Eltharon
Explorer
Hi all
Sorry for the long post, but I decided that explaining the whole situation would answer some questions.
When you think of a grim and gritty game, anything D20 related is the last thing you think of. After all, for lethal combat, you have a million other “Grim” RPGs. DnD and its many children are games about noble heroes smiting vast amounts of bad guys, getting vast amounts of treasure and doing it in suitably heroic fashion (mainly). Now, there’s nothing wrong with that, as the characters I’ve played in DnD have done all that and more, and I’ve had great fun doing so. But then I tried to run an epic adventure in traditional “fantasy book” format (Meaning, instead of many liked dungeons, which is what the DMG says is a minor campaign, there is a large “metaplot” that the characters must solve. Anyone who has read any sort of traditional fantasy book, in my case, based on A Song of Ice and Fire, knows what I’m talking about). The problem was that the heroes had to be good enough to fight the evil bad guys (demons, in this case), and bad enough to feel threatened by evil minions (Humans, mainly). So I thought about it, and decided that 10th level was a good starting point, since they had to fight demons early on, provided I use the Grim ‘n Gritty rules to make stuff more lethal. That way, I said to myself, they can fight the demons AND get threatened by reasonably low level NPCs, while keeping a sense of danger throughout (something normal DnD doesn’t really have, due to its HP system, you know when a fight is going bad, normally). So we started. And…
The characters, just as in normal DnD, cut the minor NPCs into small, bite sized portions. In fact, due to the grim ‘n gritty rules, they did it in one hit.
Well that got old fast, so I put the adventure on hold until I could think of something.
So I put on my +2 Mithril Chain Shirt, grabbed my elven blade, and delved deep into the depths of my RPG collection, fighting off evil dust mice and the occasional Large Cat sitting on the character sheets. I pulled up GURPs Lite on my PC. I dug out my World of Darkness book. I dusted off my vintage copy of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (and admire the cool cover)
GURPs…hmm. Not enough material in the lite version, and I really couldn’t afford to buy more, even though I like the lethal combat.
World of Darkness has a combat system that’s much to streamlined (New WoD, btw). Lethal, but rather boring and predictable.
Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay seemed to be it. We had played it before and liked it, and It certainly had characters that wouldn’t slice apart everything that came their way (except the party dwarf, of course, but he has ascended into legend)
Well, sort of.
The D100 Mechanic is nice, until one considers the odds of actually hitting someone.
So I ran some tests, we played a session, and yes, the game was good, but everyone—NPCs, PCs, Monsters—kept, well, whiffing. 5 rounds in row where a fighter type character missed the equivalent of a 1st level fighter in leather armour. And the peasant npcs in the traditional barroom brawl couldn’t hit the broadside of a barn standing next to it with their fists.
Now, understand that I’m not trying to kill the players here, just trying to instill that fact that combat is nasty (because they really get into it allot, and normally can get away with a lot), and the fact that characters in d20 leave their low level adversaries lying in pools of blood regardless of what optional rules you use. And with that thought, it hit me.
The thing I don’t like about DnD is the level curve. The DnD design is based on, well, Dungeons (!). The characters go through dungeons, fight bad guys, gain levels, and fight harder bad guys, working their way up the CR scale, and leaving the lower ones horribly outclassed. I mean, there is no 1st level fighter who can fight a 5th level one without the Dice Gods special blessing.
This works fine for dungeon delving, where it makes sense to have gradually higher level monsters, but we haven’t done a dungeon delve in 4 years. The thing is, you can’t really “fix” the level curve because it’s one of the important elements of DnD.
So, some of you are thinking that I’m crazy for trying to take the levels out of D20, but that is what I’m trying to do.
In fact, I’m also trying to tweak the combat system to make it a bit more realistic (heresy!) and allow things like parries and dodges (and less HP).
But the classes have to come first.
So how do I do it?
and thanks for sticking through the whole post.
Sorry for the long post, but I decided that explaining the whole situation would answer some questions.
When you think of a grim and gritty game, anything D20 related is the last thing you think of. After all, for lethal combat, you have a million other “Grim” RPGs. DnD and its many children are games about noble heroes smiting vast amounts of bad guys, getting vast amounts of treasure and doing it in suitably heroic fashion (mainly). Now, there’s nothing wrong with that, as the characters I’ve played in DnD have done all that and more, and I’ve had great fun doing so. But then I tried to run an epic adventure in traditional “fantasy book” format (Meaning, instead of many liked dungeons, which is what the DMG says is a minor campaign, there is a large “metaplot” that the characters must solve. Anyone who has read any sort of traditional fantasy book, in my case, based on A Song of Ice and Fire, knows what I’m talking about). The problem was that the heroes had to be good enough to fight the evil bad guys (demons, in this case), and bad enough to feel threatened by evil minions (Humans, mainly). So I thought about it, and decided that 10th level was a good starting point, since they had to fight demons early on, provided I use the Grim ‘n Gritty rules to make stuff more lethal. That way, I said to myself, they can fight the demons AND get threatened by reasonably low level NPCs, while keeping a sense of danger throughout (something normal DnD doesn’t really have, due to its HP system, you know when a fight is going bad, normally). So we started. And…
The characters, just as in normal DnD, cut the minor NPCs into small, bite sized portions. In fact, due to the grim ‘n gritty rules, they did it in one hit.
Well that got old fast, so I put the adventure on hold until I could think of something.
So I put on my +2 Mithril Chain Shirt, grabbed my elven blade, and delved deep into the depths of my RPG collection, fighting off evil dust mice and the occasional Large Cat sitting on the character sheets. I pulled up GURPs Lite on my PC. I dug out my World of Darkness book. I dusted off my vintage copy of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (and admire the cool cover)
GURPs…hmm. Not enough material in the lite version, and I really couldn’t afford to buy more, even though I like the lethal combat.
World of Darkness has a combat system that’s much to streamlined (New WoD, btw). Lethal, but rather boring and predictable.
Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay seemed to be it. We had played it before and liked it, and It certainly had characters that wouldn’t slice apart everything that came their way (except the party dwarf, of course, but he has ascended into legend)
Well, sort of.
The D100 Mechanic is nice, until one considers the odds of actually hitting someone.
So I ran some tests, we played a session, and yes, the game was good, but everyone—NPCs, PCs, Monsters—kept, well, whiffing. 5 rounds in row where a fighter type character missed the equivalent of a 1st level fighter in leather armour. And the peasant npcs in the traditional barroom brawl couldn’t hit the broadside of a barn standing next to it with their fists.
Now, understand that I’m not trying to kill the players here, just trying to instill that fact that combat is nasty (because they really get into it allot, and normally can get away with a lot), and the fact that characters in d20 leave their low level adversaries lying in pools of blood regardless of what optional rules you use. And with that thought, it hit me.
The thing I don’t like about DnD is the level curve. The DnD design is based on, well, Dungeons (!). The characters go through dungeons, fight bad guys, gain levels, and fight harder bad guys, working their way up the CR scale, and leaving the lower ones horribly outclassed. I mean, there is no 1st level fighter who can fight a 5th level one without the Dice Gods special blessing.
This works fine for dungeon delving, where it makes sense to have gradually higher level monsters, but we haven’t done a dungeon delve in 4 years. The thing is, you can’t really “fix” the level curve because it’s one of the important elements of DnD.
So, some of you are thinking that I’m crazy for trying to take the levels out of D20, but that is what I’m trying to do.
In fact, I’m also trying to tweak the combat system to make it a bit more realistic (heresy!) and allow things like parries and dodges (and less HP).
But the classes have to come first.
So how do I do it?
and thanks for sticking through the whole post.
