Mechanics of Revived Settings; your thoughts?

Birthright is the Game of Thrones setting of Dnd, with a dedicatd rule set for running militant, religious and mercantile factions in the games Provinces/Realms. This is done at the strategic level of political intrigues as a backdrop rather than at the more tactical leve of PF Kingdom Building rules (although building assets like Trade routes, Forts and Shipyards can happen too). WHile the standard game is pitched at Regents ruling Realms, the rules can be tweaked to be about Merchant Companies seeking to dominate international trade, Bandit Gangs raiding the local villages or feudings Lords seeking to take the Iron Throne (the GM has to maintain the NPC allies and rivals and keep up a regular stream of rumours and NPC intrigues). Its this aspect of political plotting and factional intrigues that marks out the Birthright niche.

On top of that Birthright adds the elements of divine Bloodlines where PCs can be 'Scions' with their godly bloodlines giving them extra abilities (ranging from minor bonus to alertness, through Invunerability to teleportation or the ability to cause damage by their touch) and a means to directly tap in to the power of the land so they can also perform month-long rituals to cast spells that affect whole Provinces.

The setting fluff also has powerful monstrous NPCs who are also Scions and carry the blood of ancient gods (The Gorgon (humanoid , stone bull) is the most famous, but also the multiheaded Hydra and the Ghoul) otherwise Brithright was well realised but kind if generic western fantasy. Its human centric, but with the standard races too and elves who don't like humans and thus stick to themselves.

Mystara would be great but the sheer volume of Gazetteer info means they would be unlikely to launch it - unless, they bring out rules for racial classes to evoke the Halfling Fighter/Thief, Dwarf Fighter, and Elf Fighter/Magic-User.

GreyLord said:

In the Sword Coast Adventurer's guide we already have the templates for the Solamnic Knights...though the terminology could be confusing...

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I think the suggestions in the SCAG really botched on the Knights of Solamnia category. The suggested Oath of the Crown for Sword Knights, and Purple Dragon Knight for Rose Knights. If they weren't only suggesting new material from the SCAG, and had also referenced stuff from the PHB for completeness, they could have probably done better. Oath of Devotion is a better fit for Knight of the Sword, and Oath of the Crown for Knight of the Rose.

Here's the best solution I can think of, though it requires two new subclasses (my solution involving no new subclasses was a mess):

1) The book includes the fighter Knight of the Crown subclass, and the paladin Knight of the Sword subclass.
2) Knight of the Rose is a role-playing fluff element that a paladin with the Knight of the Sword subclass can attain.
3) To respect multiclassing as an optional element, the default would assume Knights of the Sword just start as paladins, inconsistent as that may be.
4) A sidebar specifies that if your campaign uses multiclassing, Knights of the Sword and Rose begin as fighters and take the Knight of the Crown subclass, and then multiclass into paladin and Knight of the Sword subclass.
5) The sidebar could comment that Knights of the Rose are as likely to take additional fighter levels as paladin levels, while Knights of the Sword prefer mostly paladin levels.

And that's about as close as we get while leaving Knights of the Crown as non-magical fighters. Of course, if we were willing to ditch that part, we could just make Knight of Solamnia a paladin subclass and make orders role-playing fluff rather than mechanical. But I'm not sure if that would be appropriate.

GreyLord said:

Could also work for Knights of Takhisis, where they take a Knight of the Crown background, but then could become a Knight of the Lily (Fighter subclass), Knight of the Skull (Cleric Subclass) or Knight of the Thorn (Wizard subclass...or would a warlock or sorcerer work better with this these days?).

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Knights of Takhisis could be entirely fluff. All they'd need to do is specific which subclasses are appropriate (from already existing subclasses).

Tonguez said:

Birthright is the Game of Thrones setting of Dnd, with a dedicatd rule set for running militant, religious and mercantile factions in the games Provinces/Realms. This is done at the strategic level of political intrigues as a backdrop rather than at the more tactical leve of PF Kingdom Building rules (although building assets like Trade routes, Forts and Shipyards can happen too). WHile the standard game is pitched at Regents ruling Realms, the rules can be tweaked to be about Merchant Companies seeking to dominate international trade, Bandit Gangs raiding the local villages or feudings Lords seeking to take the Iron Throne (the GM has to maintain the NPC allies and rivals and keep up a regular stream of rumours and NPC intrigues). Its this aspect of political plotting and factional intrigues that marks out the Birthright niche.

On top of that Birthright adds the elements of divine Bloodlines where PCs can be 'Scions' with their godly bloodlines giving them extra abilities (ranging from minor bonus to alertness, through Invunerability to teleportation or the ability to cause damage by their touch) and a means to directly tap in to the power of the land so they can also perform month-long rituals to cast spells that affect whole Provinces.

The setting fluff also has powerful monstrous NPCs who are also Scions and carry the blood of ancient gods (The Gorgon (humanoid , stone bull) is the most famous, but also the multiheaded Hydra and the Ghoul) otherwise Brithright was well realised but kind if generic western fantasy. Its human centric, but with the standard races too and elves who don't like humans and thus stick to themselves.

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What you just described (along with other details I recall) is about as far as you can get from generic and still be western (medieval) fantasy.

[MENTION=6677017]Sword of Spirit[/MENTION] XP for your ideas on the solamnic Knights, with roses just being additional fluff that would be a solution.

I think what [MENTION=1125]Tonguez[/MENTION] meant was that Birthright is basically a vanilla Fantasy Setting, nothing like eberron, ravenloft or darksun.

Spelljammer

• In-depth sailing and nautical combat rules, including 3D tactics. Spelljamming rules, helm rules, drains spells but not all spells. No helmsman subclass, ever, but a feat.
• All kinds of planet-building and sphere-building tools. Think Barbarians of the Aftermath.
• Please, for the love of Gygax, either well-researched, realistic firearms rules or deliberately stylized firearms rules; don't base the firearms rules on a bunch of crap you only think is true.
• No firearm class, please, but feats and combat styles that are compatible with firearms.
• No rules for crippling Clerics outside of their home sphere. Make the intersphere movement of religions a thing, but make it a more interesting thing.
• Races - Bare Minimum: Giff, Hadozee, Lizardfolk (with subraces), Orc (with subraces, including Scro), Races - Better: Thri-Kreen (with Xixchil subrace) Goblin/Hobgoblin, Bionoid (Elf Subrace). If there's page count to spare, the rest of Chapter Two of Complete Spacefarer's Handbook probably wouldn't be too awful.

Dark Sun

• Races - Minimum: Athasian subraces for all the standard races that exist on Athas, plus Thri-Kreen (with subraces), Mul, and Half-Giant. Better: Aarakocra, Dray (not Dragonborn), Pterran, Gith (with savage Gith subrace). Best: A sidebar telling players that if something doesn't exist in the setting, they don't get to play it.
  Classes: This section needs to be extensively murdered. Basically, I want Dark Sun to be Dark Sun; the 4e approach was adequate, but not what I'd have preferred. This is my best solution:
  • Elemental Domains for the Cleric. Maybe even Paraelemental.
  • Templar is a separate class from Cleric. Like a Paladin/Warlock, with a Pact for each Sorcerer-King, and roughly a melee/smite Oath, an EB/blaster Oath, and a protection/healing Oath. (Templar is good for all three, but these are specializations.) Templar replaces Paladin and Warlock.
  • Mystic.
  • Gladiator subclass for Fighter, "Bard" subclass for Rogue.
• Rules for psionic wild talents that do not cost character resources and that improve with level. Feats that build upon this. A psionic combat system that everyone gets to play with.
• Preserving and defiling rules that make defiling attractive to players.
• Expanded wilderness survival rules, starvation and thirst. Diseases, too.

Sword of Spirit said:

What you just described (along with other details I recall) is about as far as you can get from generic and still be western (medieval) fantasy.

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Heh, yeah good point

what I meant is that if you take out the Bloodlines and Domain rules then Birthright could be achieved using standard rules. Cerilia is a very good setting with a nice mix of fluf and great NPCs but at the end of the day Elves being antagonistic to humans isn't a new idea and the Gorgon is your standard 'Dark Conquerer with powers' whose armies threatens the PCs peaceful town.

I think thats a strength, it gives familiarity to new players before introducing the whole slwe of new rules and the political side of play.

Tonguez said:

Heh, yeah good point

what I meant is that if you take out the Bloodlines and Domain rules then Birthright could be achieved using standard rules. Cerilia is a very good setting with a nice mix of fluf and great NPCs but at the end of the day Elves being antagonistic to humans isn't a new idea and the Gorgon is your standard 'Dark Conquerer with powers' whose armies threatens the PCs peaceful town.

I think thats a strength, it gives familiarity to new players before introducing the whole slwe of new rules and the political side of play.

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True, it's definitely recognizable as western medieval fantasy, and doesn't need any special rules for standard (adventurer) play (no new races or classes). One of the cool things about it is how it manages to do that and have such a strong and distinctive flavor. I think a lot of people never really looked at it (even I forgot to mention it in my list earlier in the thread), which is unfortunate, because it has the makings of a real hit of a setting.

Surprised not to see any commentary on Spelljammer or Planescape; what do folks think these settings need?

QuietBrowser said:

Surprised not to see any commentary on Spelljammer or Planescape; what do folks think these settings need?

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For Planescape, the most important rules are Faction allegiance and Power of Belief. For Factions, something like you track your Affinity to all of them (for mundane faction rules), and pick one Faction whose Allegiance grants you phenomenal cosmic powers and an itty-bitty living space. Power of Belief, I would probably just dramatically expand on the Inspiration rules.

I would simplify the hell out of the spell adjustments on different Planes, and nix the bizarre Cleric nerfs. (Like, seriously, what did TSR have against Clerics, anyway?)

Which leaves the player's options. All planetouched need reprinted, and all of them need subraces. Matter of fact, given the myriad possibilities, I'd have every planetouched pick two subraces, including the option of being... double planetouched. Gith race with the obvious subraces. Bariaur and Rogue Modron, maybe Bladeling and Khaasta. Adapt some of the kits from Planewalker's Handbook to subclasses.

FaerieGodfather said:

For Planescape, the most important rules are Faction allegiance and Power of Belief. For Factions, something like you track your Affinity to all of them (for mundane faction rules), and pick one Faction whose Allegiance grants you phenomenal cosmic powers and an itty-bitty living space. Power of Belief, I would probably just dramatically expand on the Inspiration rules.

I would simplify the hell out of the spell adjustments on different Planes, and nix the bizarre Cleric nerfs. (Like, seriously, what did TSR have against Clerics, anyway?)

Which leaves the player's options. All planetouched need reprinted, and all of them need subraces. Matter of fact, given the myriad possibilities, I'd have every planetouched pick two subraces, including the option of being... double planetouched. Gith race with the obvious subraces. Bariaur and Rogue Modron, maybe Bladeling and Khaasta. Adapt some of the kits from Planewalker's Handbook to subclasses.

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Interesting... personally, I wouldn't bother with the spell adjustments rules because, ultimately, most of those boil down to too much book-keeping for too little profit.

The DMG provides special Optional Rules to cover the unique effects of each plane, such as the Feywild being able to warp your memories and shift time on you, or the Beastlands turning you into an animal and increasing your hunting skills, or Ysgard allowing you to fight to the death and come back, Hades turning you into a larva, the Abyss and the Nine Hells changing your alignment to their flavor of evil, and so forth; just point the players towards these and that gets all the flavor of being in the planes across without the overabundance of rules that each plane had, and without being quite as lethal as AD&D.