DC's New RPG Outline

[DragonChild]

So I'm thinking of working on my own 3e-ripoff RPG. This thread is to discuss general ideas and as a make-shift journal, also to

keep my thoughts together and to get feedback as I go. Here are the primary things I intend to do.

Basic System

First - this game is going to be a heroic fantasy 3e rip-off. It primarily uses d20 stuff unless otherwise noted.


Ability Scores

These don't exist! Easy!


Races

Wonderful menagerie of fantasy races, I'll likely take more inspiration from Josh's green-porn races than typical fantasy. I'm thinking each race will have about three bonuses/abilities they have access too. Nothing too complicated, and these abilities should leave them open to being the majority of classes. You shouldn't feel you can't place a class as a specific race, nor should you feel a class has a "best" race. Races should be like neat per-arranged feat groups.

I'm considering each race will have three abilities - a primary offensive, a primary defensive/healing, and a primarily mobility/utility/skill based one. These abilities can be active or passive, and will always remain useful. They are, however, generally either situational or of limited use.

More powerful races can swap out some skill bonuses (that skill you would have had at +5 is instead at +0), require feats, have a minimum level, or all of the above. They never take away from actual class levels.


Classes

This is where things get complicated and interesting. I've considered the path/job sub-system, but I don't think I want it. Simply put, I think it's much easier to write up individual classes that don't have to worry about weird interactions. "Multiclassing" type stuff can be handled with feats (below).

So what I'm going to do is make it so each class is a strong, unique thing. Think Fire Mage, but with a bit more customization. For example, as a Paladin, you get to choose some of your immunities ("Strength of Health" for poison and disease or "Strength of Mind" for charm and compulsion?), and you slowly pick up auras off of a list, gathering more and more. You get a bunch of class features based around smiting evil while defending and healing allies. There are no class features where you select if you want to be a melee defender or a teleporty offensive guy - those are totally different classes.

Each class needs to have a strong flavor idea and a strong mechanical idea. They must be distinct flavor wise but ALSO distinct in their mechanical aims and roles. For resource management, different classes will be on different types of "schedules", but it's more that they have different things to fiddle with. Some warriors work on stances, some spellcasters have to cast spells in a certain order to get big effects, others get special bonuses for layering down two spells on the same guy, etc. Nobody will be on a "per day" limit. I may not even have a true "per encounter" limit, either.


Skills

There will be a long list of cool skills. Players will get a variety of choices like...

Set 3 skills to be 5+level.
Set 5 skills to be 3+level.
Set 5 skills to be +3.
Set 2 skills to be -2.
The rest are at +0.

Powerful races might do something like: "You must put a 5+level skill on Athletics" or "Lose one of your 5+level skill choices, instead put it at +0."

I'm not sure how fast I want skills to scale. I'm currently considering +1/2 level, +level, and +2xLevel.


Feats

Feats are going to be radically changed. No more do any feats that give a passive mechanical bonus exist. From now on, feats ONLY give new abilities. Feats both give onto your old stuff (take a feat to give you another paladin aura, of which only one is active at once, or take a feat to make lay on hands ranged), or give you new stuff (take a feat to give your paladin an arcane barrier with their shield).

Overall, a LOT of feats might be class dependent, or class-type dependent. Some, like the "Arcane Guardian" are a sort of mini-class that you have to be of a specific class list (namely people with heavy armor and shields) to be in. Others are just open to everyone. Spend a feat, get a lightning sword, yay! Feats, basically, are where the lost ability customization and multiclassing are made up on.


Magic Items

Magic Items will not exist in a +X way. They will be special, awesome rewards you find while dungeon crawling and whatnot. There will be stuff like FLAMING SWORDS that turn your sword damage to fire and set people on fire holy shit. But it's not going to be +3 more accurate, or whatever. It'll just be on fire.


Monsters

Monsters are tricky. Basically I'm going to separate out the important mechanical types (archers, brutes, minions, leaders, whatever) similar to 4e. And make a huge ass table, actually balanced, saying what their unmodified bonuses are at that level. Then you choose X abilities from a huge list (akin to 3e astral constructs, only HUGE) depending on the monster, and maybe get "free" traits to throw on to, like BIG (+damage and health, -accuracy and defense). Then I write up a bunch of example monsters and have more easy to make.


So stuff I need to consider:

-Setting. This is a different thread, and very complex and hard.
-Do I want some defenses to be rolled, or all of them to be passive?
-I'm going to need a skill list. Never easy.
-How fast do skills scale?
-How many classes is too many? Is there such a thing?
-How will feats even be organized? I can use HTML, so lots of pages in a nice linked web can be convenient.
-What monster types are important to have? How do I set this up?
-Does anything stand out as being a bad idea? Are there any flaws in my plan?

[TarkisFlux]

The skills question is rather big. Are their uses going to be competing with class abilities (even if they lag behind a couple of levels)? Are they going to become obsolete at higher levels? Should some characters be vastly better at some skill things than others? How much of a difference in power does a few levels make? If skills are just another form of abilities, you really need to know how your abilities are supposed to grow and change with level before you can make any sort of reasonable attempt to map skills to that.

[Username17]

-Do I want some defenses to be rolled, or all of them to be passive?

Rolling defenses makes things more random. Unless you want something to be specifically the thing you do when you're outclassed because it might work anyway - you probably should have all defenses static.

-Username17

[Dean]

^ agree

[DragonChild]

-Do I want some defenses to be rolled, or all of them to be passive?

Rolling defenses makes things more random. Unless you want something to be specifically the thing you do when you're outclassed because it might work anyway - you probably should have all defenses static.

-Username17

True. Actually, let me clarify, because I DIDN'T make that clear, I knew what I meant but didn't type it.

-Do I want to use the 3e system, where attacks are rolled for physical and defenses or rolled for magical, or...
-Do I want to consolidate things like 4e where the attacker always rolls?

It's largely a flavor thing. I'm leaning towards the 4e system, just for the sake of everything working the same.

[Echoes]

-Do I want some defenses to be rolled, or all of them to be passive?

Rolling defenses makes things more random. Unless you want something to be specifically the thing you do when you're outclassed because it might work anyway - you probably should have all defenses static.

-Username17

True. Actually, let me clarify, because I DIDN'T make that clear, I knew what I meant but didn't type it.

-Do I want to use the 3e system, where attacks are rolled for physical and defenses or rolled for magical, or...
-Do I want to consolidate things like 4e where the attacker always rolls?

It's largely a flavor thing. I'm leaning towards the 4e system, just for the sake of everything working the same.

Heh, a lot of your OP touches on stuff I've been pondering recently. Here's some random musings.

People like rolling attacks, and are OK with missing sometimes. On the other hand, people hate failing saving throws. Ergo, static defenses = more happy players.

Also, make sure the level coefficient you use, whatever it is, is the same across the board. Personally, I like 1d20 (or 3d6) + 1/2 level + mods for attacks and skills vs. 11 + 1/2 level + mods for defenses (assuming you want a 50% baseline chance of success), but really so long as the co-efficients are the same you can use whatever one you like. Just don't do what Saga did and have skills and defenses advance at different rates but expect people to roll them against each other - that shit was just fucking stupid.

[Bihlbo]

People like rolling attacks, and are OK with missing sometimes. On the other hand, people hate failing saving throws. Ergo, static defenses = more happy players.

This has certainly been my experience.

[Josh_Kablack]

Ability Scores

These don't exist! Easy!

So what do "everything else" checks fall under?

Level+0 checks? skills with defaulting rules? magical teaparty?

Classes

This is where things get complicated and interesting. I've considered the path/job sub-system, but I don't think I want it. Simply put, I think it's much easier to write up individual classes that don't have to worry about weird interactions. "Multiclassing" type stuff can be handled with feats (below).

So what I'm going to do is make it so each class is a strong, unique thing. Think Fire Mage, but with a bit more customization. For example, as a Paladin, you get to choose some of your immunities ("Strength of Health" for poison and disease or "Strength of Mind" for charm and compulsion?), and you slowly pick up auras off of a list, gathering more and more. You get a bunch of class features based around smiting evil while defending and healing allies. There are no class features where you select if you want to be a melee defender or a teleporty offensive guy - those are totally different classes.

Each class needs to have a strong flavor idea and a strong mechanical idea. They must be distinct flavor wise but ALSO distinct in their mechanical aims and roles. For resource management, different classes will be on different types of "schedules", but it's more that they have different things to fiddle with. Some warriors work on stances, some spellcasters have to cast spells in a certain order to get big effects, others get special bonuses for layering down two spells on the same guy, etc. Nobody will be on a "per day" limit. I may not even have a true "per encounter" limit, either.

This sounds really interesting. And also like such a huge amount of work to design and get into something like balance that I myself wouldn't even consider doing such a set up.

Skills

There will be a long list of cool skills. Players will get a variety of choices like...

Set 3 skills to be 5+level.
Set 5 skills to be 3+level.
Set 5 skills to be +3.
Set 2 skills to be -2.
The rest are at +0.

The approach is sound, but my concerns are that with a long skill list, you need to make sure the skills are both balanced against and distinct from each other for character differentiation, while being careful not to go so far that adventures fail if nobody has a particular skill.

You also have a potential issue in that you have both static and scaling-with-leve skill bonuses. So if you want all skills to be equal, then all skills need to have both some static DCs and some scaling DCs.)

Powerful races might do something like: "You must put a 5+level skill on Athletics" or "Lose one of your 5+level skill choices, instead put it at +0."

Interesting.

I'm not sure how fast I want skills to scale. I'm currently considering +1/2 level, +level, and +2xLevel.

Slower scaling means that PCs can face a larger range of opposing leveled obstacles, the game can have more levels before things go off the RNG, and makes leveling up characters much quicker.

Faster scaling means that leveling means more. In this setup PCs can only face a narrower band of opposition, and that levels are less "empty"

Feats
Feats are going to be radically changed. No more do any feats that give a passive mechanical bonus exist. From now on, feats ONLY give new abilities. Feats both give onto your old stuff (take a feat to give you another paladin aura, of which only one is active at once, or take a feat to make lay on hands ranged), or give you new stuff (take a feat to give your paladin an arcane barrier with their shield).

I'm not sure I fully understand what you mean here.

Isn't allowing the Shield bonus to AC to now also apply to Saves via Arcane Barrier pretty much the same as a feat that just provides a passive mechanical bonus of +N to Saves...?

Overall, a LOT of feats might be class dependent, or class-type dependent.

Then should they be counted as "feats" or should they be organized into something closer to 4e's selectable class powers. Or even 3e stuff like the ranger selection of combat style or sorcerer spell selection

Some, like the "Arcane Guardian" are a sort of mini-class that you have to be of a specific class list (namely people with heavy armor and shields) to be in.

So an actual mechanical use for the "role" concept? I'm down with that.

Others are just open to everyone. Spend a feat, get a lightning sword, yay! Feats, basically, are where the lost ability customization and multiclassing are made up on.

Curious if you're going the route of "lots more feats to pick" or the Tome route of "each feat means a lot more"

Magic Items

Magic Items will not exist in a +X way. They will be special, awesome rewards you find while dungeon crawling and whatnot. There will be stuff like FLAMING SWORDS that turn your sword damage to fire and set people on fire holy shit. But it's not going to be +3 more accurate, or whatever. It'll just be on fire.

So does that add +1d6 fire damage or does it just allow the sword to count as piercing, slashing, or fire damage?

Monsters

Monsters are tricky. Basically I'm going to separate out the important mechanical types (archers, brutes, minions, leaders, whatever) similar to 4e. And make a huge ass table, actually balanced, saying what their unmodified bonuses are at that level. Then you choose X abilities from a huge list (akin to 3e astral constructs, only HUGE) depending on the monster, and maybe get "free" traits to throw on to, like BIG (+damage and health, -accuracy and defense). Then I write up a bunch of example monsters and have more easy to make.

Another good idea that I'm glad someone else will be doing the work for.

-Setting. This is a different thread, and very complex and hard.

Can you give a ten-words-or-less summary? That should color some of your mechanics decisions?

-Do I want some defenses to be rolled, or all of them to be passive?

The most popular options are likely either the 4e system of "all defenses passive" or the SAGA/UE variant of "players roll all dice". 1st-3e's system of "roll a save vs magic (sometimes)" is ass.

-I'm going to need a skill list. Never easy.

-How fast do skills scale?

-How many classes is too many? Is there such a thing?

If you are having distinct mechanic and flavor for each class and not allowing multiclassing, you probably need a metric fuckload.

-How will feats even be organized? I can use HTML, so lots of pages in a nice linked web can be convenient.

-What monster types are important to have? How do I set this up?

Going with Tzor's football metaphor for roles, monsters roles could be set up something like:

• Blitzers - these guys rush the squishiest PCs and try to use melee to make ranged attacks a poor choice. For iconic D&D monsters, Displacer Beasts are a good fit here, with their odd mobility and reach powers.
• Blockers - these guys limit the PCs mobility. In football, this means big heavy burly guys, but in D&D it just as often means someone with a web ability as a ogre with a spiked chain
• Coverage - these guys counter ranged attacks and big plays. Most versions of D&D are really lacking in this type of opponent, having at best miss chances against range, weak ranged counterattacks or limited healing. They really should have auras of deflection, spell counters that can protect their teammates and the ability to redirect ranged fire back at PCs.
• Safeties - these guys can perform any of the above roles to a limited extent. They shift into whichever role seems best against the PC attack plan.
• Coaches - Not actually playing these guys are about analysis and planning. For iconic D&D monsters, this is the evil wizard watching via crystal ball in his tower while he sends his minions forth.

[DragonChild]

So what do "everything else" checks fall under?

Ugh. I forgot background stuff. I was ALSO going to shave Shadowrun style background skills, where you get to write down two or three things on your character sheet like "Really good cook", "Can play the lute", "Blacksmith", or "Farmer". There will be some rules for that that are heavily magical tea party.

Anything that actually REALLY matters for a challenge will have an assigned skill.

Anything that someone could only want to do on the side ("I want to see who's the better lute player!") can just be a level-check, with like a +X if you have it as a background or can bullshit your way into using an appropriate skill.

This sounds really interesting. And also like such a huge amount of work to design and get into something like balance that I myself wouldn't even consider doing such a set up.

Honestly, I find it much easier to design a "Marshal", "Paladin", and "Bulwark" class than I do a single "Commander" class with splits for all three types.

You also have a potential issue in that you have both static and scaling-with-leve skill bonuses. So if you want all skills to be equal, then all skills need to have both some static DCs and some scaling DCs.)

True, I didn't consider that. The static bonuses were mostly just there to keep some variety in the numbers, and to make character sheets look less monotonous.

Slower scaling means that PCs can face a larger range of opposing leveled obstacles, the game can have more levels before things go off the RNG, and makes leveling up characters much quicker.

Faster scaling means that leveling means more. In this setup PCs can only face a narrower band of opposition, and that levels are less "empty"

There's also the tricky part that for skills, 1d20 is a pretty small range. If it's +1/2 per level, that means that a level 20 character only has a +10 on a level 1 character. So the level 20 character's worse result is the level 1 character's average... and the level 1 character's best result is the level 20 character's average. That's way too small.

So faster scaling means you can have more "awesome" skill actions without having unskilled commoners able to do them.

Isn't allowing the Shield bonus to AC to now also apply to Saves via Arcane Barrier pretty much the same as a feat that just provides a passive mechanical bonus of +N to Saves...?

Yes. But in this case, Arcane Barrier would be something like...

Arcane Barrier: As a move action, you may create an arcane bubble surrounding you. You and all creatures adjacent to you gain all sorts of energy resistances.

So yes, that's a "passive" buff. But it takes a move action and requires positioning. As long as I'm smart about how each class plays with the action economy, I should be fine. That's one of the reasons I want to limit feats the way I do - some classes might get very different results out of different types of actions.

Then should they be counted as "feats" or should they be organized into something closer to 4e's selectable class powers. Or even 3e stuff like the ranger selection of combat style or sorcerer spell selection

There will be a few cases of 4e's selectable class power stuff in the actual classes. But a paladin might have, like...

Lazer on Hands (makes Lay on hands ranged, paladin only)
Smite makes Bright (anytime you use your smite, all nearby darkness powers are dispelled. smite ignores concealment of all sorts, paladin only)
Meteor Rush (requires shield, allows a charge/bullrush/trip combo type attack. heavy armored shield characters only)
Arcane Barrier (settle down to magically protect allies in a bubble, defense-shield characters only)
Guardian Angel (auto-stabilizes at low health, some sort of benefit when you go down in combat, holy classes only)

Some of those might be a little too passive benefity, namely the first two ones. However, I think that as long as they're a choice between "Be better at your existing schtick in RARE CIRCUMSTANCES, letting you apply them to more situations" and "Gain a whole new schtick/power that can be applied to all new situations."

It's like, it's OK if you give a Fire Mage a feat that lets them cast Flame Bolt in melee, because it'll be up against powers that let them cast Ice Bolts, or that let them have Electric Touch attacks. But it's never OK to give Fire Mages a feat that lets them deal more damage on Flame Bolt.

Does that make more sense? I know what I want to do, but I'm having problems wording it usefully.

Curious if you're going the route of "lots more feats to pick" or the Tome route of "each feat means a lot more"

Lots of feats to pick, but they'll be organized in pretty tight themes. I still intend to have them a LOT more "noticeable' than 3e/4e, though.

So does that add +1d6 fire damage or does it just allow the sword to count as piercing, slashing, or fire damage?

The latter. The flaming sword lets your sword deal fire damage, and it maybe has some property that's like:

"Whenever you threaten a critical hit, you can not roll to confirm and instead just set your enemy on fire!"

So yes, having a magical sword will be mechanically superior to not having it. That's totally not avoidable. But I don't want players to feel like they NEED magical equipment on all their slots and whatnot, and instead just be happy with trying to use and apply what they find.

Can you give a ten-words-or-less summary? That should color some of your mechanics decisions?

No. The idea is still forming. Originally I was going to do all of this with my homebrew Drakonas setting, but I'm starting to wonder if it has too many terrible ideas created when I was 13 to be useful anymore. So I'm trying to piece together a few different ideas on locations and cultures I have until I get to a coherent whole. I roughly know what "power level" or "awesome level" I want, but that's hard to define in words.

[Josh_Kablack]

I roughly know what "power level" or "awesome level" I want, but that's hard to define in words.

Okay then, how about pictures?

Closer to

or to

?

[DragonChild]

Honestly, the power level of the Sharn Watch classes is kind of what I'm going for.

[tussock]

-Do I want some defenses to be rolled, or all of them to be passive?

You should always get a usable defence on the character sheet. Things that drain HPs the attacker can roll, because you can have more HP, and are busy doing subtraction anyway. Things that impose conditions on you, you get to roll. Not getting a defence you have some sense of control over is bad (4e gives you duration checks, but yuck).

-I'm going to need a skill list. Never easy.

C&C uses 6. Strength, Dexterity, ... you get it. 1 class, 1 pick (+1 for humans). Multiply that by how pointlessly complicated you want the choices to be.

-How fast do skills scale?

How high level does a Rogue need to be to ignore pleb guards, vs a Wizard doing the same thing with a spell?

-How many classes is too many? Is there such a thing?

Chunking. 5-7 classes is a comprehensible choice, but 4-5 sets with 3-6 classes each is too (even if they have 5 options in each class), because you can step through the choices.

-What monster types are important to have? How do I set this up?

All of them. You write, and you don't stop. Use your own favourites to start, ones you have a good feel for how you want the tests to play out.

-Does anything stand out as being a bad idea? Are there any flaws in my plan?

Monsters by table. "There will be stuff like FLAMING SKULLS that scream terror and set people on fire holy shit. But it's not going to be +3 more AC, or whatever. It'll just be screaming terror." Make the table, just don't use it. The odd padded sumo or glass cannon is good for changing up the gameplay, giving different characters the spotlight.

Feats giving abilities. The potential there being that there's 100 cool things for your character class to do and your character can't do 97 of them. Much better than feats being a choice to matter or not, but, take care to have characters that can do the things they should do, no matter what. Also, don't make a point buy game where every choice has the same cost, they don't work even when the costs vary.

[DragonChild]

So given those more thought, and decided on some more framework stuff, that I need to finish to continue.


Damage Types

There are six so far, not counting physical. Not sure if I want physical to be on its on, to only apply vs a DR type thing, or what. But these six are:

Fire: Good vs icy foes, bad vs fiery ones.

Ice: Good vs fiery foes, bad vs icy ones.

Electricity: Good vs amorphous foes, like shadows, water elementals, and oozes. Bad vs "solid" foes, like earth elementals and iron golems.

Force: This is a combination of "arcane" and "sonic". Good vs "solid" foes like earth elementals and golems, also punctures through arcane barriers and similiar. Bad vs amorphous foes.

Radiant: Needs a better name. Contains holy light, burning light, blessed swords, etc, but is not necessarily "good". Good vs undead, bad vs plants and something else. Objects?

Necrotic: Needs a better name. Contains poison, negative energy, withering curses, rusting grasps, etc. Is not necessarily evil. Good vs plant creatures and... something else, I don't know what. Bad vs undead.



Ability Descriptors

Not a lot of detail here yet, but...

Fire, ice, electricity, force, radiant, necrotic ; stuff for the damage types

Magic ; a vague overall "Can this be dispelled?" tag

Weapon ; to let you know it's a [W] type attack.

Push, Blood, Curse, Teleport, Mind-Effecting, Trick, Poison, Divination, Barrier, Charm, Illusion; A lot of these will be cut, but just some ideas for now. Namely, I need to figure things that'll actually need to be reacted to or interacted with.



On Abilities

Everyone gets three actions a round: Standard, Move, Minor.

Some abilities are "Channeled", and require an action to be spent each turn to maintain it.

Some abilities are "Interrupts", and are also tied to one of the three actions. An interrupt can either be "prepared", in which case a specific interrupt must be named, and that action must be used or, OR it can be used and will "take away" from your action next turn.



On Designing Monsters

I want a system to easily and quickly design monsters that doesn't HAVE to be adhered to, but makes life easier for the DM.

There will be a giant chart that includes; Level, HP, AC, Saves, Attack bonus, "at-will" damage, and skill bonuses for monsters of every level.

All monsters then get a (and only one) TYPE: Human, lava dragon, plant, earth elemental, incorporeal undead, mindless undead, wild beast, etc. This gives some modifiers to the base structure, namely resistances, bonuses and penalties to base stats, etc.

All monsters then get a (and only one) BODY: Humanoid, quadruped, winged humanoid, bird, etc. This namely provides movement speeds and some things based around that.

Monsters then get to choose a (and only one) TRAIT: These are modifiers like "brute", "mentalist", "ferocious", "archer", and so on. These provide more necessary adjustments, namely making sure brutes are tough and easy to hit, mentalists are squishy but with high will saves and stuff, etc. These are intended to be a lot more "Monster role" type choices.

Finally, monsters get POWERS: They get more of these based on levels and importance, and powers DO stuff. Lots of examples for powers will be given.

[Josh_Kablack]

So given those more thought, and decided on some more framework stuff, that I need to finish to continue.


Damage Types


Radiant: Needs a better name. Contains holy light, burning light, blessed swords, etc, but is not necessarily "good". Good vs undead, bad vs plants and something else. Objects?

Maybe bad vs "shiny" foes like will-o-the-wisps, lantern archons, and prismatic ropers ?

On Abilities

Everyone gets three actions a round: Standard, Move, Minor.

Some abilities are "Channeled", and require an action to be spent each turn to maintain it.

Some abilities are "Interrupts", and are also tied to one of the three actions. An interrupt can either be "prepared", in which case a specific interrupt must be named, and that action must be used or, OR it can be used and will "take away" from your action next turn.

In this set up you need to make preparing an interrupt use a cheaper action than aborting to an interrupt, otherwise it will be objectively inferior prepare in most cases.

Also, it's worth considering whether adding the 3e "swift action" type interrupt to the 4e action sequence would be a net gain in the calculation of rules clarity vs. potential option paralysis. There is something to be said for having a distinct "interrupt" action-type which can be used anytime during the round instead of having a mish mash of powers which are "interrupts", "reactions", "zones", "aborts" or "readied actions"