no on level SOD's" is a design goal for the spells system you don't just sit down and design the saves. You also sit down and design the core principles behind spells.

Don't forget: spells don't exist. I don't have any design goals for spells yet, except that they are cast by spending MP, so I'm not going to waste any time working on any principles to do with spells. Spells will not exist in all styles of games. They aren't a core part of the rules skeleton, they aren't needed for the game as a whole to function properly. They are an afterthought. A specific room on a floor far above the foundation of my building.


A sort of short list of what kind of effects they can do and a list of effects they can't do. (possibly sorted by level difference where appropriate). You then have top lay out the attack roll, damage, nd HP systems around these in core concepts so that you can figure out at final design exactly how much damage is a SoD and how much isn't, what kind of attack rolls wizards need to make and what kind of attack rolls mundanes need to make, (the two will be loosely connected in many systems though you could make the dispensate). And so on and so forth...

This is all well and good and things I will undoubtedly take into consideration when I work out any of the various subsystems of the game including things like alchemy, blessings/miracles, incantations, maneuvers/stances, pact magic, primal power, skill tricks, spells, truenaming, etc... But I'm not there yet. One thing at a time.

Grod_The_Giant
2013-05-05, 07:14 PM
If any spell is cable of becoming a SoD through any degree of failure against "on level" targets it is going to be a serious and massive issue no matter what, the problem might not be as severe as 3.5, but it will exist. If you want to eliminate it you have to eliminate the possibility of it happening. DO that and you don't need to change how offence and defence
This is patently untrue. Mutants and Masterminds 3e's Affliction (http://www.d20herosrd.com/6-powers/effects/effect-descriptions/affliction-attack)power operates through increasing-effects-on-degrees-of-failure, and it works just fine. I've run the system plenty of times, and I've never seen an issue with it. In fact, math shows it to be less effective than damage (http://atomicthinktank.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=46085), at least in terms of raw SoD-ness.

Just to Browse
2013-05-05, 08:35 PM
Mutants and Masterminds 3e's Affliction (http://www.d20herosrd.com/6-powers/effects/effect-descriptions/affliction-attack)power operates through increasing-effects-on-degrees-of-failure, and it works just fine.

This this this this this.

EDIT: Of course, I do agree with Carl's other statements about stats coming after effects. You shouldn't design a game by rewriting it page-to-page, you should redesign it by what will be the most important in the game session.

Ziegander
2013-05-05, 09:21 PM
This this this this this.

EDIT: Of course, I do agree with Carl's other statements about stats coming after effects. You shouldn't design a game by rewriting it page-to-page, you should redesign it by what will be the most important in the game session.

I'm not rewriting it page-by-page. If I was I'd be designing Classes next and I don't plan to do that for quite a while.

Let's try to put this another way: Which part of d20 game design connects to all other parts of the system in-game and out? The d20 resolution mechanic itself. So I started there. Not much needed changed, nothing mechanically, just a slight change in perspective that points toward future design. Okay, now after that, what connects to the resolution mechanic before anything else? The modifiers to the d20 roll. Which is all I've been trying to lay out so far. Everything else, the skills, the feats, the classes, the spells, all of that comes after the rules concerning the d20 resolution mechanics and associated modifiers to that roll. In the end, the Ability Scores and how they work, and also the Chassis, are just different collections of modifiers to d20 rolls. It is necessary to determine exactly how I want these modifiers to work before I start designing any other elements of the game because all those other elements will depend on the mechanics of the d20 roll and its modifiers.

Just to Browse
2013-05-05, 09:34 PM
Action resolution mechanics aren't as important as knowing how fast a combat is, or how often a character should act in a round. We haven't looked at actions in combat, or even though about average damage output, and we're supposed to be considering how many skill points get granted per level? Without the context of the rest of that, we have no idea what those skills are even useful for. Heck, I don't know if being a Paragon in Athletics should let you jump a 20' tree, a small building, or to the moon. We're supposed to be outlining how fast characters get abilities without knowing at all what those abilities should be doing, and so writing advancement is impossible!

Going back to the jumping example, if Joe the Jumper is supposed to be doing the following things at the following levels:
1: Jump over barrels
5: Jump over people
10: Jump over houses
15: Jump over redwoods
20: Jump to the moon
He should probably be getting different skill tricks every 2-4 levels. However, if he is doing the following things at the following levels:

1: Jump over barrels
8: Jump over people
15: Jump over houses
22: Jump over redwoods
Then he should be getting different skill tricks every 4-6 levels. How on earth can I decide that Joe is a legend at level 18 if I don't know whether "legend" means redwoods or moons?

Yitzi
2013-05-05, 09:44 PM
Hmhm, that's not quite what I meant. I meant that if a fully trained lvl1 swordsman were to attack a wizard's lowest defense (as in he put literally 0 points into), then that swordsman should still have no chance of hitting.

I would half agree. If he's a level 20 adventuring wizard, then it can be assumed that he's put some effort into defense even if he didn't put in the extra effort represented by spending points, and so the swordsman should at least be extremely unlikely to hit. If, on the other hand, he's a level 20 scholarly wizard who's never seen battle, then by all means the swordsman should be able to hit him easily.

Just to Browse
2013-05-05, 09:53 PM
I would half agree. If he's a level 20 adventuring wizard, then it can be assumed that he's put some effort into defense even if he didn't put in the extra effort represented by spending points, and so the swordsman should at least be extremely unlikely to hit. If, on the other hand, he's a level 20 scholarly wizard who's never seen battle, then by all means the swordsman should be able to hit him easily.

What I mean is that characters just don't get a choice. Level 20 wizards should all have +10 armor bonus, and while that can come from winter's barrier, mage armor, or shadow cloak, all wizard's will have one. You just don't get the choice to gimp yourself. Even a level 20 scholarly wizard who has never seen battle shouldn't be touchable by the swordsman, because that level 20 wizard has been reading so many books that the warrior's attack is reminiscent of Lord Strangleborn's Compendium of Esoteric Fightning Techniques from Hades, vol. 3 which means a small blast of mana at .622c when the blade is 120 degrees from the ground should send pressure waves down the hilt and cause the fighter to drop it.

Ziegander
2013-05-05, 09:54 PM
Action resolution mechanics aren't as important as knowing how fast a combat is, or how often a character should act in a round.

I vehemently disagree.


We haven't looked at actions in combat, or even though about average damage output, and we're supposed to be considering how many skill points get granted per level? Without the context of the rest of that, we have no idea what those skills are even useful for. Heck, I don't know if being a Paragon in Athletics should let you jump a 20' tree, a small building, or to the moon.

Someone asked me what my thoughts on the skill system were. So I outlined some of my thoughts. Note, I haven't said, "okay guys, how many skill points per level should the Fighter get?" I haven't said that precisely because we have no idea what those skills are even useful for yet. We don't have a skill list yet (though I have a preliminary one sketched out). Just because another poster asked me what my thoughts were and just because I already have thoughts about it doesn't make me ready to design skills.

Now then, I did already say that next I was moving on to skills, but I would like to amend that. From here I could move on to skills, or to environment/exploration mechanics, or to combat. To me it makes more sense to design skills before the other two since you can, and often will, use skills while exploring and while in combat. Only very rarely, if at all, do you explore or fight while you are using a skill. That barely even makes any sense. Does any of this better explain my design approach to you?

Just to Browse
2013-05-05, 09:59 PM
I vehemently disagree.Then how can we even begin to discuss what the generic d20 bonus to character level should be, or how far on the RNG any character should differ, if we don't even know how quickly a character with maximum offense should put down a character with minimum defense?


Someone asked me what my thoughts on the skill system were. So I outlined some of my thoughts. Note, I haven't said, "okay guys, how many skill points per level should the Fighter get?" I haven't said that precisely because we have no idea what those skills are even useful for yet. We don't have a skill list yet (though I have a preliminary one sketched out). Just because another poster asked me what my thoughts were and just because I already have thoughts about it doesn't make me ready to design skills.You literally wrote out skill tiers and gave skill bonuses. Those are skill ranks as far as D&D 3.5 is concerned, so those are what I'm referring to. Can you give me a cogent reason as to why you arranged those as they are by drawing on things that were posted before this thread?


Now then, I did already say that next I was moving on to skills, but I would like to amend that. From here I could move on to skills, or to environment/exploration mechanics, or to combat. To me it makes more sense to design skills before the other two since you can, and often will, use skills while exploring and while in combat. Only very rarely, if at all, do you explore or fight while you are using a skill. That barely even makes any sense. Does any of this better explain my design approach to you?Right, but this doesn't get to the main point that we still don't know what the character should output at any given level. If we have these arbitrary 4-level categories, and then it turns out the major consensus thinks skill tricks are too complicated and should be relegated to every 6 levels, then why on earth did we decide to make the 4-level categories in the first place?

Ziegander
2013-05-05, 10:29 PM
Then how can we even begin to discuss what the generic d20 bonus to character level should be, or how far on the RNG any character should differ, if we don't even know how quickly a character with maximum offense should put down a character with minimum defense?

How far two characters should be from one another on the RNG is kind of a matter of preference that will probably differ from player to player. It's not like there's any objective value there that I'm trying to arrive at to best suit the RPG industry. I would personally like to see a game where two characters of equal level are never much more than half an RNG away from each other. That's subjective as hell, yes, but it's one of the little perks that come from designing your own game. You get to choose things like that.

As far as actions in combat, damage output, and speed of combat encounters are concerned, you do realize that there's a lot more to D&D 3.5 than combat, right? You're trying to tell me that I need to make sure I have determined all of that data before I worry about anything else in the system. I want my game to have even more robust non-combat mechanics than D&D 3.5, and I'm not going to worry about combat until I'm comfortable with and confident in the basic systems that feed into combat. I'm not there yet.


You literally wrote out skill tiers and gave skill bonuses. Those are skill ranks as far as D&D 3.5 is concerned, so those are what I'm referring to. Can you give me a cogent reason as to why you arranged those as they are by drawing on things that were posted before this thread?

Right, but this doesn't get to the main point that we still don't know what the character should output at any given level. If we have these arbitrary 4-level categories, and then it turns out the major consensus thinks skill tricks are too complicated and should be relegated to every 6 levels, then why on earth did we decide to make the 4-level categories in the first place?

Ah, okay, I see your concern, I think. This could have been a bit more clear, but in the previous threads there was a sort of over-arching feeling that tiers of advancement need to be better baked into the game itself. That the game needs better support for characters of all stripes that go from plucky squire to special agent to Batman to Gandalf the White to Sun Wukong the Monkey King. I saw the five skill tiers as an easy way of doing this as well as a convenient way to fill in spaces in the levels from 1-20.

They can be more than just tiers of skills, they could be a fundamental part of how the game is designed and organized. Levels 1-4 could be the Novice Tier. 5-9 the Expert Tier, 10-13: Master Tier, and so on. It was my thought that everything could work off of this principle, though I did definitely do a poor job of explaining that.

Why the +2 bonus for each tier? Well, aside from offering easy vertical advancement, so that even less intelligent characters have a competitive bonus to their d20 roll, my initial reason was a simple as making sure a 1st level warrior has better than a +1 bonus to weapon attack rolls with a proficient weapon over a 1st level mage with no weapon proficiency. Obviously the bit regarding vertical advancement being cheaper and easier than horizontal advancement is the more important reason for the +2 bonus at each tier, but that was why I chose +2 to start with.

Yitzi
2013-05-05, 10:43 PM
Even a level 20 scholarly wizard who has never seen battle shouldn't be touchable by the swordsman, because that level 20 wizard has been reading so many books that the warrior's attack is reminiscent of Lord Strangleborn's Compendium of Esoteric Fightning Techniques from Hades, vol. 3

Sure, if he happens to prefer military books for recreational reading. Chances are he doesn't, and the books he's been reading so many of are technical books on magic. And of course that's even assuming he can keep his composure during a battle; most people can't, you know.

For a real-life example, imagine someone who's read books about martial arts but never practiced. You think he's going to stand a chance against a guy with a knife and experience using it?

Just to Browse
2013-05-05, 10:43 PM
How far two characters should be from one another on the RNG is kind of a matter of preference that will probably differ from player to player. It's not like there's any objective value there that I'm trying to arrive at to best suit the RPG industry. I would personally like to see a game where two characters of equal level are never much more than half an RNG away from each other. That's subjective as hell, yes, but it's one of the little perks that come from designing your own game. You get to choose things like that.If you are the person writing the game, you are the person designing the RNG. This isn't subjective player-to-player, it is written in the character options. If the design goal is no more than +/- 5 for any character, then this skill system is broken because skill ranks at level 17 have already hit that cap. You literally cannot add any skill bonus items because then a Legendary stealth character at level 17 will beat the desired threshold when sneaking by a character with no ranks in perception. That is design goals.


As far as actions in combat, damage output, and speed of combat encounters are concerned, you do realize that there's a lot more to D&D 3.5 than combat, right? You're trying to tell me that I need to make sure I have determined all of that data before I worry about anything else in the system. I want my game to have even more robust non-combat mechanics than D&D 3.5, and I'm not going to worry about combat until I'm comfortable with and confident in the basic systems that feed into combat. I'm not there yet.This kind of feels like a strawman argument. I'm saying that before you allot combat bonuses (BAB, or generic d20 bonuses, or combat-relevant skill tricks) you need to determine how combat pans out. In an identical vein, if you want to allot skill bonuses (tiers, skill tricks, skill points) you need to determine how effective a given character is at any level. If you're going to buy jelly from the store, you should probably already have a plan to use that jelly for something, or else it's just a wasted purchase.


Tiers[snip]

Why did you choose five tiers?

Why does it span 20 levels?

Why are the tiers linear?

Why is +2 a better option than +3?

THESE are the questions that need to be answered before anybody even starts talking about feats or skill tricks.

Grod_The_Giant
2013-05-05, 10:45 PM
The more relevant question is "should a player character be allowed to fall so far behind level-appropriate numbers?" (Especially in an area which will come up, constantly). If no, how to stop it, and if yes, how do we keep players from accidentally doing so?

Ziegander
2013-05-05, 11:01 PM
I'll try and get back to this tomorrow, but I've got to get to bed.

Carl
2013-05-05, 11:28 PM
I think i'll hold of replying till I've had some sleep too Zeigander. It's 6AM in the morning here and 4 hours past my usual bedtime, been running the download War Thunder and wanted to keep an eye on it but i'm way too testy atm to participate without going OTT with you and i don't want that so catch you in 10-12 hours at a guess.

Yitzi
2013-05-06, 08:40 AM
A failed save should never induce an "omg what did he hit me with" moment.

Then how would you have a master wizard able to instantly kill a mook (common enough in the genre that it should be possible)? Save-or-die isn't the problem; it's having save-or-die be a credible threat to an enemy near your level that's the problem.

Although having save-or-die spells be something like "save or take a negative level/CON damage and have to save again" (with someone killed by it not rising as undead even if using the negative level option) is a definite possibility.

Although even so, I think that you should be able to have saves with a serious chance of failure that do serious effects on failure, even if they're harder to pull off than a standard action spell and/or don't quite take the enemy out of the fight.

Morty
2013-05-06, 09:59 AM
I agree with Ziegander. When designing a system, you need to work from the ground up. Same with revising one; you need to examine each part of the system, starting with the most basic one, and see what needs reworking and how. Especially when you're working with system as fundamentally b0rked as D&D 3e.

Yitzi
2013-05-06, 10:10 AM
I agree with Ziegander. When designing a system, you need to work from the ground up. Same with revising one; you need to examine each part of the system, starting with the most basic one, and see what needs reworking and how.

I would disagree slightly. It'll often be more useful to look at the part that most obviously needs reworking, think about how it should work, and see what that requires with the more basic stuff.

You'll still end up starting with the most basic stuff for the actual revision, as you and Ziegander said, but for examination it could be more useful to start with the higher-level stuff.

Carl
2013-05-06, 08:52 PM
@Yitzi: Please don' pick and choose pieces ignoring the surrounding stuff. I added a cavet about on level in the piece. The point is if the target is vaguely on level SoD needs to be downright impossible.

@Morty: This isn't about designing there system from the ground up. it's about designing a system that isn't going to be a broken abusable mess. This isn't about my personal opinion either, this is a hard fact that I've observed in practise many times. People lay down a few elements in detail first then try to make everything else fit into that, the problem is they have to start making compromises in terms of how these other elements interact to keep their earlier work intact. And that ends up creating all kinds of abusive loopholes, bad gameplay elements and the like.

To use an example. I've got the bare bones behind a system in progress right now. Currently since I've decided on the setting i know i'm going to need the ability to handle high auto rates of fire. But before i go any further i now need to sit down and consider how melee will work, how HP's will work, and how magic will work. I need to sit down with each of those elements and lay the same basic frameworks. Basically rules concepts for each elements. They'll give me some basic idea's of ow each element is going to function without setting anything in stone. In effect i'm still at a stage where since i haven't written all the details i've got room to step in and go "hey i need to eliminate this trick", or "hmm, i need to be able to do this with that" And i can later re-work that core set of concepts to handle the more awkward problems that might come up. When i'm done i don't have a single rule written, but i have a set of clearly defined limits on what each element of the system can do and what it cannot do and how that's supposed to interact with everything else. Then and only then do i sit down and actually write anything in detail.

Practically speaking no design process is ever quite that perfect, but this is the exact opposite, design whole swathes of the rules before any concept of how other interacting elements will function has been made.

Morty
2013-05-07, 05:30 AM
Right, except that if you design a system from the ground-up, you can make sure, at each step of the way, to avoid those problems from ever coming up. Why worry about SoDs if there's no guarantee whatever spells system Ziegander settles on involves any spells that might work this way? Your idea of system design has it backwards and such an approach is why most system fixes - not just of D&D - never get anywhere. Because they focus on patching up whatever the authors have a big problem with instead of examining the system as a whole.

Yitzi
2013-05-07, 06:22 AM
@Yitzi: Please don' pick and choose pieces ignoring the surrounding stuff. I added a cavet about on level in the piece. The point is if the target is vaguely on level SoD needs to be downright impossible.


I must have missed that when I read it. My apologies.

Although even so, I think that "next to impossible" would be enough. 5% failure chance is probably too high, but a fifth of a percent would probably be acceptable (for targeting a weak save, as you said). After all, why should a save be any different from "eight hits in a row"? And likewise, even a 50% failure chance (even against a strong save) is probably ok for a ten-minute-casting-time spell that requires the target to stay in range, just because that's so hard to pull off.

Carl
2013-05-07, 12:10 PM
Morty did you even read my post.

This isn't about patching this is about a complete re-design.

The point is you can't completely re-work a system ion this level and do it piecemeal without getting a broken abusable mess. fact. I've seen it way too many times to believe otherwise.

The reason you have to worry about the spells whilst designing the save system is that what the save system needs to do is directly informed by what you want the save to be saving against. You need to sit down and define what the limits on both saves and spell effects are before you can write the spells or the save rules. And since the spells system interfaces with the HP's system (and through that the stats system), you've got to lay out certain basics in all those area's first as well before you can write a single rule or spell.

Just to Browse
2013-05-07, 12:17 PM
Right, except that if you design a system from the ground-up, you can make sure, at each step of the way, to avoid those problems from ever coming up. Why worry about SoDs if there's no guarantee whatever spells system Ziegander settles on involves any spells that might work this way? Your idea of system design has it backwards and such an approach is why most system fixes - not just of D&D - never get anywhere. Because they focus on patching up whatever the authors have a big problem with instead of examining the system as a whole.

Because what if we make a game that works great without SoDs, but then people want SoD classes? You can't just say "well we might not add [x] so let's not plan for it!" because then if you do add [x], then the result will end up clunky or broken or boring because you didn't plan for it.

EDIT: Also, Carl, you are a flaming ball of pent up rage. Chill bro.

Morty
2013-05-07, 01:26 PM
Morty did you even read my post.


I did, in fact, read your post. But that you would ask me this makes me seriously doubt if it's worth it to argue with you.


Because what if we make a game that works great without SoDs, but then people want SoD classes? You can't just say "well we might not add [x] so let's not plan for it!" because then if you do add [x], then the result will end up clunky or broken or boring because you didn't plan for it.


I don't think there's any reason to include SoDs in a system at all. Binary effects that you either completely resist or are completely screwed by are bad.

Grod_The_Giant
2013-05-07, 01:31 PM
I don't think there's any reason to include SoDs in a system at all. Binary effects that you either completely resist or are completely screwed by are bad.
Because effects like turning someone into a newt are classic fantasy tropes, and-- in the absence of strong, probably-setting-specific fluff about why that's not possible-- would feel weird not to have. Mind you, 3.5-style binary SoDs are bad, but... (GOTO: previous post about degrees of failure)

necroon
2013-05-07, 01:41 PM
Oh my... lots of hostility here!
@Ziegander, just for clarification, this topic is to discuss the pros and cons of the universal chassis you have suggested at the beginning of the thread and not the adverse or necessity of SOD's in D&D, correct?

As for the Chassis: I thought about it quite a bit (As well as my way earlier comment about 4th ED and SWSE style saves) and so far, without a complete understanding of possible tweaks or changes to other parts of the system (spells, skills, ect.) I do not see anything wrong with the proposal.

A question if you would: One of the largest complaints I heard regarding 4th edition (from my group - mileage may vary) was that it gave way to "class transparency". That being that the boundaries, play style, and overall "feel" between classes was the same.
Do you feel that your proposed change would blur the lines as it were?
If so would a balance of class abilities offset this risk?

While we are on the topic of the chassis what classes do you plan on building with it?
Since the project rose from a Fighter Fix obviously Fighter would be one.
Are very specific classes like the Paladin on the table for you or are those more of an archetype in your mind? or perhaps even a template or title and not a class at all?

Ziegander
2013-05-07, 02:24 PM
Okay, sorry guys, I was getting a little cranky the other night. But things are looking up after a day, so let's get back to business.

@Just to Browse: My general design goals trump any specific mechanics that I propose. Remember, stuff in this thread is just a proposal for the moment. No rules have really been set in stone yet (for any of the project). So the RNG goal supersedes my plans for skill tiers if at some time the skill tiers prove to be a problem. If I have to tweak some of the values to meet my RNG goal, so be it. But I find that it's better, for me, to have something down now than nothing at all, so I can move on to design other parts of the game that need such a rule.

On combat: And how am I supposed to know how combat is going to pan out if I don't know what bonuses creatures have to their rolls in combat? How should I know how combat will pan out before I even have playable characters or DM'able monsters?

On skill tiers: I chose five because it felt better than three or four. Do I need a more detailed explanation that that? Do you have a suggestion of your own to make? It spans 20 levels because I'm most comfortable designing for classes that span 20 levels (I've been doing it for 10+ years). The tiers are linear because the entire advancement of the game I'm planning to design is linear. I don't know what else they could be, do you have some ideas to share? +2 isn't necessarily a better option than +3, it's merely the one I chose because I was comfortable with it. +2/tier, when combined with the +1/2 levels, grants a final total bonus of +20 when a player maxes something out. I like how that matches up to max character level.

@Necroon: Yes, this thread is for the discussion of the chassis. Not necessarily just my suggested chassis, just on the concept and execution of the chassis in d20 as well as the pros and cons of my suggested one. If you have any other suggestions to make regarding the chassis, or would like to put forth your own proposal for revisions to concept of the d20 chassis those would be most welcome as well.

On "class transparency": Yes, that was a major criticism that I shared with 4e, but the big reason that I experienced this problem with 4e was not necessarily because of its universal chassis (3.5 has a universal chassis as well), but because all of the classes operated on the exact same set of rules. Every class got at-will, encounter, and daily powers, they always got them at the same level, and they all were either Controllers, Defenders, Leaders, or Strikers. There was a lot of rigidity to the system. I would seek to avoid that problem by allowing different classes, and even different characters of the same class to focus on different ability scores, to have different styles of play and even different subsystems, and by allowing players to build their character in whichever way they should choose.

On Classes: I'm not sure yet. This is something that must come last. I would say even last after coming up with possible campaign settings, monsters, and magic systems. I would like to design the base classes tailored to campaign settings themselves. No set of "core classes" will be appropriate for play in any game, and yet core rules generally try to make themselves useful for as many types of gameplay as possible. Having classes as part of the core rules feels rather against the grain. From a software standpoint, I'd like my core rules to function like a game engine, offering all of the technical things that make the world work, and then I'd like to design campaign settings as the actual games that use the engine and featuring all of the other content like classes, feats, magic systems, monsters, etc.

Fighter would actually not necessarily be a class that I would want to design for my game. To reference my approach above, I might rather design classes specific to worlds themselves. If I were in the Forgotten Realms, then I'd want lots of classes with deep ties to magic, including warrior classes that also use magic, such as Bladesingers and Paladins. But in a setting like Middle-Earth, such high magic would be inappropriate, and any magic-user class(es) would need to be far more subdued in their spellcasting and simultaneously more robust in non-casting abilities.

Yitzi
2013-05-07, 03:07 PM
Because what if we make a game that works great without SoDs, but then people want SoD classes? You can't just say "well we might not add [x] so let's not plan for it!" because then if you do add [x], then the result will end up clunky or broken or boring because you didn't plan for it.

The problem is that SoD as a standard tactic is not viable, and probably cannot be made viable in conjunction with damage-dealing classes. SoD as anything other than "remove speedbump" is probably going to end up looking like this (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0456.html), which is broken (because it makes everyone else's stuff useless) and boring (because there's no progression; either it does nothing or wins the battle), and there's simply no way to make it work.

necroon
2013-05-07, 03:27 PM
Okay, sorry guys, I was getting a little cranky the other night. But things are looking up after a day, so let's get back to business.
Hope all is well.


@Necroon: Yes, this thread is for the discussion of the chassis. Not necessarily just my suggested chassis, just on the concept and execution of the chassis in d20 as well as the pros and cons of my suggested one. If you have any other suggestions to make regarding the chassis, or would like to put forth your own proposal for revisions to concept of the d20 chassis those would be most welcome as well.
As it stands I really like the chassis you have presented as a concept. I feel the +1/2 HD to rolls is a good idea and leads to class developement and difrences via class abilities.
I look forward to seeing how it changes and adapts as further sugestions are made.


On "class transparency": Yes, that was a major criticism that I shared with 4e, but the big reason that I experienced this problem with 4e was not necessarily because of its universal chassis (3.5 has a universal chassis as well), but because all of the classes operated on the exact same set of rules. Every class got at-will, encounter, and daily powers, they always got them at the same level, and they all were either Controllers, Defenders, Leaders, or Strikers.

A very good explaination. Oddly enough though the class role names were defined in 4E, which seemed to be recieved negatively, I often find players attempting to build to a role when considering their character.


There was a lot of rigidity to the system. I would seek to avoid that problem by allowing different classes, and even different characters of the same class to focus on different ability scores, to have different styles of play and even different subsystems, and by allowing players to build their character in whichever way they should choose
This is always a concept I have been in favor of and something that is very feat-taxing and hard to do in 3.5 as it stands.
Since this is not part of the chassis discussion or the ability discussion do you seek to adress this when we get to actual class builds through archatypes or via character generation with the selection of a "Primary attribute"?


On Classes: I'm not sure yet. This is something that must come last. I would say even last after coming up with possible campaign settings, monsters, and magic systems. I would like to design the base classes tailored to campaign settings themselves. No set of "core classes" will be appropriate for play in any game, and yet core rules generally try to make themselves useful for as many types of gameplay as possible. Having classes as part of the core rules feels rather against the grain. From a software standpoint, I'd like my core rules to function like a game engine, offering all of the technical things that make the world work, and then I'd like to design campaign settings as the actual games that use the engine and featuring all of the other content like classes, feats, magic systems, monsters, etc.



Fighter would actually not necessarily be a class that I would want to design for my game. To reference my approach above, I might rather design classes specific to worlds themselves. If I were in the Forgotten Realms, then I'd want lots of classes with deep ties to magic, including warrior classes that also use magic, such as Bladesingers and Paladins. But in a setting like Middle-Earth, such high magic would be inappropriate, and any magic-user class(es) would need to be far more subdued in their spellcasting and simultaneously more robust in non-casting abilities.

I didn't think of this - I really really like that approach. To your point a warrior in middle earth is drastically different to one in Ebberon which is different to one in the Far Realms.

Ziegander
2013-05-07, 05:52 PM
A very good explaination. Oddly enough though the class role names were defined in 4E, which seemed to be recieved negatively, I often find players attempting to build to a role when considering their character.

While there isn't anything wrong about building to a role it can become a straightjacket when forced upon you. In 4e, if you chose to play a Cleric, for example, you were a Leader, no way around it. You needed to make Wisdom your highest ability score and yet your attacks, even weapon attacks, were just as accurate and damaging as a character that focused on Strength.


Since this is not part of the chassis discussion or the ability discussion do you seek to adress this when we get to actual class builds through archatypes or via character generation with the selection of a "Primary attribute"?

I want to avoid a selection of Primary Attribute. Or rather, I want to avoid forcing that selection on the players. Something that was important to me when coming up with the Ability Scores and their uses/modifiers was to make sure that each score was important for something all characters could use. Introducing the derived Constitution and Willpower scores also serves to make each of the six Ability Scores important to all characters.

I want to ensure that easy and robust multiclassing is possible as well as cross-training in skills. I want to allow players to build characters not roles, and I aim to make as many concepts possible as I can.


I didn't think of this - I really really like that approach. To your point a warrior in middle earth is drastically different to one in Ebberon which is different to one in the Far Realms.

Exactly! I'm glad you like the approach. I think it makes the most sense and I hope it will lead to more interesting and compelling classes when the time comes to design and play them.

lesser_minion
2013-05-08, 06:02 AM
If you were amenable to adding a new universal mechanic, you could probably do something interesting with intelligence without making it a god stat.

For example, imagine a system where instead of having every spell or other exotic special ability a character possesses immediately usable for combat, you could require them to first devise a "tactic" or a "move" that incorporates the power, and intelligence could determine how many tactics a character can devise.

So, for example, a wizard might make a bargain with a demon in exchange for the power "wielder of fire and flame". That doesn't give them anything immediately useful in combat; instead, they have to spend time devising a tactic for wielding fire and flame in battle. One wizard might devise a tactic that consists of setting his hands on fire and then realising that that bloody hurts, actually; while another might be content to just fling fire bolts and fireballs around.

Note that a similar system can also work perfectly well for warriors -- for example, a warrior with a practical knowledge of magic could try using that knowledge aggressively against enemy magic users, timing his strikes to coincide with the points in spellcasting where the magical energy present is at its greatest, and is therefore hardest to control (i.e., Roy's new sword move, although it might just be a souped up version of the Mage Slayer feat). Another warrior might use the knowledge to harden her mind and body against hostile magic -- while simultaneously making it easier to accept helpful spells.

Of course, balancing a system like this would be a nightmare. You'd essentially be banking on the system being so interesting that nobody really minds if it isn't balanced -- and even saying that, it shouldn't be so hard to keep casters and non-casters balanced against each other. The real problem would be the internal balance of individual classes and archetypes.

PairO'Dice Lost
2013-05-08, 12:15 PM
I don't know if the suggested make-up-a-tactic idea would be a good idea, since as mentioned it would require a hefty redesign and would be difficult to balance, but the general suggestion of making an attribute useful by tying it to a subsystem rather than by just adding to a bunch of stats can be a good one.

Take Cha, for instance. Almost universally a dump stat unless you're a Cha-based caster...but it's also used for Leadership to determine followers and could be expanded to also limit summoned/animated/hired minions, you could tie it to luck rerolls/action points the same way Cha represents divine favor for the paladin, you could unify fear effects and mook rules into a morale system which depends a lot on Cha, and so forth. No one is adding Cha to saves or initiative or AC or any other basic stats, but suddenly having a good Cha (or at least avoiding a really bad one) actually provides a well-rounded set of benefits.

What you do with Int depends on what sorts of subsystems you want to have (you could add a research/reasoning subsystem used for crafting, learning spells/maneuvers, solving puzzles, and getting hints when stuck, for instance), but that would help divorce Int from being the skill-points-and-nothing-else attribute without turning it into the can-add-it-to-every-stat attribute.

Seerow
2013-05-08, 12:20 PM
I don't know if the suggested make-up-a-tactic idea would be a good idea, since as mentioned it would require a hefty redesign and would be difficult to balance, but the general suggestion of making an attribute useful by tying it to a subsystem rather than by just adding to a bunch of stats can be a good one.

Take Cha, for instance. Almost universally a dump stat unless you're a Cha-based caster...but it's also used for Leadership to determine followers and could be expanded to also limit summoned/animated/hired minions, you could tie it to luck rerolls/action points the same way Cha represents divine favor for the paladin, you could unify fear effects and mook rules into a morale system which depends a lot on Cha, and so forth. No one is adding Cha to saves or initiative or AC or any other basic stats, but suddenly having a good Cha (or at least avoiding a really bad one) actually provides a well-rounded set of benefits.

What you do with Int depends on what sorts of subsystems you want to have (you could add a research/reasoning subsystem used for crafting, learning spells/maneuvers, solving puzzles, and getting hints when stuck, for instance), but that would help divorce Int from being the skill-points-and-nothing-else attribute without turning it into the can-add-it-to-every-stat attribute.

I'd love to see more ideas along these lines. Would you be basically coming up with 6 new subsystems, one for each attribute? Or just have that for the attributes that typically have less to do? If the former, how do you manage this without making the game unbearably complex?

PairO'Dice Lost
2013-05-08, 02:10 PM
I'd love to see more ideas along these lines. Would you be basically coming up with 6 new subsystems, one for each attribute? Or just have that for the attributes that typically have less to do? If the former, how do you manage this without making the game unbearably complex?

I was thinking more for the attributes that have less to do. Right now, Dex is mostly fine on its own (being the defensive "god stat" in combat and the gadget-y "god stat" out of combat), Wis just needs to have some things shifted around and some existing optional rules implemented (Wis gets initiative and Concentration, mind-over-matter stuff like Autohypnosis and Diamond Mind, maybe use the faith system from Complete Divine, etc.), and most of the existing combat stuff benefits from Str, so we'd only need three entirely new subsystems. The morale subsystem from above would work well for Cha; in fact, adding some teamwork mechanics to go with it and fleshing out the inspiration/communication aspects of the social skills could expand that to a whole mass combat subsystem.

Thinking further on the research subsystem from above, that combined with more fleshed-out Search, Forgery, and Appraise would handle investigation fairly well, and those research/investigation mechanics could be expanded into a whole "downtime" subsystem to handle training, research, and other stuff to do when not adventuring.

Con doesn't do much on its own, so let's make it to the defensive/endurance aspects of combat what Str (and to a lesser extent Dex) is to the offensive/maneuvers aspects. Create a stamina system for Con to unify nonlethal damage, fatigue/exhaustion, carrying capacity, persistent injuries, and similar and you have yourself a subsystem that lets you give martial types Nice Things in combat by basing some ability usage on stamina and lets you flesh out the exploration/hex-crawl side of things out of combat by putting all of the environmental hazards, gear tracking, overland travel, etc. rules in one unified system. Str would get most combat stuff, which is fairly one-dimensional but is really all Str is used for anyway.

So that gives you five subsystems overall: tactical combat, crafting/gadgets, exploration/travel, research/training, and morale/mass combat, with perception/scouting/willpower for Wis being important to all of those; the imbalance of not having 6 subsystem rubs my OCD tendencies the wrong way, but there's really not a good way to have a Wis subsystem without either making it the new god stat or making religion and meddling gods a much larger part of the world, neither of which is all that desirable. Everything else follows naturally from those, I think--running a business or a kingdom draws various mechanics from the Con/Int/Cha subsystems, for instance.

Obviously there wouldn't be a one-to-one match between attributes and subsystems, particularly in Wis's case, as all of them can plausibly find some use in all of the subsystems, but making each one very important in its own area ensures that having a very high or very low score in any attribute benefits or penalizes you accordingly.

Seerow
2013-05-08, 03:03 PM
So basically:

Tactical Combat-Primary strength.
Exploration-Primary Con
Crafting/Gadgets-Primary... Dex? (was originally going to say int, but Research/Training gets int. This one seems weird)
Research/Training-Primary Int
Morale/Mass Combat-Charisma

Wisdom applies to all to some lesser degree.



One issue I see is Tactical Combat is still the main minigame people think of when it comes to D&D, and they want everyone to be good at it. While technically strength is the primary stat there (as it adds to hit/damage by default), basically every stat is going to be important to some degree. Everyone will be able to meaningfully apply their primary stat to tactical combat, and get as much, if not more, out of it than you get out of strength.

Personally I'd lean towards not defining Tactical Combat as one of the minigames, unless you're reworking the system to the point where the strength based guy really does dominate it, which I don't think you really want.


I think the more interesting thing is how each of these subsystems affects combat.

Exploration, as you described it, would have characters with lower con getting worn down before the fight even starts from the riggors of travel. It also provides characters in battle with more resources to use (so a Fighter with high con has more stamina points. A Wizard with more con can cast more spells. etc). Basically more con = last longer, a higher con character will have more durability as the day drags on, and possibly a deeper pool of resources even at the start of the day.

Research/Training presumably allows characters to get access to new abilities they can use (ie the Wizard goes and researches a new spell, the Fighter goes and learns a new combat stance, whatever). Higher int = more of these types of abilities the characters can learn (Basically figure it as int applying to the Wizard's spells known rather than spells per day).

Crafting/Gadgets obviously gives advantages in terms of options, similar in method to Intelligence. Except rather than learning a new move, you put together some new toy that gives you new options/benefits.

Morale/Mass Combat is interesting. Morale can be applied on the small scale, where characters/enemies can be demoralized and in doing so force them to surrender, or even bluff them into taking actions that aren't quite as logical. A high charisma character has the force of personality such that he's harder to demoralize in this way, and is better at manipulating his own allies/enemies morale. A high charisma can keep his own allies' morale up, and/or reduce enemy morale. It's basically a mini-game within the tactical combat mini-game. With a subsystem along these lines, you can even change out a Dragon's fear aura to just being "All enemies take massive penalties on morale", which will basically amount to the same thing normally, but will have more back and forth interraction on how to overcome it.

And of course mass combat is its own beast, but if built upon the same foundations as a morale system could be easier to balance. Though I would want skill/intelligence to play at least as much of a role as charisma in mass combat.

PairO'Dice Lost
2013-05-08, 06:55 PM
Crafting/Gadgets-Primary... Dex? (was originally going to say int, but Research/Training gets int. This one seems weird)

Gadgets goes under Dex because Open Lock, Disable Device, and other trap-y stuff is Dex-based, and I wanted to make a split between combat-scale trapmaking, device customization, jury-rigging, intricate crafting, and other short-/small-scale crafting where being good with your hands is important, and "day job"-type crafting which would mostly be Int-keyed and fall under downtime stuff. And of course remember that these attributes are primary, not exclusive, so blacksmithing might find Str important, trapfinding might find Int or Wis important, etc.


One issue I see is Tactical Combat is still the main minigame people think of when it comes to D&D, and they want everyone to be good at it.
[...]
Personally I'd lean towards not defining Tactical Combat as one of the minigames, unless you're reworking the system to the point where the strength based guy really does dominate it, which I don't think you really want.

By "tactical combat" I'm not just referring to D&D combat as a whole, but to things like combat maneuvers, fortification-making, and similar, the kind of stuff that in 3e would be more in theme for the warblade or marshal than for the barbarian or monk, if you see what I mean; making it Str-focused means that the barbarian gets some of it and that you can't dump Str or sub it out for something else like Dex rogues and Wis monks can now. So it's just one facet of combat like the other minigames are, as you discussed.


I think the more interesting thing is how each of these subsystems affects combat.

That's part of the idea, yes; each of the minigames have different foci and each character is strong or weak in a different set, but they all interact to some degree (unlike 4e's "powers in combat, skill challenges out of combat, and never the twain shall meet" design) and it doesn't pigeonhole your character to focus on one stat or one minigame.


And of course mass combat is its own beast, but if built upon the same foundations as a morale system could be easier to balance. Though I would want skill/intelligence to play at least as much of a role as charisma in mass combat.

Of course mass combat would involve skill and intelligence, and most likely all of the stats to some extent just like the other minigames can, as mentioned above.

Ziegander
2013-05-08, 07:53 PM
Well it seems that my proposed Chassis is well enough liked for me to go ahead and move on to the Skills section - where the first real meat and potatoes design can be done. Look for it in the next few days, there's a LOT of review and work to do just to look into the issues with the existing system and barely scratch the surface of proposing solutions.

Pyromancer999
2013-05-08, 10:12 PM
Well, defenses scaling as you go up hasn't quite been addressed.

Ziegander
2013-05-08, 10:44 PM
Well, defenses scaling as you go up hasn't quite been addressed.

I mentioned that I'd intended for that to have always been included. Not putting that into the Chassis originally was just an oversight. I have since edited to the Chassis to include the half-level bonus to Defense. Was there more to it that you wanted to discuss?

Pyromancer999
2013-05-09, 09:57 AM
I mentioned that I'd intended for that to have always been included. Not putting that into the Chassis originally was just an oversight. I have since edited to the Chassis to include the half-level bonus to Defense. Was there more to it that you wanted to discuss?

It would seem to be good as-is. Only thing I might find better would be to make sure it scales better with martial classes as opposed to non-martial classes, but as-is works for now.