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Your dream PHB?
- Thread starter der_kluge
- Start date
Particle_Man
Explorer
Crothian said:KiSS??
That is an acronym for Keep it Simple, Stupid. It is neither a come-on nor an invitation to become a fan of a certain rock group.
Particle_Man
Explorer
erian_7 said:
Awoo? [Checks out the 3.5 PHB...Compares to his 3.0 PHB] Well I'll be! Guess that's one more of those little changes I never noticed until now. Thanks for the catch!
Terwox
First Post
My DMG...
Add unearthed arcana -- most of it. It's good to have options, and some of these make the game easier to play, especially for beginners, and it opens up a lot of options for others. UA sets a good bar for complex house rules.
To agree with Crothian and add a specific, use a "how to storytell" chapter out of a White Wolf manual, trying to find the least pretentious one. (The WoD 2.0 stuff has been really good in this point so far.)
And maybe I'd add more of what Monte said about designing prestige classes in 3.0 -- I don't mind the glut of them, but I think PrCs should be more focused on letting a DM put interesting classes and organizations and abilities centered around their world, especially if it's a homebrew, especially a "weird" homebrew.)
Design guidelines in general in any form would be good -- I don't own any item creation guidelines, maybe I should look at the Artificer's Handbook. (Don't wanna hijack -- I'm just gonna go read some reviews now.)
For my PHB, I'd include the XPH. I'd maybe include some of the rules from Savage Species too, some of my players and I enjoy non-standard races too much.
That's really about it, I guess. Add UA, the XPH, and storytelling and design rules, and the design bits of SS. No real replacements for me, I'm very happy with the core rules, and I currently just use the 3.5 rules with minor modifications. (Gestalt for solo play, spell points for beginner player. Sounds convoluted, but it's working great.)
Add unearthed arcana -- most of it. It's good to have options, and some of these make the game easier to play, especially for beginners, and it opens up a lot of options for others. UA sets a good bar for complex house rules.
To agree with Crothian and add a specific, use a "how to storytell" chapter out of a White Wolf manual, trying to find the least pretentious one. (The WoD 2.0 stuff has been really good in this point so far.)
And maybe I'd add more of what Monte said about designing prestige classes in 3.0 -- I don't mind the glut of them, but I think PrCs should be more focused on letting a DM put interesting classes and organizations and abilities centered around their world, especially if it's a homebrew, especially a "weird" homebrew.)
Design guidelines in general in any form would be good -- I don't own any item creation guidelines, maybe I should look at the Artificer's Handbook. (Don't wanna hijack -- I'm just gonna go read some reviews now.
)For my PHB, I'd include the XPH. I'd maybe include some of the rules from Savage Species too, some of my players and I enjoy non-standard races too much.
That's really about it, I guess. Add UA, the XPH, and storytelling and design rules, and the design bits of SS. No real replacements for me, I'm very happy with the core rules, and I currently just use the 3.5 rules with minor modifications. (Gestalt for solo play, spell points for beginner player. Sounds convoluted, but it's working great.)
I'd re-write the whole thing, but I'd make sure to leave enough out so that I could sell version 4.5 a few years later.
Seriously, though, here are some ideas.
I'd include the Leadership feat, or at least enough to give the player more information.
I'd include a magic item section that gave players enough information about things like item slots, and bonus types, so that my players wouldn't have to spend so much time digging through the DMG when they have enough gold to buy an item.
I think I'd like to see the spell system reworked so that two things change. First, some kind of BAB for spell casting is included (Thanee proposed a system elsewhere on these boards and I've adopted a version for my campaign). Second, I'd probably retool all the spells so that the spell levels don't go from 0 to 9, but go from 1 to 20 instead. Further, I'd allow for rules to expand spells from levels 21+ and scrap the Epic spell business.
I'd have two different rogues, one that's combative, as the current rogue seems to be (i.e. uncanny dodge, evasion, sneak attack) and another one that's based around the Charisma ability (bluff, diplomacy, etc.). I don't like that the two are melded together. A solution to this could be to use something similar to the talent trees that are in d20 Modern. Yeah, I like that. I'd bring in the talent trees from d20 Modern.
Oh, I'd probably not stick with 5- and 10-level prestige classes, since so many saves and BAB progressions don't fit well (I like the way that a 6- or 8-level prestige class works better).
I'd introduce the average save progression, it would be a rare class indeed that had two good saves (perhaps just the ranger and monk).
Dave
Seriously, though, here are some ideas.
I'd include the Leadership feat, or at least enough to give the player more information.
I'd include a magic item section that gave players enough information about things like item slots, and bonus types, so that my players wouldn't have to spend so much time digging through the DMG when they have enough gold to buy an item.
I think I'd like to see the spell system reworked so that two things change. First, some kind of BAB for spell casting is included (Thanee proposed a system elsewhere on these boards and I've adopted a version for my campaign). Second, I'd probably retool all the spells so that the spell levels don't go from 0 to 9, but go from 1 to 20 instead. Further, I'd allow for rules to expand spells from levels 21+ and scrap the Epic spell business.
I'd have two different rogues, one that's combative, as the current rogue seems to be (i.e. uncanny dodge, evasion, sneak attack) and another one that's based around the Charisma ability (bluff, diplomacy, etc.). I don't like that the two are melded together. A solution to this could be to use something similar to the talent trees that are in d20 Modern. Yeah, I like that. I'd bring in the talent trees from d20 Modern.
Oh, I'd probably not stick with 5- and 10-level prestige classes, since so many saves and BAB progressions don't fit well (I like the way that a 6- or 8-level prestige class works better).
I'd introduce the average save progression, it would be a rare class indeed that had two good saves (perhaps just the ranger and monk).
Dave
Psion
Adventurer
die_kluge said:
Y'know, I love EOM, but I wouldn't. EOM is a level more complex and requires a bit of thinking on the fly. It doesn't have the casual involvement readiness that a basic gaming book needs.
There's a reason I think the slot system has its advantages.
Now that I'd do.
Personally, I would like them to yank out the spells (except for maybe a few zero/first level ones). I would like to see a separate large book on just magic that's all spells and magic items. A third of the PHB is taken up by spells (100+ pages). Those pages could be put to much better use for a variety of reasons.
Wombat
First Post
If I were to redesign the PHB, it would be shorter, much shorter.
What I would really love to see would be a small, pocket-sized book with all the essential rules, but not a lot of the particulars, in one place. Characteristics, race (as a concept), basic classes (maybe only the Core Four?), basic weapons & equipment, basic mechanics of combat and skill use, and like that. Put the rest of the specifics into some sort of adjunct book, but keep the rules themselves clean, crisp, and very much To The Point.
The one thing I have found over and over again in trying to introduce newbies to rpgs in general is the longer the rules, the less interested they are in playing. One of the best introductory set of rules I ever ran across was Over The Edge -- in about 10 pages ALL of the rules were explained. Now that is great way to bring in a newbie! D&D, conversely, gets pretty intimidating for a lot of people, especially in a culture that seems to be heading towards post-literacy. If the hobby would like to attract new people in, it would be advantageous to game companies to come up with precis forms of the rules in short, esaily digestible chunks, rather than longer and longer tomes.
What I would really love to see would be a small, pocket-sized book with all the essential rules, but not a lot of the particulars, in one place. Characteristics, race (as a concept), basic classes (maybe only the Core Four?), basic weapons & equipment, basic mechanics of combat and skill use, and like that. Put the rest of the specifics into some sort of adjunct book, but keep the rules themselves clean, crisp, and very much To The Point.
The one thing I have found over and over again in trying to introduce newbies to rpgs in general is the longer the rules, the less interested they are in playing. One of the best introductory set of rules I ever ran across was Over The Edge -- in about 10 pages ALL of the rules were explained. Now that is great way to bring in a newbie! D&D, conversely, gets pretty intimidating for a lot of people, especially in a culture that seems to be heading towards post-literacy. If the hobby would like to attract new people in, it would be advantageous to game companies to come up with precis forms of the rules in short, esaily digestible chunks, rather than longer and longer tomes.
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