So, this is sort of a repost of a rules alteration I suggested a short while ago. It's cleaned up, I believe, and it has a new name, as the previous name was eerily similar to the name of another poster's eerily similar idea.
The goals here are twofold:
1) Remove item dependency from the game. PC's are heroes and should be heroes regardless of what "stuff" they happen to own.
2) "Fix" the math behind the game.
Now, by "fix," I mean that I am altering the math to meet what I believe was the original goal. Players will maintain the same relative attack and defense values from level 1-30. If they hit a Lv+1 enemy on a 10 at level 1, they will hit a Lv+1 enemy on a 10 at level 30. This has the added side benefit of allowing DM's to easily calibrate enemies to match whatever difficulty they want.
Also, keep in mind that while I actually don't want any magic items or Rituals in the game at all (unless it's a very special artifact style item or other MacGuffin), there's no reason you can't use these rules, too. I'll have a special section at the end on how to keep those things in the game with my alterations in mind.
Without the treasure system, there is room for all sorts of new wrinkles to the game. You can actually, effectively, run an adventure in which money is precious. PC's might actually appreciate Gold and how rare it is--how the average person is unlikely to see even 100 gold total in their lifetime, even though PC's are throwing 100 gold around like it was pocket change, even in the latter half of the Heroic tier.
Anyway, without further ado, here's how it's done in five easy steps:
1) Characters add: their full level to attacks and defenses (rather than half their level); half their level (rounded down) to damage rolls; and their full level as a additional damage on a critical hit (so a critical hit would actually add your level 1.5 times).
2) Magic Items and Rituals are removed from the game completely. As it is now impossible to acquire Masterwork Armor, characters wearing Heavy Armor in the paragon tier receive a +2 bonus to AC, and characters wearing Heavy Armor in the epic tier instead receive a +4 bonus to AC.
3) Monsters in the paragon tier receieve a +2 bonus to attacks and all defenses. Monsters in the epic tier instead receive a +4 bonus to attacks and all defenses.
4) All powers with neither the Implement nor Weapon keywords have their additional attack bonuses removed if the power targets Fortitude, Reflex, or Will, or replaced with a +2 if the power targets AC. At some point, I will attempt to gather a full list of the powers that are changed.
5) Escaping from a Grab is now handled as either a Strength vs. Fortitude attack, or a Dexterity vs. Reflex attack, rather than as skill checks.6) The following feats are altered/removed:I will attempt to keep this updated and eventually create a complete list, rather than just generalities (though it will take a while to get all the racial damage feats, for example).
Armor (or Shield) Expertise - No longer increases AC, though it does provide any other benefits (reducing check/speed penalties).
Any Racial feat that provides a +2 feat bonus to damage or a scaling feat bonus to damage that begins at +2 in the heroic tier - Change the feat bonus into an unscaling +1 feat bonus to damage.
Any Racial feat that provides scaling feat bonus to damage that begins at +3 in the heroic tier - Change the feat bonus into an unscaling +2 feat bonus to damage.
Implement Expertise - Removed
Paragon Defenses - Removed
Robust Defenses - Removed
Versatile Expertise - Removed
Weapon Expertise - Removed
Weapon Focus - Removed
And why i shouldn't need cool toys to be cool be it doesn't hurt . Infact dnd is all about cool toys infact the whole econimomy is baised around those redicious items.
MPL, I love this idea with the following change if you want to keep magic items, and I hope this is where you were going.
Still allow normal magical items, but cut the following.
1.) All enhancement bonuses from items
2.) All Critical dice
3.) Any permanent bonuses to Att/Dmg/Def items (i.e. Boots of Quickness, Radiant Weapon, Staff of Ruin, Iron Armbands). These flavorless husks are all gone. You may even go so far as to restrict any items with Properties that add any mechanical mathmatical bonus, but this would be DM perogative.
What this means, is that people actually take your Bag of Holding, your Armor of Living Water and your immovable rod. Magic items are about cool and fun again, NOT MECHANICAL BORING BONUSES. Lets face it, no one takes those items now, everyone simply takes the base bonus stuff necessary for their role and then just upgrades as time goes on. Snooze.
The only shortcoming I see with this, is I am not sure that the motivation is there to upgrade many items (though some may still have it, there is always the chance someone could ride a level-independent Item Level 2 weapon or armor all the way to 30). This may or may not be a problem depending on how many treasure parcels you place in the game.
Despite this, I think the system you are proposing has a great deal of promise, it puts the cool back in items again, eliminates the parcel headache for the DM and frees up some serious space to take neat character building feats and not boring mechanical bonus feats.
Bravo!
I have completed the section on how to use my rule "fixes" while keeping magic items in your game.
But i Love my +2 flaming great sword , my bag of holding , my armor of living water and my inmovible rod .
And why i shouldn't need cool toys to be cool be it doesn't hurt . Infact dnd is all about cool toys
If you feel that way, these changes are clearly not for you. To me, D&D is all about being a hero. It's about overcoming challenges, monsters, evil plots, etc. and saving the day. In my heroic fantasy, the heroes are heroic themselves. If they drop their cool sword, they still punch the big bad guy out.
And really, with the exception of King Arthur and Excalibur, just about all the old hero stories involved heroes who didn't need any special items to win the day. Beowulf ripped Grendel's arm off with his bare hands. Gilgamesh and Enkidu were strong enough to carry hundred pound axes and swords into battle.
Even in the Lord of the Rings, they had awesome named swords with history behind them, but what did those weapons actually do? Glow when orcs came by? Whoopdeedoo. He didn't need that to carry the ring to Mordor.
No, in my games, the players do amazing heroic things because they are heroes, and it has nothing to do with the "stuff" they carry around
infact the whole econimomy is baised around those redicious items.
The whole economy is actually not, which makes the existance of such expensive things really weird and out of place. The average person in D&D world will never see 100 gold in their lifetime, despite PC's starting with it. By level 5, they're throwing around a farmer's yearly wages like it was pocket change. By 15th, their armor costs more than the local church. It's silly. They always list Immortalities for Epic Destinies. How come none of them so far have been, "You sell your back up sword and feed the entire world's poor for a decade."
In my game, the players are heroes, but they're not automatically filthy stupid rich just because of it. They might get some free lodgings and food now and then, but that's it. They're heroes, not movie stars. And I don't think word really gets around in a D&D style word. There's no real communication between points of light.
Anyway, if you see something actually wrong with it mechanically, please let me know, but I never said everyone would like my changes.
Because he wants to give you your cool toys, not take them away.
MPL, I love this idea with the following change if you want to keep magic items, and I hope this is where you were going.
Well, sort of. That was indeed what I was going for with my section on how to use magic items with my math fixes, but honestly, I really do play without any magic items whatsoever.
If I want them to get special things they don't get from classes, I customize boons for them. Well, they're not the boons from the DMG2, that's for sure (I dislike just about all of them, and I've done this even before 4e), but they basically work the same way.
What this means, is that people actually take your Bag of Holding, your Armor of Living Water and your immovable rod. Magic items are about cool and fun again, NOT MECHANICAL BORING BONUSES. Lets face it, no one takes those items now, everyone simply takes the base bonus stuff necessary for their role and then just upgrades as time goes on. Snooze.
Yeah, that's pretty much what my changes allow for, and it seems like quite a bit of fun could be had playing that way, since magic items could actually be wonderous and not necessary.
I am still not a big fan of the parcel system, but it works, I suppose.
The only shortcoming I see with this, is I am not sure that the motivation is there to upgrade many items (though some may still have it, there is always the chance someone could ride a level-independent Item Level 2 weapon or armor all the way to 30). This may or may not be a problem depending on how many treasure parcels you place in the game.
It should not be a problem with the parcel system I suggested in my section on using my system with magic items. I just removed all the parcels that would have theoretically gone to upgrading, and the rest can be used freely on whatever fun or flavorful items you want.
Despite this, I think the system you are proposing has a great deal of promise, it puts the cool back in items again, eliminates the parcel headache for the DM and frees up some serious space to take neat character building feats and not boring mechanical bonus feats.
Bravo!
Thank you, I quite like it as well.For your "How to use my math alterations without removing Magic Items and Rituals" section, it seems to me that #2 is too simple. This may have been discussed in your previous thread - I can't remember - but if it hasn't then here it goes. The size of the critical die (or in a few cases ongoing damage of some type) is intended to be part of the balance with item powers and properties. Weapons with d6 criticals should have better powers/properties than weapons with d10s. That d12 weapon (vicious IIRC) doesn't even have a property or a power. It's whole thing is the massive critical damage. The critical damage die is also part of the flavor for "bane" weapons. An example critical line might be "d6, d10 vs dragons." So just thinking about it, it would seem simply removing the critical line from a weapon will not affect all weapons equally.
...I had one other thing, but I forgot it while typing the previous paragraph. That's probably a sign to go to bed.
The size of the critical die (or in a few cases ongoing damage of some type) is intended to be part of the balance with item powers and properties. Weapons with d6 criticals should have better powers/properties than weapons with d10s. That d12 weapon (vicious IIRC) doesn't even have a property or a power. It's whole thing is the massive critical damage. The critical damage die is also part of the flavor for "bane" weapons. An example critical line might be "d6, d10 vs dragons." So just thinking about it, it would seem simply removing the critical line from a weapon will not affect all weapons equally.
This is completely true. I will admit that I am not completely settled on how to handle the extra critical damage in my core rules, or in the magic item option.
Yes, those items defined by their critical property might just be lost. To be honest, I was assuming most people wouldn't bother with magic weapons except maybe the damage type changers, since only their special powers would really apply, so I wasn't really concerned with effectively removing a category of gear.
Using the Critical properties straight would mean either they would stack with the normal critical damage bonus, which is excessive, or it would replace it, which means you would need to keep upgrading the weapon to keep pace with the natural bonuses you'd get otherwise. In that case, the items would still be basically gone, as they wouldn't be worth it.
The only way I could really see it happening is if the weapon's critical property altered your normal critical damage bonus. If you had a vicious weapon, all your d6s would become d12s. Or maybe only d6s equal to your weapon's enhancement would be d12s? I don't know. It's trickier than it seems, so I don't know.
How do you suggest handling it?
Like I said, my players didn't want to do low magic, so I never got past the idea stage. What I had planned to do was use a replacement method. When fighting unarmed or with mundane weapons, the PC used d6s for critical damage. If they used a magic weapon, its critical line replaced the default d6s. Since they would be using inherent bonuses, the magic item itself would not have a +x so the number of die that they rolled would still be tied to their level. A 3rd level PC with a vicious weapon would roll 1d12 while a 13th level character with the same weapon would roll 3d12.
I agree with this, and I have to admit, my main objection was how difficult it would be to word such a thing. I am actually still unhappy with the wording on my current critical hit related houserule. The problem comes becuase I don't use inherent bonuses, I just change the math to avoid that whole mess, so, the extra d6's kind of feel like some random add on that uses this weird 1/5 level math even though everything else based on your level is either your full level or 1/2 your level. I am striving to come up with a clean and easy mechanic for that, actually.
Anyway, I ultimately gave up and just wrote it out plainly, since I figure I can update it later.
As an additional update, I've added several of my houserules to the houserules section. These aren't really necessary to use my math fixes, but they do all fit into my larger goals of removing "feat taxes" and making the PC's feel more heroic themselves, without relying on outside sources of awesome. Feel free to use them, discuss them, offer suggestions, or anything else.
infact the whole econimomy is baised around those redicious items.
The whole economy is actually not, which makes the existance of such expensive things really weird and out of place. The average person in D&D world will never see 100 gold in their lifetime, despite PC's starting with it. By level 5, they're throwing around a farmer's yearly wages like it was pocket change. By 15th, their armor costs more than the local church. It's silly. They always list Immortalities for Epic Destinies. How come none of them so far have been, "You sell your back up sword and feed the entire world's poor for a decade."
In my game, the players are heroes, but they're not automatically filthy stupid rich just because of it. They might get some free lodgings and food now and then, but that's it. They're heroes, not movie stars. And I don't think word really gets around in a D&D style word. There's no real communication between points of light.
Anyway, if you see something actually wrong with it mechanically, please let me know, but I never said everyone would like my changes.
The reasons you can't sell your weapons to feed the starving is beacouse:
1) All merchants has agreed upon a conspiration to skin adventurers and sell items for alot more then any adventurer can sell his items for and give quest rewards in the form of allowing players to keep whatever they find.
2) No-one except adventurers can afford it anyways.
No the economy of DnD is seriously retarded and so is the magic item dependency so i'm happy someone does anything about it. I'd rather have a large army of mercenaries then a +5 sword any day anyways.
Really, it's about how you tell the story. A Beowulf would tell you, sometimes even the greatest warriors are facing a foe that requires a magic weapon to defeat. Thor is willing to dress in drag if he thinks it will get him his hammer back, and Freyja has herself a menage-a-quatre with some smelly dwarves for a magic necklace. Look at how much attention is paid to Nothung in the Siegfried story, or to Perseus' gifts in his. Zeus needs his lightning bolts to fight the Titans, and remember Excalibur wasn't the only magic sword in the Arturian Legend.
If even gods need magic weapons to fight gods, mortals must need them to do the same.
And the wealth makes perfect sense once you understand that the setting changes. Would Odin go attempt to sell Gugnir to a random smith named Ulfgar the Hobbled so he could buy Norway? No, because he's not concerned with such things. When your characters reach epic level they are demi-gods, or at that level of power. Why would they still take part in the economy of mortals?
I'll note your examples were not always good ones: Beowulf needed a magic sword to slay Grendel's mother
I am pretty sure that was just a giant's sword laying around, not a magic one. And Siegfried wasn't really all about magic items, it was about that magic bath he took. But, yes, your point is still taken.
Why would they still take part in the economy of mortals?
Because the worth of a single level 30 item could feed almost 50,000 people for a year, and that's 3 meals a day, 7 days a week at an inn (imagine if you only did 2 meals a day and bought raw foodstuffs instead of complete inn service meals). Surely, some righteous paladin or priest of a compassionate god would care about that.
But anyway, yes, a lot of this comes from the way I tell my stories, and that's fine with me. And I have used special items like Thor's Hammer before, but I've never equipped an entire party with Thor's Hammers.
Regardless, if you like magic items and even if you like the Parcel system, it's still possible to use my alterations, and I think they work pretty damn well, if I do say so myself.
By the way, do you see any mechanical issues with these rules? Or is it just the fact that you like magic items?
Why would they still take part in the economy of mortals?
Because the worth of a single level 30 item could feed almost 50,000 people for a year, and that's 3 meals a day, 7 days a week at an inn (imagine if you only did 2 meals a day and bought raw foodstuffs instead of complete inn service meals). Surely, some righteous paladin or priest of a compassionate god would care about that.
The cost of food is based on the supply of food. You giving 16,000,000 gp to some nation wouldn't suddenly cause their farmlands to sprout more food, it would just devalue gold in the region. Now, the argument could be made that he could melt down all his items for residiuum and hire a ton of spellcasters to conjure food, but then I'm not convinced ritualists are common enough for this to be effective. He'd have to fund magic adademies to train these spellcasters/chefs (gourmages, if you will) and after all this he'd need a steady supply of magic items to melt into residiuum to turn into food.
Now, the average adventurer takes in about 16,000,000 gp worth of loot in his career, but about 40% of that are magic items he'd have to melt for 20% of their value. In total, at the end of his career he'd have 10,880,000 gp worth of residiuum for his philanthropy.
The most cost-effective food-bearing ritual is Bloom, which costs 20 gp to cast, takes up about a quarter acre (11025 sq feet) of land, and feeds 5 people for a week. This means he'd be able to feed 2,720,000 people (about the population of Chicago) for one week.
That's his whole career. Granted, the population of a medieval setting is likely less dense in most settings; the city of Sharn in Ebberon or Calimshan in Forgotten Realms are both ~200,000 people: he'd be able to feed them for 13.6 weeks, a little over 3 months.
That's not including the wizards he'd need to hire. In a full 10 hour workday, a wizard could cast this ritual 60 times (not including added time to walk from field to field) and thus feed 2,100 people per week. You'd need to hire about 100 wizards, working 7 days a week to feed Sharn during those 3 months, which wouldn't, I imagine, be cheap, nor would renting or buying the land which would be required for this endeavor.
There's a worse problem. They say 40 days is all it takes to form a new habit: what happens when a city the size of reinassance London or Paris spends 3 months eating free food created by magic? I suspect they'd get rather used to it, and expect it to continue. Attempts to ration the food to prolong the charity would be met with populist outrage! How dare you let them starve! And when the food finally runs out...
It won't be pretty.
But anyway, yes, a lot of this comes from the way I tell my stories, and that's fine with me. And I have used special items like Thor's Hammer before, but I've never equipped an entire party with Thor's Hammers.
Virtually all the Aesir used magic weapons and other items of great power, not just Thor. Gugnir is almost as Iconic, after all. Freyja has her falconskin cloak, and Freyr losing his sword was a story unto itself; losing his sword was a big deal, and his backup weapon (an Elk horn) wasn't up to the task come Ragnarok.
Regardless, if you like magic items and even if you like the Parcel system, it's still possible to use my alterations, and I think they work pretty damn well, if I do say so myself.
By the way, do you see any mechanical issues with these rules? Or is it just the fact that you like magic items?
They're fine, but I don't see why the "Inherent Bonuses" system outlined in DMG 2 (and enabled in the CB) aren't just as good, and simpler to boot.
Why would they still take part in the economy of mortals?
Because the worth of a single level 30 item could feed almost 50,000 people for a year, and that's 3 meals a day, 7 days a week at an inn (imagine if you only did 2 meals a day and bought raw foodstuffs instead of complete inn service meals). Surely, some righteous paladin or priest of a compassionate god would care about that.
The cost of food is based on the supply of food. You giving 16,000,000 gp to some nation wouldn't suddenly cause their farmlands to sprout more food, it would just devalue gold in the region. Now, the argument could be made that he could melt down all his items for residiuum and hire a ton of spellcasters to conjure food, but then I'm not convinced ritualists are common enough for this to be effective. He'd have to fund magic adademies to train these spellcasters/chefs (gourmages, if you will) and after all this he'd need a steady supply of magic items to melt into residiuum to turn into food.
Now, the average adventurer takes in about 16,000,000 gp worth of loot in his career, but about 40% of that are magic items he'd have to melt for 20% of their value. In total, at the end of his career he'd have 10,880,000 gp worth of residiuum for his philanthropy.
The most cost-effective food-bearing ritual is Bloom, which costs 20 gp to cast, takes up about a quarter acre (11025 sq feet) of land, and feeds 5 people for a week. This means he'd be able to feed 2,720,000 people (about the population of Chicago) for one week.
That's his whole career. Granted, the population of a medieval setting is likely less dense in most settings; the city of Sharn in Ebberon or Calimshan in Forgotten Realms are both ~200,000 people: he'd be able to feed them for 13.6 weeks, a little over 3 months.
That's not including the wizards he'd need to hire. In a full 10 hour workday, a wizard could cast this ritual 60 times (not including added time to walk from field to field) and thus feed 2,100 people per week. You'd need to hire about 100 wizards, working 7 days a week to feed Sharn during those 3 months, which wouldn't, I imagine, be cheap, nor would renting or buying the land which would be required for this endeavor.
There's a worse problem. They say 40 days is all it takes to form a new habit: what happens when a city the size of reinassance London or Paris spends 3 months eating free food created by magic? I suspect they'd get rather used to it, and expect it to continue. Attempts to ration the food to prolong the charity would be met with populist outrage! How dare you let them starve! And when the food finally runs out...
It won't be pretty.
Or, I'll buy/enchant 12.952 Everlasting Provisions which is enough to feed 64.760 persons for an unlimited ammount of time.
Why would they still take part in the economy of mortals?
Because the worth of a single level 30 item could feed almost 50,000 people for a year, and that's 3 meals a day, 7 days a week at an inn (imagine if you only did 2 meals a day and bought raw foodstuffs instead of complete inn service meals). Surely, some righteous paladin or priest of a compassionate god would care about that.
The cost of food is based on the supply of food. You giving 16,000,000 gp to some nation wouldn't suddenly cause their farmlands to sprout more food, it would just devalue gold in the region. Now, the argument could be made that he could melt down all his items for residiuum and hire a ton of spellcasters to conjure food, but then I'm not convinced ritualists are common enough for this to be effective. He'd have to fund magic adademies to train these spellcasters/chefs (gourmages, if you will) and after all this he'd need a steady supply of magic items to melt into residiuum to turn into food.
Now, the average adventurer takes in about 16,000,000 gp worth of loot in his career, but about 40% of that are magic items he'd have to melt for 20% of their value. In total, at the end of his career he'd have 10,880,000 gp worth of residiuum for his philanthropy.
The most cost-effective food-bearing ritual is Bloom, which costs 20 gp to cast, takes up about a quarter acre (11025 sq feet) of land, and feeds 5 people for a week. This means he'd be able to feed 2,720,000 people (about the population of Chicago) for one week.
That's his whole career. Granted, the population of a medieval setting is likely less dense in most settings; the city of Sharn in Ebberon or Calimshan in Forgotten Realms are both ~200,000 people: he'd be able to feed them for 13.6 weeks, a little over 3 months.
That's not including the wizards he'd need to hire. In a full 10 hour workday, a wizard could cast this ritual 60 times (not including added time to walk from field to field) and thus feed 2,100 people per week. You'd need to hire about 100 wizards, working 7 days a week to feed Sharn during those 3 months, which wouldn't, I imagine, be cheap, nor would renting or buying the land which would be required for this endeavor.
There's a worse problem. They say 40 days is all it takes to form a new habit: what happens when a city the size of reinassance London or Paris spends 3 months eating free food created by magic? I suspect they'd get rather used to it, and expect it to continue. Attempts to ration the food to prolong the charity would be met with populist outrage! How dare you let them starve! And when the food finally runs out...
It won't be pretty.
Or, I'll buy/enchant 12.952 Everlasting Provisions which is enough to feed 64.760 persons for an unlimited ammount of time.
Sure, until the guy who didn't melt all his weapons and armor down comes to steal the provisions for his village...
~65 people being fed forever is a noble enough end to a career adventuring, I suppose, but it's hardly the world-buying uberwealth it's portrayed as. Hell, a downtown soup kitchen can feed 1000 people a day based on charitable donations and volunteer labor, a D&D character needs to travel to hell and battle demons to feed even a tiny fraction of that.
Why would they still take part in the economy of mortals?
Because the worth of a single level 30 item could feed almost 50,000 people for a year, and that's 3 meals a day, 7 days a week at an inn (imagine if you only did 2 meals a day and bought raw foodstuffs instead of complete inn service meals). Surely, some righteous paladin or priest of a compassionate god would care about that.
The cost of food is based on the supply of food. You giving 16,000,000 gp to some nation wouldn't suddenly cause their farmlands to sprout more food, it would just devalue gold in the region. Now, the argument could be made that he could melt down all his items for residiuum and hire a ton of spellcasters to conjure food, but then I'm not convinced ritualists are common enough for this to be effective. He'd have to fund magic adademies to train these spellcasters/chefs (gourmages, if you will) and after all this he'd need a steady supply of magic items to melt into residiuum to turn into food.
Now, the average adventurer takes in about 16,000,000 gp worth of loot in his career, but about 40% of that are magic items he'd have to melt for 20% of their value. In total, at the end of his career he'd have 10,880,000 gp worth of residiuum for his philanthropy.
The most cost-effective food-bearing ritual is Bloom, which costs 20 gp to cast, takes up about a quarter acre (11025 sq feet) of land, and feeds 5 people for a week. This means he'd be able to feed 2,720,000 people (about the population of Chicago) for one week.
That's his whole career. Granted, the population of a medieval setting is likely less dense in most settings; the city of Sharn in Ebberon or Calimshan in Forgotten Realms are both ~200,000 people: he'd be able to feed them for 13.6 weeks, a little over 3 months.
That's not including the wizards he'd need to hire. In a full 10 hour workday, a wizard could cast this ritual 60 times (not including added time to walk from field to field) and thus feed 2,100 people per week. You'd need to hire about 100 wizards, working 7 days a week to feed Sharn during those 3 months, which wouldn't, I imagine, be cheap, nor would renting or buying the land which would be required for this endeavor.
There's a worse problem. They say 40 days is all it takes to form a new habit: what happens when a city the size of reinassance London or Paris spends 3 months eating free food created by magic? I suspect they'd get rather used to it, and expect it to continue. Attempts to ration the food to prolong the charity would be met with populist outrage! How dare you let them starve! And when the food finally runs out...
It won't be pretty.
Or, I'll buy/enchant 12.952 Everlasting Provisions which is enough to feed 64.760 persons for an unlimited ammount of time.
Sure, until the guy who didn't melt all his weapons and armor down comes to steal the provisions for his village...
~65 people being fed forever is a noble enough end to a career adventuring, I suppose, but it's hardly the world-buying uberwealth it's portrayed as. Hell, a downtown soup kitchen can feed 1000 people a day based on charitable donations and volunteer labor, a D&D character needs to travel to hell and battle demons to feed even a tiny fraction of that.
sixtyfourthousandsevenhundredandsixty persons a day, not sixty five persons a day.
In 1000AD there were 265,000,000 people worldwide. At 5 people/basket, that would be 53,000,000 Everlasting Provisions to feed the world which would cost 44,520,000,000gp to manufacture at 840gp each. That is the same manufacturing cost as making 14,246.4 30th level magic items.
However, a hero more likely to look after his own so it is of more interest to look at the population of a single kingdom. I've seen an estimate that Italy had 5,000,000 people at that time. That's only 1,000,000 baskets at a cost of 840,000,000 or the same cost as manufacturing 268.8 30th level magic items. Even a party of benevolent heroes would have problems affording to feeding an entire country.
In the end though, this argument approaches the problem of the influence of magic items on the world from the wrong direction. Checking wikipedia, the GDP per capita of the Byzantine empire in 1000AD was $680 to $770 (1990 international dollars). With a population between 12-18 million at that time, the whole empire had a total GDP between $8160 and 13860 million. Now if fantasy churches get their 10% tithe, and the churches happen to be benevolent, even after covering expenditures they have plenty of money for discretionary spending. Taking the long view, the church starts making a few thousand everlasting provisions every year for decades and suddenly, thanks to stockpiled magic items, famine becomes a thing of the past.
sixtyfourthousandsevenhundredandsixty persons a day, not sixty five persons a day.
Ah, well that's quite a bit better then, isn't it? Still just a small city though, a city that would have no way to defend itself when your arch-rival shows up, having spent his accumulated fortune to give 5000 soldiers magic swords to come and take your food baskets from you
sixtyfourthousandsevenhundredandsixty persons a day, not sixty five persons a day.
Ah, well that's quite a bit better then, isn't it? Still just a small city though, a city that would have no way to defend itself when your arch-rival shows up, having spent his accumulated fortune to give 5000 soldiers magic swords to come and take your food baskets from you
Yeah, but he did that with one item. He probably found it under his bed one day while looking for a stocking. And since all those soldiers are apparently minions wielding magic items, he can just keep doing it, until the entire world is fed forever. And since the city is fed and invading army still has to pay for food, they can safely and securely wait out the siege.
sixtyfourthousandsevenhundredandsixty persons a day, not sixty five persons a day.
Ah, well that's quite a bit better then, isn't it? Still just a small city though, a city that would have no way to defend itself when your arch-rival shows up, having spent his accumulated fortune to give 5000 soldiers magic swords to come and take your food baskets from you
Yeah, but he did that with one item. He probably found it under his bed one day while looking for a stocking. And since all those soldiers are apparently minions wielding magic items, he can just keep doing it, until the entire world is fed forever. And since the city is fed and invading army still has to pay for food, they can safely and securely wait out the siege.
And all those that before worked with food production can now work as elite soldiers keeping that villain at bay. And the hero takes up a destiny as an archmage and the rarely seen guardian of the city and headmaster of the towns magic college.
Everything in my versions of the rules used either your full level, or half your level, except Critical hit damage, which added something based on 1/5 of your level. It felt sloppy to me, so I decided to fix it.
I did some number crunching and discovered that just adding your level again would be roughly equivalent to the d6s equal to 1/5 level method.
It starts out slightly lower, up until around level 10 or so, at which point it slowly grows superior (until it is roughly equal to rolling 6d8 at level 30), at least where average damage is concerned.
The most important aspect of it, to me, though, is that it is simple. I don't think critical hits happen enough to be absolutely critical to the game balance, so a point or two off was not as important to me as being easy to implement was.
As for still using magic weapons with this system, I don't know. I think they're stuck with the clunkier 1/5 your level math.
But even that will still screw people up on NADs, and things that give a stat-based bonus to attack can still muck things up a bit (Instant Planning, Warchanter, Dishearten, Demoralizing Strike, etc). Seems like a low hanging fruit if you doing the level of surgery on the system you're doing.
Also, you could technically just do the same thing with skills and increase them by level.
Shouldn't you also stop ability score increases, if you want to add level? I assume that's why you include the +2 (and +4 for epic, presumably, though it says +2) to all defenses and attacks for monsters.
I could, but I don't really want to take anything away from the character's progression--from feeling more personally awesome. The stat bumps just about always match the +2/+4 anyway. Not to mention that if I removed stat bumps, I'd have to lower so many attribute requirements on feats. That'd be a nightmare.
But even that will still screw people up on NADs,
It will only screw people for one or two NADs, depending on if their build is based on stats tied to the same NAD or not. I don't know that I see a problem with that. Having one crap NAD is kind of assumed in the game, and having a second is the price of certain builds benefits in other areas (not all, and for those that aren't worth it, I just wouldn't play them, honestly).
and things that give a stat-based bonus to attack can still muck things up a bit (Instant Planning, Warchanter, Dishearten, Demoralizing Strike, etc). Seems like a low hanging fruit if you doing the level of surgery on the system you're doing.
I am not sure what the issue is here. Those things are in place normally and provide exactly the same benefit as before. The only difference in my math and the baseline is that I don't require you to continuously maintain up to date magic items or take three feats over the course of your career. It otherwise ends up the same number.
Also, you could technically just do the same thing with skills and increase them by level.
I could. I was actually looking more at not increasing them by level whatsoever and leaving them at baseline numbers, but I have to admit that Skills are not a huge concern of mine, since I can just slide the DC's up and down by whatever number I use anyway.