MostlyHarmless42
Adventurer
I second really liking the idea of tweaking arcane recovery as a possible moon magic thing. Possibly allow twice the amount of recovery at high sanction, normal for mid and half or even none for low sanction? Hmm.
I should probably preface my further comments saying that I value game balance...always...over some minor setting fluff (i.e. Sivak being large creatures, etc.)
Other Dragonlance suggestions:
1) I don't much care for the UA versions of Kender or Minotaurs. Instead I use Goliath for Minotaur with swapping the mountain living thing for something minor and sea related. That said, I have also thought about just refluffing half-orcs. This may be the better call, actually, as then I could use Goliath as Tarmak if I wanted to use them in a game (I typically kind of ignore that they exist) or possibly as half-ogres.
2) For Kender I use normal halfling stats for afflicted Kender, and give the player the option to trade the advantage vs fear for immunity at the cost of having disadvantage on concentration checks and intimidate checks (taken from an article I found online about Kender homebrews. For "handling" I give each Kender a bag with randomly changing trinkets to help keep them from doing *nothing* except stealing stuff constantly as it can cause issues with other players and I find it often more reflects the Kender mindset of not even realizing they are taking items.
3) It has already been said about rock gnomes, so the rest us just fluff.
4) I make up equivalent draconian abilities for dragonborn, a poison for the Kapak and Venom draconians, a weaker rage for Frost and Baaz, a few spellcasting options for Bozak, Flame, and Lightning, and a transformation option for sivak. Stuff like that. I use noble draconians (from the bestiary of krynn) for all the chromatic colored dragonborn. I give each player the option to take the breath weapon, but explain to them that it is *very* rare for it to happen, and then treat them as an oddity if they take it. I also weak ability score bonuses to match each subtype. I have also allowed Tiefling once statwise for an Aurak, as they kind of are the odd duck for draconians.
5) For irda I use Tieflings, and honestly I can't believe I've never seen another person or blog post anywhere suggest the idea. For one, Tieflings don't exist in Dragonlance. For two, swap the word "fiend" for "Orge Titan" and you have Irda damn near perfectly as a race. Admittedly I may consider swapping out some of their racial spells for others, or might allow a Tiefling to be used as some form of Chaos spawn type character.
6) Half-dragons I save for dragon vassals (refluffing the scale roleplaying), and dragonspawn.
7) For elves, I allow drow as a mechanical race, but brand them as "Dark Elves" as per the settings lore. I allow Qualinesti elves to swap the intended bonus for charisma to better reflect their more friendly nature.
8) Knight orders I just treat as backgrounds and encourage certain archetypes. That said, I have made a homebrew Dragon Knight class with a couple options including dragon rider as an archetype.
9) For casters, I break them down into categories based on Wild (spontaneous) and Focused (prepared/God based). I set up factions sort of like the Knight Orders. Clerics/Paladins have one that I've called the Order of the Gods, The Towers of High Sorcery for Wizards/Alchemists (I get bored and homebrew), The Academy of Sorcery for Sorcerers/Bards, and the Oracles for Druids/Rangers/Clerics. Warlocks are an odd duck once again, and I fit them in where ever makes sense. I've also got Renegade Wizards and The Order of the Thorn as the equivalent to renegade sorcerers. Roleplaying fluff revolves heavily on the factions policing each other and working with/against each other like the Knight Orders. This works best for Age of Mortals, though I'd likely find something equivalent for other time periods.
10) And perhaps the potential thread derailing suggestion (sorry in advance, I don't mean to, this is strictly my opinion)... do NOT run War of the Lance games. It was okay for the books, but is absolutely HORRIBLE for games. First, it's stale and been done to death. It is THE time period everyone hates on when they hate the Dragonlance setting for quite possibly good reasons (namely railroading being the most accurate, but also other problems with magic casters). Second, it is by far the most heavily documented time period. You would think this would be a good thing, but the issue is similar to running Lord of the Rings as a game as opposed to running a Middle Earth game. You either end up railroading the hell out of players to "stick to the story", or completely ignore the books and then all that documentation becomes worthless.
Honestly I avoid the whole Age of Despair in general for games. I either do a Post War of Souls Age of Mortals game (and treat it almost like the entire world is recovering from WWII in tone, which is pretty much is if you analyze the novels), or possibly the Age of Dreams or Starbirth. The latter two are more difficult to convert due to lack of spontaneous magic classes or races being the big one.
I should probably preface my further comments saying that I value game balance...always...over some minor setting fluff (i.e. Sivak being large creatures, etc.)
Other Dragonlance suggestions:
1) I don't much care for the UA versions of Kender or Minotaurs. Instead I use Goliath for Minotaur with swapping the mountain living thing for something minor and sea related. That said, I have also thought about just refluffing half-orcs. This may be the better call, actually, as then I could use Goliath as Tarmak if I wanted to use them in a game (I typically kind of ignore that they exist) or possibly as half-ogres.
2) For Kender I use normal halfling stats for afflicted Kender, and give the player the option to trade the advantage vs fear for immunity at the cost of having disadvantage on concentration checks and intimidate checks (taken from an article I found online about Kender homebrews. For "handling" I give each Kender a bag with randomly changing trinkets to help keep them from doing *nothing* except stealing stuff constantly as it can cause issues with other players and I find it often more reflects the Kender mindset of not even realizing they are taking items.
3) It has already been said about rock gnomes, so the rest us just fluff.
4) I make up equivalent draconian abilities for dragonborn, a poison for the Kapak and Venom draconians, a weaker rage for Frost and Baaz, a few spellcasting options for Bozak, Flame, and Lightning, and a transformation option for sivak. Stuff like that. I use noble draconians (from the bestiary of krynn) for all the chromatic colored dragonborn. I give each player the option to take the breath weapon, but explain to them that it is *very* rare for it to happen, and then treat them as an oddity if they take it. I also weak ability score bonuses to match each subtype. I have also allowed Tiefling once statwise for an Aurak, as they kind of are the odd duck for draconians.
5) For irda I use Tieflings, and honestly I can't believe I've never seen another person or blog post anywhere suggest the idea. For one, Tieflings don't exist in Dragonlance. For two, swap the word "fiend" for "Orge Titan" and you have Irda damn near perfectly as a race. Admittedly I may consider swapping out some of their racial spells for others, or might allow a Tiefling to be used as some form of Chaos spawn type character.
6) Half-dragons I save for dragon vassals (refluffing the scale roleplaying), and dragonspawn.
7) For elves, I allow drow as a mechanical race, but brand them as "Dark Elves" as per the settings lore. I allow Qualinesti elves to swap the intended bonus for charisma to better reflect their more friendly nature.
8) Knight orders I just treat as backgrounds and encourage certain archetypes. That said, I have made a homebrew Dragon Knight class with a couple options including dragon rider as an archetype.
9) For casters, I break them down into categories based on Wild (spontaneous) and Focused (prepared/God based). I set up factions sort of like the Knight Orders. Clerics/Paladins have one that I've called the Order of the Gods, The Towers of High Sorcery for Wizards/Alchemists (I get bored and homebrew), The Academy of Sorcery for Sorcerers/Bards, and the Oracles for Druids/Rangers/Clerics. Warlocks are an odd duck once again, and I fit them in where ever makes sense. I've also got Renegade Wizards and The Order of the Thorn as the equivalent to renegade sorcerers. Roleplaying fluff revolves heavily on the factions policing each other and working with/against each other like the Knight Orders. This works best for Age of Mortals, though I'd likely find something equivalent for other time periods.
10) And perhaps the potential thread derailing suggestion (sorry in advance, I don't mean to, this is strictly my opinion)... do NOT run War of the Lance games. It was okay for the books, but is absolutely HORRIBLE for games. First, it's stale and been done to death. It is THE time period everyone hates on when they hate the Dragonlance setting for quite possibly good reasons (namely railroading being the most accurate, but also other problems with magic casters). Second, it is by far the most heavily documented time period. You would think this would be a good thing, but the issue is similar to running Lord of the Rings as a game as opposed to running a Middle Earth game. You either end up railroading the hell out of players to "stick to the story", or completely ignore the books and then all that documentation becomes worthless.
Honestly I avoid the whole Age of Despair in general for games. I either do a Post War of Souls Age of Mortals game (and treat it almost like the entire world is recovering from WWII in tone, which is pretty much is if you analyze the novels), or possibly the Age of Dreams or Starbirth. The latter two are more difficult to convert due to lack of spontaneous magic classes or races being the big one.
