Blending the D&Ds

Garthanos · Dec 9, 2018

Zardnaar said:
Only the cheesy fighter builds can keepup in damage and even then the Sorlock has other options. .

hmmm isnt that basically the same problem 3e had

Zardnaar · Dec 9, 2018

Garthanos said:
hmmm isnt that basically the same problem 3e had

Its more of a corner case in 5E and its optional so its not as bad as 3E. And its at higher levels so in some respect its more theory crafting as most games still don't go past level 10 apparently so in most games it won't be an issue even if someone builds that PC. Can be done but its not systematic if that makes any sense.

Garthanos · Dec 9, 2018

Zardnaar said:
This gets back to my precious comment about separating combat and non combat stuff. 5E kind of does this with some class features but if you use feats the non combat ones are competing with the combat ones. 2E split them up initially (late 2E they merged). 4E also gave it a shot with the U part of AEDU but failed on the feat thing.

Making general adventuring arena completely distinct is something I could definitely support. However I have also noticed one could go the other direction as many of the mechanisms of more interesting combat actions relate to skills like intimidations and bluffs and diplomacy relating to feints/false openings ie deceptions and in general manipulating enemies and inspiring allies.

Zardnaar said:
Pathfinder 2 tried something similar in the early playtest in effect having lots of options but from a preselected list. PF2 could easily be tweaked into 4.5.

I have heard that murmur going around.

Zardnaar · Dec 9, 2018

Garthanos said:
Making general adventuring arena completely distinct is something I could definitely support. However I have also noticed one could go the other direction as many of the mechanisms of more interesting combat actions relate to skills like intimidations and bluffs and diplomacy relating to feints/false openings ie deceptions and in general manipulating enemies and inspiring allies.

I have heard that murmur going around.

5E is about the only D&D where skills could be integrated into combat better.

4E for example still had that problem of the +5 trained/untrained thing along with +5 off skill focus. SWSE had that problem where Jedi could key combat stuff off use the force skill checks- potentially +13 or +15. At level 1.

IDK where Pathfinder 2 ended up in the playtest but early on they had a lot of things from 4E in there, not so much things like powers but all the classes had a unified design but they kept things like spell tables. The layout and presentation was terrible though so it lacked the elegance of 4E/5E or even 3.0. But it woudln't be to hard to redo PF2 as 4.5 IMHO or use it as a chasis, but you can also use 4E to clone BECMI and add 4E stuff to OSR if you could be bothered to spend the time doing either one. You could convert the Warlord almost as is to OSR just adjusting its hit points and powers that targeted NADs into the OSR equivalent. It wouldn't matter how powerful it was to the other classes as long as the xp table reflected it.

Garthanos · Dec 9, 2018

Zardnaar said:
5E is about the only D&D where skills could be integrated into combat better.

By keeping the numbers in the same arena... yeh that is one of the gains on the trade off of bounded accuracy I think... I do understand the motivation.

Zardnaar · Dec 9, 2018

Garthanos said:
By keeping the numbers in the same arena... yeh that is one of the gains on the trade off of bounded accuracy I think... I do understand the motivation.

The numbers could be stretched a bit though and tweak the ACs at lower levels to account for it. By that I mean you could do the 4E +1/2 levels thing but 4E gave you +2 or 3 to hit off weapons while Star Wars Saga used the 4E system but you didn't get the +2 or +3 to hit off weapons.

My Blend from a few years ago tweaked slightly once 5E came out. Its kind of a mix of the 5E, B/X and 3.5 Fighter.

Garthanos · Dec 9, 2018

Zardnaar said:
. You could convert the Warlord almost as is to OSR just adjusting its hit points and powers that targeted NADs into the OSR equivalent. It wouldn't matter how powerful it was to the other classes as long as the xp table reflected it.

I might be interested in seeing that.

In 5e at some level Mearls took the flavor text of 2e for the fighter and said yup one Warlord is a type of Fighter. Battlemaster is a nod to that - the prototype Warlord he put out in a video is also a sub type of fighter you could call a chess master styled warlord and it's pretty interesting.

It looks like it might have saving throw issues and like all fighters who arent dex fighters they have rather suck initiative which seems rather contrary to theme in a big way but more reason to put stats in other areas so its a bigger issue.

Zardnaar · Dec 9, 2018

Garthanos said:
I might be interested in seeing that.

In 5e at some level Mearls took the flavor text of 2e for the fighter and said yup one Warlord is a type of Fighter. Battlemaster is a nod to that - the prototype Warlord he put out in a video is also a sub type of fighter you could call a chess master styled warlord and it's pretty interesting.

It looks like it might have saving throw issues and like all fighters who arent dex fighters they have rather suck initiative which seems rather contrary to theme in a big way but more reason to put stats in other areas so its a bigger issue.

There was a thread about mass combat rules for 4E. You could use the old Battlesystem rules in the Rules Cyclopedia and just have the Warlord grant a bonus to the battle numbers or have the warlord add double its level or something. Healing surge don't work obviously but just beef up the healing word ability and replace with non magical CLWs or something and at higher levels they get a non magical cure serious/critical that refreshes on a short rest or something (*something equivalent to 1/3rds the clerics spell capacity devoted to healing perhaps).

Garthanos · Dec 9, 2018

Zardnaar said:
The numbers could be stretched a bit though and tweak the ACs at lower levels to account for it. By that I mean you could do the 4E +1/2 levels thing but 4E gave you +2 or 3 to hit off weapons while Star Wars Saga used the 4E system but you didn't get the +2 or +3 to hit off weapons.

My Blend from a few years ago tweaked slightly once 5E came out. Its kind of a mix of the 5E, B/X and 3.5 Fighter.

The +2 or 3 for weapon proficiency didnt serve a great purpose, what did it do? disguise the AC which tended to be a couple points higher than other defenses. In practice how many times do characters pick up an weapon they arent proficient in? This could be an argument for just putting them at a 5e style disadvantage when they do.

Garthanos · Dec 9, 2018

Zardnaar said:
There was a thread about mass combat rules for 4E. You could use the old Battlesystem rules in the Rules Cyclopedia and just have the Warlord grant a bonus to the battle numbers or have the warlord add double its level or something.

I was considering letting Warlords and those with Noble background get a DMs best friend +2 bonus on all the skill checks interacting with them from intimidations/bluff/diplomacy or exploiting historical battle lore etc

i am not familiar with Battlesystem. I think if 4e had a healthy set of Swarms that might be the first step without going too far afield.

I am also curious about Birthright setting and whether it might have had something to grab.

Zardnaar said:
Healing surge don't work obviously but just beef up the healing word ability and replace with non magical CLWs or something and at higher levels they get a non magical cure serious/critical that refreshes on a short rest or something (*something equivalent to 1/3rds the clerics spell capacity devoted to healing perhaps).

Mearls did put healing that can also generated temp if it pushes you over the top and even attack damage boosting in via a daily refresh into his Warlord prototype and balanced it theoretically around the spell casting of the Eldritch knight.

I am actually thinking he might have captured a healthy amount of the concept with only minor misses, for instance a 4e tactical warlord keeps the party seriously on its toes with initiative bonuses that mean we always go first and can sometimes adjust initiative basically by sacrificing his to boost an ally.