D&D 3E/3.5 3E D&D to 3E SW HP and AC

[Krail Stromquism]

I was wondering if anyone has started converting the 3E DND to more closely fit the SW 3E so that you use WOunds and Vitality Points instead of HP, classes have Defense Ratings and armor soaks damage to your wounds?

Sense all the Pulp Heroes, D20 Supers and D20 Modern are using these I wondered if the 3E D&D was going to catch up or change over?

thanks,

KRAIL

 

[ruleslawyer]

In general, there are no WotC plans to switch over D&D hp and AC to the SW vitality/wounds and defense bonus system. Many folk have discussed making this switch in their own campaigns, however.

For a conversion of D&D hit points to SW vitality/wounds points, go here .

As for defense bonuses, I'd suggest the following progressions:

-Fighter, Paladin, Cleric, Sorcerer, Wizard: poor
-Barbarian, Druid, Bard: medium
-Monk, Ranger, Rogue: good

If you continue to use armor bonuses to AC, then allow the fighter and paladin to stack their defense bonus and armor bonus, as per the Soldier class in SW. The druid and bard get medium progression for balance reasons only (otherwise, they get hosed).

If you use armor as a damage soak: Well, you'll have to make up your own system or analogize from d20 games which use this rule. One simple rule is to convert the armor's AC bonus directly to DR; so a chain shirt would grant DR 4/-, while full plate +5 would grant DR 14/-. I don't know how you'd deal with the interplay between armor and defense bonus, though; maybe make the "max defense bonus" equal to the max dex bonus for each type of armor, and allow fighters and paladins to ignore the maximum.

 

[Krail Stromquism]

Ive read the Revised SW Core book will integrate the armor rules.

Its a tricky thing but can help in refining classes and balancing them out.

As to how Spells will interact and affect the different rules, will be tricky at first as well.

Under the Top 5 House Rules thread a surprising amount of people posted using the WP/VP system.

Integrating new material is a lot easier using the SW system as a lot of new interesting stuff is using that mechanic.

thanks for the help/input!

KRAIL

 

[heylel]

Hail!

About WP/VP...
You could do a straight conversion (just use hp total for VP and CON for WP, as in SWRPG).

IMHO, the problem arises with the wepaon critical multipliers and killer spells/effects.

If you could reduce all D&D weapons to x2 multiplier, you would have the SW threat range. That would solve the weapons part.

The spells would have to be taken care individually.


About Defense...
You may have noticed that in SWd20 (but not in Whell of Time) the class Defense bonus is given by ((base REF save)+2).
That would be the fastest way to assign this stat.
You may want to remove magical items that affect AC (armor enhancement, natural armor, and deflection bonuses, mainly), for balance.

bye,
heylel.

 

[Aaron2]

A few thought

Just a few thoughts on this topic. Also, the d20 Pulp game uses hp and armor as normal.

VP/WP - The main problem with this is that it give minor monsters, such as Kobolds a significant increase in survivability relative to things like orcs and ogres. An orgre now has three times the hp (VP+WP) of a kobold instead of ten times.

Criticals - Just because you use VP/WP does not mean that you have to have criticals go straight to Wound Points. You may want to, but think about it first.

Armor as DR - The main concern about this is that it affects light weapons much more than heavy weapon (as a percentage of damage reduced) whereas Armor as +AC affects both equally. Due to this, certain things such as "light" fighters and two-weapon fighters are seriously disadvantaged. You'll find all you players using two-handed weapons.


Aaron