D&D 4E [Continuation 4e] - a manifesto

[GreyICE]

Theme rename is easy, Role or Background.

All rules terminology (Push, Pull, Slide) is in by default, you can't copyright rules text. Same with Blast (I vote we kill burst and change everything to be a blast, Bursts don't work properly on hex grids and that terminology has always been bonkers). You can't copyright power source names or damage types (Cold/Fire/Arcane/etc.).

We'd have to rename pretty much absolutely everything, but that's a bridge we can cross when we come to it.

Character creation software would have to be made, but again that's not too hard.

Oh yeah, and it's fine to call me Grey~

 

[Xethreau]

I think you mean "Should," but of course that is just semantics. ;D

Another thing that just occured to me was monster design. Race and classes seem pretty easy to work under the new system, but how about monster-building? I figure naming monsters for roles and giving them level advancements (akin to hit-dice) sounds easy enough, doing things like renaming "soldiers" "guardians" and minions "henchmen." We rework to show how certain monsters are already compatible, but then give some examples of new creatures using role levels instead of creature type hit dice.

On top of that, we would have to revamp how the monsters worked using similar mechanical adjustments used by the PC's.

As for weaknessess and resistances, do you say we just do it the Pokemon way and say double/half?

 

[GreyICE]

I think you mean "Should," but of course that is just semantics. ;D

Another thing that just occured to me was monster design. Race and classes seem pretty easy to work under the new system, but how about monster-building? I figure naming monsters for roles and giving them level advancements (akin to hit-dice) sounds easy enough, doing things like renaming "soldiers" "guardians" and minions "henchmen." We rework to show how certain monsters are already compatible, but then give some examples of new creatures using role levels instead of creature type hit dice.

On top of that, we would have to revamp how the monsters worked using similar mechanical adjustments used by the PC's.

As for weaknessess and resistances, do you say we just do it the Pokemon way and say double/half?

Minion/Standard/Elite/Boss is probably the terminology we should use.

Elite is straight from World of Warcraft, there's enough prior art that it's impossible to claim it's anything other than derivative of many things. Boss is a decent term, there's enough encounters where the "Boss" should be an Elite, but overall it should stand.

Hmmm... probably first order of business is to decide on HP/Damage/Defense/Hit growth standard, and then work from there in a framework.

In standard, an encounter on level (EL+0) should take around 4 rounds and deplete some resources, but not massive? That way EL+3 or EL+4 can be done in 6 rounds with massive resource drain?

 

[Xethreau]

I think that is correct, and it consumes approximately about "20% if the party's resources."

The other thing to consider is how much enemy difficulty just needs to be upped by virtue of the disparity in 3.5 and 4e racial, class, and theme features. Also there is a disparity in assumed ability score arrays; by Pathfinder standards, 4e characters use 20 point-buy. Not even to consider that we have no idea about how many hit points we want to give our guys.

So yes, I guess we are at the math portion of design. Incidentally, I am working on, to the best of my ability, modifying the basic rules to suit our needs, including the variant rules I suggested earlier. The first thing I worked on was powers ("techniques,") and that is going surprisingly well. (I think that what would have been a power in 4e could just be handled in a single typed line, which IMO is very nice. Maybe not things like spells, but at very least racial powers, at-will powers, and power strike.)

I am also using the 4e rulebooks, the standard SRD, and the Pathfinder SRD to make a complilation of "core rules" and gutting them of gross 3.5 stuff. I think it will prove effective. I will report when I make some headway; my computer has this really strange glitch that makes it hard to do stuff like this. (I got my computer wet, and so in addition to several normal keys not working - I use a USB keyboard - sometimes either the period key or the delete key will fire like someone is pressing it, but the key is not stuck. I can change it by pressing the Num Lock key, oddly enough. Any advice would be appriciated.)

 

[GreyICE]

Hmmmmm.

I'd really like to eliminate the +1/2 per level, magic item treadmill, and Expertise mistakes right off the bat.

So, tentitively:

Defenses: Grow at the rate of +1 per 3 levels, giving us a total growth of +6/+7 over the course of 20 levels. That should keep lower level monsters relevant much longer.

Damage: Grows at the rate of +5% (average) per level. 50% boost for encounter and recharge powers, -25% for area powers. This should result in level 20 monsters dealing roughly 2.5 times the damage of level 1 monsters, on average.

A starting point is swinging a 1d10 weapon with a +4 modifier to damage thanks to stats, which is 9.5, so calling a standard damage at-will action 10 damage at 1st level is probably fair (this would make the same at-will need to do 25 damage at level 20)

Other: As the range of options available to the PCs grow, the range of options the opposition has should grow. Therefore I'd suggest that there is scaling ability growth baked in somewhere (otherwise the game will get progressively LESS lethal, which is not the goal). We probably should encapsulate that somehow.


This is a VERY flat math system, but it should offer us long-term benefits in terms of powers remaining relevant longer, and having to toss less math fixes in the system (if the variety between levels 1 and 20 is just 2.5x damage and +6 defenses it's a lot harder for the game to massively unbalance than it is if the variety is +19 to defenses and like 10x damage)

Suggestions? We should nail down the numbers in the framework before we start making powers, so we know what we're aiming for.


Possibility: We could stat one set of numbers for levels 1-10, and then choose a new, higher plane for levels 11-20. It would create more of a feeling of separation between the two, but it probably fairly creates a sense of "another tier" for the paragon levels.

 

[FireLance]

The name Healing Surges is something people hate. And the name doesn't match the effect.

You know, something I'd really like to do with healing surges is to (at the minimum) reflavor the self-healing mechanic for each power source or class.

So, instead of every character of every class spending a healing surge, the cleric and the paladin cast cure personal wounds, the druid casts barkskin, the wizard casts force armor, the warlock casts false life, the bard casts personal heroism, a psionic character uses cell adjustment, the fighter, barbarian and rogue spend a point of Adrenaline and gain Vigor Points (which work exactly like hit points), etc.

As an optional module, you could also make them all mechanically distinctive, but that would add (possibly unnecessary and unwanted) complexity.

 

[GreyICE]

Nooooo, lets not walk down the road of screwing up the naming conventions of core mechanics. 4E kept flavor and function separate for a reason.

We can write up separate flavor for different feels of healing surge, from the inspirational words of a Bard to the healing magic of a Cleric, but lets keep the core system clean and simple. If our goal is to make a better 4E, we shouldn't start adding cruft on day 1.

 

[Xethreau]

In reguards to healing surges and second wind - I think you guys are both right. What I have right now looks a lot like the healing surges system we know. It has been renamed reserve surges, and you only get 4 + your con mod.

Now, I had been giving thought to second wind, and thought it would be lame of us to rip off that name. I kind of like the idea of granting a power-source based second wind, and reflavoring it for each. No reason the technique that spends a reserve surge and restores hit points for a martial character could not be called "Adrenaline Surge," nor any reason why a warlock's self-heal could not be "false life."

Since I have most of the rules modifications together, I will upload them tomorrow, and hopefully my computer will be kind enough to allow me to edit them.


RE: Math - It occurs to me that what I have created so far will be subject to change as the math of the battles change and adjust. Specifically, the reserve surges buisness.


This makes me think that we should have a google docs thing together and crowd-source this. But this is all too much for me to think about this late.

 

[GreyICE]

Second Wind is absolutely the right name for this. It's hardly a unique name like "Righteous Hammer of Pelor" or something, it's a power named "Second Wind" that describes a way to recover in a high-stress situation (catching your "second wind").

 

[Xethreau]

I think you are correct, on the whole. Maybe it would be a cool feat to be able to replace your second wind with a feat-power, or something like that.

Anyway, I decided I would go ahead and upload what I have so far. Mind you that there are errors because of reasons. But most of it should come through. Now mind you, these are all written from a "contributing to the OGL" standpoint, and would be how the alternate rule would look on the d20 SRD or something, or in the appendix.

I gave it the place-holder new "Neo Olde Heroes," which is more or less a Phoenix Wright reference. Anyway, here are all the files I have so far in compressed form.
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/8019277/neo olde heroes.zip

Unzip it to begin the compatability magic. Oh, also, the "core" rules, starting from the beginning, I am putting in the "operation square fireballs" document. Because of reasons, I have a difficult time editing it, but if one looks one can see some fourthedifications I have made thus far.