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Post by Admin Pete on Jul 29, 2015 14:18:10 GMT -5
First of all I redid several of the tables which I will show you here: Click for a larger image!
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Post by Admin Pete on Jul 29, 2015 14:23:39 GMT -5
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Post by Admin Pete on Jul 29, 2015 15:14:33 GMT -5
First of all, in the Levels and Number of Experience Points table, there is a discontinuity across the board between 6th level and 7th level. That is deliberate to keep the number both before and after that point exactly where I wanted them to be. I revised the Level names for all three using a number of sources and also made name level, 9th level for all three classes. I increased the required experience for clerics since I have always felt it was too low. The XP required after name level is set to deliberately have an unofficial level cap of about 10th to 11th level. I have no dwarves, elves or hobbits in this campaign. The playable races are humans, lizardmen, insectoid men and an alien race. I am still working on good names for them. The playing field between the races is level, they are all roughly equal. The lizard men do have a very limited telepathy that allows them over short distances to send images or single words. The insectoids have six limbs and the front pair can be used as arms and "hands". The insectoids can not wear most armor unless specially designed as they are hard shelled. As for the Alien - think of a leaner more wolfish version of a klingon.
To create a character pick your class and race. Then you have some choices:
Method I
Roll 3d6 6 times with a minimum number of an 8 on any number for Str, Int, Wis, Con, Dex and Cha and arrange them to taste. Then I will assign 3 perks to the character, some of the items I may assign are similar but not limited to the racial benefits that elves and dwarves had but they are now individual traits not racial and the list I am choosing from is larger.
OR
Method II
Roll 4d6 and drop the lowest 6 times with a minimum number of an 8 on any number for Str, Int, Wis, Con, Dex and Cha and arrange them to taste. Then I will assign 1 perk to the character, some of the items I may assign are similar but not limited to the racial benefits that elves and dwarves had but they are now individual traits not racial and the list I am choosing from is larger. OR
Method III
Roll 5d6 drop the two lowest 6 times with a minimum number of an 8 on any number for Str, Int, Wis, Con, Dex and Cha and arrange them to taste. Then the character will not get any additional perks.
So far everyone has chosen Method I.
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Post by Admin Pete on Jul 29, 2015 15:29:29 GMT -5
All classes are open to all races. Magic-Users and Clerics get Level one spells at Level one, Level Two Spells at Level two and so on. So Magic-Users get Level nine spells at level nine and Clerics get Level 7 spells at Level 7. However, there is a smaller number of spells that are automatically available to them at each level. The rest of the spells must be found on a scroll and transferred to their spell book or traded for with another Magic-User or Cleric as the case may be or researched from scratch. Future developments will include specific details of how magic items are created.
Fighting-Men start with Hit Dice of 1d6 +2 and cap at the max level of 16 with 19d6 +2. Clerics start with 1d6 and cap at the max level of 16 with 12d6. Magic-Users start with 1d6 and cap at the max level of 16 with 8d6 + 2. That gives max possible hit points of 116 vs 72 vs 50 not counting any constitution bonuses which apply only to Fighting-Men.
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Post by tetramorph on Jul 29, 2015 15:29:37 GMT -5
Admin Pete, I would choose method I as well. Feels more old school! Nice tables. i like you making the CL half way in ease of advancement b/w FM and MU. You know, that makes a lot of sense.
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Post by Admin Pete on Jul 29, 2015 15:48:25 GMT -5
Admin Pete, I would choose method I as well. Feels more old school! Nice tables. i like you making the CL half way in ease of advancement b/w FM and MU. You know, that makes a lot of sense. What do you think of how I am handling spells? It will be clearer once I post the spell lists. Magic-Users will be allowed to wear armor; however, if they where anything other than leather armor, then they will only be able to cast a spell every other melee round.(edit) The insectoid magic-user will have a bit of an advantage when it comes to armor. Magic-users can use as weapons, daggers, an iron-bound rowan staff, spears, bows or swords.
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Post by tetramorph on Jul 29, 2015 15:54:27 GMT -5
Admin Pete, wow, okay, I just studied your spell tables. Seems to me to seriously power up the MU. However, if they can wear armor, but that armor decreases spell capacity, then perhaps you have written in a check or balance. Thought: in play, I can imagine player and ref wondering "wait, did you cast a spell last round or not, can you cast this time or not, I can't remember." What if armor just reduces number of spells in toto, so, like, each AC below 9 removes a spell. That would keep low-lvl MUs still pretty squishy! But higher lvl MUs might be willing to purchase the cost of protection, especially with as many spells as you are allowing them. Just a thought.
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Post by Admin Pete on Jul 29, 2015 16:07:42 GMT -5
Admin Pete, wow, okay, I just studied your spell tables. Seems to me to seriously power up the MU. However, if they can wear armor, but that armor decreases spell capacity, then perhaps you have written in a check or balance. Thought: in play, I can imagine player and ref wondering "wait, did you cast a spell last round or not, can you cast this time or not, I can't remember." What if armor just reduces number of spells in toto, so, like, each AC below 9 removes a spell. That would keep low-lvl MUs still pretty squishy! But higher lvl MUs might be willing to purchase the cost of protection, especially with as many spells as you are allowing them. Just a thought. Let me sleep on that, sounds like a good idea. This is a work in progress and I plan on playtesting for the next couple of years or so.
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Post by Admin Pete on Jul 30, 2015 8:13:58 GMT -5
Admin Pete, wow, okay, I just studied your spell tables. Seems to me to seriously power up the MU. However, if they can wear armor, but that armor decreases spell capacity, then perhaps you have written in a check or balance. Thought: in play, I can imagine player and ref wondering "wait, did you cast a spell last round or not, can you cast this time or not, I can't remember." What if armor just reduces number of spells in toto, so, like, each AC below 9 removes a spell. That would keep low-lvl MUs still pretty squishy! But higher lvl MUs might be willing to purchase the cost of protection, especially with as many spells as you are allowing them. Just a thought. Let me sleep on that, sounds like a good idea. This is a work in progress and I plan on playtesting for the next couple of years or so. After further thought I think I have balanced that - the power up for both the cleric and magic-user is balanced by the fact that they have to go looking for most of their spells instead of them all being handed to them and clerics are lesser fighters than they were before and magic-users using armor is offset by the fact that they are much worse fighters than they were before. Look at the following tables. As far as keeping track of when a spell is cast I do not usually have any problems with tracking that - I am even considering dropping that given the way I nuked their fighting ability.
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Post by Admin Pete on Jul 30, 2015 8:18:37 GMT -5
Click each for a larger image!
Attack Matrices for PC's:
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Post by Admin Pete on Jul 30, 2015 8:49:52 GMT -5
Click for a larger image!
Monsters attack matrix:
In the monster attack matrix there has always been the 2-3, 3-4, 4-6, 6-8 overlapping categories and I separated those and cleaned it up and then added more detail at 11 HD and up.
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Post by The Red Baron on Jul 30, 2015 14:35:31 GMT -5
All classes are open to all races. Magic-Users and Clerics get Level one spells at Level one, Level Two Spells at Level two and so on. So Magic-Users get Level nine spells at level nine and Clerics get Level 7 spells at Level 7. Two items in od&d: 1. When magic-users and clerics reach name level, they gain acess to their highest spell level. 2. Magic-user name level is higher than fighting-man name level is higher than cleric name level. Perhaps a nice reflection of this would be have magic-user name level at 9, fighting-man name level at 8, and cleric name level at 7?
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Post by Admin Pete on Jul 30, 2015 15:06:50 GMT -5
Having the name level be the same for all of them was a specific design feature that I was altering things to achieve.
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Post by Admin Pete on Jul 30, 2015 16:16:54 GMT -5
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Post by Admin Pete on Jul 30, 2015 16:21:11 GMT -5
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Post by Crimhthan The Great on Jul 31, 2015 10:58:41 GMT -5
I like the way you have cleaned up some of the tables and while this really increases the power level of both magic-users and clerics in regards to their spells, I look forward to hearing how your play testing goes. You have noticeably weakened the fighting ability of clerics and offset that with starting them at two spells at first level. You have made the magic-users into seriously wimpy fighters and they now really need the ability to wear armor. While they will be more powerful with spells, I think you might be on to something here. As I see you have noted before you play once per month whereas I play 2-3 times per week, so it makes sense that the rules we use may need to be a lot different.
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Post by Admin Pete on Jul 31, 2015 13:32:43 GMT -5
Thank you Crimhthan The Great, I am just getting started. For Magic-Users it will take them an uninterrupted two weeks to transcribe a Limited Wish spell from a scroll into their spell book and it will take an uninterrupted five weeks to transcribe a Wish spell from a scroll into their spell book. For magic-users and clerics at 9th level and 7th level respectively is where they can start creating scrolls and other magic items. The two most difficult things for a magic-user to create are items with a Limited Wish or Wish. Putting a Limited Wish on a scroll will take an uninterrupted six weeks and use all spell slots for that entire length of time. It will take double that uninterrupted time to put the spell into a ring or other item. Putting a Wish on a scroll with take 15 uninterrupted weeks and use all spell slots for that entire length of time and it will take double that time to put the spell into a ring or other item. For clerics the most difficult things to create are items with Raise Dead and Raise Dead Fully. A Raise Dead is treated just like a Limited Wish in all respects as above and a Raise Dead Fully is treated just like a Wish in all respects as above. All other spells for both magic-users and clerics take an uninterrupted week to transcribe from a scroll into their spell book and double that length of uninterrupted time to create a scroll while using all spell slots during that length of time and double that uninterrupted amount of time while using all spell slots during that length of time to make any other magic item.
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Post by The Archivist on Jul 31, 2015 15:14:59 GMT -5
I like what you are doing here and I will likely ste, . er borrow things from it.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Aug 5, 2015 7:16:22 GMT -5
Admin Pete asked me to comment, so here goes. The changes are sweeping, for sure, but I can see Admin Pete's stated design objectives reflected in the progression tables. My understanding is that the game is to be played only infrequently so i'm not sure, with astronomical XP, whether the upper levels will ever see use. If 16th level play is ultimately desired but play time is limited, possibly consider cutting all XP requirement by nine-tenths to make getting there more practical? I don't know the various methods of generating PCs are to my own taste; they certainly appear to favor heroic stats. My concern is that the players might be cheated out of some of the most interesting characters before they've even started. I guess it's down to individual player style, but flaws and weaknesses can make a character truly memorable and great. Above average in everything gets pretty blase. I appreciate the desire to promote the fighting-men by re-balancing the other classes, and I see above that clerics will require a lot more XP across the board, and M-Us will require a lot more XP from 8th. Ultimately, clerics will have fewer HD compared to F-M, and M-Us will have dramatically fewer HD compared to F-M. I wonder whether much the same effect could be achieved simply by switching the BtB F-M and Cleric XP requirements? I'm not overly troubled by calling 9th name level for all classes (evidenced by DD V4 which does exactly that) particularly as the XP requirements to reach 9th seem "about right" (allowing for your redefined stance on clerics). I don't mind the simplified spell progressions, although I'm not generally a fan of allowing clerics to memorise spells at 1st level (the "penance" of no clerical spells at 1st level is, IMHO, a striking feature of OD&D). Also, you might look at bringing the numbers of spells more in line with the original? By the book a name level cleric can memorise just ten spells of up to 5th level; here he can memorise 17 spells of up to 7th level. That's a serious kicker. Another consideration is the broader spell lists. Proliferation of the spell lists has been a subtle but continual nerf to the fighting-men across the editions. The F-M's combat powers (i.e., number of attacks) have steadily diminished while the magic-user and clerical spells lists have grown ever broader. And then people whine that F-M are too weak! It seems to me that while the magical types have slower advancement and fewer HD, they are significantly powered up in their spell capability and so are possibly more powerful--relative to the fighting-man--than they were in OD&D. This may be counter to the stated design goal. Regarding the attack matrices: I can appreciate the desire to have more granular attack matrix for F-M. This is, after all, exactly the way EGG went with AD&D. But on the other hand, the coarseness of the original attack matrices are another feature of OD&D. I'm sure your matrices will work just fine, but I've found my workload as a ref to be genuinely lighter with simpler attack matrices rather than more complex ones. Thus I use just three rows now for everyone (including monsters): one each for normals, heroes, and superheroes. For me it's a dream to run, but YMMV. I'm sure you know what you're doing, so take everything above with a generous pinch of salt!
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Post by Admin Pete on Aug 5, 2015 8:17:00 GMT -5
Thank you waysoftheearth for your comments. Some things will become more clear as I am able to post more info and like I said it has to be play tested and tweaked. My understanding is that the game is to be played only infrequently so i'm not sure, with astronomical XP, whether the upper levels will ever see use. If 16th level play is ultimately desired but play time is limited, possibly consider cutting all XP requirement by nine-tenths to make getting there more practical? We are only able to play once per month; however, I am implementing a Silver economy with realistic size coins, and XP are based on Silver and XP are given for other things besides treasure. Since we are looking at getting to domain play down the road, the players know up front that they are going to need to hoard/save coin for the future, but I am also putting in place some things to make a lot of it flow through their fingers. I don't know the various methods of generating PCs are to my own taste; they certainly appear to favor heroic stats. My concern is that the players might be cheated out of some of the most interesting characters before they've even started. I guess it's down to individual player style, but flaws and weaknesses can make a character truly memorable and great. Above average in everything gets pretty blase. Every player so far has chosen 3d6 arrange to taste. I offered the other options, but then bribed them not to use them, by handing out perks which comes from a long list that included things that elves and dwarves got for free. Those little perks are part of their background, since younger players like background. So far all of the numbers are either rolled by me or in front of me 3d6 arrange to taste so the numbers are pretty normal. The only tweak I made to that is the minimum number is an 8 so if they rolled less than an 8 then I increased it to an 8. That is because in this game less than an 8 makes it unplayable. I appreciate the desire to promote the fighting-men by re-balancing the other classes, and I see above that clerics will require a lot more XP across the board, and M-Us will require a lot more XP from 8th. Ultimately, clerics will have fewer HD compared to F-M, and M-Us will have dramatically fewer HD compared to F-M. I wonder whether much the same effect could be achieved simply by switching the BtB F-M and Cleric XP requirements? I am looking forward to play testing this to see how it goes. Between hit dice and the attack matrix I powered the fighting-men way up compared to the other two classes, Magic-users are now really ineffective as fighters and clerics much less effective compared to the normal BtB. I think this is definitely going to be tweaked more as we go forward to help the fighters in more ways. You have some posts about fighting-men elsewhere that I am looking at for ideas. I don't mind the simplified spell progressions, although I'm not generally a fan of allowing clerics to memorise spells at 1st level (the "penance" of no clerical spells at 1st level is, IMHO, a striking feature of OD&D). Also, you might look at bringing the numbers of spells more in line with the original? By the book a name level cleric can memorise just ten spells of up to 5th level; here he can memorise 17 spells of up to 7th level. That's a serious kicker. Another consideration is the broader spell lists. Proliferation of the spell lists has been a subtle but continual nerf to the fighting-men across the editions. The F-M's combat powers (i.e., number of attacks) have steadily diminished while the magic-user and clerical spells lists have grown ever broader. And then people whine that F-M are too weak! It seems to me that while the magical types have slower advancement and fewer HD, they are significantly powered up in their spell capability and so are possibly more powerful--relative to the fighting-man--than they were in OD&D. This may be counter to the stated design goal. A couple of things here that I think will balance this out, is that the Magic-Users and Clerics only get three spells at each level and they are not necessarily the best ones. They have to find and add all of the others. A 9th level magic-users may only have 4-7 spells for levels 1 to 4 when he reaches 9th level even though there are a lot more than that. And if I wrote it correctly you have to be 9th level to start researching spells. I am also working at further changes in the fighting-men's combat powers. Also when they find a scroll they can use it or they can transcribe it to their spell book and they can only do one or the other. If the spell is a higher level spell they can not transcribe it until they reach the appropriate level. Thanks for the feedback, you have given me some things to think about and as I continue to work on things.
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Post by Admin Pete on Aug 5, 2015 8:26:22 GMT -5
When I get a chance some of the things that are in paragraphs above will be put into tables.
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Post by Admin Pete on Aug 7, 2015 13:43:04 GMT -5
Another thing I am doing in this campaign is how monsters and alignment are handled. So here are a few examples.
Usually Chaotic(but could be Neutral or Lawful) lean towards evil but do not have to be. Currently under truce and not a war with the human kingdoms. While you may encounter exceptions but you can not assume they are exceptions up front)
Goblins Kobolds Orcs Hobgoblins Gnolls Bugbears Ogres Giants
Chaotic and mindless eating machines - they will always attack and try to eat you - dead or alive.
Trolls Purple Worms Hydra Gelatinous Cubes
Chaotic and evil - hates everyone - will always seek to kill you
Beholders
A few examples to get us started.
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Post by finarvyn on Aug 7, 2015 16:43:57 GMT -5
I guess I'm a little puzzled by the "big picture" here. If the main intent of your rules shakeup is to allow for faster advancement because you don't play often, why not just award more XP each session? Don't get me wrong -- I like what you've done in concept and it looks like you've put together some neat tables, but I'm just not sure why you want to change the class balance in OD&D. (It's fine if the answer is "I like to tinker" or "my players like this better."
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Post by Admin Pete on Aug 7, 2015 22:13:16 GMT -5
I like to tinker is a big part of it and I want to try something new. As we play test I will find out more of what the players think, if it is fun, great, if not then I will make changes. I think the combination of things that I am doing will result in more class balance at all levels rather than the balance radically shifting as levels increase. Am I giving clerics and magic-users more, well yes I am but I am also taking away from them and making some things more difficult too. I think fighting-men will be significantly more powerful at higher levels and more balanced with high level clerics and magic-users.
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Post by The Red Baron on Aug 8, 2015 1:44:58 GMT -5
I think fighting-men will be significantly more powerful at higher levels and more balanced with high level clerics and magic-users. Howso? HD progression is slightly hastened, but offensive capability is reduced in comparison to the ACS matrix presented in M&M.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Aug 8, 2015 3:49:50 GMT -5
It seems to me that this F-M variant has a few more hp than btb (which doesn't hurt), and gets ahead by one HD from 6th (which doesn't hurt vs normals, if using the FAQ rule for attacks vs normals).
If I'm reading it right, the new-F-M's attack matrix appears to be just marginally better (1 pip better every third level, or so) than btb.
However, the F-M here does require more XP than btb from 7th up (where it starts to matter), but the real issue for me is that these very modest gains are hardly comparable to the gains had by the cleric and M-U in terms of spell casting capability. IMHO this F-M is diminished in comparison to the spell casting classes.
Even assuming every hero and superhero capability from Chainmail, this F-M looks--to my eye at least--to be in trouble.
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todd
Prospector
Posts: 75
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Post by todd on Aug 8, 2015 9:28:27 GMT -5
Great discussion.
I think, to me, rebalancing the casters versus the non-casters is all about adjusting spell selection, requirements, and casting times, rather than manipulating the advancement tables.
That said, I look forward to reading how your attempt works out.
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Post by Admin Pete on Aug 8, 2015 22:47:32 GMT -5
I think fighting-men will be significantly more powerful at higher levels and more balanced with high level clerics and magic-users. Howso? HD progression is slightly hastened, but offensive capability is reduced in comparison to the ACS matrix presented in M&M. I haven't posted all the details yet, but part of making fighting-men more powerful by comparison with clerics and magic-users is making them both weaker fighters. ACS matrix is more finely divided by the same numbers overall. But Fighting-Men will have more attacks for one thing. Again I have not yet posted all the details.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Aug 18, 2015 16:21:09 GMT -5
These are very interesting tables, Admin Pete. The level progressions seem very logical to me, and I'd be interested in seeing how the spell checks and balances play out. This is a bit of a tangent, but: For casting while they're using armour, what about having magic-users roll vs AC in order to cast their spell? If it fizzles, they just have to try again next round. I can see it being an 'attack your own AC' roll to cast, or maybe 2D6 ≤ AC. With the 2D6 method, a magic-user suited up with AC 5 would have a 27.8% chance of getting a spell off, so on average he'd have to try four times to get his spell to fire off successfully. At AC 8, he'd have a 72.2% chance of successful casting. It the casting roll was a basic D20 attack vs your own AC, then that would also have the side effect of having magic-users get slightly better at casting spells in armour as they gain levels.
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Post by ivanmike on Aug 26, 2015 8:30:02 GMT -5
Cool Stuff - I'm especially interested as in my own situation, it's likely that I won't be able to game that frequently, and likewise, part of the hurdle is to keep things interesting and rewarding enough for my potential player base in terms of access to spells and what have you. I'm looking forward to what extras you've given to FM. In my own situation I've started them one place better than everyone else on the attack tables at level one, (actually everyone else starts one worse) and increased their spot on the table by 1 every level (a la optional AD&D ruling). ~ Ever since Dragon #80, I've always used granular increases in to hit, saves, and what have you. ~ (Sorry Ways of the Earth). So, when do we play?
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