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  1. - Top - End - #61
    Ettin in the Playground
     
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Grod, could you get the "This time its personal" thing out of quotes so I can put that in my signature? I really like it.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Figures someone would post while I make a gigantic edit. There's a lot of opinion at the bottom of the last page now.
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  3. - Top - End - #63
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by Eldan View Post
    I would argue for full-round casting times for most battle spells. It makes wizards more static and spells easier to disrupt, both of which are good things.
    How about inter-round casting times.

    Round 1: Unless you had prepped a spell before, you can only get off a cantrip. And then you can prep a spell for next round.

    Round 2: If your prepped spell was disrupted, you can only get off a cantrip. Otherwise, you can cast your prepped spell.

    In effect, non-cantrips require that you start casting on the previous round. But that doesn't eat your previous round's action.

    This gives time for the other side to make knowledge checks or disrupt your spellcasting.

    You could imagine a similar system for aiming ranged weapons, where taking a "snap shot" has significant penalties (barring specialization to compensate), without requiring you to burn 2 round's actions to fire one arrow (which sucks, fun-wise).

    ...

    A page you might want to steal from 4e/5e (I know, I know) is the idea of keeping d20 modifiers (on both attack and defence sides) under tighter control than 3e did. Checks that "always hit" and "always miss" should be the exception, not the rule.

    Getting rid of boring flat bonus feats and magic items is a step along this way, as is paring down the types of bonuses.

    The same is less true of bonuses to damage -- HP grows linearly (or, with con bonus, almost quadratically) with level. Static bonuses can grow pretty fast without being bad. On the other hand, it does apply somewhat.

    When you roll 1d6+3, something happens that is different than when you roll 10d6+30. The middle 50% likelyhood for 1d6+3 is roughly 4-8. The middle 50% likelihood for 10d6+30 is not 40-80, but rather 59-71, a much much tighter range.

    10d6+30 is more like (1d2+5)*10 than (1d6+3)*10.

    In effect, as you add more dice, the middle of the bell curve dominates more and more (the relative size of the middle bulge grows with the square root of the number of dice).

    So if you want the same swinginess to damage at higher totals, you need to have less static bonus and more dice, or you need to multiply dice by constants rather than adding them up (1d6*10 + 30 is just as swingy as 1d6+3).

    ...

    The idea of rolling multiple weapon dice is a great one (while using static modifiers once). If done aggressively enough, you can express increased competence at using weapons without having to throw on a static damage bonus or accuracy bonus, or requiring upteen attacks per round.

    As an example, a Standard (Power) Attack might be:
    (Melee Level/2 + 2) weapon dice on one target.
    a Cleave Attack might be:
    (Melee Level/4 + 1) weapon dice on (2 + Melee Level/2) targets.

    ...

    Instead of increasing BaB, you could grant a more modest Proficiency bonus (like +2 plus 1 every 2 levels) and stack on top Melee Level damage increases and attack rerolls.

    Fighters might get parry/block/dodge checks they can expend to avoid attacks, and things that trigger off them (a riposte feature, that gives a significant bonus for a successful parry against an attacker, or a shield bash that lets you stun someone whose attack you blocked, etc). That kind of thing would go a long way towards giving Melee types more "crunch" to hook abilities onto. Class bonuses that aren't just "static increase" ,but rather new abilities and options...

  4. - Top - End - #64
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by Eldan View Post
    I love third edition D&D. It is my favourite system, and I have tried many (Shadowrun, Vampire, Mutants and Masterminds, FATE, Gamma World, Dark Heresy and perhaps half a dozen less well known ones). I think fundamentally, it works and we honestly don't need that many changes. The framework is sound, there are just some things on top of it that are broken. I say we fix what needs fixing, simplify a thing or two that we don't really need to, but think is helpful and make the one or other improvement. That's all.
    I agree. Don't be hasty, little hobbits. There's work to be done, but perhaps not every single thing.

    Skill points should stay in, as far as I'm concerned. I like having a character with fewer points in more skills, especially at high level. And starting a character with one rank in profession: undertaker, or craft: weaponsmith is a nice way of adding some background.
    I don't see why craft and profession and appraise need to be combined either. There's such a thing as too general. Knoweledge might be able to be slightly reworked, perhaps. Some people might like the whole perception instead of spot and search. I'm not sure where I stand on that one.

    I honestly don't care much either way on rolled saves and static DCs vs. static defences and rolled attack spells. The result is mostly the same.
    Reflex, Fort and Will are things I think might serve best as is. AC and Saves are for two entirely different things, though I see what they might have been thinking with reflexes verses some non magical entities to AC. Mainly the saves are for magical things, though they do touch on other things. If we rework magic, it's likely to affect saves in some way, and when that happens, we'll figure out how.

    Condition tracks are a good thing, and I think they would solve many problems, mostly with save or dies. We have a fear track, an exhaustion track and a nausea track. My suggestion is adding another stun track and make them all have four steps, from "mildly annoying penalty (sickened, fatigued)" to "out of the fight" (paralyzed, panicked). Do we need any more tracks?
    What about drowning and suffocation?
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  5. - Top - End - #65
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Those aren't really tracks, are they? I think fortitude saves or nonlethal damage work quite well on those.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    I've done a bit of brainstorming, and run into a few immediate questions. For spells, do we wish to maintain the use of Saves as the main resistance to spells? If we're going with a check-based casting, it could make sense that the defender offer their defense as a bonus to that DC. I'm still working through some numerical possibilities there.

    Basics that I currently have down:

    Check: 1d20+Ability Mod+Casting Bonus (1/2, 3/4, or Full. 1/2 for Paladin-type, 3/4 for Bard-type, and Full for fullcasters) vs. a DC of 10+Spell Level*C+Factors. I'm toying around for different values of C for balance's sake. Running with 2 or 3 for now.

    If you fail a check by 5-9, something minorly bad happens (1 nonlethal per spell level?). Failing by 10+ something more detrimental (Stunned? Minus on spell-checks for the next few rounds?).

    For casting time, I was thinking about dividing spells up into Short, Medium and Long casting time groups, like we do with spell ranges. Each would have a default casting time, and then this casting time can be changed by the caster, resulting in a modifier in the check. You can shorten a casting up to four steps, but only increase it by two. +5 for every step shortened, +2 for each lengthened. 3 Hours (Long default) -> 1 Hour -> 10 Minutes (Medium default) -> 1 Minute -> Full Round (Short default) -> Standard -> Move -> Swift -> Immediate (A few spells like feather fall should be able to be casted as an Immediate action without a massive penalty to the check). So for your higher-level combat spells, you'll likely be in Full Round territory whenever you can. The limit on two-steps-up is to prevent players from spending 3 hours on the stupidest spells just to ensure success. And of course there'd be a rule where no matter what you can't cast more than one spell per round.

    I plan to include other modifiers that could increase or decrease the check, within reason. I don't want us to repeat the Epic Spells mistake of allowing the DC to be reduced to 0.

    I would like to include a preparation system where casters can ready spells ahead of time. I'm contemplating this right now.

    Lastly, we need a way to limit the amount of magic a caster can use. It shouldn't be infinite. First thing I think of is a point-based system (X levels/day) but I'd like to stay away from that if possible. Perhaps what Truenaming tried to do, with increasing DCs when repeating spells? That, or failed spells could impose a penalty on later spells, so after casting enough you start getting "Tired". Open to suggestions.
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  7. - Top - End - #67
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by Welknair View Post
    Lastly, we need a way to limit the amount of magic a caster can use. It shouldn't be infinite. First thing I think of is a point-based system (X levels/day) but I'd like to stay away from that if possible. Perhaps what Truenaming tried to do, with increasing DCs when repeating spells? That, or failed spells could impose a penalty on later spells, so after casting enough you start getting "Tired". Open to suggestions.
    The power points system that Psionics uses is generally considered a very good one, hindered only by the powers themselves being too strong. Consider something similar? It has two main benefits - it reduces annoying times/day limits (which many players hate) and it also provides a way to reduce spell redundancy; a low-level psionic power is just a higher-level one waiting to happen.


    Quote Originally Posted by Chilingsworth View Post
    Wow! Not only was that awesome, I think I actually kinda understand Archeron now. If all the "intermediate" outer planes got that kind of treatment, I doubt there would be anywhere near as many critics of their utility.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by Welknair View Post
    I've done a bit of brainstorming, and run into a few immediate questions. For spells, do we wish to maintain the use of Saves as the main resistance to spells? If we're going with a check-based casting, it could make sense that the defender offer their defense as a bonus to that DC. I'm still working through some numerical possibilities there.

    Basics that I currently have down:

    Check: 1d20+Ability Mod+Casting Bonus (1/2, 3/4, or Full. 1/2 for Paladin-type, 3/4 for Bard-type, and Full for fullcasters) vs. a DC of 10+Spell Level*C+Factors. I'm toying around for different values of C for balance's sake. Running with 2 or 3 for now.

    If you fail a check by 5-9, something minorly bad happens (1 nonlethal per spell level?). Failing by 10+ something more detrimental (Stunned? Minus on spell-checks for the next few rounds?).

    For casting time, I was thinking about dividing spells up into Short, Medium and Long casting time groups, like we do with spell ranges. Each would have a default casting time, and then this casting time can be changed by the caster, resulting in a modifier in the check. You can shorten a casting up to four steps, but only increase it by two. +5 for every step shortened, +2 for each lengthened. 3 Hours (Long default) -> 1 Hour -> 10 Minutes (Medium default) -> 1 Minute -> Full Round (Short default) -> Standard -> Move -> Swift -> Immediate (A few spells like feather fall should be able to be casted as an Immediate action without a massive penalty to the check). So for your higher-level combat spells, you'll likely be in Full Round territory whenever you can. The limit on two-steps-up is to prevent players from spending 3 hours on the stupidest spells just to ensure success. And of course there'd be a rule where no matter what you can't cast more than one spell per round.

    I plan to include other modifiers that could increase or decrease the check, within reason. I don't want us to repeat the Epic Spells mistake of allowing the DC to be reduced to 0.

    I would like to include a preparation system where casters can ready spells ahead of time. I'm contemplating this right now.

    Lastly, we need a way to limit the amount of magic a caster can use. It shouldn't be infinite. First thing I think of is a point-based system (X levels/day) but I'd like to stay away from that if possible. Perhaps what Truenaming tried to do, with increasing DCs when repeating spells? That, or failed spells could impose a penalty on later spells, so after casting enough you start getting "Tired". Open to suggestions.
    Right. Let's see. (And I still think this should wait until we have organization down and sub-threads).

    First of all, spell failure dangers. Should there even be any? And if yes, should there be negative effects? Fighters don't suffer negative effects from missing on attack rolls.

    I also hate, hate, hate, hate, hate, hate, hate and mildly dislike point-based casting systems. They are incredibly boring and fluffless. What's wrong with slots? I went with level-less generic slots myself (just spells prepared, similar to maneuvers prepared), and they refresh with a ten-minute break for the caster.
    Of course ,this is for prepared casters. Spontaneous casters, if we make any, work fine with points. But prepared casters are more interesting to me.
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  9. - Top - End - #69
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by Eldan View Post
    First of all, spell failure dangers. Should there even be any? And if yes, should there be negative effects? Fighters don't suffer negative effects from missing on attack rolls.
    Fumble and fizzle rules add needless complexity and don't really make the game any more fun.

    I also hate, hate, hate, hate, hate, hate, hate and mildly dislike point-based casting systems. They are incredibly boring and fluffless. What's wrong with slots? I went with level-less generic slots myself (just spells prepared, similar to maneuvers prepared), and they refresh with a ten-minute break for the caster.
    Of course ,this is for prepared casters. Spontaneous casters, if we make any, work fine with points. But prepared casters are more interesting to me.
    Counter point: all of the T3 casters in the current paradigm are spontaneous casters, and in any event it doesn't have to be boring and fluff-less. In fact, most non-Vancian spellcasters cast from a reserve of either physical or mystical energy that would easily translate to some kind of point system.

    Personally, I feel that Vancian casting (prepared casting) is a travesty, myself. We should really decide if we have to keep it as a legacy or if we can come up with a replacement that's better.


    Quote Originally Posted by Chilingsworth View Post
    Wow! Not only was that awesome, I think I actually kinda understand Archeron now. If all the "intermediate" outer planes got that kind of treatment, I doubt there would be anywhere near as many critics of their utility.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Just came upon this project this morning and I admit that I've mostly skimmed thus far because I'm just on break from doing a college assignment do later today, but I like where this is going so far and am glad to see a project like this being attempted and so far done in such an amiable manner. I definitely plan to give the whole thread a good sit down and read when I get a chance.

    So knowing all that:

    GitP Username: Troll Brau
    Skype Username, if applicable: Jaegermonster
    How much time can I contribute?: I can easily contribute 1 hour a day, bare minimum. This might flucutate depending on real life barging in such as college and other things, but I feel I can easily give one hour.
    Skills and credentials:Well, I started homebrewing back in 2010, but didn't really get into the swing of it until I entered the GiTP Monster competitions that Mullet used to run (I did place first every time I did enter though). Since then I've made a handful of 3.PF homebrew that was met with some small, small bases of popularity for certain items. I'm also the holder, judge, and usually sole critic of the GiTP Pathfinder Grab Bag Competition, which has been running for over half a year now. I don't think I'm as amazingly qualified as some on here, but I don't think I'm terrible either.
    Preferred project: Monsters (including Monsters as PCs) and General Brainstorming
    Do you wish to be one of the organizers?: No.

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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Back to Leaders: we don't have any votes so far. Could we please get that done first, and discuss the specifics later?

    As for Vancian casting: I love it. It's unique to D&D, while everything out there has the generic point system. Why drop an interesting, unique system?
    And again: it promotes wizards. D&D has wizards as intelligent, systematic scholars, which I think is an archetype we should not drop. For me, the prepared slot system, with it's focus on careful forethought, need for preparation time, distinct spell formulae and mechanical importance of spellbooks and implements complements the scholarly wizard well. Leave spell points and mystical energies to sorcerers and psions, wizards need preparedness.

    And, well. Show me one piece of magic fluff for points that is as interesting as "I use a magical formula to rip a piece of magic out of its natural flow, break it down and reshape it to suit my needs and imprison it in my head until I want to release it".
    Last edited by Eldan; 2012-09-25 at 12:20 PM.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by TheWombatOfDoom View Post
    I don't see why craft and profession and appraise need to be combined either. There's such a thing as too general. Knoweledge might be able to be slightly reworked, perhaps. Some people might like the whole perception instead of spot and search. I'm not sure where I stand on that one.
    On that note, I'll link my Knowledge skills below and see what y'all think of that?

    The Six Knowledges.

    I had other stuff planned for Craft as well (though that would incorporate stuff from d20 Modern as well), plus some skill combinations a la Pathfinder/4E and a little something for Iaijutsu Focus and other less-known/non-Core skills, but those last things are probably not as relevant to this.


    EDIT: Suppose I'll fill this out too and be slightly more of an active supporter.

    GitP Username: Morph Bark
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    How much time can I contribute?:
    Skills and credentials: Not much to speak of. I got an Extended Homebrewer Signature with some stuff. I'm mostly good with fluff, naming things, and have become somewhat apt at reviewing balance and finding out what people are good at due to the Tiering thread.
    Preferred project: I prefer small bits. Tweak details. Maybe check up on others' work afterwards and help out. I like big stuff occassionally, but it's not my forte, as I work primarily off inspiration, which gets harder with bigger things, so a position of working on details or keeping an overview or such would suit me best, I figure.
    Do you wish to be one of the organizers?: Could do. Way it's looking I may end up with a lot of time on my hands anyway, despite my best intentions.
    Last edited by Morph Bark; 2012-09-25 at 12:23 PM.
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  13. - Top - End - #73
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Morph: as a planescape fanboy, I dislike the name "Forbidden Knowledge" for other planes, but that's about it. And I'm not sure Geography should even be there: most of what goes into Geography sounds like it would be either History and Culture or Planes. Also, why would elementals be separate from Planes? Psychology seems to fit more under culture than nature, unless you want Sociobiology to exist in D&D.

    And again: Focus people. These are details .We can discuss them later. If we cant focus enough to start at the big things instead of the little details, we can bury this project right away.
    Last edited by Eldan; 2012-09-25 at 12:26 PM.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Aye, aye. We need to figure out organization, and then continue the other discussions in appropriate sub-conversations.


    People that have posted my little signup thingy:
    Welknair: Magic, general mechanics, and classes
    TheWombatOfDoom: Fluff and general brainstorming
    Eldan: Magic shtuff
    GunBladeKnight: General brainstorming
    WaylanderX: Classes, Magic, Races, General brainstorming
    Grod The Giant: I don't think he's posted a signup thingy, but is obviously active on this. General brainstorming?
    Troll Brau: Monsters and General brainstorming
    Morph Bark: Tweaking, small things, and balance

    Any I'm missing?
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    Quote Originally Posted by Morph Bark
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Races too. I've done tons of races.

    We still don't have a main organizer, though.

    After that, we were discussing on Skype. The main four areas for now:

    Skills, Feats, Magic and Combat. These need to be done first. Why? Because you can't make wizard class features until you know how magic works, or build a fighter until you know the combat basics.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by Eldan View Post
    And again: Focus people. These are details .We can discuss them later. If we cant focus enough to start at the big things instead of the little details, we can bury this project right away.
    the problem is, saying we are basing it off of D20, people already have the broad strokes down outside of alignment and class/race design philosophies.

    Basically, these rules should be followed:

    Alignment: Keep it simple, keep it subjective, define it objectively to be loose

    Races: give each race a reason for existing besides "the gods made us" Warforged dont count in this. Make the elves all-female, make the dwarves living rock. justify gnomes with halflings in the same system.

    Classes: Design each class first and foremost with a central role. Wizards cant exist though as a class, having to step down for the Mage specialist, who still gets vancian.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by Eldan View Post
    Morph: as a planescape fanboy, I dislike the name "Forbidden Knowledge" for other planes, but that's about it. And I'm not sure Geography should even be there: most of what goes into Geography sounds like it would be either History and Culture or Planes. Also, why would elementals be separate from Planes? Psychology seems to fit more under culture than nature, unless you want Sociobiology to exist in D&D.
    Since you adressed it: I used the name "forbidden lore" primarily because that's its function in my main current setting, and for possible ties to the Knowledge (forbidden lore) skill of Unearthed Arcana, which drives the Insanity mechanic. That use is entirely optional (and not even worked out as of yet anyway) and the skill can be easily renamed to something better. ("Hidden lore" could fit just as well and not carry the same connotations.) In this manner, I hoped to reserve the Planes and knowledge of them for higher level characters or specialized ones (or both) and thus make planar adventures that much more epic and full of mystery.

    I kept Elementals seperate from the planes as people in the Material Plane could encounter them relatively easily (or at least as easily as other creatures governed by knowledge (arcane)). Likewise, I believe Geography is plenty different from History, plus I had already stuffed History & Culture with so much (though generally things that won't come up much, so in the end it's about as relevant as the other skills) that I didn't want to add that in too.


    At any rate, on a greater scale, I believe our plan of attack should be thus:

    First: the system itself. Combat and Magic.
    Second: things derived from this. This most likely comes down to Feats and Spells, though Skills should come before the Feats. A talk on combining skills seems important at that point.
    .
    .
    Middle: creatures. By this I mean both monsters and races, and of course trying to see if we should make monsters available as playable. We could turn the intelligent monsters into classes, of course, which would make them need to be put much further down the line, while also giving us quite an extra workload at the end.
    .
    .
    Last: the classes. They depend on everything else, so they should come last. PrCs, or whatever they'll be replaced with, should of course be a part of this. Also, make base classes as broad as possible. Leave the better stuff up to PrCs or their replacement, or a path within a class.
    Afterwards: setting stuff things? Core has, for instance, some info on the Planes, as well as gods. This is the parts that I love doing. Heck, I'd even throw in forms of religion that aren't polytheistic for good measure, all justified and well.
    Last edited by Morph Bark; 2012-09-25 at 12:39 PM.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by toapat View Post
    Classes: Design each class first and foremost with a central role. Wizards cant exist though as a class, having to step down for the Mage specialist, who still gets vancian.
    Woah, woah, woah, woah. What? Why? I mean, you can state your opinion, but I never heard anyone saying something like that. Wizards are a classic. We can't just entirely kick them out for some new class.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by Eldan View Post
    Woah, woah, woah, woah. What? Why? I mean, you can state your opinion, but I never heard anyone saying something like that. Wizards are a classic. We can't just entirely kick them out for some new class.

    He's saying you can't have Wizards exist as the guys who can do anything. You instead have specialized magical classes that are more specialized into a role. The question then becomes "Will people accept a more limited caster as a 'Wizard' or does this class need a different name to be accepted?"
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    smile Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by Eldan View Post
    Woah, woah, woah, woah. What? Why? I mean, you can state your opinion, but I never heard anyone saying something like that. Wizards are a classic. We can't just entirely kick them out for some new class.
    Wizards are not classic, they are a Plot device.

    They also completely annihilate any flavor magic might have. ive pointed out at least 4 times on the boards that no mechanics within DnD present magic as difficult, complex, strange, or mysterious. The mechanics entirely support the idea that the fighters are morons for NOT becoming wizards, clerics, or other casters.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by toapat View Post
    ive pointed out at least 4 times on the boards that no mechanics within DnD present magic as difficult, complex, strange, or mysterious.
    This has been a core principle of DnD since before 3.5 though, since before Wizards became the masters of everything.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    It never says Wizards have to be able to do anything. "Wizard" is like "Scientist". No scientist is a quantum physicist, a geneticist, a chemist, an astronomer and an ecologist.

    Yes, they should be forced to specialize, I'm not debating that. But I don't see the need for one new class for every kind of magic. That would leave us with about as many spellcasting classes as other classes.

    I hate to name my own wizard fix again, but my suggestion is this: have spells build on each other, like maneuvers. Give the wizard a limited number of spells he can reliably cast, and give him a requirement to know X lower level spells of the same school/group/lore/whatever before he can learn the next higher. Just as you need three other Tiger Claw maneuvers to learn a higher level one, you need three other compulsions to learn Dominate Person.

    That way, you can have a specialists who get more powerful spells, but less versatility, and generalists, who learn a few spells form everything, but never et to the really good stuff in any category.

    As for magical difficulty and mystery: I think you can make magic difficult with rules, no problem. But I also think that magic loses most of it's mystery as soon as you hand it to the players and they can read the rules on it. I don't think you can represent "Mystery" in rules. You can in the fluff, but in the rules, it will be difficult.

    And again: We still don't have any votes on project leaders. Priorities, people.
    Last edited by Eldan; 2012-09-25 at 01:00 PM.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by Welknair View Post
    Grod The Giant: I don't think he's posted a signup thingy, but is obviously active on this. General brainstorming?
    I did; I just went back and edited it into a post, so you may not have seen it. Skype grod_the_giant; interested in classes and general mechanics; willing to lead.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by Morph Bark View Post
    First: the system itself. Combat and Magic.
    Second: things derived from this. This most likely comes down to Feats and Spells, though Skills should come before the Feats. A talk on combining skills seems important at that point.
    .
    .
    Middle: creatures. By this I mean both monsters and races, and of course trying to see if we should make monsters available as playable. We could turn the intelligent monsters into classes, of course, which would make them need to be put much further down the line, while also giving us quite an extra workload at the end.
    .
    .
    Last: the classes. They depend on everything else, so they should come last. PrCs, or whatever they'll be replaced with, should of course be a part of this. Also, make base classes as broad as possible. Leave the better stuff up to PrCs or their replacement, or a path within a class.
    Afterwards: setting stuff things? Core has, for instance, some info on the Planes, as well as gods. This is the parts that I love doing. Heck, I'd even throw in forms of religion that aren't polytheistic for good measure, all justified and well.
    Yeah, I think you've got the right approach here.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Grod_The_Giant View Post
    Grod's Law: You cannot and should not balance bad mechanics by making them annoying to use

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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by Eldan View Post
    And again: We still don't have any votes on project leaders. Priorities, people.
    I technically voted earlier for you and grod, earlier, but I don't know if you're counting it.

    Perhaps we should get a refresher on who wants to lead and what not, I know morph just volenteered to be a leader, I'm considering changing my no to a yes, so on. In otherwords....let's propose the organization system and also speak about leadership for it.

    I propose we do something like this-

    (project leader) - (project leader) - These two work with each other to organize things, encourage subject matter, call errors, whip people into gear, so on.

    Then we have the groups within the project. Each group has a group head, that is basically in small leadership of their area, to keep things flowing and help the project leaders. Examples of these groups would be things like -
    (Fluff Masters) (Class Creators) (Creature Teachers) (Magic Conjurors) (Generalists) (Grammar Monkeys)
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Right, then. We had a vote on the Skype thread.

    I'm the Great Poker. My obligation is to organize things. I will make sub-threads as necessary, collect the information and ensure it's accessible, poke people when nothing is happening and shout at them when they get delayed.

    Waylander is Subpoker, his job is to poke me when I get lazy.


    The first two sub-threads will be up later tonight. As per Morph's priority list, we will start with Combat and Magic. You may now begin start squabbling amongst yourselves as to who becomes responsible for those subjects.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by Grod_The_Giant View Post
    Personally, I'm in favor of dropping the ability score/ability modifier distinction altogether; let's merge them together and just use the "modifier." 2d4-4 gives a nice bell curve centered around 1.
    4d3-8 gives a nice bell curve centered around 0, which preserves the +4 and -4 extremes before races are taken into account, and as such is nicely symmetrical.

    As for condition tracks - you probably don't need all that many, and a proliferation of them is unhelpful anyways.
    Last edited by Knaight; 2012-09-25 at 01:37 PM.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Quote Originally Posted by Eldan View Post
    Condition tracks are a good thing, and I think they would solve many problems, mostly with save or dies. We have a fear track, an exhaustion track and a nausea track. My suggestion is adding another stun track and make them all have four steps, from "mildly annoying penalty (sickened, fatigued)" to "out of the fight" (paralyzed, panicked). Do we need any more tracks?
    Perhaps it can be Slowed (half speed) > Immobilized > Stunned > Petrified?
    Then possibly Shaken (-2) > Frightened (-6) > Panicked > Heart Attack?
    Fatigued (-2) > Exhausted (-6) > Drained (unable to act) > Unconcious?

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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    Don't think all those condition tracks should end in death, no.

    And I'd rather put dazed in there with stunned. Petrified is kind of its own thing.
    Fear is already a working track, it doesn't need change, really.
    Exhaustion looks good.

    I'd say Fear, Fatigue and Nausea already exist as tracks. Add in one more for stunning, and we should be good.
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    Default Re: Gaols and Giants - The Playground rewrites third Edition

    For condition tracks, you can take inspiration from Heroes of Horror. They grouped some of them together more, though a few of them are shakily tied together.
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