So the
google hangout interview just ended, what do you guys think?
Really interesting discussion that’s chock full of stuff. I came away from it thinking this:
What a tricky balancing act this is becoming! But I think they are going about it the right way (IMHO). Specifically:
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Attention paid to the game play experience and making the GM's job easier. As an underlying design principle, a few of Mike's and Jeremy's comments highlighted their attention to "is this rule easy on the player?" and "is this easy for the GM?" This is a good thing.
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Skills/Areas of Expertise and Attribute Checks. Though I'm partial to 4e, Mike's explanation on the making skills more character customization elements (at least in the basic game) made sense esp. in making the GM's job easier i.e., the GM doesn't have to memorize skill lists.
OTOH, I don't agree with fighters add skill dice to STR while Rogues add it to DEX, etc. Let the player choose during chargen!
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Allowing Martial Characters to do "Cool Stuff". As part of the skills discussion, they commented on taunt and capabilities of martial characters in general. I'm glad they’re paying attention to balancing what martial characters can do. I think Jeremy mentioned that "narrative defining non-magical abilities" will not be in the basic rules (perhaps a module?). But skill tricks like Taunt (as PC defining abilities) are included. The discussion highlighted what a tricky balancing act this will be.
Oh yeah, change the "Charm" condition to "Friendly". It's confusing.
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Martial Damage. Mike mentioned that it currently is too high. But the math is easy to fix. Do you agree?
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High Level Play. A few topics were touched on. Jeremy indicated, in terms of the abilities of high level characters in the playtest, the benchmark is Conan and members of the Fellowship than say, Beowulf or Roland. I’m good with that. Mike mentioned a Legacy system, for PCs going beyond 20th level. My impression was it wasn't in current development, more a concept than anything.
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The Dragon and 43 Bugbears. Mike commented less on the result of that encounter, and more on the design of the dragon, i.e., it should be able to take on 4 characters at once. I agree with their comments about status effects (like stunning) and how solos shouldn't - as a rule - be immune to those. It'll be interesting to see what they come up with. What Mike didn’t want is for the game play to devolve into casting the same three spells as some “I Win” button.
But Jeremy made it a point to say that they’re ok with encounters ending in unexpected ways but want the rules to stack the deck against unsatisfying endings. They "want cleverness to be rewarded in the game." Mike added that players wanted more variability in the game. The essence of D&D is not knowing what is going to happen next (not only b/c you have a GM but also the rules facilitate this).
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Spreading Damage Dice. Again, they touched on martial characters. I’m ok with using the damage dice in the way they described, like spreading it across multiple targets or reducing it for status effects.
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Sources of the Playtest. Jeremy mentioned four sources of feedback for the playtest. There are daily internal playtesting, feedback from playtesters who’ve signed a NDA and have access to materials not released to the public playtesters, the public playtesters (he mentioned 1000s) and finally, the forums.
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Swarm and minion rules. Not really a focus now. Mike mentioned he wanted rules for mass combat in the standard game (meaning not in the basic game).
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Out of combat.So far, they’ve removed class skills. But the classes will be designed that some will be better than others in certain situations (like a bard will be better in social situations). Beyond that, the discussion was very general. Mike doesn’t envision specific rules for non-combat, like they have it for combat. He could provide more options, but not “I Win” buttons (he was referring to taunt making the opponent want toward you).
OTOH, both wants to avoid defining too much (or as Jeremy mentioned, making it “suffocating”), b/c it may discourage improvisation. Mike concluded that he’s not sure of the priority of this part of the rules.
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Multi-class and New Class. Multiclass will be by level. But Mike mentioned that while the system may work for edge cases (like a L19 Fighter/L1 Wizard or 1 level in 20 classes), it will work best for “reasonable multi-classing”, described as up to 3 classes that are close in level.
A new class will be released during Winter Fantasy. What do you think it will be? My hope is the Warlord!