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Color me intrigued! I have nothing specific or "official" or set in stone yet, but it'll get my brain meat churning. Edit: Are we allowed to snipe from half-D&D games, like D20 modern or Star Wars Saga Edition?
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| # ¿ May 31, 2012 02:18 |
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| # ¿ May 18, 2013 22:34 |
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Potsticker posted:The default roll is 2d6 and add the relevant ability score. If you have Advantage, then you roll 3d6 and keep the higher two dice. Similarly, being at a Disadvantage means that you roll 3d6, but instead you use the two lower value dice. This is genius and I am totally considering stealing it.
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| # ¿ May 31, 2012 10:12 |
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What I'm thinking of so far. D&D Baka Edition For lack of better name Current Design Goals * Death to Ability Scores to a comfortable degree while keeping them around for D&D-isms * Four broad roles that a number of classes can share, starting with three classes for a mix of 4e and OD&D/Basic * Cut down on the billions of dice rolls * Semi-puzzle based gameplay, OD&D/Basic style * Semi-emphasis on the "Dragons" rather then the "Dungeons" * Items are not just found lying around OR just sitting on baddies; magic armor is literally the hide of beasts, magic swords are literally their teeth and claws (or have teeth and claws forged in) * No +x anything * Flatter math then 3e and 4e, not quite as flat as D&D Next * As per OD&D and AD&D, no skills - just attribute checks * IN GENERAL, think of this as "4e meets Basic/OD&D" Current mechanics Class * Each character chooses one Role, one Class, and one Theme * Role is how your character fights: Bulwark, Skirmisher, Tactician, and Archer. * Class is your power source. For this game it will be limited to Fighter, Cleric, and Magic User * Theme is what sort of person you are out of combat. Each theme is linked to an attribute. Examples include Thief, Soldier, Barbarian, Loremaster. * Roughly speaking, Theme is out-of-combat ability, Role is in-combat, Class adds to both. * Each class has their own list of powers and resource management. Fighters use Stamina, Clerics use Divine Will, MUs use Spell Slots. All are gained back either by resting or through other mechanics. * Attributes can either be rolled or done via point buy. * Skills are done by rolling 2d6 and adding it to your attribute. * Your Theme gives you "training" in one attribute * If you are trained in an attribute you roll 3d6 and take the higher two numbers * Two 1's means you fail in an exciting way - not one that injures your kills you, but one that makes things a bit more difficult * Two 6's means you succeed in an exciting way * Tasks of your attribute level or lower are beneath the need to roll Monsters * Monsters are meant to be more interesting, rare, and dangerous. Fewer fights, but more exciting * All monsters have weaknesses and strengths. Exploit the weaknesses! * Having someone on-hand who can identify monsters and their weaknesses is very important. * Fight dirty. Examples Some rough examples. Obviously nothing set in stone. Roles grant abilities or bonuses only at level 1, but they're broad and effect the class as a whole. A Bulwark Magic-User for example might gain the ability to channel all close-range spells through a weapon, letting them attack with both a sword (or axe) and shocking grasp at the same time. A tactician MU on the other hand may gain the ability to effect multiple targets with buff spells instead of just themselves or one other. So a Bulwark MU could cast shield on themselves then start laying about with an axe, whereas a tactician MU casts shield on the whole party but can only use Shocking Grasp on enemies that come close. Classes have self-contained lists of abilities gained at different levels and one or two to start with. A level 1 MU might start off with two "cantrips" and one spell slot. A Fighter on the other hand might only get to choose two or three actual abilities from their list (rather then being able to switch their spell slot to any of them while resting) but have far more versatility on when they use them and how they use them (I am tenatively looking at Stamina working similar to Power Points in 4e). Why no thief? The Fighter ate it alive. A thief is a Skirmisher Fighter with "thief" as a theme. A more charming version could be a Skirmisher Fighter with a theme that grants advantage to Charisma skills but still has a high dexterity. Still pondering how to do clerics and what the actual abilities will be.
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| # ¿ Jun 1, 2012 01:15 |
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I also foresee all of us constantly stealing from each other.
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| # ¿ Jun 1, 2012 01:17 |
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An idea I had that obviously needs more development is that Classes all not only have a list of abilities, they all also have a core mechanic. For fighters, let's say, it's a Mark. Now, that mark is applied depending on your role. Tacticians can put marks on any enemy. Archers can put it on one target and can only switch it once that target dies or runs. Bulwarks mark all adjacent enemies. Skirmishers gain the mark bonus on anyone granting advantage. The mark gives a bonus to attack and damage, except for tacticians, who can give that bonus to allies instead. Maybe skirmishers get a bigger attack and damage bonus as well. Mark isn't the 4e style mark, mind you. It's more similar to striker mechanics in 4e, I think, like a warlock's curse. I'm still not sure if I'm going to do marking or defender stuff or tanking or etc or how zones and the like will work, right now I'm just brainstorming myself on ideas in general. My main block so far has simply been the cleric. I just don't play a lot of divine classes! Oh well.
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| # ¿ Jun 1, 2012 03:38 |
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Alignment D&D loves it some alignment, and I still think alignment can be done without making GBS threads everything up. I've mentioned in previous bits that I'm sorta going with a Basic Meets 4e approach here, so I thought: Hey, why not go old school on alignment catagories, and new school on what that could mean? So, I present to you, Baka Edition alignment mechanics! Alignment is as follows: LAWFUL - NEUTRAL - CHAOTIC LAWFUL is the alignment of the gods and angels. This alignment promotes order and safety, but taken to an extreme it leads to dictatorship and elitism. The progenitors of this alignment, the gods, desire to create and enforce a grand empire that lasts ten thousand years, cleansing most of the world of the unworthy and bringing the rest to live in peace and serenity, albeit under strict, absolute laws. LAWFUL characters can speak Celestial, the language of the heavens. CHAOTIC is the alignment of the monsters and demons. This alignment promotes freedom of choice, thought and action above all else in stark contrast to the controlling nature of the Law alignment. However, this freedom can lead to a vast amount of suffering and anarchy, leading the world into a state of unsuppressed vice and survival of the fittest. The progenitors of this alignment, the devils, desire to create an utterly unenforced world where any can do as they please, so long as they've the strength to back it up, and the strong crush the weak underfoot. CHAOTIC characters can speak Infernal, the language of the underworld. NEUTRAL is the alignment of the fey and the natural world. It is also known as Balance. This alignment accepts the need for laws to govern the world but not at the cost of personal freedom. It also rejects the concept of relying on Lawful or Chaotic powers to focus instead on personal empowerment, refinement, individuality and the inherent strength of mortal life. Although seemingly the "best" alignment, NEUTRAL suffers heavily from idealism and isolationism - a NEUTRAL man has no friends amongst either gods or devils, and must constantly exert and check themselves to maintain a reasonable balance. NEUTRAL characters can speak Fey, the language of the natural world. Every character must be one of three alignments, though they don't need to be so extreme that they desire their patron's end goals of mass anarchy or mass tyranny, nor do they need to hate all those of different alignments. The only mechanical change is what alignment language you speak. Clerics do not need to be LAWFUL, but their gods will constantly try to push them into committing lawful acts. Depending on how this contest goes, a sidebar will add that later classes could include the Druids, who are pushed towards NEUTRAL, and the Warlocks, who are pushed towards CHAOS
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| # ¿ Jun 1, 2012 09:22 |
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As this is the basic or "core module," and since this is 4e meets Basic/OD&D, I'm going to keep myself limited to the three classes and likely to only early levels. Is that ok?
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| # ¿ Jun 1, 2012 19:02 |
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Over the weekend I'll put together my full one page submission; until then, that post totally works as a carry over  Which reminds me, can we use this thread to continue chatting about mechanics, or should we take that elsewhere?
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| # ¿ Jun 1, 2012 22:52 |
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Ok! How skills and themes are looking now in Baka Edition: You can either roll or point buy your attributes. Your attributes are your skills. The end, full stop. If you're doing something charisma-based, you roll charisma. Skill rolls are 2d6+attribute. Not +attribute modifier, but the whole thing. A LOREMASTER with 15 intelligence would roll 2d6+15. If the difficulty of what you're attempting to do is equal to or less then your attribute, no roll is needed. Double 1's mean you fail in such a way that it gives a greater penalty to something. Double 6's mean you succeed in a fantastic manner that the player can totally ham up and it gives a greater bonus to something. Attributes will likely use 4d6 drop lowest and divvy how you want for it's roll based and aim for more middling 3e levels of scores rather then the higher 4e ones. HOW IT STANDS NOW, a Theme gives you "training" in one attribute. Say, Thief. Thief gives you training in dexterity. That means whenever you roll dexterity, you have advantage - you roll 3d6 and pick the top two. A Theme also grants +1 to a second related attribute. For Thief, it's intelligence. In total, taking Thief as your theme gives you training in dexterity and +1 intelligence. The basic game will have a handful of themes along with a sidebar about making your own, since seriously, you just choose one attribute to be trained in and another to get +1 in, not that hard.
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| # ¿ Jun 1, 2012 23:07 |
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MadRhetoric posted:Holy poo poo there's like three people making something that isn't a 4e heartbreaker and only one of them is in earnest instead of "Caster Edition Mine is trying to mix Basic and 4e. I suppose I could go with the other editions, but if you want to make a good game, you use good materials 
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| # ¿ Jun 1, 2012 23:17 |
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Oh don't get me wrong, I'm stealing from anything and everything that looks nice. My alignment is a bizarre twist of OD&D and MegaTen combined, for crying out loud, and I'm thinking of hijacking arena rules from OSH. It's just that my main two/three D&D inspirations are 4e and Basic/OD&D.
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| # ¿ Jun 1, 2012 23:22 |
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D&D Baka Edition This document is my official entry for the June 9th deadline of a one-page outline.
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| # ¿ Jun 2, 2012 07:04 |
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Thinkin' about races, here's my rough design sketch of them right now. RACES * All races have a single ability. This ability should be able to be utilized by everyone. Doesn't matter your class or role. * Some races should be semi-pushed into specific classes, not by mechanics, but by fluff. Example: Dwarves lean towards lawful alignment, as do clerics; dwarves make natural clerics. * Racial abilities should be broad enough so that "dwarf fighters" aren't unquestionably the best * A bit of leeway is fine in balance! Maybe the dwarf ability for clerics is better then the elf ability for clerics. So long as one doesn't overshadow the other, we're still good So, a (very changeable) example: DWARVES Long before the rise and fall of the Empire of Man, the dwarves were forged by the gods to be their weapon against the armies of chaos. Though the influence of the gods have faded since the Empire of Man was formed, most dwarves continue to be lawful by nature. Dwarves live in a strict hierarchy with little to no allowance to pass from one social structure to the next. Dwarven adventurers tend to be either followers of Law, out to cleanse the world of chaos, or those few dwarves who don't fall comfortably in the hierarchy and desire something else with their life. All dwarves lean towards Lawful alignment Dwarves have the racial ability Dwarven Resilience. Dwarven Resilience The dwarves were not merely birthed; they were forged in the anvil of the heavens and fashioned to stand as a wall against the traitorous armies of Chaos. Once between rests, a dwarf can as a free action call up this divine strength and grant himself a defense bonus of +X against a single attack. ~*~ So there's dwarves as they currently stand. They are fluff wise pushed into being Lawful without it being mandated, and their racial ability is usuably by anyone who is being attacked (which could basically be anyone period). Obviously the math isn't in there yet, but hopefully this makes for a good guideline for myself on the other races.
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| # ¿ Jun 2, 2012 22:53 |
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Hey now, basic fluff is important too. D&D has always had a basic setting it takes place in with the core books, just usually not that deeply explained. Having that basic fluff is pretty necessary.
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| # ¿ Jun 3, 2012 03:06 |
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Gau posted:It would be brilliant if people keep us updated as to their progress! The work-in-progress posts are one of my favorite parts of this thread. My skill system is pretty much done aside from me hashing out a guideline and list of some sample difficulties. I also need to start going through class utilities and how they interact with skills, since my ideal is for classes to provide both in-combat and out-of-combat abilities. For combat mechanics, here's what I'm thinking now: 1) Completely flat attack bonuses. ENTIRELY flat. You roll 1d20+bonuses, and those bonuses are few and far between, most of them coming from your class. Your AC equally never changes, and monsters - ALL monsters - generally have a semi-flat range of AC. A level 1 fighter can hit a level 20 dragon. 2) As was previously mentioned, monsters divided into three groups. Vermin are minions pretty much straight out. However, they can be used for more then just blood pinatas though, such as for bait or for hunting down other monsters. Beasts are your normal fights and encounters. Rather then go with finding armor and weapons just sorta laying around, my idea is that small or temporary "magic" equipment can be "harvested" from beasts. Elites are incredible solo monsters with large immunities and a few small but crippling weaknesses. Powerful or long-time magical equipment can be forged from elites. Elites are "puzzle fights" that you need to prepare for in advance. To kill a dragon you might need to research it's weak points (where it has soft scales, weakness to a certain poison, etc), kill a group of salamanders to fashion suits of heat-resistant armor, lay poisoned bait at the foot of it's cave, and ambush it. Combat rules are the same though with different emphasis for the three types. Vermin can either be done through simply combat if you're just trying to go through them, or though skill checks if you're trying to use them otherwise. Combat against beasts is for the most part simple standard combat. Combat against elites involves monsters who you can't ordinarily hurt unless you go through to exploit their weakness. So for that dragon example, though it could have standard AC, it might be immune to all damage unless you know to hit it's weaker, softer scales, it's breath is nearly instant kill unless you have the right sort of armor, it might simply fly away unless you bind or take out it's wings, etc. The goal of hitting these weaknesses isn't to turn the fight into easymodo but to make it a normalized fight instead of unwinnable. Right now I'm looking at a "3d6+1d20" system, where the only dice you need are 3d6 and 1d20. In this system, hit rolls is a d20, damage is 1d6 (upgrading to 2d6 or 3d6 depending on abilities or circumstance), and skills are 2d6 (3d6 take best two if you're trained). There are different weapon types but, rather then doing different damage, they have different catches that work with abilities. This is my leaning more towards BECMI then 4e; while you get upgrades to your damage with various weapons and abilities, it's not a HUGE change. Instead you rely more on scaling abilities to make a difference in damage. I'm deeply considering group initiative rather then individual, and I'm looking at a few different options for how combat is presented, such as 13th Age and jTTG style engagement, or OSH's arena rules. As far as classes go I want something of a mix of BECMI and 4e with one catch - very little in-combat healing. Fighters will overwhelmingly get offensive abilities, clerics get more defensive ones, wizards stand somewhat in-between. Wizards have the classic semi-Vancian spell slot system. Fighters get stamina, which works similar to power points, with a few differences that I'll go into later. Clerics... Clerics are giving me a bit of trouble. I still need to decide on how they do their resource management. One thing I also wanted to do was give ways to heal your resources without resting, though these would be few and far between. Still haven't made up my mind on this one.
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| # ¿ Jun 4, 2012 21:56 |
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Let's talk crescendos. One idea I have is that either every level or every other level, in order to level up, you must do something properly mythic. At high levels this could be slaying a dragon or defeating an evil warlord, but at low levels it could be killing a troll or banishing chaos from a forgotten temple. This is where Elite monsters come in. Mythic events do two things: first, as mentioned, it could be your level cap. But second, it's how you increase your character ability beyond simple chargen. As I have it now, at level 1 every player games one "Feat." These are generally meant to be non-combat stuff like the one Rulebook mentioned on speaking to birds. After that, you gain feats by doing mythic things. If you kill a dragon, the fighter forges a spear and armor from it's teeth and scales, a cleric uses it's bones to make armor and a mace, but what about the wizard? The wizard eats it's heart to gain it's knowledge. These are meant to be the big crescendos of an adventure - rather then ending on "And then you get a +3 sword!" it ends with you drinking the troll's blood. Mythic events don't have to be capstones either. They can be something you do on the way to a greater event. Before fighting the dragon, the fighter baths in the pools of iron to increase his durability. The cleric, on clearing the temple of chaos, is given a boon by the gods ( or the warlock, in removing a despotic dictator, is given a boon by the demons ). Feats, then, are meant to be far more interesting then +1 attack. In general, I'm leaning towards saying that every X levels a character should gain one feat. The chargen rules will come with a selection of level 1 non-combat feats to provide a "catch" to each player, and the adventure will have those feats and a few others tied to specific places and events to be gained. Right now I have feats pegged as mostly being non-combat based - either cool new abilities that make the level 1 feats (such as befriending the harpy queen to learn how to speak to birds) or increases to attributes which ties into skills (eating the dragon's heart grants wisdom and intelligence, bathing in the river of iron grants strength).
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| # ¿ Jun 5, 2012 00:49 |
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Utility Powers Welcome to the black hole that is "I don't know how clerics work." SO! Utilities! I've mentioned a few times that class gives both combat and non-combat abilities. As keeping with classical D&D-isms, rather then put these on separate tracks, they're going to be on the same. That is to say, your wizard can totally just fill all spell slots with more "utility" based spells and rely entirely on their cantrips for damage. Fighters...well. We'll get to that. WIZARDS Wizards are the most unchanged class so far. They have their spell slots, generally lower armor that can be raised at the cost of buff spells, and aside from Bulwark Wizards lean towards big group attacks. But what about utilities? With each class I wanted to set in a sort of "philosophy" regarding utilities and how they interact with skills. Wizards, classically speaking, don't. So I'm keeping that. Wizard utilities bypass attributes entirely. Knock opens a door without any need for a dexterity roll. Jump gives them astonishing acrobatics without any need for a strength roll. Expeditious Retreat lets you run at high speeds without rolling constitution. The first problem of course is that spell slots are limited and you cannot change what spells are in them until you rest for the night - even stuff that lets you regain spells only lets you regain those exact spells you've cast. The second problem is that all arcane utility spells have a flaw. Knock is VERY LOUD and takes time. Jump gives you little to no actual control of your jump. Once you cast Expeditious Retreat, you're going to be running until the spell ends. This means arcane spells always work. Always. Even when you don't want them to. FIGHTERS Fighters have long had a few problems with utility. Namely, they ain't got any. However, with the attributes as skills system, fighters are just as skilled as anyone else. So if wizards can simply auto-succeed at anything, what about fighters? Fighters are rooted in the physical. They're not magical hoity toity fuckoffs, they're swole and fast and smart normal people who are extraordinary because of how swole and fast and smart they are. So if wizard utilities are based around ignoring attributes, fighter utilities are based around increasing them. A wizard casts Knock, a fighter pushes her dexterity to inhuman limits. A wizard casts Jump, a fighter reaches into her inner strength and hurls herself upwards far more then any other woman could. Generally, fighter utilities are based around either momentarily switching attributes (using intelligence to count as dexterity for example) or in momentarily boosting their attributes (for the sake of one check, increase strength by X) Clerics I have no loving clue. Seriously I like never play divine characters. This is easily going to be my biggest problem.
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| # ¿ Jun 5, 2012 01:21 |
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Potsticker posted:I just have to keep reminding myself that it has to be a D&D specific Fantasy Heartbreaker and not just a cool boardgame/TRPG hybrid. It's making me second guess some of my choices in design. I dunno, I think it makes an interesting added challenge. For example, I more or less dared myself not to use healing surges, and the end result of that is leading me down very rare and uncommon healing in general so that a restriction on it simply isn't needed. It also lead me to kill the HP rollercoaster in fights, which I think is a good thing. For me the general challenge is to find a nice halfway point between BECMI and 4e while adding in influences from other games. It's fun!
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| # ¿ Jun 6, 2012 01:45 |
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Evil Mastermind posted:I've found it helps to go through the old editions and find the stuff I really liked from them, and then figure out how to combine them. I've found the secret is to, basically, do the opposite of 5e. 5e is based around grabbing mechanics willy nilly in hopes it will spark some distant faded memory of when they were happy as a child, desperate to avoid the crushing depression of years lost and wasted around a cheeto stained table. Instead, look at what works philosophically in older editions and think about how those can be expressed to avoid past pitfalls.
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| # ¿ Jun 6, 2012 04:13 |
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Progress Report on Character Generation * All three classes are down as well as their resource type and general theming * All roles for fighter done * Two roles for Wizard done * Basic combat and skill mechanics done * Dwarf done Major bits still to be done by Monday * Class abilities * Last two wizard roles * All four cleric roles * Human needs to be done * Elf needs to be done * loving class abilities * Level 1 feats to be done * More complex combat rules to be done QUESTIONS Does any of this have to be in .pdf form? How...required are pictures? Am I allowed to blatantly steal pictures from elsewhere?
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| # ¿ Jun 8, 2012 04:40 |
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Once the character module is complete, how allowable is it to go back and make changes if we are unsatisfied with how it turns out along the way?
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| # ¿ Jun 10, 2012 05:47 |
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This is the first part of my character module. This is class, race, alignment, etc, etc - everything but actual spells or powers and the like. Hopefully I can finish that before the deadline tonight. https://docs.google.com/document/d/...54Xt_cRb5g/edit
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| # ¿ Jun 14, 2012 02:32 |
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Dropping out. I have way too much on my plate right now, trying to ensure I get a specific job, and a ton of poo poo that all just sprang up on Sunday. Trying to go through character abilities at the last moment killed it. Hope what ideas I did have will help someone. I'll still work on it a bit and hopefully eventually finish up, but I'm not going to be making any deadlines while I have all this training to pull through.
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| # ¿ Jun 14, 2012 04:22 |
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Gau posted:Sorry to say it, guys, but I'm cancelling the contest. Some of us even managed to do both!
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| # ¿ Jun 14, 2012 05:11 |
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Catastropost posted:Hey, hey guys. I ran into a wall when I hit power creation, and frankly I have way too much on my plate now to work on this anyways. When I first started I had a lot of free time, but on Sunday I learned I had to do 100+ hours of TEFL training by July, which has, let us say, hampered my free time significantly. Thus, me dropping out.
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| # ¿ Jun 14, 2012 07:34 |
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A game without combat isn't too hard. A game without dice, that one's a bit more challenging.
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| # ¿ Jul 21, 2012 01:53 |
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| # ¿ May 18, 2013 22:34 |
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TK-31 posted:Better yet, a game without randomization. Now we're talking. I'm actually really tempted to make a game with no randomization on the player's end.
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| # ¿ Jul 21, 2012 02:43 |
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