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How would these house rules affect D20?
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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 5418990" data-attributes="member: 4937"><p>What an intelligent question. You'd be amazed by how many home brewers don't ask this basic question.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>The effect would vary heavily from table to table. How often is 'Skill Focus' or similar feats taken at your table at present? If the answer is, "Almost Never", then it would be a net negative change. The purpose of siloing feats and skills is the same as the purpose in having classes in the first place - you are trying to force reasonably well-rounded builds rather than the hyperspecialists you tend to see in pure point buy/skill based systems. Having skill points forces you to have skills, rather than more straightfoward combat power or class enhancing utility. </p><p></p><p>That isn't to say that in pure D20 the siloing of feats and skills was well enough defined, but personally I wouldn't go that way. Not even 4e goes that way and instead uses fixed skill progression with a few 'skill focus' feats given out for free. That would be better than replacing skills with feats.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Rewards multiclassing too heavily for my taste, and handling the multiclassing could get janky. Gap reduction between 'poor' and 'good' save isn't a bad idea at all, and better than stock D20, but you'd be better off going to the 'average' progression FantasyCraft uses (maximum of +9 at 20th level) for some saves and using it as the 'poor' progression if you are going this route to fix the issue.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>I'd be inclined to say 'no named bonuses' would almost be preferable. Named bonuses make the game extremely complicated especially at high levels. Of course, there is a problem in going this way, and on the whole I'd probably stick with things how they are. Named bonuses should be seen as useful. Lots of named bonuses means lots of time figuring out what your modifier should be and lots of human error.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Yes. And better yet reduce the number of names down to a managable level. "Divine Grace, Holy, Blessed, Sacred, Vile, Anarchic, Axiomatic" are all bonuses that just shouldn't exist. They should all be either 'morale' or 'enchantment' or 'insight' bonuses as case may be. There should be no 'inherent' bonus (what the heck is that?), and yes folding them into Enhancement is fine. Defender bonus should become dodge, deflection, or armor on a case by case. </p><p></p><p>Bonuses from feats should generally be unnamed or some other stacking name like 'dodge' so that you aren't always recalculating that on the fly. I don't mind synergy bonuses. They should only be calculated once anyway, and they reward skill monkeys who need the help. Circumstance bonuses that are completely different should be unnamed or if they effect AC 'dodge' bonuses. If there is any question that they should or should not stack, they should be unnamed. Only give a bonus a name if it is clear that they should never stack with anything with the same name.</p><p></p><p>If the total list of names for bonuses in your game exceeds eight to ten, you are doing some thing wrong. If the total number of types of bonus that can effect a regularly calculated value exceeds 3 or 4, you are doing something wrong. Really, if you are looking to simplify cutting the total list of names down to 3 to 4 would be ideal.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Trivial. I don't concern myself much with Epic because its all badly thought out anyway. Personally, I wouldn't go here mainly because at high levels non-spellcasters need all the help they can get.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Lots of dump stats just like 4e. Even more generic stat arrays per class than in 3e, as many stats become almost completely unuseful or at least not useful enough to consider in many builds. You'll never see a Sorcerer with a Wis higher than 8 again, and Wisdom is already a dump stat for Sorcerer. The only mitigating factor is 3e has attribute damage so you'd probably avoid going all the way down to 3 in your dump stats just to avoid being easily taken down by attribute damage. But other than that, lots of dump stating.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 5418990, member: 4937"] What an intelligent question. You'd be amazed by how many home brewers don't ask this basic question. The effect would vary heavily from table to table. How often is 'Skill Focus' or similar feats taken at your table at present? If the answer is, "Almost Never", then it would be a net negative change. The purpose of siloing feats and skills is the same as the purpose in having classes in the first place - you are trying to force reasonably well-rounded builds rather than the hyperspecialists you tend to see in pure point buy/skill based systems. Having skill points forces you to have skills, rather than more straightfoward combat power or class enhancing utility. That isn't to say that in pure D20 the siloing of feats and skills was well enough defined, but personally I wouldn't go that way. Not even 4e goes that way and instead uses fixed skill progression with a few 'skill focus' feats given out for free. That would be better than replacing skills with feats. Rewards multiclassing too heavily for my taste, and handling the multiclassing could get janky. Gap reduction between 'poor' and 'good' save isn't a bad idea at all, and better than stock D20, but you'd be better off going to the 'average' progression FantasyCraft uses (maximum of +9 at 20th level) for some saves and using it as the 'poor' progression if you are going this route to fix the issue. I'd be inclined to say 'no named bonuses' would almost be preferable. Named bonuses make the game extremely complicated especially at high levels. Of course, there is a problem in going this way, and on the whole I'd probably stick with things how they are. Named bonuses should be seen as useful. Lots of named bonuses means lots of time figuring out what your modifier should be and lots of human error. Yes. And better yet reduce the number of names down to a managable level. "Divine Grace, Holy, Blessed, Sacred, Vile, Anarchic, Axiomatic" are all bonuses that just shouldn't exist. They should all be either 'morale' or 'enchantment' or 'insight' bonuses as case may be. There should be no 'inherent' bonus (what the heck is that?), and yes folding them into Enhancement is fine. Defender bonus should become dodge, deflection, or armor on a case by case. Bonuses from feats should generally be unnamed or some other stacking name like 'dodge' so that you aren't always recalculating that on the fly. I don't mind synergy bonuses. They should only be calculated once anyway, and they reward skill monkeys who need the help. Circumstance bonuses that are completely different should be unnamed or if they effect AC 'dodge' bonuses. If there is any question that they should or should not stack, they should be unnamed. Only give a bonus a name if it is clear that they should never stack with anything with the same name. If the total list of names for bonuses in your game exceeds eight to ten, you are doing some thing wrong. If the total number of types of bonus that can effect a regularly calculated value exceeds 3 or 4, you are doing something wrong. Really, if you are looking to simplify cutting the total list of names down to 3 to 4 would be ideal. Trivial. I don't concern myself much with Epic because its all badly thought out anyway. Personally, I wouldn't go here mainly because at high levels non-spellcasters need all the help they can get. Lots of dump stats just like 4e. Even more generic stat arrays per class than in 3e, as many stats become almost completely unuseful or at least not useful enough to consider in many builds. You'll never see a Sorcerer with a Wis higher than 8 again, and Wisdom is already a dump stat for Sorcerer. The only mitigating factor is 3e has attribute damage so you'd probably avoid going all the way down to 3 in your dump stats just to avoid being easily taken down by attribute damage. But other than that, lots of dump stating. [/QUOTE]
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