Pathfinder 1E Pathbreaker - musings of an amateur game designer

Oh as a short note, most of what I am working on now are things that I haven't completely solved in the last 20 years, special cases and things I wanted to see that didn't exist. I love the Talent Monk that Owen wrote, so aside from getting all talents and edges in one document and printing it, I don't need to do design work on it, just compiling and editing, and I can use as is - so no real motivation to get to that first. It will come.... just not yet.
 

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Been working on collating Mythic info I use. Things like Mythic versions of class abilities I try and keep with the class itself, but for general I run things with some serious changes.

One - there aren't any specific mythic paths, they all get 4 HP per tier.
Two - and the biggest one, I don't use mythic points. Every path ability, every mythic feat are the ones that do not use points - they are either passive abilities or something you can just do, no artificial limit on how often things can be done. Points were a balancing point for some of the more extreme powers, so most of those are out, or some modified.

I've been noodling around with allowing them as a specific thing - like getting them as part of mythic magic, but then in can only be used for mythic spells, and nothing else, and you don't get as many. Or for skill and save bumps, but only for that.
 

Next little while I don't have much design work I'm planning on. Last little while, I was organizing all my various books (to make them much easier to reference) as well as sorting all my adventures (3.x and Pathfinder) and noting the levels. This in addition to finishing my Mythic path document; one where I get all the mythic path stuff from all the sources I have to have all together -not unlike the "great netbooks of old"

I was going to do some work with Akashic stuff, but that has even more different sources than Mythic; Dreamscarred for the originals, some stuff from Lost Spheres publishing, some Legendary, Studio M, some bits from the original Magic of Incarnum book, and a few others. So right now I am getting all the veils from all those sources (the ones I plan to use anyway) into one chapter/book/file. Having that to hand will make design work on Akashic stuff much easier.

Getting that and then doing the same for Martial Maneuvers will be a dry run for the huge project that will take forever. Getting all the spells I use together. Which I will likely do by letter. All "a" spells, all "b" and so on. Long work, but super useful when I am done.
 

Still plugging away at Akasha - have 70 pages of veils pulled together from a few sources... probably about 35-40 percent of all I have.

The other things I am working on - two subsystems from other games (and a third I have written up because it was short).

Playing a solo game means you don't really have a party healing, so that can be an issues - the way I solved that was the Reserve points from Iron Heroes. You have reserve points equal to your HP. After a fight you can move a pt from reserve to HP, at 1 HP per minute, so you can get mostly full for the next fight, but it still hasa a limitation on how much you can do in a day. Healing goes to the reserve then to HP. That is the basic idea. It has worked for us.

Action points for d20 modern/unearthed arcana/eberron. I generally dislike this kind of mechanic (spend a point to roll a die and add), but I've been looking at other uses. Still don't know if I use it or not... but it is something I am looking at.

The third is the Escalation die from 13th age (I think) 2nd round of combat put a d6 out and add the number to the PCs hit rolls and such. It means as combat goes on, it starts leaning in the players favor. As a solo character will take longer in a fight than a party (Action economy and all that) this helps with that.
 

So I have copy edited and formatted another 50 pages of veils, and this weekend (Mon and Tues for me) I will be putting them in the main list alphabetically. Also got most of the work on master list of veils, by slot and class (that was a bear).

So today is usually dead for me at work (work escalations at a call center, and Sundays have lots of available time), I am going through my large collection of 3.5 edition books (most of which I've read multiple times) to look for cool rule bits to use. One of those was something I had some issues with mechanically, but really liked the idea of - (from Mongoose Quintessential Wizard or something with Dragon Magic from them) - you learn the language of magic (or draconic in the original) takes skill points, and when you get to certain benchmarks it gives you bonuses. I'm thinking free levels of metamagic. There was also an alternate metamagic system somewhere out there that ran differently - as long as you could cast the metamagice enhanced spell, it didn't take a higher level slot, but used normal. It also had a matrix of Metamagic you picked and could use that wasn't feat choices (those may be 2 different things that I merged in my head). This allows lower level spells to be useful without killing using higher level spells (as usually the metamagic version was still weaker than the native spells) The idea of casting a maximized and Empowered Magic Missile as a first level spell rather than 6th makes lower level spells much more useful.

Note - I tend to lean heavily on magic use, as that is one of my favorite parts of the game - given that this is solo, the LFQW isn't an issue (and I buff martial characters with Path of War, Spheres of Might and borrowing heavily from Unchained Fighter and Legendary Fighter.
 

Got all the veils (77 pages of them) all in one document, formatted, and alphabetized. Still have more to add, but the three biggest sources of veils are now in that one document.

Did some minor design work - Modified Bloodborn to something I like better mechanically, made an arcane version of the Elan (using Owens Spell Point system for spells, which made the conversion pretty easy), Figured out the "Akashic Memory (or as I call it the "Overmind") path for Vizier stealing bits from the Akashic from Monte Cook's Arcana Unearthed/Evolved, a cool new Veil I made myself, and some other minor editing.


The Veil ( I was looking for some crossover between Akashic and Normal Spell system, as there is some Akashic and Sphere interaction, and some Spheres and regular spells interaction existing.

Diadem of Magic Prowess
Descriptors none
Class vizier;
Slot : Headband
Saving Throw
none

Shaping this veil forms a small diadem with a pearlescent gem with split that brings to mind a cat's eye. It appears to look at people interacting with the veilweaver.

When this veil is shaped in the Headband slot, it effects normal spells that the user may cast. She no long needs to use verbal components when casting spells. This does not mean that the spill isn't obviously from the caster, and the eye generates a small pulse of white light when the spell is cast.

Essence: Each point of essence increases the maximum level of effect/damage for the spell being cast. For example if the caster casts burning hands as a 7th level caster (with a normal Maximum of 5d4), and has 2 essence invested, the spell would be 7d4 of damage.. If the caster were 10th level, it would maximum of 9d4 (as the essence only added 4 levels). This still cannot get damage higher than a 9th level spell.

Chakra Bind (Headband)- Touch spells can be cast at short range, and all other ranges doubled.​
 

glass

(he, him)
Funnily enough I had been meaning to ask you if you were familiar Monte Cook's Akashic and if so, if if there was any way to fit it in/reconcile it with DPS's Akashic stuff (I am considerably less familiar with the latter).

BTW, did you take a look at my Wide and Supplementary classes posted earlier in the thread? What did you think?

EDIT: Added words so the first paragraph made some kind of sense. Also added link.

_
glass.
 
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Funnily enough I had been meaning to ask you if you were familiar Monte Cook's Akashic and if so, if if there was any way to fit it in/reconcile it with DPS's Akashic stuff (I am considerably less familiar with the latter).

BTW, did you take a look at my Wide and Supplementary classes posted earlier in the thread? What did you think?

EDIT: Added words so the first paragraph made some kind of sense. Also added link.

_
glass.
I did. They worked to fill some of the same things I am doing, and were very interesting. If I wasn't so set in my ways I might use them, but I went down a different path... but there are bits I'm stealing. :)
 

glass

(he, him)
I did. They worked to fill some of the same things I am doing, and were very interesting. If I wasn't so set in my ways I might use them, but I went down a different path... but there are bits I'm stealing. :)
Now I am curious what bits!

BTW, I have started a thread about my approach to tackling some of the same issues (albeit for slightly different reasons - I am not married), if you want to take a look and maybe steal some more.

_
glass.
 


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