Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 bone_naga Feb 12, 2012 11:26:10	Ok, so just like I ended up creating my own version of 3e that I used for years before 4e was released, I am now working on my own version of 4e. The main goal started out as me simply wanting to consolidate all the sub-classes, get rid of obsolete feats and feat taxes, and recompile all the material with the errata included. Then I started looking at some of the other mechanics, like dailies, and I've been working on changing them. So I decided to post some of my ideas here and open them up for comments. I'm going to post a general summary here and then give details for my follow-up posts. These posts will be updated as I work out the details. -Essentials subclasses are now just different builds of the primary class. -The feat list will be greatly pared down. -There will be a set of abilities and powers available to anyone of a particular power source (for example, a set of stances that any martial character can use). -Each class and/or power source (I'm still working on the specifics) will have some non-combat abilities outside of just skills (for example, all arcane characters will be able to use cantrips). -Some classes will have access to powers from more than one power source (such as both martial and divine for Paladins). I'm still debating if theses classes will have access to both power source pools, or if they choose one at character creation. -Multiclassing will be seeing some modifications to the feats and getting a theme that allows it as well. -All classes will get 5 trained skills (no more dumb fighter getting shorthanded). There are recommended skills for each class but no more class skills. Choose whatever fits your character. -Dailies are being reworked. I don't really like dailies both because the daily mechanic doesn't really work for most of my campaigns and because they just encourage characters to save them for the BBEG and then go nova. I am trying to make them effects that the character builds up to, creating sort of a combo chain, or something that inflicts a penalty like fatiguing the character so it becomes more useful to use it to end fights instead of start them. I still have no ideas on how to integrate this with daily utility powers. -Each class has a default build. This lays out skills, class abilities, and powers. They are all designed to be as friendly as possible to new players. However, all of these things can be swapped out, either at creation for experienced players, or by retraining so a player that starts learning the mechanics of the game isn't stuck with a simple character he made 10 levels ago. So a fighter might default to 2 martial stances, Power Strike for all encounter powers, and Brute Strike for all daily powers, but the player could just as easily swap one or all instances of Power Strike for different encounter powers. -Powers scale with level. If you desired, you could keep your level 1 encounter and daily powers throughout your entire career. This helps to reduce power bloat (since some powers are just scaled up versions of earlier ones anyway) and lets a character have signature moves that he becomes famous for. It also slightly increases character power (which I hope will even out with some of the things that will be taken away) and makes it easier when it comes to mechanics like swapping out Power Strike (this way all encounter powers are always on the same level, otherwise trading Power Strike, which already scales with level, could cause potential balance issues depending on what level power is gained from the trade). -Different classes will have slightly different mechanics. The weapon-using classes will rely heavily on stances and "booster" powers (powers that are tacked onto a basic attack, like Power Strike or Backstab) whereas casters will rely on spells and miss effects. I'm still working out how I might be able to differentiate their daily attacks. -I'm thinking to changing the way skill feats work. What I'm leaning towards now is that Skill Training provides a +3 bonus, and Skill Focus provides a +2 bonus along with some other modification to the skill, something along the lines of skill powers. The idea is to make Skill Focus more attractive without leading to a greater disparity in actual skill bonuses among the characters. I want characters to be better at skills because of what they can do with that skill, not because they have a +10 bonus instead of a +6. -Extended rests will be more narrative in approach. They can only be taken at a safe place (like an inn or the character's home), not in a dungeon or in the wilderness. They are also typically a week long. Of course the DM can change either of those two to suit the adventure (giving them a 1 day extended rest during a break in the adventure, maybe they have been under so much stress or pushing on for days without pause that even a simple bedroll under the stars gives them a much-needed break). -Heavy armor provides a small amount of DR.
#2 bone_naga Feb 12, 2012 11:26:23	Multiclassing. These are my ideas so far: -MC feats no longer grant a trained skill. This increases the importance of the skill training feat but I think MC feats will remain sufficiently attractive. I am also wondering if this will make it feasible to allow characters to have more than one MC feat. -I am getting rid of the Power Swap feats. I think they are just too costly. I am considering consolidating them into the original MC feat or allowing the MC Theme to handle this. -I would like a way for hybriding to be possible beyond character creation. Obviously this is difficult to do, but I have been considering having the theme handle that. The Multiclass Theme -The granted encounter power is simply an at-will power chosen from the class. This is similar to the half-elf dilettante power. -Requirements. Depending on how I go with this I have considered making the MC feat the requirement to take this theme, or if I keep the 1 MC feat per character limit, the theme could be completely divorced from the feat and offer an alternative way to MC. -Theme Powers. I have considered having the theme simply grant the benefits of all 3 Power Swap feats as a feature (this would be if I do not simply combine those feats into the base MC feat). An alternative approach would be to create a way for the theme to replace hybrids. So the theme could grant limited use of class abilities as theme features and allow almost unlimited power swapping so long as the number of MC powers did not exceed the number of powers from the base class. I'm still working out exactly how this would be done since I'd prefer to follow the normal theme progression of abilities instead of front-loading them like most classes do.
#3 bone_naga Feb 12, 2012 11:26:40	The Figher Class This was the class I wanted to work on first. I am also working on the basic outlines of other classes, but this is my starting point. HP, defenses, proficiencies, etc., same as PHB fighter. At-Wills: The Fighter may choose 2 at-will exploits from either the Fighter class list or the Martial power source list. All of these exploits are stances (similar to Essentials) that modify the Fighter's basic attacks. Encounters: The Fighter's default encounter exploit is Power Strike (from Essentials) which he gains more uses of per encounter as he increases in level. Any or all uses of Power Strike can be swapped for a different encounter exploit of the character's level or lower. Most encounter exploits function similar to Power Strike in that they provide a one-time modification or boost to the character's basic attack. Dailies: The Fighter's default daily exploit is Brute Strike (basically a stronger version of Power Strike). Even though I'm using Essentials as the model, I want all classes to have access to the same basic progression so that the number of combat encounters doesn't throw off balance between daily and non-daily classes. Brute Strike can be swapped for other dailies. I'm still working on the final version of the daily mechanics since I want them to not function strictly on days (I need to find another name for them too). Class Features: -Vigilant Defender and Defender's Challenge: These are just slight modifications of the Knight class features. They can be swapped out for Slayer (apply either DEX or INT to damage rolls) or for the Combat Challenge and Combat Superiority features of the PHB fighter. -Weapon Talent: the standard +1 to weapon attack rolls feature. Can be swapped out for Brawler, Distance Defender (allows use of Combat Challenge with ranged weapons, obviously requires CC to use, might be too powerful I'm not sure), Legionnaire (+1 AC when using a shield, spear, or wearing light armor), or Battlerage Vigor (I'm going to tone it down significantly from the original version, however).
#4 bone_naga Feb 12, 2012 11:27:18	Daily Powers This is just basic idea and still needs a lot of tweaking, but here's what I've got so far. -Dailies either require building up to or exact some sort of toll on the user. I want to make the specifics slightly different for each power source but we'll see how that goes. -Only one daily attack (regardless of level or power source) can be used during a single encounter. Daily attacks are no longer limited by X uses between extended rests. I may provide a way to exceed this limit at a cost (for those times when the fight is growing desperate and the characters have to do something), but I'm not certain at the moment. -The mechanic I'm working on right now basically works like a combo attack. This may not end up being a requirement for all daily attacks, but I think it's very flavorful for the martial characters at least. The player declares when he wants to begin his "setup". The setup involves meeting certain prerequisites within a set time frame, usually 2 consecutive rounds. One example of a setup might be that within 2 rounds you must knock and enemy prone and immobilize him (possibly in that order or maybe in whichever order you choose). Dailies with more complex effects will have more complex setups. Very basic ones (such as Brute Strike) will have very simple setups. Failing a setup does not count as using that daily. Action Points become very useful during setups as the extra action may allow you to make up for a missed attack. -Other daily mechanics might involve spending a healing surge to activate them or suffering a penalty until the character takes a short rest to represent fatigue. -Here is Brute Strike as an example of what I'm working on. Brute Strike Brute Strike                 Martial Attack 1 You deliver a bone-shattering blow that reverberates through your weapon and body.
#5 bone_naga Feb 12, 2012 11:27:40	Math and Monsters I want to eliminate the feat taxes (like expertise) and eliminate the reliance on magic items. I want even a +1 sword to feel special, with most of an item's benefits coming from non-bonus granting properties and powers. I could just use the innate enhancement bonuses, but the purpose of doing all this work is to get rid of all of the extra stuff that was tacked onto the system. I'd rather keep it as streamlined as possible. So I want to get rid of all assumed enhancement bonuses and go with just the flat 1/2 level bonus. I think the easiest way to do this would be to simply change the monster bonus so that they also progress with a 1/2 level bonus instead of the 1/level bonus, but I'm throwing it out here because there is always a chance that I missed something. For HP, I am most likely going to cut some of the HP down. I'm not sure exactly how much. I'm going to start small, then insert it into my current games to see how it works out. I'm going to start with just eliminating the base HP by monster role (so if a monster got 8 + CON + 8/level, it would now just get CON + 8/level). It's not a huge reduction, but I don't want it to be. It'll be significant at low levels, but at higher levels it will be a smaller percentage, which should even out with the characters all having more powerful encounter attacks and dailies potentially being dropped every encounter. I may cut down on character HP too, but I don't know just yet.
#6 bone_naga Feb 12, 2012 11:28:06	Skills -I'm thinking of changing trained skills to +3 and skill focus to +2. It decreases the range between character skill bonuses. I'm not sure if it's necessary, though. I'm curious as to whether or not anyone else has input on this. -Make skill training more valuable by adding to the list of "trained only" tasks for skills. Removing free skills from the MC feats (see multiclassing above) also makes this more valuable. -Have skill focus grant additional benefits (a minor ability related to the skill, something along the lines of some of the skill powers). -Decouple skills from ability scores. The ability score used will depend on the use of a skill. Recalling details of a specific religion or recognizing the holy symbol of an obscure cult might be INT while a cleric performing a ritual to honor his god might make a WIS check. Knowledge of magic would be Arcana + INT, but channeling entropic energies through your body to dissipate the aftereffects of a failed ritual might be Arcana + CON. And of course this allows for the oft-cited muscle-bound freak to use STR to scare someone with intimidate, while someone using other means or trying to manipulate someone into an action other than running away might use CHA instead.
#7 bone_naga Feb 12, 2012 15:03:47	BTW, does anyone know of any good tools for creating custom classes, powers, etc? I tried the DM Toolkit and the 4e Power Creator. The DM Toolkit has more tools available (like PPs and EDs) whereas the 4PC only has classes and powers (even the race tool apparently was never completed). I like the interface of the 4PC better. However, neither one of them is capable of producing custom themes, rituals, feats, etc. Granted, I could use multiple tools (Masterplan has support for a lot of that stuff but I don't like the work I have to do to change a power from one class/race/theme/etc to another since you can't just copy and paste the entire power block), but really just want everything stored in a single location, and I don't want to just manually plug everything into MS Word either.
#8 mhbjarkistef Feb 12, 2012 16:58:26	Bump. I'll read through this later. I recommend the block builder in my signature.
#9 Devereaux Feb 13, 2012 1:28:31	What would you like Masterplan to do? We'll sort it out for the next version.
#10 bone_naga Feb 13, 2012 17:48:33	What would you like Masterplan to do? We'll sort it out for the next version. Well the main thing is that I can't copy and paste powers. That sounds minor but at the stage I am at now where I have a lot of general ideas and not much concrete stuff, that can turn into a big hassle. For example, I sometimes go back and forth on whether or not I want Brute Strike to be a Fighter exploit or a general Martial power source exploit. As it stands now, I have to basically retype the power every time I change my mind. Likewise, when I did a MCWoD 4e conversion, I had 5 types of vampires and werewolves, and some of them shared or had slight variations of the same racial powers, but that meant retyping it each time, and if I made a change later on, I had to change it 5 times. Another cool thing but not as important would be having some of the common items used in custom creation available as check boxes with a custom box for new material. For example, all classes generally choose from the same list of skills and proficiencies, so instead of writing them out each time I create a custom class, it would be helpful if those were just boxes that I checked to add them to that class. However, there still needs to be that text box so that if I add a modern class, I can type in non-standard items like a Computer Use skill and firearm proficiencies. Likewise, most powers use the same keywords, and check boxes would be more convenient than me opening a book or trying to remember which ones might apply to my new power. Finally, one thing that would be immensely helpful is if there was a set of advanced options to tweak the math for the DM. So if I decide I want to change the skill DCs, I open the settings and make adjustments, and then when I run a skill challenge, the easy/moderate/hard DCs are now set at those levels. Or if I decide I want monsters that deal more damage and have less HP, I can alter that guidance, and from then on whenever I create a monster, it is those values that show up for the recommendations. It wouldn't matter to me if this altered the program as a whole (you can always have two copies) or if it only affected a single campaign file (if I reuse those rules I'll create a template campaign file to use), but either way it should have a button to restore the default settings. But out of all of those I would say the first one is the biggest deal for me right now since it creates the greatest amount of work. If that could be fixed that would be awesome because right now Masterplan is the only thing I know of that allows me to pretty much store an entire custom game in one location (short of doing it the hard way and typing it all into a word doc). Thanks for popping in here. Keep up the awesome work on that program. I can't believe (well I can believe but it makes no sense to me) that the DDI team hasn't reached out and sucked you up.
#11 dave2008 Feb 13, 2012 21:30:22	Bone_naga: I haven't read through all the post yet, but I like the general direction of your 4.75e.  One thing that you might want to look at is the healing surge mechanic.  In our campaign they are just called surges and they can be used for many things.  You can use them for a second wind and healing, but you also spend one surge to use an encounter power and 2 surges for a daily power, and you can spend a surge to gain an action point, etc.  Basically surges are a pool of vitality in our game that can be spent on many things.  I haven't increased the number of surges, so that means there is a lot less healing in our game, but I you can also use the daily power more than once with this system. Just thought you might be interested.
#12 bone_naga Feb 14, 2012 18:31:23	Bone_naga: I haven't read through all the post yet, but I like the general direction of your 4.75e.  One thing that you might want to look at is the healing surge mechanic.  In our campaign they are just called surges and they can be used for many things.  You can use them for a second wind and healing, but you also spend one surge to use an encounter power and 2 surges for a daily power, and you can spend a surge to gain an action point, etc.  Basically surges are a pool of vitality in our game that can be spent on many things.  I haven't increased the number of surges, so that means there is a lot less healing in our game, but I you can also use the daily power more than once with this system. Just thought you might be interested. I like that idea. I've decided to rename them as Heroic Surges. Like you said, I intend for them to be a pool that can be used for a number of different things, healing just being one of those. I didn't really get to that part in my posts yet since it's still in the very early stages, pretty much just a couple quick notes on my list of things to do. One thing that I thought of for the daily powers was that some powers might require a surge or alternatively maybe you could use the surge to bypass the normal prerequisites (see my bit on daily powers). I'm not sure if I want that to be a universal mechanic, a way to compensite for some of the weaker powers by giving them an alternate way to activate them, or something specific to certain classes/power sources. I also plan to have a way to "quicken" rituals by spending a surge and making a skill check.
#13 dave2008 Feb 14, 2012 20:32:09	I like that idea. I've decided to rename them as Heroic Surges. Like you said, I intend for them to be a pool that can be used for a number of different things, healing just being one of those. I didn't really get to that part in my posts yet since it's still in the very early stages, pretty much just a couple quick notes on my list of things to do. One thing that I thought of for the daily powers was that some powers might require a surge or alternatively maybe you could use the surge to bypass the normal prerequisites (see my bit on daily powers). I'm not sure if I want that to be a universal mechanic, a way to compensite for some of the weaker powers by giving them an alternate way to activate them, or something specific to certain classes/power sources. I also plan to have a way to "quicken" rituals by spending a surge and making a skill check. Heroic surges - i like that.  I like the idea of quickened rituals as well.  I just been using scrolls and skill checks, but addind surges makes a lot of sense.
#14 bone_naga Feb 17, 2012 21:44:17	Rituals -Overall, the cost of rituals will decrease. I want to encourage greater use of rituals during the game. In addition, some treasure may be in the form of ritual components and PCs might be able to harvest ritual components from certain monsters. -Rituals can be quickened to allow casting during combat. This requires the caster to lose a healing surge, use a standard + move + minor action (aka full round action), and make an Arcana check at DC 15 + ritual level. This is in addition to all the normal ritual requirements, which must still be met. Does anyone know of any rituals that might be abused in this manner? Would 2 surges be a better cost or would that be excessive? I want rituals to be easier to use when you need them, but I still don't want them to be more attractive than letting another character do his thing.
#15 bone_naga Feb 18, 2012 18:20:09	Critical Hits [EDITED] -Still working on the details here, but I think converting the 2e crit charts into 4e is feasible. -Requires a crit (and it must be a natural 20), roll for location, then a roll for the injury. -2e severity (which determined the dice used to roll for the injury) was based on the size of the weapon compared to the target. I'm thinking I'd rather base the severity of the attack off of the type (AED) instead. -Only attacks that roll for damage can generate a critical injury. -Crit effects will use the disease track for healing. -A critical injury can be ignored by spending one or more healing surges. I'm debating between a flat 1 surge or having some of the more extreme results cost 2 surges. I think this is a better mechanic than the 2e version of just rolling a saving throw to try to ignore the injury. -Obviously this favors anyone that makes multiple attacks, particularly AoEs. In my own games I only have AoEs make a single attack roll anyway, but this still leaves an issue where the game may suddenly slow down to roll a fistful of dice for 5 different targets. I don't want to leave AoE users out in the cold. Maybe restrict critical effects to 1 target per turn?
#16 mhbjarkistef Feb 19, 2012 10:10:56	From what I've heard, epic level rituals are really game-breaking. Make it 1 surge per tier, at least. Don't ruin crits! Crits are supposed to be the times where the player can choose what happens. Rolling for location and severity REALLY reduces the freedom and fun created by scoring a critical hit. Some players just like the damage, but some players get really creative and discribe their crit with a great performance. This you should aim at keeping, even encouraging. Also, isn't 5% chance enough? Do you really want to reduce it to 2,5%
#17 kangsregiment Feb 19, 2012 10:20:16	If you're still tinkering with daily powers, what I'm trying out with my own system is having action point effects on encounter powers. You spend the point when you use the power and apply the listed effects. The thought is that characters will be getting more action points per day than they currently do (either through accrual or starting with more each day).
#18 bone_naga Feb 19, 2012 10:31:03	From what I've heard, epic level rituals are really game-breaking. Make it 1 surge per tier, at least. That's a good idea, thanks. Eventually I'll have to look over all the specific rituals to see if any of them are going to be problematic but for now I think your idea will be useful to establish a basic framework to operate in. Don't ruin crits! Crits are supposed to be the times where the player can choose what happens. Rolling for location and severity REALLY reduces the freedom and fun created by scoring a critical hit. Some players just like the damage, but some players get really creative and discribe their crit with a great performance. This you should aim at keeping, even encouraging. I've always offered crit charts as an option to my players. Sometimes they want them and sometimes they don't, I go with whatever the group wants. But right now they are interested in bringing them back so I am attempting to do so in a way that isn't terribly broken. And not all players get descriptive with their hits. Mine will sometimes describe what they are doing, but they rarely describe the result, so in this case it isn't really taking anything away from them. Note that since this is essentially its own subsystem it can be added or removed from a game without causing any significant problems based on the preference of the players. Also, isn't 5% chance enough? Do you really want to reduce it to 2,5% It took me a minute to realize what you meant here, then I looked back at my post and realized I wasn't being clear enough. The saving throw doesn't negate the critical hit, it negates the chance of a specific injury.
#19 bone_naga Feb 19, 2012 10:33:37	If you're still tinkering with daily powers, what I'm trying out with my own system is having action point effects on encounter powers. You spend the point when you use the power and apply the listed effects. The thought is that characters will be getting more action points per day than they currently do (either through accrual or starting with more each day). I am definitely still tinkering with the dailies. In fact, I am trying to set up unique mechanics for different classes to activate their dailies while still maintaining some general balance across the board. I'd be very interested to see how your system works out.
#20 kangsregiment Feb 19, 2012 11:00:30	I liked your idea on scaling powers, so I decided to go back and incorporate that. It's scary how many powers replicate each other (or try to end end up being worse)! The reasoning for the action point mechanic is that weapon-users generally do not get daily powers. On the other hand, spellcasters do not get encounter powers, but can use an action point to retain a spell when it is cast. The number of techniques/spells a class is able to use is tweaked slightly to compensate.
#21 bone_naga Feb 19, 2012 11:53:47	I liked your idea on scaling powers, so I decided to go back and incorporate that. It's scary how many powers replicate each other (or try to end end up being worse)! Exactly. I'm also consolidating some powers into a generic power source pool so you have one Careful Attack type of power that all martial classes can acccess instead of writing up different powers with the same effect for various classes. I'm still working on the scaling for daily powers, I posted my idea but I can't help but feel that it needs some tweaking still. The reasoning for the action point mechanic is that weapon-users generally do not get daily powers. On the other hand, spellcasters do not get encounter powers, but can use an action point to retain a spell when it is cast. The number of techniques/spells a class is able to use is tweaked slightly to compensate. That's interesting, have you tried it out in play?
#22 kangsregiment Feb 19, 2012 11:55:42	I have not. I'm just starting to get ideas onto paper. My players think it's a very interesting idea though.