Anybody excited by Undead Presidents Press?

[Zoatebix]

Hee-hee! Despite the lack of magic items in the document, I emailed the link to 1AC and your other stuff to one of my Players/GMs immediately after I finished reading it. Good luck with Summa Fantasia!


Let's talk about more fan support for 1-Action Combat? Some things that I'd really like to see (and that I might start working on in my spare time) include:
-The previously mentioned support for the Immortals Handbook/Grim Tales CR system.
-Support for Elements of Magic: Revised.
-New versions of the Speed Burst and Rapid Strike feats (possibly combined) from Monte Cook's Arcana Unearted and support for all the stuff from The Book of Iron Might.

 

[ecliptic]

The link to the spells per encounter is broken on the Undead Presidents page.

 

[DonAdam]

The One-Action Combat System, I feel neutral about. I think I would have to try it out before I could make any sort of ruling on it. The one thing I do like about it is the, X number of spell points per encounter and 5X points per day. That is something that D&D could really use.

I'll talk this over with Nathan and see if we can't come up with something that would work for you. Using the conversion of spells as written with the normal round structure would undoubtedly weaken spellcasters too much.

Reintroducing caster level scaling to spells won't work, because it provides an incentive to memorize lots of low level spells rather than any high level spells.

Increasing the number of spell points per encounter might be the way to go.

Note that the 5x a day is somewhat arbitrary. We figured that if a party healer used his spells to get the party back up between fights that it would allow 2-3 delves before healing. The primary impact of changing the number of times per day is socioeconomic, as the spells become much more viable for doing things like building houses. In fact, characters from an Arcane society (like a race) in Summa can get their spells back 10x a day, precisely becuase we wanted those cultures to look like bizarro world.

A Mencken quote? Nice.

Let's talk about more fan support for 1-Action Combat? Some things that I'd really like to see (and that I might start working on in my spare time) include:
-The previously mentioned support for the Immortals Handbook/Grim Tales CR system.
-Support for Elements of Magic: Revised.
-New versions of the Speed Burst and Rapid Strike feats (possibly combined) from Monte Cook's Arcana Unearted and support for all the stuff from The Book of Iron Might.

I'd love to see the IH conversion. I use GT's calculator for my standard d20 games, and we are adopting something very similar for Summa.

As far as EOM goes, Nathan had already written a whole class based on the original for 1AC. When I bought the revised I said that I didn't think this new version needed much conversion. I'll look at it this afternoon between studying for my medieval philosophy midterm tomorrow; if it's as simple as I seem to remember thinking it was I'll post it tonight.

I don't have Iron Might, but I'll look into AU as well; it holds a special place in my heart, since I was the first to buy a copy, heehee. That was my ultimate geek-out moment.

If people want to type these up formally, I'll talk to the publishers/authors of the texts in question and see if they would be cool with us posting a set of fan-created conversions for 1AC on the UPP website.

The link to the spells per encounter is broken on the Undead Presidents page.

We'll get that fixed today. You can get to it by clicking on the design diary link from February 8 on the front page.

 

[Monty Haul]

Anybody excited by Undead Presidents Press?

Nope. I am absolutely not E X C I T E D by Undead Presidents Press. (Sorry.)

 

[Cheiromancer]

The one thing I do like about it is the, X number of spell points per encounter and 5X points per day. That is something that D&D could really use.

I agree! Too often the players want to rest after one encounter because the spellcasters are no longer on "full." If a variant could be made for standard D&D, it would rock!

 

[whydirt]

I agree! Too often the players want to rest after one encounter because the spellcasters are no longer on "full." If a variant could be made for standard D&D, it would rock!

A quick and easy option would be to take the regular number of spell slots (or power points if you're using Psionics/spell points if you're using that UA variant) available to spellcasters and cut them in half (rounding up), but allow them to regain spells after 15 minutes of rest. Limit casters to 3-5 "recharges" each day, depending on the power level and away you go. Personally, I'd not cut the number of cantrips in half per recharge, but I like having a lot of low-power options for spellcasters available.

Here's an example using the lowest power level option from above: A 5th level Sorcerer with 16 Cha would usually get 6 cantrips, 7 1st-Level spells, and 5 2nd-level spells each day. Under this system, he'd now get 6 cantrips, 4 1st-level spells, and 3 2nd-level spells at the beginning of the day. He could replenish these spells twice during the day with 15 minutes of rest for each recharge.

Casters who prepare their spells ahead of time would need to be allowed to swap their prepared spells during this 15 minute period in order to stay balanced with the Sorcerer.

After some thought, I think limiting the recharges to 3 per day is probably good since this variant allows more spells per encounter than the 1actionsystem document.

 

[DonAdam]

You should be able to use Elements of Magic Revised by simply giving 1 spell point per half caster level.

I haven't had time to run through the individual spells and feats yet. The major potential problem area is anything dealing with Time; anything that grants extra actions is significantly more powerful in this system.

 

[Cheiromancer]

A quick and easy option would be to take the regular number of spell slots (or power points if you're using Psionics/spell points if you're using that UA variant) available to spellcasters and cut them in half (rounding up), but allow them to regain spells after 15 minutes of rest. Limit casters to 3-5 "recharges" each day, depending on the power level and away you go. Personally, I'd not cut the number of cantrips in half per recharge, but I like having a lot of low-power options for spellcasters available.

Here's an example using the lowest power level option from above: A 5th level Sorcerer with 16 Cha would usually get 6 cantrips, 7 1st-Level spells, and 5 2nd-level spells each day. Under this system, he'd now get 6 cantrips, 4 1st-level spells, and 3 2nd-level spells at the beginning of the day. He could replenish these spells twice during the day with 15 minutes of rest for each recharge.

Casters who prepare their spells ahead of time would need to be allowed to swap their prepared spells during this 15 minute period in order to stay balanced with the Sorcerer.

After some thought, I think limiting the recharges to 3 per day is probably good since this variant allows more spells per encounter than the 1actionsystem document.

I would like low-level spells to scale (magic missiles eventually giving 5 missiles), and I would like to use a spell-point system. (1 point per level, plus ability bonus, as in the Dead Presidents system (DPS)) but I recognize that this would make low-level spells too attractive. It would usually be much better for a 9th level caster to cast 5 magic missiles instead of 1 cone of cold.

I propose that spells be allowed to scale by adding 1 point to their casting cost. A scaling magic missile would cost 2 points, a scaling fireball would cost 4 points, and so on. A spell that doesn't scale has its caster level set equal to its spell level. A non-scaling fireball would cost 3 points, but would only do 3d6 damage. Non-scaling magic missiles do 1d4+1 hp damage, and so on.

Spellcasters could recharge their spell points up to 5 times their maximum daily capacity, as with DPS.

Given how cheap a wand of cure light wounds is, I might even allow clerics to cast cure wounds spells without it counting towards their daily limit of spells.

 

[DonAdam]

A revised document is up, including magic items:

http://www.undeadpresidentspress.com/1ActionCombat.pdf.

Initiative design diary is also up.

 

[Strithe]

Hrm. Godlike has a similar combat round ... 3 seconds, one action, severe penalties for trying to perform more.

We hated it. Hate hate hated it. I really like Godlike, but the simple fact of the matter was combat took twice as long. At least for us. And there's the thing. Different things work well for different groups. I'm sure for those designers the people they play with have alot of fast fun with 3 second rounds. For us it didn't seem to REMOVE any complexity, and just doubled the time combat took. Because people can only move or attack it's that much more important to decide what you're going to do any given round, so people are even MORE likely to sit and agonize and measure and judge and hem and haw around before deciding because they can move into a position and get snarked.

I've seen this happen with standard D&D combat, as well as just about any game you can think of. Some people act as if they're going to loose a real-life appendage if they make the wrong move. The worst was a guy playing the Attack! boardgame with. In spite of waiting for 7 other players before his turn, he spent an average of 5 minutes between each move. Since I my turn was right after his I grew to truly hate this guy by the end of the game.

For guys like him those little sand timers work great. If one of your players is agonizing over what to do, whip out a 30 second sand timer (or 1 minute, if you want to be more merciful). The whole round is only 6 seconds long, your players shouldn't have forever to consider options.