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I wasn't part of the Kickstarter and have only just purchased the game, but I wanted a thread so here we are. I'll work on adding some art and junk when I get a chance. Here's the dev's summary blurb:quote:Unity is an Indie Tabletop Roleplaying Game set in a new and unique world that blends epic fantasy with a flavourful dose of magick-infused technology. Unity focuses on telling spectacular stories while emphasizing teamwork with a combat engine that allows players to combine their powers and develop interesting synergies for a deep and fulfilling tactical experience. You can buy the pdf right now and pre-order the physical book, which is due to ship in late September. https://unity-rpg.com 44-page free preview pdf: http://unity-rpg.com/extras/UnitySamplerv10.pdf Unity definitely borrows a lot from D&D 4e, but bases its core mechanic around rolling 2d10 instead of 1d20. By default players roll all the dice for attacking and defending. It trims the attributes from vanilla D&D down from six to four (Might, Agility, Mind, and Presence) and you directly mark down your bonus instead of dealing with raw attributes. The core book has four playable races:
Races only provide a small variance in base stats and a small racial power; both of these can easily be replaced or set aside if you don't want to bother with the default choices in the core book. The book presents nine character classes:
From a first pass through the book, I feel the classes do a good job of teasing out some flavor of the core setting without getting locked into specific jargon that would restrict transplanting them into another world. I think they can also all be reskinned to fit other archetypes pretty easily if that's what you're into. While there are effective equivalents to at-will and daily powers, the explicitly per-encounter powers of 4e are replaced with small resource pools of 6-10 points that fuel powers that typically cost 2-4 points each. These resources are recharged by a few points whenever they roll doubles on their 2d10 (or match two dice when they have a Benefit and get to roll three and pick the two highest) as well as from rest and a few other sources. I have yet to play obviously, but on paper it seems like a fun way to put some fun types of flow and variance into combat. Hopefully some of the folks who were in on the kickstarter and have gotten to actually play this will chime in! whydirt fucked around with this message at 00:43 on Aug 25, 2018 |
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Aug 24, 2018 18:36
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Thanks for doing the heavy lifting.  Just grab assets from the Kickstarter page for art and stuff; it's what I was planning to do.
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Aug 24, 2018 19:11
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So from the kickstarter updates, we know there's a few other races coming as stretch goals in their own supplement. The Skulkers: Totally not Skaven. Sarathi: Lizard-people. Nazirim Fell-Touched: So we heard you liked Tieflings. Dhampir: Vampire-descended humans from the part of the world where a magical accident spontaneously turned an entire country undead overnight.
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Aug 24, 2018 19:12
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I just noticed that different classes get different combinations of attack and defense rating bonuses as they level. Not sure how I feel about that since I assume that as in 4e that accuracy is king in combat.
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Aug 24, 2018 20:52
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this looks real good. can't wait to play a version of 4e with framerate issues.
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Aug 24, 2018 21:13
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From my first pass through the classes, I feel like the War Priest variant and the Judge are too similar to one another. I realize that coming from D&D where the Paladin and Cleric exist side by side that it's part of the genre, but given how many other sacred cows Unity took away I'm surprised this one remained. It doesn't help that the Judge's powers don't really speak to me; it definitely reads as the least interesting of the nine class options. At the same time, I feel like squishing the war priest and chaplain options together means that each side has fewer useful power choices than other classes.
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Aug 24, 2018 23:27
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How 4E like is it? Do you need miniatures or some other method of keeping track of tactical positioning/etc?
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Aug 24, 2018 23:37
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Tactical positioning and power ranges are based on distance bands. Adjacent - Within melee range Nearby - At most one move action away Far - At most two move actions away Very Far - At most three move actions away Enough powers care about positioning for range and splash effects that I'd personally want a dry erase board or other gridless mat to keep track of things for bigger fights, but pure theater of the mind could easily work for smaller fights or a dedicated group. There's a nominal option to add a grid in the GM section, which just turns each band into a radius of squares.
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Aug 25, 2018 00:31
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So more like how 13th Age or Exalted 3E handles movement. Sounds okay to me then, I'll look into it more.
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Aug 25, 2018 00:39
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There's a 44-page preview pdf on the website that gives a decent taste of the game. I'll add a link to the OP. http://unity-rpg.com/extras/UnitySamplerv10.pdf
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Aug 25, 2018 00:42
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Going over the priest I'm...pretty sure the only power it affects is whether they use sacred bolt or holy strike? Plus both of them are mind-based vs the judge's might-based. Which unlike 4E also affects what they roll for their basic attack. Besides both being holy flavored, the priest's stuff is almost all about healing as a secondary effect to doing damage. The Judge is more like a mix of 4E Paladin and 4E Warlord-a lot of their powers have riders and upgrades that give bonuses or share buffs. (Also I actually like the Judge's "I turn into a goddamn orbital strike" ultimate.)
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Aug 25, 2018 01:40
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I hope my book gets here soon. I will have more cogent thoughts about it afterwards.
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Aug 29, 2018 20:12
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Doesn't look like my store can get this in so I'm prooooobably gonna pick the PDF in the next couple weeks. Loving the art direction.
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Aug 30, 2018 04:33
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After some time to sit with the pdf, I’ve got some more thoughts to share. I dislike how the daily Overdrive powers share the same character building and resource points as regular powers. Without generous use of benefit on player rolls or energy potions, most characters use up their resource in 2-3 powers, which means basic attacks make up a larger slice of the action economy if fights take longer than 4-5 rounds. The general perk that lets you both get crit damage and recharge and overdrive on a double 10 should just be the default for characters. It seems like a trap feat otherwise since a player could realistically go weeks or months without a natural 100 on a attack roll. The one that lets you help downed allies without provoking attacks seems like it should be a default rule as well. The other general perks also just seem kind of bland (more HP!) or narrow (anti-poison!) overall. I’d be tempted to just have everyone effectively take Jack of All Trades to bump a non-primary stat since even casual casual layers will likely find it hard to avoid optimizing their PC by bumping their primary stat (why aren’t these capped like Core Paths?). Alternatively, I could see going DTAs and decoupling the default AR and damage bonus from attributes and give everyone the max theoretical bonus so they can play a smart Sentinel or muscle Mystic if they want. Every class has so many ways to avoid or mitigate provoked attacks that I get a sense that they might not be worth the rules headspace to track in practice. I also dislike characters using the same resources for doing proactively cool things as avoiding penalties. Maybe it plays out better than it reads.
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Sep 2, 2018 11:43
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I got my hardcover today. I'm ready to dive in. e: If I can do a pretty simple conversion, I'm hoping I can make it work for a Zeitgeist sequel campaign. If not, I'll stick with 4e. dwarf74 fucked around with this message at 22:41 on Sep 26, 2018 |
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Sep 26, 2018 22:30
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