Help! Ideas to Balance Difficulty with my Homebrewed Rules! - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

Help! Ideas to Balance Difficulty with my Homebrewed Rules!

Post/Author/DateTime Post
#1
Aldath
Jan 26, 2012 15:01:05 Ok guys, I love the system 4E hanles since it's very malleable and adaptable.

My friends and I had always wanted something like it since other systems were filled with tricky rules and checks, and we finally have made our dream come true: Making a loooong campaign based on the famous award-winning videogame (and now Anime) Persona series.

The thing goes like this... they are a bunch of higschoolers who awaken the power of their inner demons or Persona to hunt the urban legend demons that haunt their city, Anegawa. We combine investigation, japanese urban legend learning, interpretation and A LOT of Solo Monster Battles...

Dungeon crawling is easier here, and we don't worry about making much sense, so we're having a blast... However I homebrewed the following Rules:

-CHARACTERS CAN NOT DIE: If the character is "killed" within a dungeon, and it's not revived/saved, the character will NOT be able to participate in the dungeon again unless the whole party dies OR they escape (and they won't be able to do any other dungeon till' the following day). Revival Beads and Potions are also price lowered to make them waaay more accesible to characters.

-SOCIAL LINKS: Like in the game, characters can interact with important NPCs to raise their relationship level with them. Every NPC like that is associated with a Tarot Card, which are assosiated with Personae. The more they get along with their Social Links, the stronger the Personae will be.

-PERSONA SWITCH: Tough each character has a class (Cleric, Ranger, Psion, etc.), I let them have a limit of 5 Personae per character. Equiping a Personae gives them bonuses to their stats (usually ranged from +1 to +2) and penalties to others (-2 to -3), to add balance. Each Personae gives them an asset of special Dialy and Encounter Powers (the encunter ones usually with a recharge) so they can have a wider array of combat tactics. An example of a low-level Personae is:

HUA-PO
RELATED ARCANA: THE MAGICIAL (Social Link Level 1 Needed)
DEMON FAMILY: JIRAE (-2 to every die roll when used by strikers)
EFFECTS: +1 TO CHARISMA AND INTELLIGENCE, -3 TO CONSTITUTION
WEAKNESSES/RESISTANCES GRANTED: INMUNE TO FIRE, WEAK TO COLD 7
POWERS:

AGI (Encounter/Recharge)
ACTION: Standard RANGE: Melee
RECHARGE: 4-6
EFFECT: 1d4+Intelligence Modifier Damage. The target takes 3 ongoing fire damage at the begining of each of its turns (save ends)

JIRAE CHARM (Utility)
EFFECT: +2 to Skill Checks related to Charisma as long as the Persona is equiped.

The game has been fun so far but I feel like I need to balance difficulty... characters either die too much or wipe out dungens easily.
I've managed to put up a good balance at some parts, giving them smooth runs and then facing them with shocing challenges, very fun to do... However I still need help to come out with ideas to make some enemies tougher (specially since the game is more boss-battle oriented).

Thanks for reading.
#2
alitain
Jan 26, 2012 18:20:38 Well first I'll say I've never played the Persona games.

So that being said, are you wanting help on trying to fit D&D 4th into this Persona game? With houserules and such I mean?  I just ask for clarification. Basically, looking at your first houserule, "Characters cannot die" doesn't make much sense. All you mention is that if someone dies they can't "participate" in a dungeon unless the party escapes or all dies. This sounds like a video game mechanic and not D&D. I mean generally speaking in D&D, at least for me and my group, we pretty much never go back into any type of dungeon we've been in. It's not like a video game where you might want to go back to a previous dungeon to fight the monsters to farm equipment, items, or exp to level up. So I'm not really sure what you're driving at here with this.

I mean if a member of the parties dies while the group is going through the dungeon if no one has anything to revive the character than they should chop a piece of the character off(if they can), and carry it with them(preserved or in bag of holding) till they leave the dungeon they're in and can get to a NPC that can ressurect people for them. It's really as simple as that. Or if a party member can do the raise dead ritual but the group doesn't have enough money then they could wait till they have enough. But regardless why would they then want to go right back in the dungeon they just went through? Again, this isn't a video game. It's more meant to be like a book or story. I mean in Lord of the Rings you don't see the party go back to one of the first areas they traveled to in say the first book and fight the orcs again to "level up" or anything. They just keep going on and on till the end.

"Social Links". Not really sure how this would work in a D&D setting. Again this sounds like more of a video game mechanic. I mean sure, the party could form allies as they quest along; maybe saving someone, or helping a king or something. And then later as the adventure gets bigger in scale at higher levels maybe they could fall back on asking for help in certain matters. But generally speaking this sorta thing should be more organic to the story and whatever the characters do. I mean you could sure, keep some chart with the party members and important NPCs and then give the players a point if they do the right thing with the NPC or deduct a point but what use is this? How is this relevant to the game? Would these "relationship levels" give a bonus to skill checks with these NPCs? Like if the party rescues the King's daughter as an example and that gives them say a +1 to their relationship level with the king what benefit is that to them? If the party returns to the King because they need troops to storm a castle does it give them a +1 to a diplomacy check to convince the King to aid them?

Maybe I'm just not seeing it, like I said I never played the Persona games and I'm sure these kinda mechanics work fine in the game but they don't seem to make sense in D&D, from my point of view.

"Persona Switch". I think this, outta the three, makes the most sense in terms of D&D.  Each player has an internal demon or Persona they can draw upon to boost their stats and give them a power.  I will say though that five seems extreme. Even if they can only equip one at a time is there a restriction on equipping? I mean if say a player had five Personae and was in a battle could he use the power or one Persona then say on his next turn unequip it and equip another Persona and then use that ones' power, rinse and repeat. That could potentially be OP depending on what abilities these Personae have. And I would argue against giving player rechargable powers. Recharge powers are meant for monsters because they're basically only going to be around once, that combat.  And usually they have one or two regular at will attacks then 1-3 enc/daily attacks to use in the combat. So rechargable abilities are needed for monsters to give them more of a variety or else you'd have a monster that would be left doing mostly their basic attack after a round or two. But with players, they have two(usually) at wills, up to four enc & dailies as well as their utilities to use which can help them in combat. They have actually several different options available so giving them a rechargable encounter is a little much.

The Hua-Po. Alright, so giving a minus to a stat doesn't actually balance out giving a bonus. This was part of the reason why they did away(for the most part) with racial minuses in 4th ed. It doesn't necessarily balance things out, and sometimes is tilted more toward the negative. Speaking strictly of his Persona, a +1 to Cha/Int isn't balanced by a -3 to Con. If say a Sorcerer were to equip this they would gain the +1 and really wouldn't suffer the -3 because it wouldn't affect anything. The only use the Con stat has is for your initial HP, possibly your Fort stat, and the Endurance skill. Which if you're a character that benefits from Cha/Int most likely your Con is going to suck anyway and really one matter much. Now obviously this may not always be the case, I don't know every class/build stat requirement but like the new Sha'ir wizard build coming up, that one is Int/Con so that would be affected by this Persona. But all in all this kinda +/- thing really doesn't work. I would just stick to giving it a +1 to Cha OR Int, and leave it at that.

Then there's the resistances. Immunity to fire is powerful. Even though at low level you may or may not encounter enemies that do type damage much fire tends to be the most common. And regardless of element type, immunity is a strong thing to be able to have available so easily. If nothing else this Persona would be potentially even more useful at high levels when you're encountering monsters doing more typed damage. I mean I know in our games we tend to encounter quite a few monsters that do type damage, and more specifically fire. And the vulnerability 7(which by the way, odd to use an odd number like that. Most of the time it's in increments of 5) to cold isn't too big a deal really. I would instead do what they do for racial bonuses; have it give a 5+half level resistance to fire. That way it continues to grow and help out as the player gains levels. Unless you're intending for them to discard Persona of low level and get replacements ones of higher level. In which case have it give a static say Resist 5 fire would be sufficient without a penalty I think. Or at most have the resistance and weakness match. So resist 5 fire, vulnerability 5 cold.

The power AGI doesn't seem too bad. Except for the recharge which I already discussed. And the fact that there's no attack needed, which given that this does a decent damage AND ongoing damage, is bad. This needs to have an attack roll. Best bet would be Highest Ability Score vs Will maybe. Then again, having it do "+Int mod damage" already narrows it to only classes with a decent Int score. Otherwise it's useless. So I would replace it as well with "+ HAS mod damage", makes more generally usable for everyone. Unless of course you're planning out specific Personae for each player and not just them being able to aquire random ones whether they're beneficial or not. Fairly straight forward, but in terms of simple wording there's no reason to have "at the beginning of each of its turns". Ongoing damage is always taken at the start of a turn so all it needs to say is thus; "Effect: 1d4+HAS mod damage. The target takes ongoing 3 fire damage(save ends)." Though again, an odd number like 3 is odd, like I said usually ongoing damage follows resistances in that it goes by increments of 5.

The Jirae Charm isn't bad, except if this is a constant effect then it isn't a utility but a Property.  So you should put it at the top(like armors/weapons/etc) as "Property: While equipped you gain a +2 to all Cha based skill checks".

Alright, so I know this is long and kinda negative, so apologies. It sounds like you're already playing with these rules so if they work for you fine. Just my observations at the first two are more suited for a video game than a D&D rpg. But if they work for ya then that's cool, have fun with it.
#3
OgreBattle
Jan 26, 2012 18:59:31 Something to consider

Persona is a single player RPG
D&D is a group experience. You have to make the content a group experience. Say with Social Links, is it single player individual stuff, or does the party gain the links as a group?

And tell me more about your wiped parties or wiped dungeons so we can figure out the problem.

#4
Aldath
Jan 26, 2012 19:07:23 Hm... well, first of all, Persona is set on a modern day day Japan, and at least for my players IT IS meant to "feel" like a video game ;/
I have rple payed more serious or story-based D&D 4e games (tough never on D&D worlds, haha), which are, as you say, "cooperative narrations with battles".

With "returning to dungeons".... think my group is more into cassual dungeon runs, RANDOM dungeon runs. The characters have a time limit to finish a dungeon (hey are highschoolers who use their time to save the city in secret), so if one of them falls they either revive him or use a teleporting device/traesto gem to get out WITH the inuried character. As I said we don't look to make much sense out of t, but if a character dies practically the plot we have is severely screwed. It's like an uhm... big adventure... we NEVER get out f that city.

Now with Social Links, if you never played Persona, you would not understand it, I tought I explained myself up there but seems I failed to n_n;
In Persona, you gained acces to more powerful, useful personas via Social Linking. Each persona is ruled by a Tarot Card (say, Hua Po is under the Magician Arcana)... so let's say, we want something more useful than Hua Po.. supposedly Personae are born from the emptional bonds between people. If you help someone under The Magician Arcana, the Bond grows stronger and so your Personae. There's an NPC for each Arcana (save the World and Judgement) AND EACH ARCANA NPC apports like a mini plot to the actual plot.

I should have clarified, I use Persona Switch as a "full turn" action, and can only be done once each 5 assaults.

I give recharge powers cuz usually battles are long. I give Solo monsters LARGE HP ammounts.

Hm... but yeah I could work that +/-'s out -.-

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 Aldath Jan 26, 2012 15:01:05	Ok guys, I love the system 4E hanles since it's very malleable and adaptable. My friends and I had always wanted something like it since other systems were filled with tricky rules and checks, and we finally have made our dream come true: Making a loooong campaign based on the famous award-winning videogame (and now Anime) Persona series. The thing goes like this... they are a bunch of higschoolers who awaken the power of their inner demons or Persona to hunt the urban legend demons that haunt their city, Anegawa. We combine investigation, japanese urban legend learning, interpretation and A LOT of Solo Monster Battles... Dungeon crawling is easier here, and we don't worry about making much sense, so we're having a blast... However I homebrewed the following Rules: -CHARACTERS CAN NOT DIE: If the character is "killed" within a dungeon, and it's not revived/saved, the character will NOT be able to participate in the dungeon again unless the whole party dies OR they escape (and they won't be able to do any other dungeon till' the following day). Revival Beads and Potions are also price lowered to make them waaay more accesible to characters. -SOCIAL LINKS: Like in the game, characters can interact with important NPCs to raise their relationship level with them. Every NPC like that is associated with a Tarot Card, which are assosiated with Personae. The more they get along with their Social Links, the stronger the Personae will be. -PERSONA SWITCH: Tough each character has a class (Cleric, Ranger, Psion, etc.), I let them have a limit of 5 Personae per character. Equiping a Personae gives them bonuses to their stats (usually ranged from +1 to +2) and penalties to others (-2 to -3), to add balance. Each Personae gives them an asset of special Dialy and Encounter Powers (the encunter ones usually with a recharge) so they can have a wider array of combat tactics. An example of a low-level Personae is: HUA-PO RELATED ARCANA: THE MAGICIAL (Social Link Level 1 Needed) DEMON FAMILY: JIRAE (-2 to every die roll when used by strikers) EFFECTS: +1 TO CHARISMA AND INTELLIGENCE, -3 TO CONSTITUTION WEAKNESSES/RESISTANCES GRANTED: INMUNE TO FIRE, WEAK TO COLD 7 POWERS: AGI (Encounter/Recharge) ACTION: Standard RANGE: Melee RECHARGE: 4-6 EFFECT: 1d4+Intelligence Modifier Damage. The target takes 3 ongoing fire damage at the begining of each of its turns (save ends) JIRAE CHARM (Utility) EFFECT: +2 to Skill Checks related to Charisma as long as the Persona is equiped. The game has been fun so far but I feel like I need to balance difficulty... characters either die too much or wipe out dungens easily. I've managed to put up a good balance at some parts, giving them smooth runs and then facing them with shocing challenges, very fun to do... However I still need help to come out with ideas to make some enemies tougher (specially since the game is more boss-battle oriented). Thanks for reading.
#2 alitain Jan 26, 2012 18:20:38	Well first I'll say I've never played the Persona games. So that being said, are you wanting help on trying to fit D&D 4th into this Persona game? With houserules and such I mean? I just ask for clarification. Basically, looking at your first houserule, "Characters cannot die" doesn't make much sense. All you mention is that if someone dies they can't "participate" in a dungeon unless the party escapes or all dies. This sounds like a video game mechanic and not D&D. I mean generally speaking in D&D, at least for me and my group, we pretty much never go back into any type of dungeon we've been in. It's not like a video game where you might want to go back to a previous dungeon to fight the monsters to farm equipment, items, or exp to level up. So I'm not really sure what you're driving at here with this. I mean if a member of the parties dies while the group is going through the dungeon if no one has anything to revive the character than they should chop a piece of the character off(if they can), and carry it with them(preserved or in bag of holding) till they leave the dungeon they're in and can get to a NPC that can ressurect people for them. It's really as simple as that. Or if a party member can do the raise dead ritual but the group doesn't have enough money then they could wait till they have enough. But regardless why would they then want to go right back in the dungeon they just went through? Again, this isn't a video game. It's more meant to be like a book or story. I mean in Lord of the Rings you don't see the party go back to one of the first areas they traveled to in say the first book and fight the orcs again to "level up" or anything. They just keep going on and on till the end. "Social Links". Not really sure how this would work in a D&D setting. Again this sounds like more of a video game mechanic. I mean sure, the party could form allies as they quest along; maybe saving someone, or helping a king or something. And then later as the adventure gets bigger in scale at higher levels maybe they could fall back on asking for help in certain matters. But generally speaking this sorta thing should be more organic to the story and whatever the characters do. I mean you could sure, keep some chart with the party members and important NPCs and then give the players a point if they do the right thing with the NPC or deduct a point but what use is this? How is this relevant to the game? Would these "relationship levels" give a bonus to skill checks with these NPCs? Like if the party rescues the King's daughter as an example and that gives them say a +1 to their relationship level with the king what benefit is that to them? If the party returns to the King because they need troops to storm a castle does it give them a +1 to a diplomacy check to convince the King to aid them? Maybe I'm just not seeing it, like I said I never played the Persona games and I'm sure these kinda mechanics work fine in the game but they don't seem to make sense in D&D, from my point of view. "Persona Switch". I think this, outta the three, makes the most sense in terms of D&D. Each player has an internal demon or Persona they can draw upon to boost their stats and give them a power. I will say though that five seems extreme. Even if they can only equip one at a time is there a restriction on equipping? I mean if say a player had five Personae and was in a battle could he use the power or one Persona then say on his next turn unequip it and equip another Persona and then use that ones' power, rinse and repeat. That could potentially be OP depending on what abilities these Personae have. And I would argue against giving player rechargable powers. Recharge powers are meant for monsters because they're basically only going to be around once, that combat. And usually they have one or two regular at will attacks then 1-3 enc/daily attacks to use in the combat. So rechargable abilities are needed for monsters to give them more of a variety or else you'd have a monster that would be left doing mostly their basic attack after a round or two. But with players, they have two(usually) at wills, up to four enc & dailies as well as their utilities to use which can help them in combat. They have actually several different options available so giving them a rechargable encounter is a little much. The Hua-Po. Alright, so giving a minus to a stat doesn't actually balance out giving a bonus. This was part of the reason why they did away(for the most part) with racial minuses in 4th ed. It doesn't necessarily balance things out, and sometimes is tilted more toward the negative. Speaking strictly of his Persona, a +1 to Cha/Int isn't balanced by a -3 to Con. If say a Sorcerer were to equip this they would gain the +1 and really wouldn't suffer the -3 because it wouldn't affect anything. The only use the Con stat has is for your initial HP, possibly your Fort stat, and the Endurance skill. Which if you're a character that benefits from Cha/Int most likely your Con is going to suck anyway and really one matter much. Now obviously this may not always be the case, I don't know every class/build stat requirement but like the new Sha'ir wizard build coming up, that one is Int/Con so that would be affected by this Persona. But all in all this kinda +/- thing really doesn't work. I would just stick to giving it a +1 to Cha OR Int, and leave it at that. Then there's the resistances. Immunity to fire is powerful. Even though at low level you may or may not encounter enemies that do type damage much fire tends to be the most common. And regardless of element type, immunity is a strong thing to be able to have available so easily. If nothing else this Persona would be potentially even more useful at high levels when you're encountering monsters doing more typed damage. I mean I know in our games we tend to encounter quite a few monsters that do type damage, and more specifically fire. And the vulnerability 7(which by the way, odd to use an odd number like that. Most of the time it's in increments of 5) to cold isn't too big a deal really. I would instead do what they do for racial bonuses; have it give a 5+half level resistance to fire. That way it continues to grow and help out as the player gains levels. Unless you're intending for them to discard Persona of low level and get replacements ones of higher level. In which case have it give a static say Resist 5 fire would be sufficient without a penalty I think. Or at most have the resistance and weakness match. So resist 5 fire, vulnerability 5 cold. The power AGI doesn't seem too bad. Except for the recharge which I already discussed. And the fact that there's no attack needed, which given that this does a decent damage AND ongoing damage, is bad. This needs to have an attack roll. Best bet would be Highest Ability Score vs Will maybe. Then again, having it do "+Int mod damage" already narrows it to only classes with a decent Int score. Otherwise it's useless. So I would replace it as well with "+ HAS mod damage", makes more generally usable for everyone. Unless of course you're planning out specific Personae for each player and not just them being able to aquire random ones whether they're beneficial or not. Fairly straight forward, but in terms of simple wording there's no reason to have "at the beginning of each of its turns". Ongoing damage is always taken at the start of a turn so all it needs to say is thus; "Effect: 1d4+HAS mod damage. The target takes ongoing 3 fire damage(save ends)." Though again, an odd number like 3 is odd, like I said usually ongoing damage follows resistances in that it goes by increments of 5. The Jirae Charm isn't bad, except if this is a constant effect then it isn't a utility but a Property. So you should put it at the top(like armors/weapons/etc) as "Property: While equipped you gain a +2 to all Cha based skill checks". Alright, so I know this is long and kinda negative, so apologies. It sounds like you're already playing with these rules so if they work for you fine. Just my observations at the first two are more suited for a video game than a D&D rpg. But if they work for ya then that's cool, have fun with it.
#3 OgreBattle Jan 26, 2012 18:59:31	Something to consider Persona is a single player RPG D&D is a group experience. You have to make the content a group experience. Say with Social Links, is it single player individual stuff, or does the party gain the links as a group? And tell me more about your wiped parties or wiped dungeons so we can figure out the problem.
#4 Aldath Jan 26, 2012 19:07:23	Hm... well, first of all, Persona is set on a modern day day Japan, and at least for my players IT IS meant to "feel" like a video game ;/ I have rple payed more serious or story-based D&D 4e games (tough never on D&D worlds, haha), which are, as you say, "cooperative narrations with battles". With "returning to dungeons".... think my group is more into cassual dungeon runs, RANDOM dungeon runs. The characters have a time limit to finish a dungeon (hey are highschoolers who use their time to save the city in secret), so if one of them falls they either revive him or use a teleporting device/traesto gem to get out WITH the inuried character. As I said we don't look to make much sense out of t, but if a character dies practically the plot we have is severely screwed. It's like an uhm... big adventure... we NEVER get out f that city. Now with Social Links, if you never played Persona, you would not understand it, I tought I explained myself up there but seems I failed to n_n; In Persona, you gained acces to more powerful, useful personas via Social Linking. Each persona is ruled by a Tarot Card (say, Hua Po is under the Magician Arcana)... so let's say, we want something more useful than Hua Po.. supposedly Personae are born from the emptional bonds between people. If you help someone under The Magician Arcana, the Bond grows stronger and so your Personae. There's an NPC for each Arcana (save the World and Judgement) AND EACH ARCANA NPC apports like a mini plot to the actual plot. I should have clarified, I use Persona Switch as a "full turn" action, and can only be done once each 5 assaults. I give recharge powers cuz usually battles are long. I give Solo monsters LARGE HP ammounts. Hm... but yeah I could work that +/-'s out -.-