Banishing "Sacred Cows"

[hong]

The Preamble to the United Nations Charter, the hit point version

WE THE DESIGNERS OF DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS DETERMINED

to introduce succeeding generations to the scourge of war, which twice in our corporate history has brought untold profits to TSR, Wizards of the Coast and now Hasbro, and

to reaffirm faith in hit points, in the dignity and worth of classes and levels, in the equal rights of men and women and of races large and small, and

to establish conditions under which fairness and respect for the obligations arising from Dungeon Masters and other sources of rules law can be maintained, and

to promote obesity, lack of exercise, poor personal hygiene and better standards of life in pursuit of decadence,


AND FOR THESE ENDS

to invade and despoil the dominions of uncooperative neighbours ("go into dungeons"), and

to unite our strength to liquidate non-signatories by means of armed force ("kill the monsters"), and

to ensure, by the acceptance of principles and the institution of methods, the proper economic and social advancement of all player characters ("take their treasure"),


HAVE RESOLVED TO COMBINE OUR EFFORTS TO ACCOMPLISH THESE AIMS

Accordingly, our respective Corporate Vice-Presidents, through representatives assembled in the city of Seattle, who have exhibited their full powers found to be in good and due form, have agreed to the present Charter of Dungeons and Dragons and do hereby establish a completely revised ruleset to be known as 3rd Edition.

 

[hong]

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the hit point version
[abridged]

Article 1.
All human beings are born free and equal as 1 HD humanoids. They are endowed with hit points and saving throws, and should not indulge their attack bonus without good reason.

Article 2.
Everyone is entitled to all the attributes and abilities set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, template, sex, type, subtype, hit dice, climate, religion, political or other opinion (or lack thereof), property, Challenge Rating or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the Dungeon Master or campaign to which a character belongs, whether it be simulationist, gamist, dramatist, or any-other-ist-you-care-to-name.

Article 3.
Everyone has the right to hit points, saving throws and ability scores (except where indicated otherwise by their type).

Article 4.
No one shall be held in servitude to their advancement; level advancement and extra hit points, saving throws and ability scores shall be a privilege of player characters.

Article 5.
No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment that causes permanent loss of hit points or ability scores.

Article 6.
Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a creature and not an inanimate object. This extends to sentient magic items.

Article 7.
All are equal in the eyes of the ruleset and are entitled without any discrimination to equal treatment by the ruleset. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination ("rule 0").

Article 8.
Everyone has the right to an effective remedy by the Sage for acts violating the fundamental rights granted him by the ruleset.

Article 9.
No one shall be subjected to arbitrary charm or compulsion effects, imprisonment or temporal stasis.

Article 10.
Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an online discussion forum, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him.

 

[Cheerio]

Thats why I've taken some inspiration from RM and have looked at using similar penalties. In RM the following penalities take place:

25% Hits taken - -10
50% Hits taken - -20
75% Hits taken - -30

Rolemaster is a percentile system, so scaling it back for use with 3e would present 2 options. Either -1/-2/-3 or -2/-4/-6.

Since I don't like calculating percentiles, I housed a simple wound penalty rule:
If a character takes more damage from a single blow than his/her CON score, he receives a -1 to all rolls. It is cumulative and can only be cured with time or specific spell.

 

[hong]

Never let it be said that I never contribute anything new to a thread!


The First Chapter of Genesis, the hit point version

[1] In the beginning, EGG created Chainmail and the Red Book.

[2] And Chainmail was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the Book. And the spirit of Arneson moved within the depths of the dungeon.

[3] And EGG said, let there be alignments, and there were alignments.

[4] And EGG saw the alignments, that they were good; and EGG divided the alignments into Law and Chaos.

[5] And EGG called Law good, and Chaos he called bad. And the fight between Law and Chaos marked the first day.

[6] And EGG said, Let there Neutrality in the midst of the alignments, and let it divide Law from Chaos.

[7] And EGG made the firmament, and divided the creatures which were under the firmament from the creatures which were above the firmament: and it was so.

[8] And EGG called the firmament the Dungeon. And the Dungeon and the Wilderness were the second day.

[9] And EGG said, Let the creatures inside the Dungeon be gathered together unto one place, and let the treasure hoard appear: and it was so.

[10] And EGG called the creatures outside the Dungeon Good; and the creatures inside the Dungeon called he Evil: and EGG saw that it was good.

[11] And EGG said, Let the characters have Attributes, six in number, being Strength, Intelligence, Wisdom, Dexterity, Constitution and Charisma: and it was so.

[12] And Strength brought forth Fighters, and Intelligence yielding Magic-Users, and Wisdom Clerics, and Dexterity Thieves: and EGG saw that it was good.

[13] And the character classes were the third day.

[14] And EGG said, Let there be Hit Points in the character sheet to divide the living from the dead; and let them be for levels, and for classes, and for weapons, and spells:

[15] And let them be for rules in the firmament of Dungeons and Dragons to give form upon the game: and it was so.

[16] And EGG made two great rules; the "To Hit" Roll to rule the day, and the Saving Throw to rule the night: he made Armor Class also.

[17] And EGG set them in the firmament of Dungeons and Dragons to give form upon the game,

[18] And to rule over the Hit Points and over the Classes, and to divide the strong from the weedy: and EGG saw that it was good.

[19] And the "To Hit" Roll and the Saving Throw were the fourth day.

[20] And EGG said, Let the Dungeons bring forth abundantly the Evil monsters that prey on Good, and Dragons that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of Dungeons and Dragons.

[21] And EGG created spells, and every spellcasting creature that moveth, they all used the Vancian mechanic, which was Fire-and-Forget, and Spell Memorisation, and Spellbooks, and Spell Components, such as bat guano: and EGG saw that it was good.

 

[hong]

One possibility I'm considering is that all damage is subdual unless a critical hit is scored. If a critical is scored then a special 'real damage' effect occurs.

That's essentially the VP/WP system, as used in Star Wars, Spycraft and maybe a few other places. You could use it in D&D, but you would have to tone down crits quite a bit; they aren't nearly so prevalent in SW or Spycraft, and they don't inflict multiplied damage either.

 

[Lord Vangarel]

Originally quote by hong
That's essentially the VP/WP system, as used in Star Wars, Spycraft and maybe a few other places. You could use it in D&D, but you would have to tone down crits quite a bit; they aren't nearly so prevalent in SW or Spycraft, and they don't inflict multiplied damage either.

Crits still inflict normal hit point damage but can have a critical effect based on the amount of damage they inflict in relation to the current hit points before the crit roll is subtracted. The heal spells are changed so they only cure critical effects. Probably need some restorative equivalent to restore subdual damage. Actually same spell could do either but not both.

 

[Psion]

Oh, please, Psion. A Defense bonus of +1 AC is hardly "another layer of complication" compared to +3 hp.

If you are going to refute me, you might actually try to refute what I was actually saying. I was referring to armor as DR. It does most explicitly add another step to EACH hit: subtracting. Your AC/defense rating will have already been calculated, ergo does NOT add to each step.

And it doesn't just "achieve the same thing";

It most explicitly does acheive the same thing. The way D&D interative attacks work, armor effectively reduces the HP damage you take... in the end, the effect is the same as if you cut down the damage of each hit.

 

[Gallowglass]

Just like real life.

Uh, no. A misericorde (think "stiletto") can stab a downed knight through the gaps in his armor, but it won't punch through the breastplate, and you certainly wouldn't choose a dagger over a sword or axe against an armored knight.

Hmm depends. "stillettos" were Gunner's knives, specifically useful for permanently blocking the touch holes on cannon that had to be abandoned when positions were over run. "misericrde" (literally: "mercy of god") was a soldiers dagger, carried on the field to kill any poor knight (or other combatant) seriously injured (the alternative to such a mercy killing bing an almost inevitably painful death from gangrene and other secondary infections).

Most daggers used against armour were designed to get through the weak points: the mail gussets at elbow, shoulder, groin and knee. I would certainly choose some form of dagger against a Knight in plate over most blunt weapons... although I'd prefer an English Billhook or a decent yew longbow (mind I never managed to pull a bow over sixty pounds draw, whereas I know exactly what I'm doing with a billhook)...

 

[Desdichado]

I think there is some value in retaining the sacred cows so as not to lose the multitudes that wouldn't have accepted anything else.

However, the DMG throws out a lot of alternatives. Why doesn't it include class-less, or level-less, or alternate forms of HP, or something like that?

These same sacred cows are big deterrents for other multitudes, and the fact that they didn't even think that offering alternatives to gather those folks back in was sloppy marketing, IMO. If they really want d20 to be the generic system of choice, suitable for any play style, why wasn't it designed as such? Instead, we have to wait years and years for third parties to eventually get around to designing those systems out. Or, we have to house-rule it ourselves. d20 Call of Cthulhu showed us a way to do essentially no classes, d20 Star Wars showed us how to substitute something else for HP. Sovereign Stone and others have had alternate magic systems. But we still don't have a more granular method of progressing other than levels. My understanding is the Green Ronin superheroes book will be the first to tackle that. I'm actually quite amazed that these types of things, which were big turn-offs to lots of folks that fled D&D in droves in the "Dark Years" weren't among the first things converted into the d20 system as alternates to bring those kinds of folks back. And it was really short-sighted of Monte and the other designers, I think, to not include them as options in the DMG instead of spending so many pages talking about dungeons, for instance.

 

[Psion]

These same sacred cows are big deterrents for other multitudes,

Sure, but you change that stuff, you drive away people who LIKE those conventions (I am extremely dubious about games that don't lend some type of structure to chargen, for example), AND you aren't guaranteeing that you will be drawing any more of the multitudes* into the game.

A bird in the hand...

* - And I use the the term multitudes reservedly here, as d20/D&D is still the game of choice for a great many people... the remainder of the market is pitiful by comparison.