E6: The Game Inside D&D (with PDFs!)

[Ry]

Just a question as I have been reading this thread for a while and have been working on converting it to d20 modern..... has anyone tried to convert this to modern at all
(I do not mean to derail this thread as more people play D&D than modern, but it makes sense in the real world that people aren't as high level)

I don't run modern myself, but one of my players runs a d20 modern game. He said he switched systems because he had 10th-level Tough heroes charging machineguns, and that he thought E6 would have been a nice fix if he'd thought of it when he set up the campaign. There's a lot of modern feat pdfs out there from 3rd party publishers if you have a yen for that.

 

[Ry]

I've been thinking of adding a twist for if I ever run an E6 game. Characters gain levels normally until 6th, after 6000 exp, they get a level of an paragon class (unearthed arcana) appropriate for their race. After another 7000 exp, they get the second level of their paragon class (or a level of a prestige class, if they really want it, and it's not broken/fits the character). After that, it's the normal feat every 5000 exp. I know this is essentially E8 and would allow some 4th level spells, but the idea intrigues me for some reason.

I was thinking about this, and I think it sounds like a great way to encourage race or those few prestige classes to be important in the story/world itself. That dovetails with what I posted about variant classes defining a setting (above) - about these things really shining in a situation/setting that plays to them.

 

[Ry]

I don't know what kind of editors are reading this thread, but if any are, I could really use some help rewriting the section about how epic the 6th-level characters are from the first-level commoner's perspective.

 

[Narmical]

No sence making

All the previous posters seem to be gushing over you ideas. To each his own. I must say, however, I feel your idea demonstrates poor design.

I understand the problem you have identified in out of the box d20 D&D. The feeing and nature of play changes as level increases. Fixing an inconsistency of flavor with an inconsistency in mechanics is not a well designed solution.

From your titling the system "epic" its clear you just applied the epic level concept with a lower level cap. This is not the super innovative idea that you, and other posters, seem to think it is.

Why have "filler" feats? the idea of your feat picking system is to keep power low while still having meaningful advancement. filler feats are not meaningful.

In the case of your stat up feat and its associated filer, a better design would be to have just a stat up feat that reads.

Stat Up Feat
Choose a stat, you get +1 to that stat.
This feat may be chosen 2 times per stat.

admittedly an odd stat value is almost meaningless (not a design flaw on your part but on d20s) it does open new feats. Most importantly the feat pick has an actual change to the sheet other than filler.

Is there any good reason to have the mechanics of level progression dramatically change at some point?

Was it simply that was how the epic level handbook handled things?

Having a game where the mechanics of something drastically change at some point during the game is poor design. You pointed out this kind of flaw in d20 D&D. You solution has the same flaw but in a different location.

In d20 D&D the basic resolution mechanic is d20 + bonus vs target number.
At levels 1 - 5 The die greatly dominates your bonus. This makes for a highly fortune based interaction. Your success or failure at anything is highly dependent on your dice roll.
Similarly for damage dealing. You hitpoits on average are 1 to 5 times the damage of a weapon. This high fortune and highly lethal weapons lead towards the gritty feel.

At the other end levels 16-20 your bonus dominates the die roll. A level 20 fighter has a base attack bonus of +20. With his +5 sword and 20 strength his attack bonus is +30
Additionally weapon damage does not keep pace with hit points.
Longsword 1d8
Longsword + 5 1d8+5
Level one Fighter HP 10
Level 20 Fighter HP 10 + 19d10

This removes the lethality of a sword stroke.

At level one play is fortune based. Hoping i can make my roll. At level 20 its "how do i bring my ablates to bear to kill the monster".

That is bad design.

Your solution was to kind of freeze the game at the point where the bonus and the die contribute about the same amount to the resolution mechanic. That is a noble goal. That is what a well designed system should be, consistent.

Your approach, however is misguided. Having a level advancement system that just changes midway through the game is inconsistent and poorly designed.

To make an analogy its like raiding in MMOs. Its a totally different style of advancement and play. And if you really like that, sorry, you need to invest a year of playtime before you can get to that. At least if your the grind enjoying player you can just start fresh when you get board. But not for the raid loving player, they must grind to earn the right to raid.

That’s not fun.

You system has merit. I however believe all advancement should be feat based. Just have the level 6 mechanics locked in from the start.

In my opinion you either level-up forever or feat pick forever. having one then breaking to the other is just plain bad design.

--Mitch

 

[Ry]

Your approach, however is misguided. Having a level advancement system that just changes midway through the game is inconsistent and poorly designed.

Hi Narmical. You're definitely not the first to tell me E6 is misguided, or to say it's a bad idea (I'm guessing you followed from the "nice enworlders" thread where I posted about the positive). The other posters who stick around tend to be pretty E6-positive, but if you look around at the older posts (especially the threads at therpgsite.com and the giantitp forums) you'll see that it is quite controversial.

As to your specific idea that a changeover in advancement is bad design, think of it like this: The genre I'm emulating features characters who have a major change in how they advance after an initial period of fast advancement. Young fantasy heroes, and heroes in historical fiction books and movies, work this way:

At the beginning, any given character is unimportant and vulnerable. A series of dangerous events transform them into a capable adventurer, and they are significantly more powerful (6th level) than their younger selves (1st level). After this, they develop masteries and diversify their skills, but do not as a matter of course outpace others who have gone through a similar period (i.e., they gain feats, but not levels). Against others of their power level, they must take advantage of their special strengths and techniques to overcome their foes; this leads them to even further development and again, this is not a linear progression beyond their peers (i.e. even more feats).

Having an rpg with a changeover point in advancement isn't bad design when the underlying world you're trying to describe has a changeover point.

Edit: None of this is to say that an E6 game can't start at level 6, feature only level 6 characters, and so on. I think that could be really cool (although I'd still use lower-level characters for the unimportant NPC types).

 

[Narmical]

... The other posters who stick around tend to be pretty E6-positive, but if you look around at the older posts (especially the threads at therpgsite.com and the giantitp forums) you'll see that it is quite controversial.

I just followed your link off the forge. So i didnt know about prevous threads.

A change in the speed of the increase in effectiveness doesnt need to be modled as a drematic rules change as you decided to use. for example, in straight D&D rules combat changes from high fortune to high stratagy with out a change in the game rules.

I think you could have a model simaler to this. I feel constant rules are of utmost importance.

do you remember how confusing AD&D 2ed was? combat, non-weapon profs, system shock, saves all had independent rules that were unrealted. It was needlessy confusing.

 

[Ry]

I feel constant rules are of utmost importance.

do you remember how confusing AD&D 2ed was? combat, non-weapon profs, system shock, saves all had independent rules that were unrealted. It was needlessy confusing.

Right, but consistency in the rules doesn't trump how those rules affect gameplay. Depending on the gameplay you want, sometimes you need different rules for different situations. I know there's some great single-mechanic games (I've played with them in some very long, excellent campaigns) but that's not an aim of E6.

 

[der_kluge]

I admit I'm coming into this topic late... I have to concur that I think this is an interesting idea. Though, I can't help but wonder if 6th level is a little *too* low. Like, maybe 9th would be good. That makes 5th level spells the max. I could see that as being just about the pinnacle of power. For that matter, 10th would be ok, since from a spellcasting POV, it's not much more powerful.

Does E6 scale easily to this approach? Like, if you made the cap at 10th, instead of at 6th?

I admit, I haven't read the PDF. I'll go d/l it now.

 

[Kunimatyu]

I admit I'm coming into this topic late... I have to concur that I think this is an interesting idea. Though, I can't help but wonder if 6th level is a little *too* low. Like, maybe 9th would be good. That makes 5th level spells the max. I could see that as being just about the pinnacle of power. For that matter, 10th would be ok, since from a spellcasting POV, it's not much more powerful.

Does E6 scale easily to this approach? Like, if you made the cap at 10th, instead of at 6th?

I admit, I haven't read the PDF. I'll go d/l it now.

You can cap your "E" anywhere from 6-10, but the reason 6 is usually chosen is because casters and non-casters are balanced with each other at this level. An E10 game will still work, but your casters will be able to produce effects that non-magic-users cannot deal with through mundane means(wall of force/stone, solid fog, etc.).

The other particularly nice thing about stopping at 6 is that monsters in the 1-2 CR range still are a capable threat if encountered in large numbers. At 10th level, this is not so much the case.

EDIT: Remember that incantations are often used in an E6 game for higher-level magical effects like raise dead and banishment -- by making them incantations that require time and effort, they become plot points, as opposed to powers that are casually tossed around.

 

[der_kluge]

You can cap your "E" anywhere from 6-10, but the reason 6 is usually chosen is because casters and non-casters are balanced with each other at this level. An E10 game will still work, but your casters will be able to produce effects that non-magic-users cannot deal with through mundane means(wall of force/stone, solid fog, etc.).

The other particularly nice thing about stopping at 6 is that monsters in the 1-2 CR range still are a capable threat if encountered in large numbers. At 10th level, this is not so much the case.

EDIT: Remember that incantations are often used in an E6 game for higher-level magical effects like raise dead and banishment -- by making them incantations that require time and effort, they become plot points, as opposed to powers that are casually tossed around.

Hmm, so I'm looking at the 4th level spell list (a cap at 8th level, say). It includes stoneskin, Evard's black tentacles, and polymorph - which are probably the most powerful in that set. I could see just removing polymorph outright. Then I'd say a cap of 8th would be pretty reasonable. They'd be strong, yes, but not ridiculously so.