Making Your Game Better

[Mark Chance]

I've been thinking lately. (Amazing, huh?) I'm not currently DMing, but I'm the next DM up to bat with my group. So, I started coming up with ideas for making our game better.

Some basic steps I'm considering:

1. Try Pathfinder.
2. Try E6.
3. Try out a new action point system.
4. Try out a more cinematic combat system.

I've written up documents for 3 and 4. My goals were to give players more options, DMs less bookkeeping, and everyone more game in the same amount of time. I think the documents as written look promising, but playtesting is a must at this point to iron out the kinks.

All this recent work got me to asking: What would other gamers want to change about 3.5?

I'm not talking about huge, sweeping changes, such as rewriting the entire magic system. I'm thinking smaller scale modifications that can be easily tried out in nearly any sort of campaign.

P.S. Once my site is fully operational, I'm going to offer the action points system to the public.

 

[Alzrius]

For a great way to use action points in your game, as well as many other great ideas and improvements, I highly recommend taking a look at Trailblazer.

 

[Mark Chance]

For a great way to use action points in your game, as well as many other great ideas and improvements, I highly recommend taking a look at Trailblazer.

Oh, but I have. I like Trailblazer quite a bit, and a lot of what it suggests for action points are things I plan on using.

My twist is to tie acquisition of action points to specific roleplaying goals that the players establish for their characters. The basic idea is to reward good roleplaying (meaning as a player playing his character according to certain traits the player defines for his character) with something other than an XP bonus (which, IME, often is too arbitrary).

I also expanded a little on the things that action points can do with the aim of making combat more dynamic/cinematic.

 

[delericho]

All this recent work got me to asking: What would other gamers want to change about 3.5?

This is a really tricky one for me, because these days I'm not interested in making the game any more complex. In fact, I would prefer to play a much simpler version of the game (almost a D&D Saga Edition).

(While I like Pathfinder very much, and find a lot in there that is great, it's even more complex than 3.5e. Between that and yet another round of power creep, I'm inclined to leave it and stick with 3.5e.)

So, while there are various things I might do to the game to make it simpler, I also don't want to introduce a lot of House Rules to make it happen. And so, most of what I do end up doing is very minor.

The bullet-point list of things I'm using in my current campaign is as follows:

- Using the skill system (but not the skills themselves) from Pathfinder.
- Eliminate Monk/Paladin multiclass restrictions.
- Eliminate Favoured Classes
- Encumberance by armour only
- Ignoring all currency less than 1 gp
- Fixed hit points per level, at a rate of 3/5/7 depending on BAB. Rather than "max at 1st level", all characters get a flat bonus of 5 hit points.

I'll probably also be porting the concept of Skill Challenges and the Minion/Normal/Elite/Solo split across from 4e.

And that's about it.

Now, if I am interested in doing a full rewrite... well, that's another thing. Some of the big headline items I might consider:

- Reduce the importance of attributes by changing from +1 per 2 points to +1 per 3. Remove all effects that temporarily change these values, and vastly reduce the effects that permanently change them.

- Cut right back on bonus types, to about 7 in total. Eliminate trivial (and especially trivial and conditional) bonuses. Reduce stacking.

- Add talent trees for all races, classes and alignments. Characters get either a talent or a bonus feat every level (as in Saga). Add "prestige trees" in place of Prestige Classes. Also, some talents have alignment restrictions but classes themselves do not.

- Eliminate multiple attacks for high BAB (and other sources). Instead, characters do extra dice of damage. Also, mixed dice types will not be used for damage - when sneak attack, critical hits or energy weapons add dice to the pool, these will be of a same type as the dominant dice in the pool.

- Remove shields from a character's armour class. Instead, shields grant the character extra hit points. The player can usually choose whether to take a blow on the shield or not.

- Consider splitting the 'avoidance' and 'absorption' parts of armour class into the AC and the Ref defense. An attack must beat both to do damage (though some attacks negate one or the other). However, I think this may be a bit over-complex.

- Adopt a Beginner/Expert/Commander/Master tier structure as in BECM D&D. (Yes, I know these aren't the same names.) Provide generation guidelines for starting at the lowest level in each tier.

- Eliminate multiclassing, and the majority of choices, in the Beginner tier. (Optional rules can add it back in, but the default should be reduced choice, to be newbie-friendly.)

- Vastly reduce the rate of power acquisition in the Commander and Master tiers. BAB and Skill Ranks would top out at 15. Hit points, Skill points and so on would be acquired at a much reduced rate. The game would instead focus on empire building and then legacy building.

- Eliminate "Small" as a size category.

- Introduce a Stunting system for more freeform combat (importing the Combat Maneuver Bonus.Defense from Pathfinder), and a Social Conflict system to augment the Skill Challenge system.

But, of course, all of that has fairly wide-reaching implications for the game as a whole. As such, it's only something I would do if I suddenly found myself with endless free time.

 

[Mark Chance]

This is a really tricky one for me, because these days I'm not interested in making the game any more complex. In fact, I would prefer to play a much simpler version of the game (almost a D&D Saga Edition).

(While I like Pathfinder very much, and find a lot in there that is great, it's even more complex than 3.5e. Between that and yet another round of power creep, I'm inclined to leave it and stick with 3.5e.)

Definitely favoring simpler myself, which is one of the two major things that's keeping me away from 4E. I don't, however, see Pathfinder as being more complex than 3.5.

But that's not my point. My point is that I like simpler. For example, I'm going to do away with attacks of opportunity. The novelty of them has long since worn off. As a player, I tolerate them the way I tolerate a bothersome nephew. As a DM, I don't like them at all.

Also, as I mentioned on what passes for my blog, I'm going to toss in two amendments to DMing:

Amendment I

You, the players, don't get to one-shot my BBEG. Save-or-die and save-or-sucks spells just won't work. My BBEG will make his saving throws, et cetera, against such effects. All BBEGs are treated as solos (as explained in Trailblazer by Bad Axe Games). This means he's got a whole lot more hit points than he'd have if he wasn't a solo.

Amendment II

I, the DM, will not use save-or-die or save-or-suck effects against your PCs unless your PCs have the ability to undo the effect or unless you want your PC to be affected by such effects. In the latter case, I, the DM, will award you extra XP for creating story drama.

- Eliminate Monk/Paladin multiclass restrictions.
- Eliminate Favoured Classes
- Encumberance by armour only

The first for me is a given. There was never a good reason to for the multiclass restriction to begin with. I like the way Pathfinder handles favored classes. I don't think I've ever considered adding up encumberance by armor only. I think I like that idea.

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

I'm not talking about huge, sweeping changes, such as rewriting the entire magic system. I'm thinking smaller scale modifications that can be easily tried out in nearly any sort of campaign.

Awww... Well there goes my suggestion, unless rewriting the entire spell chapter is meaningfully different from rewriting the entire magic system.

 

[delericho]

Definitely favoring simpler myself, which is one of the two major things that's keeping me away from 4E. I don't, however, see Pathfinder as being more complex than 3.5.

I was thinking of things like the Barbarian rage abilities, Sorcerer bloodlines, and so forth. Taken individually, these are all fine, and there's a lot of good ideas there. But collectively, they add a whole raft of new powers for players to choose from and keep track of, in an already very complex system.

I like the way Pathfinder handles favored classes.

I quite like it too, although it's now more about encouraging a player to stick with a single class, rather than encouraging them to stick with a racial stereotype.

However, for me, it's an example of a 3.5e rule that can be eliminated at a stroke, and with no (or minimal) effect on game balance. So out it goes.

YMMV, of course.

 

[Mark Chance]

I was thinking of things like the Barbarian rage abilities, Sorcerer bloodlines, and so forth. Taken individually, these are all fine, and there's a lot of good ideas there. But collectively, they add a whole raft of new powers for players to choose from and keep track of, in an already very complex system.

Ah. That makes sense, but that's not the sort of complexity that much affects me as DM. IOW, it's not something I have to keep track of. Still, I get what you're saying.

I quite like it too, although it's now more about encouraging a player to stick with a single class, rather than encouraging them to stick with a racial stereotype.

However, for me, it's an example of a 3.5e rule that can be eliminated at a stroke, and with no (or minimal) effect on game balance. So out it goes.

YMMV, of course.

Yanking out favored class certainly wouldn't have any noticeable game effect. I also don't like the way PF removed specific race-based favored classes.

But I digress.

Things like sorcerer bloodlines don't bother me much because the complexity I'm trying to get rid of either directly affects me the DM (such as attacks of opportunity) or else tend to bog the game down for everyone (such as the dreaded 15-minute-adventuring day and the general slowness of the combat system).

 

[Voadam]

I go with 4e healing surges to reduce dependency on healing magic, though trailblazer has other options for that.

I switch divine casters to the UA spontaneous divine caster option. This reduces how many spells I need to keep track of for judging PC powers while leaving open options for special spells with scrolls or npc casters. Judgment calls on possibly broken spells can be done at level up instead of during spell prep in the middle of a game. I also like the world flavor of having some casters as oracle types while others are healers while others are battle buffers instead of each one being able to configure themselves to do anything given 24 hours.

I don't sweat NPC/Monster skills, I just ad hoc a number that looks right if it is needed.

I use a lot of predone monsters, from the srd, straight out of monster books, from the npc wiki, etc.

If I don't have a handy stat block I plan to use the pathfinder chart for CR appropriate numbers and not sweat all the mechanics of getting there.

Change turning to be something simple. positive energy damage is easy as are the saving throw effect options out there.

Pathfinder style free cantrips. I hate crossbow wizards as the norm.

Consider recharge magic option from UA. It switches vancian casters from novaing with all top spells once a day to novaing with one spell per spell level each fight (or more if fights are super long in number of rounds).

Don't sweat round per round durations, change most to "until end of encounter"

Change save or die to save or dying.

Change save or suck to save each round or suck.

Don't sweat individual xp tracking, level up either when thematically right (end of a module) or after X number of encounters.

Use pathfinder dispel magic, it only affects one magical effect, not a check against every one on a target. Huge reduction in stat recalculation.

Pathfinder skills are a nice simplification over the baroque class/cross-class core 3.5 system. Saga/4e system is even easier.

 

[Mark Chance]

I like the sound of these:

I don't sweat NPC/Monster skills, I just ad hoc a number that looks right if it is needed.

If I don't have a handy stat block I plan to use the pathfinder chart for CR appropriate numbers and not sweat all the mechanics of getting there.

Don't sweat round per round durations, change most to "until end of encounter"

Change save or die to save or dying.

Change save or suck to save each round or suck.

I'm already implementing something along this line:

Change turning to be something simple. positive energy damage is easy as are the saving throw effect options out there.

I'll have to check this one out. I've not read up on it:

Consider recharge magic option from UA. It switches vancian casters from novaing with all top spells once a day to novaing with one spell per spell level each fight (or more if fights are super long in number of rounds).