AD&D thoughts, Part Six point Five: Classes, continued
2012-Apr-25, Wednesday 21:02![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dorchadas
Well, it's been a while since I wrote one of these, but I put my planning on hiatus for a while since I didn't really have any players other than schoolpsychnerd and running a one-on-one game is a ton of work. Now, I have two (maybe three or four) players, so this is worth planning again.
So, upon picking this up again, I was still trying to figure out what to do with the lowly fighter when I stumbled on a retro AD&D 2nd Ed. clone called Myth and Magic (warning--elf boobs. They are trying to emulate 2nd ed., after all, including the art), which has a neat section called "Class Talents" that allows each class group (warrior, wizard, priest, rogue) to pick from groups of powers to further customize themselves. The restrictions on classes help prevent a lot of the problems with d20 feats (the two biggest being that some feats had a lot of stupid prerequisites that were basically useless and a lot of feats in and of themselves were basically useless, but the variety meant that you could combine some of them to horrific effect, as in the Omniscifier etc mentioned in my previous post) while still allowing everyone to have a few neat abilities they get here and there.
Some examples: Battle Blessing (once per day, a cleric can get a bonus to hit and damage rolls), Dirty Fighting (Rogues can shine the sun in the target's eyes or throw dirt in their face to temporarily lower their AC), Expeditious Healing (cure spells no longer have casting times), Fighter's Mark (the warrior focuses intently on a single opponent and gets +1 to hit and damage, but anyone who attacks him also gets +1 to hit), Light Armor use (Wizards with Strength 12+ can wear leather or padded armor and still cast spells), Morph Radius (wizards can reduce the radius of an AoE spell by half in exchange for exempting the targets they don't want to hit. Now, you can throw fireballs into combat!), Poison Use (Rogues can make poison and poison people), Turn Target (lets clerics focus all their Turning power on a single target in exchange for an increased chance to do so), and so on.
They're really neat, and since you get one slot to start and one per three levels, and some powers cost more than one slot, they aren't likely to be super-unbalancing either. There's a few I'll have to rework, but that's not so bad. For example, using a mana system means that the various talents that link into Vancian casting are pretty useless, but I have some ideas for those. I can take the one that means lets wizards turn any spell into a damage-dealing spell and let them spend quadruple mana to reroll all damage dice that do half or less of the maximum, for example, or double mana to maximize the range or duration of a spell. I just need to properly balance mana regeneration so that wizards are the cannons with limited ammo that they're supposed to be.
There's no way to replicate the "did you memorize the right utility spells?" aspect using a mana system, but I'm not sure I care that much anyway. It's also about whether players think to use Stone to Mud to cause avalanches or using Grease and then Burning Hands to start fires. Ingenuity is important.
One additional benefit is that it provided me with the inspiration I needed to just turn all thieving abilities into proficiencies like everything else. I don't see the harm in letting a wizard learn how to pick pockets if he wants to blow a bunch of proficiency slots on it. A thief gets all those abilities for free and gets free points every level on them, so they'll always be better anyway. I know AD&D isn't really about the whole "unified mechanic" thing, but seeing as how I'm working 40 hours a week and trying to learn Japanese well enough to translate it professionally as well, any time I don't have to spend kludging together house rules or planning things out makes me happier!
Okay, that's a lie. I love tinkering and kludging together house rules. (^_^)'''
For example, a lot of people play rangers as woodland stalker-type characters, but they aren't really optimized for it. Sure, they can move silently, but they have no inherent ability to be better with a bow than anyone else. I stole the "fighting styles" from Baldur's Gate (Two-handed, Two-weapon, Weapon and Shield, and One-Handed), and added a "Ranged" fighting style that lets you fire into melee with no penalty at one proficieny slot and lets you apply your Dexterity bonus to hit with missile weapons to damage too at level 2, plus gives a flat +1 to hit and damage. Rangers can either start with two levels of two-weapon fighting (which mimics their ability at base[1]), or with two levels of ranged, depending on what they want to specialize in.
[1]: The only reason rangers have two-weapon fighting like that anyway is because of Drizzt Do'Urden, if I remember right. Aragorn certainly never used two swords.
Kind of short, but this is just an addendum, after all. Next--the long-awaited campaign setting overview!
schoolpsychnerd and running a one-on-one game is a ton of work. Now, I have two (maybe three or four) players, so this is worth planning again. So, upon picking this up again, I was still trying to figure out what to do with the lowly fighter when I stumbled on a retro AD&D 2nd Ed. clone called Myth and Magic (warning--elf boobs. They are trying to emulate 2nd ed., after all, including the art), which has a neat section called "Class Talents" that allows each class group (warrior, wizard, priest, rogue) to pick from groups of powers to further customize themselves. The restrictions on classes help prevent a lot of the problems with d20 feats (the two biggest being that some feats had a lot of stupid prerequisites that were basically useless and a lot of feats in and of themselves were basically useless, but the variety meant that you could combine some of them to horrific effect, as in the Omniscifier etc mentioned in my previous post) while still allowing everyone to have a few neat abilities they get here and there.
Some examples: Battle Blessing (once per day, a cleric can get a bonus to hit and damage rolls), Dirty Fighting (Rogues can shine the sun in the target's eyes or throw dirt in their face to temporarily lower their AC), Expeditious Healing (cure spells no longer have casting times), Fighter's Mark (the warrior focuses intently on a single opponent and gets +1 to hit and damage, but anyone who attacks him also gets +1 to hit), Light Armor use (Wizards with Strength 12+ can wear leather or padded armor and still cast spells), Morph Radius (wizards can reduce the radius of an AoE spell by half in exchange for exempting the targets they don't want to hit. Now, you can throw fireballs into combat!), Poison Use (Rogues can make poison and poison people), Turn Target (lets clerics focus all their Turning power on a single target in exchange for an increased chance to do so), and so on.
They're really neat, and since you get one slot to start and one per three levels, and some powers cost more than one slot, they aren't likely to be super-unbalancing either. There's a few I'll have to rework, but that's not so bad. For example, using a mana system means that the various talents that link into Vancian casting are pretty useless, but I have some ideas for those. I can take the one that means lets wizards turn any spell into a damage-dealing spell and let them spend quadruple mana to reroll all damage dice that do half or less of the maximum, for example, or double mana to maximize the range or duration of a spell. I just need to properly balance mana regeneration so that wizards are the cannons with limited ammo that they're supposed to be.
There's no way to replicate the "did you memorize the right utility spells?" aspect using a mana system, but I'm not sure I care that much anyway. It's also about whether players think to use Stone to Mud to cause avalanches or using Grease and then Burning Hands to start fires. Ingenuity is important.
One additional benefit is that it provided me with the inspiration I needed to just turn all thieving abilities into proficiencies like everything else. I don't see the harm in letting a wizard learn how to pick pockets if he wants to blow a bunch of proficiency slots on it. A thief gets all those abilities for free and gets free points every level on them, so they'll always be better anyway. I know AD&D isn't really about the whole "unified mechanic" thing, but seeing as how I'm working 40 hours a week and trying to learn Japanese well enough to translate it professionally as well, any time I don't have to spend kludging together house rules or planning things out makes me happier!
Okay, that's a lie. I love tinkering and kludging together house rules. (^_^)'''
For example, a lot of people play rangers as woodland stalker-type characters, but they aren't really optimized for it. Sure, they can move silently, but they have no inherent ability to be better with a bow than anyone else. I stole the "fighting styles" from Baldur's Gate (Two-handed, Two-weapon, Weapon and Shield, and One-Handed), and added a "Ranged" fighting style that lets you fire into melee with no penalty at one proficieny slot and lets you apply your Dexterity bonus to hit with missile weapons to damage too at level 2, plus gives a flat +1 to hit and damage. Rangers can either start with two levels of two-weapon fighting (which mimics their ability at base[1]), or with two levels of ranged, depending on what they want to specialize in.
[1]: The only reason rangers have two-weapon fighting like that anyway is because of Drizzt Do'Urden, if I remember right. Aragorn certainly never used two swords.
Kind of short, but this is just an addendum, after all. Next--the long-awaited campaign setting overview!
