Dan's Diminutive d20

[RFisher]

The solution to healing is that you've got to make natural potions of healing (or something) available to PCs for purchase in the campaign.

Call ’em “healing herbs”. I liked the system Rolemaster had for foraging for them, though it may have been a bit complex. Could be good inspiration for a simpler system, though.

 

[Elephant]

Delta, you haven't read about Microlite, have you? This seems like a similar effort.

http://microlite20.net/

 

[Delta]

Delta, you haven't read about Microlite, have you? This seems like a similar effort.

Microlite20 | The smallest thing in d20 gaming

Hey, Elephant -- yes, I have. I'll cross-post my response to the same question from my blog:

----------------------------------------

Regarding other options, I've really been surprised at how far they're willing to veer from basic D&D. For example, I consider the "core" of the D&D game to be (stuff in every edition OD&D-3E) stuff like the 6 abilities, archetypal classes, class-based Hit Dice, AC, attacks, and Vancian wizards.

With Microlite20, the first thing I see is that they cut the abilities down to 3, which is alone enough to turn me away. (Also: no class-based Hit Dice or attacks, magic costing hit points). With True20, I can't deal with the change from hit points to a Toughness save/wound status track.

So in short, I haven't yet found an offering that got close enough to the "core" of D&D so far.

 

[lionrampant99]

Hi. I just found your rules, and find them interesting. I also have discovered that I like removing clerics, as non-RPG derived fantasy fiction never discusses any characters like that.

HOWEVER, that isn't what I'm here to quib about. I'm wondering why you removed having humans get an extra feat, as opposed to the demi-human races, which all have special abilities that make them "better" than humans to the gamist among us. I'm sure I would go ahead and give humans an extra feat if I was ever able to convince my game group to try this, and want to see if play testing has shown this to be a bad idea, for some reason.

 

[Delta]

Hi. I just found your rules, and find them interesting. I also have discovered that I like removing clerics, as non-RPG derived fantasy fiction never discusses any characters like that.

HOWEVER, that isn't what I'm here to quib about. I'm wondering why you removed having humans get an extra feat, as opposed to the demi-human races, which all have special abilities that make them "better" than humans to the gamist among us. I'm sure I would go ahead and give humans an extra feat if I was ever able to convince my game group to try this, and want to see if play testing has shown this to be a bad idea, for some reason.

Hey lion, I just saw your post today. Thanks for the comment and really good question. My aggravation with the human bonus feat is mostly a two-fold accounting issue:

I. At 1st level it requires new players to parse and select from multiple feats, which is additional starting complication. It's pretty easy to give them one "point of interest" about their PC to choose from, without getting into multiple feats and prerequisite trees, etc.

II. On the DM side, it requires any random 1st level-level human NPC to have more feats to choose. Again, I'm happy with picking one "point of interest" for a bottom-level NPC, but more than that seems like a complicated waste of time (like up to 3 in core 3E for any random 1st-level human Fighter, ugh!). Also it throws off the feat-accounting for higher level characters (as in DMG 3.0 NPC lists). 10th-level Wizard has 3 bonus feats, right? Oh, wait, no, that's nonhumans only, it's 4 if it's a Human.

My current attitude is that the "any favored class" is benefit enough for humans, especially when all nonhumans also include some balancing disadvantage (ability penalties, class restriction, Small or slow movement).

But even if you feel that humans still need some added benefit, I would prefer any of the following to a starting bonus feat (and have considered all of them): (a) free +1 to any ability score; (b) humans gain experience faster; (c) delay that bonus feat to 2nd/4th/5th level, etc.

 

[Delta]

Version 1.1

Also today: An update to Dan's Diminutive d20 after more playtests & analysis. Primary changes are as follows:

• "Uniform Feats" which more closely match core rules feat acquisition, but spread evenly across levels. Fighters get a feat every level; rogues every 3/4; wizards every 1/2 level (that is, same as attack bonus). That's it.
• Iterative attacks at high levels got cut out. Take the feat "Rapid Attack" if you want that.
• Supplement downloads: PC Stock Parties (what I use for playtests) and Quick NPC Creation (what I use for NPC magic gear in about 1 minute flat).

There's a few more details if you're watching closely. Wizards get Knowledge (Arcana) at start, not all Knowledge skills. Skills are based on class level (not character level), to avoid obvious multiclass dipping. Reach weapons are given a simple ruling.

Thanks to everyone who's given comments recently! And special thanks to Simon Bull for his early email comments that actually inspired me to release the first version in this online format.

http://www.superdan.net/dimd20/

 

[epicbob]

Sorry if I'm committing thread necromancy but I had an idea of my own to give some healing potential to the wizard.

We could simply use the Bard's spell list.

It has healing spells among many other things and it's a 6-level list. Also, the list is relatively short (it would fit on 2 pages if formatted properly) so you don't spend too much time searching around.