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Quadratic_Wizard posted:Collected a few thoughts on the game. I've only had a rough look at the rules, so this analysis could be full of misconceptions. Class Die and HP It's been said earlier in the thread, but basically classes with smaller Class Dice get more tricks to avoid being attacked, whereas classes with more HP tend to just do "CON-based" tanking. It's definitely hard to balance and probably needs testing to get it right, but the "easy" solution of bringing everyone more towards the middle just seems dull. The other thing with that is I've never much liked the arbitrary nature of some of the numbers/modifiers you typically see in RPGs; using class die was always sort of a thought-experiment as to how far I could go with ripping those out. This is the same idea behind Expertise, (that, and rolling 1s sucks); as you mention, like, yeah a +1 gives roughly the same math but to me it's just bland. It also leads to inflation. Dice Mechanics Some good points here, I would just clarify that Power Attack is limited to basic attacks, which are only ever going to be one attack at a time (unless I've accidentally put "Basic" into the text where it shouldn't be.) For example, the Monk has a clause where their Flurry of Blows is multiple basic attacks, but if you Power Attack, you do it once for the whole action, kinda thing. I think it ends up not that clunky, overall  Skills Having worked out the skill math, here there was never going to be a whole ton of valid +maths. Like, +1d10 and "+1d6 with Expertise" work out roughly the same. So, some classes get "+1d10 with Expertise" for the few skills they're meant to be SUPER good at, but that's meant to be very limited. The alternative is to up the DC and end up stacking more dice to compensate, but I'm not sure I like that. Combat [Initiative] I wanted something more engaging than just a DEX check or a straight random roll. At one point there were a handful of distinct skills that could be exclusively used for initiative checks, but then my thinking turned more towards "when does a fight actually start?" (mostly brought up by 5e's poor implementation of Surprise and Stealth) so I migrated more towards the current model. The initiative draft is mostly spitballing, in its current form. [Reliable] This is one that's always drawn ire, but what came up in the last playtest is that I don't want much of a whiff factor. Like, either you: a) Attack multiple times, so you're always doing some damage (probably) b) Attack once and hit, for [damage] and [effect] c) Attack once and miss, for [damage] Through playtesting, basically Reliable got cut down from 'everyone all the time' to basically just damage-focused classes/specs and high-Class Die classes. Engaging, Disengaging, and Provoking [Healing] I think again, the swinginess is a case of "the cure is worse than the disease" in that you have to add a bunch of resource management subsystems to make it any more engaging. The basic idea is I wanted a simple way that the party gets worn down but as long as they win the encounter, they can keep adventuring in some capacity. Skills in Combat Again, this is a recent re-draft. I think Break Objects is potentially good, I might have to walk it back to being its own action. In any case, you have to stick your attack in order to do any damage; skill uses themselves don't do HP damage and require a separate check. Encounter Guidelines Hopefully the previous post addresses this a little. Resource Management I think the points you bring up here are very valid and poignant, I'm just not sure it jives with the intents of the system (which I should probably expand on.) If anything, I think that I come out on the other end of the spectrum; the game has crept towards a complexity I never really intended it to have, but only in one direction. So the game ends up feeling like it needs to branch out more in all directions, when if anything I think I would want to take what's there and go back to basics. quote:Without that, you’re left with pseudo-4e characters that are running on fumes, relying on a handful of at-wills and passive feats. Class Design I think I should probably lay out what I want the game to do, because it explains a lot of why none of this stuff is already in to begin with. The idea is for this to be a very ground-floor entry-level RPG for people new to the hobby. Why? Because the advice that's often given out for people interested in playing RPGs is often "find people you already enjoy spending time with, then teach them to play." I feel like D&D has too many moving parts, a steep learning curve, and the barriers to entry are daunting. But, if the idea is to get people comfortable with D&D-style gaming, they have to be eased into the complexity of it in some fashion, i.e. the more *World-style games go too far in the other direction and aren't "crunchy" enough. The hope here is that I've created a few, simple mechanics that are broadly applicable and easy to pick up, but that the specific implementations of them require a little bit of a learning curve to get the hang of, and do so in an engaging way (hopefully nothing too daunting, though.) All that said, "character creation and advancement" is thus intended to be fairly binary, and non-existent, respectively. It's meant to be more of a "pick up and play"-thing than any sort of lego-bricking experience. (On that note, if the fun is in the roleplaying, then I want the game to have just enough mechanics to actually be a game; getting people to the table is where the fun starts to happen, so speeding up/simplifying char-gen options is meant to facilitate that.) Now, you could convincingly argue that not introducing inexperienced players to "the character creation mini-game" is doing them a disservice for if/when they do branch off into more complex systems; that falls more under my personal preference though -- I often just want to jump in and play, rather than be given a dearth of options to sort through before I can start having fun and/or planning out your build to 20 levels. (Similarly, this is why the game is gridless; some people enjoy drawing maps, I'm not one of them.) I feel likewise with resource management. It's a fun mini-game that can/should be in more complex games, I just don't think this game is one of them. That's also part of why it's written in a more "natural language" sort of way, rather than 4e power blocks; the abilities are "if/when [this], you can always [this]" and sort of implies or imparts what you would get out of a specific feat+power combination, but it's just served up for the players in a more easily digestible way. It also helps to define the fighting/playing styles of each class; if you have an ability that says "you get +math when you ____" the players are going to try and do ____. As long as it's evocative of what the class does in fluff, I think that's a good thing to encourage. I think the target audience is people who liked some of the "quality of life" improvements of a 13th Age, 5e, or even Dungeon World, but with more of the crunch and tactical ideas of 4e, just without the numbers bloat and feats. That's the type of game that many people in the 5e thread seem to be talking about wanting. I often think of TNP as an attempt at taking the concept of Essentials, but executing it better, and killing a bunch of sacred cows along the way. That's why I had the idea of "Iconic Abilities" -- you're boiling down a 4e class to its "essentials" like Twin Striking, for example; the playstyle is evocative whether you're doing an at-will "two attacks; 1[W] damage each" or an encounter-power "two attacks; 2[W] damage each." I think keeping the target number math simple also helps with keeping the game moving fast, particularly with easy numbers like 10 and 20 (and sometimes 15.) I think the "unstable framework" comes from this game basically being a response to the criticisms of the last game I drew up. Everyone's math was similar, and the game was fluffless, it was just all a bunch of mechanics that you pieced together, in a very "build your own class" sort of way. With The Next Project, I wanted to go the other direction, to come up with identifiable class concepts, and then build them in mechanically interesting ways that fit with the core mechanics (d20 + Class Die being one of them.) As an aside, the idea I have for another game is basically "taking the best of both worlds" from the two systems I've done. Class Die is a straight-jacket, but it's also a design choice that I think can be hammered into shape. Like, HP should be a simple enough thing to fix, for starters; probably a flat 10 or 15 in addition to class bonus, for example; an earlier version had HP rolled at the start of each day, so under that idea, something like 1d20(expertise)+Class Die(advantage) would produce similar results.
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Nov 8, 2015 21:18
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I have just stumbled upon this thread, and I find your rule set really interesting. Mostly because I have been working on a similar system based off of DnD5e. I have a couple questions about your design philosophy, and I was hoping you'd take the time to answer them. I think a lot of my questions can be answered this sentence in your last post, "The idea is for this to be a very ground-floor entry-level RPG for people new to the hobby." But I was hoping you could go a little more in depth, if you find the time. Why have you completely abandoned Leveling up? I always love the feeling of getting stronger. I play TRPG's for the story and hanging out with friends, but that little addition of character development on paper always felt fun when it coincides with my in-story character development. Why have you removed Basic Ability scores or attributes? I read the thread, and somewhere you stated you wanted to remove all math from the game. I'm curious if you could go into more detail? Why use a Class Die mechanic? With out having any leveling in the system, there seems to be even less important. An entire class is really balanced around their Class Die. Classes with a bigger die will just have less options available because they are just statistically better. If you give all classes the same amount of utility, but some class have a greater Die, then the system encourages players to only play the classes with the largest Die. Otherwise you must balance the class against their Class Die, which limits utility among the higher die Classes. The Warrior and Warlord are going to be limited to the powers the class receive because they have much more damage, and numbers. At its core, the same problem that normal DnD has always had, that martials have less utility than casters. Wouldn't it be just as easy to make all classes use the same HP, and Damage dice? Are you working on any sort of equipment or item system? I've always loved items that change up mechanics of the game. +1's are boring, and definitely have no place in your system, but is there going to be a place for that unique game changing artifact? Or is that going to be limited to flavor stuff only? I really like what you have so far. Some of the mechanics I'm in love with. Thanks again! EDIT: Most of my questions where answered in the post above me. Sorry, I reread your post I asked my questions, this time with them fresh in my mind and realized they where answered. Huckabee Sting fucked around with this message at 22:26 on Nov 9, 2015 |
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Nov 9, 2015 21:50
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Huckabee Sting posted:Why have you removed Basic Ability scores or attributes? I read the thread, and somewhere you stated you wanted to remove all math from the game. I'm curious if you could go into more detail? I'll address this one even though you struck it out. There's lots of problems with ability scores. Like, 4e made them really "paint-by-numbers" so as long as you put the high numbers where the framework told you to, your math worked out. It was basically a layer of obfuscation and the numbers ended up feeling superfluous. 5e does more of the "older" style, where you have a bit more freedom in how you can do your ability scores, but it doesn't end up making it a lot more interesting. For example, a +3 mod and Prof is always gonna be better than a -1 mod and Prof. 4e pigeonholes what skills you can be good at, by locking in what ability scores you need in order to be combat-competent, and then goes on to further gate it behind Class Skill lists. 5e sorta lets you pick your weapon stat, but is less flexible about your AC stat, and ends up in the trap of making a few ability scores supreme above most others. Getting rid of it all allows for combat math to be simple and transparent, and also allowed me to assign skills more flavourfully (which I think Class Skill lists are meant to do, but fail at, partly because of ability scores.) Huckabee Sting posted:Why use a Class Die mechanic? With out having any leveling in the system, there seems to be even less important. An entire class is really balanced around their Class Die. Classes with a bigger die will just have less options available because they are just statistically better. If you give all classes the same amount of utility, but some class have a greater Die, then the system encourages players to only play the classes with the largest Die. Otherwise you must balance the class against their Class Die, which limits utility among the higher die Classes. The Warrior and Warlord are going to be limited to the powers the class receive because they have much more damage, and numbers. At its core, the same problem that normal DnD has always had, that martials have less utility than casters. Wouldn't it be just as easy to make all classes use the same HP, and Damage dice? I've mentioned it elsewhere, but it was mostly a design-challenge/thought-experiment that I wanted to use as a way to restrict myself. Like, if you can just assign any size/shape of HD to your classes, it's almost too easy to design 
I also didn't like how 4e and 5e seem to arbitrarily use die-shapes for things. Granted, I'm sure the reason comes down to "because math" or "tummyfeels" respectively. But the Fighter having a d10 hit die and Superiority Dice starting going d8->d10->d12 (see also: Bardic Inspiration) or Divine Smite adding d8s of all things... 4e Implement powers using damage dice that were pulled out of thin air -- I was just like "why?" So, instead I drew from some older mechanics for inspiration. A wizard in 3.5 had a d4 hit die, and Magic Missile has pretty much always been a d4 (modded) for damage. Bam, make a class around that. Same for Rogue, and as I've mentioned in the thread, d6 is a great die to design mechanics around using lots of, because most people will have extra ones from their pantry of boardgames. In-home tabletop play has always been an influence. All that being said, I think part of the fun/challenge is to build classes around different dice, that offer comparable utility and damage, but just enough obfuscation that they don't feel the dreaded 'samey," which gets applied (often unfairly) to 4e classes. So like, a Warrior might do d12s of damage, but I tried to keep that to 1 or 2 of them per turn, whereas a class with a d4 for damage will be attacking a lot more, or a d6 Class will stack lots of them together. At that point, the mechanics are almost writing themselves, and it's all built on a simple idea; from there it's just a matter of dressing it up. Huckabee Sting posted:Are you working on any sort of equipment or item system? I've always loved items that change up mechanics of the game. +1's are boring, and definitely have no place in your system, but is there going to be a place for that unique game changing artifact? Or is that going to be limited to flavor stuff only? I think the thing with equipment is that it would almost have to not be +1s, the problem being most of the +math mechanics are used heavily in the class abilities. This is also a problem I was having with ideas for "feats" or with spreading things over levels; you'd basically be just de-constructing class mechanics, and making them harder to get/gating them to higher levels. To directly answer your question, I have not worked on any items, in earnest. I think if they were to be included, they would basically have to be either flavour stuff, as you say, or else something that grants access to a (probably very-minor) new ability. I mean,  but if there's some other way to skin that cat that I'm overlooking, I always take suggestions  Huckabee Sting posted:I really like what you have so far. Some of the mechanics I'm in love with. Thanks again! Thank you! I enjoy discussing the system, so any chance to answer a post other than my own, is appreciated Are there any particular mechanics that stick out as good/bad? Also, have you had the chance to read over each class, or just a few particular ones? What stuff caught your attention in that regard?
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Nov 10, 2015 06:45
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HP and I'm spitballing some ideas for new ways of determining your maximum HP value, and I think I kind of like this one:
b) the maximum value of your Class Die Now, any increase in the HP baselines will necessitate changes to how you regain HP. As has been mentioned recently, earlier drafts of the rules had players roll their HP to start each adventuring day. That might return, as an option post-"day 1", but I also think re-rolling your HP after every encounter might be a good replacement for the current rules (namely, regaining Class Die[Disadv] if you are Dropped, Class Die[normal] if below max HP) The other thing to consider is existing Abilities that restore HP. Most of them either set your HP to your max, or let you "overheal" by adding a Class Die roll to your current HP. I think keeping the values as they are would be ok, but for spammable HP restoration abilities, the "overheal" clause would probably have to be removed. The alternative is to have in-combat healing work the same as out of combat/setting your HP at the start of the day; this kind of approaches a unified Healing Surge mechanic, which probably isn't a bad thing either, although it also means "all heals are big heals." Edit: Another idea might be to give each class a number of Healing Surges per day equal to the maximum value of their class die: to spend surges, roll a Trade-off; gain the bonus as HP, subtract the penalty from your remaining surges.  Suggestions? P.d0t fucked around with this message at 11:34 on Nov 10, 2015 |
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Nov 10, 2015 11:13
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Updates/Changes I like that HP change enough that I've instituted it into the encounter math, as well as the main doc. This should give DMs the flexibility to use several different damage expressions, rather than limiting it to 1 or 2 points at a time. Also updated the section on Simple Monsters, because PCs can probably do closer to 3 HD of damage per round. Other changes/suggestions I've put into the docs recently:
Warrior: changed Adventuring skills a little bit Rage: changed "disadvantage on d20s for Defense" to "use Class Die with Expertise in place of d20s for Defense"; this might suck if a Trickster is using it, so something to keep an eye on Martial Superiority: Warriors now have Expertise on all Trade-offs Arcane Aura: I didn't like the Swordmage version that much, and it was mostly a response to their low HP; with that fixed, I gave them something more in line with what I wanted Warlord: changed the background skills a little bit Defender: Can take damage OR make a basic attack if an adjacent ally takes damage HP: changed how much you get at the end of an encounter; full if you survived, roll a d20 if you were dropped School of Trickery: teleportation now removes most status effects
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Nov 13, 2015 18:28
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Also, i just noticed/realized that Deception probably doesn't fall under "Combat" skills, since Agility already includes Stealth  So those skill usages suggested there will probably... go away. I think probably at some point I should work out some hybrid-encounter rules/DM advice, where you're dealing with traps or pleading for help, whilst in the middle of a fight; this is where Detection and Deception skillsets would probably get some additional mileage (if they even needed any.) Also, I'm thinking about ...mounts?
P.d0t fucked around with this message at 22:47 on Nov 13, 2015 |
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Nov 13, 2015 22:44
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P.d0t posted:Also, I'm thinking about Don't. You should probably leave mounts to be flavor thing. Background stuff without crunch.
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Nov 13, 2015 23:57
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I think I might want it to be something more cinematic rather than mechanical, i.e. that scene from the Lord of the Rings where they're fighting worg-riders and poo poo Gets Really Real. But we'll see. It probably wouldn't have to by much more complicated mechanically than like, "while on your mount, you have High Ground and you do not Provoke by moving." The other I'm thinking of opening is new archetypes.  Now, doing one new archetype for each class would mean 10 new archetypes; instead, I'm thinking maybe do 5 archetypes, each applying to 2 (or more?) classes. Early ideas: Mage/Mystic ->  HexbladeRanger/Druid ->  WardenMonk/Paladin ->  Cleric/Friar?Rogue/Trickster ->  ...swashbuckler?Warrior/Warlord ->  Any ideas/requests/suggestions on that?
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Nov 14, 2015 00:16
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P.d0t posted:
Gladiator. Combines the combat and martial prowess of a warrior, and the inspiring presence, maybe dressed up as theatrics, of a warlord that plays up to an audience.
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Nov 14, 2015 05:40
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Before I get too carried away on that, I really do need/want to finish the Druid. So, using the 4e shaman as a foundation for the 2nd archetype, it gives some ideas for a Bear, Panther, and Eagle spirit companion. That's great! It lines up very well with Generic Octopus' shapeshifting druid's forms. There are a couple problems, though: 1. I don't feel like the 4e stuff is particularly evocative or flavourful. The Panther stuff in particular feels like it lends itself more to a pack animal or something, and some of the other powers are +healing when you heal. With healing being somewhat rare in TNP, I'd basically have to staple 4e leader heals onto a class that's already not really meant to fill that role, in this system. I need to find some mechanics that fit more with the game system, for instance, maybe allies who are adjacent to the Panther spirit become Hidden? 2. The class still feels like a spirit companion with a pet shitfarmer. Most of the interesting things the class does involve the pet attacking/standing in the right place, and the Shaman itself is fairly secondary. it just seems weird and.. off. I'm not sure what I can add or change to remedy this. 3. It has the Summoner-class problem. The 3 animal forms can work for both a shapeshifting Druid and a spirit-summoning Shaman, but that only goes as deep as the title for the abilities; mechanically, they aren't going to have anything in common, so it'll be like writing 2 separate classes worth of powers, that just happen to have the same power names and class skills. I do really want to get the first 10 classes finished before moving onto anything bigger, but I'm really hung up on how to resolve this. Any help or advice would be appreciated.
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Nov 19, 2015 04:52
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P.d0t posted:Before I get too carried away on that, I really do need/want to finish the Druid. This is going an entirely different direction than what you stated as a plan, but if that's giving you trouble I've got an idea for a neat inversion on the Druid. Where the Druid is a man who takes the form of nature, the Swarm is nature that has taken the form of a man. As a Swarm, you are composed of vines, or worms, or rats, or some other plant or animal, that has come together to gain a strange consciousness and take on the shape of a man. Swarm [Not sure on Skills, probably ] Iconic Ability: Swarm Shape As a minor Action you may switch between your Iconic Abilities Engulf or Disperse. Iconic Ability: Engulf [Concentration] Special: When you activate this Enemies Engaged with you become Grappled. (This ignores the normal limit of one target per grapple.) Special: When an enemy becomes Engaged with you, it becomes Grappled. (This ignores the normal limit of one target per grapple.) Special: When an enemy breaks a Grapple with you, it Withdraws. Iconic Attack: Consume As an Action you can make a melee attack against each enemy you are Grappling. If every Attack is successful, roll your class die and heal that much. Iconic Ability: Disperse [Concentration] Special: When you activate this you Withdraw. Iconic Defense: Squirming You have advantage on Defense rolls. When you succeed on a Defense roll, you become Hidden. Iconic Attack: Spread As an Action you can roll your class die and make Melee Attacks against up to that many Enemies. These attacks do no damage. Also I'm not the person who created the rules for Grappling, and if those are something you don't want to include, I can see doing Engulf another way, but it seemed like a relatively convenient way to do what I was envisioning so I went with it.
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Nov 19, 2015 06:40
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P.d0t posted:There are a couple problems, though: Honestly, trying to replicate the Shaman feels pretty close to the Beastmaster you already have written. I mean I get there's a difference between a ranger dude & his dogbearbird, and a guy summoning a nature spirit to wreck face, but mechanically I'm not sure there'd be much difference. If you were still gonna try at it though, a slightly different tact would be to make the spirit the primary battlefield participant while the summoner uses their actions to grant it various buffs & whatnot (probably like, summoner has minor action stuff to do, spirit has normal action stuff to do). This bumps up against problem #2, but done right you can end up with an interesting pair of characters. It might seem "off" because a lot of characters have some measure of personal strength and are self-sufficient to a degree, while this sort of PC would be comparatively weak & codependent on the spirit. But this only really matters if the player thinks of their PC as just the summoner, instead of the summoner and the spirit(s); you kinda have to think of them together, otherwise yea, it might leave a weird taste to just be the dude who's major contribution is "asking for help from someone/something else". For #3, if you go with the idea that the Shaman does minor action stuff to buff the spirit, you could then go with the idea that the Shapeshifter uses it's minor to shift between forms (maybe with some benefit for doing so), while the Shaman calls a spirit buddy and can grant it various aspects as a minor action. So like, a shifter in the form of a bear and a spirit with the aspect of the bear would be similar/the same, but you could then apply archetype-specific differences.
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Nov 20, 2015 21:51
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Just a spitball idea that I'm writing down for the sake of not forgetting later, but what if you came at it from the angle that Shaman is largely meant to be an enabling sort of leader class, akin to the Warlord. You could then say that the Shaman uses spirits that ~possess~ other party members and grant them buffs and/or directed attacks and such.
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Nov 23, 2015 00:06
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Is an animal companion that important? to me a druid class is more about changing all or part of themselves into an animal more than has a pet.
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Nov 23, 2015 01:19
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The existing text is exactly that; I want each class to have at least 2 archetypes, and the "shamany druid with spirit pet" is the 2nd archetype I'm trying to staple on.
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Nov 23, 2015 02:13
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I'm going to take a sabbatical from working on TNP until the new year-ish. I'll still be keeping an eye on the thread, so please continue to post comments or questions here edit: Brief Update/Design Thoughts I'm thinking the Druid will have to end up as "just" a shapeshifter, and the Shaman archetype will have to show up somewhere else later, if at all. I also think the Fighter archetype is a little superfluous as it's currently written. It either needs completely new (and interesting) mechanics, or it should just be scrubbed. The Trickster is probably broad enough that it could be broken down into smaller pieces/among multiple classes. I think the divide between a "knowledge" bard and a "performance" bard is something that could be explored, but would probably mean an expansion of the game's status effects/conditions (think "Pied Piper" for inspiration.) The Sorcerer Archetype doesn't really use the "Lucky Number" mechanic in interesting ways; it's basically just "you're a mage or you're a warlock, and also Fireball." It could probably stand to have some unique mechanics added on and be made into a full class, or else it might be a good candidate for a "hybrid" archetype. Other than the classes/archetypes mentioned above, I think all classes are at least playtest ready.I anticipate that playtesting would reveal some changes needed with the following:
Rogue: Scout archetype Mystic: clunky trade-off stuff Warlord: OP  Monk: too fiddly? P.d0t fucked around with this message at 21:38 on Dec 1, 2015 |
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Dec 1, 2015 20:52
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Alright, in case anyone was wondering, I postponed work on TNP until after the holidays because I got a laptop for Christmas! Yay me. Topics of interest: 1. P.d0t posted:So after having read the first 7 pages of [the "Powered by the Apocalypse"] thread, I want to ask if I should consider turning The Next Project into a PbtA hack. 2. Assuming the status quo, are their any game terms/mechanics that need to be cleaned up? I feel like if I were to make a big index of game terms, one that would be at the top of my list is "maximum damage"; it gets referenced a few times but isn't really concisely explained in any one spot. As for mechanics, I think the recent change to HP could be refined, but as a side-effect of it, probably most healing powers need to be re-examined, along with the Zeal trade-off mechanic. Anything else that should be made a priority?
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Dec 30, 2015 06:41
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Trickster I'm thinking I'll get rid of the Skald archetype, and maybe use its mechanics somewhere else, if I find the right fit. I... just don't like it, where it is As I said before, I feel like I should expand on the Sorcerer archetype, so having the Trickster be purely a mage will probably help the class coalesce a little better. Rogue Likewise for the Scout; the Ranger version doesn't translate that well to a d6 class, and if I get rid of it and the Skald, then every class has 2 archetypes. I do kinda like the idea of a Rogue that specializes in the more scouty/rangery skills, but as above, maybe it'll fit better somewhere else.
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Jan 4, 2016 05:20
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Re: PbtA I mean if you really want to, but personally, I don't think the world needs yet another pbta game. Maybe it's just me but all the variations I've seen don't actually change much of anything from the core "2d6+X" mechanic, so all I'm left with is a set of basically identical games that differ only by flavor & the "moves" someone thought up (or renamed from another source).
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Jan 7, 2016 16:20
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Upon doing a little more reading on the subject, I'm not sure it's a good fit. TNP leans heavily on traditional crunchy combat, whereas PbtA is starting to head in the direction of "one roll resolves an entire scene." As a matter of personal taste, something more fiction-driven with a focus on character and personality, certainly appeals to me. But maybe that's something for the next next project.
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Jan 7, 2016 19:09
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Stealing 5e Ideas (more) The recent Unearthed Arcana article brings back the Scout as a Fighter archetype which kind of got my gears turning a little bit. TNP's current Barbarian archetype for the Warrior class leans in the primal/nature direction; I've always thought of a Scout as either a primal/nature-ish Rogue (3.5 influence) or a TWF Ranger (Essentials) So maybe the Scout archetype in TNP could find a home as a Warrior archetype. I was also thinking about the Healer feat in 5e, and it's almost the 4e Leader role (except that it's an Action rather than a Minor, and it's once per party member per encounter, rather than 2/encounter.) Sentinel is similarly meant to encompass a large part of the Defender role. Might it be beneficial to separate out "Role" abilities where they currently exist, and make them so they can be applied to any class, in the style of Strike RPG (or my own The Unnamed RPG)?
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Jan 15, 2016 23:33
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Class Slates as Power Sources Earlier in the thread, I had considered "class dice as flavour"; 4e tried to do (roughly) one class for each Role+Power Source combo. I'm thinking/wondering if this is something that TNP could do, but instead have the combination be Class Die and Power Source. For example, Power Sources might be Divine, Martial, Arcane, and Primal; for each power source, there would be 1 class for each die (d4,d6,d8,d10,d12) The reason for this idea was that I keep finding myself with stray archetypes that don't quite fit, and I do want to find ways to include them all -- it may be necessary to expand the roster of classes, while slimming down the classes themselves. It might also be a useful way to group classes to fit a campaign theme, as well as separating the game's content into smaller chunks of related ideas. Where 4e D&D has it's PHBs with classes from several power sources, and then each Power Source has it's own "players options" book, I would ideally like to stick with just the latter. Example Power Sources: Arcane d4 - Wizard d6 - Bard d8 - Skald d10 - Warlock d12 - Swordmage Divine d4 - Monk d6 - ??? d8 - Cleric d10 - Paladin d12 - ??? Primal d4 - Shaman d6 - Scout d8 - Druid d10 - Ranger d12 - Barbarian Martial d4 - ??? d6 - Scoundrel d8 - Archer d10 - Warlord d12 - Fighter Shadow d4 - Necromancer d6 - Assassin d8 - ??? d10 - Blackguard d12 - Deathknight Any suggestions for filling in the empty slots, or entirely revamped class lists?
P.d0t fucked around with this message at 08:40 on Feb 1, 2016 |
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Feb 1, 2016 08:37
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It seems weird to me that Warlock would favor Arcane over Shadow, even though I know that's how it worked in 4e. Maybe move Warlock to the d10 Shadow slot and Assasin to the d8? Especially if the latter gets some sneak attack/poisons/shadowdancery powers. You could replace the Arcane slot with some kind of striker (Elementalist/Evoker/Warcaster/whatev) assuming Wizard is retaining its role as controller. A d4 Martial could maybe be a Strategist? I'm thinking a controller that gives buffs and debuffs depending on battlefield positions, though that could get really fiddly. Part of your trouble is you've got 4 roles to fill while using a base of 5 damage dice and 5 power sources. Each power source is going to have to have one extra of a role, and you still have one left over.
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Feb 1, 2016 09:16
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Wow, it's been almost a week already; time flies! Anyway, I think that TNP isn't necessarily married to the 4e "role" system, as mentioned upthread, here: P.d0t posted:I'm actually less enamoured with the idea of "Role" in a 4e sense, for this game. There's a few reasons why, but I suppose that's probably academic at this point. The problem with hard control was actually a matter of discussion quite recently, in the 4e thread. For power sources, while I think it'd be nice to have "shadow" as one, I'd probably just stick with the 4 others; as a class, Blackguard would have to be built out and expanded upon from being a Paladin archetype. But then that leaves the question of "what does a Deathknight do that a Blackguard doesn't?" The Assassin sorta presents the same quandary; you could probably just keep it under Martial. As development has shown, Necromancer could maybe be a hybrid archetype. So if you have 4 Power Sources, then I think 4 roles become more manageable (assuming you want to keep with that conceit.) The reason being that 4e's power sources tend to each favour one role (Arcane = control, Divine = leader, Martial = striker, Primal = defender [I guess?]) so you could have each power source "double dip" on its role specialty, maybe? P.d0t posted:Might it be beneficial to separate out "Role" abilities where they currently exist, and make them so they can be applied to any class, in the style of Strike RPG (or my own The Unnamed RPG)? This is another design question that needs to be answered: Should archetypes inform role, or should role be a separate layer of character-building? What do dice do? This is something that probably needs to be more clearly defined, specifically d8s, but d12s to a lesser extent as well. d4 - attacks more for smaller damage, provides a small +math bonus, or a small pool of resources (i.e. Ki) d6 - single attacks with stacking damage (Rogue), or a short table to roll on (Trickster) d10 - single attack with stacking damage (Warlock), as well as lots of "roll twice" abilities such as trade-offs So what should d8s do? Well, Ranger as a d8 HP class dates back to 3.5, and for melee a d8 longsword or scimitar (particularly with Twin Strike) is pretty iconic of 4e, or a 5e longbow. The decision to make Druid a d8 class was a fluff choice, since skill-wise, Druid is basically to INT what Ranger is to FORT. But what should be the sort of noteworthy mechanic of d8, that other, new d8 classes could be built off of? Similarly, d12 sort of holds down the "has lots of HP/hits like a truck" spot, and the Warlord can use it to hand out a huge bonus sometimes. What would other d12 classes do? What might their unifying mechanic be? It might be hard to build 4 different d12 classes without a clear idea of what they do.
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Feb 7, 2016 17:26
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P.d0t posted:This is another design question that needs to be answered: Should archetypes inform role, or should role be a separate layer of character-building? On the topic of Role being a separate layer of character creation, I've had a little bit of an idea, regarding the typical Leader and Defender roles. The standard leader heal could be a minor action, and use the Leader or the recipient's Class Die when restoring HP, whichever is higher. Similarly, the "mark punishment" could be auto-damage using the Defender's Class Die or that of their ally who was attacked (assuming an attack provoked the opportunity.) The reasoning for this is so that the higher CD classes don't become the best at these roles by default, just due to having better class math. As for a controller role, I think it might be wise to take the route that Strike! does and have "does area attacks" and "does status effects" be split. Attacking multiple targets is probably a thing TNP can handle, but I'm less sure about status effect stuff, even if they are single-target. They seem to always end up making solos easier when they should be the most challenging fights, unless you build in workarounds and "Nopes" into their design, which just feels cheap. P.d0t fucked around with this message at 19:53 on Feb 14, 2016 |
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Feb 14, 2016 19:47
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Warrior (Fighter) changes I added in some suggested changes to the Weapon Styles ability, to make it more unified mechanically (each stance using a Trade-off.) HP change? (again?) Rather than go with "roll d20 with advantage; use max CD if higher" for determining HP, I'm now leaning towards "max CD + max d20"  This gives ranges almost identical to 4e's level-1 HP; it'll just be a matter of adjusting healing- and monster-mechanics around these numbers. edit: d6 Class changes I suggested a minor change to the Scout. Skald has been deleted from the Trickster; the original text for the Skald is currently still available here. P.d0t fucked around with this message at 23:40 on Feb 21, 2016 |
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Feb 21, 2016 22:35
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Striker Mechanics? Looking into the idea of roles a tiny bit more, perhaps the status quo of all damage rolls having Expertise could be shifted to the Striker role? This would allow higher-ish damage classes to not have to be rewritten and their mechanics ripped out. More Warrior stuff Comparing the Warrior and the Ranger:
each Ranger archetype has its own ability, and then the class has 2 concentration effects, and 1 Iconic Ability. This is something that the Druid (by poster Generic Octopus) ran off of, and it seemed to "fit." Does anyone have any particular objections to a few classes having 1 (or 3?) archetypes, when the majority have 2? Posting! I'm going to try and post here once a week, on weekends. Hopefully that might get some discussion rolling. P.d0t fucked around with this message at 07:02 on Feb 28, 2016 |
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Feb 28, 2016 07:00
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Paladin I changed Lay on Hands in the doc to a full heal-up; this seems to fit with the new HP calculation and comparable action economy stuff, like Inspiring Words. [edit]: d12 Classes Upthread I had mentioned that d12 needs a distinct mechanic. I'm not sure that entirely describes what I've come up with, but after looking over the Warrior and the Warlord some more, I think it's fair to say that "big HP+big damage" classes need to be melee-focused. It also stands to reason that giving them advantage on damage can be generally allowable, which probably also inclines them more towards building off of Basic Attacks rather than iconic attacks. Dice-stacking classes (d6 and d10) won't have advantage on damage rolls, as rolling it on more than 1 damage die is pretty clunky and not intended in my designs; Eldritch Blast will need to be changed to reflect this, and I'll have to check for other instances, across the text. I like the use of the "Combat Superiority" die for the Warrior, so something similar might appear on other d12 classes in the future. I kind of had it in my head that Trade-offs could be something more for d10 or possibly d6 classes, but I think I like how I have it implemented for the Warrior. I probably won't silo that mechanic off onto specific die-shapes. P.d0t fucked around with this message at 02:58 on Feb 29, 2016 |
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Feb 29, 2016 02:38
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I'm fighting off a cold this weekend, but here are some quick notes:P.d0t posted:d12 Classes P.d0t posted:More Warrior stuff With these ends in mind, I am going to remove the Archery weapon style from the Warrior, and change the class' Archetype abilities to Iconic abilities. I will have to fiddle with the application of the Concentration tag to either Rage or Weapon Styles, or both; to give the Warrior enough knobs to fiddle with, I think Rage should be an option in addition to Weapon Styles, not an either-or. Weapon Styles themselves, obviously, should be exclusive of one another. P.d0t posted:Class Slates as Power Sources Further to this post, with Skald being siloed off from Trickster, as well as archery being moved off of Warrior, in the coming days and weeks, I am going to start trying to stat up some more classes, as inspiration strikes me/as time allows. [edit] Finalized a bunch of changes to the Warrior, so check it out! P.d0t fucked around with this message at 02:17 on Mar 7, 2016 |
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Mar 6, 2016 23:37
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d12's Signature Mechanic Looking over some existing material, I really like the "use a d12 in place of a d20" mechanism that was added into the Rage ability. I did some math on the Warlord's passive buff from Combat Maneuvers, and it was a bit too powerful, so I am suggesting replacing it with this: Warlord (Beta 3) posted:If you or an adjacent ally makes a basic attack without Advantage, roll your class die with Expertise and use the higher of the two rolls; if this roll results in the maximum value on your class die, and the attack is successful, treat the attack as a critical success. So these are the possible outcomes: d20 = 20. Result: Critical hit (always) d20 = 10-19, d12 = 2-9. Result: normal hit d20 = 10-19, d12 = 10 or 11. Result: normal hit d20 = 10-19, d12 = 1 or 12. Result Critical hit d20 = 1-9, d12 = 2-9. Result: miss d20 = 1-9, d12 = 10 or 11. Result: normal hit d20 = 1-9, d12 = 1 or 12. Result: Critical hit
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Mar 7, 2016 00:44
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Posting mostly to say I'm still watching the thread, just haven't had time to really analyze the stuff. Still a fan of the simple mechanics/design goals, keep it up.
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Mar 12, 2016 01:54
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Sorcerer I was just paging through some old posts, and noticed where I had mentioned the Sorcerer needing some more meat to it, and some more uses of the Lucky Number. Here's the suggestion I came up with: Trickster (Beta 3) posted:Sorcerer: For the duration of the encounter, if you roll any damage dice and the result equals this number, you can treat the damage of that die as being its maximum value. If your lucky number is equal to the maximum value of your Class Die, deal 1 additional d20 of damage any time at least 1 of your damage dice results in your lucky number. Also, suggested merging the Bard-specific portion of "Chaos & Luck" into "Inspiring Song" since the Warlord ability now covers most of it.
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Mar 12, 2016 20:02
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P.d0t posted:What do dice do? tl;dr in bold I was thinking about this a little bit earlier today, and I recalled the previous skill mechanic for Ranger: basically (after some errata) it was "when an ally uses one of your [trained/proficient] skills and doesn't have Advantage on the roll, add your Class Die to the skill check." This was in a version of the rules where Advantage and Class Die usage were the main +maths for skills, rather than the current +1d10/+1d6 model. I think this might be something that could be built on; mathematically, Advantage is around +4/+5 and the average on a d8 is 4.5 The interesting mechanic at play here is that in TNP, adding dice to a d20 roll increases the "critical threat" range, since only the total result needs to be 20+ for a crit (not just a natural 20), which, by the way, is one of the nice things about not having the typical extraneous modifiers you see in D&D (like BAB/prof, ability mod, etc.) Previously, this mechanic was used by the Warlord (as mentioned here) but the use of a d12 makes for a much bigger bonus, which is problematic; I think d8 could potentially work well for an "instead of Advantage"-type bonus. This is actually a mechanism that I used in 4e, when homebrewing/converting monsters, as described in this post from the "Retrocloning 4e" thread.
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Mar 20, 2016 09:08
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P.d0t posted:Before I get too carried away on that, I really do need/want to finish the Druid. So with the aim of stimulating some discussion, here's a link to the Druid I began working on, back in November. As you can see, it is mostly just an info-dump of 4e Shaman text, with ideas for converting the mechanics over to TNP, written in the form of suggestions; also, none of the healing mentioned takes into account the new HP calculations. When I get some free time, I want to take a look at this stuff, coupled with the mechanics from my previous post, and see if I can't iron something out (finally.)
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Mar 20, 2016 20:17
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P.d0t posted:Just a spitball idea that I'm writing down for the sake of not forgetting later, but what if you came at it from the angle that Shaman is largely meant to be an enabling sort of leader class, akin to the Warlord. Right now I'm giving some thought to this idea, although we may still see a Shaman/Druid Archetype that uses a pet instead. I think the d8 mechanic is sound enough and can be built out in many ways. As with anything, I'll just need to get writing and things will take shape as I go Posting may be slow until about the 2nd week of April.
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Mar 23, 2016 10:20
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d8 Mechanic In addition to the "instead of Advantage" idea, I think that d8 could be used for something like this:
There are examples of this mechanic currently, in the Scout's "Cut & Run" defense perk, as well some applications of the Trickster's lucky number; d8 works particularly well for this purpose, since its range covers most of the "miss" numbers on a d20. I think this mechanic would generally incline d8 towards a support/leader role when applied to allies, but could just as easily be a situational self-buff, to make for a reliable damage-dealing class.
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Mar 24, 2016 00:39
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Posting About Posting Kind of a disjointed week, but I'm hoping Sunday I will have some free time, and can start working in earnest on a class or two. If not, it'll have to be a week from now.
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Mar 31, 2016 09:44
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Did a minor tweak to the Trickster; when they cast Rage on someone, they use 2d6 for defense. I didn't get around to doing any work on the Druid, but as of right now I'm hoping to have it include a 'leader' archetype to start; if I can work the Shapeshifter stuff into it as I'm writing, then I will
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Apr 7, 2016 09:44
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Lately I've been pondering a few ideas:
Now, this third point wouldn't line up very well with 4e's numbers (unlike the new HP calculation, which lines up quite nicely) -- specifically 4e ranges from 6 to 10 (+CON mod) whereas max(Class Die) would range from 4 to 12. On the other hand, the classes with smaller CD already include mechanics to help them avoid hits; with the new HP calculation, I was thinking of removing or revising these abilities, but if we go with "similar HP, different amounts of Recoveries" for the paradigm, these mechanics can probably stay. Another consideration is that the in-combat heals would be slightly more regular than 4e's Leader heals (2/enc vs. 1 per PC per enc), and also 'surgeless', allowing PCs to need fewer surges. This still means that at the high end on the CD scale, classes will have more Recoveries to play with than their lower-CD counterparts; this probably gives merit to the possibility of letting d10 or d12 classes burn Recoveries to fuel special abilities. This is good, since d12 probably needs more "signature mechanics" anyway The main benefit I hope to garner by doing this/brazenly steal from 4e, is the party always beginning each fight at full HP, thus making encounter building both simpler and more reliable. In one of the playtest, I realized I was manually calculating encounter budgets based on how much HP the party currently had, and that that would have to change each time they started a fight, if they were below full. Making out-of-combat healing restore you to full just simplifies the whole process of it all.
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Apr 11, 2016 00:35
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"A day late and a dollar short," but here is my first completed draft of the Druid (d8), with not 1, not 2, BUT 3 archetypes!  [Shaman/Shapeshifter/Summoner]Will probably need some ironing out over the coming days, but I am going to leave it for now, and hopefully get some feedback to help shape edit: P.d0t posted:Apropos of nothing, how does this sound to people?
P.d0t fucked around with this message at 05:30 on Apr 11, 2016 |
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Apr 11, 2016 03:20
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