Instant Edition Converter

[Sir Robilar]

So I had this absurd idea about D&D and I thought "what better place to go with it than good old EnWorld?".

What if there was an edition converter that allowed to convert rules on the fly and during a session of D&D (all editions)? It would be an electronic DM tool or a fat book containing lots of conversion charts and tables. I prefer the latter, obviously. Using this converter, each player in the group, including the DM, could play in the edition he or she prefers.

Say, for example, the fighter attacks an ogre. The fighter character´s player is playing 3.5 and in all aspects acts as if everyone was playing 3.5. After that player has rolled damage, the DM - playing OD&D - looks up the 3.5/OD&D damage conversion chart. He finds out that the 14 damage that the fighter inflicted would translate to 5 damage in OD&D terms. Thus his OD&D ogre gets 5 damage.

Another example: The cleric prefers 4E and chooses to heal another character using the Holy Word Cleric Utility power. He uses it on the AD&D 1E magic user. In 4E terms, the one healed spends 1 healing surge and adds another 1d6 hit points. Looking up the 4E/1E healing conversion chart, the DM quickly assigns that this would equal the use of a 1E Cure Light Wounds spell and it is thus played out.


So what do you think?

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

So I had this absurd idea about D&D and I thought "what better place to go with it than good old EnWorld?".

What if there was an edition converter that allowed to convert rules on the fly and during a session of D&D (all editions)? It would be an electronic DM tool or a fat book containing lots of conversion charts and tables. I prefer the latter, obviously. Using this converter, each player in the group, including the DM, could play in the edition he or she prefers.

Say, for example, the fighter attacks an ogre. The fighter character´s player is playing 3.5 and in all aspects acts as if everyone was playing 3.5. After that player has rolled damage, the DM - playing OD&D - looks up the 3.5/OD&D damage conversion chart. He finds out that the 14 damage that the fighter inflicted would translate to 5 damage in OD&D terms. Thus his OD&D ogre gets 5 damage.

Another example: The cleric prefers 4E and chooses to heal another character using the Holy Word Cleric Utility power. He uses it on the AD&D 1E magic user. In 4E terms, the one healed spends 1 healing surge and adds another 1d6 hit points. Looking up the 4E/1E conversion chart, the DM quickly assigns that this would equal the use of a 1E Cure Light Wounds spell and it is thus played out.


So what do you think?

I don't think it would work. There's another thread going over converting adventures ... while doable, it would take a lot of work, and much of this work could not be done by a computer.

Just to illustrate a few issues between a 1e and 4e ogre:

A generic ogre in 4e has a recharge 6 ability called "Angry Smash" ... how could you possibly model that in 1e?

A 4e cleric can use Healing Word as a minor action, and then attack or cast a spell like Command. No cleric in 1e could do that, and I'm pretty sure it takes a very specific combo using non-core rules to do that in 3.5. On the other hand, a 1e to 3e cleric can cast more than two healing spells per encounter... and is more limited in terms of what healing it can do per day.

Or another example... a generic orc in 1e or 2e is a wimpy combatant. It has 1d8 hit points (so, maybe 4 hp), dies in one hit, and deals 1d8 damage (by weapon). In 3.x an orc warrior may be as strong or even stronger than the PC fighter, and in 4e said orc, if a brute, isn't going to die in one hit without some very specific non-core combo.

 

[Stormonu]

This would be a great tool to do before-the-game conversions, especially for modules, but I think it would fare poorly for in-the-heat-of-the-moment conversions.

 

[Sir Robilar]

One thing I forgot mentioning is that for this discussion I am much more interested in your ideas about how this could be achieved, than in rational insights as to why it is not possible. I know the idea is absurd and probably impossible but once ideas are born they are sometimes hard to silence.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

It's just my opinion that a computer cannot do this. Having a different set of rules for DM and players would be problematic too.

I don't know if this has anything to do with the previous thread about converting adventures. I think that's certainly doable, but it would take work.

 

[Mark CMG]

You might need some sort of universal rating system so that all aspects of the game could be given a value for conversion.

 

[Pilgrim]

In theory I'm sure a lot of players would enjoy such a tool, but personally, I would have zero interest in playing across multiple editions.

 

[was]

nice idea but probably impossible to implement

 

[jonesy]

You could make set rules where certain things from certain editions always get modified/added/removed into something from another edition. But even then there'd be a ton of exceptions you'd need to set exceptions for. A lot of it would need to be totally case by case.

Balance would be really hard to code. And especially in the way intended by the original in relation to the rules of the edition it was created for.

I don't think it's undoable in principle, but it would take huge amounts of time.

In theory I'm sure a lot of players would enjoy such a tool, but personally, I would have zero interest in playing across multiple editions.

But if you had a converter like that you wouldn't need to. You could take an adventure from any edition, and play it in the one you prefer.

 

[Stormonu]

One thing I forgot mentioning is that for this discussion I am much more interested in your ideas about how this could be achieved, than in rational insights as to why it is not possible. I know the idea is absurd and probably impossible but once ideas are born they are sometimes hard to silence.

Gah, I don't even know where to begin with such a converter. I imagine it would look something like a huge crosstable for each edition. Item/Power/Ability/Action/Whatever as a row entry, a column for the resulting effect in each edition - if you could get it down to a one-word statement for each effect.