Unearthed Arcana Variant Rules - Previews and Questions

[jasamcarl]

I've always disliked aspects of roleplay given as benefits of experience / leveling in a roleplaying game.

"So Anagar, how did you meet the Baroness DuFarlia?"

"Well, I killed four orcs in the southlands."

"And...?"

"They where barbaric, so I noticed a sudden surge in power after killing them, and suddenly people I've never met or heard of before where hanging out at my pad, despite me doing the deed in complete secrecy."

Having rules for handling contacts is great, but getting them should be part of the roleplay, not just an arbitrary benefit of killing Orcs...

You know, while I'm not sure I would use these rules, your stance against them seems somewhat odd. Given that they are optional and by no means required, they can serve as a handy way for dms and players to pace their 'footprint' in the campaign. I might not want/need them, but others very well could.

And you are being far too literal with the above scenario. It shows an inability to distinguish ingame and metagame reality.

 

[Olive]

Having rules for handling contacts is great, but getting them should be part of the roleplay, not just an arbitrary benefit of killing Orcs...

totally agree.

 

[jasamcarl]

There is no excuse for not playtesting.

None.


A well playtested and edited product versus one rushed out is the difference in the consumer between looking at it and saying "I've got to have this to use in my game - and make all my players buy it" versus "Too much work to be usable in my game, I'll shelve my copy and tell my players they don't need to pick it up. Matter of fact, I'll sell my copy on eBay/local store's used section to some other sucker."


It also impacts future sales, as the consumer loses faith in the company. I and my group no longer buy all but the most vital of WotC's products, and then only one of my players does so. In the past, I had several who kept current with all releases, even for settings we weren't using.

The financial solvency of my players today is about on par with what it has always been, I as the prime purchaser am one of the few who had a major drop in income (dot-com crash turned me from senior programmer to unemployed university student). So our drop in purchasing is not motivated by a drop in income.



I for one could stand to wait another year to buy a book done right. Especially given that it's all variant rules - nothing in it is 'needed' until the moment I see it and feel "I gotta use this". If it's all done as shoddily as the import of Mutants and Masterminds Damage Save appears to have been done, or as poor in balance as the Spell Points were done, then there won't be anything I can use anyway...

Both of those ideas can be done right, and they should be done right before people lay out money. Likewise for any other new or old idea in the book.

Spell Points maybe. The damage save is pretty debatable. It's not as granular as hitpoints, but I'm dubious as to how much ingame effect it will actually have. It might skew things in a minor way, but again, it might very well trade in a little balance for a lot of simplicity. Doubt I'll use it though.

And actually the spell points thing isn't even a very big deal. I never bought into the notion that spell versatility was a problem, so a spell point sorcerer in most situations would be nothing more than a wizard with slightly more points.

 

[Kichwas]

And you are being far too literal with the above scenario. It shows an inability to distinguish ingame and metagame reality.

I don't think so on either charge.

if I get the benefit as a result of leveling, I get it.

If it's a part of ingame reality, it needs to be given as a result of ingame actions.

We've long managed to rationalize getting more hitpoints and skills from killing Orcs - a far stretch in many cases - but if we are to now have inroads with the Baroness, it should come from actually meeting her. And it should be available even if we don't level as a result of meeting her.

If you want to tie the aquisition of contacts to a mechanic, tie it to diplomacy checks.

A little bit of playtesting could have addressed that issue before people put money on it.

 

[Grayhawk]

How does the level based turning checks work?

(I don't believe this has been mentioned, but if it has please point me to the page it's on, thanks...)

 

[jasamcarl]

I don't think so on either charge.

if I get the benefit as a result of leveling, I get it.

If it's a part of ingame reality, it needs to be given as a result of ingame actions.

We've long managed to rationalize getting more hitpoints and skills from killing Orcs - a far stretch in many cases - but if we are to now have inroads with the Baroness, it should come from actually meeting her. And it should be available even if we don't level as a result of meeting her.

If you want to tie the aquisition of contacts to a mechanic, tie it to diplomacy checks.

A little bit of playtesting could have addressed that issue before people put money on it.

Of course the person who gets the contact would roleplay it out with the dm. Wow, you must have a lot of problems with the Leadership feat; you know, when the cohort just poofs into existence? The point of the rule is to allow the dm to pace the effects of reputation through actions. Its nothing more than a rule of thumb, and one that is much simpler than giving extreme circumstance bonuses to diplomacy for slaying the evil archdragon. It also saves a lot of time by putting contacts in the players hands as oppossed to forcing the dm to adjudicate how many rp oriented benefits a player can get in any given circumstance through their sucessful quests. What's wrong with this?

And you think this rule, which is probably little more than sketchy advice, is the type of thing that requires playtesting? There is no 'balance' point here. Its essentially fluff rule meant to relate level and class to ingame influence. How well it would work ingame would vary wildly from group to group just like any given adventure hook in the frcs would probably be interpretted differently by different groups. Its not like combat, which is the lowest common denominator of any given dnd game.

 

[Saeviomagy]

A little bit of playtesting could have addressed that issue before people put money on it.

What issue? That you don't like that particular rule?

Do you roleplay every single encounter a character ever has, from childhood onwards? Every one?

Gah - can you imagine the yawns as bob the bard meets yet another ordinary peasant and makes life-long friends with him?

No, I doubt you do.

Giving people a level-based number of 'people you know who'll help you out' is not a terrible mechanic by a long shot. And it's not like it totally removes the necessity of diplomacy to convert people who's help you need.

It provides a way to have a campaign rely on social elements without necessarily having a group negotiator.

 

[Silveras]

What I find silly at the moment is that people are condemning the book based on assumptions fueled by brief descriptions of the content. We are reading three sentence blurbs about 13 page blocks of text, in some cases. Gee... that gives you a complete and thorough understanding of what's there. Before we start condemning it, could we at least wait for it to be released in the US ?

Regarding playtesting: The Sanity rules sound like they are from Call of Cthulhu d20. VP/WP have been in Star Wars d20 for several years. Damage Save has been in M&M for almost as long. Of course these don't sound playtested.

That the Bloodlines were used in Andy Collins' home game, or even that they came from there, is not terribly important. The book is a book of variants, some culled from the OGC of other companies. As a book of variants, the playtesting is almost guaranteed not to be as complete as core products. Certainly, I would not expect to find that all possible combinations of them have been checked and double-checked.

 

[Olive]

VP/WP have been in Star Wars d20 for several years. Damage Save has been in M&M for almost as long. Of course these don't sound playtested.

While I basically agree with you, M&M and SWd20 are pretty different to DnD in their assumptions, combat styles, etc. regardless of the basic mechanic. So just because they work well in those games doesn't mean that they'll work well in DnD.

But the whole Andy Collins rules the DnD world thing is pretty silly.

 

[Silveras]

While I basically agree with you, M&M and SWd20 are pretty different to DnD in their assumptions, combat styles, etc. regardless of the basic mechanic. So just because they work well in those games doesn't mean that they'll work well in DnD.

But the whole Andy Collins rules the DnD world thing is pretty silly.

Granted. I was less articulate than I intended (I know, not a first ). The "Of course these don't sound playtested" should have been with the next paragraph, before "As a book of variants ...".