I used to be in academia, so I figure that I should engage in a little thesis defense of my game here on the eve of it's beta release. So I am going to go through each part of the design and defend my decisions about how to design that aspect.
Note: this is a mega post of enormous length. Proceed at your own risk.
Some of this is only going to make sense to people who have been on the Alpha distribution list and receiving updated drafts of the game over the past few months. However, anyone who is not already on that list and who wishes to get a copy of the beta pre-release, please e-mail me directly: christophergreg (at) hotmail (dot) com. I just cannot release publicy until I get all my artists to sign off on it. I tried to explain things a bit in the text below but there are probably still going to be comments that only make sense if you are holding the text in your hands already.
Core Mechanic:
The core mechanic is rolling a d20 under your attribute (or skill). Since you are rolling 3d6 for attributes, that evenly distributes the attributes between 3 and 18, thus leaving 2 points on either end to create an endcap on a D20. As characters get better, certain skills & things like magic will become essentially impossible to fail at because of the bonuses, but those things are judged on margins of failure/success rather than outright success and a 10th level Ranger should be able to find his way through the wilderness pretty much without failure. Since the system does not create very many modifiers outside of skills (only 6 skills) and spellcasting, most interactions will be on this distribution under the d20. Thus people who have higher attributes will be more likely to succeed with those attributes in a statistically balanced way (and vice versa).
I compare this to a d20 mechanic with modifiers which results in a complex game of balancing all the modifiers (which can become impossible at a point) and makes it a mini-game for the GM to set difficulty levels. It is much easier to give a penalty to someone for trying something hard under my system than in classic d20 roll vs difficulty number.
Here is an example of the above principle; lets say that you have a player with a 14 DEX attempt something involving DEX. Because each point of D20 is a 5% chance, you know that they have a 70% chance of success with a 14. You can apply a penalty with the knowledge that each point of penalty drops the percent chance of success by 5%. In contrast, how can a GM determine the odds of success of a 5th level thief in classic D20 attempting to pick a lock and adjust their difficulty number accordingly? Unless they have an Excel spreadsheet up to do all the calculations, it is very hard to set a difficulty level except by feel.
There is NOT automatic success with a natural 20 or failure with a natural 1. My argument against critical hits/failures is way too complex to fully detail here, but the shorthand answer is that statistically the monsters are more likely to critically hit the players than the reverse. The monster only has to work for 1 encounter, maybe 2-3 in the case of a big villain, while the players generally need to survive the whole game. It is more likely that a critical hit will kill a player than any given monster simply due to the volume of rolls made against the player. I feel like the occasional happiness of turning a goblin into goo is not worth having an occasional player killed randomly.
Saving Throws:
I decided to move a lot more onto the Saving Throws than in the classic game. Some of these are skills like Spot and Listen. By moving these things into reactive actions rather than proactive decisions, you allow the GM to call for them when required but you don't get the players going into a room and asking to make spot/listen checks. I wanted to encourage the players to look for these things without making rolls. To say what they are doing, to be more involved in the game. I also used saving throws to emulate a lot of the Racial and Class differences in a more elegant and simplified way. Giving Elves bonuses to a Spot save is a simple bonus that gets applied and forgotten, rather than having to track skill growth for the rest of the game.
I feel like saving throws in the classic game provided many "distinctions with a difference". Why should someone have a different save for Rods/Staves? That just seems redundant. So I simplified resistance to magic into a single saving throw and added more variety.
Ultimately, I wanted the saving throws to provide the GM with an interface for calling upon the player to react to the world without passing that agency to the players so that they are using the mechanic as a crutch to avoid actually involving themselves in the world.
Races:
As mentioned above, I used saving throw differences to model a lot of racial effects. These things function a lot like what I described for skills above in the section on Core Mechanics. It makes it so that Elves are highly likely to spot things, maybe even always spot things if they have a strong Wisdom. But the shifts are even less than skills will be because they are fixed at something like +2 instead of equal to CL like with skills. So it provides a baseline of improvement for the race without becoming overpowered.
I also used racial abilities to enhance other aspects of the design. Humans and Halflings get more luck. Elves can use bows (which is actually a really important distinction considering only the Ranger has this ability, unlike in classic d20). Gnomes have a unique nose. And of course, the traditional vision distinctions. I decided to eliminate Darkvision and replace it with Heat Vision because I want there to be a bit of a weakness left in the vision of even an underground denizen. I feel like Darkvision makes people feel like they should be able to see everything and I like leaving a bit of mystery out there in the dark.
Classes:
I went with 8 classes because I wanted to include a lot of the innovations of the 90s in terms of bringing in things like Druids and Paladins, but I still wanted to keep the classes limited to classic medieval concepts (i.e. no Monks/Barbarians). I kept a few game elements that don't need defending (ex. Starting Gold), so let's focus on the rest.
Each class has abilities that are scalable by level. Even skills fall into this category. But they require no real thought to calculate. There are no skill points used to buy skills, you simply have skills or you don't. Your bardic music gives a bonus equal to CL, no need to calculate it. By doing magic through HP, there are no spell progression grids. And everyone advances equally through XP, so there are no XP grids. Everything is streamlined down with the goal of providing distinctive styles of play without becoming a math mini-game.
Where I put abilities that might become abused by crafty players, I left the description open-ended enough to give the GM freedom to control it on the backside. For example, you have to consult with an animal spirit before you can shapeshift into it, thus giving the GM control over what shapeshifting a Druid is doing. Same logic applies for familiars and animal companions; they are tied to Hit Dice and of course, the GM determines how many hit dice an animal has.
I did provide a lot more "utility" powers than people might be used to because I wanted to encourage creative play. For example, a Druid could shapeshift into a bird at 1st level and fly around. Does that give them an informational advantage? Perhaps. But it also encourages exploration. And it provides a good amount of niche protection for the Druid. The Fighter can calculate encumberance without including their armor because they are used to it's weight. This provides a little niche protection for them as a hauler of treasure. Stuff like that adds to the game, I think.
I do want to address the issue of Clerics. I do not have Clerics because I hate Clerics. I don't see any support for them in literature or film. I hear people say that they hate being clerics. I do see support for Paladins though. So I rolled Turn Undead into a Paladin ability and gave healing to the Sorcerer and Scholar classes.
Setting aside Bards and Druids as speciality spellcasters, lets address the primary spellcasters of Sorcerer and Scholar. I wanted to use the Sorcerer to create some of the concepts that I see in literature and film but not so much in RPGs. I just don't see a really cool Necromancer at the table. Or Enchanter. Or Diviner. Because of the way magic has been done in the past with these games, there is not good mechanical support for it. You can become a specialist wizard, but you have to choose between schools of magic that are not equally weighted. So when I made my magic system, I tried to balance each school at each level against each other. So 1st level Divination spells are roughly as useful as 1st level Evocation spells. Part of that involved bringing utlity concepts traditionally associated with higher spell levels down to lower spell levels.
So when you choose a Sorcerer, you have to choose a primary school and this choice really does define you. You don't get to choose many spells, only 1 spell outside of your school every other level. First of all, this makes being a spellcaster MUCH easier on the new player. They don't have to worry about memorization, spell progression, spells per day, spell levels different from class levels, choosing from lots of spells divided unevenly into different schools, and so on. You choose a primary school, you cast everything in that school. And choose one other spell you like in another school and cast that one too. Easy.
Scholars, in contrast, are about preparation and diligence. But without involving memorization. Instead, they have to cast off scrolls and they know only two spells at character creation. This seems powerful until you realize that access to paper and finding new spells while adventuring is completely up to the GM. So once again, there is a hedge against abuse. Further, the Scholar can heal people that are wounded (but only very slowly, more on this later), they are the only literate class, and they are the only class with unfettered access to the Expertise skill (i.e. they know lots of stuff). This creates, I think, the classic mythos of the Learned Sage.
So if you want to be the direct-damage missile platform, you can be an Evoker. But there are numerous, equally rewarded paths that allow you to bring in a lot of utility magic and creative solutions to the table.
On other topics, the Ranger is the only class with access to bows (Elves too, as I mentioned earlier). This means that having an elevated position and using a bow is a valuable thing and can really make a difference because most of your enemies will not be using bows either (more on that in the GMs book). A Paladin's Lay-on-Hands is truly powerful considering the slow rate of healing in the game. Knaves (thieves) have a First Strike ability that makes them really strong in the surprise round, especially when combined with an even more powerful backstab than in other games.
In the end, each class fits on it's own single page in 12 pt font. And that is a powerful ally in the war to find new gamers. So you can sit someone down at the table, make a few decisions, make a quick character, and they can have a handy reference to guide them. Simple simple simple.
Ambitions:
I put ambitions in the game because I think it represents some of the gains made in other games towards building a realistic framework of goals for your character and then rewarding you for reaching those goals. I realize this does walk away from the traditions of the game I am using as my basis, so I made them really optional sub-systems. You can use ambitions to flesh out your character or not, your call. And if you do play along, the GM can give you some XP rewards to reflect it. I think this will also provide a good framework for new players because it gives them direction that I often feel new players complain they don't have. "What do you do?" leads to "I don't know". Now, they know what they want to do and they can change them as the game progresses and they grow.
Luck:
Luck is another system that incorporates some aspects of other games. It also helps out new players when they get into a rough spot. And it keeps players alive through the hard early levels when chance can mean the difference between life and death in a very big way. The stat also depletes to zero and doesn't get refilled except by a very generous GM. So anyone who does feel that it is imbalancing the game won't feel that way very long. The luck really does run out.
Languages:
I always felt like Languages was another "distinction without a difference" in gaming. Yeah, you know common and these two other languages. But a lot of times people wouldn't use them. Everyone was using common anyway. So I moved Common from an open access language up into a Scholarly class ability, in a way. There are two kinds of languages; vernacular and racial. Racial languages are like Latin, widely known to an elite class of scholars but largely unknown to everyone else. So even if you know the common human tongue, you are generally not speaking it but using it in letters to other elite people of your status level. Common people speak in various tongues. Language becomes important. Knowing the right language becomes more valuable, knowing the common langauge becomes valuable, everything wins, the world is more alive and real. I think it works.
Karma:
I always fel like good & evil concepts are so subjective that it creates a source of contention at the table without providing a forum to discuss it. So I made Karma. Karma goes up and down based on the decisions of the group and it can be measured in degrees. A minor theft and a murder are not both "evil" acts. One is a small penalty, the other a massive one. At a certain point, the group can decide that continuing to commit those petty thefts doesn't make you more evil than you already are. Or vice versa, giving a few coins to beggars does not eventually lead to sainthood unless you really bring in some Mother Teresa scale stuff.
It also provides a mechanical basis for bringing in magical effects based on good/evil. You can create hallowed ground that helps evil people and harms good people, in proportion to their good/evil. And the entire system is divorced from religion and based on the general morality of the table. I feel like Karma solves a lot of the Alignment problems that people have traditionally struggled with.
Religion:
As a seperate note, I want to highlight that NONE of the game mechanics are tied to a religious system. Errant can be used with Monotheism, Polytheism, Animism, etc ad infinitum. I always disliked the wedding to polytheism that was made, thus limiting flexibility for the GM because removing religions meant limiting character creation choices. Where religion does intersect with game concepts, I left things vague on purpose (ex. Karma, Paladin morality, etc).
Hit Points and Attribute Damage:
I departed significantly from the classic game on this point, but I think for the better. The many critiques against hit points are well-known, the replies are limited to basically "well, it's the best we have". So I tried to find a solution and here is what I got.
Every class has a hit die per level to reflect their relative toughness and endurance against being hurt. So a John McLean type character has a lot of hit points. He can take a real beating without being truly injured. But anyone who starts getting injured feels pain and has a much harder time going on with their life. Once you run out of hit points, you take damage to attributes as rolled randomly on a table. This table makes it more likely that you will take STR, DEX, CON damage than WIS, INT, CHA damage. When you take temporary attribute damage, you are directly IMPAIRED from further action. You have to start making Pain saving throws in order to do things. You are really hurt.
This system grants the ability to endure damage without being injured, to model how actually being injured really slows you down, and to also maintain the realism of a strong survival ability in the human (elven, dwarven, etc) body. You can get injured, taken out of the fight, and still survive. You can be permanently injured if not treated quickly enough. People are a lot more durable than we give them credit for in games. People can survive some really bad injuries, maybe with a bum leg or a missing arm, but they survive.
And HP regenerates faster than in the classic game, but still fairly slow. It remains a resource that you are strongly compelled to conserve.
I think this system provides the best balance between realism and functionality. It doesn't descend into a complex numbers game. It also doesnt allow you to be perfectly healthy at one HP level, take 1 point of damage, and fall down critically injured. It works to do what we need it to do.
Experience Points:
I tried to provide a lot of ways to get XP based on how the group wants to play. I can't point to any method of XP generation and say "this is the best", so I gave people choices. And I think by listing the choices it provides a starting point for discussion rather than decision by fiat.
Gifts:
Every other level you get a gift (except Sorcerers). These are more like Perks in Fallout than Feats in 3rd Ed. They are simple, basic bonuses or abilities. They don't override or break other game mechanics. They are not ripe for combining into strings of combos. They are just another nice way to adding some flavor to your character. And they allow me to bring in concepts like Dual-Wielding or Favored Enemies without restricting them to a single class or bringing in highly complex rules to cover everything. It's just that simple.
The Encounter Intentions Table:
I tried to emulate a lot of the classic game feel here, while giving better guidelines of behavior and allowing more opportunity for the characters to NOT fight. There is a 70% chance that a random encounter will not be interested in attacking you at all. Only a 10% chance they will charge right at you. Of course, this is designed for when the GM calls for such a roll, so they can always get the result they want as the GM, while still providing a template for a good interaction between NPCs/Monsters and the Characters.
Encumberance:
I did not go with a method as simple as Raggi did. Instead, I just gave people a simple weight amount before becoming encumbered and being encumbered just drains you of HP until you collapse. I tried to balance simplicity and ease of teaching to a new player with some realism.
Daily Mechanics:
I provided mechanics for finding food/water in the wilderness, swimming, sleeping, keeping track of time, etc. These are all really optional rules because I know a lot of people don't bother tracking this.
Toxins and Drugs:
I like having neat toxins and drugs in the game. With toxins, I tried to stick with the core ideas already in implementation such as relying on attribute damage instead of HP, but I added some cool things like Intervals and Symptoms to allow the toxin designer to create a truly unique poison. The same kind of logic applies to Drugs, but with an addiction mechanic. Once establishing this addiction mechanic, other addicitive things can be linked to it (such as addiction to the Ecstasy spell) without having to write up additional rules. Plus, all of this doesn't need to be memorized by the player since it will be presented piecemeal to them by the GM as these substances start to affect them.
Vision and Light:
I specifically left all aspects of this in the hands of the GM. They can assess penalties, tell you whether you see something or dont, tell you how far your torchlight extends, grant bonuses for concealment or cover, and so on. I always thought these rules added unnecessary complexity to the game. Just leave it for the GM and move on.
Searching:
One of the things that really impressed me about reading the old Temple of Elemental Evil module was the notations to simply roll a dX and if it came up as a 1, someone finds the ring in the floor crack or notices the wire running along the wall. So I codified this into the game, while still allowing the GM freedom to choose whatever dice they want. The same logic applies to randomly finding stuff as for when you are intentionally searching, just the GM may change the size of the die.
Initiative:
Nobody ever has to roll iniative. The lowest Dexterity person always acts first, then up the line to the highest Dexterity person. Damage is applied at the end of the round, so acting last doesn't carry a penalty. Instead, acting last is great because you can see what is going on.
Attack Actions:
These are pretty basic and simple. Some important changes were made though. First, just moving gives you an AC bonus. This makes it much more advantageous to flee from combat than in the traditional model. I wanted to encourage a kind of fluidity of movement that just doesn't exist in the base game. Further, I added the ability to parry or block someone who attacks earlier in the round. The mechanics are simple, but add some realism and interesting features to the combat. I was able to make a grappling rule that I think is pretty simple, yet functional and pretty realistic as well. And I think it is important to list surrender as an option to give them a chance of remembering that they CAN surrender. Since these actions are listed on the character sheet, the player should always be realizing that they can surrender. This should reduce TPKs. It also reminds the GM that the monsters and NPCs can also surrender.
Magic:
In general, I tried to maintain the principles of the game as described above in the magic system. I allowed people to get utility spells at lower levels than they are used to. As I said before, I want this to encourage player creativity. And I matched spell level to character level, so that there is less confusion for a new player. And spells end at fifth level, beyond that you need to innovate. And given the gluttony of products on the market with spell lists, that should be no problem for a player while simultaneously giving them AGENCY over their own character.
The biggest change is, of course, the HP mechanic. Spells are cast out of HP for all classes, Scholars just have to do it in advance, and HP regenerates fairly slowly. So even though some of the spells are more powerful than in the classic game, you are probably casting fewer of them. But you are in control of the rate of expediture. And casting spells makes you weaker and thus more vulnerable to damage. Ultimately, I think the whole thing is actually really balanced. Much more so than memorization and spells per day.
Conclusion:
I was going for a simple design. I think I did a fair job of achieving it. I think I provided a lot of innovation on the game of my youth, while keeping the spirit. And I incorporated a lot of the "innovation" of the past that had been pushed aside by WotC.
I am interested in seeing if you think the same. If there is a design decision you wonder about, please let me know and I would be happy to defend it. If I cannot defend it adequately, then it probably needs to be changed. I do make mistakes, after all.
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