D&D 5E Things from other games that are unlikely to be put into NEXT that you will port over
Yora
Legend
Allegiances. Allegiances do pretty much what people expect from alignment and do it so much better while allowing for moral ambiguity when that is part of the setting.
Instead of positioning yourself in regard to Good and Evil and Order and Chaos, you chose a number of groups or ideologies that you feel commited to. If you encounter people who realize you share allegiances, they have a more friendly attitude towards you, and if you have opposing allegiances, it makes relations worse.
But the best thing about allegiance is, that it is an amazing tool to help you play a character who is different from your own personalty. Especially when you play a character in a world, that has very different ideas of right and wrong than your own. When you play a good character and ask yourself "what is the right thing to do", you make that descision based on your own values and customs, but you may not want to do that all the time. Supposed you have an evil summoner taken prisoner and you have to decide what to do with him. Your own values may tell you, that you can't murder a prisoner. But then you could take a look at your characters allegiances and remember that he very loyal to an order of demon-hunters who have the policy of destroying demons and those who work for them at all times. This character has a different view on these things than you do, so killing the prisoner would be what fits the character best.
He may also have an assistant who is also a member of the order, but is so against his will and he doesn't really feel commited to the orders teachings and views. He is a member of the organization, but it is not one of his allegiances, as he isn't really commited or loyal to it's ideology and teachings.
If you want to play characters who have faults and do bad things and are not shining paragons of virtue, then allegiances are a great thing. And I think most people would quite enjoy it. Any time I started a new group, the first time players where the ones the most exited about playing a made up character very different from themselves. It's mostly the more experienced players who lose sight of that and play an idealized hero who represents everything they believe. But many genres have not so shining heroes as a core concept and allegiances can help you get sight of this aspect again.
For my campaign setting I am currently working on, allegiance will be an important addition to the rules.
Instead of positioning yourself in regard to Good and Evil and Order and Chaos, you chose a number of groups or ideologies that you feel commited to. If you encounter people who realize you share allegiances, they have a more friendly attitude towards you, and if you have opposing allegiances, it makes relations worse.
But the best thing about allegiance is, that it is an amazing tool to help you play a character who is different from your own personalty. Especially when you play a character in a world, that has very different ideas of right and wrong than your own. When you play a good character and ask yourself "what is the right thing to do", you make that descision based on your own values and customs, but you may not want to do that all the time. Supposed you have an evil summoner taken prisoner and you have to decide what to do with him. Your own values may tell you, that you can't murder a prisoner. But then you could take a look at your characters allegiances and remember that he very loyal to an order of demon-hunters who have the policy of destroying demons and those who work for them at all times. This character has a different view on these things than you do, so killing the prisoner would be what fits the character best.
He may also have an assistant who is also a member of the order, but is so against his will and he doesn't really feel commited to the orders teachings and views. He is a member of the organization, but it is not one of his allegiances, as he isn't really commited or loyal to it's ideology and teachings.
If you want to play characters who have faults and do bad things and are not shining paragons of virtue, then allegiances are a great thing. And I think most people would quite enjoy it. Any time I started a new group, the first time players where the ones the most exited about playing a made up character very different from themselves. It's mostly the more experienced players who lose sight of that and play an idealized hero who represents everything they believe. But many genres have not so shining heroes as a core concept and allegiances can help you get sight of this aspect again.
For my campaign setting I am currently working on, allegiance will be an important addition to the rules.
Blacky the Blackball
First Post
Something I'd love to see in 5e is a set of flashback rules inspired by those in 3:16 Carnage Among The Stars.
Basically the idea is that instead of spending ages coming up with a backstory to your character when you create them, your created character is fairly anonymous with just a name and some stats (in D&D, of course, you'd also already have a race/class combination).
Then you are given a number of "Flashback" slots at first level, and you get more as you increase in level.
At any time, you can use one of those flashbacks to briefly narrate a flashback to your character's past in order to explain how you acquired a particular skill or talent; and - assuming the DM doesn't veto it for being a blatant attempt at powergaming - your character now has that skill or talent.
I think it's a great way of incrementally giving characters a theme and backstory organically as they are played, rather than having the player come up with pages of purple prose when the character is created only for them to die at level 1.
Basically the idea is that instead of spending ages coming up with a backstory to your character when you create them, your created character is fairly anonymous with just a name and some stats (in D&D, of course, you'd also already have a race/class combination).
Then you are given a number of "Flashback" slots at first level, and you get more as you increase in level.
At any time, you can use one of those flashbacks to briefly narrate a flashback to your character's past in order to explain how you acquired a particular skill or talent; and - assuming the DM doesn't veto it for being a blatant attempt at powergaming - your character now has that skill or talent.
I think it's a great way of incrementally giving characters a theme and backstory organically as they are played, rather than having the player come up with pages of purple prose when the character is created only for them to die at level 1.
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