Fantasy Concepts: An OGL Fantasy Saga Project

[Kunimatyu]

As I've been reading this thread, the key question, in my mind, is not what elements of D&D get added in, but what is the basic "Saga Paradigm" that's going to be transplanted into D&D?

Here are some possibilities: (in no particular order)

I've bolded the Saga baseline for ease of comparison.

Classes: Soldier, Scout, Noble, Scoundrel, (Jedi) or should they be retooled into different classes entirely (Warrior, Expert, Adept or Warrior, Expert, Arcane, Divine)?

Talent trees: Unique talent trees for each class or, class-specific bonus feats chosen from a list, fixed abilities gained at each level, etc.

Skills: Massively consolidated - Spot/Search/Sense Motive -> Perception, etc.
or granular (Spot, Search, and Sense Motive), or Skill Groups (Perception group of Spot, Sense Motive, and Search).

Initiative and Endurance as skills, or not?

Skills constantly rising at 1/2 per level, with Trained and Skill Focus providing a +5 bonus, or the standard system of trained skills at 3+level?

Instead of saves, rising Defenses: Fort, Ref, Will -- or, Fort/Ref/Will/AC like normal, or, Combat Bonus governing Attack and Defense, etc.

A unified condition track covering the majority of conditions, with Unconscious at the end, or a bunch of similar-but-not-identical conditions?

Magic: Feat-like "powers" usable once per combat and only usable more with resource expenditure, or Vancian casting or True20 feat-like Powers usuable all day but with Will saves to resist fatigue?

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

If we do tie AC to a save, why does it have to be reflex? Could not a warrior trained in how to deflect and absorb blow with his armor use fortitude defense? Would a wizard with powers eldritch and dire not have some ward that protects him with his will defense?

That is rather awesome, but I think from a mechanical point of view the poor Wizard would never hit anyone, and be as hard to hit as most others which removes their classic weakness. For a non-D&D cinematic fantasy game though, truly this is the way forward.

In reply to another post, I kinda like skill points. With fewer skills there would be fewer points, so less to fiddle around with. I do think it adds a trade-off when multiclassing, instead of just gaining a whole new set that are class skills at your character level (which makes the rogue looking damned tempting for one level but not much beyond).

 

[EditorBFG]

I'm not a fan of Advanced and prestige classes, though I must admit they fit well within the SW mllieu. IF we include them in Fantasy Concepts, I think classes like Paladin, Ranger,Bard are obivious (see unearthed arcana). Also Archwizard (Jedi master) and Sorceror (Sith Lord) are viable.

However, I would just prefer Talent Trees that have certain prerequisites

I think that we can do high-end talents, as Sorcica says, but that Prestige Classes should be specific to the individual home campaign, and include specific talent trees.

The real use of prestige classes in such as system is for high-end focused classes that have better numerical level-based advantages (base attack, saves, etc.) and a chance to pick up a new skill or two, rather than classes with cool new class abilities. High end talents cover those.

BTW, Sorcica: Sorry for quoting you in my above post. It just made my post confusing, because it had nothing to do with your quote. I just sometimes instinctively quote the last post in the thread on a specific subject (In this case, Wulf's post.)

 

[tsadkiel]

Talent trees: Unique talent trees for each class

Skills: Massively consolidated - Spot/Search/Sense Motive -> Perception, etc.


Initiative and Endurance as skills

Skills constantly rising at 1/2 per level, with Trained and Skill Focus providing a +5 bonus,

Instead of saves, rising Defenses: Fort, Ref, Will


A unified condition track covering the majority of conditions, with Unconscious at the end

As far as I'm concerned, the above is what I would like to see. I like the five class model proposed earlier, and I'm not tied to a particular magic system, but I love the mechanical tweaks of Saga, and that's what I'll be looking for.

 

[Kunimatyu]

I'd like to speak out in favor of the Force-powers-like setup, but with a D&D twist:

Namely, I'll bet that all of D&D's signature spells can be condensed into about 20(or fewer) powers.

Here's an example of how they could work:

Fire Magic:
Scorching Ray: (Standard) With a DC X Magic check, you may fire a ray of 4d6 fire at your target's Reflex defense.

Fireball: If you expend this power for the rest of combat, create a 20ft radius burst in your line of sight that deals damage equal to your caster level, half damage if it does not exceed their Reflex save.

Basically, you have a delination between at-will spells (Scorching Ray, Magic Missle), and expendable powers, but a mage might have to choose to expend his capacity for more scorching rays(which aren't great, but don't run out) or a devastating Fireball that removes his ability to use the Scorching Ray for the rest of the encounter unless he spends a Mana Point to get the feat back.

 

[Matrix Sorcica]

I was looking at both True20 powers and Elements of Magic: Mythic Earth yesterday, and just spending an hour fiddling gave me the rough basics of using one or both systems as a base for saga-magic.
It's really not that hard - I guess a really nice system could be whipped together pretty fast, given some dedication and sparring.

I agree with tsadkiel - those are elements I'll be looking for as well.

I also like either the 4 class or 6 class set-up. Oh, and Paladin, Knight and Avenger. Yeah!

 

[Flynn]

If we do tie AC to a save, why does it have to be reflex? Could not a warrior trained in how to deflect and absorb blow with his armor use fortitude defense? Would a wizard with powers eldritch and dire not have some ward that protects him with his will defense?

While there's a certain consistency that works with this approach, in that Warriors and Priests would likely have the higher Fortitude saves and thus have higher ACs (reflecting the likelihood of these two core classes to be more defensive in nature), there comes a problem when you start looking at flat-footed situations.

I imagine a re-written Mage Armor spell might possibly do something similar to your suggestion, or perhaps a new spell might offer that in place of normal armor modifiers.

Things are still early on in the creation process, but comments like this one are very good at helping us to know what you are looking for.

With Regards,
Flynn

 

[Flynn]

A unified condition track covering the majority of conditions, with Unconscious at the end

Okay, quick thought exercise: Using only OGC from the start, how would one derive a condition track similar in concept to the one found in Saga?

Hmm... ah ha! The Anime D20 System Reference Document has the following, which could be formalized into a condition track, easily enough:

Wound Difficulty Penalties
The Game Master may wish to assign difficulty penalties to characters who have been injured in combat. When the character’s Hit Points are reduced to 75% of their original value or less, all tasks suffer a -2 penalty. This penalty applies to all Ability, Skill, and combat checks. At 50% Hit Points, tasks suffer a -4 penalty; at 25%, tasks suffer a -6 penalty.

In fact, there's a lot of good stuff that can be derived from that document:
http://www.opengamingfoundation.org/animesrd/Combat.htm

The rest of the trip could be made by applying the concept of Massive Damage Threshold to the wound track, and formalizing the presentation.

Interesting,
Flynn

 

[Mokona]

Saga Skill System

Skills: Massively consolidated - Spot/Search/Sense Motive -> Perception, etc.
or granular (Spot, Search, and Sense Motive), or Skill Groups (Perception group of Spot, Sense Motive, and Search).

Initiative and Endurance as skills, or not?

Skills constantly rising at 1/2 per level, with Trained and Skill Focus providing a +5 bonus, or the standard system of trained skills at 3+level?

In reply to another post, I kinda like skill points. With fewer skills there would be fewer points, so less to fiddle around with. I do think it adds a trade-off when multiclassing, instead of just gaining a whole new set that are class skills at your character level (which makes the rogue looking damned tempting for one level but not much beyond).

The massively simplified skill list (above referred to as "consolidated") and no skill points is one of the most important innovations of Saga rules. Spending skill points each level and tracking ranks bought at class versus cross class rates is annoying for multi-class characters. I dare say it also contributes to the long time it takes to make NPCs in D&D.

Without Saga-style rules for skills I'd probably just convert Saga to fantasy myself instead of buying something that isn't different enough from Dungeons & Dragons.

With Saga skill rules...

20th level fighter could have a +20 skill check. Compare that to the +26 skill check a similar D&D fighter has (remember the Saga fighter has the skill focus feat).

That same 20th level fighter can move silently with a +10 compared to a D&D fighter at +0 (both would take penalties for armor). Any requirement of stealth in D&D currently requires magic unless you split up the party and send the Rogue in alone. I personally dislike only giving one character the ability to participate in the adventure (such as when something other than crushing skulls is involved).

The DC of skill checks in D&D have to be very high in order to make skill points an effective resource to manage. This leads to save-or-die style skill results where it's either easy or impossible but not much between those two extremes. Saga rules avoid this pitfall by restricting certain skill actions to trained users.

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

You have a good point, I can see the advantages. You'll have to fill me in on how Saga deals with skills in multiclass situations. Would a Mage with one level of Rogue effectively use nearly all the skills at full class level, or is it such that you get +1 for levels in the right class and +0.5 for the wrong class, total across all classes? That would work fine. Especially giving Rogues a nifty skill-based talent tree so they really excel. Restricting some activities to trained users also sounds good. I'd also add feats that allow skills to be used in even more special ways - for instance consider wrapping Use Magic Device into Spellcraft, but require it to be both a class skill and have the feat that lets you start fiddling with explosive wands.