Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 nonsi Jan 17, 2007 2:30:31	. Note: This thread is updated frequently. If a link presented here leads to any rule that conflicts with anything specifically written here, the rule given in this thread takes precedence. INTRODUCTION Objective: Massive game improvement on numerous aspects. A few notes to start with: 1. One of the game's primary week-points, in my view, is that it offers very few options per class per given level and any meaningful attempt to make a character versatile eventually ends up making it ineffective on all aspects and has a detrimental impact on power level and survivability. This eventually leads to one-dimensional characters (and players' attitude) that put their trust in magical gear (or the DM to set the challenges AND provide the solutions). This is NOT an attempt to boost the core game's power level (non of what you'll see here can scale to some optimized multi-classing builds I've seen on these boards) and this system rejects the validity of power play supplements like BoED. It is, however, an attempt to increase versatility and self sufficiency of each base class (and of each character as a result). This, of course, would have quite a dramatic effect on PrCs, and as a thumb rule the guidelines are that a PrC IS NOT meant to be more powerful than other classes, but rather more capable on other aspects. 2. Back in 2e, a +3 sword that did +1d6 fire damage was a good weapon, now weapons that don't do +3d6 are considered weak. It's hard to work around if you use the 3e CR and wealth guidelines, since they are hardwired into an expected equipment amount per level. 3. It is true that "all classes should be balanced vs. each other". However, balance has many aspects outside of frontal combat. Different characters have different goals and different classes have different roles. 4. Here's a wonderful motivation for putting the effort of defining house rules in the first place: http://lucasbuchanan.com/House%20Rules Basically, I'm attempting to: 1. Redefine and rebalance the base classes in a way that would make all of them VERY worth while taking the full 20-levels stretch - and make each of them decently built "out of the box", even for players with very poor background in character design. 2. Make an arbitrary party of adventurers way less dependant upon magical gear to serve as solution to otherwise dead-end situations. As levels go up, magical gear should gradually change from life-preserver to a collection of nice-to-have addons. 3. Simplify the ever inflating rules resulting from adding more and more base-classes, and offer a dramatic decrease in management, while increasing the fun factor – without resorting to overpowering. 4. Try to set things to better reflect the atmosphere of medieval folklore and fantasy literature. 5. Enhance the "real feel" when it comes to "biomechanics" (non magical abilities). On this aspect, another relevant part of these rules would be: http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=767191. 6. Minimize the "marvel" feel & touch of the non-magical abilities (e.g. the Monk no longer receives wacky movement or Slow Fall and ToB is not a viable resource). 7. Make each and all classes a lot more iconic to their role/functionality. 8. Plug the loopholes that allow rediculously powerful character builds that revolve around boosting hit/damage/AC stats. I will do the following: 1. Redefine some of the base classes, which are either grossly underpowered or hopelessly broken. 2. Remove some of the base classes, for various reasons detailed below. 3. Rebalance and retool the rest of the remaining base classes. 4. The Witch class is introduced, based on the clerical-domains list, which undergoes extensive expansion. "Warlock" is reserved for a male Witch. 5. Introduce my own perspective regarding spell casting, based on Strain & Tolerance (detailed in entry #3 of this thread). 6. Redefine some of the game mechanics for simplification, rebalancing, expanding game options and enhancing realism (to what extent it can be enhanced in a fantasy game). 7. Ditto for feats. 8. Add 2 new ability-scores, Agility (AGI) and Perception (PER), and redistribute the skills more rationally among 8 ability-attributes. 9. Define solid rules for PrCs and display several sample PrCs, for illustration. 10. Psionics is deliberately not included in these house rules. It is a grey area to me and is not core, so it will not be handled within these modifications. Other, more experienced individuals in Psionics are welcome to fill in for me, but I don't think it'll be necessary. The "casualty" base classes (and why) would be: Already Covered (more or less) by a given revised class / class-combo: - Barbarian – savage Warrior - Beguiler – Mage-Rogue mix - Dread Necromancer – A Cleric heavily focused on necromancy & undead. - Favored Soul – War Cleric - Knight – Warrior wearing full plate (see Armor Mastery feat) and having a royal title - Ninja – Rogue-Monk mix - Ranger - Warrior-Druid mix - Samurai – Warrior wielding a Katana and wearing the proper armor - Scout – Rogue-Warrior mix - Shaman – a Cleric with primitive background, focused on summoning and spirits/souls - Shugenja – Cleric with elemental domains - Swashbuckler – unfettered Warrior - Warmage – a Mage focused on blasting - Woo-Jen – a Mage focused on elemental effects Unnecessary with these gamerules: - Sorcerer – the revised Warlock is in my eyes the true should've-been-Sorcerer, so "Sorcerer" would be the redecorated Warlock's new and more appropriate name. Non-viable by these gamerules: - Spirit Shaman – Too much unnecessary added mechanics. Moreover, it has no unique spell list of its own, its spellcasting category is impossible to define with these gamerules and all of its abilities are easily replaceable with spells. Lame concept & poor execution: - Marshal – The Bard and Paladin of these house rules make it redundant - Spell Thief – Invalid in a reality where spells are not prepared in advance (see below) PrC: - Dragon Shaman - See the revised Dragon Disciple - Duskblade - See the Spellblade - Paladin Note: Other base/prestige classes can be added to the ones given here (and are welcome), but a new class should come along with many characteristics that don't resemble any of the other classes' and should allow enough customization for filling several roles, but without adding significant mechanics to the game. A new perspective regarding spell casting There are 5 methods of Invoking magical effects: -Arcane (INT based): Magical Weaving. Magical Weaving is the scientific approach to magic (Mage). -Divine (WIS based): Bending reality to your belief-driven will by drawing from the upper/lower planes (Cleric) or from the strength of the land (Druid). -Charm-Spinning (CHA based): The Bard casts spells via sheer force of personality. In terms of technique, his spell casting technique is sort of divine-arcane hybrid. He sort of "charms" reality to cooperate with him and spins the magical energies around him, selecting the desired effect "on the fly". The Bard's spell progression remains unchanged. Bardic music is another way of spinning the magical energies into a desired effect. -Witchcraft (INT based): Occult rituals that draw power from the essence of powders, liquids, crystals, minerals, symbols, plants and animal remains. Witches are the only spell casters who can bond with a familiar. -Eldritch (CON based): Inborn magical affinity that offers a limited amount of inexhaustible abilities (Sorcerer - renamed Warlock). Due to the "inborn" nature of these varied abilities, many Sorcerers have dreadful social skills and not enough patience to acquire proper education. Notes on magic in general: - Metamagic feats and Spell-Focus feat are the sole territory of the one class that researches magic "scientifically" - the Mage. - Spells are basically not cast in advance. The core rules tell us that a 20th level wizard can have 180(!) spell levels activated and ready for triggering within an hour(!) of morning study. And like until now no one has learned how to trigger them violently and burn the wizard to a cinder because...?! - Magic-items are scarce – scarce enough so that people almost never sell them willingly. Each magical power requires special components to manifest in magical items – a combination of creatures' organs and/or precious materials of various sorts (some of which might not even exist on the prime material plane). - The only class that needs materials as given is the Witch class (see below) that draws power from the essence of physical substances and items. This makes Eschew Materials relevant only to witches. Animal Companions and Special Mounts The idea of being able to "resonate" your essence to strengthen another being sounds ridiculous to me – even within fantasy game. If someone wants to groom a pet or a mount: 1. It takes time – LOTS OF TIME! 2. Pets and mounts that accompany you for a long time are something you come to care for, not merely extra fire power or cannon fodder. This makes them more of a nuisance than practical aid. 3. Every creature with above-zero INT has a survival instinct and won't willingly lay down its life for you (dogs are about the only reliable exception). 4. As for Druids – a Druid that stays resident is a specific location sometimes gains highly intelligent magical beasts and/or awakened animals as allies, not as animal companions. As for low INT creatures – it is up to spells and Wild Empathy to do their tricks.
#2 nonsi Jan 17, 2007 2:31:09	. Rebalancing the Bard Notes regarding the core Bard: 1. It's supposed to be the "Jack of all Trades". The CORE class needs a bit extra in ordet to fulfill that role. 2. It has absolutely no major kick on its own and it suffers from low survivability at the higher levels. 3. Its musical ability seems to offer very little.
#3 nonsi Jan 17, 2007 2:31:43	. Game Mechanics and Misc Issues AC: - The AC modifiers are: Armor, Dodge, Deflection and Morale. Any other type is ignored/redefined. - Dodge AC can only come from character traits - Other AC types never stack (they overlap). Actions - additions & re-categorizations: - Immediate Actions: AoO, Drop Prone, Self only Druid spells, Shield Another. - Swift Actions: Superior Feint (Rogue 17), activating Burst (Soulknife 6), Cast a Quickened Spell, Divine Ascension (Guild Cleric 10). - Standard Actions: Sneak Attack III (Rogue 15), - Full Round Actions: Master Strike (Warrior 15), Spinning Weapon Defense (feat). Action-Trading: - A standard action can be replaced with 2 move actions. Any other category can be traded for gaining an action from the category directly below it: full for standard, move for swift, swift for immediate (except for AoOs) and immediate for free. - Special: 5' step is Swift-Actions-Equivalent when it comes to action trading (retains the core mechanic otherwise). AoO: Being an immediate action, you only get 1 per round. Combat Reflex feat is omitted. The only way to emulate multiple AoOs is when counter-attacking (see the revised Fighter's "Counter Attack" and "Ripost") or spending your combat turn Shielding Another. Armor: Redefinitions & Additions – mechanically & thematically: - Studded Leather is called "Reinforced Leather": studded leather wouldn't work like describe and has never really been used historically. - Chain-Mail: Max-DEX is +3 and it only weighs 35 lb. Because of this, the price is set to 200gp. - Heavy Brigandine / Banded Mail (2 new armor types – identical stats): Has an AC-bonus of +5, max-DEX-bonus of +2, ACP -5, ASF 30% and weighs 40 lb. Price is 150gp. - Splint-Mail: Redefined as Heavy Brigandine. - Plate-Mail (new armor type): In effect, a lighter version of the full-plate armor – Breast-Plate extended with limb covering chain & plate. It has an AC-bonus of +7, max-DEX-bonus of +2, ACP -5, ASF 25% and weighs 35 lb. Price is 900gp. This is the best armor available for buying. - Half-Plate: Redefined as Plate-Mail. - Full-Plate: Tailor-made – requires special order and a lot of time. - Supreme-Plate: Found exclusively in the possession of dwarven kings or obscenely rich warriors with too much time on their hands. It is stainless, tailor-made and takes years to complete. It has an AC-bonus of +10, max-DEX-bonus of +3, ACP -4, ASF 20% and weighs 30 lb. Price is 12000gp. Banned Items: - Monk's Belt Called Shots (yes/no) ? Called shots are already in the game. - Called Shot to the Feet: Trip - Called Shot to the Hands: Disarm - Called Shot to the Weapon(s): Sunder - Called Shot to a Vital Organ: Sneak Attack If your players want to go beyond that, remind them that anything they can do, the monsters can do as well - and the monsters will get off a hell of a lot more shots against any given PC than the PCs will get against any given monster. Character Creation/Advancement: - Characters WILL age during the game. There will be significant "down time" between adventures during which characters will train, research, build strongholds, etc. - Characters add 1 point to one ability score at each level. Racial limits are exceeded at each level divisible by 4 and you cannot increase the same ability twice in a row. This serves as a decent compensation for a bad start and/or MAD. It also puts yet a greater impact to level progression. - Training to gain a new class takes one year - requires a mentor. This includes prestige classes. - Gaining a new level takes one month with a mentor, or one year without a mentor. A mentor is required until level 7. After that, self training takes one month per level. A prestige class requires no tutoring beyond attaining 1st level. - Each major city has a special training academy for adventurers, sponsored by the authorities. This includes coverage of all base classes. Charge: While charging with a 2H weapon, each extra attack is translated to double / triple / quadruple damage multiplier (added to base / crit damage), according to the #Att your BAB allows with the weapon. Combat-Stats Manipulation (playing with the numbers): 1. Damage at the expense of AC / attack-bonus (PA mechanics): Up to the minimum between STR-mod and AGI/DEX-mod (can be applied to both, if you really wish to push the damage). 2. Attack-bonus at the expense of AC: Up to the minimum between DEX-mod and AGI-mod. 3. AC at the expense of Attack-bonus: Up to the minimum between AGI-mod and DEX-mod. Notes: - All of the above modifiers are capped by BAB, but are otherwise available to all classes and characters. - Option #1 modifiers are counted AFTER damage multipliers - Option #1 is stackable with either option #2 or #3 - The above modifications can be further extended with Fighting on the Defensive or Reckless Attack (the exact opposite). Coup-de-Grace: Getting into coup de grace position takes a standard action - execution is a move action. Maintaining the threat provoke AoO's, but with +8 init bonus to carry out your threat, unless attacked by an unnoticed opponent. Critical Enhancements: - Weapon Focus step III increase critical threat range by 1. - Weapon Focus step IV increase critical damage multiplier by 1. - Keen (magical): increases the critical threat range and damage multiplier by 1, rather than doubling threat range. - Vorpal (magical): increases critical threat range by 1 and the critical damage multiplier by 3, rather than behead (which is bad mechanics for a game that has no called shots or hit locations). Vorpal and Keen magical enhancements don't stack. Every other combination does. Note: Critical threat is plain simple critical hit. Critical Hits do maximum damage and the extra damage dice are rolled normally (makes no sense for a critical hit to do less than a standard one). Weapon Focus related damage (see the revised Warrior spoiler) is regarded as base damage and also multiplied when making critical hits (e.g. stage VI crit with a Greatsword deals 30 + 2d12 before applying STR-mod and magical damage). Defensive Casting: 3.5's defensive casting is DC 15 + spell level, which is OK, but doesn't seem to account for variations in the opponent's fighting skill and gives the same opportunity vs. a commoner as vs. an epic level Warrior. A more reasonable approach might be DC = 10 + 1/2 attacker's BAB + spell level. Dice-Rolling Time Optimization: High level play can get very slow with massive ammount of dice to roll and the variety of modifiers for each roll. If an effect calls for dice rolling, it isn't necessary to roll them all. Instead, for each 3 dice of damage that come from an attack, roll the first and average the remaining two (e.g. a 9HD fireball would do [1d6 + 7] thrice, which is 3d6 +21). Dodge AC progression: 1/2 Ref-Save is applied as dodge AC, detracting ACP from all sources. Epic level progression: Use the epic progression rules for saves past +12. Beyond character level 20, BAB improves at a rate of +1 per 5 levels, unless one of your base classes catches up. Disregard everything else related to Epic levels. Extra knowledge: All characters get 1 extra skill point per level that is assigned by the DM to knowledge skills. This reflects each character's spontaneous knowledge accumulation throughout his career. Extra Spells: The main spellcasting ability's score already affects the number of spells by increasing tolerance. The numbers given in PHB-I for extra spells are applied to known spells instead. A Witch may select domain spells from domains within her chosen art in which she didn't yet (or never intends to) dabble. Feint – redefined: I always felt awkward with feinting being tied to skills. Battle cunning has nothing to do with having a slick tongue or sharp wits. So here's an alternative calculation, based on one's basic combat aptitude: - Aggressor's score = BAB + [(DEX & INT)-mod] + d20 - Defender's score = BAB + [(PER & WIS)-mod] + d20 Flatfooted: Does NOT occur just for losing initiative. Hit Points: All creatures gain maximized HP according to their racial HD (either as given in the relevant Monster Manual or character races' paragon class HD) plus their CON-score. Any class taken grants 1/2 its maximized HD value +1 (e.g. 6 HP for d10) without regarding CON-mod. Dropping below 0 HP: Disabled state: Up to the creature's HD in negative HP value. Disabled creatures automatically stabilize. Dying: Any negative value between HD + 1 and HD + CON-score (consciousness is lost after 1 round per positive CON-mod). Death: Anything beyond "dying". Immunities – Redefinition: In all the D&D games I've played, one thing has always stayed the same: For certain fights, some character types have no options other than to assist others and sit back and wait. For instance, a rogue dual-wielding a pair of vorpal scimitars (for having more attacks and fantastic crits). Fighting a construct, he'll soon find his extra attacks & extra damage ineffective and simply make him weaker, because of the construct's DR (as opposed to wielding a 2-hander). So he can't do much and ends up bored. Likewise, a bard fighting an army of undead soon finds that all his singing and all his enchantment spells are wasted and without serious multiclassing, there's little for him to do. Here's an attempt to ameliorate this problem: 1. Critical hits, Unlike SA, are NOT precision damage, but simply damn good strikes. Only incorporeal opponents are inherently immune to them. 2. Fortification works only against precision damage. 3. Only creatures with no mind (no INT score listed, or with an INT of 0) are inherently immune to mind-effects. So you could Charm-Monster a lich (with -4 to the DC, because the taint of death strengthens their determination), but not a zombie. Again, the exception would be those who're under the effect of Mind Blank or similar effects. 4. The only creatures who're inherently immune to flanking are those with class abilities like Uncanny Dodge, items / spell-effects that negate such penalties, or creatures with multiple/no mechanical facing (e.g. Beholder/Hydra/jellyfish). Initiative - base Ref-save bonus is added to initiative. - Identical initiatives go together (after all, there are real life situations where two men kill each other). INT increment: Apply extra skills from INT bonuses retroactively. It's only reasonable that someone who becomes more intelligent can learn new things, and otherwise, if you're making a character above first level, you'd have to go through all his levels to nail the end result. Magical Plusses & DR: There are no Magical Plusses for weapons/armors/shields. There's also no [DR x/magic]. Replace all cases of [DR x/magic] with [DR x/adamantine]. Remove [DR x/magic] altogether for creatures that are just too "squishy" to have adamantine based DR (adjust CR downward appropriately). Massive Damage: Redefined as 50% of maximum health HP. Simple and proportional to the subject's ability to endure damage. Starting with a decent amount of HP at 1st level ensures it won't occure too often at the lower levels, but there's still a significant difference between a 1st level Mage and a colossal red dragon. Missile Devices and Skills: Missile devices are cumbersome and hinder movement. When equipped, Shortbows and light Crossbows apply a -2 ACP, and Longbows and Heavy Crossbows apply a -4 ACP. Multiclassing penalties are dropped: To balance up the humans back again, they have +1 skill-ranks cap beyond all other races. Fractional BAB & Saves: It's highly unreasonable that someone with 1st Monk level and 1st Rogue level (which is quite combatative) would trail behind a 2nd level mage in terms of BAB. It's also unreasonable that the same character would have double the initial Ref save boost. Multiple Attacks and Movement: - Full attack allows spreading your attacks between multiple opponents (if you have more that a single attack per round) while moving a distance no greater than your movement rate (once you pass it – no more attacks are allowed). - Upon Gaining 3 attacks per round (depends on your BAB and weapon speed), you can spend a standard action either to make a number of attacks equal to 1/2 your full attack (rounded up) from a stand-still, or make a single attack while moving up to your speed. You can also make a single attack as a move action from a stand-still. - TWF and FoB are both applicable in a standard-action attack. Natural 1s and natural 20s: When you roll 1, calculate as 2 – d12 (min -10). When you roll 20, calculate as 18 + 2d6 (max 30). This rule applies to all d20 rolls. Scoring the exact to-hit never counts as critical. Fumbles: On a natural 1 (1-2 for non proficient), unless you actually score a hit (some targets are just too easy), you fumble. Roll d6. On a result of 1, 2 or 3, have the player roll an additional attack against a square adjacent to the target that's within his reach (including self, for self inflicted injury). If no target is available, the character missed stylishly. This option is discarder in case of a reoccurring fumble (fumbling a fumble). On 4 or 5 the attacker drops his weapon. On 6 the attacker is rendered prone. Omitted Mechanics: - Alignment-based DR. - Permanent ability-score enhancements by magical means. - Stacking ability-score enhancements by magical means. - Racial weapon-familiarity - Racial bonuses on attack-rolls / AC (use Favored Enemy feat when relevant) - Racial-substitution class features Out-of-Turn Dodge: Any time you are about to be attacked, you can initiate Total Defense (giving up your next combat turn), provided you're not denied your DEX-mod to AC. Pulling Punches: Pulling your punch successfully works just like making a successful subdual attack. You still roll for damage normally - to relay the potential of your attack to your opponent. You can choose to cause just 1 HP damage, to more effectively illustrate your readiness to draw blood. If your attack hits but would've missed for subdual damage, you cause your weapon's base damage plus the carried weapon's traits (magical bonuses/effects etc). From this you can subtract: - your DEX-mod (your hand-eye coordination) - Weapon Focus bonuses to-hit (your improved control over your weapon) When attacking for subdual damage, you crit only on a natural 20. Removed Spells: - Celerity: Time-Travel doesn't exist. - Clone: This spell makes absolutely no sense – even in D&D reality. It makes even less sense in a reality that does not allow XP drain. - Mage’s Lucubration: Meaningless when spells are not lost upon casting. - Polymorph Any Object: Trickery domain's 8th level spell is Screen. - Rope Trick: Tearing a hole into another dimension via a 2nd level spell. C'mon. - Power Word... – Ridiculous concept (no effect / no save) and over brokenness. - Stone to Flesh: Break Enchantment covers this one. - Wish (and Limited Wish): Magical effects cannot be that diverse. To cope with magical effects that are unusually potent at lingering on, a new spell ("Unmaking") replaces Limited Wish as a 7th level spell, which serves as replacement for all cases that the core rules enable undoing with Limited Wish. Anything that's undoable only with Wish or Miracle (by core) is undoable only with Miracle. Redefinitions Camouflage: beating the best Spot check by 10 points or more. Hide in Plain Sight: beating the best Spot check by 15 points or more. Retraining Every time you gain a level, you can change one feat selection (You must meet the prereqs for the new feat and can't replace a feat that's a prereq for any other attribute you have) and/or reallocate up to 4 skill points (you cannot degrade a skill to no ranks, or if it's a prereq for any other attribute you have). Revised Spells: - Atonement: Clerics may grant atonement to Clerics and Paladins. Druids may grant atonement to Druids. - Changestaff: No preparation. If the Treant is killed, it cannot be created for 1 month. - Destruction: Modified to a 9th level spell that replaces Wail of the Banshee in Death domain. Control Undead takes its place as 7th level domain spell. - Detect Evil: Works only on creatures with immediate hostile intent, or creatures that are inherently evil (some sentient undead and extraplanar evil creatures (demons, devils, etc), various artifacts and unholy locales. - Disintegrate: deals 12d10 (save for 1/2). Any creature KILLED by this spell is entirely disintegrated - Energy Drain: Subject suffers 2d4 worth of power drain (see "Energy Drain" note in the the "XP" entry in this spoiler). - Explosive Runes: Multiple triggering of explosive runes in the same AoE cannot exceed the spell's maximum damage potential. This prevents the spell from granting a low level alternative to Delayed-Blast-Fireball. - Forcecage: This spell is modified so that it allows a Reflex save to negate, but you must be able move out of the area of effect as an immediate action. - Gate: The option of "Calling Creatures" to fight for you is cancelled. - Harm/Heal: 5HP / level. Mass Harm/Heal are removed (way too powerful, especially the "Harm" aspect). - Iron Body: Renamed to "Granite Body" and the recipient doesn’t suffer from ill effects specifically tied to metal, which is an unreasonable drawback for an 8th level spell. In a reality of mobile combat, 50% movement decrease is penalizing enough. - Mage armor: An abjuration spell. It should have been so to begin with. - Magic Missile: does d6s and is a ranged touch attack. - Orb spells are now evocation instead of conjuration. - Permanency: no XP cost. Only a single effect can be made permanent on a target creature/object. Replacing an existing permanent effect requires its dispelling. Area effects of all kinds cannot be targeted by this spell and require the full cost and time of magical-item creation. - Polymorph: Polymorph(4), Baleful Polymorph(5) and Shapechnge(9) are Druid/Witch Spells only. - Raise Dead (6th level spell): At level 11 this spell enables the Cleric to reconnect a corpse’s soul with its body, restoring life to a creature deceased no more than 1 round per [Cleric's CHA-mod + target's HD + target's CON-mod], stabilizing the target at -1 HP. At level 14 the spell functions as the 5th level spell of the same name, however, exceeding the duration noted above requires Speak with Dead (deceased approval), Commune (deity's approval) and Consecrate / Hallow (holy ground for your deity) before application is possible. The revived target makes a d20 system shock check against its [CON-score + HD] minus [the Cleric's level]. If the result is higher, it loses 1 CON-point that can only be regained with a Miracle spell. At level 17 the spell works as described for Resurrection and with no CON loss risk (confirmation & holy-ground still required). In all cases, casting time equals 10min + 1min / ECL of the target creature. Only a Miracle can revive as described for True Resurrection. - Righteous Might: Change DR x/evil to DR x/adamantine. - Teleport: Casting time is 1 minute - it's used for travel, but doesn't allows instant escape during encounter. - Time Stop: Any spell cast during Timestop fizzles once it ends (with the exception being spells and effects on the caster). - Wall of Iron: The material is of very poor quality (1/4 value). - Wail of the Banshee: Emanates from the caster's mouth (ZERO-range) and affects everybody within AoE except the caster. The spell doesn't differentiate between friend and foe and Evasion is inapplicable. "Save or Die/Suck" spells and effects: SoD: Creatures with HD equal or less than the caster / monster level minus 6 who also fail their save are slain outright. If the creature is either stronger or makes its save, it instead takes 1d6 damage per [caster / monster level plus spell-level]. If the creature is both stronger and passes its save, it takes no ill effect. Polymorph: same concept, but the damage is 1d6 per [2 levels plus spell-level]. "All or Nothing" mind effects: Partial effect means confusion for 1d3 rounds. This way you get to put all those classic literary SoD elements in the game as background and plot devices, but you don't have to apply twelve blanket immunities to every high level foe or turn the game into Russian roulette. Sea Sickness: Fort save vs. DC 10 + 2 per degree of weather roughness. Shields’ AC Adjustments: Heavy shields grant +3 to AC. Double the AC granted from Combat Expertise, up to the shield’s base AC value. Also, add +1 to AC for fighting on the defensive and +2 for total defense. Shield Another: You place yourself to take a hit for someone else. You confer a +4 armor bonus to an adjacent ally's AC. If you're wielding a shield, whatever benefit it can grant you can be applied to your ally instead. If you're a Monk, your WIS-mod AC can be applied to your ally instead. Shielding another is an immediate action that attempts to counter a single attack. Drawback: the attacker(s) might turn on you instead, as a swift action with +4 to hit. Note: If you spend a full round action defending someone, you influence all attacks and anyone within your threaten range provokes an AoO, unless actually turning on you. Skill modifiers by size:(rebalancing sizes) - Apply +1/-1 to Disable Device and Sleight of Hands. - Apply +2/-2 to Balance, Climb, Listen, Move Silently, Search, Spot and Tumble. - Apply the usual +4/-4 to Hide. Skill Synergies: In addition to the +2 Synergy bonus at 5 ranks, for each additional 5 ranks you increase the Synergy bonus by +1. (e.g. at 15 ranks the Synergy bonus would be +4). Bluff & Intimidate synergize Sense Motive for the purpose of countering Bluff & Intimidate respectively. Spellcasting Requirements - None: Since full spellcasters represent deep understanding of their art, rather than inborn talent, I found the best way to represent this would be to give them free maximized ranking in the most appropriate skills, which I selected to be: - Mage: Spellcraft. - Cleric: Knowledge (Religion). - Druid: Knowledge (Nature). - Witch: Craft (Alchemy). Note I: This approach removes the need for high ability scores in order to cast spells from certain levels. However, learning spells, magical research, and any other ability-related rules regarding the use of magic remain unchanged. Note II: For a Bard To be able to cast ZERO level spells, he needs 2 skill ranks in his chosen perform skill. 2 extra skill ranks are required for each spell-level thereafter. Spell Resistance: Ignore on all cases of energy damage except for "automatic hit" effects. Turning Undead: Turning undead has 3 distinct problems: - It's very complicated (two rolls, nonstandard mechanics). - It works differently for good and evil characters. - It's too powerful at low levers and useless at high levels if not used to fuel divine feats (undead HD rise much faster than their CR. At levels 10+ most undead will have more HD than party level+4). The following rule is meant to solve all 3 issues: Undead turning is replaced with the ability to discharge positive/negative energy (called Holy/Unholy Light) that deals/heals 1d6 damage per level in a 30-foot-radius sphere and allows Will save for 1/2 damage against DC [10 + 1/2 Cleric's level + CHA-mod]. The cleric must decide if his Holy/Unholy Light targets the living or the undead. It is still strong at low levels, but not as much as the PHB version, and it keeps being useful at higher levels. Additionally, changing "nothing or destroyed" to damage helps party tactics, because it stacks with whatever the characters are doing. Note: This setup is much stronger against a horde of weak undead than a single strong one, which is probably for the better. It means that the Cleric unleashes whatever he can unleash... and it does what it does. Uncanny Dodge: Regards character level and not class level. Undead Spawns: Only free undead can spawn/control undead minions. Weapon-Groups (2nd link) corrections: - Kusarigama belongs to the following category: "Flails & Chains" + "Light Blades" + "Picks & Hammers" - Dagger: crit 19-20 / x3. - Axes: Don't have enhanced crit (but they do have move options than core). Wildshape and alteration / polymorph spells: you can't change into legendary or dire-version animals and size increase is limited to one category larger. Also, creatures affected already count as being under size change, so further size-increase factors don't count. Wild Shape grants all extraordinary senses of a taken form. XP - XP is not a fluid substance one can trade: You cannot just "pore" your accumulated knowledge to anything. The same rule that is given for magical items' creation (special components) is applied to spells that are defined with XP cost. This is the thing that limits their uses. Other spell components are only required when they serve as receptacles. Here's the motivation: http://forums.gleemax.com/showpost.php?p=14118017&postcount=12 And here's how to tone down the power level gained by magical items: http://forums.gleemax.com/showpost.php?p=14119613&postcount=16 - XP and Level Advancement: Whenever a level is gained, the XP drops to ZERO. Gaining the next level requires earning XP equal to your next ECL (current +1) times 1000. This simplifies things significantly and is OK, given the classes are way more capable and there's no XP loss of any kind. - Energy Drain doesn't consume XP: You lose 1 point of STR, DEX, CON and BAB. You also take a -1 penalty to any level check you have to make. Instant death by [Energy Drain = level] is still valid (as it puts your level check modifier to ZERO). The HP drain is quite negligible, but you may lose #Att, there's still danger of instant death and the effect is immediately permanent (in case of energy draining attacks the save takes place immediately rather than later on). This rule is also compatible with magical items not costing XP.
#4 nonsi Jan 17, 2007 2:32:16	. Non-Classed Character Races and Racial-Paragons According to the PHB, an individual belonging to a character race has no existence without picking a class (even a commoner is considered a class). This, of course, is ridiculous. Here's an attempt to define typical 0-level characters of the classic character races, and apply 2 racial-paragon levels. - Paragon levels grant 4 + INT-mod SkPts each (5 + INT-mod for humans). - Racial level Zero (being an adult specimen ==> 0-XP) grants the same amount times 4 (i.e. 16 / 20 + 4*INT-mod), separated from skills gained from class levels. - Each race has skills (racial skills) that count as class skills at Zero level and paragon levels. This also takes care of the 1st level SkPts-multiplication absurdity. - Divided Ancestry is a racial trait of half-human races. In order to take paragon levels of other races, a half-human must first gain his two paragon levels. Racial skills of the other races count as your racial skills when gaining paragon levels in those races. - Any paragon ability that's not detailed / commented here, is taken as is from UA. - Unlike level advancement of a base/prestige class, taking a paragon level requires no training and is affective immediately. - At character creation, the player starts as an adult of his chosen race and may choose his 1st class level. This level can be of one of the base classes or a racial paragon level. Note: I deliberately omitted spellcasting progression, since it is too much counter-intuitive to presume spellcasting to be an inherent racial trait (and it's inconsistent, since you might not get it – and then you get nothing in exchange). Dwarf HP: 8 at Zero level; 5 at paragon levels Class Skills: Appraise, Balance, Craft, Drinking, Disable Device, Knowledge (architecture and engineering / dungeoneering). Racial Traits changes: None Paragon Levels (BAB: good ; Good Saves: Fort) 1st: Improved Darkvision (+30 ft.), Improved Stonecunning 2nd: Ability boost (Con +2), Save Bonus * * Change to +4. Elf HP: 6 at Zero level; 4 at paragon levels Class Skills: Climb, Hide, Move Silently, Listen, Search, Spot and Survival. Racial Traits changes: Ability modifiers are: CHA & DEX +2 / STR-2. Elves never age beyond "Old" category. They're immune to magical aging and have an unlimited lifespan. Paragon Levels: (BAB: average ; Good Saves: Ref) 1st: Elfsight *, Ability Boost (INT +2) 2nd: Resist Enchantments, Ability Boost (CHA +2) * Change the skill bonuses to +4 Gnome HP: 6 at Zero level; 4 at paragon levels Class Skills: Appraise, Bluff, Diplomacy, Forgery, Gather Information, Listen and Spot. Racial Traits changes: 120' Darkvision (Gnome – originally "Genomos" – means "earth-dweller"). Speak with Animals is replaced with the Whisper Gnome's Silence (Whisper Gnome doesn't exist), which makes you qualify for Silencing Strike and Extra Silence feat (RoS). The other spell-like abilities are not CHA-score dependant. [b]Paragon Levels[/b] (BAB: average ; Good Saves: Fort & Will) 1st: Keen Senses *, Bonus Feat: Piercing Sight (RoS) 2nd: Eyes of the Underdark, Ability boost (CHA +2) * Spot is also modified. - Eyes of the Underdark: The Gnome can now see in the dark as well as in broad daylight, but with no colors distinction. He can also pierce 60 feet of magical darkness around him, through which he sees as well as a human in low lighting conditions. Half-Elf HP: 8 at Zero level; 5 at paragon levels Class Skills: Bluff, Diplomacy, Gather Information, Innuendo, Intimidate, Knowledge (local) and Sense Motive Racial Traits changes: Gain +2 competence modifier to ALL CHA-based skills (offsets them having no societies and being somewhat outcast). [b]Paragon Levels [/b] (BAB: average ; Good Saves: Ref) 1st: Elven Vision, Bonus Feat 2nd: Persuasion *, Ability Boost (+2) * Diplomacy and Gather information gain an inherent +2 bonus. All other CHA-based skills gain an inherent +1 bonus. Half-Orc HP: 10 at Zero level; 6 at paragon levels Class Skills: Climb, Handle Animal, Intimidate, Jump, Ride, Swim and Survival. Racial Traits changes: Also gain +2 to CON, +3 on all Intimidate checks and +2 to all Survival checks. Paragon Levels (BAB: good ; Good Saves: Fort) 1st: Bonus Feat: Rage, Monstrous Mien 2nd: Improved Darkvision (+30 ft.), Ability Boost (Str +2) Halfling HP: 6 at Zero level; 4 at paragon levels Class Skills: Climb, Disable Device, Escape Artist, Hide, Move Silently, Ride and Use Rope Racial Traits changes: Base land speed is set to 25. Halflings also gain a +2 competence bonus to Balance, Ride and Tumble. [u]Paragon Levels[/u] (BAB: average ; Good Saves: Ref) 1st: Thrown Weapon Mastery, Athletic Prowess * 2nd: Ability Boost (Dex +2), Save Bonus * The bonus increase is assigned to Balance, Climb, Jump and Swim (which better represent athleticism). Human HP: 8 at Zero level; 5 at paragon levels Class Skills: Any 7 skills Racial Traits changes: Also has +1 skill-cap at all levels Paragon Levels (BAB: average ; Good Saves: Will) 1st: Bonus Feat: Any, Bonus Feat: Able Learner 2nd: Skill Supremacy, Ability boost (+2) - Skill Supremacy: The Human-Paragon's skill-cap limit is stretched by +1 (+2 for human, +1 for half-human). //-- Orc Paragon Levels (BAB: good ; Good Saves: Fort) 1st: Greater Darkvision (+60 feet), No light sensitivity. 2nd: Elf Slayer *, Ability Boost (Str +2) * The Orc paragon gains Improved Favored Enemy (Elf) as a bonus feat, even if he doesn't meet the prerequisites.
#5 dex Jan 17, 2007 6:37:34	Okay... With your classes, put all the benefits on the table. I'm looking at monk in particular, since they get all the benefits of their table, plus everything in "Additional Changes". Why do you have the soulknife in if you don't do psionics? Characters with the abilities of a soulknife don't really fit the general fantasy feel, and would be better left separate or modified as a PrC. Having Wild Talent allowed soulknives to use the feats which required psionic focus to use - now they can't do that, they also cannot use their bonus feat Speed of Thought (which only works while psionically focused). It doesn't matter if they can still take the feat because they ignore the prerequisites, they still can't use it. Rogues now can't sneak attack with saps, and they now require hide and move silently to use sneak attack? You may have increased the rogue's melee attack ability, but that means he has less skills to spend in other areas - some of the most incredible rogues I've seen played were talk rogues. It doesn't make sense to me that only rogues with hide and move silently can sneak attack, since they can sneak attack when flanking as well - and you can't hide if you want to flank. It also seems you've reduced the damage from a rogue's sneak attack. Gaining untyped bonuses to AC and damage reduction seem a bit odd considering that most druids seem to spend their entire time in wild shape - you haven't reduced the duration of wild shape so I see no reason to change back. The prerequisites for your paladin class seem very steep - 13 feats, plus the high ability scores, and why on earth Improved unarmed strike and Improved grapple? Your class does not seem have anything to do with these feats, nor have they any thematic tie to the traditional DnD paladin. The flaming weapon I can understand, but perhaps it should be "energy weapon" with a type specified on taking the class - not all LG deities are about fire. Ditto for fiery touch for the monk. I am also uncertain about some of your revised rules - the 'attack buckles and weak points in armour' rule in particular seems as though it should be a varient of Sunder or Improved Sunder. I do, however, like the spell system, the new Lay on hands, the revised fighter, and death attack for the rogue.
#6 mkill Jan 17, 2007 7:15:30	Did you playtest this? As in, get a group and play a few sessions at different levels under the rules?
#7 nonsi Jan 17, 2007 7:42:04	Okay... With your classes, put all the benefits on the table. I'm looking at monk in particular, since they get all the benefits of their table, plus everything in "Additional Changes". I'm well aware of that. The idea behind the Monk is versatility. Most of the class's abilities don't synergize, So it's not supposed to be overpowered. Okay... Why do you have the soulknife in if you don't do psionics? Characters with the abilities of a soulknife don't really fit the general fantasy feel, and would be better left separate or modified as a PrC. Having Wild Talent allowed soulknives to use the feats which required psionic focus to use - now they can't do that, they also cannot use their bonus feat Speed of Thought (which only works while psionically focused). It doesn't matter if they can still take the feat because they ignore the prerequisites, they still can't use it. Speed of Thought could be easily be replaced with Fast Movement. Okay... Rogues now can't sneak attack with saps, and they now require hide and move silently to use sneak attack? You may have increased the rogue's melee attack ability, but that means he has less skills to spend in other areas - some of the most incredible rogues I've seen played were talk rogues. It doesn't make sense to me that only rogues with hide and move silently can sneak attack, since they can sneak attack when flanking as well - and you can't hide if you want to flank. It also seems you've reduced the damage from a rogue's sneak attack. You're probably right. I probably should keep only the Knowledge (Vital areas) requirement. Okay... Gaining untyped bonuses to AC and damage reduction seem a bit odd considering that most druids seem to spend their entire time in wild shape - you haven't reduced the duration of wild shape so I see no reason to change back. 1. I guess I wasn't clear enough. It's ARMOR AC bonus. 2. I now notice I did mention that "Strength of the Land" is lost in wild shape. Okay... The prerequisites for your paladin class seem very steep - 13 feats, plus the high ability scores, and why on earth Improved unarmed strike and Improved grapple? Your class does not seem have anything to do with these feats, nor have they any thematic tie to the traditional DnD paladin. The flaming weapon I can understand, but perhaps it should be "energy weapon" with a type specified on taking the class - not all LG deities are about fire. Ditto for fiery touch for the monk. 1. The prerequisites should be very steep. The Paladin-would-be should be very attractive to begin with. 2. Improved unarmed strike and Improved grapple are there to make sure he's not totally helpless without his weapon (e.g. disarm). 3. I never mentioned LG in this Paladin build. 4. As for the Monk, the idea is that 1st he learns to produce tremendous amount of heat and then he learns to substitute it with other damage types. Okay... I am also uncertain about some of your revised rules - the 'attack buckles and weak points in armour' rule in particular seems as though it should be a varient of Sunder or Improved Sunder. Reasonable enough. It probably should provoke AoO's, unless you take Improved Armor Targeting (another feat to add to the list). Okay... I do, however, like the spell system, the new Lay on hands, the revised fighter, and death attack for the rogue. Thanks. If there are any other comments, by all means, share them.
#8 nonsi Jan 17, 2007 12:21:12	Did you playtest this? As in, get a group and play a few sessions at different levels under the rules? Since there are quite a lot of changes, I'd like to get as many feedbacks as possible, so I can make any necessary corrections before I put it to the test.
#9 kadeity Jan 17, 2007 14:31:48	I think all in all you ahve a good idea and good intention...however youve narrowed the fireld for alot of the best character ideas ive seen. Arcane Your "Strain casting" system seems inspired, and id like to commend you on it... Your Witch reminds me of a combination of the Hexblade and the OA shaman. I dont really know how i feel about the class however. Your "Sorcerer" (which is a renamed warlock) seems odd... since its just a rebalanced Warlock, that i dont agree with. No one should get Fast Healing that early with that degree of ease. You killed the bard. Ive had bards who danced with slashing scimitars to get their bardic music. Ive had bards who made fun of the enemy with perform oratory to get it. Ive had some REALLY GOOD bards, and i see no reason why you should make them MORE music dependant. Also, Bards CHARMING the world into doing what they want... um...thats manipulating the inert forcews of reality ..and theres a name for it. ARCANE MAGIC. Divine your Cleric seems ok i suppose... though i dont like not having to petiton the diety for specific spells. Allowing them to have acess to all the cleric spells at once, from all the books...thats dirty. Your druid seems wierd. You could easily use the Shapeshift variant from the PHB2 and remove all the "polymorph"-like abilities of wildshape. Its a very good fix, thats already in the books. Your lack of animal companions seemes based on flawed logic. The druid IS a divine caster, one that can turn into an effing animal, so i dont see why their "personal resonance" wouldnt be able to strengthen an animal. Besides, One level of expirience SHOULD be a long time. The lack of a paladin & ranger is ridiculous. If your going to have the hybrid arcane caster (bard) you should have the hybrid divines. The paladin is an archetype, one that is reinforced by the idea of the "crusader". the ranger is the hermit Hunter who mingles with nature and civilization, not really fitting in anywhere. In LOTR Aragorns Horse risked his life to find aragorn. WHy? because he trained him, and because that horse was part of him. Logolas? Ranger. If you cant see the inherent difference between a magical woodsy archer and a big furry fighter...you shouldnt be playing dnd. Expert Rouges who cant sneak attack with subdual weapons? Your insane. And, im pretty much sure the rogues are dealing less damage now. Theres a joke in my group abou the last ten levels of rogue being called "assassin". You havent done much to fix that by adding death attack.FURTHERMORE, almost EVERY GOOD ROGUE FEAT EVER requires sneak attack damage, and buffs it. Swashbucklers were erronious and are 20 level of the Deulist PRC so i dont miss them. Scouts. where are my scouts. Skirmish is amazing. wheres my skirmish. Warriors Your fighter is bad. very bad. Its not a fix. Its a broke-ix. Erradicating all the classes and lumping them into one is a horrible idea. Its as abad an idea as combining all the spellcasting classes into one class. Fighter styles are as different as Casting classes... dont lump them. Wanna fix the fighter? do what i did. After lvl 10, fighters get a feat every level. BAM. fixed. Now youve got enough feats to excel at anything, and theirs a good reason to play into the teens as a fighter. Barbarians are a necessary evil. Rage cant be mimicked by feats, and feats that grant DR arent balanced. What a good barbarian needs is the feat "goad." Barbarians are made to absorb damage, and to deal damage. You need that niche. Knights are a nice way of saying "sword and a board class". I like them. Change the flavor or alignment requirements if you want... but some class abilities cant be replaced by feats. They just cant. Soulknives not being psionic is ok...but its just like saying that a warlock can recieve their power from wherever they want. If you dont give flavor, then why are all these different sources of power bottlenecking to manifest in the same way in different people? ALL IN ALL All in all i think your missin a very basic idea in dnd... That the rules are "simplified" versions of realism. We could easily use things like Large fatigue scales, or wound and vitality points...we could have stats for every organ if we wanted...but DND is made to have streamlined Gameplay. Its already got enough papaerwork... you dont need to change everything. Think about the Multitude of feats out there. There are HUGE amounts. And alot of them are REALLY REALLY GOOD. Not broken, not weak, and not a waste of my "only have 11 of em" feats. Think about the prestige classes out there. Tons. Some are really good and worthwhile. The last thing you want to do when trying to fix the game, is break it. If your going to try and change things, be sure you take into account how much of the Content out there your making obsolete ot useless. For example, without sneak attack dice, almost all of the rogue PRC's and Feats...just stop being useful. You cant touch them anymore. If you change the spell system, you have to change the metamagic system, the reserve feats, the prestige classes...ect. Dnd is not a computer game. Every extra bit of realism you add is more paperwork. Every new mechaninc you add is new rules that have to be learned, and every mechaninc you throw out changes things. If you want to fix dnd, you shouldnt end up taking out more than you put in, unless what your putting in is just AMAZING ENOUGH to compensate.
#10 nonsi Jan 17, 2007 16:52:25	>> Your "Sorcerer" (which is a renamed warlock) seems odd... since its just a rebalanced Warlock, that i dont agree with. No one should get Fast Healing that early with that degree of ease.<< Check out your friendly neighborhood Dragon Shaman when you get the chance. >> You killed the bard....... i see no reason why you should make them MORE music dependant.<< What do you mean more music dependant ?! 1. I didn't remove or decrease a single Bard ability 2. I gave the Bard automatic maximized Perform (singing) – without investing a single skill point. This was done to make sure no one could take away his music abilities by breaking his guitar/flute on his head. >> Also, Bards CHARMING the world into doing what they want... um...thats manipulating the inert forcews of reality ..and theres a name for it. ARCANE MAGIC.<< The bard is the only core class that has both arcane & divine spells. His spell casting was defined arcane – that's spell weaving. And what's his musical magic if not charming reality? >> your Cleric seems ok i suppose... though i dont like not having to petiton the diety for specific spells. Allowing them to have acess to all the cleric spells at once, from all the books...thats dirty.<< 1. I think you missed out on something. Here's a quote of mine from "A new perspective regarding spell casting": "Only pure Arcane spell casting allows magical-effects' alteration and researching for new spells (beyond those given in PHB I & II)". Meaning I think all the listed spells in PHB I & II plus the new spells from the extra domains are enough for any campaign. 2. Event the most narcissistic deity would get tired of his followers ringing his requests-bell more than 40 times a day. Praying for spells 1ce a day seems nagging enough to me. The thing that bothered me the most whenever I role played a spell caster was having to rest whenever I wasn't lucky enough to guess the right spells for the unknown events to come (role-playing is not 20-questions you know). >> Your druid seems wierd. You could easily use the Shapeshift variant from the PHB2 and remove all the "polymorph"-like abilities of wildshape. Its a very good fix, thats already in the books.<< 1. I think you missed the intention. Shapeshifting has an enormous amount of uses. It just feels wrong to me that melee combat would be one of the main issues tied to shapeshifting. 2. I visualize the druid more nature-tied and less monster-tied. The core druid outshines any warrior built in melee and that's wrong. In all cases I encountered Druid related characters in literature and folklore, the emphasis was always subtlety rather than pure brute force. 3. My concept of the Druid if of the one and only true self-sufficient class that lets nature provide all his needs. >> Your lack of animal companions seemes based on flawed logic. The druid IS a divine caster, one that can turn into an effing animal, so i dont see why their "personal resonance" wouldnt be able to strengthen an animal. Besides, One level of expirience SHOULD be a long time.<< I must admit I didn't understand you at all. See if you could rephrase yourself. >> The lack of a paladin & ranger is ridiculous.<< 1. Did you get to "The PrCed Paladin" part ? 2. The archetypical Ranger is best described by the Hunter variant. The core Ranger is mechanically awkward. TWF got ABSOFRAG'NLUTELY NOTHING TO DO with being the woodland type. And the spells – where do they fit in the archetype ? >> If your going to have the hybrid arcane caster (bard) you should have the hybrid divines.<< The Bard is not hybrid. He's the jack of all trades, having some of everything (ok, not exactly everything, but a lot). >> The paladin is an archetype, one that is reinforced by the idea of the "crusader".<< Which doesn't feel thematically right with spell casting at all. >> the ranger is the hermit Hunter who mingles with nature and civilization, not really fitting in anywhere. In LOTR Aragorns Horse risked his life to find aragorn.<< 1. I really don't remember that part about the horse. 2. Please remind me how many spells Aragorn was described to be casting during the saga. >> Logolas? Ranger. If you cant see the inherent difference between a magical woodsy archer and a big furry fighter...you shouldnt be playing dnd.<< 1. You're taking things awfully personal. We can still get along without agreeing. 2. I challenge you to catch me tying Logolas with the archetypical Ranger. >> Rouges who cant sneak attack with subdual weapons<< That's exactly where the Monk comes in - a lot of subdual damage. >> And, im pretty much sure the rogues are dealing less damage now.<< 1. The Rogue eats the Fighter for breakfast as a skill monkey. I see no reason he'd match the Fighter in straight forward melee combat. 2. It seems appropriate to me that bigger weapons deal more damage and more SA damage. 3. I role played a Roguish type more than any other since the days of OD&D and always managed to be the most important character in the group, even though I was the least significant during combat. Competing with the Fighter is the worst attitude possible to role such a class. >> Theres a joke in my group abou the last ten levels of rogue being called "assassin". You havent done much to fix that by adding death attack.<< And what's Death Attack if not assassination? >> Scouts. where are my scouts. Skirmish is amazing. wheres my skirmish.<< I'd be grateful if you could direct me to some literature or folklore describing anything vaguely resembling the Scout's "skirmishism". >> Wanna fix the fighter? do what i did. After lvl 10, fighters get a feat every level. BAM. fixed. Now youve got enough feats to excel at anything, and theirs a good reason to play into the teens as a fighter.<< That's exactly the narrow minded power-gaming approach I'm trying to shift from. I don't need more feats for the power buildup. Weapon Supremacy + Shield Ward + Combat Stability / Vigor is obtainable with 19 feats. The Fighter lacks skills. The extra feats are there for versatility – the exact opposite of a minimum-options build. >> Barbarians are a necessary evil. Rage cant be mimicked by feats, and feats that grant DR arent balanced. What a good barbarian needs is the feat "goad." Barbarians are made to absorb damage, and to deal damage. You need that niche.<< There's a juggernaut built on these boards. It takes more and deals more. I get the feeling your concept is that of fantasy-marvel mesh. Mine is purely fantasy. >> Knights are a nice way of saying "sword and a board class". I like them.<< Good. With my approach you don't need a separate class to role them. >> Soulknives not being psionic is ok...but its just like saying that a warlock can recieve their power from wherever they want. If you dont give flavor, then why are all these different sources of power bottlenecking to manifest in the same way in different people?<< Spell casting IS power of the mind over reality. I never found any added value in psionics. >> Think about the prestige classes out there. Tons. Some are really good and worthwhile.<< Right. Now show me a single player that didn't take a PrC for the power boost. >> For example, without sneak attack dice, almost all of the rogue PRC's and Feats...just stop being useful. You cant touch them anymore.<< Can you point out anything specific from PHB I& II ? >> Dnd is not a computer game. Every extra bit of realism you add is more paperwork.<< Which one of my changes ADDS paperwork ? (as opposed to ToB & BoED ?!) The most "problematic I can think of are "Missile-Throwing-Weapons and Tumbling" and "skill points at 1st ECL". Both are manageable outside of gameplay.
#11 zombiegleemax Jan 17, 2007 19:19:47	I have to say I like most of your ideas, very ingenius. Some it (mostly classes) needs to be fine tuned and playtested to find some possible imbalances. I use some similiar ideas in my game world and will try incorporating some others. It has given me some great ideas. Thank you! Of course much of this wouldnt fit everyones game world
#12 nonsi Jan 18, 2007 1:35:25	I have to say I like most of your ideas, very ingenius. Some it (mostly classes) needs to be fine tuned and playtested to find some possible imbalances. I use some similiar ideas in my game world and will try incorporating some others. It has given me some great ideas. Thank you! Of course much of this wouldnt fit everyones game world Thanks. Do you have any fine tuning you already see appropriate ?
#13 seerow Jan 18, 2007 8:52:27	Ive only started reading this so far, but I have to ask. Why do you define BoED as a power play supplement? I've only seen 1-2 items and a template in there that's overpowered. Most of it is fluff and relatively weak things. Edit: 3. Every creature with above-zero INT has a survival instinct and won't willingly lay down its life for you (dogs are about the only exception). rofl and what makes Dogs better than every other animal in the universe? The fact that you like them? If a dog will bond with you well enough to lay down its life for you, so can any other animal trained similarly. Edit2: It's nice to see someone agreeing on the Fighter's weakness, but your fix doesn't necessarily cover everything. I'd suggest at the very least borrowing Combat Styles from my Fighter, rather than giving a feat at every level. As you noted, you listed 26 feats, but 8 of them aren't necessary for the Fighter's style in question. However, with the Combat Styles, he could have those other feats in a separate, more offensive, or battlefield controlling style, and switch between them as needed. This also prevents unforseen synergies from breaking your game. Many people worry about a direct power up. The Combat Styles allow you to give lots more feats, without worrying about the game breaking because of some combo that wasn't there before that needed just one more feat to work. Edit3: Armor Adaptation:for each +5 BAB multiplier the fighter reduces his armor's Check Penalty by 1 and adds +1 to Max-DEX – with any armor. At level 10 you ignore speed reduction caused by medium armor. At level 15 you treat medium armor as light armor and heavy armor as medium armor on all aspects. Armor category reduction doesn't stack, meaning Heavy Mithral armor never counts as light armor - even when donned by a level 15+ fighter. At level 20, heavy armor no longer reduces the Fighter's running speed. I know what you're trying to say... but I'm not sure you do. Realize from this description, you are treating Heavy Armor as Medium, then ignoring the speed reduction from Medium Armor, so you're actually moving in Heavy Armor as if it were Light. The only other benefit of Light Armor is stuff like the Ranger's combat style, but since you eliminated those classes.... Edit4: I disagree with your take on the rogue on two counts: 1) The Rogue Special Abilities are VERY worth taking the Rogue all the way to 19th. The only real problem with the Rogue is the lack of anything at 20th level. Fix that and it's a solidly designed class. Saying nobody would take rogue past 10th level is silly. 2) Your Sneak Attack, while intuitive, leads to counterintuitive results. It encourages larger, more powerful creatures to be rogues. A Half-Ogre Fighter/Rogue is going to get a LOT more out of the double damage sneak attack ability than your average Halfling Rogue. Even with the light weapon restriction. You also went ahead and made TWFing useless while you were at it. The designers made SA the way they did to avoid this very issue. making it the same for everyone encourages smaller users. 3) Sound Imitation sounds more like a new skill than a special ability to me. Edit5: The Manamage has been posted here before, my opinions on it are there for anyone to see. Edit6: The restriction of Monks NEEDING to have their first level in monk is asinine. Period. You don't require someone to go to school for 10 years to become a Wizard, do you? If you do, you certainly didn't mention it in the Wizard description. The Elemental Fist abilities are worthless. Unless you make it deal some sort of bonus damage, the best case scenario is it'll do extra damage against somebody with a weakness. Worst case scenario is they'll hurt themselves for trying to have fiery fists in flavor, running into a guy with fire resistance. Giving them some bonus damage for it is the only way to make those abilities in any way worthwhile. There's likewise no reason at all to prevent Flurry from working with Two Weapon Fighting. If you flurry with a kama, you're still only using one kama, so why would using Flurry prevent you from using a second kama for extra offhand attacks? Cleric: Are you seriously telling me you POWERED UP the cleric? If I understood your speil in the beginning about the new casting systems, the Cleric is a spontaneous caster now (you don't even mention his spells in your writeup, that's really not very good or professional, but whatever). But now not only does he have the spontaneous casting but he gets bonus feats, extra domains, Divine Grace, and See Ethreal for free? Seriously, wtf? I'm afraid to even look at your druid now. Edit7: My bad, looking again you DID mention the spells, briefly. So he can "invoke any spell on his list according to needs" so essentially he's a spontaneous caster with ALL spells known, and unlimited spells per day, save for DM fiat? That's a TERRIBLE system. Far too subjective, and leaves way too much room for the Cleric to just flat dominate. Spell Slots were designed for a reason. That reason was to prevent exactly this sort of ad-hoc thing. Edit8: So you gave the Druid the same absurd Spellcasting System, frontloaded his Wildshape abilities, while mildly powering him down by removing Huge Wildshape, then gave him a crapton of special abilities to along with what he already had and his newly powered up spellcasting? Oh, and more skillpoints too. Can't forget that. Are you ****ing insane? You "did it" alright. You broke D&D right in twain. Edit9: I can't comment on the Bard. At this point I'm hoping you're going to tell me how I understood your spellcasting system was totally wrong, so I'll reserve judgement until then. Also, to be sure, the stuff listed under the Bard is in addition to what he got normally, correct? On the Soulknife, you really fixed very little. Why does Flaming etc need to be priced as +2? Just him have it as +1. 5 bonus feats and full BAB is nice. But it really doesn't fix the class. The Fighter is living proof that handing out feats and BAB does not a good class make. Edit10: I can't even bear to go in depth on your domains and spells. Free SR12+spell level+cha? It's a nonstandard progression, but leaves potential for SR32ish at high levels. Normally I don't care about those levels of SR at high levels. But he's getting it for free, which isn't cool. From there I just couldn't bear to read anything more that you were giving to casters.
#14 nonsi Jan 18, 2007 18:07:32	Hi Seerow, 1st of all, thanks for the effort. 2nd, the one major mistake you made was trying to isolate each topic (or group of topics) as a narrow modification while disregarding everything else. now, let's see what we've got here. >> Why do you define BoED as a power play supplement? Vow of... merciful… And you're absolutely right, shame of me to neglect ToB. >> rofl and what makes Dogs better than every other animal in the universe? The fact that you like them? If a dog will bond with you well enough to lay down its life for you, so can any other animal trained similarly.<< I have no special attitude toward dogs, but the fact is that they're quite unique in the world. After all, they don't say that the dog is man's best friend for nothing. >> It's nice to see someone agreeing on the Fighter's weakness, but your fix doesn't necessarily cover everything. I'd suggest at the very least borrowing Combat Styles from my Fighter, rather than giving a feat at every level.<< 1. It may surprise you, but I'm aiming toward versatility and not power play (I'll explain further as we go along). 2. Combat Styles just complicate the mechanics and I didn't fully understand the concept (probably a side effect to my inner aggression toward ToB). >> As you noted, you listed 26 feats, but 8 of them aren't necessary for the Fighter's style in question. However, with the Combat Styles, he could have those other feats in a separate, more offensive, or battlefield controlling style, and switch between them as needed.<< So, if I understand correctly, with Combat Styles you'd practically gain even more feats than with my approach (and I'm a game breaker?). >> This also prevents unforseen synergies from breaking your game. Many people worry about a direct power up. The Combat Styles allow you to give lots more feats, without worrying about the game breaking because of some combo that wasn't there before that needed just one more feat to work.<< Weapon Supremacy + Shield Ward + Combat Stability + Combat Vigor (the two add up to three with Combat Focus). There you have it. All the melee power you can wish – without adding a single feat. Which goes to prove that adding feats to the Fighter would not overpower, but rather make him more versatile. That's exactly the "battlefield control" I was talking about. >> I know what you're trying to say... but I'm not sure you do. Realize from this description, you are treating Heavy Armor as Medium, then ignoring the speed reduction from Medium Armor, so you're actually moving in Heavy Armor as if it were Light.<< 1. Armor categories don't amount to just speed. For that you could pay a mid-level core wizard to craft you a ring of Expeditious Retreat. 2. Look for "Armor & Tumble" in "Revised rules". 3. You forget we're talking level 15 and up. That's what a fighter does – wear armor. With years of practice you adjust. French king Charles the 16th was said to be able to mount his warhorse from behind while donning his full suit armor. 4. With bracers of armor, I see nothing game breaking in these rules. They just make the Fighter a bit less magic dependant. >> The only other benefit of Light Armor is stuff like the Ranger's combat style, but since you eliminated those classes....<< ACP man. ACP… and Max DEX. >> Your Sneak Attack, while intuitive, leads to counterintuitive results. It encourages larger, more powerful creatures to be rogues. A Half-Ogre Fighter/Rogue is going to get a LOT more out of the double damage sneak attack ability than your average Halfling Rogue. << That's exactly way I said "Try to get the big picture before you decide." You didn't get to "Skill modifications by size" in my "Revised rules". About half the non spell casting PrC's have UD and IUD. The only way to sneak someone like that would be if he's standing stone still without being aware that you're there when you deliver the blow. With size affecting your Hide chances by +-4, Move Silently by +-2 and listen by +-1, the little guys now get a huge advantage. >> You also went ahead and made TWFing useless while you were at it.<< I just don't get it. The smaller the weapon the more attacks you get. What's so useless with that ?! TWF with 2 small weapons amount to 7 attacks at level 20, or 6 + Aid Self. – with just 2 feats. And given Weapon focus also affects melee AC, 2WFing yet gains an extra boost. With more than 50% of the damage coming from various modifiers, the base weapon damage die is not that significant. >> Sound Imitation sounds more like a new skill than a special ability to me. << I know an OCD type who tried for months to learn how to mimic. Let's just say he wasn't much of a success. Skills go well with "practice makes perfect", so it doesn't really add up. >> The Manamage has been posted here before, my opinions on it are there for anyone to see.<< Good. I made quite an extensive modification to the Manamage mechanics. >> The restriction of Monks NEEDING to have their first level in monk is asinine. Period. You don't require someone to go to school for 10 years to become a Wizard, do you? If you do, you certainly didn't mention it in the Wizard description.<< Knowledge can be acquired throughout the entire life, but in real life one needs to work on his body while it grows up in order to be able to do the things Shaulin monks do. There's a certain amount of flexibility & and moves you'll never acquire if you don't start as a child. >> The Elemental Fist abilities are worthless. Unless you make it deal some sort of bonus damage, the best case scenario is it'll do extra damage against somebody with a weakness. Worst case scenario is they'll hurt themselves for trying to have fiery fists in flavor, running into a guy with fire resistance. << Again you got it all wrong. They're there for dealing with opponents that are indifferent to physical blows (e.g. certain oozes & slimes), not to increase the monk's power level, but rather his usefulness. >> There's likewise no reason at all to prevent Flurry from working with Two Weapon Fighting. If you flurry with a kama, you're still only using one kama, so why would using Flurry prevent you from using a second kama for extra offhand attacks? << 1. The Monk gains TWO extra attacks at full BAB. That's worth at least the core Greater 2WF. 2. Go ahead and reread the description in PHB I. FoB recquires the Monk to attack with his entire body: hands, feet, knees, elbows, head… whatever applicable within the non-described combat maneuvers of both sides. >> Cleric: Are you seriously telling me you POWERED UP the cleric? NO. With poor BAB & Fort saves they leave the melee arena vacant for the non-spell casters. >> If I understood your speil in the beginning about the new casting systems, the Cleric is a spontaneous caster now That's right. >> (you don't even mention his spells in your writeup, that's really not very good or professional, but whatever). All spells on the PHB I & II lists (probably excluding Implosion from the standard spell list). Please reread "A new perspective regarding spell casting" >> But now not only does he have the spontaneous casting but he gets bonus feats, extra domains, Divine Grace, and See Ethreal for free? 1. Metamagic is now beyond the Cleric. 2. There's no real power boost in extra domains, just more versatility. 3. The bonus feats would not go into straight combat. 4. Divine Favor guarantee's he'll focus on his CHA (and therefore CHA based skills) rather than physical stats. It also ensures greater survivability to the party's healer. 5. See Ethereal goes great thematically with someone who's there to fight off the dark powers (or good powers). It gives the Cleric almost nothing in combat. 6. Check out my revised spells. >> My bad, looking again you DID mention the spells, briefly. So he can "invoke any spell on his list according to needs" so essentially he's a spontaneous caster with ALL spells known, and unlimited spells per day, save for DM fiat? << 1. All spells from the Druid's list. 2. Where exactly did you get the "unlimited spells per day" from ?! "invoke any spell on his list according to needs" is still subjected to spell slots per spell-level. I seriously don't understand what I wrote that hinted what you claimed. >> So you … frontloaded his Wildshape abilities<< DEPOWERED would be a more appropriate term. Read again. >> while mildly powering him down by removing Huge Wildshape,<< Restricting Alternate Form advantages to start only at 10th level (and bird form at no sooner than 8th level) is hardly mild. You probably didn't put too much emphasis on Druid's note #1. >> then gave him a crapton of special abilities to along with what he already had and his newly powered up spellcasting? << The "crapton of special abilities" go to further enhance the Druid's self sufficiency and his ties to "mother earth", which preserves his essence. The Druid has an inferior spell list to that of the Cleric, no domains, no Divine Favor, no undead turning and no extra feats. All the "crapton of special abilities" just level him up with all other classes. I guarantee you that both the Cleric and the Druid are less powerful that the core. They're just way more versatile – by several scales. >> Oh, and more skillpoints too. Can't forget that. << Yes. Woodland self sufficient get-buy requires quite a lot of investment. >> I can't comment on the Bard. At this point I'm hoping you're going to tell me how I understood your spellcasting system was totally wrong, so I'll reserve judgement until then. << I guess reality's back on track by now. If not, feel free to nag and I'll do my best to reconcile the differences or modify what needs to be modified. >> Also, to be sure, the stuff listed under the Bard is in addition to what he got normally, correct? << Trapfinding is just for the times no rogue is available. You know, I did leave out Disable Device (but not lockpicking) by mistake. Evasion & Slippery mind are there for survivability – something the Bard is a bit short of. All the above are the Bard's roguish aspect. The other additions are mainly versatility boosters. Being on the mid-low power scale, I do believe I didn't brake it. >> On the Soulknife, you really fixed very little. Why does Flaming etc need to be priced as +2? Just him have it as +1. 5 bonus feats and full BAB is nice. But it really doesn't fix the class. The Fighter is living proof that handing out feats and BAB does not a good class make.<< 12 overall feats + good BAB + Flaming (ok, the +1 does sound reasonable) are just enough for a decent combat suit. All the Soulknife's abilities come instead of "battlefield control". The Soulknife's is a combatant that's 100% free of magic dependency and the Fighter dominates the battlefield. >> I can't even bear to go in depth on your domains and spells. Free SR12+spell level+cha? It's a nonstandard progression, but leaves potential for SR32ish at high levels. << Could you please explain to me what's so broken about "SR spell effect AGAINST MAGICAL DETECTION ONLY". Really, what am I missing ?!?
#15 kadeity Jan 18, 2007 19:03:15	I wont pretend i havent "Tried to fix dnd" before.... because i have. But i came to a very important conclusion. My houserules wont change anything, and will only confuse players. The best thing you can do is make a few SMALL fixes to try and make the game more like what you see it as. There are a MASSIVE amount of supplements, rules and feats, many of which are AMAZING, and some of which arent. Any changes you make to the CORE classes, need to be very very small. ALL IN ALL, your rogue cant qualify or take advantage of ANY of the GOOD rogue prestige classes. Your Cleric can cast any spell from any Supplement. And eliminating Animal Companions FLIES IN THE FACE of the last three editions of DND. What i was saying about the druids animal companion is that if the druid is so in tune with nature that they can CHANGE INTO AN ANIMAL THEMSELVES, then why shouldnt they be able to make extra special super buddy friends with an animal, and grant it more strength? Think about falconry. Think about hunting dogs. Think about the bears those guys on Tv have raised from cubs. Think about The Circus. Theres nothing a dog can have with a human that another animal cant. If your going to ELIMINATE the class ability, at least replace it with a feat. Youve got to be sure that those fixes dont end up like the cartoons where someone "fixes" something and in the end has a bunch of parts lying on the ground that they arent sure where came from. If you check out dragon magazine 310, and look at specialist fighters, youll see a LOT of good fixes for the fighter class. Like i mentioned before, lumping the martial classes is just like lumping the spellcasting classes. Its ILL ADVISED. You mentions that theres no reason why a rogue should do as much damage in face on combat as the Fighter classes. Um, well they dont. They ahve to flank, or sneak up on the guy. And that guy cant be a plant, undead or construct, or otherwise immune to criticals. Rogues are good, SOMETIMES. What i was saying about the bard is that you pigeonholed them into singing. Ive had several bards who used other kinds of perform, like perform (weapon drills) or perform(blade dance) or perform (oratory). I was also saying that its a Hybrid Caster because, well, it casts spells and Fights in melee. As for rangers.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ranger_(character_class) As for scouts, think about anyone who uses gurella tactics. The movie "The Patriot" shows several examples of the "hit and run" tactic in combat. The idea is that your speed and movement provide an oppertuinity to catch the other combatant off gaurd, and slash at their flank as you run by, or snipe at them on the run with your bow. What i was saying about the Rogue is that the Rogue archetype OFTEN sneaks up and whacks a guy with something to provide enough subdual damage to konk him out. Your suggestion of using your monk is ridiculous, since it means ill have to TRAIN FROM CHILDHOOD just to be able to K.O. a guy. Also, if sound imitation isnt a skill, then its a magical ability. (It cant be a feat, since feats are like learning to ride a bike. They are the sort of thing you can do or cant do. theres no degree of skill beyond learning.If you improve it, then thats a new feat in itself.) Sound Imitation just seems like a skill or a racial ability.There are a few races that have this as a racial trait... like Kenku, or the ability of changelings to sound like whoever they have changed into. But as for your argument about "my friend couldnt do it", well id like to know if you know where exactly reality has anything to do with fantasy? Can your friend shoot four arrows at once? Can ANYONE? It seems however that you DONT intend to use ANY supplements beyond The PHB 1 & 2, or any Prestige classes. You also seem to have had no trouble in eliminating the Complete series... Im wondering how your players feel about the Narrow field of options they are gonna have... and how your apparently never going to use any new manuals. In fact youve had no problem Butchering Core.... so why dont you just make a new game?
#16 seerow Jan 18, 2007 19:18:59	Vow of... merciful… Explain to me how any of these are powerful. The only time VoP is strong is when it's being used by a Wildshape Druid with a DM who won't allow core items (and if he's not allowing Wild Armor, Monks Belt, etc, he's likely not allowing the Druid to take VoP either). For anyone else, they can buy effects better than what's granted by VoP, and extra. Even monks. And you're absolutely right, shame of me to neglect ToB. So you're trying to add versatility rather than power, and denote Tome of Battle as power play? You're losing credibility by the post. I have no special attitude toward dogs, but the fact is that they're quite unique in the world. After all, they don't say that the dog is man's best friend for nothing. Or it could just say that you have no experience with other animals. People who handle animals regularly will tell you how loyal any animal can come to be if they associate with you enough. 1. It may surprise you, but I'm aiming toward versatility and not power play (I'll explain further as we go along). 2. Combat Styles just complicate the mechanics and I didn't fully understand the concept (probably a side effect to my inner aggression toward ToB). The Combat Styles have nothing at all to do with Tome of Battle. And your aggression towards it is completely unfounded. >> As you noted, you listed 26 feats, but 8 of them aren't necessary for the Fighter's style in question. However, with the Combat Styles, he could have those other feats in a separate, more offensive, or battlefield controlling style, and switch between them as needed.<< So, if I understand correctly, with Combat Styles you'd practically gain even more feats than with my approach (and I'm a game breaker?). Yes, it gives more feats. But only lets you have certain groupings of them available at one time. Say at 4th level, when combat styles start. You get two feats instead of one. You choose Combat Expertise and Power Attack as your two feats. Now at any given time, you can use Combat Expertise OR Power Attack. By level 8, you've gotten 2 more style feats. So now for one style you have: Combat Expertise Improved Trip Dodge For the other style you have: Power Attack Cleave Great Cleave However, you can only have one of these styles at once. So you choose which feats you want to have active. You can switch to the other group of feats with a move action (or a swift action at level 9) Weapon Supremacy + Shield Ward + Combat Stability + Combat Vigor (the two add up to three with Combat Focus). There you have it. All the melee power you can wish – without adding a single feat. Which goes to prove that adding feats to the Fighter would not overpower, but rather make him more versatile. That's exactly the "battlefield control" I was talking about. First, that doesn't give combat control. Combat control would be stuff like Hold the Line, Defensive Sweep, Standstill, Robilar's Gambit, Combat Reflexes. What you have is a guy who can hit, and has a good touch AC, with minor fast healing. Also, you're only seeing what you choose to see. Instead look at what I'm saying. Instead of the feat build you're playing with, consider what players will do. Rather than diversifying now that they have 20 feats to play with instead of 11, they will try to put all 20 of those feats into a single style. Why? Because D&D rewards specialization over generalization. Someone with all of their resources put into one specialization will usually win out over someone good in many areas. Because of this most fighters will have one, maybe two tricks. That's where the combat styles come in. They FORCE you to be somewhat generalized. Why? Because if you specialize with EVERY feat you get (and yes, you do get a lot now) many of your feats are simply going to waste. You can still focus primarily on one thing, and have all the others be backups, or you can devote everything you have to being the best generalist you can. But the point is in the end the Fighter with combat styles WILL have versatility and generalization. Whereas the fix you've proposed -might- allow for more versatility, but is more likely to become more specialized. 1. Armor categories don't amount to just speed. For that you could pay a mid-level core wizard to craft you a ring of Expeditious Retreat. 2. Look for "Armor & Tumble" in "Revised rules". 3. You forget we're talking level 15 and up. That's what a fighter does – wear armor. With years of practice you adjust. French king Charles the 16th was said to be able to mount his warhorse from behind while donning his full suit armor. 4. With bracers of armor, I see nothing game breaking in these rules. They just make the Fighter a bit less magic dependant. I didn't say it broke the game. I was just pointing out that that was the effect, and wasn't sure if it was intentional or not. ACP man. ACP… and Max DEX. Max dex doesn't matter until you get to the point where bracers of armor are better than anything else you can get (roughly dex bonus of +10-12) otherwise Full Plate will always be better. And nobody gives a **** about ACP. Seriously. There's so many ways to reduce/get around it, and that's if you even care about the skills it affects to begin with. That's exactly way I said "Try to get the big picture before you decide." You didn't get to "Skill modifications by size" in my "Revised rules". About half the non spell casting PrC's have UD and IUD. The only way to sneak someone like that would be if he's standing stone still without being aware that you're there when you deliver the blow. With size affecting your Hide chances by +-4, Move Silently by +-2 and listen by +-1, the little guys now get a huge advantage. So I stand corrected. Sneak Attack is now worthless on the whole instead. I just don't get it. The smaller the weapon the more attacks you get. What's so useless with that ?! TWF with 2 small weapons amount to 7 attacks at level 20, or 6 + Aid Self. – with just 2 feats. And given Weapon focus also affects melee AC, 2WFing yet gains an extra boost. With more than 50% of the damage coming from various modifiers, the base weapon damage die is not that significant. But see, TWFing sucked to begin with, and it's generally agreed it's only worthwhile to those who can get bonus damage from other sources. Killing sneak attack removes the normal source of bonus damage Sneak Attackers use. I know an OCD type who tried for months to learn how to mimic. Let's just say he wasn't much of a success. Skills go well with "practice makes perfect", so it doesn't really add up. I know a guy with a really shaky hand who tried for months to learn how to forge a signiture. Let's just say he wasn't much of a success. Skills go with with "pracice makes perfect" so it doesn't really add up. Forgery is clearly not a skill. Knowledge can be acquired throughout the entire life, but in real life one needs to work on his body while it grows up in order to be able to do the things Shaulin monks do. There's a certain amount of flexibility & and moves you'll never acquire if you don't start as a child. In real life, one needs to work on his body while it grows up in order to do the things Knights do. There's a certain amount of flexibility and freedom in armor that you'll never acquire if you don't start as a child. I guess you can't multiclass into Fighter now either. 1. The Monk gains TWO extra attacks at full BAB. That's worth at least the core Greater 2WF. 2. Go ahead and reread the description in PHB I. FoB recquires the Monk to attack with his entire body: hands, feet, knees, elbows, head… whatever applicable within the non-described combat maneuvers of both sides. The Monk-weapons are just built for this affectiveness with the hands. If you want more attacks, build up you feats tree toward Greater 2WF and switch to Fighter after 13 Monk levels. 1) It's worth improved TWFing. 2) TWFing is generally considered weak, for valid reasons. 3) I have read the description. Now read the mechanics. If I flurry with a monk weapon, I flurry with ONE monk weapon. Not one weapon and my offhand attacking. Every attack I make is made as though I'm striking with that weapon. Thus it is not two weapon fighting. NO. With poor BAB & Fort saves they leave the melee arena vacant for the non-spell casters. There's more to it than BAB and Fort Saves. In fact that's a VERY minor thing to the Cleric. I'll get to that soon. That's right. You realize Spontaneous Casting is deemed so good that the Sorcerers give up 4 bonus feats, Scribe Scroll, the ability to use Quicken Spell, gain a crappy casting stat, and are given an EXTREMELY limited spells known list to cast from? Now compare that to here. You just took away BAB and Fort save from the Cleric, and in turn gave him spontaneous ANY CLERIC SPELL EVER along with some bonus feats and extra domains. 1. Metamagic is now beyond the Cleric. 2. There's no real power boost in extra domains, just more versatility. 3. The bonus feats would not go into straight combat. 4. Divine Favor guarantee's he'll focus on his CHA (and therefore CHA based skills) rather than physical stats. It also ensures greater survivability to the party's healer. 5. See Ethereal goes great thematically with someone who's there to fight off the dark powers (or good powers). It gives the Cleric almost nothing in combat. 6. Check out my revised spells. 1) That was one thing I hadn't noticed. What per se would restrict a cleric from using normal metamagic? I saw nothing in what you wrote restricting it. 2) Well I misinterpreted one, and by the time I got there I was too fed up to read the rest. Your Cleric and Druid fixes alone were enough for me to say "**** it" to anything else. 3) I don't care what his bonus feats go to. The fact is he has them, on top of spontaneously casting from EVERYCLERICSPELLEVER is too much. 4) Right. Because the Cleric really needed to be tougher. It doesn't ensure he'll spend it on Cha to the exclusion of physical stats though. Indeed, most physically built clerics have at least a 14 Charisma to help with turning. You just encouraged them to buy a +6 Cha item for +3 to all saves. 5) It doesn't matter. Clerics have SPELLS for that sort of thing. 6) Which ones? The ones grouped with the domains? I didn't see anything revised, just new stuff. Now while we're on the topic of spells, here's the thing. You want to keep the Cleric from entering melee, yet you did -nothing- to his buff spells. This cleric is still 100% as combat capable as the old Cleric, minus a couple of points on his fort save (made up for by Divine Grace). Except now he has some extra feats and Divine Favor to improve him. Why? Because he still has his buffs. He can still cast Divine Power, Righteous Might, Divine Favor, and whatever else you want after that. He'll have Full BAB, be Large, and have a bonus to hit and damage better than GWF/GWS. And this is before he starts trying. And what's more. He's BETTER at it now, because he's a spontaneous caster now! So he doesn't even have to prepare the spells 50 times to be sure he'll be useful throughout the day. So long as he has higher level spells left, he can buff. 1. All spells from the Druid's list. 2. Where exactly did you get the "unlimited spells per day" from ?! "invoke any spell on his list according to needs" is still subjected to spell slots per spell-level. I seriously don't understand what I wrote that hinted what you claimed. You said nothing of spell slots in your writeup anywhere. You said "invoke spell on his list according to needs" with that vague wording, I could say, as a level 1 cleric "I need a Miracle, now Ao. Chop Chop" and I'd get it. DEPOWERED would be a more appropriate term. Read again . I noted they were depowered. I also noted they were front loaded in that he got a lot of them much quicker, while not gaining any more uses at later levels. Restricting Alternate Form advantages to start only at 10th level (and bird form at no sooner than 8th level) is hardly mild. You probably didn't put too much emphasis on Druid's note #1. It's because Druid Note #1 makes no sense. First it says you use your own stats. Then it says your stats are modified to match the creatures. Which is it? If what you meant is he gains a bonus as if he were being templated with the creature, you may have made the Druid a bit more MAD, but you actually powered him UP by letting him achieve higher scores if he wanted to focus on melee combat. The "crapton of special abilities" go to further enhance the Druid's self sufficiency and his ties to "mother earth", which preserves his essence. The Druid has an inferior spell list to that of the Cleric, no domains, no Divine Favor, no undead turning and no extra feats. All the "crapton of special abilities" just level him up with all other classes. I guarantee you that both the Cleric and the Druid are less powerful that the core. They're just way more versatile – by several scales. Huh? No class with 9th level spells needs to play catchup with ANYBODY. The Druid's spell list is fine, and gets better as you leave core. Yes. Woodland self sufficient get-buy requires quite a lot of investment. Actually, you can get by in the woods fine on 4. If you want to be exceptional, have a high intelligence. There is no need at all to put the Druid on the Ranger's skillpoint level.
#17 nonsi Jan 19, 2007 15:26:44	I wont pretend i havent "Tried to fix dnd" before.... because i have. But i came to a very important conclusion. My houserules wont change anything, and will only confuse players. The best thing you can do is make a few SMALL fixes to try and make the game more like what you see it as. There are a MASSIVE amount of supplements, rules and feats, many of which are AMAZING, and some of which arent. Any changes you make to the CORE classes, need to be very very small. ALL IN ALL, your rogue cant qualify or take advantage of ANY of the GOOD rogue prestige classes. Your Cleric can cast any spell from any Supplement. And eliminating Animal Companions FLIES IN THE FACE of the last three editions of DND. What i was saying about the druids animal companion is that if the druid is so in tune with nature that they can CHANGE INTO AN ANIMAL THEMSELVES, then why shouldnt they be able to make extra special super buddy friends with an animal, and grant it more strength? Think about falconry. Think about hunting dogs. Think about the bears those guys on Tv have raised from cubs. Think about The Circus. Theres nothing a dog can have with a human that another animal cant. If your going to ELIMINATE the class ability, at least replace it with a feat. Youve got to be sure that those fixes dont end up like the cartoons where someone "fixes" something and in the end has a bunch of parts lying on the ground that they arent sure where came from. If you check out dragon magazine 310, and look at specialist fighters, youll see a LOT of good fixes for the fighter class. Like i mentioned before, lumping the martial classes is just like lumping the spellcasting classes. Its ILL ADVISED. You mentions that theres no reason why a rogue should do as much damage in face on combat as the Fighter classes. Um, well they dont. They ahve to flank, or sneak up on the guy. And that guy cant be a plant, undead or construct, or otherwise immune to criticals. Rogues are good, SOMETIMES. What i was saying about the bard is that you pigeonholed them into singing. Ive had several bards who used other kinds of perform, like perform (weapon drills) or perform(blade dance) or perform (oratory). I was also saying that its a Hybrid Caster because, well, it casts spells and Fights in melee. As for rangers.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ranger_(character_class) As for scouts, think about anyone who uses gurella tactics. The movie "The Patriot" shows several examples of the "hit and run" tactic in combat. The idea is that your speed and movement provide an oppertuinity to catch the other combatant off gaurd, and slash at their flank as you run by, or snipe at them on the run with your bow. What i was saying about the Rogue is that the Rogue archetype OFTEN sneaks up and whacks a guy with something to provide enough subdual damage to konk him out. Your suggestion of using your monk is ridiculous, since it means ill have to TRAIN FROM CHILDHOOD just to be able to K.O. a guy. Also, if sound imitation isnt a skill, then its a magical ability. (It cant be a feat, since feats are like learning to ride a bike. They are the sort of thing you can do or cant do. theres no degree of skill beyond learning.If you improve it, then thats a new feat in itself.) Sound Imitation just seems like a skill or a racial ability.There are a few races that have this as a racial trait... like Kenku, or the ability of changelings to sound like whoever they have changed into. But as for your argument about "my friend couldnt do it", well id like to know if you know where exactly reality has anything to do with fantasy? Can your friend shoot four arrows at once? Can ANYONE? It seems however that you DONT intend to use ANY supplements beyond The PHB 1 & 2, or any Prestige classes. You also seem to have had no trouble in eliminating the Complete series... Im wondering how your players feel about the Narrow field of options they are gonna have... and how your apparently never going to use any new manuals. In fact youve had no problem Butchering Core.... so why dont you just make a new game? >> There are a MASSIVE amount of supplements…<< Have no chance in hell of not leaving too much room for imbalance. >> your rogue cant qualify or take advantage of ANY of the GOOD rogue prestige classes.<< I do admit my approach requires reinventing all PrCs. As I said, one my goals was that any PrC would be different, not more powerful, so that each class would be satisfying enough taking all the way and that class deviation would only result from personal taste. Depowering SA was something I felt long overdue. I know it's a "delicacy" few are willing to give up, but if a Rogue eventually outshines the Fighter in straight forward combat (and that's exactly what happens at high levels when the Rogue is sneaky most of the times), than the Fighter becomes redundant. >> Your Cleric can cast any spell from any Supplement.<< Just PHB I & II. >> What i was saying about the druids animal companion is that if the druid is so in tune with nature that they can CHANGE INTO AN ANIMAL THEMSELVES, then why shouldnt they be able to make extra special super buddy friends with an animal, and grant it more strength?<< By all means, the Druid can spend the long time grooming a pet or a more intelligent companion (that's what Handle Animal & Wild Empathy are fore among other things), but once it is killed he can't just "pluck" or charm another for the extra fire power or cannon fodder. He'll have to groom one all over again – the long and hard way. >> If you check out dragon magazine 310, and look at specialist fighters, youll see a LOT of good fixes for the fighter class. << I'll check it out soon. >> You mentions that theres no reason why a rogue should do as much damage in face on combat as the Fighter classes. Um, well they dont. They ahve to flank, or sneak up on the guy. And that guy cant be a plant, undead or construct, or otherwise immune to criticals. << Flanking is quite easy to high leveled rogue and plants & undead are no real challenge at high levels (not their type at least). >> What i was saying about the bard is that you pigeonholed them into singing.<< The bardic powers still operate with other perform skills – they just gain 1 maximized for free, which shouldn't be their 1st choice to present their performance. >> As for scouts, think about anyone who uses gurella tactics. The movie "The Patriot" shows several examples of the "hit and run" tactic in combat. The idea is that your speed and movement provide an oppertuinity to catch the other combatant off gaurd, and slash at their flank as you run by, or snipe at them on the run with your bow.<< I think it could be more reliably emulated by a feat that allows you to take one movement and then 5' moves in between strikes as a full round action, probably with Bounding Assault as prerequisite. >> What i was saying about the Rogue is that the Rogue archetype OFTEN sneaks up and whacks a guy with something to provide enough subdual damage to konk him out. Your suggestion of using your monk is ridiculous, since it means ill have to TRAIN FROM CHILDHOOD just to be able to K.O. a guy. << OK, your argument makes sense enough to omit this revised rule. That's exactly why I post these rules, to get arguments that make sense and put things into perspective. >> Sound Imitation just seems like a skill or a racial ability. << Or a class ability (I'd be happy to make it into a feat and trade it for another practical and reasonable class ability, if you could come up with one). >> It seems however that you DONT intend to use ANY supplements beyond The PHB 1 & 2, or any Prestige classes.<< As I stated, PrCs must be reinvented to fit in. Spells should be limited to PHB I & II (spells from other sources would be evaluated per case) Skill & feats & equipment can come from almost any source – including Complete…
#18 nonsi Jan 19, 2007 17:11:47	Explain to me how any of these are powerful. The only time VoP is strong is when it's being used by a Wildshape Druid with a DM who won't allow core items (and if he's not allowing Wild Armor, Monks Belt, etc, he's likely not allowing the Druid to take VoP either). For anyone else, they can buy effects better than what's granted by VoP, and extra. Even monks. So you're trying to add versatility rather than power, and denote Tome of Battle as power play? You're losing credibility by the post. Or it could just say that you have no experience with other animals. People who handle animals regularly will tell you how loyal any animal can come to be if they associate with you enough. The Combat Styles have nothing at all to do with Tome of Battle. And your aggression towards it is completely unfounded. >> As you noted, you listed 26 feats, but 8 of them aren't necessary for the Fighter's style in question. However, with the Combat Styles, he could have those other feats in a separate, more offensive, or battlefield controlling style, and switch between them as needed.<< Yes, it gives more feats. But only lets you have certain groupings of them available at one time. Say at 4th level, when combat styles start. You get two feats instead of one. You choose Combat Expertise and Power Attack as your two feats. Now at any given time, you can use Combat Expertise OR Power Attack. By level 8, you've gotten 2 more style feats. So now for one style you have: Combat Expertise Improved Trip Dodge For the other style you have: Power Attack Cleave Great Cleave However, you can only have one of these styles at once. So you choose which feats you want to have active. You can switch to the other group of feats with a move action (or a swift action at level 9) First, that doesn't give combat control. Combat control would be stuff like Hold the Line, Defensive Sweep, Standstill, Robilar's Gambit, Combat Reflexes. What you have is a guy who can hit, and has a good touch AC, with minor fast healing. Also, you're only seeing what you choose to see. Instead look at what I'm saying. Instead of the feat build you're playing with, consider what players will do. Rather than diversifying now that they have 20 feats to play with instead of 11, they will try to put all 20 of those feats into a single style. Why? Because D&D rewards specialization over generalization. Someone with all of their resources put into one specialization will usually win out over someone good in many areas. Because of this most fighters will have one, maybe two tricks. That's where the combat styles come in. They FORCE you to be somewhat generalized. Why? Because if you specialize with EVERY feat you get (and yes, you do get a lot now) many of your feats are simply going to waste. You can still focus primarily on one thing, and have all the others be backups, or you can devote everything you have to being the best generalist you can. But the point is in the end the Fighter with combat styles WILL have versatility and generalization. Whereas the fix you've proposed -might- allow for more versatility, but is more likely to become more specialized. I didn't say it broke the game. I was just pointing out that that was the effect, and wasn't sure if it was intentional or not. Max dex doesn't matter until you get to the point where bracers of armor are better than anything else you can get (roughly dex bonus of +10-12) otherwise Full Plate will always be better. And nobody gives a **** about ACP. Seriously. There's so many ways to reduce/get around it, and that's if you even care about the skills it affects to begin with. So I stand corrected. Sneak Attack is now worthless on the whole instead. But see, TWFing sucked to begin with, and it's generally agreed it's only worthwhile to those who can get bonus damage from other sources. Killing sneak attack removes the normal source of bonus damage Sneak Attackers use. I know a guy with a really shaky hand who tried for months to learn how to forge a signiture. Let's just say he wasn't much of a success. Skills go with with "pracice makes perfect" so it doesn't really add up. Forgery is clearly not a skill. In real life, one needs to work on his body while it grows up in order to do the things Knights do. There's a certain amount of flexibility and freedom in armor that you'll never acquire if you don't start as a child. I guess you can't multiclass into Fighter now either. 1) It's worth improved TWFing. 2) TWFing is generally considered weak, for valid reasons. 3) I have read the description. Now read the mechanics. If I flurry with a monk weapon, I flurry with ONE monk weapon. Not one weapon and my offhand attacking. Every attack I make is made as though I'm striking with that weapon. Thus it is not two weapon fighting. There's more to it than BAB and Fort Saves. In fact that's a VERY minor thing to the Cleric. I'll get to that soon. You realize Spontaneous Casting is deemed so good that the Sorcerers give up 4 bonus feats, Scribe Scroll, the ability to use Quicken Spell, gain a crappy casting stat, and are given an EXTREMELY limited spells known list to cast from? Now compare that to here. You just took away BAB and Fort save from the Cleric, and in turn gave him spontaneous ANY CLERIC SPELL EVER along with some bonus feats and extra domains. 1) That was one thing I hadn't noticed. What per se would restrict a cleric from using normal metamagic? I saw nothing in what you wrote restricting it. 2) Well I misinterpreted one, and by the time I got there I was too fed up to read the rest. Your Cleric and Druid fixes alone were enough for me to say "**** it" to anything else. 3) I don't care what his bonus feats go to. The fact is he has them, on top of spontaneously casting from EVERYCLERICSPELLEVER is too much. 4) Right. Because the Cleric really needed to be tougher. It doesn't ensure he'll spend it on Cha to the exclusion of physical stats though. Indeed, most physically built clerics have at least a 14 Charisma to help with turning. You just encouraged them to buy a +6 Cha item for +3 to all saves. 5) It doesn't matter. Clerics have SPELLS for that sort of thing. 6) Which ones? The ones grouped with the domains? I didn't see anything revised, just new stuff. Now while we're on the topic of spells, here's the thing. You want to keep the Cleric from entering melee, yet you did -nothing- to his buff spells. This cleric is still 100% as combat capable as the old Cleric, minus a couple of points on his fort save (made up for by Divine Grace). Except now he has some extra feats and Divine Favor to improve him. Why? Because he still has his buffs. He can still cast Divine Power, Righteous Might, Divine Favor, and whatever else you want after that. He'll have Full BAB, be Large, and have a bonus to hit and damage better than GWF/GWS. And this is before he starts trying. And what's more. He's BETTER at it now, because he's a spontaneous caster now! So he doesn't even have to prepare the spells 50 times to be sure he'll be useful throughout the day. So long as he has higher level spells left, he can buff. You said nothing of spell slots in your writeup anywhere. You said "invoke spell on his list according to needs" with that vague wording, I could say, as a level 1 cleric "I need a Miracle, now Ao. Chop Chop" and I'd get it. . I noted they were depowered. I also noted they were front loaded in that he got a lot of them much quicker, while not gaining any more uses at later levels. It's because Druid Note #1 makes no sense. First it says you use your own stats. Then it says your stats are modified to match the creatures. Which is it? If what you meant is he gains a bonus as if he were being templated with the creature, you may have made the Druid a bit more MAD, but you actually powered him UP by letting him achieve higher scores if he wanted to focus on melee combat. Huh? No class with 9th level spells needs to play catchup with ANYBODY. The Druid's spell list is fine, and gets better as you leave core. Actually, you can get by in the woods fine on 4. If you want to be exceptional, have a high intelligence. There is no need at all to put the Druid on the Ranger's skillpoint level. >> Yes, it (Combat Styles ) gives more feats. But only lets you have certain groupings of them available at one time. So what's to stop me from choosing a decent group and group I'll never intend to switch to, using all my feats for things I DO want ? >> First, that doesn't give combat control. Combat control would be stuff like Hold the Line, Defensive Sweep, Standstill, Robilar's Gambit, Combat Reflexes.<< OK. Weapon Supremacy + Shield Ward + Combat Stability + Combat Vigor. By CORE That's 6 + 3 + 3. This still leaves me with 7 extra feats (as a human). Just enough for Rapid Blitz + Combat Reflexes + Robilar's Gambit. Ultra fire power + reasonable combat control. You won't get much deadlier than this even with 50 feats. Add 9 extra feats (a bit more, actually) to that, and now, even if you go for Great Cleave, we're talking about at least 6 feats for versatility, since the power build is practically fulfilled. If someone still wants to push for more fire power – he probably deserves a dull character. >> Someone with all of their resources put into one specialization will usually win out over someone good in many areas. Because of this most fighters will have one, maybe two tricks.<< Sometimes killing your opponent is not winning. Tripping, disarming, sundering and entangling are all very important in various situations – but by taking them with the core Fighter you DO compromise on his power. With mine – you don't have to. >> That's where the combat styles come in. They FORCE you to be somewhat generalized.<< One thing I didn't understand was how you define a combat style. Which combinations qualify as combat style ? >> But see, TWFing sucked to begin with, and it's generally agreed it's only worthwhile to those who can get bonus damage from other sources. Killing sneak attack removes the normal source of bonus damage Sneak Attackers use.<< Ok, let's dare to assume for one moment you'd go along with my general pattern of thought. How would you modify my SA rules ? >> In real life, one needs to work on his body while it grows up in order to do the things Knights do. << I don't agree with you on this in the least. All knights needed was a good solid training. Whereas Shaulin monks don't accept new subjects beyond their teens (and it's not bureaucracy). >> 1) It's worth improved TWFing. +15, +15, +15, +10 + 5 equals +13, +13, +8, +8, + 3 ?!? >> 3) I have read the description. Now read the mechanics… Ok, things can be interpreted both ways. But what you're saying, is that a monk usually attacks with only on hand when fighting unarmed. If so, what's the point in the following statement: "When using weapons as part of a flurry of blows, a monk applies her Strength bonus (not Str bonus
#19 zombiegleemax Jan 19, 2007 20:40:11	Depowering SA was something I felt long overdue. I know it's a "delicacy" few are willing to give up, but if a Rogue eventually outshines the Fighter in straight forward combat (and that's exactly what happens at high levels when the Rogue is sneaky most of the times), than the Fighter becomes redundant. The rogue is fine, the fighter is bad. No need to hit the rogue with the nerf-stick until he becomes fighterish abysmal. OK, your argument makes sense enough to omit this revised rule. That's exactly why I post these rules, to get arguments that make sense and put things into perspective. Tip: Don't consider flavour for your rules. Rules are just the mechanics, keep them separated from flavour - this makes balance and discussion easier, since flavour is dependant on the actual DM/world and a very bad way to balance something (since it doesn't restrict anything but player imagination).
#20 zombiegleemax Jan 20, 2007 14:10:06	Tip: Don't consider flavour for your rules. Rules are just the mechanics, keep them separated from flavour - this makes balance and discussion easier, since flavour is dependant on the actual DM/world and a very bad way to balance something (since it doesn't restrict anything but player imagination). Thats a Very good point. Using Flavour to make the rules can unbalance the rules. I remember when the Oriental rules for 3rd edition came out, some people complained that the samurai wasnt any better than plain old fighter. The whole point is it wasnt supposed to be better. No class should be better than another only different.
#21 nonsi Jan 20, 2007 14:51:56	Using Flavour to make the rules can unbalance the rules. I spent many hours trying not to compromise on either. No class should be better than another only different. I couldn't agree more. Anyway, I came to several conclusions (so far) as a result from the exchange of ideas in this thread: SA – works with any type of damage (including subdual) and Hide & Move Silently are no longer mandatory. Death Attack – also deals auto crit damage (prior to the victim's saves). No more than 1 Death Attack per combat turn. War Cleric – No extra bonus feats. The cleric's bonus feats are assigned to combat instead. Soulknife: 1. Flaming & Flame Strike count as +1 & +2 enhancements respectively. 2. Speed of Thought is replaced with Fast Movement. Melee "skirmishism" is reinvented as a feat named Offensive Mobility [prereq: Bounding Assault]. It allows 1 move action and then full attack with possible 5' steps in between strikes. If you make 2 consecutive strikes without moving, you lose the momentum and cannot move until your next action. Unlike Spring Attack, you don't get a move action after attacking. Ranged "skirmishism" makes no sense and will not be incorporated into the revised rules. Implosion spell is removed from the cleric's standard spell list and left only in Destruction and Slime domains. You said in your previous post that "Some it (mostly classes) needs to be fine tuned". I'd be glad to know what you had in mind. And if you have anything else left you feel worth mentioning....... by all means, please do so.
#22 mkill Jan 21, 2007 3:58:18	I strongly suggest you get a group together and playtest this stuff. Honestly. People in forums talk a lot, but the important question is whether it actually works at the gaming table. Hand your stuff out to players and force them to make characters using it. You'll instantly know how understandable your rules are and how desirable the changes. One thing I noticed... You claim to change D&D, but you only messed with one aspect: The abilities of the base classes. You may think this is enough, but here's a list of things that remain unchanged: (1) - Unimaginative combat system Sure, there's magic, and there are a couple of maneuvers you can do with the right feats, but does it allow for imaginative fights? How about "I grab the rope, cut down the chandelier, swing across the room, land on the demon's head, grab him by the horns and shake him until he let's go off the princess?" How about "I run up the dragon's tail to get my sword in the soft parts under the wings?" How about "I fling sand in the face of the gladiator and give him a swift kick to the groin while he's distracted?" "I lock my axe with the enemy barbarian and swirl around until he let's go of his weapon, then I wait for that chariot to smash one of the wheels from the side"... And now, I'm not talking about "imaginative DM with high improvisation skills", I want simple basic game mechanics that are able to handle interesting combat maneuvers without slowing combat down to a discussion whether jumping across the room on a rope involves moving through anybody's threatened area. (2) - Insane scaling of numbers Is it really necessary that a twentieth-level threat like an adult dragon has one hundred times the hp of a first-level threat like the orc? Wouldn't it be enough if high-level characters were just able to do more cool stuff, without sending the numbers to the sky? The side effect of this is, that the game world will sooner or later be unable to catch up with the characters. The city watch that can easily handle a first-level group will be turned to ashes by a mid-level party before breakfast! (3) - PCs heavily depend on magical gear to do cool stuff Sure, finding a +5 sword is great, but it would be even greater if my high-level fighter would be able to kick monster butt of his CR with just the rusty old piece of metal that his father gave him when he was a kid. If I have something magic, it should better be something cool, like flaming or whatever. And yes, there is (4) and so on, but I don't want to hijack the thread. I just wanted you to show that if you start tampering with the basics of D&D to make it a better game, there are other areas to start than the base classes. Actually, even though this forum seems to be heavily occupied with weighing classes against each other, class balance is not a problem in D&D 3.5. Sure, it's not perfect, but it's a minor issue, really. Ok, let's look at your incentives for a rewrite and whether you achieved your goals. Basically, I'm attempting to: 1. Redefine and rebalance the base classes in a way that would make all of them VERY worth while taking the full 20-levels stretch. Actually, many classes are already worth taking all 20 levels. Everything that has full caster levels, for example. Sure, with many classes you get a more powerful character if you go for a Prestige class instead. Well, but Prestige classes were intended for exactly that!!! It's like complaining that bread is not as sweet as candy. That's the whole point of candy. So yes, the fighter is not worth taking 20 levels, but again... the fighter was designed as a dip class. It was never intended to be worth taking all 20 levels. So you can rewrite the fighter if you think that is wrong, but there is no point in changing classes that work fine, like the rogue and the bard. 2. Simplify the ever inflating rules resulting from adding more and more base-classes, and offer a dramatic decrease in management while increasing the fun factor – without resorting to overpowering. I'm sorry to say but you made no major effort to simplify the game. None. Your system is standard D&D with variant classes, and that is just as complicated as normal D&D. No change here. 3. Try to set things to better reflect the atmosphere of medieval folklore and fantasy literature. This is not done by changing the D&D base classes. This is done by writing better flavor texts than the PHB and similar have. This is done by empowering DMs with more narrative tools. To quote Skip Williams (unexactly), give me rules for the game and leave the rest to me. 4. Enhance the "real feel" when it comes to "biomechanics" (i.e. minimize the "marvel" feel & touch of the non-magical abilities). On this aspect, another relevant post would be: http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=767191 I've been playing RPGs a long time, and many different, and I've been on RPG boards a lot, and I know that anytime somebody claims to make games more "realistic", all he will ever achieve is screw up the rules and kill the fun. It's a fantasy game, man! I don't want realism! I wouldn't even want realism if the game was called "Computers & Cubicles" and PCs would have to work for their cp instead of killing people and taking their stuff.
#23 nonsi Jan 21, 2007 15:31:53	I strongly suggest you get a group together and playtest this stuff. Honestly. People in forums talk a lot, but the important question is whether it actually works at the gaming table. Hand your stuff out to players and force them to make characters using it. You'll instantly know how understandable your rules are and how desirable the changes. One thing I noticed... You claim to change D&D, but you only messed with one aspect: The abilities of the base classes. You may think this is enough, but here's a list of things that remain unchanged: (1) - Unimaginative combat system Sure, there's magic, and there are a couple of maneuvers you can do with the right feats, but does it allow for imaginative fights? How about "I grab the rope, cut down the chandelier, swing across the room, land on the demon's head, grab him by the horns and shake him until he let's go off the princess?" How about "I run up the dragon's tail to get my sword in the soft parts under the wings?" How about "I fling sand in the face of the gladiator and give him a swift kick to the groin while he's distracted?" "I lock my axe with the enemy barbarian and swirl around until he let's go of his weapon, then I wait for that chariot to smash one of the wheels from the side"... And now, I'm not talking about "imaginative DM with high improvisation skills", I want simple basic game mechanics that are able to handle interesting combat maneuvers without slowing combat down to a discussion whether jumping across the room on a rope involves moving through anybody's threatened area. (2) - Insane scaling of numbers Is it really necessary that a twentieth-level threat like an adult dragon has one hundred times the hp of a first-level threat like the orc? Wouldn't it be enough if high-level characters were just able to do more cool stuff, without sending the numbers to the sky? The side effect of this is, that the game world will sooner or later be unable to catch up with the characters. The city watch that can easily handle a first-level group will be turned to ashes by a mid-level party before breakfast! (3) - PCs heavily depend on magical gear to do cool stuff Sure, finding a +5 sword is great, but it would be even greater if my high-level fighter would be able to kick monster butt of his CR with just the rusty old piece of metal that his father gave him when he was a kid. If I have something magic, it should better be something cool, like flaming or whatever. And yes, there is (4) and so on, but I don't want to hijack the thread. I just wanted you to show that if you start tampering with the basics of D&D to make it a better game, there are other areas to start than the base classes. Actually, even though this forum seems to be heavily occupied with weighing classes against each other, class balance is not a problem in D&D 3.5. Sure, it's not perfect, but it's a minor issue, really. Ok, let's look at your incentives for a rewrite and whether you achieved your goals. Actually, many classes are already worth taking all 20 levels. Everything that has full caster levels, for example. Sure, with many classes you get a more powerful character if you go for a Prestige class instead. Well, but Prestige classes were intended for exactly that!!! It's like complaining that bread is not as sweet as candy. That's the whole point of candy. So yes, the fighter is not worth taking 20 levels, but again... the fighter was designed as a dip class. It was never intended to be worth taking all 20 levels. So you can rewrite the fighter if you think that is wrong, but there is no point in changing classes that work fine, like the rogue and the bard. I'm sorry to say but you made no major effort to simplify the game. None. Your system is standard D&D with variant classes, and that is just as complicated as normal D&D. No change here. This is not done by changing the D&D base classes. This is done by writing better flavor texts than the PHB and similar have. This is done by empowering DMs with more narrative tools. To quote Skip Williams (unexactly), give me rules for the game and leave the rest to me. I've been playing RPGs a long time, and many different, and I've been on RPG boards a lot, and I know that anytime somebody claims to make games more "realistic", all he will ever achieve is screw up the rules and kill the fun. It's a fantasy game, man! I don't want realism! I wouldn't even want realism if the game was called "Computers & Cubicles" and PCs would have to work for their cp instead of killing people and taking their stuff. >> You claim to change D&D, but you only messed with one aspect: The abilities of the base classes.<< That's the primary thing that needs remedy to my point of view. All the base classes are not interesting enough, not versatile enough and not capable enough to handle unexpected situations. I'm not talking about power, since my modifications offer a negligible power boost and the main means of power remain the magical items. What's missing is diversity of capabilities beyond long preparations in order to deal with unexpected situations and/or licking your wound afterwards (and yet notice that most of the class-modifications suggestions on these boards go for total damage inflation). >> How about "I grab the rope, cut down the chandelier, swing across the room, land on the demon's head, grab him by the horns and shake him until he let's go off the princess?" << Actually this could easily be done if the DM decides the settings are correct. All that's left to do is make a grapple check (assuming the demon doesn't kill her in the process). >> How about "I run up the dragon's tail to get my sword in the soft parts under the wings?" << It could be done with the proper balance penalties (but what would be considered "proper balance penalties"?). >> How about "I fling sand in the face of the gladiator and give him a swift kick to the groin while he's distracted?"<< Dirty Fighting takes care of the "sand in the face" part. With my approach to SA, one could decide that SA I/II/III are feats anyone could take (at higher levels than the rogue, off course) and that Knowledge (Vital areas) applies to groups of opponents (humanoids, felines, dragons, golems etc…). This, off course, would nerf the rogue a bit, but I always viewed this class as the ultimate skill monkey rather than damage monkey. It may surprise you, but of all my revised classes this one is among the top 3 in my book. >> "I lock my axe with the enemy barbarian and swirl around until he let's go of his weapon, then I wait for that chariot to smash one of the wheels from the side"... << Ok, that's as far as my imagination goes. This could amount to a feat, but one that's applicable only in certain situations. >> And now, I'm not talking about "imaginative DM with high improvisation skills" << But that's what defines a good DM. If the DM sucks, improvisation is the least of your worries. >> I want simple basic game mechanics that are able to handle interesting combat maneuvers without slowing combat down to a discussion… << There's no set of finite rules that handles infinite amount of possibilities. >> Is it really necessary that a twentieth-level threat like an adult dragon has one hundred times the hp of a first-level threat like the orc? << Actually, my instinctive approach says there should be a certain buffer to begin with and then a slow incline, if you don't mind breaking the mold. Something like this: All [+0 LA] races start with (8 + CON-score) HP as commoners, and then each HD grants 1/2 its max score without CON-mod (+5 / level for d10, +4 for d8 etc). The part about dragons (or any other creature for that matter) getting gargantuan / colossal is distasteful in my boot as well. >> (3) - PCs heavily depend on magical gear to do cool stuff << Actually, on this part 3e is a major downgrade. I really tried to cope with this problem in my revised rules – by increasing the characters' capability scope. >> Sure, with many classes you get a more powerful character if you go for a Prestige class instead. Well, but Prestige classes were intended for exactly that!!!<< NO!!! PrCs are a mechanism for selling more printable material. Haven't you noticed that the base-classes' power level increases (slowly but) steadily ? >> It's like complaining that bread is not as sweet as candy. That's the whole point of candy. << Some people prefer bread over candy. >> So yes, the fighter is not worth taking 20 levels, but again... the fighter was designed as a dip class. It was never intended to be worth taking all 20 levels.<< Are you sure that was the intention when PHB I came out ? >> but there is no point in changing classes that work fine, like the rogue… << As a damage monkey, rather than skill monkey (the parallel generic class is the expert) >> I'm sorry to say but you made no major effort to simplify the game. None. Your system is standard D&D with variant classes, and that is just as complicated as normal D&D. No change here. << 1. Simpler spell-management. 2. Less classes 3. Movement based AoOs require Ready action, leaving you with less calculations on the overall. 4. Retroactive skill buildup at INT increase – less management when creating a mid-level character or tracking the group's characters. 5. Simple, fair, satisfying and yet balanced Point-Buy system. 6. Balance between the classes, based on contribution rather that confronting one another in combat (including divine casters not overshadowing fighters in melee anymore). If everyone's satisfied, the game flows better. That's just from surface review. >> This (atmosphere) is not done by changing the D&D base classes. << Why not ? Doesn't the Witch feel right ? Doesn't the Rogue feel more like a true expert now ? Doesn’t the Mage feel more like characters like Raistlin Majer ? Doesn’t the Fighter feel more appropriate for building Al'Lan Mandragoran would be ? … >> This is done by empowering DMs with more narrative tools. << Good DMs don't need them and bad DMs won't be able to properly put them to use. >> I've been playing RPGs a long time, and many different, and I've been on RPG boards a lot, and I know that anytime somebody claims to make games more "realistic", all he will ever achieve is screw up the rules and kill the fun. << I've done it successfully, twice (with OD&D and AD&D). I'm hoping for a third successful time. The previous times took months, but now each comment is a small beacon of light that helps me with the fine tuning.
#24 Lotus_Crane Jan 22, 2007 13:05:20	Requirements Abilities: STR 15+, WIS 14+, CHA 16+ Skills: Knowledge (religion) 5 ranks, Knowledge (nobility and royalty) 4 ranks, Heal 5 ranks Feats: Diehard, Endurance, Greater Weapon Focus (deity's favored weapon), Improved Unarmed Strike, Improved Grapple, Improved Sunder, Indomitable Soul, Iron will, Power Attack, Last Stand, Valor, Willful, Weapon Specialization (deity's favored weapon). Special: The deity must concur with the character's selected Fighter-theme and fighting style. Look, I know you're trying to make prestige classes "prestigious" and special again, but those requirements are just way, way too high, even for a fighter. Epic PrC's have easier to meet requirements than that, and even assuming a pre-epic fighter qualified for your paladin, every single one would be a cookie-cutter clone of eachother, since they really don't have any room to customize themselves with feats other than the ones they need to qualify for the PrC. Please drop Improved Unarmed Strike, Improved Grapple, and Improved Sunder from the list of required feats. Not only do they make it too difficult to enter the PrC, but speaking strictly, they really don't have that much to do with the entire concept of being a "paladin." PrC's are supposed to be powerful but focused, not a mishmash of requirements and benefits from across the board. That being said, a lot of your other ideas merit consideration. For example, while I would disagree with the idea of removing the rogue's normal sneak attack damage progression entirely (cutting it back to half seems reasonable), I do find your alternate sneak attack abilities to be intriguing.
#25 nonsi Jan 25, 2007 1:35:47	Look, I know you're trying to make prestige classes "prestigious" and special again, but those requirements are just way, way too high, even for a fighter. Epic PrC's have easier to meet requirements than that, and even assuming a pre-epic fighter qualified for your paladin, every single one would be a cookie-cutter clone of eachother, since they really don't have any room to customize themselves with feats other than the ones they need to qualify for the PrC. intriguing. 1. If you follow the revised Fighter rules, you'll see that any fighter of any race could qualify to take the Paladin's 1st level by ECL 11. 2. The Paladin is chosen among the finest of the finest to serve a deity's interest. He nust ba able to fend for himself even when his weapon is not available. Please drop Improved Unarmed Strike, Improved Grapple, and Improved Sunder from the list of required feats. Not only do they make it too difficult to enter the PrC, but speaking strictly, they really don't have that much to do with the entire concept of being a "paladin." PrC's are supposed to be powerful but focused, not a mishmash of requirements and benefits from across the board. intriguing. I tend to agree that Improved Grapple requirement is inappropriate. It should be Cleave instead. I would also say Great Cleave, but then non-human Swashbucklers and Hunters would not be able to qualify to Paladinhood before level 11.
#26 the_puppetmaster Jan 30, 2007 8:40:41	How about "I grab the rope, cut down the chandelier, swing across the room, land on the demon's head, grab him by the horns and shake him until he let's go off the princess?" I'd rule as a swift action to cut the rope, with a use rope check to swing to the demon, followed by a grapple check against the demon with a +5 to the DC due to favorable surprise circumstances. How about "I run up the dragon's tail to get my sword in the soft parts under the wings?" Move action, Balance check, followed by an appropriate knowledge check (or houserule an "on-the-fly" thing) against the dragon's anatomy. A standard action to attack. Dragon's ability to fly disabled for 1d3 rounds. How about "I fling sand in the face of the gladiator and give him a swift kick to the groin while he's distracted?" If there's sand on the ground, then its a move action to kick the sand. Not a hard task, concentration or sleight of hand (foot?) check DC 5 or 10. Success rules opponent is blinded 1 round. Standard action for unarmed strike. Flatfooted raises hit chance. Successful groin hit = stunned for 1d4 rounds. "I lock my axe with the enemy barbarian and swirl around until he let's go of his weapon, then I wait for that chariot to smash one of the wheels from the side"... See Tome of Battle: Book of Nine Swords. I know its not exactly what you described, but the flavor for combat rules are all in there. Its an amazing book. I love to use skill checks for most anything a player can think of, as long as it makes sense. I rule that they have 10 seconds to explain their case on why it should work, andd then i make my ruling. If any of my other players object to any of these rulings (which they don't, they all do these things), I tell them, "You could've done it too, had you thought about it."
#27 OneWinged4ngel Jan 30, 2007 11:38:17	While I believe it can be done, I don't believe you did it. :thumbsdow
#28 Ra-Tiel Jan 30, 2007 12:45:12	[...] (1) - Unimaginative combat system Sure, there's magic, and there are a couple of maneuvers you can do with the right feats, but does it allow for imaginative fights? Although I partially agree with you, your examples are off. How about "I grab the rope, cut down the chandelier, swing across the room, land on the demon's head, grab him by the horns and shake him until he let's go off the princess?" Grabbing the rope and swinging around: the swashbuckler can do this pretty well, and IIRC there's a feat or two from CAdv/CSco that aids with that. Could also work as per the charging rules. The rest: grapple and damaging in grapple as per the rules. How about "I run up the dragon's tail to get my sword in the soft parts under the wings?" Grapple. Attacking the wings = called shot. See below. How about "I fling sand in the face of the gladiator and give him a swift kick to the groin while he's distracted?" Bluff skill -> Feinting. Kick to the groin = called shot = NONO in DnD, as there is just no reasonable mechanic for implementing that. "I lock my axe with the enemy barbarian and swirl around until he let's go of his weapon, then I wait for that chariot to smash one of the wheels from the side"... [...] Barbarian: disarm. Chariot: readied action -> sunder attempt.
#29 ruff0126 Jan 30, 2007 13:59:08	I am starting a campain soon but was tired of the power diffrence between classes and I'll try this all players heve 10+ years of gaming under their belt, so this might scew thr results. By the way I really liked it over all. Just a few questions. Are Mages the only ones to suffer from fatigue, if so it should probably apply to all casting classes. I know you don't think a hexblade would fit these rules but you may want to check out Otto the Bugbear's http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=772135. Any thoughtful repy would be appreciated.
#30 yuntil Jan 31, 2007 1:11:01	From what I read (about half) I see you got some good ideas and a lot of thought and time involved. Good for you. No sarcasm intended. I like D&D and I play it occasionaly. I play a game similar to D&D a lot. Every DM I know changes and/or ignore rules thay don't like. I agree with several of your points. Characters rely too much on magic toys instead of skills/feats/abilities. Fighters are a good solid class (not a dip like some dips think) and Prestige Classes exist to sell more poorly written books. My intention, before I got distracted, was too say good job. If your players like the stuff you do, go for it.
#31 nonsi Jan 31, 2007 6:30:39	Are Mages the only ones to suffer from fatigue, if so it should probably apply to all casting classes. 1. Take Raistlin Majere as an archetype. Fatigue was always associated with arcane spell casters in fantasy literature. 2. I've supplied an 'explanation' in the rules why arcane spell casters suffer fatigue while others don't. Arcane spell casters both operate with extremely complex patters and channel the magical powers (at least partially) like a conduit. Eldritch classes also function as a conduit, but they are born with the ability to channel their inborn talent without ill effects - as long as it's their naturally inborn talent. 3. Other concepts like raw spell points seem inappropriate to the other spell casters' types and would consume too much game time if assigned to Mages. 4. If you can think of other spell casting techniques that would be more appropriate thematically to any of the classes (and mechanically simple), you're more than welcome to present them. I know you don't think a hexblade would fit these rules but you may want to check out Otto the Bugbear's http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=772135. 1. The given Hexblade would have to undergo several adjustments just to fit my game rules (mechanically). I'm also uncertain about its balance within my game rules. I mean, full BAB + inexhaustible supply of very powerful (SWIFT!!!) hexes at high levels... (the Eldritch Blast I don't even count) 2. One of my objectives was that there would be no hybrid classes in terms of unique class features. The given Hexblade seems like a bizarre Fighter-Sorcerer(warlock)-Witch hybrid.
#32 ruff0126 Jan 31, 2007 8:28:15	Either you are misinformed about the hex blade or someone lied to you when they played it a HexBlade only gets 5 uses of his hexblade’s curse at 17th level 6 at 21st level. Can only wear light armor, medium with a feat, allot of people think it is an under powered class but has lots of flavor. As far as the Arcane fatigue thing you said arcane casters ie: mage/bard or just mage. I know you fixed the cleric being better than a fighter in melee with the new spell selection set, a war cleric could still do it, but to limit the powers of the divine classes you could say that do to the innate mortality of the caster you can only channel your class level+casting ability modifier in spell levels an encounter, if you go past that you are fatigued, after 1.5 class level+ casting ability modifier your are exhausted and cannot cast. Example: cleric 2 Wis. 16 can cast 5 no problem 6 fatigued 7 exhausted cleric 6 Wis. 19(21) can cast 10 no problem up to 13 fatigued 14 exhausted. This stops high level clerics from just burning off spell slots at random. Oh ya and no casting fatigue in between encounters for divine classes unless the DM thinks it warrants it. Does that sound fair?
#33 nonsi Jan 31, 2007 12:08:36	Either you are misinformed about the hex blade or someone lied to you when they played it a HexBlade only gets 5 uses of his hexblade’s curse at 17th level 6 at 21st level. Can only wear light armor, medium with a feat, allot of people think it is an under powered class but has lots of flavor. "Inexhaustible supply" was what I deduced from the description in the link you inserted. As far as the Arcane fatigue thing you said arcane casters ie: mage/bard or just mage. Just Mage. I know you fixed the cleric being better than a fighter in melee with the new spell selection set, a war cleric could still do it You've just convinced me that Righteous Might has to go (the DR part is totally broken) and that Divine Favor & Divine Power shouldn't stack with other ability boosting effects. These modification would ensure that the Fighter is not outgunned in his own field of expertise. to limit the powers of the divine classes you could say that do to the innate mortality of the caster you can only channel your class level+casting ability modifier in spell levels an encounter, if you go past that you are fatigued, after 1.5 class level+ casting ability modifier your are exhausted and cannot cast. Example: cleric 2 Wis. 16 can cast 5 no problem 6 fatigued 7 exhausted cleric 6 Wis. 19(21) can cast 10 no problem up to 13 fatigued 14 exhausted. This stops high level clerics from just burning off spell slots at random. Oh ya and no casting fatigue in between encounters for divine classes unless the DM thinks it warrants it. Does that sound fair? That would limit the Cleric to about 2 or 3 spells per encounter (would practically turn the class into a mobile bandage) and would have no effect on the Druid. Btw, I'm not too comfortable with the Druid being a divine caster. I'll try to fix that one in the next few days.
#34 ruff0126 Feb 02, 2007 9:27:47	That link was to Otto's version of the hexblade the original version was in complete warrior. Your right my version keeps the arcane/divine even at low levels but the lets arcane dominate, sorry. I can't think of anything to keep arcane/divine balanced except to apply the same rules to casters. If you want divine to be more powerful say that they can only become fatigued but once they become fatigued they make concentration checks to cast spells(as defensive but+1 per spell cast when already fatigued). That way they can stay as 2nd teir warriors. No penalty to divine casting but a penalty to arcane casting just screams impalance/favratism. Keep up the good work.
#35 nonsi Feb 05, 2007 7:29:19	Invalid entry
#36 nonsi Jul 16, 2007 23:45:06	A more rational ability distribution: One part of D&D's stats that has always seemed odd to me was the fact that Dexterity measured both speed and coordination. I think the two are loosely tied (much like STR and CON are loosely tied), there are examples of people who have one but not the other. A marksman is undeniably dexterous, but he may be "un-agile" (it is beneficial to have fast reflexes, but your reflexes don't make you a better shot). Similarly, the fact that Wisdom encompasses your senses as well as your mental resilience seems odd. I can see some correlation between the two (insane people often have what could be considered a sensory disorder), but I don't think the two are directly linked. Someone could have a lot of experience but still be imperceptive. This optional rule requires some effort on the DM's side (so it might even be inappropriate for DMs who'd adopt all other aspects of these rules), but it shouldn't be too difficult to compile the appropriate Agility according to a monster's given Strength and Dexterity scores. The same goes for Perception compiled form Wisdom and Intelligence. Strength: This is a measure of a character's physical power. You add your STR modifier to: • Damage rolls when using a melee weapon, a thrown weapon, or a composite bow. Off-hand attacks receive only 1/2 your STR bonus or twice a STR penalty, while two-handed attacks receive 1 1/2 times your strength bonus or 1/2 the strength penalty. • STR checks for breaking objects through force, not an attack (such as bursting chains or bending an iron bar). • Grapple, Trip, Overrun, and Bull Rush checks (both to perform and to resist). Your STR score also determines your carrying capacity, and the size of weapons you can wield without penalties (see the weapons link at the top of this thread). Dexterity: This is a measure of a character's hand-eye coordination. You add your DEX modifier to: • Melee and Ranged attack rolls • Disable Device, Open Locks, Ride, Sleight of Hand, Stealth* and Use Rope checks. Agility: This is a measure of a character's energy level, his reflexes and his athleticism. You add your agility modifier to: • AC, provided that a character is not flat-footed or helpless; the amount of a character's Agility modifier that they can apply to their AC is limited by the armor they are wearing and their current encumbrance rating. • Reflex saving throws. • Balance, Climb, Escape Artist, Jump, Swim and Tumble checks. • If higher than your STR, checks to resist Bull Rush, Trips and Overruns. • For each +3 agility modifier (rounded down), increase movement by 5 feet. • All "quick" creatures that gained DEX bonus - using this system, they gain agility bonus instead. Constitution: This is a measure of a character's ability to resist and withstand injury, poison, and disease. You add your CON modifier to: • Fortitude saving throws. • Concentration, Drinking* and Food Tasting* checks. • Endurance checks to resist fatigue, exhaustion, and damage from environmental effects. Intelligence: This is a measure of a character's memory and ability to learn, as well as a character's common sense. You add your INT modifier to: • The number of languages a character knows at 1st level. • The number of skill points gained each level. • Appraise, Decipher Script, Forgery, Spellcraft* and Use Magic Device checks. Wisdom: This is a measure of a character's mental resilience, mental health and application of experience to a variety of tasks. You add your WIS modifier to: • Will saving throws. • Autohypnosis*, Craft, Heal, Knowledge and Survival. Perception: This is a measure of a character's senses and awareness to details. You add your perception modifier to: • Initiative checks. • Innuendo* (synergy from Bluff), Listen, Read Lips* (synergy from Spot), Search, Sense Motive, and Spot checks. • Can also replace agility for AC purposes if Uncanny Dodge feat is taken. Charisma: This is a measure of a character's force of personality. You add your charisma modifier to: • Bargain*, Bluff (& taunt), Diplomacy, Disguise, Gather Information, Handle Animal, Intimidate and Perform* checks. • Certain saves that are checked with CHA modifier. • A d20 check that is based on pure luck. * A new / modified skill to be defined. Note: Under this ability distribution, it would be reasonable to allow ability increase every 3 levels. Skills Description: AUTOHIPNOSIS (WIS, Trained Only) This skill is described here: http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/skills/autohypnosis.htm BARGAIN (CHA) You manage to get the best possible price, either buying or selling. The DM rolls for the player and NPC to determine the result. The one with the higher score wins. In case of a tie, no one has the upper hand. This rule can be expanded as the DM sees fit. DRINKING / FOOD TASTING (CON) DC equals the beverage / poison DC. INNUENDO (PER, Trained Only) You know how to send and read secret messages while appearing to be speaking about other things. Two people, for example, might seem to be talking about bakery goods when they’re really planning how to break into the evil wizard’s laboratory. You can send a basic message at DC10, a complex message at DC 15, new information at DC 20 and complex new message at DC 25. Reading a message is a bit easier, since you only have to listen. Start with DC 10 and add +3 per difficulty level. If the message was sent inappropriately, you can still compensate, but the DC increases according to the sender's failure. Retry: Generally, retries are allowed when trying to send a message, but not when intercepting one. "Take 20" – you can take 20 delivering a message, but then any deciphering attempt that scores lower than 10, counts as 10 automatically. PERFORM (mimic) (CHA, Trained Only) As a standard action, you can imitate almost any sound (footsteps, a door opening or closing, or two people fighting). You cannot simulate anything louder than a shout or duplicate the sound of any magical effect like a banshee's wail. Use the Perform skill opposed by the audience's Listen skill to be convincing. READ LIPS (PER, Trained Only) You can understand what others are saying by watching their lips. You must be able to see them speak and understand the speaker’s language. The base DC is 10. Add +3 to the DC for complex speech, an inarticulate speaker and for each 10’ distance. You have to concentrate on reading lips for a full minute before making the skill check, and you can’t perform some other action during this minute. You can move at half speed but not any faster, and you must maintain a line of sight to the lips being read. If the check succeeds, you can understand the general content of a minute’s worth of speaking, but you usually still miss certain details. If the check fails by 5 or more, you draw some incorrect conclusion about the speech. SPELLCRAFT (INT, Trained Only) This skill encompasses both Spellcraft and Knowledge (Arcana). I believe this synthetic separation goes way back to the days of OD&D gazetteers, where skills were initially introduced. STEALTH (DEX) This skill comes instead of Hide and Move Silently. Note: Profession is similar to Speek Language. You put 1 rank in Profession and you know one profession.
#37 Rustmonster Jul 17, 2007 13:11:07	After reading your ideas, I came to the conclusion that you want to: 1) Make flavour into mechanics, which is not a good idea. Flavour is what the players and DM make, not something the rules force you to do. And 2) Make everything in the game how YOU want it. This is fine. But don't put a campaign built for you and you alone and say you "fixed" D&D. It's basiclly just fine the way it is, IMO, except some minor areas like Monk lawful restrictions and ASF. I would change the restriction and ASF for MY games, and for me, that fixes something I don't like. But I don't start saying "D&D is completly broken! The only way to fix it is to remove Monk lawful restrictions and remove ASF!" Example: Fighter Classes In YOUR opinion, all of the classes you identified as "fighter classes", are essentially the same with some skill changes and feats. The thing is, they are NOT all the same thing. Take swashbuckler. Only light armour proficient, weapon finesse as bonus feat, causes ability damage with criticals, acrobatic charge and skill mastery, special dodge ability, Int to damage, bonuses to reflex, luck reroll, second save VS enchantment. Now, YOUR swashbuckler is just a fighter. They still wear heavy armour, they still use strength as their main stat, they don't use their DEX as much, etc. That is not my idea of a swashbuckler. MY swashbucklers wear light armour, make you bleed on a crit, use poise and grace to dodge your blow instead of letting armour take it, fight with finesse, use high DEX to make sure they don't get hit and to strike with deadly persision, use their intellect to find the perfect spot to strike. It is OBVIOUS that fighter and swashbuckler are COMPLETLY different.
#38 nonsi Jul 17, 2007 17:09:55	After reading your ideas, I came to the conclusion that you want to: 1) Make flavour into mechanics, which is not a good idea. Flavour is what the players and DM make, not something the rules force you to do. And 2) Make everything in the game how YOU want it. This is fine. But don't put a campaign built for you and you alone and say you "fixed" D&D. It's basiclly just fine the way it is, IMO, except some minor areas like Monk lawful restrictions and ASF. I would change the restriction and ASF for MY games, and for me, that fixes something I don't like. But I don't start saying "D&D is completly broken! The only way to fix it is to remove Monk lawful restrictions and remove ASF!" Example: Fighter Classes In YOUR opinion, all of the classes you identified as "fighter classes", are essentially the same with some skill changes and feats. The thing is, they are NOT all the same thing. Take swashbuckler. Only light armour proficient, weapon finesse as bonus feat, causes ability damage with criticals, acrobatic charge and skill mastery, special dodge ability, Int to damage, bonuses to reflex, luck reroll, second save VS enchantment. Now, YOUR swashbuckler is just a fighter. They still wear heavy armour, they still use strength as their main stat, they don't use their DEX as much, etc. That is not my idea of a swashbuckler. MY swashbucklers wear light armour, make you bleed on a crit, use poise and grace to dodge your blow instead of letting armour take it, fight with finesse, use high DEX to make sure they don't get hit and to strike with deadly persision, use their intellect to find the perfect spot to strike. It is OBVIOUS that fighter and swashbuckler are COMPLETLY diffrent. If you had put this in the houserule forums and said somethign like "These are some houserules I use for D&D. If you like any of the ideas, feel free to try them out!" this would be alright. But when you go to the General forum, and blantly say "I fixed D&D!" when many people either don't think it is broken or have different ideas on how to "fix it", that's just the wrong thing to do. These are house rules, plain and simple. What you are trying to do is make D&D YOUR game. Do this in your own campaign. WoTC encourages it. But don't belive that your house rules "fix" D&D as a whole. It just does that for you. Hi Rustmonster, First of all, thanks for the honest reply. I truly appreciate bluntness, since it makes it a lot easier to get down to the little details. Before I begin, I'd like to note that I took most of what you said into consideration in advance (but off course you couldn't have guessed). Ok. First thing's first. >> Make flavour into mechanics, which is not a good idea. Flavour is what the >> players and DM make, not something the rules force you to do. That's the best excuse for sticking to OD&D. I mean, why bother with the rules if all the flavor stuff is dealt within the campaign anyway. To my opinion, the rules are intrinsic to how the game world feels. >> Make everything in the game how YOU want it. Show me a single modification proposal on these boards in which this isn't the primary incentive to putting an effort in the first place. If the only problem is with the declaration, then I'm guilty as charged. But this isn't the result of megalomania. I do believe I covered about 90% of the most common issues on these boards ("fighters suck, but can out scale monks in unarmed damage output"... "Rogues deal more damage than Fighters"... "Divine casters are too powerful"... "Magic beats swordplay any day"... "the Monk/Bard is pathetic"... "all spell casters use the same magic system more or less"). Just look at the amount of posts on these boards regarding Gestalt and tell me everyone's content. Gestalt is hands down cheating (Rogue-Druid combo... give me a break). And even if we dropped Gestalt, most players are interested in the core classes as a necessary evil in the way of getting into prestige classes. >> But don't put a campaign built for you and you alone and say you "fixed" >> D&D. It's basically just fine the way it is, IMO, except some minor areas. Than it's a win-win situation for you. Completely legitimate. Now, regarding the Swashbuckler in particular . . . . . 1. It appears you ignored this link: http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=767191, given in the beginning of the INTRODUCTION spoiler block. 2. Of all classes in my approach, the only one that comes built-in with armor at all is the Soldier fighter-template. 3. Perhaps if you'd take a look at my previous post (in this page, right above yours), things would seem a bit more appropriate. 4. My Swashbuckler template is tailor made for a dexterous and sophisticated man of arms and skills. The starting package, the extra skills and the progression all aim to a certain atmosphere. If someone wants so badly to screw it up with armor and a massive weapon (I never met the DM that would allow to Quickdraw a Greatsword) instead of taking another template, that's his problem. 5. It never felt right to me that of all stats, the one that reflects analytical capabilities and memory capacity would be assigned to combat. If one is anxious to apply stylish combat, CHA would be much more appropriate, but it could be a feat rather than a built in trait. 6. Charging is another aspect that never really tilts the balance – you only get 1 attack out of it anyway (unless some external feat I missed allows multiple attacks while charging). 7. I personally never liked (thematically) the substantiality of luck in RPG. This is where magic comes in, but to will luck…… that ain't fantasy in my book. 8. I didn't leave out Slippery Mind, just made it optional, for those who prefer evasiveness over stubborn-will, and with my approach, you could get it at level 13 rather than wait till near epic stage of the campaign. Now, Try to build my Swashbuckler with its built-in advantages and light / medium weapons, attempting to make it as interesting as your imagination goes. Let me know how it came up and if (with the above comments) you changed your mind in the meantime.
#39 Rustmonster Jul 17, 2007 17:18:22	HAHAHAHAHA! Sorry, two things made me laugh. 1) That you gave me a reply that wasn't meant to offend me, which is a rare and beautiful thing. Thank you! 2) That we in fact ARE in the house rules forum! I'm an idiot! See, there's this other post, and I think I got it mixed up with yours, so, umm, sorry, I'll take that out of the post. I will try to make my swashbuckler with your system, and we'll see how it goes. Side note, do all fighter types start with light armour proficency? I couldn't find if it said that. Side side note, what is the cap on the skill points for level 1? Is there one?
#40 nonsi Jul 17, 2007 18:34:28	>> do all fighter types start with light armour proficency? I couldn't find if it said that. Most classes start proficient with light armor. The Mage and the Monk have no armor training. The Fighter and the Cleric start proficient with medium armor and shield. >> what is the cap on the skill points for level 1? Is there one? Basically, this remains unchanged (both for amount and ranking, unless stated otherwise - for Fighters and Druids, if I recall correctly), but also see the "Multiclassing penalties are dropped" entry in the "Revised rules" spoiler block (post #3).
#41 khadmus Jul 23, 2007 15:43:45	While I believe it can be done, I don't believe you did it. :thumbsdow Though I would prefer a less polite approach, 4ngel sums my opinions up.
#42 trapspringer Jul 23, 2007 16:44:00	I agree, although at a glance I like your take on spellcasting. With a little reworking and a lot of playtesting it could be viable. I think you powered it up a good deal, though, and it sure doesn't need that.
#43 nonsi Jul 23, 2007 19:10:52	I agree, although at a glance I like your take on spellcasting. With a little reworking and a lot of playtesting it could be viable. I think you powered it up a good deal, though, and it sure doesn't need that. I'm sure you missed out on something. Before I continue explaining myself... 1. Please go to entry #3 (http://boards1.wizards.com/showpost.php?p=11207156&postcount=3) and open the "Revised rules" spoiler block (focus on "Revised Spells" and Metamagic). Also see entry #35 for further information (http://boards1.wizards.com/showpost.php?p=11392642&postcount=35). I may have left a fiew spells here and ther, but hey, I'm only human and I did it pretty much by myself. 2. Try to understand my claim that the divine casters underwent a significant depowering (view the revised classes again and cross reference with the above links). Just for the sake of argument, let's make a comparison. You try to build the most ridiculously overpowered non-epic spell caster you can think of using my rules (at any level) and I'll show you one (at the exact same level) that eats your's for breakfast, using just core + Complete {whatever} + Races of {whatever} + Book of {whatever}. Actually, I don't even need to create one myself. I can just go to the "Character Optimization" forum and get one that's already ready. Now, before you even bother, first check out my replies throughout this thread. They clarify a lot of issues. After that I really anticipate reading your opinion regarding everything (and making that comparison, should you feel like it). Side Note: I'm planning on simplifying the Fighter class, to a version much more compatible to the core rules (in the next fiew days).
#44 tantric Jul 27, 2007 14:44:40	why don't you just GET RID OF CLASSES. use feats, advantages, disadvantages and skills. DnD has the most pointlessly restrictive character creation system imaginable. tinkering with that is not going to help. why must all feats be equal? assign point values to them, make ALL class abilities into feats, then give out Feat Points. Arcane Casting - 10 Feat Points per level. Spontaneous Arcane Casting 20 Feat Points. Sneak Attack +1d6 5 Feat Points. BAB +1 5 Feat Points. etc You want an spontaneous arcane caster that can rage? no problem. you want a fighter that can sneak attack? come right in! OR GURPS DnD
#45 nonsi Aug 02, 2007 18:38:56	why don't you just GET RID OF CLASSES. use feats, advantages, disadvantages and skills. ... GURPS DnD The mechanics is too complicated. I took a peek and found a huge mass of text to compile. Way too much for me. Thanks anyway.
#46 nonsi Aug 29, 2007 8:17:07	Bumping for my own needs. (These rules are modified frequently and have underwent extensive changes since they were initially inserted, so if anyone feels like commenting.............)
#47 asurya Sep 03, 2007 9:36:04	I, for one, really like what you've done in the part II of post#36, increasing the number of abilities make perfect sense to me, without increasing the complexity too much. the same goes for the 3.0 skills you reinstated (Readlips & Innuendo) form the 3.5 melting (Spot & Bluff respectively)! If you could reinstate Wild empathy as a skill (Animal empathy), so we could see character which can drastically change an animal behavior but have no clue how to speak to people (Diplo) and are not entitled to class (Druid & Ranger). I don't know what to think of eating/drinking skill of yours but Bargain is fine (maybe make Taunt a skill by itself instead of part of bluff, but I'm not sure) and merging Hide & MoveSilently is great. The main problem I see with that system though, is that is increase MAD a great deal for all the non casters (monks anyone?, and fighter which now require Dex, both of which not needing a nerf) and change little-to-no for casters. Moreover, as you give 2 more stats, you will have to raise the points available in a point buy system and it's all to the benefit of casters which can now have crazy main ability scores with little loss (the little they invested in Dex, they will now put it in Agi and dump Dex altogether => harder touch spells hit chance? err... you must have missed the "touch" part!). => Balance-wise this is quite an issue. as for letting +1 to a stat every 3 levels, I would rather keep the "every 4 levels" thing but give 4 points and let the player choose how to spend them*. * I don't claim the creation of this mod, I read it on the houserules board but could not find where, credits to whoever made it
#48 nonsi Sep 03, 2007 17:35:33	I, for one, really like what you've done in the part II of post#36, increasing the number of abilities make perfect sense to me, without increasing the complexity too much. the same goes for the 3.0 skills you reinstated (Readlips & Innuendo) form the 3.5 melting (Spot & Bluff respectively)! If you could reinstate Wild empathy as a skill (Animal empathy), so we could see character which can drastically change an animal behavior but have no clue how to speak to people (Diplo) and are not entitled to class (Druid & Ranger). Thanks. Animal empathy kind'a slipped my mind. Guess I'll have to reread it and see how it fits (shouldn't be a problem I believe). As for the Ranger, I guess it could be made viable if I used both Woodland Swiftness over combat style and Special Abilities over spell casting (if I could only remembar where the latter was ). Add general feats in the remaining dead levels on top of that and you could truly make the Ranger more than interesting to role and participate as a dignified member of the self reliece game mechanics. I don't know what to think of eating/drinking skill of yours but Bargain is fine (maybe make Taunt a skill by itself instead of part of bluff, but I'm not sure) and merging Hide & MoveSilently is great. Mainly for flavor (the Dwarf's legendary ability to soak alcohol and the king's food taster) The main problem I see with that system though, is that is increase MAD a great deal for all the non casters (monks anyone?, and fighter which now require Dex, both of which not needing a nerf) and change little-to-no for casters. Moreover, as you give 2 more stats, you will have to raise the points available in a point buy system and it's all to the benefit of casters which can now have crazy main ability scores with little loss (the little they invested in Dex, they will now put it in Agi and dump Dex altogether => harder touch spells hit chance? err... you must have missed the "touch" part!). => Balance-wise this is quite an issue. Casters still need HP, SkPts and dodge boosting factors. as for letting +1 to a stat every 3 levels, I would rather keep the "every 4 levels" thing but give 4 points and let the player choose how to spend them*. * I don't claim the creation of this mod, I read it on the houserules board but could not find where, credits to whoever made it I think the following changes provide the required adaptibility for both issues: 1. Start with the initial stats: 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15 2. Take 32 points and spread as you see fit, according to the rules given here: http://forums.gleemax.com/showpost.php?p=11207156&postcount=3 Anyway, it'd be nice to read what you have to say about my classes rework and the revised rules.
#49 asurya Sep 04, 2007 11:14:07	ok, my bad, I forgot you also reworked the point buy system. But my answear is "No, thanks", I dont like this change, partly because you don't start with a "blank" profile (i.e. 8 8 8 8 8 8), and mainly because the actual works well => why change? for the rest of you work, I must admit I didn't go deep enough to have a valuable feedback at the moment, but I will when I have more time. I don't understand why you said: >>Casters still need HP, SkPts and dodge boosting factors.<< because that's what I say! the amount they spent in Con will stay (HP), the amount spent on Int will stay (SkPts), and what they used to spend in Dex, will be spent in Agi (dodge boost). Bottom line: nothing has changed for them
#50 nonsi Sep 19, 2007 2:42:05	I don't understand why you said: >>Casters still need HP, SkPts and dodge boosting factors.<< because that's what I say! the amount they spent in Con will stay (HP), the amount spent on Int will stay (SkPts), and what they used to spend in Dex, will be spent in Agi (dodge boost). Bottom line: nothing has changed for them Given this system already de-powers casters quite significantly (even with the enhanced versatility), I don't find anything problematic with that.
#51 nonsi Oct 12, 2007 18:38:31	Bumping to keep the thread alive (these revised rules are quite close to being finished, but not just yet). In the meantime, if someone feels like commenting... by all means.
#52 operation_shoestring Oct 15, 2007 3:36:46	Oh, mod, yet another AD&Dified version of the Rogue. Sneak attack die were an improvement over multipliers, moddamnit. Rogues don't do all that much damage to multiply in the first place. And the bonus feat list is weak tea. The rogue wasn't exactly overpowered, and now it's weaker. Oh, yay.
#53 nonsi Oct 17, 2007 18:58:13	Oh, mod, yet another AD&Dified version of the Rogue. Sneak attack die were an improvement over multipliers, moddamnit. Rogues don't do all that much damage to multiply in the first place. And the bonus feat list is weak tea. The rogue wasn't exactly overpowered, and now it's weaker. Oh, yay. Ok, SA did need a slight boost + simplification. Done. Try to keep an open mind and go over the revised Rogue once again. The SA may have been reduced slightly, but I doubt my version is overall less capable in any way (just less breakable) (Other changes include slight modifications to the revised Bard and some serious boost to the Soulknife, if you're interested)
#54 kari Oct 19, 2007 11:36:06	Let me say for the record, I don't agree with what all you've done. You have some nice ideas here, but you've also got some things I don't like at all. I did want to ask if you'd done the math on on your Sneak Attack changes, though. By a strict reading of what you wrote, a 9th level rogue is, effectively, on a critical hit, dealing 12d6 damage with a short sword... with x12 on whatever his bonus damage is. And since every sneak attack is an automatic threat, this is pretty easily done with multiple strikes in a round, -especially- if using TWF. If your intent, however, was to, say, cause a shortsword, on SA, to cause 3d6 damage (and 4d6 on a crit) then you need to reword this. Desperately. I'll also add that this stuff gets much, much worse with a high-multiplier weapon, too. A feat gives access to x3 or x4 base weapons, such as the Handaxe (which gives 3d6 base damage, or 15d6 on a crit, or 5d6 if you meant that way, instead. Just think of rogue could with with a Heavy Pick or, god forbid, a Scythe, instead....)
#55 nonsi Oct 19, 2007 14:09:03	Let me say for the record, I don't agree with what all you've done. You have some nice ideas here, but you've also got some things I don't like at all. I did want to ask if you'd done the math on on your Sneak Attack changes, though. By a strict reading of what you wrote, a 9th level rogue is, effectively, on a critical hit, dealing 12d6 damage with a short sword... with x12 on whatever his bonus damage is. And since every sneak attack is an automatic threat, this is pretty easily done with multiple strikes in a round, -especially- if using TWF. If your intent, however, was to, say, cause a shortsword, on SA, to cause 3d6 damage (and 4d6 on a crit) then you need to reword this. Desperately. I'll also add that this stuff gets much, much worse with a high-multiplier weapon, too. A feat gives access to x3 or x4 base weapons, such as the Handaxe (which gives 3d6 base damage, or 15d6 on a crit, or 5d6 if you meant that way, instead. Just think of rogue could with with a Heavy Pick or, god forbid, a Scythe, instead....) Hi Kari, See "Multiplying Damage" on PHB I, page 134. It specifically says that ALL cases of damage multipliers wark off the original weapon's-damage - meaning if you'd be multiplying x3 (adding the weapon's damage twice) and then x2 (adding the weapon's damage once) , you'd get a total of x4...... meaning even triple damage with a hand axe just means gaining automatic 2d6 extra damage and a shot at another 2d6 with confirmation on SA II, so it certainly doesn't boost the Rogue's damage output, but Greater/Supreme Feint make it much more easily obtainable. Add my approach regarding "Multiple Attacks and Movement" and "Immunities" to the equasion and you'll find that the Rogue could practically be having a blast (flanking galor and SA against almost any opponent), so no more need to define multiple types of precision damage and consequently multiple base classes that cover them. Regarding TWF, open the 1st spoiler of the 1st entry of this thread and click on the given link. If there's anything else you'd like to ask / comment - fire away. I'll be more than happy to clarify what needs clarification and correct what needs correction.
#56 nonsi Nov 11, 2007 2:42:42
#57 arkhaminmate Nov 14, 2007 18:56:53	[sblock=The PrCed Paladin] Contemplating the old days of OD&D, one could easily conclude that the paladin and the Druid are probably the prototypes for all PrCs. While the Druid is firmly built, the Paladin feels awkward – both thematically and in usability. It doesn't feel right that such a role can be taken simply by choice. This class feels just right for the niche of PrC. The core paladin is the epitome of the holy knight in shining armor, a beacon of heroic Good. The PrCed Paladin is a fighter (almost mandatory that s/he starts out non religious) with intense devotion and vigorous tenacity to a certain deity's cause, a zealot that puts tremendous amount of attention to his willpower. A fighter who meets all the prerequisites in the eye of a certain deity is petitioned by the deity to become his/her active hand of execution on earth. Thematically, I visualize the powers of the paladin to be emanating through sheer strength of will and force of personality rather than via spell casting. So without further delay, I give you The PrCed Paladin: Requirements Abilities: STR 15+, WIS 14+, CHA 16+ Skills: Knowledge (religion) 4 ranks, Knowledge (nobility and royalty) 4 ranks, Heal 5 ranks Feats: Iron will, Endurance, Diehard, Last Stand, the deity's favored weapon as primary weapon of focus. Special: The deity petitions the Fighter and not vice versa.
#58 nonsi Nov 20, 2007 0:13:35	I wouldn't say the paladin was an early try at prestige classes as it's pretty much always been a base class In OD&D you had to be a 9th level Fighter to become a Paladin (and a 9th level Cleric to become a Druid). The difference is that you didn't need to earn another level to become one. now bards, they were one of the earliest prestige classes Not really. in the 1st edition of AD&D, the Bard was actually a 3-stage class. It started as a Fighter, continued as a Thief and finished as a Wizard. This worked very similar to 3.Xe multiclassing. also i just don't get how you can say a PALADIN should start out non religous Following a path because of religious upbringing means you might abandon it if you lose your faith, while following a path out of gut instinct and THEN adoptin the religion that demands the path you're already following means you'll probbably stay true to it till your terminal breath. and i will admit i kinda like what you did with some classes, not all of them I'm curious to know which of them you liked (why) and which you didn't (why) and what you thought of my revised rules.
#59 nonsi Jan 26, 2008 14:13:44	OK, it's been quite a while since I got a reply for these rules and I've finally reached the stage where I can find nothing further to add, remove or modify in them (these are my 4e). Nevertheless, I'd be most interested to see if someone finds anything flawed in these rules or has any interesting new rules or base classes to offer – including rough ideas. So anyone who feels like it........... fire away (and brutal replies would be welcome as well).
#60 concerro Jan 27, 2008 2:12:11	OK, it's been quite a while since I got a reply for these rules and I've finally reached the stage where I can find nothing further to add, remove or modify in them (these are my 4e). Nevertheless, I'd be most interested to see if someone finds anything flawed in these rules or has any interesting new rules or base classes to offer – including rough ideas. So anyone who feels like it........... fire away (and brutal replies would be welcome as well). You killed the sorcerer. I liked the idea of not having to prepare spells. The things I did not like was the full round actions for metamagic, and the fact that wizards get more feats(to many more), and even get to learn spells even at epic levels. I thought the psion should have been how the sorcerer worked, with maybe a few tweaks.
#61 leress Jan 27, 2008 2:35:21	I will give my full critique on this later when I have time to full look through it Here is a slight preview.. Females and ability scores: -2 to STR & CON, +2 to INT & CHA. Why in the Infinite levels of the Abyss is this even here? It makes no sense and it isn't even realistic in the slightest. Gender ability have either been dumb for being just a plain power up for munchkins or so low no one even cares. Just get rid of it. What I have seen so far with this is that while a good effort there are class that were unnecessarily beaten with the nerf stick and others that were powered up for no real reason. :thumbsdow
#62 nonsi Jan 27, 2008 3:52:07	You killed the sorcerer. I liked the idea of not having to prepare spells. The things I did not like was the full round actions for metamagic, and the fact that wizards get more feats(to many more), and even get to learn spells even at epic levels. I thought the psion should have been how the sorcerer worked, with maybe a few tweaks. My apologies, I think I lost you. >> The things I did not like was the full round actions for metamagic. I don't remember ever implying something like that. I'd be happy if you could pin-point or quote what brought that idea. >> and the fact that wizards get more feats(to many more), I didn't add a single extra feat, just incorporated the Archmage into it (which offsetted the loss of several spell-categories and the nerf-bat some of the arcane spells took). >> and even get to learn spells even at epic levels iirc, I specifically stated that there are no new class features or special abilities at epic levels.
#63 nonsi Jan 27, 2008 3:55:54	I will give my full critique on this later when I have time to full look through it Here is a slight preview.. Why in the Infinite levels of the Abyss is this even here? It makes no sense and it isn't even realistic in the slightest. Gender ability have either been dumb for being just a plain power up for munchkins or so low no one even cares. Just get rid of it. What I have seen so far with this is that while a good effort there are class that were unnecessarily beaten with the nerf stick and others that were powered up for no real reason. :thumbsdow >> Gender ability have either been dumb for being just a plain power up for munchkins or so low no one even cares. Just get rid of it. << I'll give it a serious thought. >> there are class that were unnecessarily beaten with the nerf stick and others that were powered up for no real reason. << Please elaborate.
#64 k.530 Jan 27, 2008 7:42:24	I have an admittedly difficlt time with sarcasm on the net. Many of the ideas presented here, from blatant sexism to non-sensical training times are ideas that have been discredited in the gaming community for as long as I have been alive, and their inclusion in this document makes this indistinguishable to my eye from low comedy. But on the off chance that this is serious, I would like everyone involved with it to understand on a deep intellectual level that it is a gargantuan failure on every level. Not only is it a failure, but that no amount of fiddling with the numbers or insertion of rule adjustments major or minor will ever produce a work out of this that could in any manner be called a success. All effort thus far expended on this task is lost, and continuing to invest effort on this project is setting aside future creativity and setting it on actual fire. Like war blimps or freeze rays, this is a dead end technology and there is nothing whatsoever to be gained from advancing this project any more. ... A game is not like an arsenal. If you let DaVinci build you a bunch of super weapons some of them will fail, some of them will be poor investments, and some of them will light the fields ablaze and strike terror into the hearts of your enemies. You can watch this in action when those thrice damned Florencians try to come over your walls and your arsenal can evolve - those weapons which underperformed can be scrapped and those weapons which shocked and amazed can be produced in greater numbers. Minor kinks can be worked out and the entire system can be improved a thousand times. But a game is not like that. It's like a recipe. You make the cake and it either tastes good or it does not taste good. Adjusting the recipe to make a cake that tastes better is not a matter of changing things at random until you have a cake that is delicious. It's not even a matter of putting things in that you personally like to eat. As soon as pork ribs or collard greens go into the "chocolate cake" it looks, and tastes, disgusting. To properly make a tastier cake requires a plan, a basic understanding of what ingredients you want to use, how those ingredients will interact with each other, and what proportions those ingredients will be in relative to one another. In a game like DnD you would want to put down a gnuine list of what you wanted adventrers to be doing at each level, running through conflicts with them, and using their talents to overcome obstacles. Maybe a first level team is supposed to fight off some gnolls, get past a locked door, go through a maze that has some nasty pit traps in it, cross a river, fight a flame snake, and convince the mayor that the orcs are on the move. Maybe a 9th level party is supposed to fight off some demon cultists backed up by some actual demons, cross a chasm filled with lava, get to the flying castle, bypass the golem, fight the necromancer, and destroy the ankh. Or whatever. But when you design the character classes and mark teir capabilities, that is where you should be coming from. For example, you removing animal companions, apparently because your parents didn't love you enough to take you to see Lady Hawk is not equivalent to planning out a cake and building a careful recipe around the ingredients you have access to and the interections you expect from them. It's the equivalent of putting "some baking powder in the bowl." You have no idea how much baking powder is in that bowl now and no idea much baking powder that is relative to the other ingredients. ... Unless and until you stop and take stock of your goals and remake all of your assumptions from the standpoint of what you want to accomplish, you will have the same chance of making a delicious cake as a monkey with a typewriter has of crafting Hamlet.
#65 leress Jan 27, 2008 9:02:38	Wow thanks, K. That's was said better than I could have ever thought of typing.
#66 concerro Jan 27, 2008 9:12:19	My apologies, I think I lost you. >> The things I did not like was the full round actions for metamagic. I don't remember ever implying something like that. I'd be happy if you could pin-point or quote what brought that idea. >> and the fact that wizards get more feats(to many more), I didn't add a single extra feat, just incorporated the Archmage into it (which offsetted the loss of several spell-categories and the nerf-bat some of the arcane spells took). >> and even get to learn spells even at epic levels iirc, I specifically stated that there are no new class features or special abilities at epic levels. All of my complaints were refering to the original verson(WoTC). I guess what I should have said was these are common complaints and you did not fix any of them, but instead you said the sorcerer should have been what the warlock is, and unless I missed it I did not see any sorcerer fixes. I also should have said specifically if anyone wanted to make the sorcerer different from the wizard it should have been similar to the psion.
#67 nonsi Jan 27, 2008 10:13:11	All of my complaints were refering to the original verson(WoTC). I guess what I should have said was these are common complaints and you did not fix any of them, but instead you said the sorcerer should have been what the warlock is, and unless I missed it I did not see any sorcerer fixes. I also should have said specifically if anyone wanted to make the sorcerer different from the wizard it should have been similar to the psion. Maybe I did. >> The things I did not like was the full round actions for metamagic. The core Wizard doesn't require a full-round-action to use metamagic. My Mage doesn't either. Nothing that's been working and broken down so far. >> and the fact that wizards get more feats(to many more), If there are no longer near-identical twin classes, then the side that gets deprived is no longer an issue. Each day my Mage has access to as many spells as the core Sorcerer (and more, given it has a certain amount of spells to remember permanently) and still retains all the flexibility of the core Wizard (and more, given strain and tolerance are used). My approach gives way more versatility and way more flexibility, but prevents the NOVA syndrome.
#68 concerro Jan 27, 2008 10:45:26	Maybe I did. >> The things I did not like was the full round actions for metamagic. The core Wizard doesn't require a full-round-action to use metamagic. My Mage doesn't either. Nothing that's been working and broken down so far. >> and the fact that wizards get more feats(to many more), If there are no longer near-identical twin classes, then the side that gets deprived is no longer an issue. Each day my Mage has access to as many spells as the core Sorcerer (and more, given it has a certain amount of spells to remember permanently) and still retains all the flexibility of the core Wizard (and more, given strain and tolerance are used). My approach gives way more versatility and way more flexibility, but prevents the NOVA syndrome. I found your mage. Somehow I missed it. The forgetting spells, and random spells is no good. Casters need all their spells, however it has given me an idea. Removing the sorcerer also removes the concept of the hero/villian who is born with strange magical abilities that is part of many fantasy stories. I think that is what the sorcerer is supposed to represent. The removal of spells that affects souls establishes to an extent definite split between arcane and divine magic. This should have been done by WoTC a long time ago.
#69 nonsi Jan 27, 2008 12:10:32	The forgetting spells, and random spells is no good. Usually every fiber in my body screams against randomeness, but people don't get to control the things they forget. Removing the sorcerer also removes the concept of the hero/villian who is born with strange magical abilities that is part of many fantasy stories. I think that is what the sorcerer is supposed to represent. I fail to see how my Sorcerer (revised Warlock that is) fails to represent that niche. It has 50% more invocations and a far more versatile, iconic and useful set of class features than the core Warlock.
#70 concerro Jan 27, 2008 12:32:21	Usually every fiber in my body screams against randomeness, but people don't get to control the things they forget. I fail to see how my Sorcerer (revised Warlock that is) fails to represent that niche. It has 50% more invocations and a far more versatile, iconic and useful set of class features than the core Warlock. People also forget things based on importance, and if I know I need a certain spell to save my life, and it is my profession I doubt I will forget it. As an example a doctor may be out of practice for a while and may not be able to recall a particular medicine, but most doctors as long as they are working can suggest certain medicines in a certain order without having to look at a book. Doing this is not just recalling names, but chances of success, and possible side effects depending on his knowledge of the patient. I am sure it is just as detailed as learning spells. The Warlock is a good example of the guys who throws magical energy around. It does magic, but it does not cast spells or do the equivalent. The ability to just want something to happen is kind of what a psion does, and what the sorcerer should have been. He/she usually just concentrates and things happen. In the movies theses powers usually don't need names, but for D&D they have to have names for purposes of classification. The wizard could have been the book worm. The warlock the guy who blast you with magical energy, and is probably the most immediately intimidating. The sorcerer is the guy who just thinks about it and it happens. He would not have the wizards versatility, but he packs a bigger punch. It could just be that we have different views on the different types of fantasy casters.
#71 leress Jan 28, 2008 1:09:09	Here goes... Introduction: I would like to use the first section to denote when that very thing is either twisted or completely contradictory to what is placed here.
#72 nonsi Jan 28, 2008 1:13:22	I have an admittedly difficlt time with sarcasm on the net. Many of the ideas presented here, from blatant sexism to non-sensical training times are ideas that have been discredited in the gaming community for as long as I have been alive, and their inclusion in this document makes this indistinguishable to my eye from low comedy. But on the off chance that this is serious, I would like everyone involved with it to understand on a deep intellectual level that it is a gargantuan failure on every level. Not only is it a failure, but that no amount of fiddling with the numbers or insertion of rule adjustments major or minor will ever produce a work out of this that could in any manner be called a success. All effort thus far expended on this task is lost, and continuing to invest effort on this project is setting aside future creativity and setting it on actual fire. Like war blimps or freeze rays, this is a dead end technology and there is nothing whatsoever to be gained from advancing this project any more. ... A game is not like an arsenal. If you let DaVinci build you a bunch of super weapons some of them will fail, some of them will be poor investments, and some of them will light the fields ablaze and strike terror into the hearts of your enemies. You can watch this in action when those thrice damned Florencians try to come over your walls and your arsenal can evolve - those weapons which underperformed can be scrapped and those weapons which shocked and amazed can be produced in greater numbers. Minor kinks can be worked out and the entire system can be improved a thousand times. But a game is not like that. It's like a recipe. You make the cake and it either tastes good or it does not taste good. Adjusting the recipe to make a cake that tastes better is not a matter of changing things at random until you have a cake that is delicious. It's not even a matter of putting things in that you personally like to eat. As soon as pork ribs or collard greens go into the "chocolate cake" it looks, and tastes, disgusting. To properly make a tastier cake requires a plan, a basic understanding of what ingredients you want to use, how those ingredients will interact with each other, and what proportions those ingredients will be in relative to one another. In a game like DnD you would want to put down a gnuine list of what you wanted adventrers to be doing at each level, running through conflicts with them, and using their talents to overcome obstacles. Maybe a first level team is supposed to fight off some gnolls, get past a locked door, go through a maze that has some nasty pit traps in it, cross a river, fight a flame snake, and convince the mayor that the orcs are on the move. Maybe a 9th level party is supposed to fight off some demon cultists backed up by some actual demons, cross a chasm filled with lava, get to the flying castle, bypass the golem, fight the necromancer, and destroy the ankh. Or whatever. But when you design the character classes and mark teir capabilities, that is where you should be coming from. For example, you removing animal companions, apparently because your parents didn't love you enough to take you to see Lady Hawk is not equivalent to planning out a cake and building a careful recipe around the ingredients you have access to and the interections you expect from them. It's the equivalent of putting "some baking powder in the bowl." You have no idea how much baking powder is in that bowl now and no idea much baking powder that is relative to the other ingredients. ... Unless and until you stop and take stock of your goals and remake all of your assumptions from the standpoint of what you want to accomplish, you will have the same chance of making a delicious cake as a monkey with a typewriter has of crafting Hamlet. I have to admit, I've seen a lot of things in my days, but never someone who goes to such extremes to try and insult someone else s/he has absolutely no knowledge about. It's not that I have anything against harsh criticism, but even harsh criticism should be civilized and followed by constructive suggestions for corrections (even profound ones). Yours wasn't on either aspect. I was looking for some fine tuning and you came riding in with an entire demolition crew. Ok, let's start analyzing the value of your reply. >> Many of the ideas presented here, from blatant sexism to non-sensical >> training times are ideas that have been discredited in the gaming community >> for as long as I have been alive, Just for the sake of someone actually taking you seriously, you could make the effort of presenting several examples (since you already took the effort of blowing so much wind) and actually back them up. Let's focus for a moment on the two issues you did bother mentioning: - sexism – a single entry in an entire set of rules that had any relevancy to gender and already I'm tagged as chauvinist ?! - non-sensical training times – there's a basic unwritten code in society about how one is to articulate criticism. - - "Rule X raises the following problems:…" (OK) - - "If you don't get why Rule X is %#$!@ than you're $@%^$%" (BAD) As for the issue itself. Maybe you're used to things happening instantly (video-games style), but I've never met a DM that doesn't use downtime to make things happen – including gaining levels. >> and their inclusion in this document makes this indistinguishable to my eye >> from low comedy. Thanks for the compliment >> ... I would like everyone involved with it to understand on a deep intellectual >> level ... Man, that's heavy. In which fortune cookie did you get this one ?! >> Not only is it a failure, but that no amount of fiddling with the numbers or >> insertion of rule adjustments major or minor will ever produce a work out of >> this that could in any manner be called a success. Given the vast number of systems out there that do work, do you have any substantial evidence (from within my text) to back up this mind boggling claim? >> All effort thus far expended on this task is lost, and continuing to invest >> effort on this project is setting aside future creativity and setting it on actual >> fire. You must be one frustrated dude, if you find the need to get down to personal insults. >> A game is not like an arsenal. No it's not. It's more like a puzzle you didn't even attempt taking out of the box. >> If you let DaVinci build you a bunch of super weapons... A useless speech that has completely no bearing on house rules you never attempted to figure out. >> To properly make a tastier cake requires a plan, a basic understanding of >> what ingredients you want to use, how those ingredients will interact with >> each other, and what proportions those ingredients will be in relative to >> one another. Now let's see you convince me you actually tried to assemble a party of level-K adventurers of my classes and assess how they'd fair (and interact) facing various challenges (not necessarily just combat related) compared to 3.Xe classes. Afterwards add my other revised rules and see what you come up with. >> Maybe a first level team is supposed to fight off some gnolls, get past a >> locked door, go through a maze that has some nasty pit traps in it, cross a >> river, fight a flame snake, and convince the mayor that the orcs are on >> the move. >> Maybe a 9th level party is supposed to fight off some demon cultists backed >> up by some actual demons, cross a chasm filled with lava, get to the flying >> castle, bypass the golem, fight the necromancer, and destroy the ankh. And maybe if you bothered checking, you might've found that my classes would've outscaled your expectations. >> For example, you removing animal companions, apparently because your >> parents didn't love you enough to take you to see Lady Hawk is not >> equivalent to planning out a cake and building a careful recipe around the >> ingredients you have access to and the interections you expect from them. Being experienced is discussion boards beyond RPG I have a tip for you. Attempting to psychoanalyze someone in the virtual world doesn't really work as an insult and it usually implies that you don't really have a claim. Btw, I was in my early teens when I saw Ladyhawk. I saw it more than once and I remember nothing about the core druid's version of animal companion in it. Now let's take the description of the core Druid's means of attaining an animal companion: "If a druid releases her companion from service, she may gain a new one by performing a ceremony requiring 24 uninterrupted hours of prayer. This ceremony can also replace an animal companion that has perished." You get it? Basically, it's no more than disposable gear, except it has a certain degree of acting on its own. In my gameworld Handle Animal is still a viable skill and Wild Empathy is still a Druid's class feature. You just don't get to pluck bio-tanks in 24 hours. The way you're talking it was before your days, but D&D actually had many pre-CoDzilla years, which were quite successful. >> Unless and until you stop and take stock of your goals and remake all of your >> assumptions from the standpoint of what you want to accomplish... I did. You were just too busy insulting to notice.
#73 nonsi Jan 28, 2008 1:28:01	Here goes... Introduction: I would like to use the first section to denote when that very thing is either twisted or completely contradictory to what is placed here.
#74 nonsi Jan 28, 2008 1:49:54	The Warlock is a good example of the guys who throws magical energy around. It does magic, but it does not cast spells or do the equivalent. The ability to just want something to happen is kind of what a psion does, and what the sorcerer should have been. He/she usually just concentrates and things happen. In the movies theses powers usually don't need names, but for D&D they have to have names for purposes of classification. Let's remember that it's possible to build a Warlock without a single blast-shape or eldritch-essence invocation. I't also possible to invent new ones. With 18 invocations available, the options are limitless - and so are the different roles. The wizard could have been the book worm. The warlock the guy who blast you with magical energy, and is probably the most immediately intimidating. The sorcerer is the guy who just thinks about it and it happens. He would not have the wizards versatility, but he packs a bigger punch. If you're looking for an uber-Mage that does things instinctively than you're probably right. I didn't create one, because I don't think anyone should be a better arcanist than the ultra-specialist of the arcane. If you want the guy that does spells by instinct - my revised Bard does a great job (if you could shake off the troubadour image). With little immagination it could fill countless roles - including the BBEG. and let's not forget multiclassing and Quicken Spell-Like Ability (for "making things happen").
#75 concerro Jan 28, 2008 2:29:52	Let's remember that it's possible to build a Warlock without a single blast-shape or eldritch-essence invocation. I't also possible to invent new ones. With 18 invocations available, the options are limitless - and so are the different roles. If you're looking for an uber-Mage that does things instinctively than you're probably right. I didn't create one, because I don't think anyone should be a better arcanist than the ultra-specialist of the arcane. If you want the guy that does spells by instinct - my revised Bard does a great job (if you could shake off the troubadour image). With little immagination it could fill countless roles - including the BBEG. and let's not forget multiclassing and Quicken Spell-Like Ability (for "making things happen"). Then make a spontaneous ultra-specilialist, and does the bard cast spontaneous spells that equal the mage? Also spontaneous does not make him better than the mage, becuase he is less versatile, but what he does, he does well, like how psions have disciplines
#76 nonsi Jan 28, 2008 5:39:22	Then make a spontaneous ultra-specilialist, and does the bard cast spontaneous spells that equal the mage? Also spontaneous does not make him better than the mage, becuase he is less versatile, but what he does, he does well, like how psions have disciplines Ok, I'm convinced. The Psion archetype is missing. Problematic issues: 1. How should its known-disciplines table look like under my rules ? 2. What about psionic races when it comes to strain & tolerance ? 3. What about appropriate class-features ?
#77 concerro Jan 28, 2008 10:23:56	Ok, I'm convinced. The Psion archetype is missing. Problematic issues: 1. How should its known-disciplines table look like under my rules ? 2. What about psionic races when it comes to strain & tolerance ? 3. What about appropriate class-features ? What do you mean by strain and tolerance?
#78 nonsi Jan 28, 2008 10:40:10	What do you mean by strain and tolerance? My "Spell-Points" system is based on strain & tolerance. It allows the versatility of spell-points, but without too much accessibility to the higher-level spells. Check it out.
#79 concerro Jan 28, 2008 11:23:09	My "Spell-Points" system is based on strain & tolerance. It allows the versatility of spell-points, but without too much accessibility to the higher-level spells. Check it out. I will look at it and reply as soon as possible.
#80 Rustmonster Jan 28, 2008 17:22:16	- sexism – a single entry in an entire set of rules that had any relevancy to gender and already I'm tagged as chauvinist ?! 1. attitudes or behavior based on traditional stereotypes of sexual roles. 2. discrimination or devaluation based on a person's sex, as in restricted job opportunities; esp., such discrimination directed against women. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/sexism This is basiclly what you are doing. You are effectivly restricting class choices (the D&D equivilant of jobs opportunities) by enforcing behaviour based on stereotypes of sexual roles (Female = weak, beatiful, sexy, etc). To keep it short, needless restriction that limits roleplaying opportunities, based on idiotic "realistic" stereotypes. Ability mods should be applied only when there is a distinct difference (example: Halflings have a STR penalty because they are the size of a young child). Any difference in Male-to-Female averages (this is important) are much too small to warrent a penalty/bonus. Are you saying full-grown women should have the same STR penalty as people who are 3 feet tall? And to get back to some business, any differences between Male-to-Female averages (told you it was important) should never be applied to an individual. My character is not neccesarily the average. I could be that one in something woman who is as strong as an elephant, who might also happen to be homely and shy.
#81 nonsi Jan 29, 2008 1:28:45	http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/sexism This is basiclly what you are doing. You are effectivly restricting class choices (the D&D equivilant of jobs opportunities) by enforcing behaviour based on stereotypes of sexual roles (Female = weak, beatiful, sexy, etc). To keep it short, needless restriction that limits roleplaying opportunities, based on idiotic "realistic" stereotypes. Ability mods should be applied only when there is a distinct difference (example: Halflings have a STR penalty because they are the size of a young child). Any difference in Male-to-Female averages (this is important) are much too small to warrent a penalty/bonus. Are you saying full-grown women should have the same STR penalty as people who are 3 feet tall? And to get back to some business, any differences between Male-to-Female averages (told you it was important) should never be applied to an individual. My character is not neccesarily the average. I could be that one in something woman who is as strong as an elephant, who might also happen to be homely and shy. This is starting to go to places I never intended, so I'll just say this: - I don't regard charisma as physical beauty, but as overall grace. If someone's a klutz, the odds that it's a man are more than 50% (that's my experience at least) - I've once read an article about a woman that scores 239 on the IQ test. Never heard of a man that scored 200. - otoh, there isn't a singe strength or durability test in athletics where women endanger men's records. Take the competition for the world's strongest man for instance. I've never seen or heard (even in a hearsay) of a woman that could qualify for such a compitition (agains men of course) so this is not just about averages. Of course there are women with an overall greater muscle power than mine (not that many though - most lift weights or compete in shot put professionally), but I'm far from being a candidate to compete for the title of the world's strongest man. This has nothing to do with chauvinism, being bias or living in my own private world of stereotypes. That's just how humans & primates are on our planet. Female abdomen has to occupy something that the male abdomen doesn't and female limbs have lower mass of bone & musle. Pound-per-pound males are stronger and more durable to physical punishment than women (given the same level of starting health, the same nutrition and the same amount of training). I see no reason why such modifiers should have bearings over roleplaying opportunities or why this issue should raise such protest. I think people attribute too much impact to a single ability-modifier. Having INT-score 18 instead of 16 at 1st level won't be the most important factor to determine how powerful your Mage will be at level 13. About halflings. An average chimpanzee weighs less than 1/2 as an average human, but is still more that twice as powerful, so I see no problem with halflings being mechanically more efficient and having only -2 STR penalty compared to humans.
#82 concerro Jan 29, 2008 6:09:11	I will look at it and reply as soon as possible. I did not find the spell-points, but I did find something on strain. I think your idea was to be able to cast more spells, but less of the higher level spells without putting a strain on the caster due to the power of the magic. I did not read the strain rules in detail so I can't say to much about that right now, but my sorcerer/your psion gives up the versatility of multiple schools with the advantage of being able to take on a higher tolerance strain in one discipline/school. The fluff could be that since he/she was not trained in magic/psions the versatility is not there, but because it comes so naturally to him/her they have more power. Practice in anything is important, but some people are just so talented(Hakeem Alajuwon*, basketball) that even with minimal training they are better than most others. I used him because he did not start playing until 15, and seriously until 18. I read a couple of your other rules, and I will be commenting on them in other posts.
#83 concerro Jan 29, 2008 6:22:57	Part 1: Armor Targeting: By targeting straps, buckles and other vulnerable points, you can reduce a foe’s armor AC by -1 for every successful hit. Armor targeting is a touch attack at a -3 hit penalty (count shield AC) that can only be done with piercing/slashing weapons. This maneuver provokes AoO's To hit another person's armor straps if he is even close to your level is unrealistic, even in D&D. You should have a hard enough time just hitting the opponent, and to do it with such precision that you only cut the strap is not something I can see. There is also the fact that swing at someone with an increased AC just to lower the AC instead of trying to damage them seems inefficient. Defensive Casting: 3.5's defensive casting is DC 15 + spell level, which is OK, but doesn't seem to account for variations in the opponent's fighting skill and gives the same opportunity vs. a commoner as vs. an epic level Warrior. A more reasonable approach might be DC = 10 + 1/2 attacker's BAB + spell level. Casting defensively is just the ability to cast without presenting an opening for a free attack which is all an AoO if. The same logic applies to tumbles. When you try to tumble past multiple creatures your foot may slip, or you may have opened yourself up(on a failed check), and somebody gets a free swing. Improved Uncanny Dodge: Once gained, it regards character level and not class level. A fighter3/rouge 9 is most likely not as well trained as a rogue 12 at preventing attacks from other rogue types. Only creatures with no physical body (incorporeal) are inherently immune to critical hits and sneak attacks (you could sneak attack a lich, but not a ghost). Metal constructs count as having heavy fortification. Constructs made of various minerals and ethereal creatures count as having medium fortification. Other constructs and corporeal undead count as having light fortification. The exception here would be creatures under the effect of Heavy Fortification armor and spells designed to specifically protect against these things. Multi source fortifications stack, but never get beyond heavy fortification. Liches and Constructs have no vital areas, and part of the rogues attractiveness is that he is useful outside combat unlike the fighter. Not everyone will be useful at every encounter due to the defenses of certain monsters, so if the rogue wants to SA the construct he can take a feat that allows him to know how to strike the construct to get past this feature. There was a feat called sabotague in one of the magazines that did this. As far as SA and crits on undead, unless you have a vorpal sword you should just accept it. They don't get a con bonus to their HP so to allow sneak attacks against them would really be a bad idea. Magically Enhanced Weapons and Extra Damage: Only one magic damage type enhancement is possible per weapon (can't be sonic and acid, etc). Why
#84 concerro Jan 29, 2008 6:29:42	Part 2 No permanent ability-score enhancements by magical means. - No stacking ability-score enhancements of any sort by magical means. - No magical boosting to hit or dodge AC (you need to use your head to hit / evade a moving opponent). - No racial weapon-familiarity - No racial bonuses on attack-rolls - No racial-substitution class features The changing of ability score enhancements will make the game harder. How do you plan to adjust the CR and experience table to support this? Same question for the AC change The racial familiarity makes sense, unless the PC grew up apart from his race. It could be changed to a regional feat. I agree with the racial bonus. Just because creatures are of a certain race that does not mean they fight the same way. I never used the racial substitution class features, but I don't see a reason to ban them. - Half Elves: gain +2 competance modifier to ALL CHA-based skills. This does not make them any more desirable to play. They should either get the skill points of a human or the extra feat(Players choice at time of character creation). Destruction: Modified to a 9th level spell that replaces Wail of the Banshee in Death domain. Control Undead takes its place as 7th level domain spell. why? Disintegrate: deals 12d10 (save for 1/2). Any creature KILLED by this spell is entirely disintegrated The spell was fine the way it was. It requires an attack roll, is subject to spell resistance, and a save for less than half damage. Gate: "Calling Creatures" option is canceled ! ! ! I don't think there is anything wrong with the call option, but calling Epic/deity leve creatures should only be done by an epic level spell. I would change the option, not get rid of it. Iron Body: Renamed to "Granite Body" and the recipient doesn’t suffer from ill effects specifically tied to metal, which is an unreasonable drawback for an 8th level spell. In a reality of mobile combat, 50% movement decrease is penalizing enough. Agreed, I see know reason to spend gold on a spell that does more harm than good. Harm/Heal: 5HP / level, up to 100. Mass Harm/Heal removed (way too powerful, especially the "Harm" aspect) The Harm aspect is only usable by one class, and the Heal mass will be need after your party is hit with a hell ball(epic level spell) Mage armor: An abjuration spell. It should have been so to begin with. we agree again Telekinesis: The option to end the spell immediately (for the greater effect) is canceled. What is the greater effect? True Strike: The spell completes only the 1st attack's hit bonus to +20. The core spell can be manipulated to produce totally broken offensive power. That spell is only supposed to affect the first attack even if you can make more than one. Wail of the Banshee: Effects everybody within AoE except the caster. The spell doesn't differentiate between friend and foe and Evasion is inapplicable. Evasion was never applicable, and other sonic spells only affect who the user wants so why not this one? Wish: Wish and Limited Wish are removed. Magical effects cannot be that diverse. Instead of Limited Wish, one might allow a more powerful version of Break Enchantment to cope with magical effects that are unusually potent at lingering on. Wish cost 5,000 XP at minimum, so if the players are spamming this spell it is a DM issue. It is only as broken as the DM allows it to be. What about Miracle? Shield Another: You place yourself to take a hit for someone else. You confer a +4 armor bonus to an adjacent ally's AC. If you're wielding a shield, whatever benefit it can grant you can be applied to your ally instead. Shielding another is an immediate action that attempts to counter a single attack. If you spend a full round action defending someone, you influence all attacks and anyone within your threaten range provokes an AoO. Drawback: the attacker(s) might turn to attack you instead as a swift action, with +4 to hit. I like this one. Turning Undead: Turning undead from PHB is very complicated (two rolls, nonstandard mechanics), too powerfull at low levers and useless at high levels if not used to fuel divine feats (undead HD rise much faster than their CR; at levels 10+ most undead will have more HD than party level+4). The following rule is ment to solve all 3 issues: Undead turning is a burst. It deals 1d6 / level damage to undead in the area and turns them. Will save (DC equal to 10 + 1/2 the cleric's level + CHA-mod) halves the damage and negates being turned. It is still strong at low levels, but not as much as PHB version, and it keeps being useful at higher levels. Additionally, changing "nothing or destroyed" to damage helps party tactics, because it stacks with whatever the characters are doing. Note I: This setup is much stronger against a horde of weak undead than a single strong one, which is probably for the better. It means that the Cleric unleashes whatever he can unleash... and it does what it does. Note II: Controlling undead is way more potent than turnung them, therefore Rebuke/Control undead continue to use the core mechanics. I have seen similar concepts, but I like yours better. I will use this one. P.S. I want to tackle some of these before I ask any more questions
#85 nonsi Jan 29, 2008 16:16:19	I did not find the spell-points, but I did find something on strain. I think your idea was to be able to cast more spells, but less of the higher level spells without putting a strain on the caster due to the power of the magic. I did not read the strain rules in detail so I can't say to much about that right now, but my sorcerer/your psion gives up the versatility of multiple schools with the advantage of being able to take on a higher tolerance strain in one discipline/school. The fluff could be that since he/she was not trained in magic/psions the versatility is not there, but because it comes so naturally to him/her they have more power. Practice in anything is important, but some people are just so talented(Hakeem Alajuwon*, basketball) that even with minimal training they are better than most others. I used him because he did not start playing until 15, and seriously until 18. I read a couple of your other rules, and I will be commenting on them in other posts. Hi concerro, Thanks for the detailed attention. let's see.................... >> my sorcerer/your psion gives up the versatility of multiple schools with >> the advantage of being able to take on a higher tolerance strain in one >> discipline/school. Strain-tolerance is not discipline/school related – simply inapplicable with my approach. >> The fluff could be that since he/she was not trained in magic/psions the >> versatility is not there, but because it comes so naturally to him/her >> they have more power. if we're talking about someone who makes things happen without even understanding how he does it, than he should have access to any spell-list, but with a narrow repertoire. >> You should have a hard enough time just hitting the opponent, and to do it >> with such precision that you only cut the strap is not something I can see. Yeah, maybe this one is overdoing it with unnecessary mechanics. >> Casting defensively is just the ability to cast without presenting an >> opening for a free attack which is all an AoO if. The same logic applies >> to tumbles. When you try to tumble past multiple creatures your foot may >> slip, or you may have opened yourself up(on a failed check), and somebody >> gets a free swing. I didn't catch on what the argument was. >> (IUD) A fighter3/rouge 9 is most likely not as well trained as a rogue 12 >> at preventing attacks from other rogue types. Didn't get the rationale. >> Liches and Constructs have no vital areas I don't attribute precision damage as necessarily being tied to vital organs, but more to mechanics. Take the knee for instance. If the leg is straight and you connect with a powerful low-kick dead on the joint from the outer side – the knee breaks. Pure mechanics. Break the collar-bone and the arm dangles uselessly. Snap the spine and you break the skeleton in half. etc. etc. etc. >> Not everyone will be useful at every encounter due to the defenses of >> certain monsters And that's basically the "spending the encounter with your finger stuck up you nose/ass" syndrome. >> so if the rogue wants to SA the construct he can take a feat that allows >> him to know how to strike the construct to get past this feature. Yes. WotC practically have a feat for everything, but there are just too many feats and too little slots to ever assemble a really useful group of feats. Too many products on the market – too little room to carry them home. >> They don't get a con bonus to their HP so to allow sneak attacks against >> them would really be a bad idea. Yes, but there's also a feat somewhere that allows you to SA undead, so this just basically makes the skill-monkey invest everything on damage – bad thematics. With the moderate SA damage, things don't get out of proportions and our friendly neighborhood rogue has a feat to spare. >> Why (Only one magic damage type enhancement) Well... 1st, because fire & ice / acid & lightning damage make no sense. 2nd, with my mobile combat + easier crit / precision damage, things could really get out of control. I made everything possible to expand character's range of capabilities in order to drastically reduce dependency upon magical gear, not stack them one on top of the other. >> The changing of ability score enhancements will make the game harder. >> How do you plan to adjust the CR and experience table to support this? Being able to increase any ability-score every 2 levels and gaining a point each level (see "Character Creation/Advancement" in my revised rules) and boosting that with another temporary +6 seems more than enough to me. >> Same question for the AC change I've seen builds on these boards that grant characters AC 75 (armor + dodge + deflection + moral + sacred + circumstance + magic +...). Ridiculous. With 1/2 ref-save mod to dodge AC (my rule) and moral bonuses going to dodge – this should provide more than enough. >> The racial familiarity makes sense, unless the PC grew up apart from >> his race. Working with weapon-groups (see 1st link in the 1st spoiler of the 1st post), having a single weapon familiarity makes no sense. My weapon-groups approach provides way more focused choice and makes racial weapon familiarity redundant. >> I never used the racial substitution class features, but I don't see a >> reason to ban them. Because I don't like race-class ties. They make no sense. >> - Half Elves: gain +2 competance modifier to ALL CHA-based skills. >> This does not make them any more desirable to play. It does if you value social capabilities. Playing a social warrior could be great. Robin Hood was a kind of unfettered & social warrior. >> They should either get the skill points of a human or the extra feat >> (Players choice at time of character creation). 1. "Player's Choice" doesn't qualify for a racial trait. 2. Where's the distinction from the human ? >> why? (Destruction - 9th level ; replaces Wail of the Banshee) 1. Wail of the Banshee is just another way to kill someone "normally". 2. "Destruction" is a kind of ultimate doom >> The spell (Disintegrate) was fine the way it was. It requires an attack roll, >> is subject to spell resistance, and a save for less than half damage. With my gamerules you have a lower HP average (40d6 would be hysterical) and it's just a 6th level spell. Using it after several combat rounds have passed could be disastrous even in its modified form. >> I don't think there is anything wrong with the call option "Calling Creatures" is basically an "I win" spell. You get another uber-ally to fight for you. Harm/Heal: 5HP / level, up to 100. Mass Harm/Heal removed (way too powerful, especially the "Harm" aspect) >> The Harm aspect is only usable by one class, and the Heal mass will be need >> after your party is hit with a hell ball(epic level spell). One class too many. Ok, if we're talking epic, maybe it's not such a good idea to limit, but 5 / level still seems reasonable (especially with Mass Harm). >> What is the greater effect (Telekinesis)? Forget it. Re-reading the description made me realize it's actually far less grandiose than I initially thought. >> That spell (True Strike) is only supposed to affect the first attack even >> if you can make more than one. Being a Mage's spell only, I guess it's Ok for pure Mage, but it could turn out really problematic with a Spellblade. I need to think about it (suggestions could help). >> Evasion was never applicable (Wail of the Banshee), True >> other sonic spells (Wail of the Banshee) only affect who the user wants so why not this one? Shout / Greater Shout don't work like that. Minur/major/permanent Image don't work like that. A violent 1-time scream shouldn't work like that. >> Wish cost 5,000 XP at minimum, so if the players are spamming this >> spell it is a DM issue. It is only as broken as the DM allows it to be. I'm all against XP payment – voluntary or otherwise. It's all explained in my revised rules. >> What about Miracle? That's different. The DM has full control where divine intervention is involved – and you can't bother a god more than say 1ce a year.
#86 concerro Jan 29, 2008 19:33:28	Hi concerro, Thanks for the detailed attention. let's see.................... >> my sorcerer/your psion gives up the versatility of multiple schools with >> the advantage of being able to take on a higher tolerance strain in one >> discipline/school. Strain-tolerance is not discipline/school related – simply inapplicable with my approach. I know it is not designed to work with schools, but is it impossible to make it work that way? >> The fluff could be that since he/she was not trained in magic/psions the >> versatility is not there, but because it comes so naturally to him/her >> they have more power. if we're talking about someone who makes things happen without even understanding how he does it, than he should have access to any spell-list, but with a narrow repertoire. They know how to do certain things, just not as many things as the wizard(mage), but the things they do know how to do are done extremely well. It is kind of like that kid in school who gets really good grades in one or two subjects, but is lacking in all the others. >> Casting defensively is just the ability to cast without presenting an >> opening for a free attack which is all an AoO if. The same logic applies >> to tumbles. When you try to tumble past multiple creatures your foot may >> slip, or you may have opened yourself up(on a failed check), and somebody >> gets a free swing. I didn't catch on what the argument was. We may have a different view on it, but I understood AoO's as only taking place when someone opened themselves up for an attack. I also mistakenly thought that failing a concentration check provoked an AoO, which it does not. That is why I tried to use the tumble thing as an example of why failing that check provoked an AoO >> Liches and Constructs have no vital areas I don't attribute precision damage as necessarily being tied to vital organs, but more to mechanics. Take the knee for instance. If the leg is straight and you connect with a powerful low-kick dead on the joint from the outer side – the knee breaks. Pure mechanics. Break the collar-bone and the arm dangles uselessly. Snap the spine and you break the skeleton in half. etc. etc. etc. You changed your precision damage to breaking arms, and such. Well if that is the case then I have no argument here, but if that is the case it would not cause more damage, but it should affect their d20 rolls and AC since a body part is now ineffective, but I do understand how you planned to make them vurnable to precision damage so I will leave this one alone. >> Not everyone will be useful at every encounter due to the defenses of >> certain monsters And that's basically the "spending the encounter with your finger stuck up you nose/ass" syndrome. Most monsters don't make characters totally ineffective just, a lot less effective, and as long as the DM does not make this a habit it is not that bad. Another thing is considering the amount of damage that SA does monsters should get a HP increase if they don't have any defenses against it. Mainly the ones with no con score >> so if the rogue wants to SA the construct he can take a feat that allows >> him to know how to strike the construct to get past this feature. Yes. WotC practically have a feat for everything, but there are just too many feats and too little slots to ever assemble a really useful group of feats. Too many products on the market – too little room to carry them home. true >> They don't get a con bonus to their HP so to allow sneak attacks against >> them would really be a bad idea. Yes, but there's also a feat somewhere that allows you to SA undead, so this just basically makes the skill-monkey invest everything on damage – bad thematics. With the moderate SA damage, things don't get out of proportions and our friendly neighborhood rogue has a feat to spare. I guess I need to check that out to, but even before I do, wouldn't that moderate SA hurt the rogue against monsters that do have a lot of HP, because he won't do as much damage. I realize he is giving up power for versatility, but most monsters are not immune to precision damage, and the rogue's situation damage is not something he should be sacrificing. >> Why (Only one magic damage type enhancement) Well... 1st, because fire & ice / acid & lightning damage make no sense. 2nd, with my mobile combat + easier crit / precision damage, things could really get out of control. I made everything possible to expand character's range of capabilities in order to drastically reduce dependency upon magical gear, not stack them one on top of the other. It is a fantasy. If the sword is made of fire, and does ice damage or it is made of ice, and does fire damage then I would understood. If the sword is made of fire and ice then I understand, but there is no reason to say one sword can't do two energy types. >> The changing of ability score enhancements will make the game harder. >> How do you plan to adjust the CR and experience table to support this? Being able to increase any ability-score every 2 levels and gaining a point each level (see "Character Creation/Advancement" in my revised rules) and boosting that with another temporary +6 seems more than enough to me. I will have to look at that again. >> I never used the racial substitution class features, but I don't see a reason to ban them. Because I don't like race-class ties. They make no sense. fair enough >> - Half Elves: gain +2 competance modifier to ALL CHA-based skills. >> This does not make them any more desirable to play. It does if you value social capabilities. Playing a social warrior could be great. Robin Hood was a kind of unfettered & social warrior. It is good fluff, but mechanically they are still inferior to both the human and the elf. >> They should either get the skill points of a human or the extra feat >> (Players choice at time of character creation). 1. "Player's Choice" doesn't qualify for a racial trait. 2. Where's the distinction from the human ? They already get most of the benefits of being an elf, but they get nothing other than any favored class from being human. Giving the skill points or the feat brings something from the human side and makes them better mechanically >> why? (Destruction - 9th level ; replaces Wail of the Banshee) 1. Wail of the Banshee is just another way to kill someone "normally". 2. "Destruction" is a kind of ultimate doom ok >> The spell (Disintegrate) was fine the way it was. It requires an attack roll, >> is subject to spell resistance, and a save for less than half damage. With my gamerules you have a lower HP average (40d6 would be hysterical) and it's just a 6th level spell. Using it after several combat rounds have passed could be disastrous even in its modified form. With all these rules changes you have created your own system. I can't really say it is D&D anymore. I admire the effort, but the PHB is almost worthless now. >> I don't think there is anything wrong with the call option "Calling Creatures" is basically an "I win" spell. You get another uber-ally to fight for you. The spell could just be modified to a creature who's CR is equal to the caster level instead of twice the HD. Harm/Heal: 5HP / level, up to 100. Mass Harm/Heal removed (way too powerful, especially the "Harm" aspect) >> The Harm aspect is only usable by one class, and the Heal mass will be need >> after your party is hit with a hell ball(epic level spell). One class too many. Ok, if we're talking epic, maybe it's not such a good idea to limit, but 5 / level still seems reasonable (especially with Mass Harm). So mass harm might be borderline epic(pauses). ok you might have a point here >> That spell (True Strike) is only supposed to affect the first attack even >> if you can make more than one. Being a Mage's spell only, I guess it's Ok for pure Mage, but it could turn out really problematic with a Spellblade. I need to think about it (suggestions could help). I will have to read the spellblade(assuming it is one of your creations), and get back to you, but it probably won't be until tomorrow. >> Evasion was never applicable (Wail of the Banshee), True >> other sonic spells (Wail of the Banshee) only affect who the user wants so why not this one? Shout / Greater Shout don't work like that. Minur/major/permanent Image don't work like that. A violent 1-time scream shouldn't work like that. It has the death descriptor, but then again mass instakill sounds worse than mass harm. I may have to rethink this one myself >> Wish cost 5,000 XP at minimum, so if the players are spamming this >> spell it is a DM issue. It is only as broken as the DM allows it to be. I'm all against XP payment – voluntary or otherwise. It's all explained in my revised rules. I read that, but fluff-wise I look at it as draining the character, on what level I dont know, not him getting dumber. >> What about Miracle? That's different. The DM has full control where divine intervention is involved – and you can't bother a god more than say 1ce a year. He has full intervention with Wish. They are divine/arcane versions of the same spell. Some DM's play with the players who use wish, but I would just say no that will not work. No point in making them turn into rabbits, or some other nonsense just because they try something I don't like.
#87 Rustmonster Jan 29, 2008 19:52:37	This is starting to go to places I never intended, so I'll just say this: - I don't regard charisma as physical beauty, but as overall grace. If someone's a klutz, the odds that it's a man are more than 50% (that's my experience at least) - I've once read an article about a woman that scores 239 on the IQ test. Never heard of a man that scored 200. - otoh, there isn't a singe strength or durability test in athletics where women endanger men's records. Take the competition for the world's strongest man for instance. I've never seen or heard (even in a hearsay) of a woman that could qualify for such a compitition (agains men of course) so this is not just about averages. Of course there are women with an overall greater muscle power than mine (not that many though - most lift weights or compete in shot put professionally), but I'm far from being a candidate to compete for the title of the world's strongest man. This has nothing to do with chauvinism, being bias or living in my own private world of stereotypes. That's just how humans & primates are on our planet. Female abdomen has to occupy something that the male abdomen doesn't and female limbs have lower mass of bone & musle. Pound-per-pound males are stronger and more durable to physical punishment than women (given the same level of starting health, the same nutrition and the same amount of training). I see no reason why such modifiers should have bearings over roleplaying opportunities or why this issue should raise such protest. I think people attribute too much impact to a single ability-modifier. Having INT-score 18 instead of 16 at 1st level won't be the most important factor to determine how powerful your Mage will be at level 13. About halflings. An average chimpanzee weighs less than 1/2 as an average human, but is still more that twice as powerful, so I see no problem with halflings being mechanically more efficient and having only -2 STR penalty compared to humans. Still didn't answer my comment on averages, and how my character isn't neccesarily average. And just to say, I was not really trying to get into some "PIG!!!!!!" type argument. I'm just pointing out that this is not a very good rule. It's an obstacle to roleplaying, (and possibly a min-max tool) nothing more.
#88 nonsi Jan 30, 2008 1:41:59	Still didn't answer my comment on averages, and how my character isn't neccesarily average. To my better judgement, I did: "I've never seen or heard (even in a hearsay) of a woman that could qualify for such a compitition (agains men of course) so this is not just about averages." And just to say, I was not really trying to get into some "PIG!!!!!!" type argument. I'm just pointing out that this is not a very good rule. It's an obstacle to roleplaying, (and possibly a min-max tool) nothing more. I wouldn't role a female just to get that extraa +1. The gameflow will suffer too much for it to be worth it. Again, I don't believe it will have a major impact (but maybe it's just my poor min-max skills).
#89 nonsi Jan 30, 2008 2:45:17	I know it is not designed to work with schools, but is it impossible to make it work that way? Maybe by playing around with the strain costs, but I have no idea how to do it in a balanced way. They know how to do certain things, just not as many things as the wizard(mage), but the things they do know how to do are done extremely well. It is kind of like that kid in school who gets really good grades in one or two subjects, but is lacking in all the others. Ok, so progression in disciplines is a must if I go with your approach, but if we keep the higher-level powers toned down, than the Psion has just too few powers. So what are your thoughts, would having a number of powers according to the core Wizard's spells-per-day be reasonable or too much ? the amount of damage that SA does monsters should get a HP increase if they don't have any defenses against it. Mainly the ones with no con score That's where fortification comes in. Not every strike will produce the extra damage. wouldn't that moderate SA hurt the rogue against monsters that do have a lot of HP The SA damage was not all that moderated and with a hand-axe or hand-pick he can still do some decent damage at 9h level (without making large+ size Rogues too uber). It is a fantasy. If the sword is made of fire, and does ice damage or it is made of ice, and does fire damage then I would understood. If the sword is made of fire and ice then I understand, but there is no reason to say one sword can't do two energy types. Maybe you're right. With the ability-boost & combat-stat-boost moderation this one is probably not needed. It is good fluff, but mechanically they are still inferior to both the human and the elf. They still get the Able-Learner as racial feature. Combined with the core ratial traits + having +2 to ALL CHA-based skills, I think that makes them Ok (they'll sure make a powerful party face and natural leaders). With all these rules changes you have created your own system. I can't really say it is D&D anymore. I admire the effort, but the PHB is almost worthless now. I always had a poblem with how HP work in D&D. On one hand, a Wizard can have more HP that a Barb of the same level (all in the dice & CON-mod). Otoh, a level-20-Barb can have as many as 336 HP (pre rage & magical intervention). With a steady start and a moderate incline, the HP ratio between the classes is preserved and characters don't get Godzilla-level HP. With DR and increased means of defense, there's no justification for uber-HP. And if someone feels too frail, he can always take Toughness. The spell could just be modified to a creature who's CR is equal to the caster level instead of twice the HD. Sounds decent enough. it has the death descriptor, but then again mass instakill sounds worse than mass harm. Yes, but it becomes much trickier, since it doesn't distinguish between friend & foe.
#90 deathbane Jan 30, 2008 12:53:22	I looked at the rogue, and i saw no d6 sneak attack. Did you change it completely or just not put the d6 in the table. I saw the versions that extend crit range, and do possible death attacks. Originally Posted by concerro View Post I know it is not designed to work with schools, but is it impossible to make it work that way ? Maybe by playing around with the strain costs, but I have no idea how to do it in a balanced way. Originally Posted by concerro They know how to do certain things, just not as many things as the wizard(mage), but the things they do know how to do are done extremely well. It is kind of like that kid in school who gets really good grades in one or two subjects, but is lacking in all the others. Ok, so progression in disciplines is a must if I go with your approach, but if we keep the higher-level powers toned down, than the Psion has just too few powers. So what are your thoughts, would having a number of powers according to the core Wizard's spells-per-day be reasonable or too much ? He can learn spells like a sorcerer(3 9th level) or psion(3 9th level), which will have him knowing less than a wizard. I would go with 3-5 ninth level powers at 20th level. I am leaning toward 3 since it will demonstrate his limitation with different powers/spells. You could create more powers if the higher level ones don't have enough variety, and if his limitation still hurts him so that he is not as useful as he should be then give him advanced learning evey so many level(I am suggesting 4 or 5, but definitely not every 3 levels). Originally Posted by concerro It is good fluff, but mechanically they are still inferior to both the human and the elf. They still get the Able-Learner as racial feature. Combined with the core ratial traits + having +2 to ALL CHA-based skills, I think that makes them Ok (they'll sure make a powerful party face and natural leaders). Cha based skills are not that important in D&D unless you want to typecast the half-elf into a bard-type character. Giving +2 to noncombat based skills will not help them be more attractive. The skill points or feats can be used to build the character the way the player wants. If you want to make cha that important to the half-elf then give him the fast talker abilitiy(I made this one up). It lets him make diplomacy check that would normally take 1 minute can be done with a full round action, and if they rush it then the check takes a -10 but it can be done in one round. As far as able-learner I would rather get an extra skill skill that I know I will use, than access to all the skills with only half progression, and knowing I most likely wont be able to use them. Able-learner is like offering someone their choice of twenty different things to eat. It is nice to have the choices, but since you cant eat everything you might as well just get the few things that you like best. Originally Posted by concerro With all these rules changes you have created your own system. I can't really say it is D&D anymore. I admire the effort, but the PHB is almost worthless now. I always had a poblem with how HP work in D&D. On one hand, a Wizard can have more HP that a Barb of the same level (all in the dice & CON-mod). Otoh, a level-20-Barb can have as many as 336 HP (pre rage & magical intervention). With a steady start and a moderate incline, the HP ratio between the classes is preserved and characters don't get Godzilla-level HP. With DR and increased means of defense, there's no justification for uber-HP. And if someone feels too frail, he can always take Toughness. Some guy with his head in a book, and a guy who gets into fights, are generally not going to be able to take the same amount of pain or get out of certain situations with the same degree of difficulty which is what HP represents. With the damage some monsters do they will need that XP. I hit a player with 80 HP of damage by using power attack using a monster I had not modified(17th ish level). A wizard would never have allowed someone to get that close, but it is a melee type's job to get that close so when their AC fails they better have something to fall back on. DR at 20th level is a joke. What good is DR 3 or 5, even the - type when you are getting hit for at 40-80 points. Some monster have a +30 to the damage modifier, and if they crit on two hits and another one or two lands that is 120 before I roll the dice. Going from taking 175 HP(an example) down to 165 is not going to save you most of the time. You may have changed toughness, but if you mean the regular 3.5 version then that is what I call a roleplaying feat, and it has no real usefulness. i It has the death descriptor, but then again mass instakill sounds worse than mass harm. Yes, but it becomes much trickier, since it doesn't distinguish between friend & foe. Most DM's let their players choose exactly where to put the center of the spell if it has a radius affect so most casters will just put it where it can affect as many enemies as possible with hurting allies, and the party could always have death ward cast if they know that is what will be unleashed first.
#91 nonsi Jan 30, 2008 14:16:19	I looked at the rogue, and i saw no d6 sneak attack. Did you change it completely or just not put the d6 in the table. I saw the versions that extend crit range, and do possible death attacks. No. There's no fixed d6 added damage. It all depends on the weapon's base damage, which obviously maked hand-axe and hand-pick better SA tools than a dagger - but that's OK in my book. If someone thinks it's too complicated or unfair to the traditional dagger, a simplified altenative (without rearranging the revised Rogue's class features collumn) could be that a med-sized Rogue does 2d6 extra damage at 3rd level and 4d6 extra damage at 9th level (but with my approach you could squeez a bit more with appropriate weapons). He can learn spells like a sorcerer(3 9th level)...advanced learning... Spell/Powers-known like the core Sorc. Sounds decent enough, but to keep concurrent with the other full casters, it should gain spell-level access at each odd level. BAB will of course be poor and it will have good Will saves. Now I need to think about HD (probably d6) and weapons/armor startup packadge (probably like my revised Bard). The tricky part would be class features (they should resemble the Beguiler's, and it should get enhanced concentration capabilities like the Spirit Shaman). Other than that I don't know for the meantime. As for advanced learning... it's not really significant when you have access to all spell lists rather than have a spell list of your own. Cha based skills are not that important in D&D unless you want to typecast the half-elf into a bard-type character. Giving +2 to noncombat based skills will not help them be more attractive. It would be more helpful if someone could suggest additional appropriate class skills to my revised/rebalanced classes. As far as able-learner I would rather get an extra skill skill that I know I will use, than access to all the skills with only half progression, and knowing I most likely wont be able to use them. Actually, Able-Learner is great with multiclassing - and the Half-Elf is the most iconic race for multiclassing since the early days of AD&D, so it fits the bill wonderfully. I hit a player with 80 HP of damage by using power attack using a monster I had not modified(17th ish level). Tying PA to STR-mod instead of BAB brings things down to the right proportions (see "Feats converted to openly selectable combat options" revised rule). Most DM's let their players choose exactly where to put the center of the spell if it has a radius affect so most casters will just put it where it can affect as many enemies as possible with hurting allies, and the party could always have death ward cast if they know that is what will be unleashed first. It does seem like an issue to consider. Maybe the spell should be made to emanate from the caster's mouth. That way, if he wants to use this ultra deadly spell, than he'd have to place himself dead in the eye of the storm and away from his alies.
#92 deathbane Jan 30, 2008 15:43:16	The tricky part would be class features (they should resemble the Beguiler's, and it should get enhanced concentration capabilities like the Spirit Shaman). Other than that I don't know for the meantime. As for advanced learning... it's not really significant when you have access to all spell lists rather than have a spell list of your own. I think the part of the reason for the restriction to one school of magic/disicpline was to limit them to certain choices, but if they were to handicapped by that, then give some type of advanced learning. Actually, Able-Learner is great with multiclassing - and the Half-Elf is the most iconic race for multiclassing since the early days of AD&D, so it fits the bill wonderfully. While it may be nostalgic it does not increase his effectivness in 3.5, not does it make him a viable choice to multiclass if nobody ever plays him. I know this is a roleplaying game and power should not be the main consideration, but survivability is always an issue, and I don't see the half-elf having the same chance of surviving with what he has in a high-powered campaign. If the DM uses the four encounters per day thing so you have easy battles, then anyone can survive, but I have never played an adventure that ran like that because most DMs', I know or have known, don't see the point in giving away XP. Tying PA to STR-mod instead of BAB brings things down to the right proportions (see "Feats converted to openly selectable combat options" revised rule). I never power attack by more than 5. If I do something like that I will most likely miss. It does seem like an issue to consider. Maybe the spell should be made to emanate from the caster's mouth. That way, if he wants to use this ultra deadly spell, than he'd have to place himself dead in the eye of the storm and away from his alies I meant to say so he does not hit his allies, just like when a fireball is thrown the objective is to tag all the enemies, but if that can't be done then hit as many as possible.
#93 brianmc223 Feb 02, 2008 16:56:33	You know, I really the K;'s first paragraph summed it up nicely, but as your still going I might as well say my piece: Rogue: Have you ever heard the term glass cannon? That in real D&D Rogues don't have that problem as much, but in your system with a lot less magic and low hp they would. Also: Your rogue might just be a skill monkey, but mine isn't. Mine is the guy that know that in a one on one fight, the fighter or barbarian is going to rip his face off, but everyone also knows that if if they don't watch the guy he can end you. He's got that swagger of confidence and that cocky little grin that comes from knowing that if he wants to take you, he can, unless you are really really good. (The fighter can add his BAB to oppose being feinted.) I'm not sure how this sounds outside my head, but I always thought it would be a cool line for a Rogue to use in an argument: "You know what, fine. Be that way, but let me tell you something. If you insist we do it your way, I'm not going to help, I'm going to leave. I'll leave with a promise, "My Lord Paladin", if I leave you will never see me again. But I'll see you. I'll see you real soon." Monk: His unarmed damage should be based upon his ability to hit with force, and thus not dependent on the anatomy of his foes. I'm a bit of a grappler myself, and I can't imagine trying it on a guy with a sword. Hitting an armed man is bad enough, but the idea of doing an Uchimata on a guy with a greatsword, or slapping a double wrist lock on a guy with a rapier is just insane. Reactive stuff shouldn't be part of it either. If you really want it to work like that you have to come up with something that makes sense. There lots more, I'm honestly not a big fan of your system, but I lack the motivation to go over it in detail.
#94 nonsi Feb 03, 2008 14:03:39	Have you ever heard the term glass cannon? That in real D&D Rogues don't have that problem as much, but in your system with a lot less magic and low hp they would. To make a long story short, re-reading my description of SA, I did notice it required clarification and a slight tweaking. Done. Also: Your rogue might just be a skill monkey, but mine isn't. With Death Attack, Greater/Superior Feint and the redefinition of immunities, mine is OK as well (now that I rectified what needed rectifying). Monk: I'm a bit of a grappler myself, and I can't imagine trying it on a guy with a sword. You don't strike against a sword - you position yourself somewhere else. Hitting an armed man is bad enough, but the idea of doing an Uchimata on a guy with a greatsword, or slapping a double wrist lock on a guy with a rapier is just insane. I'm not familiar with the term "Uchimata", but once the guy's wrist is in control (btw, you din't have to grab it to gain the required momentary advantage), the rapier is no more an issue than a stick. Some background in Aikido or Ninjustu and you'll understand what I'm talking about. Reactive stuff shouldn't be part of it either. If you really want it to work like that you have to come up with something that makes sense. Which reactive stuff ? I don't remember adding any mechanics on that aspect (specific opponents are not added mechanics). There lots more, I'm honestly not a big fan of your system, but I lack the motivation to go over it in detail. Thet's just fine. If everybody did, no one would've mentioned the things I did agree that require re-evaluation.
#95 nonsi Feb 03, 2008 14:14:20	I never power attack by more than 5. If I do something like that I will most likely miss. That's probably because you never took the Shock Trooper feat (Complete Warrior). Combined with Lion-Totem Barb class feature from Complete Champion, the core PA becomes a real game breaker (now stack that on a Frenzeed Berzerker equipped with Righteous-Wrath feat..... ).
#96 brianmc223 Feb 03, 2008 15:45:47	I know you didn't include mechanics about the monks unarmed strike. Thats the problem. You say you want flavor text to matter and then you say something in flavor text that doesn't make any sense at all. "You don't strike against a sword - you position yourself somewhere else." Thats reactive. If you aren't capable of just DOING it then it isn't really an attack. It certainly isn't a strike. Your describing a counter strike, but not needing someone to attack to do it. "I'm not familiar with the term "Uchimata", but once the guy's wrist is in control (btw, you didn't have to grab it to gain the required momentary advantage), the rapier is no more an issue than a stick. Some background in Aikido or Ninjustu and you'll understand what I'm talking about." Uchimata is one of the more famous Judo Throws. The problem is getting that control. I'm a fairly adept stand up grappler (mostly wrestling with a few bit's of judo and the like) I can tell you from my experience that overcoming that two feet of sharp steel to grab someone to do a joint lock is not a reasonable basis for a monk's attacks. That is a grapple thing. I've never seen an Aikido practitioner be the aggressor in a fight. Sure, some sort of counter attack thing might make sense, but thats not what your describing. Ninjitsu has been dead for centuries. I'm automatically skeptical of anyone who claims to have an Ninjitsu background. It make's more sense that, through a lifetime of training, the Monk has conditioned his body to be as solid as stone, and every muscle in his body and every neural pathway has been trained to extremes to land blows with incredible force. He hits HARD.
#97 nonsi Feb 04, 2008 2:29:08	Ninjitsu has been dead for centuries. I'm automatically skeptical of anyone who claims to have an Ninjitsu background. That's what I thought 8 months ago. Ninjutsu is alive & kicking and is evolving to this very day. Your describing a counter strike, but not needing someone to attack to do it. ...Unless you initiate maneuvers to make your opponent make mistakes and expose himself. Uchimata is one of the more famous Judo Throws. The problem is getting that control. I'm a fairly adept stand up grappler (mostly wrestling with a few bit's of judo and the like) I can tell you from my experience that overcoming that two feet of sharp steel to grab someone to do a joint lock is not a reasonable basis for a monk's attacks. That is a grapple thing. Judo is a good sport with its respectable position, but it's far from being a combatative art. Ninjutsu takes some basic Judo principles and presents combatative applications for them. Take the basic leg tripping every 6-year-old Judo pupil learns on his 1st (or 2nd) lesson. A Ninjutsu practitioner will not brush his foot on the ground, but rather raise it and bring it down hard to demolish his opponent's knee. In Ninjutsu there's no such thing as initiating a grab against your opponent. Doing so leaves you terribly exposed. You make surprise strikes, twist a joint and send your opponent falling on his head. I've never seen an Aikido practitioner be the aggressor in a fight. Sure, some sort of counter attack thing might make sense, but thats not what your describing. When the opportunity arises, you surprise your foe and strike (If you're a Stiven Segal fan, I'm sure you saw initiative in some of his many scenes). It make's more sense that, through a lifetime of training, the Monk has conditioned his body to be as solid as stone, and every muscle in his body and every neural pathway has been trained to extremes to land blows with incredible force. He hits HARD. The human body does have the potential of hitting harder than a sledge-hammer, but this requires 15-20 seconds of concentrating and preparing a perfect strike. These sort of strikes are inapplicable during combat. Relying purely on your hardened bones to hit a metal breastplate during combat would probably make you take more damage than the amount of damage you'd deal. You have to moderate your blows to avoid taking damage. Grabbing/hitting a joint in the exact timing does more damage mechanically and allows you to apply full impact. And as far as the Monk's combat effectiveness, in my gamerules there's no such thing as alignment based DR and Versatile Unarmed Attack is a class feature of the Monk. combine that with the greate repertoire of feats my Monk hasand you'll see my Monk can handle itself quite decently.
#98 concerro Feb 04, 2008 14:33:02	That's probably because you never took the Shock Trooper feat (Complete Warrior). Combined with Lion-Totem Barb class feature from Complete Champion, the core PA becomes a real game breaker (now stack that on a Frenzeed Berzerker equipped with Righteous-Wrath feat..... ). I don't want to TPK the party, but thanks for the shock trooper statement. I will look at to see how powerful it is. Frenzied Berserker are not allowed. If PvP takes place(in character) I don't mind, but to kill the party(or even one member) just because of a class feature is not good. Instead of changing power attack, why not just say the combination of the totem thing, and the frenzied berserker are not allowed?
#99 nonsi Feb 04, 2008 15:35:11	Instead of changing power attack, why not just say the combination of the totem thing, and the frenzied berserker are not allowed? It's not even an issue, since with my PrCs rules, of all published PrCs, the only one viable would be the Fochlucan Lyrist - and given its scarce features, it wouldn't even be a choice worth while taking (which is why I didn't mention it). Anyway, my PA rule is more against monsters (which usually hit better) than against the characters. Btw, I discarded the idea of a revised Sorc/Psion, because in order to be worthe while taking, it would drastically overshadow other spellcasters. If you wish, I'll present what I got so far and let you judge for yourself.
#100 Krusk Feb 08, 2008 23:08:25	You say PEACH, so get ready for a long post. 1- Why are warriors not proficent with light armor? They get medium, but not light? 2- ok you have taken rogues back to the thief idea. Its ok, so long as you provide another option for light armored fighters, or skill users. 3- Do the rogues bonus skill tricks count against his normal limit on skill tricks? might want to specify 4-I do like your sneak attack on the rogue, thought about a similar idea at one point and never developed it. 5-in the rogue, i am really not sure what this means "Redefinitions Camouflage: beating the best Spot check by 10 points or more. Hide in Plain Sight: beating the best Spot check by 15 points or more." 6- for the mage, you should probably specify exactly which spells are no longer allowed. 7- No chaotic brawler types for the monk? 8- Your monk unarmed damage thing against larger opponents really is a huge nerf to them. 9-the flurry with melee weapons helps that /\ 10- "Sight Beyond Sight" thundercats HO!!!! 11- clerics also dont get light armor? 12- i would reword bard's knowledgable to "gains a misc bonus of __. The way you worded it is awkward. 13-warlock/sorcerer auto bypasses SR. Dosn't make sense to me, give them SR, but they automatically overcome each others SR? Minor nitpick that bugs me. 14- Fiendish life force, no longer affected by necromancy is a hugely powerful ability. -and dosn't really fit the idea of a fey warlock. 15- Witch does not seem to be a seperate enough archtype to need its own class. 16- Why do ranged characters get way less weapon proficencies than melee? 17- Your armor group proficency tables do not match up with the listed proficencies with the class. 18- under the revised tumble "Whoever, you double the ACP for medium armor and triple the ACP for heavy armor." I think you ment however or whenever. 19- " Characters add 1 point to one ability score at each level. Racial limits are exceeded at each level divisible by 4 and you cannot increase the same ability twice in a row. This serves as a decent compensation for a bad start and/or MAD. It also puts yet a greater impact to level progression." You include a racial maximum. What is it? 20- "Training to gain a new class takes one year - requires a mentor. This includes prestige classes. - Gaining a new level takes one month with a mentor, or one year without a mentor. A mentor is required until level 7. After that, self training takes one month per level. A prestige class requires no tutoring beyond attaining 1st level." Unless you have SIGNIFIGANT downtime, i would be quite upset to learn of this rule. It might be enough for me to consider not playing in your game. 21- How do vorpal and rogue sneak attack interact? 22-Capping Power attack is a little lame. But limiting it to str mod is better than limiting it to 5 like most caps i have seen. 23- "Females and ability scores: -2 to STR & CON, +2 to INT & CHA." I am glad I am not female, as I could quite probably be offended by this. Generally a consensus is that male/female ability scores are equal. While males might have higher extremes in all catagories females are generally shown to be more along the average overall. Why can i not make a female fighter who is at the huge end of one of the extremes? it is fantasy. 24- Crit fumbles would be the point where I said I wasn't willing to play in your game. After the training time, power attack cap, female ability score diffrences, and now this. Ill keep going because feedback is always good, but in person i would stop reading and leave. 25-Slashing flurry requires dance? i am a little confused by this one. Well thats it. Overall it is a decent revamp, but I would not be willing to sit through some of the ideas. Basically you had some good ideas, and then threw in some of the common houserules that i hate more than any other. Hope that helps you refine everything.
#101 nonsi Feb 09, 2008 1:24:06	>> You say PEACH, so get ready for a long post. Hi Krusk, that's definitely one of the more efficient replies I got so far. >> 1- Why are warriors not proficent with light armor? They get medium, but not light? Since light armor is prereq, I found this info unnecessary (also I tried to narro it down due to the 50,000-characters limit per post) >> 2- ok you have taken rogues back to the thief idea. Its ok, so long as you >> provide another option for light armored fighters, or skill users. My warrior already provides all the means for the unfettered type. >> 3- Do the rogues bonus skill tricks count against his normal limit on skill >> tricks? might want to specify Of course not. That's the whole point about bonuses. >> 4-I do like your sneak attack on the rogue, thought about a similar idea at >> one point and never developed it. Thanks. The point was: 1. Making SA size related. 2. Make it effective against most opponent-types to a certain degree. 3. Toning down the possible brokenness of SA via metagaming. 4. Discourage wasting more precious feats in order to make it effective against extra opponent-types - and by so making the character even more one-dimensional. >> 5-in the rogue, i am really not sure what this means "Redefinitions >> Camouflage: beating the best Spot check by 10 points or more. >> Hide in Plain Sight: beating the best Spot check by 15 points or more." It means these are no longer class features, but rather open options that are available if you really outscale your opponents. Options that make more sense mechanically than the class abilities and make room for other more interesting class features. >> 6- for the mage, you should probably specify exactly which spells are no >> longer allowed. I did - in the revised rules spoiler. >> 7- No chaotic brawler types for the monk? As a student of martial arts I can tell you that a browler could be just as dangerous (which the superrior BAB represents), but would never excel in martial arts. >> 8- Your monk unarmed damage thing against larger opponents really is a >> huge nerf to them. Yes, but it makes sense and it's ofsetted by coping far better with DR. >> 9-the flurry with melee weapons helps that /\ Which is reallistic. >> 10- "Sight Beyond Sight" thundercats HO!!!! Yeah, I know, it was already taken, but that's the most appropriate name I could come up with:D I'm open to suggestions. >> 11- clerics also dont get light armor? Clerics usually get ONLY light armor. The War Cleric variant also gets med armor. >> 12- i would reword bard's knowledgable to "gains a misc bonus of __. The >> way you worded it is awkward. Please explain, I don't understand what you mean. And I don't understand why it is awkward. On top of Bardic Knowledge, a Bard gains 1 point per 2-levels bonus to all PHB-I Knowledge skills (so in effect he gains way more than 6 SkPts / level). This makes the Bard more iconic as the sage type. >> 13-warlock/sorcerer auto bypasses SR. Dosn't make sense to me, give >> them SR, but they automatically overcome each others SR? Minor nitpick >> that bugs me. With EB only. 1. It's not the doom's-day weapon. 2. Treat it as EB mastery - in the high-levels it's a partial means of leveling-up the Sorcerer. >> 14- Fiendish life force, no longer affected by necromancy is a hugely >> powerful ability. -and dosn't really fit the idea of a fey warlock. Clerics get Death-Ward at 7th level and my Mage can make it a spell-like ability at 9th level, so I see no major problem with that. As I said, my aim was to give each class its evident advantages, with less emphasys on how they fair in a 1-on-1 frontal confrontation. >> 15- Witch does not seem to be a seperate enough archtype to need its own class. Different spells, different feature, different mechanics & different thematics....... how more seperate can it get ? >> 16- Why do ranged characters get way less weapon proficencies than melee? Warriors can trade med-armor for a 2nd range group and can also spend feats on weapon groups and reclaim them at BAB +4/+8/+12... it's all there, I just have the advantage of knowing where to look. >> 17- Your armor group proficency tables do not match up with the listed >> proficencies with the class. What do you mean ? >> 18- under the revised tumble "Whoever, you double the ACP for medium >> armor and triple the ACP for heavy armor." I think you ment however or whenever. Thanks, I meant "However" :D Fixed. >> 19- "Characters add 1 point to one ability score at each level..." >> You include a racial maximum. What is it? This means that it stacks with racial ability modifiers (for better or worse). >> 20- "Training to gain a new class takes one year...". >> Unless you have SIGNIFIGANT downtime, i would be quite upset to learn >> of this rule. It might be enough for me to consider not playing in your game. This rule is, of course, inappropriate for DMs that bombard the characters with one adventure after the other without the possibility of utilizing downtime. I'm considering omitting this rule, but it's all a part of enhanced reallism. It shold definitely NOT serve a DM as a tool for postponing level advancement - that's what XP (or lack of it) is for. >> 21- How do vorpal and rogue sneak attack interact? Since SA is detached from the weapon's base damage, they're calculated separately (see "Critical Enhancements" in the "Revised Rules" spoiler). >> 22-Capping Power attack is a little lame. But limiting it to str mod is better >> than limiting it to 5 like most caps i have seen. This would usually hurt monsters (which usually hit better) more than the characters, and it tones down Shock-Trooper feat (just immagine a Frenzeed Berserker with Pounce, Leap Attack, Shock-Trooper and Righteous Wrath - doom's day blender). >> 23- "Females and ability scores: -2 to STR & CON, +2 to INT & CHA." I am >> glad I am not female, as I could quite probably be offended by this. >> Generally a consensus is that male/female ability scores are equal. While >> males might have higher extremes in all catagories females are generally >> shown to be more along the average overall. Why can i not make a female >> fighter who is at the huge end of one of the extremes? it is fantasy. This post sums up my approach on this matter: http://forums.gleemax.com/showpost.php?p=14951268&postcount=81 >> 24- Crit fumbles would be the point where I said I wasn't willing to play in >> your game. After the training time, power attack cap, female ability score >> diffrences, and now this. Ill keep going because feedback is always good, >> but in person i would stop reading and leave. 1. It works both ways for PCs and their opponents. 2. nat-1 doesn't mean you automatically miss. you only fumble if you miss. 3. I'm considering a level of weapon skill that makes you immune to fumbles (I'll see what I can cook on this subject). >> 25-Slashing flurry requires dance? i am a little confused by this one. "Dance" doesn't necessarily mean a tool for hitting on chicks. Bruce lee was a dancer before he was a martial artist. Some "Dance" moves do wonders to your footwork and fluidity of motion. >> Hope that helps you refine everything. It sure did. I'll rephrase where needed and think of the required modifications. Thanks for the detailed reply. Please clarify the things I didn't understand. Regards
#102 Krusk Feb 09, 2008 14:33:19	>> 1- Why are warriors not proficent with light armor? They get medium, but not light? Since light armor is prereq, I found this info unnecessary (also I tried to narro it down due to the 50,000-characters limit per post) Ok, but the way it is read, at least by me, means that they do not have light armor. >> 3- Do the rogues bonus skill tricks count against his normal limit on skill >> tricks? might want to specify Of course not. That's the whole point about bonuses. i thought so, but you didn't specify. You might want to. >> 5-in the rogue, i am really not sure what this means "Redefinitions >> Camouflage: beating the best Spot check by 10 points or more. >> Hide in Plain Sight: beating the best Spot check by 15 points or more." It means these are no longer class features, but rather open options that are available if you really outscale your opponents. Options that make more sense mechanically than the class abilities and make room for other more interesting class features. You might want to again specify this, as of now it just is sort of written and i had no idea what it might mean. I assumed that maybe it was a rogue special ability to be picked from that list. >> 7- No chaotic brawler types for the monk? As a student of martial arts I can tell you that a browler could be just as dangerous (which the superrior BAB represents), but would never excel in martial arts. As a student of a couple schools of martial arts, I can attest that not all people who fight without a weapon are Lawful. Some of the people i have met/trained with can only be described as chaotic. My complaint was that you say no chaotic alignment. >> 8- Your monk unarmed damage thing against larger opponents really is a >> huge nerf to them. Yes, but it makes sense and it's ofsetted by coping far better with DR. It does not make sense to me, and seems like a huge pain for during actual game play. You look down on your sheet and arre set to deal damage, when you remember which size your opponent is and which size you are. Now you have to go recalculate your numbers. >> 10- "Sight Beyond Sight" thundercats HO!!!! Yeah, I know, it was already taken, but that's the most appropriate name I could come up with:D I'm open to suggestions. I was a fan. >> 11- clerics also dont get light armor? Clerics usually get ONLY light armor. The War Cleric variant also gets med armor. Under your armor proficency in cleric entry they get medium armor. Under the list of proficent armor in the armor groups area they only get light. >> 12- i would reword bard's knowledgable to "gains a misc bonus of __. The >> way you worded it is awkward. Please explain, I don't understand what you mean. And I don't understand why it is awkward. On top of Bardic Knowledge, a Bard gains 1 point per 2-levels bonus to all PHB-I Knowledge skills (so in effect he gains way more than 6 SkPts / level). This makes the Bard more iconic as the sage type. Now that it is farther explained to me it makes more sense. >> 17- Your armor group proficency tables do not match up with the listed >> proficencies with the class. What do you mean ? See my new comment on cleric armor. >> 24- Crit fumbles would be the point where I said I wasn't willing to play in >> your game. After the training time, power attack cap, female ability score >> diffrences, and now this. Ill keep going because feedback is always good, >> but in person i would stop reading and leave. 1. It works both ways for PCs and their opponents. 2. nat-1 doesn't mean you automatically miss. you only fumble if you miss. 3. I'm considering a level of weapon skill that makes you immune to fumbles (I'll see what I can cook on this subject). Still the fact that there is a chance i throw my weapon/hit my ally one in every 20 attacks means that i would never make an attack roll ifi could avoid it.
#103 brianmc223 Feb 09, 2008 17:19:49	>> 7- No chaotic brawler types for the monk? As a student of martial arts I can tell you that a browler could be just as dangerous (which the superrior BAB represents), but would never excel in martial arts. Doesn't mean they shouldn't be able to deal the same damage with unarmed strikes. (Which is far more what the monk represents than real martial arts.) If your telling me you would really rather get hit by Tank Abbot than Mas Oyama you really don't know as much as you think you do. For that matter define "student of martial arts." I've found almost everything you've said to based far more on bullshido than knowledge of actual effective fighting arts. I'm a wrestler, and have very limited training in kickboxing and submission grappling. I watch a lot of MMA, and do a fair bit of reading. I'm a student of Martial arts, you should like a TKD kiddy from a McDojo. >> 8- Your monk unarmed damage thing against larger opponents really is a >> huge nerf to them. Yes, but it makes sense and it's ofsetted by coping far better with DR. It does not makes sense. If a monks unarmed strike doesn't deal damage the same way to larger creatures then other medium sized weapons shouldn't. This already exists in D&D, in the form of a con bonus for increasing in size. Bigger monsters have more hp therefore you (effectively) deal less damage.
#104 nonsi Feb 10, 2008 2:45:16	Ok, but the way it is read, at least by me, means that they do not have light armor. I left it out because I've never encountered a case in which a class gains med/heavy armor without meeting the prerequisites. Still seems ok to me to omit. i thought so, but you didn't specify. You might want to. Maybe I'll add it. Depends on character-count. You might want to again specify this, as of now it just is sort of written and i had no idea what it might mean. I assumed that maybe it was a rogue special ability to be picked from that list. This one does seem to require clarification. Done. As a student of a couple schools of martial arts, I can attest that not all people who fight without a weapon are Lawful. Some of the people i have met/trained with can only be described as chaotic. My complaint was that you say no chaotic alignment. Ok, I'm convinced. Fixed. It does not make sense to me, and seems like a huge pain for during actual game play. You look down on your sheet and arre set to deal damage, when you remember which size your opponent is and which size you are. Now you have to go recalculate your numbers. Not at all. Just note to yourself: My opponent's a byped of [my-size-category + 1] or less (yes/no). Under your armor proficency in cleric entry they get medium armor. Under the list of proficent armor in the armor groups area they only get light. You'r right. Corrected and added shields for the relevant classes. Still the fact that there is a chance i throw my weapon/hit my ally one in every 20 attacks means that i would never make an attack roll ifi could avoid it. Again: 1. It works both ways for PCs and their opponents. 2. nat-1 doesn't mean you automatically miss. you only fumble if you miss. 3. I've set Weapon Focus IV to make the wielder immune to fumbles (level-12 Warrior seems reasonable). 4. quote: "On a result of 1, 2 or 3, have the player roll an additional attack against a SQUARE adjacent to the target that's within his reach (including self, for self inflicted injury). If no target is available, the character missed stylishly". Remember that the alternative target could very well be an enemy. This one produced some hilarious scenarios in a group where I was a player and things went more in our favor (tactics also help). Furthermore, with reach weapons self-inflicted injury is impossible. 5. I didn't say it, but it should be obvious that in case of a secondary attack you can't fumble a fumble.
#105 Krusk Feb 10, 2008 2:55:53	You can quote your fumble system, and i can keep typing in the same response but we wont really get anywhere on it. Lets just leave it that that might be enough for me to not play in the game. -if that were hypothetically an option-
#106 nonsi Feb 10, 2008 3:38:33	Doesn't mean they shouldn't be able to deal the same damage with unarmed strikes. (Which is far more what the monk represents than real martial arts.) I can't make an educated guess regarding the author's intentions, but I already dropped the alignment restriction for Monks. If your telling me you would really rather get hit by Tank Abbot than Mas Oyama you really don't know as much as you think you do. Tank Abbot ?....... Mas Oyama ?....... For that matter define "student of martial arts." I've found almost everything you've said to based far more on bullshido than knowledge of actual effective fighting arts. Thanks for the credit :P I'm a wrestler, and have very limited training in kickboxing and submission grappling. I watch a lot of MMA, and do a fair bit of reading. I'm a student of Martial arts, you should like a TKD kiddy from a McDojo. MMA is SPORT, not practical combat. Yes, they have quite nice KOs, but they avoid intentional permanent damage - and they deal only with each other human against human. Face it. MMA won't tell you how they'll fair against a full grown raging buffalo. It does not makes sense. If a monks unarmed strike doesn't deal damage the same way to larger creatures then other medium sized weapons shouldn't. A heavy mace crushes whatever it hits, but low-kicking a lion is practically useless. Comparing a Monk's unarmed strike (eventually) to a heavy mace represents his practice of learning to hit harder and harder as he gains experience. I am aware of it that some martial artists can shatter immobile objects with startling efficiency. For this purpose it would probably be reasonable to allow full damage and even use full BAB - as a full round action that provokes AoOs (and getting hit cancels the increased stats).
#107 nonsi Feb 10, 2008 3:52:25	You can quote your fumble system, and i can keep typing in the same response but we wont really get anywhere on it. Lets just leave it that that might be enough for me to not play in the game. -if that were hypothetically an option- If I were to hypothetically DM you and this was to be the do-or-die issue, I'd omit it. It's all about having fun afterall. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
#108 Krusk Feb 10, 2008 13:32:54	If I were to hypothetically DM you and this was to be the do-or-die issue, I'd omit it. It's all about having fun afterall. Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Good to know your at least reasonable about these things. Have fun with your game.
#109 brianmc223 Feb 10, 2008 15:48:01	Tank Abbot is one of the hardest hitters to ever fight in the ufc. Mas Oyama is the founder of Kyokushin Karate. He also happens to be one of the most famous martial artists of all time. That's like not knowing who Helio Gracie is. (I have a feeling you don't...) Bullshido is not a typo. Look at the stuff they teach military guys, looks a lot like MMA. Just because MMA allows tap-outs doesn't mean the moves wouldn't be extremely effective in a real fight. If I get you in an arm bar in a street fight I'm going to brake your arm. Most of the martial arts have evolved into sports. If you think a Judoka can't tear you a new one because he does a "sport" and you train for "combat" then you have no idea what you are talking about. An unarmed human cannot ever do as much damage as a greatsword either. However, unless the greatsword also does less damage when against inappropriate sized creatures, the monks damage should stay the same. I assume you were referring to the game again there. your ninja skills wouldn't be any good against a buffalo either. Your martial arts credentials are suspect, and you seem unable to grasp a simple concept. (Not saying all simple concepts, just this one.)
#110 nonsi Feb 11, 2008 6:42:06	Tank Abbot is one of the hardest hitters to ever fight in the ufc. Mas Oyama is the founder of Kyokushin Karate. He also happens to be one of the most famous martial artists of all time. Now that you've explained it, this just adds more weight to my claim. That's like not knowing who Helio Gracie is. (I have a feeling you don't...) So basically what you're saying is that being qualified (yes/no) to making an educated assesment is determined according to one's belonging to a certain fan club Bullshido is not a typo. Didn't doubt it for a second. Look at the stuff they teach military guys, looks a lot like MMA. Just because MMA allows tap-outs doesn't mean the moves wouldn't be extremely effective in a real fight. If I get you in an arm bar in a street fight I'm going to brake your arm. 1st you'll have to get me there. Good luck trying. If you think a Judoka can't tear you a new one because he does a "sport" and you train for "combat" then you have no idea what you are talking about. IRL, while a Judoka comes in to grab me, I'm gonna go for braking his nose, gouging his eyes, redecorating his windpipe, rattling his temple(s) etc. I'm not gonna just sit there and let him hip-toss me into a submission hold. A Judoka's killer moves start mostly AFTER he got you pinned down. Getting there is no cake walk against someone who's "all means are kosher" type of opponent. An unarmed human cannot ever do as much damage as a greatsword either. Exactly my point (though I've seen some unbelieveable concrete shattering displays by 2 brothers carrying unbelievable impact from a stand-still - and they said it's practically inappricable during combat against a fello martial artist). However, unless the greatsword also does less damage when against inappropriate sized creatures, the monks damage should stay the same. It's not about size, but rather if your killer moves are applicable or not. - You can't arm-bar a cow - You can't wrist-lock an elephant - You can't make a Titan lose his center of balance and go down head-first. I assume you were referring to the game again there. your ninja skills wouldn't be any good against a buffalo either. Precisely why I'd use weapons rather than my bare hands. Yet again adding weight to my claim. Your martial arts credentials are suspect, and you seem unable to grasp a simple concept. (Not saying all simple concepts, just this one.) I don't claim to be of international competition level, but in a moment of truth (real do-or-die situation) I ended up having the upper hand without a scratch on me... and my sensei actually noted my impressive grasping of advanced principles (believe it or not, makes no difference to me).
#111 Krusk Feb 11, 2008 7:43:40	I think what brianmc223 is attempting to explain is that you really should not limit a monks unarmed damage vs a larger opponent, any more than you should limit a fighters swords damage against a larger opponent. Keep in mind that by the time a monk is dealing greatsword-esque damage they are higher levels than any living human. And at this point the fighter with his greatsword is dealing way more damage than the monk thanks to mundane weapon properties, feats, and magical weapon properties. Generally anything the monk can do to up his unarmed damage, an equivilent feat exists for a fighter to up his greatsword damage.
#112 nonsi Feb 11, 2008 8:23:11	I think what brianmc223 is attempting to explain is that you really should not limit a monks unarmed damage vs a larger opponent, any more than you should limit a fighters swords damage against a larger opponent. Keep in mind that by the time a monk is dealing greatsword-esque damage they are higher levels than any living human. And at this point the fighter with his greatsword is dealing way more damage than the monk thanks to mundane weapon properties, feats, and magical weapon properties. Generally anything the monk can do to up his unarmed damage, an equivilent feat exists for a fighter to up his greatsword damage. 1. Remember that each of my rules is optional. 2. I'm rationalizing and I've said so repeatedly. 3. Given Versatile UAS is a class feature... and given no alignment-based-DR (also rationalizing)... and given the vast pool of SF-related feats, I think my revised Monk would do just fine (not to mention the enhanced weapons-use). 4. If that's not enough, a possible "fix" could be allowing the Monk to channel his Ki into his weapon, but I'm not entirely sure about this one.
#113 brianmc223 Feb 11, 2008 13:23:12	Not knowing who one of the most famous martial artists of all time is, somehow makes your point? Considering my point is that you have no idea what you are talking about I fail to see how that works. Sense you mentioned it as you vs me: I'm a wrestler, a kickboxer, and a submission grappler. My father is a Correctional Officer, and I've been fighting him all my life.(You think you fight dirty....) I also, in all likelihood, outweigh you by 50-60lbs. If I want to take you down, and you don't have extensive grappling experience you haven't mentioned, you are going to go down. When someone thinks they are immune to takedowns the invariably find that they aren't. You really think you could last ten seconds on your feet with Jon Bluming? You think Kazushi Sakuraba couldn't destroy you? (A Judo /Karate Guy that fought no rules fights and dominated, and a Catch Wrestler that is famous for beating Gracies) Yea, I mean god, nobody can take someone down when they are trying to hit them in the face. It's not like in MMA you have to worry about getting punched in the face, or kicked in the head, or thrown, or counter takedowns, or eating a knee, or any of a thousand things you don't get. Against someone who doesn't understand grappling (IE: You) getting a takedown is easy. A monks unarmed damage is from hitting, thats the simple concept you don't get. His damage against humans isn't from wristlocks or arm bars either because that doesn't make any sense at all. That would be grappling, not unarmed strikes. For this to make sense as you have it, monks would only get the extra damage when winning a grapple. You beat some guys who don't know what they are doing. Wow. Any decent grappler who knows a double leg takedown from a kimura shoulderlock would probably end you. Most fights end up on the ground. It's a simple fact of fighting, and the unfortunate thing (for strikers)is that the grapplers are the only ones who can prevent it from going there. (And why would they?)
#114 nonsi Feb 11, 2008 13:49:52	Not knowing who one of the most famous martial artists of all time is, somehow makes your point? Considering my point is that you have no idea what you are talking about I fail to see how that works. Sense you mentioned it as you vs me: I'm a wrestler, a kickboxer, and a submission grappler. My father is a Correctional Officer, and I've been fighting him all my life.(You think you fight dirty....) I also, in all likelihood, outweigh you by 50-60lbs. If I want to take you down, and you don't have extensive grappling experience you haven't mentioned, you are going to go down. When someone thinks they are immune to takedowns the invariably find that they aren't. You really think you could last ten seconds on your feet with Jon Bluming? You think Kazushi Sakuraba couldn't destroy you? (A Judo /Karate Guy that fought no rules fights and dominated, and a Catch Wrestler that is famous for beating Gracies) Yea, I mean god, nobody can take someone down when they are trying to hit them in the face. It's not like in MMA you have to worry about getting punched in the face, or kicked in the head, or thrown, or counter takedowns, or eating a knee, or any of a thousand things you don't get. Against someone who doesn't understand grappling (IE: You) getting a takedown is easy. A monks unarmed damage is from hitting, thats the simple concept you don't get. His damage against humans isn't from wristlocks or arm bars either because that doesn't make any sense at all. That would be grappling, not unarmed strikes. For this to make sense as you have it, monks would only get the extra damage when winning a grapple. You beat some guys who don't know what they are doing. Wow. Any decent grappler who knows a double leg takedown from a kimura shoulderlock would probably end you. Most fights end up on the ground. It's a simple fact of fighting, and the unfortunate thing (for strikers)is that the grapplers are the only ones who can prevent it from going there. (And why would they?) Ok, I quit. It's obvious we won't see thing eye to eye on this matter. If you have any other insight regarding any of my house rules and you feel like it, you're welcome to share. Edit: Just for the record........... >> Not knowing who one of the most famous martial artists of all time is, >> somehow makes your point? What makes my point is your question who I'd rather get hit by - a martial artist or a powerhouse (and still, put that Kiokoshin master against buffalo and he would only end up making it mad with strikes that would easily KO an average homan - and it's not just about HP or AC, but rather the lack of exploitable physical mechanics). >> I'm a wrestler, a kickboxer, and a submission grappler And you claim Ninjitsu has been dead for centuries, which definitely puts you strong of the "brute force" category. You're not a big fan of Steven Segal, I gather (and hold the "Aikido, not Ninjitsu" comment). As time goes by, I'm slowly learning how effective subtlety can be some times. >> If I want to take you down, and you don't have extensive grappling >> experience you haven't mentioned, you are going to go down. If I attempt to meet you head on, there's a good chance you're right, but don't hold your breath. I'm not exactly compact, but if you're way bigger than I am, I'm definitely not gonna measure my strength against yours (and it so happens that the most effective trainee in our group is the 2nd smallest). >> You really think you could last ten seconds on your feet with Jon Bluming? >> You think Kazushi Sakuraba couldn't destroy you ? No, but I'm not applying candidacy for the Olympics either. >> Against someone who doesn't understand grappling (IE: You) getting a >> takedown is easy. Does Jiujitsu background count for something ? >> A monks unarmed damage is from hitting Never claimed otherwise. >> His damage against humans isn't from wristlocks or arm bars either >> because that doesn't make any sense at all. Ho no ? If we ever meet, remind me to show you a thing or two about damage delivery by hitting ("striking", just to make things clear) a limb when it's not exactly in its natural position - without going to the ground (regarding the last topic below). But trying to come up with tactics for applying such moves against a feline or a rhino - now that's a whole new ball game. >> You beat some guys who don't know what they are doing. That's guessing. >> Most fights end up on the ground. Ninjitsu is alot about not getting there if at all possible. It is also a lot about studying other styles and running scenarios in your head, playing with combat principles even when doing other things (never happened to my with Jiujitsu). Am I good at it - not to a satisfactory level at current, but for a novice I'm doing quite well. >> Most fights end up on the ground. It's a simple fact of fighting, and the >> unfortunate thing (for strikers)is that the grapplers are the only ones who >> can prevent it from going there. It could be a reasonable approach if you're successful and there are at least as many grapplers as strikers, but the big question is what would mr. grappler do when striker#2,3&4 go for broke when he grabs a hold of striker#1 and there's no one watching his back ? In the IRL situation I described, mr. "knife slinger" (who'd already had some background in introducing a man's interior organs to the atmosphere) brought along 3 "cheer leaders" with a similar ethos (if you get what I mean) and I was all alone, so going to the ground would've meant we wouldn't have had this conversation. I'm sure that in your line of expertise you'd probably demolish me, but it doesn't mean I have no idea what I'm talking about (and I wouldn't be stupid to be using something I have little training in to save the day).
#115 nonsi Jun 11, 2008 3:57:03	Bumping to keep the thread alive. Anyone who wishes to share his/her thoughts is most welcome.
#116 wraithstrike Jun 11, 2008 8:29:29	Bumping to keep the thread alive. Anyone who wishes to share his/her thoughts is most welcome. I think I read this before. If I am correct you were trying to combine realism with D&D mechanics by making males stronger than females, among other things. Would that be correct?
#117 wraithstrike Jun 11, 2008 8:44:26	The monk damage decreasing is nonsense mechanically. If you are going to make D&D make sense IRL and mechanically then you have a lot of work to do, and it wont be D&D by the time you are done. What makes my point is your question who I'd rather get hit by - a martial artist or a powerhouse (and still, put that Kiokoshin master against buffalo and he would only end up making it mad with strikes that would easily KO an average homan - and it's not just about HP or AC, but rather the lack of exploitable physical mechanics). In D&D a powerattacking barbarian can beat a bull without unarmed strike in singe combat. Clearly not realistic. Artemis Entreri(bad ass assassin) can mechanically do it, but if he came across a bull without any weapons I am sure he would not fight it unarmed. Another example is coup de grace. In the game there is a save, but in real life if I line up an attack to chop off your head you are dead. It does not matter how good of a fighter you are because: Realistically a sleeping level one____, and a sleeping level 20 ______ are equal. For your idea to work as I understand it you would have to make it all realistic, or just leave it pretty much like it is
#118 nonsi Jun 11, 2008 13:05:07	I think I read this before. If I am correct you were trying to combine realism with D&D mechanics by making males stronger than females, among other things. Would that be correct? Here, this practically sums up my view on the issue: http://forums.gleemax.com/showpost.php?p=14951268&postcount=81 Let's take it from there, if you still feel it poses a major issue.
#119 nonsi Jun 11, 2008 13:39:25	The monk damage decreasing is nonsense mechanically. If you are going to make D&D make sense IRL and mechanically then you have a lot of work to do, and it wont be D&D by the time you are done. I believe I wrote it in the introduction that realism will not come at the expense of fun. As for nerfing unarmed damage... well, there isn't (and never was) a single martial artist that would actually choose fighting unarmed over fighting with his weapon of choice (at any martial art - at any black-belt degree) if he had the choice at hand. Unarmed combat has 3 purposes: sport, contingency and practicing the use of weapons (Karate, btw, is mainly sport rather than practical survival art - and it too has its weapons) In D&D a powerattacking barbarian can beat a bull without unarmed strike in singe combat. Clearly not realistic. Going through my revised rules spoiler, you'll easily find I've toned down Power Attacking - for this reason precisely (and now Shock Trooper is suddenly not broken anymore, but is still useful). I see no problem with a legendary barbarian overcoming a buffalo bare handed, but not in a single round. A legendary Monk, otoh, could (even with my modifications). Artemis Entreri(bad ass assassin) can mechanically do it, but if he came across a bull without any weapons I am sure he would not fight it unarmed. Maybe I'm a bit slow, but I couldn't figure what claim of your's this statement supports. Another example is coup de grace. In the game there is a save, but in real life if I line up an attack to chop off your head you are dead. It does not matter how good of a fighter you are because: Realistically a sleeping level one____, and a sleeping level 20 ______ are equal. Again. Realism for the purpose of increasing fun, not instead of fun. Compromise will always have its place. And who's to say coup de grace has 100% chance for success ? For your idea to work as I understand it you would have to make it all realistic, or just leave it pretty much like it is Definitely not all, but whatever will promote the players to hold on to the edge of their seat is always a blessing.
#120 wraithstrike Jun 11, 2008 21:12:20	Here, this practically sums up my view on the issue: http://forums.gleemax.com/showpost.php?p=14951268&postcount=81 Let's take it from there, if you still feel it poses a major issue. Women are no more graceful than men. The reason men are seen as clumsly more than women is that a man is more likely to show off which draws attention, which increases the likelihood that a man will be seen making a mistake since he made a "look at me" sign before he fell on his face. I dont think either one is smarter, and one woman, even if the article is true it does not make all women smart. I have seen just as many foolish women as men. They have just been foolish in different ways. As far as athletic feats men do have a significant advantage IRL, but for game purposes I would ignore it for the sake of fun.
#121 nonsi Jun 11, 2008 23:05:43	Women are no more graceful than men. The reason men are seen as clumsy more than women is that a man is more likely to show off which draws attention, which increases the likelihood that a man will be seen making a mistake since he made a "look at me" sign before he fell on his face. I'm not sure if you're right, but it does make sense. I dont think either one is smarter, and one woman, even if the article is true it does not make all women smart. I have seen just as many foolish women as men. They have just been foolish in different ways. An ability modifier doesn't mean all X specimens are better than all Y specimens, you know. As far as athletic feats men do have a significant advantage IRL, but for game purposes I would ignore it for the sake of fun. OK, OK. Given the protests it raises and the negligible impact it actually has on the game, I decided it's not worth the headache and removed it :surrender
#122 m-bark Jun 12, 2008 11:52:09	You know, what I gathered from the whole of the first few posts is this: you are trying to remake the whole game in such a way you feel is "balanced" and "realistic", and because of that you add in things that make things really complicated and some things that are actually really unrealistic. I do congratulate the effort you are willing to put into your project though. Kudos on that part.
#123 nonsi Jun 12, 2008 15:57:30	You know, what I gathered from the whole of the first few posts is this: you are trying to remake the whole game in such a way you feel is "balanced" and "realistic", and because of that you add in things that make things really complicated and some things that are actually really unrealistic. I do congratulate the effort you are willing to put into your project though. Kudos on that part. Thanks for the support. Could you please elaborate what you encountered that seemed complicated to you ?