One more thing, but I don't know how to model it in d20 rules:
In our own "swashbuckling" historical era, and in the Musketeer books (an archetype of swashbuckling fiction), there is not a little bad knowledge when it comes to swordsmanship. I refer specifically to "secret moves". There was widespread belief that sword masters taught special victory-guaranteeing moves, but only to their most trusted students. One such move historically was called the coup du Jarnac. No such moves actually existed, of course, and this was also the case in the Musketeer books. Nevertheless, d'Artagnan was utterly convinced that his father had taught him an all-powerful move that would guarantee victory, but it was only to be used in extremis. When he finally pulled it out, it turned out to be a quite bone-headed thing to try, and it almost got him killed.
Unfortunately, in d20 rules, everything works perfectly and players have perfect knowledge of their characters, so this feature of swashbuckling fiction would be difficult to model.
In our own "swashbuckling" historical era, and in the Musketeer books (an archetype of swashbuckling fiction), there is not a little bad knowledge when it comes to swordsmanship. I refer specifically to "secret moves". There was widespread belief that sword masters taught special victory-guaranteeing moves, but only to their most trusted students. One such move historically was called the coup du Jarnac. No such moves actually existed, of course, and this was also the case in the Musketeer books. Nevertheless, d'Artagnan was utterly convinced that his father had taught him an all-powerful move that would guarantee victory, but it was only to be used in extremis. When he finally pulled it out, it turned out to be a quite bone-headed thing to try, and it almost got him killed.
Unfortunately, in d20 rules, everything works perfectly and players have perfect knowledge of their characters, so this feature of swashbuckling fiction would be difficult to model.
