For S&G, my old 4e Wishlist

[JoeGKushner]

Happened to be digging around the old hard drive and saw this and thought it would make an interesting turn to post and see how what I wanted to be in the edition compares against what was actually in the edition.

With no comments.... the old wishlist from before 4e was published.

More competent characters at first level.

Elimination of death at -10 hit points. Should be scaling.

Clerical Turn Undead system that's quicker and takes into effect that a 20 hit die skeleton is not the same as a 20 hit die lich.

More campaign knobs/levels that a GM can flip and change the core assumptions of the campaign like Spycraft 2.0 has. (i.e. rate of feat accumulation, attribute bonus boosts, etc...)

Hit dice by race and no random hit points. (Yeah, I'm a 12th level barbarian but the halfling rogue rolled better than me so I stay in the back.)

No more cross class skills. If the fighter with 2 skill points wants to specialize in spot and listen, let him.

DMG that puts more effort into showing how campaign components, such as magic item accumulation, etc... can shape the way the game is played.

Reduce the 3-18 aspect of stats and go the True 20 way. It's much easier to keep track of and much easier to assign point buy values.

Eliminate differences between Cover and Concealment.

Eliminate 10% stablization rule.

Eliminate death at -10 hit points.

Less Core Classes-core races.

Races: Human, dwarf, elf, halfling.
half-orc, half-elf, gnome can be put into another book and built from the ground up to show the GM how to create races that in theory, balance.

Classes: Fighter, Spellcaster (Cleric/Mage), Skilled User (Expert)

Have optional PrCs for classes like the cleric, which is very similiar to the paladin in terms of being an armored fist of his gods. It's much more melee centered than cloistered and there are no good options for it.

Show how multiclassing can take an expert and warrior and make a ranger or something along those lines. Build 'em from the ground up to show GMs and players how to do it.
Streamline turning into d6 damage per level to those in radius (or something similiar ala Compleate Divine)

 

[Greg K]

Here were a lot of mine. I still need to go over the classes.

1. Fewer Absolutes as per Sean K Reynolds web articles
2. Occupations as per d20 Modern (WOTC)/ Fantasy Occupations (Adamant)
3. Remove non-biological racial abilities and make them feats
4. Culture Templates similar to HARP/ Rolemaster RMSS Adolescence with guidelines in the DMG to help DMs tailor the races to their setting.
5. Removal of XP to create magic items (Artificer's Handbook)
6. Removal of XP to cast cast certain spells
7. Removal of level drain
8. Slower Leveling
9. Tone down the spellcasters
10. Class based defense
11. Action Points (UA) as core, but die bonuses work like Hero Points from Mutants and Masterminds.
12. Weapon Groups from Unearthed Arcana
13. Incantations from Unearthd Arcana
14. Complex Skill checks from Unearthed Arcana
15. Combat Maneuver System as per Book of Iron Might
16. Quick NPC generator as per Spycraft 2.0 (Crafty Games)/Foe Factory:Modern (Adamant)

17. Classes (more to be added)
a) More guidelines in the DMG for customizing characters as per the PHB 3.0/p.94 and3.5/110). Give examples using the class variants from UA and the skill tradeoffs from the Cityscape enhancement

18. Hit Points
a) More hit points for characters and con bonus to hit points only applying at first level
b) Removing Negative hit points
c) Death and Dying similar to that in Unearthed Arcana
d) Star Wars like Condition track

19. Single Save progression w/ the initial class providing a bonus (or bonuses). This stops multiclassing to cherry pick stacking good save bonuses. It also makes the feats that increase saves more attractive.

20. Armor and Weapon proficiencies granted only by the initial class (or better don't assign armor and weapon proficiencies, but give a first level character extra bonus feats to buy armor, weapon proficiencies,). This makes the first choice of class more important, because you cannot later take a level in a martial class to to learn all martial weapons and armor rather than spending the feats. It also makes the initial choice of martial classes more important.

20. Skills
a. More Skill Points per level for the 2+int class
b. Removal of Half Ranks for cross classed skills
c. Rework the cap on ranks and/or rework the DCs.
d. New uses for skills collected from the various books
e. Opposed Rolls: a single roll with 10+ opponent's ranks + oppoenent's modifier + other appropraite modifiers

21. Feats
a. Removal of the +2 to two skills
b. Remove many of the combat feats that should be things anyone can do (e.g, throw sand in opponent's face) and/or have fiddly bits (e.g, power attack). For the latter, just have a standard maneuver and the feat simply reduces the attack penalty.
c. Rage, Sneak Attack, Turn Undead become feats.

22. Equipment
a. bring back the missing armor and weapons from 1e and 2e
b. Dire Flails, SPiked chains, etc. moved to an optional sourcebook
c. Sunrods, Tanglefoot bags, etc, moved to an optional sourcebook

23. Combat
a. class based defense as mentioned above
b. Several feats become maneuvers as per Book of Iron Might that anyone can attempt.
c. no negative hp as mentioned above
d. UA style death and dying or something similar from UA (as mentioned above). This also does away the current stabilization rules as it is built in.
d. Star Wars Condition Track

24. Poison: see both Sean Reynold's web article ongoing web article and Poison Craft (Blue Devil Games).

25. Turn Undead: Make it more like the vampire movies where it drives them back or causes them to flee

26. Magic
- Spontaneous divine casting from UA, but more limited spells lists based on the deities domains
- reassign spells and spell levels
- buffs by divine casters are assigned to specific domains
- Remove the Law/Chaos Spells
- Remove Rope Trick
- Detect Evil/ Detect Good become Detect Unholy/Detect Holy and work on outsiders, undead or divine powered classes
- Raise Dead, Resurrection, become Incantations or limited to specific domains.
- Many diviniations become incantations
- Wish become incantation or removed
- Remove HD/Level from determining the base spell effects.
- Remove HD/level from determining the number of targets affected.
- Use staged effects determined by degree of failure

26. Psionic Powers handled as per Green Ronin's Psychic's Handbook

27. Monsters
a. Seperate BAB from HD

28. DM advice
a. Tell Dm's not to be concerned if every skill point is exact
b. More Guidelines for using DMing unusual PC actions and maneuvers