Things other than rulebooks

[Silveras]

Ah, so? Ryan's not proposing a product that contains a designer who will make sure you're fully statted out 8th level Orc Fighter is different from everyone else's who bought the book. He's proposing a completely static product. Nothing but a big book of NPCs.

And while you could make a program to create some randomness, so your fully statted out 8th level Orc Fighter actually IS different than mine, I'd be happy just combining races and classes and PrCs from a series of menus and printing the results out on a handy index card, randomness or no randomness.

Subtly, of course, my response was a dig at what I perceive as a critical failure of WotC to support the most complex RPG on the market, which also happens to be the most popular, with any official electronic support.

What you are describing is a database application. Just like the one I use.

Except that I am in the process of implementing the new DMG II stat blocks in it. Those are unlikely to fit on an index card. And therein lies the rub, another part of the reason why good electronic tools are so hard to come by: you want something that fits on an index card, other people want them to take as much space as they need to provide all the information, and still others would like it to print NPC character sheets.

One product could try to do it all, but for the most abbreviated format (the index card), it is likely that almost no one would like the format ... because there would always have to be information abbreviated or left out, and very few would be able to agree on exactly what is most needed vs. could be left out.

On the other hand, adopting an existing format, like The Game Mechanics initiative cards, and printing the card with all information from the db, would make for a more viable product.

WotC does have an official electronic product: e-Tools. I don't use it because I can write my own that is 100% tailored to my tastes, though.

 

[Particle_Man]

At the simplest, you give each weapon the same chances, at which point a Halfling Wizard is as likely to wind up with a Greatsword as a Half-Orc Barbarian is to wind up with a Gnomish Hooked Hammer.

Adding complexity, you can say "this class is x% likely to want that weapon", to create affinities, so that Barbarians tend to have bigger weapons, Fighters a broader range, and Wizards lighter ones. But now, the developer has weighted what *s/he* thinks the "best" weapons are by class.

Then there is the question of how to add new ones. With hard numbers, you would need to recalculate the whole list for every class every time you add a new weapon or weapons.

Well, how about a default setting for how likely weapons are (maybe under 3 or so default categories), which you as a user could discover and could modify at will? And when you add new weapons, you "pair" it with an existing weapon, splitting the % chance of them existing between each of them so each is half as likely as the original weapon was? That is another default, which could also be changed.

 

[Janx]

Well, how about a default setting for how likely weapons are (maybe under 3 or so default categories), which you as a user could discover and could modify at will? And when you add new weapons, you "pair" it with an existing weapon, splitting the % chance of them existing between each of them so each is half as likely as the original weapon was? That is another default, which could also be changed.

Well, you could filter weapons by their association with the character aspects.

A Race-Weapon table, a Class-Weapon Table and a Feat-Weapon table. Basically, assign your weapons to the respective races, classes, and SOME feats (the ones that imply certain styles over others). Then simply select frm those 3 tables based on the provided values of the character. each restricting the next selection. The result, is when you pick and Orc Barbarian with Great Cleave, a rapier does not show up on the list of weapons to be randomly selected from. The admin tool for these tables would be rediculously easy to code and data population wouldn't be too bad.

As a GM and programmer person, I would like the following kinds of tools:
NPC generator (all stats and equipment and spells)
Town generator (with maps and NPCs)
country generator (with maps)
item generator (for populating the database with items, as well as printing out item cards)
dungeon generator
monster generator (for designing new ones & data entry and for printing out cards)
PC/NPC manager (maintain chars, print chars, print char cards)
PC in-game interface (a tool that represents your char sheet. not for leveling up, but for in-game use)
Adventure generator (make it easy for GM to flesh out adventure and plan for things, flowcharting, etc.)

I'd like all of the above integrated with each other, and with the logical tools that make it useful (spellbook printer, generator for PCs).

I want a system to contain ALL of my GMing notes (on a computer) and co-relate everything. That means a database, not just a wiki or a PDF form. It is doable. But I don't have the time.

Janx

 

[delericho]

PC in-game interface (a tool that represents your char sheet. not for leveling up, but for in-game use)

I would love a tool that could automatically re-calculate the stats of the NPC cleric whenever he cast a buffing spell (or had it dispelled). Or, just a spreadsheet that could prepare all the combinations in advance, and print them in colour-coded columns.

Oh, and a tool that would summon the stats for, well, summoned creatures on demand would be good, too.

 

[der_kluge]

Wow. You're a jackass and your rules are terrible and I wish I hadn't bought them.

Whether I'm a jackass or not is irrelevant to how good my rules might be. Ok, to call the DMG writers illiterate baboons is extreme, I'll grant you that. I'm sure they're all decent, hard-working folks, but trust me - reverse engineering those rules into what we created for AH was no picnic, and it was clear to all of us who worked on it, they missed the boat on those rules. They could have been a lot better. It was clearly not a priority for them.

 

[der_kluge]

Hmm, no. The problem with the DMG rules is that they had to grandfather in approximately 8.37 zillion exceptions caused by the legacy list of magic items, and attempt to balance those with the new systematic way of doing things. If the designers could've gotten away with tossing out all the classic old items and creating everything with a new, consistent system, I'm quite sure the DMG's magic item section would be a whole lot easier to understand. Unfortunately, things don't always work out for the best.

Well, this is true, and I can appreciate the complexities of it, but they added in some real gems - notably those damned rings of evasion, which should never have existed in the first place. So, they certainly didn't do themselves any favors by creating items that fall outside their own existing framework. Actually, most of the classic items convert rather easily.

 

[Silveras]

Well, you could filter weapons by their association with the character aspects.

A Race-Weapon table, a Class-Weapon Table and a Feat-Weapon table. Basically, assign your weapons to the respective races, classes, and SOME feats (the ones that imply certain styles over others). Then simply select frm those 3 tables based on the provided values of the character. each restricting the next selection. The result, is when you pick and Orc Barbarian with Great Cleave, a rapier does not show up on the list of weapons to be randomly selected from.

That's pretty much where the post that ParticleMan was addressing ended up.

 

[woodelf]

Originally Posted by RyanD
There are so many more valuable things that could be sold to players and GMs beyond new rules that I get greatly irritated by how many "rulebooks" I see in the marketplace.

I'm not sure what you mean by "rulebooks", or how that category differs from "A complete guide to magic item creation a la D&D3.5E"?

Also, surely a large part of the appeal of new rulebooks--and new systems--is precisely that they're different. So making them nothing more than extrapolations of existing data, while useful in its own right, is unlikely to appeal to those who are buying new rulebooks, right? I'd wager they're two different markets. And as much as smoe people want more depth and exploration of one game system/setting, there are others who want variety--something new, not a variation on something old.

 

[Christian]

Is that by RAW, or by the AH rules? I've never tried to create bracers of mage armor. How do the prices compare to bracers of armor?

Continous effect cost is spell level x caster level x 2000 GP (DMG 3.5 pg. 285). So an item with a continuous mage armor effect costs 2000 GP and gives a +4 armor bonus to AC. This compares favorably to +4 bracers of armor at 16000 GP ...

If you consider that part of the DMG to be rules, which they explicitly aren't, of course.

 

[Staffan]

Well, this is true, and I can appreciate the complexities of it, but they added in some real gems - notably those damned rings of evasion, which should never have existed in the first place. So, they certainly didn't do themselves any favors by creating items that fall outside their own existing framework. Actually, most of the classic items convert rather easily.

The thing is that D&D is, and always has been, fundamentally exception-based. It's supposed to have lots of quirky things going on. This is especially true when it comes to magic.

You'd never see a spell like Prismatic Spray in an effects-based magic system like TORG's or, from what I understand of it, Hero. But those things are part of the charm of D&D. The same goes for many of the magic items, like the Feather tokens, the Ring of Shooting Stars, or the Apparatus of Kwalish.

The rules for making magic items are secondary to the items themselves, and that's the way they should be, IMO.