I'm newly registered on the board but have been reading entirely too many of the threads recently after stumbling across Frank & K's SRD in my ongoing attempt to find an easier way to do magic that doesn't involve stupid memorization or picking from ridiculously long spell lists of mostly damaged or dumb spells. So far I'm greatly impressed with the level of thought most are putting into the game and accurately articulating how damaged the game really is and coming up with what seem on paper to be real sensible fixes plus providing an intelligent and entertaining paradym for why the world is as it is.
But, while I applaud the efforts I've read here and plan to use many of them for my current game, they are going in the opposite direction to what I actually want to do with the game. For me, the exponential increase in power is what makes the game become stupid. Everything going for enormous damage and having the world segmented into levels of power so that 10th and 5th level players might as well live on separate planets for the purposes of being able to have any meaningful interactions. I want my players to have a reason to throw down their swords when the city guard surround them in enough numbers whether they're 1st, 10th or 20th without having the city guard spontaneous evolve to giant dragons.
The "A Game of Thrones" rpg seems to be moving a bit in that direction for me as it is trying to scale back hit point growth (which when combined with DR armor, defence abilities that are penalized for repeated use in a round, and a near complete lack of magic) looks like high level characters won't be able to wade through the ranks with almost complete impunity. But of course I want magic in my game -- just want them balance it -- so I'm not there yet. Nor have i rung AGOT yet so I don't know if their fixes are actually broken/unwieldly themselves.
So the point to all this: How do we take d20 to a place where we're all just human (or whatever) but still maintain the fantastic? How would you go about revamping the damage creep and broken spells so that players can get better and cooler without becoming gods. IF anyone can recommend ideas or source material to look at, I'd be interested.
Cheers
De munchkining the game
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De munchkining the game
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Re: De munchkining the game
You'll need to totally rewrite the spell system from scratch. Something mildly like Warlock but less sucky probably. And rewrite all the magic items. And rewrite all the monsters. And yeah, that's far too much work for anyone sane to care about doing.
Re: De munchkining the game
Use SW Saga, take out all the futuristic stuff and put in swords. Oh, and give Jedi really low BAB and HD. Done.
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SunTzuWarmaster
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Re: De munchkining the game
A friend of mine used a home-grown system (he'd played alot of rpgs, lots of systems, and had no firm basis on anything), and we were playing in a modern (20 years fom now) world. We had how token representing life-points, and we got 1 every 3 levels and one at first level (like feats). They were red, and, if you exerted yourself (a "re-roll", or something equivalent), would turn yellow.
Each time you were shot, you lost 2 yellow or one red. Each time you were "grazed" (punched, usually), you lost a yellow (or a red got converted).
If someone shot a gun, and hit you, they would have to confirm the hit (80% chance, approx, lowered when you could get more bullets in a round). If someone swung a bat, they would have to confirm the hit (20% chance, approx). If someone swung non-manufactured weapons, there was about a 50% chance that it did nothing, and 50% chance that it took a yellow. Certain magic would lower their chance of hit confirmation (but magic took a red-to-yellow conversion).
There were printed rulings for most weapons (an Uzi was likely to graze you 3 times in a round, a shotgun within range always took a red, a pistol usually took a red at close range). Esentially, with this system, you were never more than 3-4 rounds from dead. Even at level 18 (which we never made it to), you got to have 7 red tokens, which meant that 3 people with Uzis could take you out in about 2 rounds.
Feel free to use/adapt/steal this system, but let me say that knowing you were 1-2 lucky rolls away from death is a bad feeling. However, if you are gearing towards a non-combat game, this is a good way to due it. Personally, among the reason I stopped playing with them (time problems, but mainly I found a solid DnD group) is that I think combat should be about 50% of a session. When, playing in a group of 3 people, someone dies 1 round into combat because the enemy got the drop on you, you are completely screwed.
IMHO, hereos shouldn't walk through armies killing anything in their way any more than they should be afraid of level 1 commoners armed with crossbows. It's a hard line to walk; if you have to choose, I think wading through goblins is more fun.
Each time you were shot, you lost 2 yellow or one red. Each time you were "grazed" (punched, usually), you lost a yellow (or a red got converted).
If someone shot a gun, and hit you, they would have to confirm the hit (80% chance, approx, lowered when you could get more bullets in a round). If someone swung a bat, they would have to confirm the hit (20% chance, approx). If someone swung non-manufactured weapons, there was about a 50% chance that it did nothing, and 50% chance that it took a yellow. Certain magic would lower their chance of hit confirmation (but magic took a red-to-yellow conversion).
There were printed rulings for most weapons (an Uzi was likely to graze you 3 times in a round, a shotgun within range always took a red, a pistol usually took a red at close range). Esentially, with this system, you were never more than 3-4 rounds from dead. Even at level 18 (which we never made it to), you got to have 7 red tokens, which meant that 3 people with Uzis could take you out in about 2 rounds.
Feel free to use/adapt/steal this system, but let me say that knowing you were 1-2 lucky rolls away from death is a bad feeling. However, if you are gearing towards a non-combat game, this is a good way to due it. Personally, among the reason I stopped playing with them (time problems, but mainly I found a solid DnD group) is that I think combat should be about 50% of a session. When, playing in a group of 3 people, someone dies 1 round into combat because the enemy got the drop on you, you are completely screwed.
IMHO, hereos shouldn't walk through armies killing anything in their way any more than they should be afraid of level 1 commoners armed with crossbows. It's a hard line to walk; if you have to choose, I think wading through goblins is more fun.
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Hey_I_Can_Chan
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Re: De munchkining the game
You'll need to totally rewrite the spell system from scratch.… And rewrite all the magic items. And rewrite all the monsters. And yeah, that's far too much work for anyone sane to care about doing.
Except the folks in charge of Crafty Games's Spycraft 2.0, which has done two of the three, and the third (the spell system) is 1/6 done.
The slow release schedule, however, means not being able to have a complete system for a few years, though.
Re: De munchkining the game
Quote:
IMHO, hereos shouldn't walk through armies killing anything in their way any more than they should be afraid of level 1 commoners armed with crossbows. It's a hard line to walk; if you have to choose, I think wading through goblins is more fun.
I agree that a commoner should be a threat by himself in the sense that you are truly worried about him killing you. But if he stabs you in the back when you're not looking it should still hurt more then a teenie bit and again a bunch of cityguard, while not a dire challenge should be more than "don't roll a one" past 5th.
Thing is I've got a d20 group I'm teaching while trying to explain the stupidity of some of what is happening. While D&D is a game about stabbing things in the face and taking their stuff by design, I gives airs of the possibility of being something different. I tend to like humanoid intregue based games, not without the the slashy stuff, but as Frank & K point out D&D characters past 10th aren't skulking and making backroom deals. They blow the fuck out of the badguys and take over their city. So unless the world is partitioned of into level appropriate areas (Don't go into port district, thats where the 5th level bad guys hang out and you're only 3rd) it really does become silly.
Squirreloid: Magic system is obviously the problem which has been a thorn in everyones side for making a better D&D(I adhocly create monsters using bits and pieces from MM but not the monsters themselves so that doesn't worry me too much). I always liked the way Mage the Ascension did magic but it would be hard fit the concept into levels and feats and did get nuclear (we had no min maxers when I played so it wasn't much of a problem)
I actually have been thinking that a desuckified Warlock might be the way to go. Give them a much wider variety of things to choose from and give them versatility outside of a walking artillery piece but the essential that magic is my sword and I need to use it every round is a good idea even if WotC screwed it up in delivery.
I know skillbased spellcasting gets crapped on here with good reason but if you can minimize the ability to magic up your skills than having different skills for different kinds of magic and then feats which progress seems like a possibility. Green Ronin's psychic system works kind of like that though I've only glanced through it so I don't know if it would actually work.
Haven't seen new spycraft yet. What does it do that's good?
IMHO, hereos shouldn't walk through armies killing anything in their way any more than they should be afraid of level 1 commoners armed with crossbows. It's a hard line to walk; if you have to choose, I think wading through goblins is more fun.
I agree that a commoner should be a threat by himself in the sense that you are truly worried about him killing you. But if he stabs you in the back when you're not looking it should still hurt more then a teenie bit and again a bunch of cityguard, while not a dire challenge should be more than "don't roll a one" past 5th.
Thing is I've got a d20 group I'm teaching while trying to explain the stupidity of some of what is happening. While D&D is a game about stabbing things in the face and taking their stuff by design, I gives airs of the possibility of being something different. I tend to like humanoid intregue based games, not without the the slashy stuff, but as Frank & K point out D&D characters past 10th aren't skulking and making backroom deals. They blow the fuck out of the badguys and take over their city. So unless the world is partitioned of into level appropriate areas (Don't go into port district, thats where the 5th level bad guys hang out and you're only 3rd) it really does become silly.
Squirreloid: Magic system is obviously the problem which has been a thorn in everyones side for making a better D&D(I adhocly create monsters using bits and pieces from MM but not the monsters themselves so that doesn't worry me too much). I always liked the way Mage the Ascension did magic but it would be hard fit the concept into levels and feats and did get nuclear (we had no min maxers when I played so it wasn't much of a problem)
I actually have been thinking that a desuckified Warlock might be the way to go. Give them a much wider variety of things to choose from and give them versatility outside of a walking artillery piece but the essential that magic is my sword and I need to use it every round is a good idea even if WotC screwed it up in delivery.
I know skillbased spellcasting gets crapped on here with good reason but if you can minimize the ability to magic up your skills than having different skills for different kinds of magic and then feats which progress seems like a possibility. Green Ronin's psychic system works kind of like that though I've only glanced through it so I don't know if it would actually work.
Haven't seen new spycraft yet. What does it do that's good?
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Re: De munchkining the game
I object to the title. No, seriously. A level 10 party should just blow off guards. A large point of being at that level is that you HAVE that power. And for level 10 to mean anyhting, they NEED To be MUCH More powerful than level 3 or 5.
Being still human is honestly the fact that you are lying to yourself in that the guards who have gotten little training are better than people who face down demons, dragons and orcs in numbers. It's not very .. consistant.
Being still human is honestly the fact that you are lying to yourself in that the guards who have gotten little training are better than people who face down demons, dragons and orcs in numbers. It's not very .. consistant.
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Hey_I_Can_Chan
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Re: De munchkining the game
Haven't seen new spycraft yet. What does it do that's good?
[*]Monsters are parts: There's a big list of special abilities that can be given to an NPC. The baseline NPC has, like, 10 stats that determine it's XP value and special abilities increase that. An NPC takes about a 100-word paragraph to describe.
[*]Monsters are always scaling: Yes, there's a difference between a monster with 5 XP and one with 50 XP, but in both cases, when you're 1st, 6th, or whatever level, the monster will scale appropriately to its and your values.
[*]Magic items are mission-based: Spycraft is a mission-based game. You're expected to save the world, take a vacation to recover, and then save the world again. At the start of the mission, the GC ascertains the mission's difficulty and you pick your gear appropriately. None of this, "Oh, undead this week--and me with my +1 unholy sword! Darn!"
[*]Magic appears to work: I'm still waiting to see the next installment of the magic system guide to see if it works as well as looks like it works on paper, but, while skill based and spell-point based, the evocation spells are powerful enough to go toe-to-toe with equal-level folks and what they can do. That just being able to cast spells is a schtick means that everyone else gets cool stuff, too, and won't feel blown away by the party spellcaster.
[*]Limited bonus types: An untyped bonus is huge in Spycraft and the highest you'll ever see a roll go--except with ridiculous luck--is, if you maximize everything toward a single, bright, shining goal, is about 75... at that's at high levels (16-20).
As a side note:
[*]The designers are fair:[/b] They listen to criticism, explain design choices, and errata sometimes even for clarity.
It's solid. Really.
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RandomCasualty
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Re: De munchkining the game
Well, really the problem tends to be the protective abilities.
-Keep ACs low. Ditch Rings of protection, amulets of natural armor and all spells that grant AC bonuses that aren't an armor bonus or a shield bonus.
-Remove DR entirely from PC hands.
-Get rid of any absolute defensive abilities like flight, and possibly greater invisibility.
That at the very least will make a mob of lesser guards a real threat. It will also make monsters much deadlier.
If you want to go farther than that, you probably should look into a different system. GURPS is pretty good for creating mortal heroes.
Another option is simply cutting XP progression so the PCs stay in the level 1-5 range
-Keep ACs low. Ditch Rings of protection, amulets of natural armor and all spells that grant AC bonuses that aren't an armor bonus or a shield bonus.
-Remove DR entirely from PC hands.
-Get rid of any absolute defensive abilities like flight, and possibly greater invisibility.
That at the very least will make a mob of lesser guards a real threat. It will also make monsters much deadlier.
If you want to go farther than that, you probably should look into a different system. GURPS is pretty good for creating mortal heroes.
Another option is simply cutting XP progression so the PCs stay in the level 1-5 range
Re: De munchkining the game
If you give the heroes options, those options change the setting.
One of the problems with D&D as it stands now is that flavour abilities are given the same creedence as game changing ones.
Yes, there's a game-changing power in the guy who can change into a small dog once a day. But that power is not the same as having spell slots or being 5% better at combat.
And to change it to have more flavour is what Frank and K try to do...
...The problem is that we really are playing two games. One that goes nuts at level 10 while flavour abilities that didn't matter at level 1 are being handed out to other classes.
Either you need to restructure the whole game so 'go nuts' doesn't happen at level 10 - or you need to hand out flavours like Bertie Bot's.
My suggestion is to make spell lists and stick to them: Your spell list is a big balancer - if spells were half as easy to get and twice as easy to cast, you'd be alot better off. Don't be afraid to make your own spells, and balance them to the Fighter.
...And then give out flavour abilities like candy. Honestly, it's not munchkin if the Fighter can turn into a Dire Weasel once a day or the Wizard has Dodge. Honestly, no one will care.
-Crissa
One of the problems with D&D as it stands now is that flavour abilities are given the same creedence as game changing ones.
Yes, there's a game-changing power in the guy who can change into a small dog once a day. But that power is not the same as having spell slots or being 5% better at combat.
And to change it to have more flavour is what Frank and K try to do...
...The problem is that we really are playing two games. One that goes nuts at level 10 while flavour abilities that didn't matter at level 1 are being handed out to other classes.
Either you need to restructure the whole game so 'go nuts' doesn't happen at level 10 - or you need to hand out flavours like Bertie Bot's.
My suggestion is to make spell lists and stick to them: Your spell list is a big balancer - if spells were half as easy to get and twice as easy to cast, you'd be alot better off. Don't be afraid to make your own spells, and balance them to the Fighter.
...And then give out flavour abilities like candy. Honestly, it's not munchkin if the Fighter can turn into a Dire Weasel once a day or the Wizard has Dodge. Honestly, no one will care.
-Crissa
Re: De munchkining the game
Guest (Unregistered) at [unixtime wrote:1180497024[/unixtime]] A level 10 party should just blow off guards. A large point of being at that level is that you HAVE that power. And for level 10 to mean anyhting, they NEED To be MUCH More powerful than level 3 or 5.
But the result of this is level 10 characters can't live in a level 5 world and engage in it in a meaningful way. You just walk around town with impunity because even if the entire cityguard comes out to arrest you for that barbrawl you just had where you massacred every participant, you will instantly butcher the lot of them and go about your marry way. Sure as you increase they should be less of a concern and one on one should pretty much a forgone conclusion but in increased numbers they should still be a viable threat. Either that or you do need a series of 20 parallel worlds where the cohabitants progress with you. In the game I'm playing in now 5 of us at 10th pretty much single handedly took out a 200 man garrison because they were largely incapable of hurting us. Yeah it was cool but also a little silly.
Look I'm not completely bashing the power game, its just not my preference and so I'm looking for a way to tone it down. I want increased level to be cooler with more tricks without necessarily being an exponential increase in power.
of course this means the MMs have to go out the window, but I hardly use them anyways so my players can't pull their copies off the shelf to instantly counteract whatever they're going up against.
Well, really the problem tends to be the protective abilities
True but they are essential due to the ever increasing base attack bonus of monsters, I think you likewise need to tone down attack progression so that you don't need to be giving out the sweet protection goods. If both were to increase at a more moderate rate than higher levels would be an edge without being ultimate power. This of course is only in relation to the hand to hand aspect of things and we haven't begun to address magic's effect in all this.
Oh and thanks for the spycraft rundown, I'll see if I can track down a copy on torrent. Wish I had a credit card to I could just buy the damn thing so much faster
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the_taken
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Re: De munchkining the game
I've been experimenting with a creeping power progression system, but I've hit a huge fvcking wall and lost interest due to lack of input and encouragement. Take a look?
http://bb.bbboy.net/thegamingden-viewth ... thread=119
http://bb.bbboy.net/thegamingden-viewth ... thread=119
I had a signature here once but I've since lost it.
My current project: http://tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?t=56456
My current project: http://tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?t=56456
Re: De munchkining the game
RandomCasualty at [unixtime wrote:1180556754[/unixtime]]Well, really the problem tends to be the protective abilities.
-Keep ACs low. Ditch Rings of protection, amulets of natural armor and all spells that grant AC bonuses that aren't an armor bonus or a shield bonus.
-Remove DR entirely from PC hands.
-Get rid of any absolute defensive abilities like flight, and possibly greater invisibility.
As has been hashed and re-hashed in the past, you can't realistically get rid of absolute defensive abilties.
If you get rid of flight (despite the abundance of shit that can, well, fly) then you have people differences in speeds. An archer on a horse against a slower land-bound enemy is effectively no different than a flying archer versus a land-bound enemy. Untouchable.
Getting rid of the ability to not be seen is equally untenable.
As for AC and DR, the stuff that breaks DnD has little or nothing to do with armor class or DR. My understanding of what breaks DnD is that spells own all, monsters don't follow the same rules as classes, and many classes only get bigger numbers as the progress (but some not as big as others) with jack squat for increased flavor.
I've tried powering stuff up to cleric levels for all-comers and it was okay, but really I think if I wanted to bring stuff to a lower level it would require a near-total rewrite... and if I'm doing that much work, I'm probably just going to use a different system entirely.
I'd be tempted to do away with power progressions entirely (or at least slow them to a crawl), and just let folks develop more abilities as they progress. The battle for bigger numbers makes every system break eventually.
Re: De munchkining the game
ckafrica at [unixtime wrote:1180586900[/unixtime]]You just walk around town with impunity because even if the entire cityguard comes out to arrest you for that barbrawl you just had where you massacred every participant, you will instantly butcher the lot of them and go about your marry way.
Why is this a problem?
You still eat the same food, use the same armorer, but hey, you can allow him to spend more time on your pieces. The guard doesn't like you? They can bugger off...
Because you're the King.
Until you don't have the kingly capability at level 10, then you can talk about guards that are level 10.
-Crissa
Re: De munchkining the game
ckafrica at [unixtime wrote:1180586900[/unixtime]]In the game I'm playing in now 5 of us at 10th pretty much single handedly took out a 200 man garrison because they were largely incapable of hurting us. Yeah it was cool but also a little silly.
A little silly, maybe, but definitely true the source material. In the Nibelungenlied, for example, there are multiple instances where 3 of fewer heroes kill thousands of people.
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RandomCasualty
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Re: De munchkining the game
clikml at [unixtime wrote:1180592915[/unixtime]]
As for AC and DR, the stuff that breaks DnD has little or nothing to do with armor class or DR. My understanding of what breaks DnD is that spells own all, monsters don't follow the same rules as classes, and many classes only get bigger numbers as the progress (but some not as big as others) with jack squat for increased flavor.
Well I agree. But he wants low level guards to pose a threat to PCs, and to do that you basically want to take away abilities that make PCs invulnerable to low level guys. This includes basically high ACs, DRs invisiblity, flight, etc.
I mean a guy on a horse isn't so much of a threat, because guards can be mounted and all. Someone flying with protection from arrows is more problematic.
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Judging__Eagle
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Re: De munchkining the game
Don't sweat the scaling power levels.
In fact, your best bet is to take it in stride.
Really, the guards wouldn't attack the PCs, ever.
Instead they'd invite them to the local lord's/king's hall/castle since he needs powerful adventurers to do stuff for him.
As for powerful characters.... you should really look at the source of all of this stuff, Greek, Egyptian, Summerian mythology and Norse, Danish, German and Russian sagas.
Seriously, look at Beowulf. He literally swam across a large body of water and fought a sea serpent; and here's the kicker that part of the story wasn't even worth describing. Beowulf summarized doing so when he shows up in King Hrothgar's lands when someone asks him why he took so much time to swim across the water.
Then, he goes and grapples with a creature (Grendel) that can kill dozens of men at once and is so strong that when the creature tries to run off, Beowulf is left with the creature's arm, since he was so strong that he pulled it off of the creature's body.
Now that's something that even most D&D character's can do. Grapple and giant and rip them apart with just their bare hands.
Later, Beowulf has to go kill Grendel's mother.
Now, to do so, he has to:
1. Go underwater, for more than a minute, Beowulf is actually underwater for anywhere from 20 minutes to a solid hour or two
2. Kill Grendel's mother. Who is actually stronger than Grendel and can't be grappled, when Beowulf uses a sword it breaks against her skin. Beowulf then has to rummage through Grendels and his mothers home to find a magical sword to go and kill her. Which he does.
Eventually as an older man, Beowulf goes and has to put down a vicious dragon, and with him and a cohort he ends up doing so, but is mortally wounded and ends up dying of said wounds.
Really, the problem isn't that the game scales with levels, it's that most people who play can't accept the fact that they're literally re-creating ancient sagas and mythologies.
In fact, your best bet is to take it in stride.
Really, the guards wouldn't attack the PCs, ever.
Instead they'd invite them to the local lord's/king's hall/castle since he needs powerful adventurers to do stuff for him.
As for powerful characters.... you should really look at the source of all of this stuff, Greek, Egyptian, Summerian mythology and Norse, Danish, German and Russian sagas.
Seriously, look at Beowulf. He literally swam across a large body of water and fought a sea serpent; and here's the kicker that part of the story wasn't even worth describing. Beowulf summarized doing so when he shows up in King Hrothgar's lands when someone asks him why he took so much time to swim across the water.
Then, he goes and grapples with a creature (Grendel) that can kill dozens of men at once and is so strong that when the creature tries to run off, Beowulf is left with the creature's arm, since he was so strong that he pulled it off of the creature's body.
Now that's something that even most D&D character's can do. Grapple and giant and rip them apart with just their bare hands.
Later, Beowulf has to go kill Grendel's mother.
Now, to do so, he has to:
1. Go underwater, for more than a minute, Beowulf is actually underwater for anywhere from 20 minutes to a solid hour or two
2. Kill Grendel's mother. Who is actually stronger than Grendel and can't be grappled, when Beowulf uses a sword it breaks against her skin. Beowulf then has to rummage through Grendels and his mothers home to find a magical sword to go and kill her. Which he does.
Eventually as an older man, Beowulf goes and has to put down a vicious dragon, and with him and a cohort he ends up doing so, but is mortally wounded and ends up dying of said wounds.
Really, the problem isn't that the game scales with levels, it's that most people who play can't accept the fact that they're literally re-creating ancient sagas and mythologies.
The Gaming Den; where Mathematics are rigorously applied to Mythology.
While everyone's Philosophy is not in accord, that doesn't mean we're not on board.
While everyone's Philosophy is not in accord, that doesn't mean we're not on board.
Re: De munchkining the game
All of that is impressive as a fighter, but as a cleric, not so much :/
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Judging__Eagle
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Re: De munchkining the game
MrWaeseL at [unixtime wrote:1180620493[/unixtime]]All of that is impressive as a fighter, but as a cleric, not so much :/
Dude, how do you know that he was a fighter?
Mechanically at least?
I've played a Paladin/Druid/Ranger/Destroyer/Sage who was really mecahically an Archivist using lots of scrolls that he scribed and gear that he crafted.
The Gaming Den; where Mathematics are rigorously applied to Mythology.
While everyone's Philosophy is not in accord, that doesn't mean we're not on board.
While everyone's Philosophy is not in accord, that doesn't mean we're not on board.
Re: De munchkining the game
YEs, Grendel and Norse gods did all that typeof stuff, but that isn't the kind of game he wants to play. Low magic -is possible- and it -can be fun- but you just have to realize you're Not Playing D&D anymore.
You're playing some other system. It could possibly be cooler if you through a couple million dollars at it and generated a franchise with it too. Who knows?
It's possible in D20, look at True 20 and SW Saga's condition track.
A character is constantly threatened, as 20s always critical, if you take more damage than your Con (or is it Fort save, which equals 10+level+Stat) you go down the condition track one step, which gives you penalties. There are 5 steps on the track, going from normal /-1/-2/-5/-10/Unconscious. Penalties apply to all saves, attacks, checks and AC. Since blasters deal 3d8, each time you're critically hit, or even hit, there's a chance you'll be slowed down. And if you have a -really- bad day, or a lucky mook shoots an artillery shot at you, then you can be dead very quickly.
You can easily apply this to a fantasy game, boosting the damage of weapons or the like as appropriate. Blasters are the 'common weapon' so they are very threatening in that game; conversely arrows and swords as 'common weapons' of the fantasy era should be similiarly deadly if you want the same kind of play style.
You're playing some other system. It could possibly be cooler if you through a couple million dollars at it and generated a franchise with it too. Who knows?
It's possible in D20, look at True 20 and SW Saga's condition track.
A character is constantly threatened, as 20s always critical, if you take more damage than your Con (or is it Fort save, which equals 10+level+Stat) you go down the condition track one step, which gives you penalties. There are 5 steps on the track, going from normal /-1/-2/-5/-10/Unconscious. Penalties apply to all saves, attacks, checks and AC. Since blasters deal 3d8, each time you're critically hit, or even hit, there's a chance you'll be slowed down. And if you have a -really- bad day, or a lucky mook shoots an artillery shot at you, then you can be dead very quickly.
You can easily apply this to a fantasy game, boosting the damage of weapons or the like as appropriate. Blasters are the 'common weapon' so they are very threatening in that game; conversely arrows and swords as 'common weapons' of the fantasy era should be similiarly deadly if you want the same kind of play style.
Re: De munchkining the game
ckafrika wrote:You just walk around town with impunity because even if the entire cityguard comes out to arrest you for that barbrawl you just had where you massacred every participant, you will instantly butcher the lot of them and go about your marry way.
The thing is, a level 10 party is really a CR 14 encounter. Actually, they are a little higher than that thanks to the high amount of player wealth. A mature adult black dragon is also a CR 14 encounter. If the night watch can round up your team and throw them in the slammer a few days for drunk and disorderly, they can do the same thing to the dragon. If they actually can take down the dragon, there is very little reason to have adventurers anymore.
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Username17
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Re: De munchkining the game
It seems like there's two things that are wanted here:
That's deeply problematic. Consider for a moment the effects of characters advancing. They can advance numerically, or they can advance in character options. If they advance numerically, then the enemies can advance with them, or they can advance in some divergeant fashion. If the characters gin options, then the enemies can develope additional defenses with them or divergeantly.
If the enemies do anything divergeantly, the game changes radically as advancement occurs. Gradually attacks and defenses will leave the RNG with one another or characters will become revolutionarily incapable of winning or losing against an increasing number of foes.
But if things advance together, then you really don't feel the advancement at all. The goblin guards slowly get replaced with ogre guards, but really the adventure is exactly the same. You could just not advance instead and move on with your life.
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Accepting advancement, real advancement, means accepting that the structure of your games is going to change. Maybe it's confined to the human scale where characters start life breaking teeth for British mobsters and later in life pull Moonraker stunts where they seize hostile space stations by force of arms. Or maybe it's actually on the mythological scale where characters start off pulling an Ali Baba and counter-ambushing some bandits and end up pulling Lu Bu stunts where you personally route entire armies with your sword and strength.
-Username17
- Advancement for characters.
- Stability in storytelling and tactical modes.
That's deeply problematic. Consider for a moment the effects of characters advancing. They can advance numerically, or they can advance in character options. If they advance numerically, then the enemies can advance with them, or they can advance in some divergeant fashion. If the characters gin options, then the enemies can develope additional defenses with them or divergeantly.
If the enemies do anything divergeantly, the game changes radically as advancement occurs. Gradually attacks and defenses will leave the RNG with one another or characters will become revolutionarily incapable of winning or losing against an increasing number of foes.
But if things advance together, then you really don't feel the advancement at all. The goblin guards slowly get replaced with ogre guards, but really the adventure is exactly the same. You could just not advance instead and move on with your life.
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Accepting advancement, real advancement, means accepting that the structure of your games is going to change. Maybe it's confined to the human scale where characters start life breaking teeth for British mobsters and later in life pull Moonraker stunts where they seize hostile space stations by force of arms. Or maybe it's actually on the mythological scale where characters start off pulling an Ali Baba and counter-ambushing some bandits and end up pulling Lu Bu stunts where you personally route entire armies with your sword and strength.
-Username17
Re: De munchkining the game
Seemingly, EN World deletes threads quite fast, despite having low traffic. Anyway, what I remember seeing there was a guy running a campaign where, once you got to 6th level, you'd spend your XP on skills and feats - only. I think that more less fits your concept, so, essentially, you could implement "epic" rules where BAB/save progession rates = 0, and so on. Of course, I think everybody knows where the good magic items would go to (hint: a flaming burst sword would be awesome).