Black Flag So What's In Kobold Press' BLACK FLAG First Playtest?

Black Flag, the codename for Kobold Press' new open TTRPG, announced during the height of the recent OGL controversy as an open alternative to 5E, has put out the first playtest packet. It's 12-page document of character creation rules. So what's inside?

The introduction summarises character creation, defining 5E concepts like level, hit dice, and so on. It introduces the game as being backward-compatible with 5E.

Black Flag -- like Level Up: Advanced 5E, and Ancestry & Culture--divides the 5E concept of 'race' and 'subrace' into inherited and cultural elements. Black Flag goes with the terms Lineage and Heritage.

It goes on to present the Dwarf, Elf, and Human, along with a choice of two heritage traits for each--the heritage traits for dwarf, for example, are Fireforge and Stone. Elves get Cloud and Grove, while humans get Nomadic and Cosmopolitan. You can choose any heritage for your lineage, though. These are analogous to 5E's 'subraces', although the inherited/learned elements are separated out -- Cloud Elves are a lot like High Elves, and Grove Elves are a lot like Wood Elves, for example.

Following that are two backgrounds -- Scholar, and Soldier. They each give the usual array of proficiencies plus a 'talent'.

Magic, martial, and technical talents are essentially feats. You get a talent from your background, and can substitute an ability score increase for one.

The playtest feels to me much like a 5E written in their own words, but with 5E's 'race/subrace' structure replaced with 'lineage/heritage', the biggest thing being that the heritage (what was subrace in 5E) is cultural.

As a disclaimer, I do of course publish Level Up: Advanced 5E, which shares the exact same goal as Kobold Press' project (BTW, check out the new A5ESRD site!) It will be interesting to see how the approaches diverge; while both are backward-compatible, they already have different ways to handle what 5E calls race -- Level Up has you choose a heritage (your inherited species, basically), and any of 30+ cultures (learned stuff from where you grew up). Black Flag goes with lineage (again, your inherited species), and a choice of heritages for each lineage. And the bestselling 5E book Ancestry & Culture on DTRPG, uses those terms -- so there's plenty of options to choose your heritage/culture, lineage/heritage, or ancestry/culture!

Whatever happens, the future certainly contains a choice of open 5E alternatives!

 

[bedir than]

@Marc Radle do y'all have guidance towards pitching content towards Kobold and Black Flag?

 

[Marc Radle]

@Marc Radle do y'all have guidance towards pitching content towards Kobold and Black Flag?

Do you mean playtest feedback … or something else?

 

[bedir than]

Do you mean playtest feedback … or something else?

I have some work that seems more in line with what Black Flag will be than it is with One D&D. In a dream world I would pitch it to y'all.

It's on my list to pitch to EN5sider soon

 

[smiteworks]

My son was saying the other day, "Why even bother with darkvision? Light doesn't do anything in the game."

In other words, in three years of playing D&D, he'd never seen light come up. That made me sad.

That's because it is hard to implement at the table unless you are using a VTT and a TV map. We were hesitant to implement it on Fantasy Grounds Unity because I wasn't convinced it would be fun to play with it, but I was wrong. When people started using the feature combined with darkvision and torches to explore a map, it really made characters with darkvision stand out. The fact that darkvision doesn't reveal color was also cool to see it first hand on a map that is explored. Even characters with darkvision needed a torch or other light to be able to see the colors of things.

 

[Hexmage-EN]

That's because it is hard to implement at the table unless you are using a VTT and a TV map. We were hesitant to implement it on Fantasy Grounds Unity because I wasn't convinced it would be fun to play with it, but I was wrong. When people started using the feature combined with darkvision and torches to explore a map, it really made characters with darkvision stand out. The fact that darkvision doesn't reveal color was also cool to see it first hand on a map that is explored. Even characters with darkvision needed a torch or other light to be able to see the colors of things.

I briefly tried to implement lighting in my Underdark campaign but forgot so much that I just gave the one player without darkivison goggles of night. It never came up again until I set a battle on a long bridge where the enemies all had superior darkvision, allowing them to attack from outside the range of normal darkvision.

 

[smiteworks]

I briefly tried to implement lighting in my Underdark campaign but forgot so much that I just gave the one player without darkivison goggles of night. It never came up again until I set a battle on a long bridge where the enemies all had superior darkvision, allowing them to attack from outside the range of normal darkvision.

This is how I would normally DM it (at least at the table) and only bring it out for a very specific encounter. I just thought it was funny that once we implemented vision and dynamic lighting for Fantasy Grounds Unity, we started seeing a lot more people running non-human characters that has some form of darkvision. Mechanics drive character builds -- but only if they are enforced. Similarly, players spend a lot of time acquiring bags of holding when you actually keep track of encumbrance.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

That's because it is hard to implement at the table unless you are using a VTT and a TV map. We were hesitant to implement it on Fantasy Grounds Unity because I wasn't convinced it would be fun to play with it, but I was wrong. When people started using the feature combined with darkvision and torches to explore a map, it really made characters with darkvision stand out. The fact that darkvision doesn't reveal color was also cool to see it first hand on a map that is explored. Even characters with darkvision needed a torch or other light to be able to see the colors of things.

One of the things that I've houseruled (if you can call it that, it's more of an interpretation, I think) into Darkvision, is that you can't READ using it. At least, not anything that isn't carved into stone. To me, it's one of the reasons that dwarves use runic for their writing. Easier to chisel.

It's also why Drow use glowing fungi lights (and magic). Elves prefer to actually be able to see, under normal living conditions. They only use their darkvision when travelling the underdark (attracts less attention, you see.)

 

[Umbran]

This thread isn't about D&D, so I'm moving it to the appropriate forum.

 

[darjr]

A week left for feedback.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

That's because it is hard to implement at the table unless you are using a VTT and a TV map. We were hesitant to implement it on Fantasy Grounds Unity because I wasn't convinced it would be fun to play with it, but I was wrong. When people started using the feature combined with darkvision and torches to explore a map, it really made characters with darkvision stand out. The fact that darkvision doesn't reveal color was also cool to see it first hand on a map that is explored. Even characters with darkvision needed a torch or other light to be able to see the colors of things.

This may be one of the most compelling arguments I've heard for using a VTT. (Seriously.)