What game mechanics do you like?

[mmadsen]

Who is "Vance"?

Who is Vance? Jack Vance, author of the Dying Earth novels (available from Amazon). Gygax based the infamous "fire and forget" spell system on the magic presented in the first Dying Earth novel.

 

[The Sigil]

In reference to Vance, Vance put a lot of character into his spells that I think gets passed by in standard D&D, because many of the spells seem like all-too-bog-standard in nature (fireball, Invisibility, haste, anyone?) I think the character of the D&D spellcaster becomes all the more compelling when you look to the less immediately used spells in the core books, or some of the better magic sourcebooks like Book of Eldritch Might, Relics & Rituals, Wild Spellcraft, and some of the EA books (I just go Enchantment and I like it...) More unique spells can quickly become a singature of spellcasting characters.

I had an interesting thought - suppose you tried a campaign where the "Spell List" came from BoEM, R&R, S&S, S&M (Spells & Magic, that is), and so forth - but no spells from the PHB are allowed! That would "break the mold" rather quickly.

On a more mundane note, I have always had my PC wizards use spells with different "visuals" but the same mechanical effects. One PC's Magic Missiles looked like arrows (old school Basic D&D stuff) - he clapped his hands together and then pulled them apart, creating one, two, three, four missiles, then flung his hands forward and the "arrows" launched to their target. A necromancer held up a skull that projected little "force skulls" from the mouth of the skull - these flew to their target and bit them. A "hedge wizard" who grew up on a farm had missiles that looked like little rams' heads (i.e., ring of the ram) that rammed their targets. In every case it was a magic missile spell - 1d4+1 points of force damage per missile, one missile every other level - the effects just looked different. All you need is a moment or two to "dress up" each spell and I have found you return a lot of individuality to the wizard.

Fireballs? Some fireballs "pop" - some "whoosh" - some are red, some are green. Some have "lines" wink out in all directions (the x-y-z axis) before exploading. Some burst in a "ball" - others burst in a "shell" - a wave of fire that washes over the battlefield, but is hollow. Some thunder. Some are silent. All do 1d6 points of fire damage per caster level to a 20' radius spread.

Some shield spells look like real moving shields. Some seem to warp and distort the air at the point of attack. Some bathe the caster in a glow on one side of his body. Some seem to be invisible, working like a wall of force. All are shield spells.

Am I giving you ideas?

--The Sigil

 

[Zaruthustran]

Good stuff. I do the same thing with weapons. One person's long sword is a Norman sword, one is a machete. They're both slashing weapons that deal 1d8 19-20x2.

Also for armor. One person's "Hide" armor is cow leather, another's is a turtle shell scale mail.

Want to have a rigid weapon with reach that can still threaten adjacent squares? You could get a goofy-looking "Duom" from Sword and Fist. Or, you could just say that your character chokes up on his long spear. Or switches grip and uses the spiked butt of the spear. Or spreads his grip and bashes with the haft. Whatever. Use the stats for "Duom".

As long as the game mechanics are the same, let your imagination go nuts.

-z

 

[Conaill]

Re: Re: What game mechanics do you like?

XP awards from GURPS, Shadowrun and storyteller all felt better than a set amount based on toughness of opponent you overcome.

Hear, hear! That's the main reason D&D has a reputation as a "hack&slash" game system in non-D&D circles!

 

[Wil]

From 3e, I really liked the "take 10", zero-average bonuses for attributes, and the idea (if not the implementation) behind attacks of opportunity.

My all-time favorite game system is Silhouette. It uses a fairly simply dice pool mechanic (roll xd6, take the highest result, add modifiers and compare against the skill difficulty or an opposed roll) and zero-average attributes (they range from -5 to +5, with 0 being the average). Fortunately, d20 already uses this very same mechanic - in reality, the bonuses are more important than the actual number of the attribute. Silhouette uses multiplied damage - the better you hit, the more damage you do. Frex, if a longsword does x16 with its base damage, your skill and your strength and you succeed over your opponent's defense roll by three, you're going to do (3x16)=48 damage. Wounding is handled by penalties to every action - if the damage dealt exceeds a wound threshold, you take that level of wound with the accompanying penalty. When your penalties get so high, you start to die from shock. The damage/wounding system would be implementable in d20, but would fundamentally change the feel of the system. Silhouette features the ability for an urchin with a steak knife *could* kill an armored, experienced warrior with a good roll - a lot of systems have this feature, but oftentimes it is entirely too random, and the die pool mechanic helps flatten that randomness out.

 

[Desdichado]

Geez, I missed it! The merits of various magic systems are one of my favorite topics on the boards!

 

[RangerWickett]

Thanks to the Forgotten Realms' Magic of Faerun book, I wasn't able to do the nifty spell altering stuff you guys mentioned. I was playing a flashy gnome sorcerer who liked to show off his stuff, but the DM didn't let me change anything unless I took the feat. He was also a woodcarver, so I wanted to go with sort of a carpentry-themed spell-list (don't laugh), so my magic missiles were going to be blasts of flechete-like woodshavings, I picked battering ram (a Magic of Faerun spell) so I could hurl a carved log at someone, and a few others. He was even reticent to let me have a dachsund as a familiar, even after I agreed to use Cat stats for it, and not take any sort of familiar bonus.

Sadly, it was the Temple of Elemental Evil anyway, and I got struck permanently blind in the second session, so E.J. and his dachsund Puckers never got to be the heroes they wanted to be.

 

[mmadsen]

One thing that earlier editions occasionally did was replace the d20 die with other dice for resolution of certain tasks; I do believe that 3E could benefit from using this technique. For example, if both opponents rolled 2d4 during an arm-wrestle and added their strength bonuses, it would better simulate how the greater strength wins - at times the random/noise component of the d20 is too great, and should be modified.

An elegant solution is to require multiple sub-contest wins to win the greater contest, e.g. an arm wrestling match would go to character who first won two or three opposed checks, or won two or three more opposed checks than his opponent.

 

[Wil]

An elegant solution is to require multiple sub-contest wins to win the greater contest, e.g. an arm wrestling match would go to character who first won two or three opposed checks, or won two or three more opposed checks than his opponent.

This is one of the reasons that I like die-pool systems. You can set it so that a number of successes (or, in a roll and keep the highest system like Silhouette, adjust the threshold) are required in order for a character to win.

 

[bloodymage]

Actually, it was. The surprise roll was just replaced by the Spot/Listen Roll. Instead of saying, "Roll for surprise." , you would say,"Roll a Spot (or Listen) check." Pretty well detailed in the PHB, and expanded upon in the DMG.

Given that 1E/2E Rangers, and 1E monks and barbarians, were very hard to surprise, it makes sense that these classes, plus the skill-master Rogue, are the only classes to have Spot as a class skill.

A lack of surprise is not a failing of the system, but rather a failing of the DM for not understanding the uses of the various skills.

You miss the point. It is not a failing of understanding. The Spot/Listen/Hide checks are a poor substitute for the drama and anticipation generated by surprise rolls. And besides, most of those checks are now made by the DM.