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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Wulf Ratbane" data-source="post: 5042688" data-attributes="member: 94">Don't forget the love child.I don't think magic items are to the detriment of 3e per se. Magic items are a big part of D&D and (despite having written the low-magic ruleset Grim Tales) I would not want to play D&D without magic items.That said, I do think that magic item creation feats give far too much control to the players. Given the ability to do so, players WILL break the system. A very good example of this can be found on various backwater "optimization" forums where the members demonstrate all the ways that the wizard is broken if the wizard PC is allowed to craft a near infinite supply of scrolls. That's not a breakdown in the system. That's a breakdown in common sense, and the DM allowing the players/rules to run roughshod over his campaign. I know how Gary would have handled such players.Anyhow, so it is with magic items. Just don't let every PC have every Big Six item maxxed out to full capacity at all times, okay?Not counting the time spent here at ENworld "developing" the design behind Trailblazer on various threads, we playtested Trailblazer through 3 different campaigns over about 2 years. But yes, you should play. I am eager to get feedback from players and campaigns in order to continue to improve the rules.There's an example of some wholly unique design that I don't get nearly enough credit for, dammit. <img src="http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/rant.png"  class="smilie" loading="lazy" alt=":rant:" title="Rant    :rant:" data-shortname=":rant:" />Still no love for my favorite goofy easter egg. I'm waiting for someone to find it.Paizo has to satisfy a very particular kind of gamer. My aim was to satisfy another type of gamer (and perhaps even more narrow). I've crafted Trailblazer as the rule set that I want to play and so I instantly have a pretty good idea of who my customers are. If you like Trailblazer, you are no doubt the sort of gamer who would be welcome at my table. Assuming you observe normal gaming good manners-- like not dumping the shells and husks from the peanuts back into the container that everyone else is eating from.Very gratifying to draw Destan back to ENworld. Thanks for the comments.I'm definitely open for feedback when you have it. There's certainly a couple of glaring omissions in the rules-- Monsters and Spells, for example-- which, when fixed, should bring us closer to that "Totally Fixed!" ideal. And we're working on those now. I'm revamping all the spells and magic items, and Chris Neveu is already most of the way through the monster revamp: a greatly simplified statblock that 3e DMs will love. I'll also break some new ground with design in monsters, extending the "monster templates" (similar to those found in Trailblazer for Summon Monster) to all monster types: aberration, animals, constructs, etc. These templates are useful for DMs to quickly create challenges at any CR, and for players who-- for fluff purposes-- would like to be able summon things other than the typical outsiders. (For example, a gnome artificer could summon CR-balanced clockwork companions from the construct templates.)Well, the data is what it is, taken directly from the SRD and sorted into an excel spreadsheet. Of course you're free to quibble with the analysis, but the text is pretty open about that, too-- our methodology, the limitations of Craig Cochrane's CR breakdowns, etc. But I did maintain the strictest adherence to the TLAR Standard.During the PF playtest there were some outspoken folks for whom such analysis was not rigorous enough, and some folks for whom any kind of analysis was anathema. (I have read at least one review of Trailblazer which you could sum up as, "Math is hard!" I'm not sure the reviewer realizes that I know exactly how much time passed between his purchase and his review...)The thing I would caution folks is not to focus on the minutiae of the analysis-- for example, class features costed out to the thousandth decimal place. This is useful for comparison, but I do not confuse precision for accuracy, and neither should the reader. Nevertheless, it allows us to make apples-to-apples comparisons to get a better "big picture" understanding of the moving parts of the d20 system.I am definitely looking forward to seeing more feedback from Trailblazer campaigns, and from the purchasers of the print-on-demand version at Amazon. We'll continue to improve as we move forward with additional releases.</blockquote>

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