Custom Campaign - G&G Classless (sort of)

[the_bruiser]

After a layoff of a few years due to grad school and marriage, I'm trying to get back into the hobby. A few friends and I have been occasionally play testing a set of campaign rules based on Grim & Gritty. I would love to hear your thoughts on this system and anything similar you might have tried in your games.

Attached please find the system we're currently using - a Word file with rules and clarifications for my players, and an excel file with the core 'system.' It's assumed that someone looking at the excel stuff will be following along with the rules doc.

Our system deviates from core rules in two primary ways. First, it uses Ken's G&G rules modified to our own taste, assuming a relatively low-magic setting. Second, it is a classless system, whereby each player gets a certain number of 'points' to purchase attributes, skills, feats, etc.

This has some clear plagiarism from one of Ken Hood's versions of G&G, which I understand to be 'open,' and from the SRD. If this is inappropriate in any way, please let me know and I will comply with whatever remedy is appropriate.

We've now used this in play on several occasions and have built the heck out of sample characters to figure out where stuff is broken. The system still needs more playtesting, but I'd say at this point it's 75% 'baked,' i.e., costs for things can be improved, but we're close enough that I think the basic structure works.

Some core takeaways to keep in mind if you review the document include:

* All characters and monsters have 30 hit points

* AC is separated into defense (base attack, dex, etc.) and soak (armor, toughness, etc.)

* Casters are potentially more powerful at lower levels, but much weaker at higher levels, a change intended to make their power level more 'comparable' with others at any given level

* Casters are much more able to customize their strengths but are forced to make trade-offs - knowing many spells vs. being able to cast many spells vs. being able to cast higher-level spells vs. casting spells with higher strength with a limited number of purchase points available

* Most class abilities are now available as feat chains - characters 'purchase' the right to buy, say, a rogue-themed set of feats, then purchase feats to gain those abilities
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Clearly the hard part is balancing the ability to be broad (many types of abilities) vs. deep (really good at something). The goal of this, if we ever got it 'perfect,' would be that players no longer have to widget together strings of classes (prestige or base) in order to get what they want; meanwhile, players who don't have the time or inclination to do all the research don't put their characters at a competitive advantage. (We're not exclusively power gamers, but we do have a sense that it's nice when combat power is somewhat comparable.)

Some areas I've thought about most for further development include new rules such as (i) 'fixing' grappling, and (ii) insanity rules if I want to go a more horror/whfrpg route.

I suspect that, while this system might appear complicated, it's actually easier and less daunting than core rules to a new player - five sheets of paper will do it. (1) racial abilities, (2) class abilities, and (3) three pages of feats. Clearly for color the core books are still critical.

I would love to hear any feedback that you have. If any of you are interested, we plan on ramping up our playing (and thus playtesting) next spring and I can update you on progress.

 

[Claudius Gaius]

Well, the hit points don't match, but the various ability chains are already broken down in Eclipse - and some of the alternative magic systems might suit you.

 

[the_bruiser]

Eclipse?

Well, the hit points don't match, but the various ability chains are already broken down in Eclipse - and some of the alternative magic systems might suit you.

Okay, so I'm a bit behind on my breadth of knowledge. Can you point me toward Eclipse? What is it, an alternate game system? Alternate setting?

Thanks for your suggestion, I'd be very interested in seeing what they've done.

 

[Claudius Gaius]

Should be linked in the signature: we've been having a lot of fun with it.

 

[the_bruiser]

Thanks!

On the character design side...

If attributes are only available at L1, and you only get 15 points - from which you must also buy a hit die size (triple effect at L1) and a skill point pool, as well as anything else you need to have for L1, then I really doubt that anyone will ever spend any points on attributes, although they may take a few +/- 2's.

In my system, you get 80 points ("DPs") for 0 level, plus 20 per level, so 100 DPs at first level.

If "only at character creation" means that you just treat the points available then as a big pool, then things get really odd: every sane player will buy a d12 HD for L1 for a base of 36 HP for only 5 points, you'll get characters who spent far more at L1 than was available at the time - say you get a pool of 150 points (L10) and spend 30 on a skill pool and eight on intelligence for (L10 x 34 = 340 skill points) (as admitted, I like highly-skilled characters), and high attributes will be quite common.

It also means that a character who developed from lower levels will look nothing like one who was created at a higher level, so evidently high-level characters simply come into existence that way. Inexperienced youngsters may not grow up to be mighty heroes unless the gods (or GM whimsy or whatever) abruptly pours a bucket of points into them.

We do treat everything as a 'big pool' in this system. One thing that is different than you might expect, however, is that (other than racial characteristics) nothing is 'bolted down' after first level. You can spend points on attributes at any level. If at 5th level your character decides, forget it, I'm going to go with two weapon, you can then jack up your dexterity at that point. This provides maximum future flexibility and also avoids the 'when were points spent?' phenomenon.

Keep in mind that this system is an almost complete overhaul of the normal system. In the same way that doing a point-buy system for attributes under normal rules 'costs' more the higher you go, the same graduated point cost system applies here to attributes, skills, saves, attack bonuses, etc. The more you want to exceed the 'normal' level, the less bang you get for your buck.

Finally, two specific points that you wouldn't catch without spending some time looking at my stuff in detail.

Re: your HD point - no way you would catch this without reading the long word doc - this is G&G based, so HP are held to exactly 30. So not meaningful for this system.

Re: the intelligence / skill point: No bonus skill points for intelligence in this system, and there are really only nine core skills and purchases are made directly in skill bonuses at increasing cost.

The whole thing is designed (imperfectly, of course!) to avoid this potential problem.

If "only at character creation" means that you go level-by-level but points cannot be spent on attributes and such after the game starts (not too relevant anyway, since there's no way to get any more points after the game starts unless the game master opts to just skip conventional experience points and such altogether and just starts handing out 1 character point per session or some such), then the sample design I thought up is still perfectly valid: I was presuming that the character was being set up at L8 and was simply breaking it down as a "level-by-level" purchase. Presumably the characters did develop somehow.

It will work as a game regardless, but the various options are fairly important to the world background.

Agreed. For us in particular, since there's no distinction between points spent at creation and other levels, character abilities 'should' be substantially the same whether created at 8th or played up to that level.

Clearly you've thought about this topic a great deal - you caught one subtlety that isn't really apparent in the doc. We have indeed bypassed the experience point system entirely - after a session, we just award DPs depending on how it went. I'm impressed that you're thoughtful enough to allude to this. For purposes of level-dependent abilities, such as an animal companion, you infer a character-level-equivalent based on the DPs your character has earned. If you have earned 200 DPs, then level-dependent abilities are treated as 6th level [(200 - 80) / 20, rounded down].

The most 'efficient' way to build a character in this system is to allocate resources (DPs) across a wide variety of areas... except that then you'd have a character that was merely above average in attack, defense, skills, etc., with no real strength - and what the fun in that? I'm aware that versatility is itself a strength, but being the second or third best in the party in everything rarely leads to the 'glory' moments that my particular playing group seems to crave. My group tends to want to be the best at attacking, or do the most damage, or be the best at skills, or be the hardest to kill, etc.

 

[Claudius Gaius]

Actually, everything about the sample character build is in reference to the other thread, which does have increasing hit dice: I did read through your document after I found it of course. As for bypassing the XP system in favor of awarding CP directly, that goes back to first-edition champions, so I really can't take much credit there.

Still, we also tend to regard the person who wants to make a flying dolphin character who uses internal talents instead of items and specializes in air and sonic magics as being only mildly eccentric. The dolphin was a lot of fun to have around.