So, yeah. Apparently this finally got released (yesterday) in pdf (its over on drivethrurpg) with a book version to follow.
I will probably pick this up later today, but I was curious if anyone already has an has any opinions on it. I remember at least one spycraft fan kicking around this forum.
I am sincerely hoping its better than, well, things that are out there now.
I'll add things to this thread when I get a hold of it and start judging.
Fantasycraft! (from the makers of Spycraft)
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RandomCasualty2
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ludomastro
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Don't have my mitts on it yet - I prefer dead-tree to PDF so it'll be a bit yet. I know some here have an issue with cross-linking to other forums but ... screw it:
http://www.crafty-games.com/forum/index.php?board=19.0
A few fans have reviews up there and a few find some faults. It isn't 100% rabid fanboy-ism, which is nice. (Although there are rabid fanboys.)
http://www.crafty-games.com/forum/index.php?board=19.0
A few fans have reviews up there and a few find some faults. It isn't 100% rabid fanboy-ism, which is nice. (Although there are rabid fanboys.)
You know, I've never been able to find Spycraft? I heard nice things about it, decided to try to pick it up, only for Books-a-Million to come up dry?
How is it?
How is it?
He jumps like a damned dragoon, and charges into battle fighting rather insane monsters with little more than his bare hands and rather nasty spell effects conjured up solely through knowledge and the local plantlife. He unerringly knows where his goal lies, he breathes underwater and is untroubled by space travel, seems to have no limits to his actual endurance and favors killing his enemies by driving both boots square into their skull. His agility is unmatched, and his strength legendary, able to fling about a turtle shell big enough to contain a man with enough force to barrel down a near endless path of unfortunates.
--The horror of Mario
Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
--The horror of Mario
Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
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Kobajagrande
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So I did end up picking it up, and scrolled through for most of yesterday evening.
Don't have much time today, so here are some big things:
Magic items are not bought with gold.
Instead there is a Reputation mechanic (you earn Rep as you adventure).
Rep can be spent on several things, first and most important is Renown, which is ranked 1-10. You start at 0.
A character can have a number of Prizes = Renown +1.
Prizes include Contacts, Favors, Holdings and... Magic Items.
You buy prizes with Reputation (or in some cases you capture, earn or seize them during adventures- particularly magic items- if you take the Shield of Awesomeness from the dragon in climatic fight you don't have to pay for it with Rep).
Contacts will do you favors, including aid in battle, based on their Trust level, which you can improve by spending further Rep. You can also improve them by spending Rep. What exactly they'll do for you is a little vague, but it is noted that if you get them stuck in a situation for longer than the basic use of a contact, you'll pay Rep for the extra time.
Favors range from training for an adventure (a feat, prof or similar), putting someone in prison, getting a pardon out of the rulers of the land, and all sorts of fun crap. All bought with Reputation.
Holdings are, essentially, big shit you own, and secure with Reputation. Want to own a ship? Holding. Castle? Holding. Caravan? Holding. That dungeon your party just cleared? Holding. You can improve your holding by adding guards, fortifications, various facilities (libraries, torture chambers, workshops, armories, vaults etc), and Tradesmen (which bring income). All these cost further Rep. Fortifications, guards and vaults make it much harder for other people to come in and take your stuff.
Magic items can be seized in battle, bought with reputation (basically, more along the lines of leveraging your Rep into a gift), or Crafted. Crafting requires a craft skill, some feats, and a shitload of downtime. A low level magic item is about 5 Rep. That will take about 5 weeks of downtime, minimum. A major magic item will take months to years of downtime.
Potions (elixirs, actually) and scrolls don't really count as Magic Items (one shot things generally aren't Prize-level material) and can be bought with silver.
The system is pretty complex, with lots of complex subsystems. I was just starting to work out the details on NPC and monster creation this morning. Basically, various traits are rated and then cross referenced on a table according to level to get their exact stats. Once you have the basic traits rating, you've got a critter you can throw out at level 1-20.
It seems to work, but I'd need to play with it.
Ah yes. Characters are either 'standard' or 'special'. PCs are always special, and so have vitality points and wounds. Standard characters make a damage save whenever they take damage. DC 10+ 1/2(accumulated damage), if they fail, they are dead.
Classes are interesting, if only because magic is only a big thing for one class, the mage. Priests get some magic, but are very limited in what they can do, but do it automatically. Mages need to make spellcraft checks and spend spell points... i need to get into the spells yet, but quite a few have been toned down. SoD (terminal) spells, for example grant a save bonus to special characters. And of course, with the damage save, just about everyone is executing standard characters left and right.
Not sure about buff or save or suck spells yet. I noticed Slow got smacked with a nerf bat, as it only effects 1 target, but I'm not sure how wide spread this is.
Spellcasters also have to deal with a certain amount of MAD- spellcraft is Int based, spells known is Wis based, and spell DC is Chr based.
Feats are nice. Most give a bonus or effect and then a 'trick' or 'stance', tricks are modified attacks, stances are just bonuses that you get while you're in the stance, but they add a lot of options to non-magic folks.
Skill system is quite different- 20 skills all of which have various uses, though I suspect some matter more than others. Athletics, by the by, is used for grapple checks, and acrobatics for trip checks. Notice replaces spot and listen, diplomacy is gone, though there is an Impress skill. Feinting in combat is a 'trick', and requires the prestidigitation skill.
Ah, proficiences. Proficiencies buy basic weapon proficiencies in various categories- blunt, edged, unarmed, ranged, hurled, siege and gunpowder (the latter only if the campaign includes the later game eras). A second proficiency in a category makes it a forte, granting +1 to hit, and access to the weapon feat categories. Further proficiencies can be spent on various advanced weapon tricks.
Anyway, there are a lot of options. At the moment it feels like an advanced, but more coherent 3.5, but with an absolute requirement for an intelligent DM. Not sure of some of the balance points yet, but it seems worth investigating.
Don't have much time today, so here are some big things:
Magic items are not bought with gold.
Instead there is a Reputation mechanic (you earn Rep as you adventure).
Rep can be spent on several things, first and most important is Renown, which is ranked 1-10. You start at 0.
A character can have a number of Prizes = Renown +1.
Prizes include Contacts, Favors, Holdings and... Magic Items.
You buy prizes with Reputation (or in some cases you capture, earn or seize them during adventures- particularly magic items- if you take the Shield of Awesomeness from the dragon in climatic fight you don't have to pay for it with Rep).
Contacts will do you favors, including aid in battle, based on their Trust level, which you can improve by spending further Rep. You can also improve them by spending Rep. What exactly they'll do for you is a little vague, but it is noted that if you get them stuck in a situation for longer than the basic use of a contact, you'll pay Rep for the extra time.
Favors range from training for an adventure (a feat, prof or similar), putting someone in prison, getting a pardon out of the rulers of the land, and all sorts of fun crap. All bought with Reputation.
Holdings are, essentially, big shit you own, and secure with Reputation. Want to own a ship? Holding. Castle? Holding. Caravan? Holding. That dungeon your party just cleared? Holding. You can improve your holding by adding guards, fortifications, various facilities (libraries, torture chambers, workshops, armories, vaults etc), and Tradesmen (which bring income). All these cost further Rep. Fortifications, guards and vaults make it much harder for other people to come in and take your stuff.
Magic items can be seized in battle, bought with reputation (basically, more along the lines of leveraging your Rep into a gift), or Crafted. Crafting requires a craft skill, some feats, and a shitload of downtime. A low level magic item is about 5 Rep. That will take about 5 weeks of downtime, minimum. A major magic item will take months to years of downtime.
Potions (elixirs, actually) and scrolls don't really count as Magic Items (one shot things generally aren't Prize-level material) and can be bought with silver.
The system is pretty complex, with lots of complex subsystems. I was just starting to work out the details on NPC and monster creation this morning. Basically, various traits are rated and then cross referenced on a table according to level to get their exact stats. Once you have the basic traits rating, you've got a critter you can throw out at level 1-20.
It seems to work, but I'd need to play with it.
Ah yes. Characters are either 'standard' or 'special'. PCs are always special, and so have vitality points and wounds. Standard characters make a damage save whenever they take damage. DC 10+ 1/2(accumulated damage), if they fail, they are dead.
Classes are interesting, if only because magic is only a big thing for one class, the mage. Priests get some magic, but are very limited in what they can do, but do it automatically. Mages need to make spellcraft checks and spend spell points... i need to get into the spells yet, but quite a few have been toned down. SoD (terminal) spells, for example grant a save bonus to special characters. And of course, with the damage save, just about everyone is executing standard characters left and right.
Not sure about buff or save or suck spells yet. I noticed Slow got smacked with a nerf bat, as it only effects 1 target, but I'm not sure how wide spread this is.
Spellcasters also have to deal with a certain amount of MAD- spellcraft is Int based, spells known is Wis based, and spell DC is Chr based.
Feats are nice. Most give a bonus or effect and then a 'trick' or 'stance', tricks are modified attacks, stances are just bonuses that you get while you're in the stance, but they add a lot of options to non-magic folks.
Skill system is quite different- 20 skills all of which have various uses, though I suspect some matter more than others. Athletics, by the by, is used for grapple checks, and acrobatics for trip checks. Notice replaces spot and listen, diplomacy is gone, though there is an Impress skill. Feinting in combat is a 'trick', and requires the prestidigitation skill.
Ah, proficiences. Proficiencies buy basic weapon proficiencies in various categories- blunt, edged, unarmed, ranged, hurled, siege and gunpowder (the latter only if the campaign includes the later game eras). A second proficiency in a category makes it a forte, granting +1 to hit, and access to the weapon feat categories. Further proficiencies can be spent on various advanced weapon tricks.
Anyway, there are a lot of options. At the moment it feels like an advanced, but more coherent 3.5, but with an absolute requirement for an intelligent DM. Not sure of some of the balance points yet, but it seems worth investigating.
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RandomCasualty2
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Based on what you've said Voss, it seems like the system might not be so great.
Thus far it has two strikes against it:
-Magic items are on the same track of resources as buying castles and stuff. So you either own a castle or you get a magic sword. Bad.
-Spell points magic system.
Those two things alone make me a little skeptical.
Thus far it has two strikes against it:
-Magic items are on the same track of resources as buying castles and stuff. So you either own a castle or you get a magic sword. Bad.
-Spell points magic system.
Those two things alone make me a little skeptical.
Eh. Getting a holding is really worthwhile, and potentially gives a shitload of benefits depending on what you invest in it. The point is, the opportunity cost isn't quite the bitchslap that it could be. Instead of getting something that gives you benefits rather than something that is nice solely from an RP perspective, you are choosing between two things that can give a range of benefits.
Magic items are also not typical D&D items. They can do some of what the needful items do in 3.5, but they don't seem to be as necessary or as powerful. There isn't DR #/crazy shit, there is just DR, so you don't need the wacky array of magical weaponry that 3.5 requires. A magic sword can add to either attack or damage, but never both (there is a system. Its a little strange, but it functions rather differently than the standard 3.5 one). Creatures don't seem to be built with the expectation that you'll have the tree. And their level can be adjusted on the fly, so if you do need the numbers (in either direction), you can account for that.
The spell point system...I'm not sure. Spell points aren't autofail to me, and with the adjustments to both monsters and spells themselves, I'm not certain this doesn't work. Its possible that it won't, but...
It might be terrible, but it might not even matter. You start with only 0 levels spells (which don't cost any SP anyway), and gain access to new spell levels every odd level. Spell points refresh every scene (which can be around 3 encounters... I think), and there are various ways of getting more.
Let me put it this way: I need to read up more on the magic system. At this point all I'm certain of is that FC does Iron Heroes roughly 500x better than IH does.
The one thing that does worry me is defenses are _low_. AC is 10 + dex mod + class bonus (+maybe shield). Class bonuses start at 0-2 and end up at 8, 12 or 16 depending on the progression. On the other hand, if the DM is paying attention to this fact, he can keep monster attack values relatively low as well.
Magic items are also not typical D&D items. They can do some of what the needful items do in 3.5, but they don't seem to be as necessary or as powerful. There isn't DR #/crazy shit, there is just DR, so you don't need the wacky array of magical weaponry that 3.5 requires. A magic sword can add to either attack or damage, but never both (there is a system. Its a little strange, but it functions rather differently than the standard 3.5 one). Creatures don't seem to be built with the expectation that you'll have the tree. And their level can be adjusted on the fly, so if you do need the numbers (in either direction), you can account for that.
The spell point system...I'm not sure. Spell points aren't autofail to me, and with the adjustments to both monsters and spells themselves, I'm not certain this doesn't work. Its possible that it won't, but...
It might be terrible, but it might not even matter. You start with only 0 levels spells (which don't cost any SP anyway), and gain access to new spell levels every odd level. Spell points refresh every scene (which can be around 3 encounters... I think), and there are various ways of getting more.
Let me put it this way: I need to read up more on the magic system. At this point all I'm certain of is that FC does Iron Heroes roughly 500x better than IH does.
The one thing that does worry me is defenses are _low_. AC is 10 + dex mod + class bonus (+maybe shield). Class bonuses start at 0-2 and end up at 8, 12 or 16 depending on the progression. On the other hand, if the DM is paying attention to this fact, he can keep monster attack values relatively low as well.
Last edited by Voss on Tue Aug 11, 2009 5:47 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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RandomCasualty2
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No...RandomCasualty2 wrote:So is monster creation more of a 4E style, where you just make up numbers on the fly?
There are pretty much two steps. You rate every trait (health, attack, resilence (saves) defense, etc) from I-X. Once you have all the traits (and special qualities) done, they produce a total XP value for the monster. Then you compare that rating to a 'threat level' chart to get the actual values.
So a 3rd level Owlbear with [and I'm totally making up numbers here] Attack III and Health IV would have +5 to attacks and +8 to damage saves, while at level 10 it would have +12 to attacks and +18 to damage saves.
Its a little complex, and made me groan and first glance, but it seems to be fairly workable once you understand it (and if you you understand what kind of target numbers you are looking for).
By tweaking what I meant was if your party is struggling against (or wiping) the opposition, the DM can easily tweak the threat level up or down and just use the higher (or lower) values from the chart for later encounters.
They have a lot of pre-built monsters and NPCs that you just need to get values for from the chart. It adds a step, but makes monsters more flexible. You can have level appropriate skeletons, minotaurs and dragons for any level, in theory, just by building the basic monster with the traits.
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RandomCasualty2
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Assuming you could print that chart on a DM screen, that system may well be pretty workable. So long as the number you're getting from the chart is a final number and doesn't involve tabulating substats.
Last edited by RandomCasualty2 on Tue Aug 11, 2009 7:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Not quite final. You add attribute modifiers (str & etc).
The chart is just a page, so easily printed.
After a couple encounters and getting a feel for the system you really shouldn't need to adjust it anymore- it just is a matter of getting used to the system and what the trait ratings mean and what kind of power level you are shooting for. There are some decent guidelines and warnings in the book, its just one of those areas where it has the potential to completely fall apart if the DM is a moron.
The chart is just a page, so easily printed.
After a couple encounters and getting a feel for the system you really shouldn't need to adjust it anymore- it just is a matter of getting used to the system and what the trait ratings mean and what kind of power level you are shooting for. There are some decent guidelines and warnings in the book, its just one of those areas where it has the potential to completely fall apart if the DM is a moron.
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RandomCasualty2
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I'm just going to look at you funny now.RandomCasualty2 wrote:Oh, that's kinda disappointing. I really hate substats in general. Sounds similar to the "build a dragon" 3E chart, which was just really hard to use.Voss wrote:Not quite final. You add attribute modifiers (str & etc).
Its literally no different than looking up class' BAB and adding the strength modifier to it to determine the entire to hit bonus.
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RandomCasualty2
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Nope, it really isn't. But I always felt that was honestly too much work and produced a less accurate system for challenges.Voss wrote: I'm just going to look at you funny now.
Its literally no different than looking up class' BAB and adding the strength modifier to it to determine the entire to hit bonus.
All you really care about is the final bonus pretty much.
The less math you have to do to create a monster, the better. At least IMO.
Last edited by RandomCasualty2 on Tue Aug 11, 2009 7:37 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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ludomastro
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I have GM'd Spycraft2 to great effect with our gaming group (d20 fans) and they liked the system. The monster/adversary system isn't that bad once you get used to it. I would often adjust on the fly and really, the attribute modifiers only come into play if you want a thug, minion, mini-boss, owlbear or whatever that is stronger than average.
Overall the system is a little more crunchy than we like; however, Fantasy Craft uses the Master Craft system which is, in theory, a little simpler than Spycraft.
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Overall the system is a little more crunchy than we like; however, Fantasy Craft uses the Master Craft system which is, in theory, a little simpler than Spycraft.
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Absolutely! Lamentably, I do not have the book yet.Caedrus wrote: Anyone up for getting together an online group of denners and trying the system out?
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Last edited by ludomastro on Wed Aug 12, 2009 4:16 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Absentminded_Wizard
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I'm up whenever I can get the book.Caedrus wrote:Neither do I, but I intend to get it.ludomastro wrote:Absolutely! Lamentably, I do not have the book yet.Caedrus wrote: Anyone up for getting together an online group of denners and trying the system out?
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Doom314's satirical 4e power wrote:Complete AnnihilationWar-metawarrior 1
An awesome bolt of multicolored light fires from your eyes and strikes your foe, disintegrating him into a fine dust in a nonmagical way.
At-will: Martial, Weapon
Standard Action Melee Weapon ("sword", range 10/20)
Target: One Creature
Attack: Con vs AC
Hit: [W] + Con, and the target is slowed.
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ludomastro
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I'm in, /tg/'s been getting pretty hype about this game.
FrankTrollman wrote: Halfling women, as I'm sure you are aware, combine all the "fun" parts of pedophilia without any of the disturbing, illegal, or immoral parts.
K wrote:That being said, the usefulness of airships for society is still transporting cargo because it's an option that doesn't require a powerful wizard to show up for work on time instead of blowing the day in his harem of extraplanar sex demons/angels.
Chamomile wrote: See, it's because K's belief in leaving generation of individual monsters to GMs makes him Chaotic, whereas Frank's belief in the easier usability of monsters pre-generated by game designers makes him Lawful, and clearly these philosophies are so irreconcilable as to be best represented as fundamentally opposed metaphysical forces.
Whipstitch wrote:You're on a mad quest, dude. I'd sooner bet on Zeus getting bored and letting Sisyphus put down the fucking rock.
