Subtle Brilliance...

[Zoatebix]

I love it when I read a whole thread and don't even notice the time fly by. I've got to go out and buy a copy of GT today.

 

[Turanil]

I love it when I read a whole thread and don't even notice the time fly by. I've got to go out and buy a copy of GT today.

I did buy many rpg d20 supplement over the last months. I did read them, sometimes being pleased with, sometimes regretted having bought, but in the end always putting them on the shelf so they may quietly gather dust thereafter. Only Grim Tales enthralled me, so I began to write a special campaign setting for it, and told players that I will begin the campaign around september or october.

Add to this Psychic's Handbook by Green Ronin, Serpent Kingdom, and Dundjinni for nice maps and floor-plans for minis, plus a projector on the wall to show some pictures... Mmmmh... I hope to run my best campaign!

 

[Tellerve]

I'm only three sessions in, so consider that in my advice.

One of the characters is a martial artist using Blood and Fists.
For now I wanted to go with GT classes exclusively, for now at least. So I went with a talent tree approach like you suggested. Here is my version:

Characters must take the base Martial Arts Style feat as usual, includeing prereqs (or GT equivalents). Once they do so, the style is tied to the class associated with the same ability as the class attack modifer (usually strong, sometimes fast and occasionally dedicated). The martial arts style feats are then added to the bonus feat list for that class. Martial Arts Masteries become talents for that class with the following additional restrictions: Must be 5th level to take any mastery; Must take 2 L1 masteries before you take any L2 masteries; Must take four L1 and/or L2 materies before you take any L3 masteries; and may only take 5 total masteries. Of course you must take the masteries in sequence as well, just as in Blood and Fists.

So far it is working perfectly well. It pretty much just simulates the Martial Arts Master and Contemplative master classes. My only concern is that the restrictions on what the class bonus feats are seems to be a significant part of the GT system, and I am bending that. But it hasn't caused trouble yet, and as long as the game is fun, I'm staying with it.

Hmm, interesting. I certainly wanna have my BnF and BnF2 in whatever game I use GT with as they are recently bought and have found places in my heart I do think you might have a good idea with melding them into the core GT classes as they are pretty beefy compared to GT characters...what with the good saves, BAB and defense bonus.

Do you allow the skills from the styles to be added as core skills as well or just not bother with those?

Tellerve

 

[BryonD]

Hmm, interesting. I certainly wanna have my BnF and BnF2 in whatever game I use GT with as they are recently bought and have found places in my heart I do think you might have a good idea with melding them into the core GT classes as they are pretty beefy compared to GT characters...what with the good saves, BAB and defense bonus.

Do you allow the skills from the styles to be added as core skills as well or just not bother with those?

Tellerve

Thanks

And yes, I use the base style feats exactly as presented in B&F. You either gain new "core" skills or get +1 if you already had them. Adding on to your starting core skill-set seems consistent with the overall GT approach. And I do not think the feats are overpowered as is (maybe a little on the high side, but no big deal).

 

[Krieg]

When and if we see a revised edition of Grim Tales, I'm putting this in the forward!

Will BryonD receive a comission check as well?

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Will BryonD receive a comission check as well?

11 words, 3 cents a word-- yep, an empty envelope. 33 cents just covers the postage.

 

[BryonD]

Hey now!

I accept electronic bill-pay also!

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Home run. Recently, I'd been having a problem balancing my encounters for my party they've either gotten blown out or walked through it. Using the EL system within GT, I've noticed that in the last two weeks the combat's felt dead right. This chapter alone -- these four little pages - should replace the byzantine explanation of EL in the SRD.

As good as it is, it's inevitable that as it is revealed to a wider audience, folks will find improvements.

Such is the case now, and while the tables in Grim Tales are convenient, a more exacting method with fewer limitations (mixing high/low CR groups) has come to light.

Please see this post:
http://www.enworld.org/forums/showthread.php?p=1648000#post1648000

There is a preliminary excel sheet there you can download. The sheet can tell you both the expected expenditure of resources as well as the expected success rate of a given encounter.

Upper Krust, CR Greathouse, Cheiromancer, and other ENworlders are all to be thanked for helping to pull the veil off one of the most unnecessarily complicated features of the d20 system.

Wulf

 

[Sargon]

Characters must take the base Martial Arts Style feat as usual, includeing prereqs (or GT equivalents). Once they do so, the style is tied to the class associated with the same ability as the class attack modifer (usually strong, sometimes fast and occasionally dedicated). The martial arts style feats are then added to the bonus feat list for that class. Martial Arts Masteries become talents for that class with the following additional restrictions: Must be 5th level to take any mastery; Must take 2 L1 masteries before you take any L2 masteries; Must take four L1 and/or L2 materies before you take any L3 masteries; and may only take 5 total masteries. Of course you must take the masteries in sequence as well, just as in Blood and Fists.

I like this. The only thing I am planning on changing is the wording of "only take 5 total masteries" to Talent Tree cannot be taken more than 5 times for a specific martial arts style. So if a character wants to learn Karate, they may take Karate mastery tree 5 times, later they learn Judo they may then take Judo mastery tree 5 times. I also plan on putting in warrior monk, sensei, and zen master, as prestige classes for martial artist characters and the only way to gain more than 5 masteries.

I think that the warrior monk and sensei will be great when combining more than one style. An example would be someone learning Shao-Lin Kung Fu with an animal style at the same time.

 

[BryonD]

I like this. The only thing I am planning on changing is the wording of "only take 5 total masteries" to Talent Tree cannot be taken more than 5 times for a specific martial arts style. So if a character wants to learn Karate, they may take Karate mastery tree 5 times, later they learn Judo they may then take Judo mastery tree 5 times.

I had not thought about that. I can't think of any reason I would not allow that as well.