True20 and D&D [Archive] - Wizards Community

True20 and D&D [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
polt
05-05-07, 03:33 PM I've been, for a long while, thinking about taking the jump from D&D over to True20. Why? I'm tired of a lot of stuff in D&D that makes no sense, that bogs down the game, that are stupid. Now, I'm not saying that True20 is stupidfree, there's plenty there, something I'll probably add myself... but anyways.

My point is this. In all this chaos of stupidity, there's also a lot of brilliance in Dungeon & Dragons. And I want to keep some of it in my True20 game.

So what I want to do, is have a little talk about what is good and pure in D&D, what is worth keeping, what can be implemented in a True20 game.

I thought about taking what I liked about True20 and put it in my D&D game, but I think it's easier the other way around. I love the combat system in True20, and I like the magic system, although it's a little lacking in content.

So, the strength of True20 is in my opinion. The combat system. The spellsystem. The skills. The logic that makes the system more believable. It does lack in flavour though, it lack in content. There's not a lot of feats, there's not a lot of stuff you can give your character.

The strengths of D&D is, to me, a lot of flavour, a lot of cool stuff, items, spells, feats, abilities, stuff like that.

But I want to hear some thoughts. Have anybody made som true20 content out of the PHB or the other D&D books?
Xeviat-DM
05-06-07, 03:56 AM [QUOTE=polt;12308126]I thought about taking what I liked about True20 and put it in my D&D game, but I think it's easier the other way around. I love the combat system in True20, and I like the magic system, although it's a little lacking in content.

So, the strength of True20 is in my opinion. The combat system. The spellsystem. The skills. The logic that makes the system more believable. It does lack in flavour though, it lack in content. There's not a lot of feats, there's not a lot of stuff you can give your character.

I'll begin with this disclamer: I own True20, I've read it, but I haven't yet run it. And I probably won't. I bought it for the purpose of utilizing its rules in my D&D games; I'm currently trying to retool the Toughness save system to work in D&D.

To me, True20 has many problems. I like some of the new combat actions, and have adopted them in my game. I like the spellsystem in theory, but it has several massive problems (the energy ray is one problem; a 20th level Adept will have an attack roll of d20+10+dex, while a Warrior will have an AC of 30+dex, but the Adept's attack will be a DC 35 toughness save, and the Warrior will probably only have +10 to +15 on their save; the Adept can also augment this attack to be a burst, and thus require a reflex save instead of an attack roll; without that augment, the Adept can't hope to hit, but if they do, the Warrior is dead).

The lack of magic weaponry, the lack of equipment creation rules (these were well done in Mutants and Masterminds; why couldn't they port the rules over?), and many other things make me not want to use the system.

There are some great ideas in it, but I think you'd be better off using its balance structure and applying it to D&D, rather than the other way around.

Again, I haven't played with it, but I have played with Mutants and Masterminds.
polt
05-06-07, 04:11 AM The two thing I like the most are the toughness save combat system, and teh spell system. And it's those two things that takes the most work to take from one system into the other. So I think it's easier the other way around. I have actually converted the toughness save over to D&D (creationforge.blogspot.com), but I just think the other way is easier.

We never play with item creation feats, so I don't miss that. And magic items are easy enough to come up with yourself.
Keyar81
05-06-07, 08:36 PM You could always use D&D as pure source. Not worrying so much about the rules that you could port over, but utilizing magic items, monsters etc as source and guide to make those things in the true20 game, rather than coming up with all of that from scratch.
I've had my experience with admiring aspects of other systems. But with both D&D and AD&D there seems to be alot more content and whatnot to make things easier. I've seen games than have no monster manuals or the like and you have to create every single monster from scratch, likewise with items, and in a new game it can be hard to balance a monster(s) with the group until you've been gm'ing it for a good time.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
polt 05-05-07, 03:33 PM	I've been, for a long while, thinking about taking the jump from D&D over to True20. Why? I'm tired of a lot of stuff in D&D that makes no sense, that bogs down the game, that are stupid. Now, I'm not saying that True20 is stupidfree, there's plenty there, something I'll probably add myself... but anyways. My point is this. In all this chaos of stupidity, there's also a lot of brilliance in Dungeon & Dragons. And I want to keep some of it in my True20 game. So what I want to do, is have a little talk about what is good and pure in D&D, what is worth keeping, what can be implemented in a True20 game. I thought about taking what I liked about True20 and put it in my D&D game, but I think it's easier the other way around. I love the combat system in True20, and I like the magic system, although it's a little lacking in content. So, the strength of True20 is in my opinion. The combat system. The spellsystem. The skills. The logic that makes the system more believable. It does lack in flavour though, it lack in content. There's not a lot of feats, there's not a lot of stuff you can give your character. The strengths of D&D is, to me, a lot of flavour, a lot of cool stuff, items, spells, feats, abilities, stuff like that. But I want to hear some thoughts. Have anybody made som true20 content out of the PHB or the other D&D books?
Xeviat-DM 05-06-07, 03:56 AM	[QUOTE=polt;12308126]I thought about taking what I liked about True20 and put it in my D&D game, but I think it's easier the other way around. I love the combat system in True20, and I like the magic system, although it's a little lacking in content. So, the strength of True20 is in my opinion. The combat system. The spellsystem. The skills. The logic that makes the system more believable. It does lack in flavour though, it lack in content. There's not a lot of feats, there's not a lot of stuff you can give your character. I'll begin with this disclamer: I own True20, I've read it, but I haven't yet run it. And I probably won't. I bought it for the purpose of utilizing its rules in my D&D games; I'm currently trying to retool the Toughness save system to work in D&D. To me, True20 has many problems. I like some of the new combat actions, and have adopted them in my game. I like the spellsystem in theory, but it has several massive problems (the energy ray is one problem; a 20th level Adept will have an attack roll of d20+10+dex, while a Warrior will have an AC of 30+dex, but the Adept's attack will be a DC 35 toughness save, and the Warrior will probably only have +10 to +15 on their save; the Adept can also augment this attack to be a burst, and thus require a reflex save instead of an attack roll; without that augment, the Adept can't hope to hit, but if they do, the Warrior is dead). The lack of magic weaponry, the lack of equipment creation rules (these were well done in Mutants and Masterminds; why couldn't they port the rules over?), and many other things make me not want to use the system. There are some great ideas in it, but I think you'd be better off using its balance structure and applying it to D&D, rather than the other way around. Again, I haven't played with it, but I have played with Mutants and Masterminds.
polt 05-06-07, 04:11 AM	The two thing I like the most are the toughness save combat system, and teh spell system. And it's those two things that takes the most work to take from one system into the other. So I think it's easier the other way around. I have actually converted the toughness save over to D&D (creationforge.blogspot.com), but I just think the other way is easier. We never play with item creation feats, so I don't miss that. And magic items are easy enough to come up with yourself.
Keyar81 05-06-07, 08:36 PM	You could always use D&D as pure source. Not worrying so much about the rules that you could port over, but utilizing magic items, monsters etc as source and guide to make those things in the true20 game, rather than coming up with all of that from scratch. I've had my experience with admiring aspects of other systems. But with both D&D and AD&D there seems to be alot more content and whatnot to make things easier. I've seen games than have no monster manuals or the like and you have to create every single monster from scratch, likewise with items, and in a new game it can be hard to balance a monster(s) with the group until you've been gm'ing it for a good time.