The Birth of a World, part 2
Creating a game world on this level won’t be easy.
Lucky for me I have plenty of time until it is going to be used.
I’m not sure how long Dale’s campaign is set to last, but my guess is that we’re nearly 50% of the way through.
Then Aaron is set to run. Since I have never seen Aaron run, I have no idea how long he will take. But I will venture a guess at a minimum of 6 months.
So with some simple math, I have about 10 months or so to prepare a game.
That should be about enough time, but we’ll have to see.
;)
And I want to repeat, I do not want to change D&D. I just want to modify it a little to make it work a little better for this particular campaign.
But that doesn’t mean I won’t do some house rules.
I’m not a big fan of house rules. I usually make a rule, then think about it, and can it. Usually my house rules add more complication than they are worth.
So any house rules I add will need to be worth it.
And in my opinion these following changes are worth it.
Because these spells are both used very often, and are a little more powerful than other spells for their level, I will we upping Haste and Enlarge Person by 1 level. And accordingly, Slow and Reduce Person will have the same fate.
The reasons for this for Haste: the Haste we know now was previously a higher level spell called Mass Haste, the 3E Haste only affected 1 person. But the spell Slow affected more than one. When 3.5 came out, they decided to make sure that Haste and Slow were truly opposite from one another, so Mass Haste replaced Haste on the level 3 spell list. Having seen that a Haste spell can do much more than a Fireball, I think they should have met in the middle, so now Haste and Slow are level 4.
And a similar back-story exists for Enlarge Person: Enlarge Person had level-dependant effectiveness in 3E, but was just changed to a flat change in 3.5. This caused the spell to become a little too powerful for a level 1 spell (approximately it gave you a +2 strength, a -2 dexterity, -1 size penalty to your AC, and a 10’ reach). Although the spell isn’t quite as powerful as other level 2 spells, it still gives too much for a level 1 spell and is used quite often. So it’s been moved to level 2 for any class that could cast it as a level 1 spell. There is an exception to any clerical domain that has it at level 1. I’m not messing with that hornet’s nest.
Inversely, I’ve rarely seen Reduce Person used. But to keep symmetry, it is getting bumped up to level 2. And since no one uses the spell, no one will care.
Now for the next house-rule hornets’ nest; Power Attack combined with two-handed weapons.
A couple months ago I started a thread on ENWorld about the huge disparity in the power of using a two-handed weapon with Power Attack versus a guy using a one-handed weapon and a shield.
It just seemed pointless to use a shield because it would only help you a little, but using a giant sword and swinging with abandon dropped your monster must faster.
The obvious result of this was that front line melee-freaks never used a shield.
I’m not quite sure of my solution yet, but I think it’s going to either changing Power Attack to a multiplier of 1.5 for two-handed weapons (rather than the current 2), or I’ll remove the +5 limit on the Combat Expertise feat.
I’m pretty much open to anything on this as every option I can come up with changes game balance in some way or another.
Next is the Invisibility line of spells. I’m adding components to them. I don’t expect there to be a shortage of money in the game, but I have seen the spell get used way too often. So a simple little cost of 50gp per casting is enough to make sure that the spell only gets used as needed. That cost will probably be a common gem (clear quartz) or something akin to that.
Now I come to the spell Keen Edge. That change is simple and obvious; it is not limited to edged weapons.
It seems a little silly to me that a spell’s name changes the spell itself rather than the spell’s effect determining the name.
The Wind Walk spell has a new sentence added to the spell description:
“The DM will screw over any group who abuses this spell.”
That should pretty much solve any real problem with that spell. The nightmares that players can come up with of what the DM might do to them can sometimes be worse than what the DM actually does.
And finally, Wish, Miracle, and Limited Wish have to go. I don’t like them as is. So for the time being (read that as “So until I think of something better”), those spells are basically not allowed except for item creation that need Wish or Miracle as a component but don’t give Wish or Miracle in return (like a Ring of Three Wishes).
And for my next topic: random encounters and how to make them easier to handle.
Let’s all face it; most random encounters are actually planned encounters. It just gets to be too much work properly setting up a true random encounter and that can bring the whole game to a screeching halt.
This can be fixed if you are willing to put a lot of work into the game ahead of time. But at some point these no longer qualify for random, they are then considered planned.
So what I have done, and am in the process of improving, is I’ve created an Excel spreadsheet that I’ve placed a simple matrix of various random encounters into it.
The matrix shows just enough to get the barest of information: name, which book they’re from, challenge rating, encounter level, number appearing, their environment, gp carried (randomized using d12’s), the number of gems and jewelry carried, the number of mundane items, and the number of magic items carried (broken down into minor, medium, and major categories).
Then I have the tables for what items are held. This will not be rolled until the last minute, or may be chosen on the fly as needed.
The creatures are as low on the CR list as 1/3 to as high as 36.
And that is just so far. I bought my 2nd to last book I’ll need for this list yesterday, and my final one will be from Monster Manual IV when it comes out. I believe that will be a total of 10 books I’ll have taken creatures from.
That almost guarantees that the players will not be able to identify every creature on sight.
Plus they will never have the same encounter twice. They might fight the same monster type more than once, but there will be more of them (to say the least).
So far the list is almost to 1500 encounters. And no, I don’t expect to use them all. I just want to be prepared.
All I have to do is to pick out a handful right before the game, based upon where I think the party is going to explore. Then I put a note in the page from the book and I’m good to go.
I really need to think of a good blog-entry end-tag.
Lucky for me I have plenty of time until it is going to be used.
I’m not sure how long Dale’s campaign is set to last, but my guess is that we’re nearly 50% of the way through.
Then Aaron is set to run. Since I have never seen Aaron run, I have no idea how long he will take. But I will venture a guess at a minimum of 6 months.
So with some simple math, I have about 10 months or so to prepare a game.
That should be about enough time, but we’ll have to see.
;)
And I want to repeat, I do not want to change D&D. I just want to modify it a little to make it work a little better for this particular campaign.
But that doesn’t mean I won’t do some house rules.
I’m not a big fan of house rules. I usually make a rule, then think about it, and can it. Usually my house rules add more complication than they are worth.
So any house rules I add will need to be worth it.
And in my opinion these following changes are worth it.
Because these spells are both used very often, and are a little more powerful than other spells for their level, I will we upping Haste and Enlarge Person by 1 level. And accordingly, Slow and Reduce Person will have the same fate.
The reasons for this for Haste: the Haste we know now was previously a higher level spell called Mass Haste, the 3E Haste only affected 1 person. But the spell Slow affected more than one. When 3.5 came out, they decided to make sure that Haste and Slow were truly opposite from one another, so Mass Haste replaced Haste on the level 3 spell list. Having seen that a Haste spell can do much more than a Fireball, I think they should have met in the middle, so now Haste and Slow are level 4.
And a similar back-story exists for Enlarge Person: Enlarge Person had level-dependant effectiveness in 3E, but was just changed to a flat change in 3.5. This caused the spell to become a little too powerful for a level 1 spell (approximately it gave you a +2 strength, a -2 dexterity, -1 size penalty to your AC, and a 10’ reach). Although the spell isn’t quite as powerful as other level 2 spells, it still gives too much for a level 1 spell and is used quite often. So it’s been moved to level 2 for any class that could cast it as a level 1 spell. There is an exception to any clerical domain that has it at level 1. I’m not messing with that hornet’s nest.
Inversely, I’ve rarely seen Reduce Person used. But to keep symmetry, it is getting bumped up to level 2. And since no one uses the spell, no one will care.
Now for the next house-rule hornets’ nest; Power Attack combined with two-handed weapons.
A couple months ago I started a thread on ENWorld about the huge disparity in the power of using a two-handed weapon with Power Attack versus a guy using a one-handed weapon and a shield.
It just seemed pointless to use a shield because it would only help you a little, but using a giant sword and swinging with abandon dropped your monster must faster.
The obvious result of this was that front line melee-freaks never used a shield.
I’m not quite sure of my solution yet, but I think it’s going to either changing Power Attack to a multiplier of 1.5 for two-handed weapons (rather than the current 2), or I’ll remove the +5 limit on the Combat Expertise feat.
I’m pretty much open to anything on this as every option I can come up with changes game balance in some way or another.
Next is the Invisibility line of spells. I’m adding components to them. I don’t expect there to be a shortage of money in the game, but I have seen the spell get used way too often. So a simple little cost of 50gp per casting is enough to make sure that the spell only gets used as needed. That cost will probably be a common gem (clear quartz) or something akin to that.
Now I come to the spell Keen Edge. That change is simple and obvious; it is not limited to edged weapons.
It seems a little silly to me that a spell’s name changes the spell itself rather than the spell’s effect determining the name.
The Wind Walk spell has a new sentence added to the spell description:
“The DM will screw over any group who abuses this spell.”
That should pretty much solve any real problem with that spell. The nightmares that players can come up with of what the DM might do to them can sometimes be worse than what the DM actually does.
And finally, Wish, Miracle, and Limited Wish have to go. I don’t like them as is. So for the time being (read that as “So until I think of something better”), those spells are basically not allowed except for item creation that need Wish or Miracle as a component but don’t give Wish or Miracle in return (like a Ring of Three Wishes).
And for my next topic: random encounters and how to make them easier to handle.
Let’s all face it; most random encounters are actually planned encounters. It just gets to be too much work properly setting up a true random encounter and that can bring the whole game to a screeching halt.
This can be fixed if you are willing to put a lot of work into the game ahead of time. But at some point these no longer qualify for random, they are then considered planned.
So what I have done, and am in the process of improving, is I’ve created an Excel spreadsheet that I’ve placed a simple matrix of various random encounters into it.
The matrix shows just enough to get the barest of information: name, which book they’re from, challenge rating, encounter level, number appearing, their environment, gp carried (randomized using d12’s), the number of gems and jewelry carried, the number of mundane items, and the number of magic items carried (broken down into minor, medium, and major categories).
Then I have the tables for what items are held. This will not be rolled until the last minute, or may be chosen on the fly as needed.
The creatures are as low on the CR list as 1/3 to as high as 36.
And that is just so far. I bought my 2nd to last book I’ll need for this list yesterday, and my final one will be from Monster Manual IV when it comes out. I believe that will be a total of 10 books I’ll have taken creatures from.
That almost guarantees that the players will not be able to identify every creature on sight.
Plus they will never have the same encounter twice. They might fight the same monster type more than once, but there will be more of them (to say the least).
So far the list is almost to 1500 encounters. And no, I don’t expect to use them all. I just want to be prepared.
All I have to do is to pick out a handful right before the game, based upon where I think the party is going to explore. Then I put a note in the page from the book and I’m good to go.
I really need to think of a good blog-entry end-tag.
posted by BlueBlackRed at 3:20 PM
5 Comments:
Here's my thoughts on the power attack house rule:
The first question I have here is what is the intent of the house rule? It sounds like you want to increase the incentive to play the archtypal sword and board melee character. There are two ways to do this that I see. Reduce the effectiveness of power attack, or increase the effectiveness of a shield.
Power attack and Combat expertise are approximately inverse, the difference being the +5 limit for combat expertise and the effect of two handed weapons on power attack. I haven't fully explored the balance concerns yet but my gut reaction is to make them truly inverse. Remove the +5 limit, limiting it to a max of your BAB instead, and give characters with shields who use combat expertise the same 2:1 exchange that two handed weapon users get for power attack.
This dramatically increases the effectiveness of the sword and board fighter. It gives the 20th level sword and board fighter using full combat expertise an AC of 60 (10+8 Armor+2 Shield+40 Combat Expertise) before magical enhancement bonuses. Is this too much, or does it even matter? That depends on the DM and the creatures the PCs face.
All too often I see people, both PCs and DMs, who assume that all the PCs opponents are either stupid or rediculously single minded. Sure the fighter now has an AC of 60 but he can't hit anything. This fighter has just made himself the equivilent of a can of peaches: hard to get at but not at all dangerous. If I get hungry and wander into my kitchen, as an intellegent creature if I haven't a can opener, I just leave the can of peaches in the pantry and instead enjoy a slice of cheese. Which in our analogy, a slice of cheese, would be the party wizard. Therefore if DMed effectively the "Can of Peaches" has effectively removed himself from the battle, he is impervious to the enemies assualts but they are likewise impervious to him.
I've begun to ramble here, a consequence of my sterotypically haptic thought, so I will now stop. I'm still not certain I would institute such a rule but at the very least I've added fuel to what will hopefully become a firey discussion.
Well the reason for it all is that the current rules give you no reason at all to take the traditional sword & board over a two-handed sword as the protection given to you by a shield just isn't worth the loss of damage potential.
But all of the options I've heard of, and any others I've come up with all affect balance in one way or another.
So my goal is to determine the least disruptive one and for that.
Right now the best one seems to be using the disarm option.
When you power attack, you effectively have lowered your BAB versus disarming - meaning you have a good chance to lose your weapon for at least one round.
That allows the power-attacker to go nuts versus the mindless monsters out in the world, but not so when fighting those who can think.
Plus I don't see any reason not to remove the +5 limit to Combat Expertise. If the front line fighter is fighting something he can't harm, or the party rogue has gotten himself into a bad spot, then I'm ok with that.
As for a fiery discussion, try ENWorld.
It's a good forum on the web that prevents flamewars, and that allows for the "adults" to have friendly discussions.
This is a thread I started about this very topic 2 months ago:
http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=168857
It covers a lot of ground and gives many options.
The bias towards offense seems to be something endimic to the entire D&D model far bigger than just power attack. Just look at weapon focus with a complete tree of bonuses vs lonely cumbersome dodge, the array of offensive PrC (Warhulk and Frenzied Bezerker come to mind) versus the Dwarven Defender. Combat characters are expected to go up offensively 1-2 points a level (BAB and other sources). However, defensively unless the PC is exceptionally well built, getting a point of AC a level is rare. Even then they usually have fragile touch AC.
I almost agree with you.
But the sources of gaining an AC bonus in a "normal" D&D game goes up as you find more and better equipment.
At level 1 you have a fighter with chainmail armor and a minor dex bonus (assume AC17).
While at level 20 that fellow will have a platemail +5 with some extra stuff added, a dancing shield +5 (also with more), an amulet of natural armor +5, and a ring of protection +5 (AC35).
Ok - that probably won't ever happen but the potential exists in the current D&D model. And it almost matches the increase in BAB. It doesn't match up to magic items giving you a greater damage potential, but the greater hp potential of higher CR monsters do.
Believe it or not, aside from a few hiccups, the designers of 3E did very well in keeping party EL vs monster CR very even.
It just happens that Power Attack might be one of those hiccups.
There is a spell for raising the threat range of bludgeoning weapons. I want to say it has the word "Impact" in it, and it is an FR spell. It is also a weapon quality for magical weapons, same as Keen. I can see the simplicity, though, of just having a one-stop-shopping spell. Or just encourage players to take Improved Crit so they have the improved range all the time if it is really important (there's almost no reason for a fighter not to take it, unless they are investing an a feat intensive tree like two-weapon fighting).
Post a Comment
<< Home