stoopid newbie to d20 question

[madelf]

I'm starting to give d20 a second look. I pretty much wrote it off when I got the D&D3 books in hand and tried to get through them. But there is so much really cool stuff coming out lately that I might just bite the bullet and dive back in.

What I'm wondering (and I know that the answer will be "It depends" to some extent) is how interchangable the various versions of d20 really are. I know the intent was to have a common rule-set, but is it still working that way? Can I buy several products, dump them in a blender and pour out my own customized game?

As an example can I take D20 Modern, mixed with Sidewinder: Recoiled, with a dash of the the new Steam and Steel, throw in D&D monsters, and have the whole mess work to run a game similar to the Wild Wild West movie meets the Forgotten Realms? Or am I in for a boatload of tweaking to get things to work together?

 

[Greatwyrm]

Some d20 products are more compatible than others. That said, it's usually not too much of a chore to port something from one product to another. It's certainly easier to mix d20Modern, d20 Wheel of Time, and D&D than it would be to take something from HERO or CyberPunk and stick it in D&D or d20M.

 

[Robbert Raets]

Though all D20 games tend to have an 'internal' balance (by that I mean, threats, weapons and rewards that off-set each other), most games are easily adapted to other genres/styles/monsters.

 

[argo]

Mechanically speaking, 90% of all d20 mateial will easily go together. Some games introduce sub-systems (example: d20 modern has class defence bonuses and action dice but plain DnD classes do not) but those are usually easily delt with by either droping subsystem related material entierly or else applying the sub-system to the other material (example: you give the DnD classes a class defence bonus progression but drop action points entierly). d20 is a very modular system once you understand the core rules. In fact it is one of the system's great strengths.

Flavor and balance are something else entierly though. I am not sure how well a MM dryad would fit in with the flavor of a wild west setting or how six-shoters and dynamite will affect encounter balance with a dragon. I'm not saying you can't do these things. Just that that is where a DM has to spend his time when he tries to mix together cross genre material. You may want to spend some time playing with just the core rules in order to get a feel for their balance before you begin playing mix and match.

Good luck.

 

[madelf]

Hmm. It's sounding good then.

I'm not really all that worried about game balance. I think half the fun of playing a conglomerate game like that would be seeing how things sorted themselves out. I suspect it would find it's own level, although it might be different than any of the source games. If not, I've got an understanding group and a willingness to make adjustments to monster stats and such on the fly, as long as long the actual mechanics are compatible.

I could see six shooters and dynamite being used against a dragon. I doubt it would be significantly more or less effective than arrows and fireballs, but it would certainly be an interesting experiment. Then of course there's always the giant coal-fired steam automaton vs the dragon, which should be a blast as well.

 

[DackBlackhawk]

d20 Compatibility

From what I've seen much of 3 and 3.5 is compatible with each other, many things requiring little or no adjustment depending on what you're using. The feeling I get is that 3 and 3.5 are closer than 1st and 2nd were, and they were pretty close...

 

[Fate Lawson]

Well, Sidewinder:Recoiled and d20Modern mix together perfectly, since S:R uses the d20Modern ruleset. As to adding 3.5 Monsters into the mix, I don't see any big issues there at all, but most 3.5 monsters should probably be considered a level or two higher for d20Modern campaigns, since without magic/FX the power of Modern hero's tend to be a bit lower than their 3.5 counterparts of an equivalent level. Since I haven't seen Steam+Steel yet I can't reliably comment on it's interoperablity with S:R, but I can hazard a guess based on past ENPublishing works, and say it shouldn't be too hard to integrate with the others.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

No talk of mixing genres is appropriate without mentioning Grim Tales, which is designed to do just that.

To use your own analogy, Grim Tales is the blender, doing all the difficult conversion work for you. If you use Grim Tales as your "core" ruleset, then you can use settings, spells, monsters, feats, classes, and pretty much anything else you want from anything else you own.

I know that's a tall claim, but I think GT holds up just that well.

/pimp

Wulf

 

[Old One]

Madelf...Listen to Wulf...

No talk of mixing genres is appropriate without mentioning Grim Tales, which is designed to do just that.

To use your own analogy, Grim Tales is the blender, doing all the difficult conversion work for you. If you use Grim Tales as your "core" ruleset, then you can use settings, spells, monsters, feats, classes, and pretty much anything else you want from anything else you own.

I know that's a tall claim, but I think GT holds up just that well.

/pimp

Wulf

Pay attention to the mack-daddy of Grim Tales...

I have been DMing for 23 years (OD&D, 1E, 2E, 2.xE, 3E and now transitioning to 3.5E). I wish Grim Tales had been around three years ago when I started my current campaign, because I would have used it as my "Core" rulebook.

The flexibility of the "mix" that is Grim Tales is unmatched and it is very modular. Don't like the magic system? Use another. Want to add some prestige classes in? They will work fine. Want something that moves almost seemlessly from genre to genre and epoch to epoch? Grim Tales is, IMO, it.

Give it a shot...

~ Old One

(Quickly becoming a slobbering Grim Tales fanboy)