catastrophic
First Post
Is there a summary of Fantasy Craft's approach to treasure up anywhere that you know of? I'd love to look over it.
What is, by consensus opinion, obviously broken?
- Thread starter Mercurius
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AdmundfortGeographer
Getting lost in fantasy maps
There's a bit of a system behind it, meaning it involves some management.
In Fantasy Craft, coin comes in two varieties: coin in hand and stake. Stake is the amount of treasure PCs have stashed away for big purchases or emergencies, coin in hand is just that and it disappears after every adventure during Downtime based on how high a character's Prudence is. During Downtime a character is assumed to be spending away their coin in hand on things like drink, food, shelter, bribes, etc. The higher the Prudence, the more thrifty a character is and so is able to take their coin in hand and move it to the character's stake.
In Fantasy Craft big prizes (titles and favors, contacts, holdings, magic items) are not bought with coin, but with Reputation points earned through adventuring. PCs must convert Reputation points to Reknown to be able to acquiretitles and prizes (the more Renown, the more prizes PCs can have) plus PCs must spend Reputation points during Downtime to keep their Prizes so without enough Reputation points spent PCs will lose prizes including magic items.
PCs must continue adventuring just to hold on to their magic items, hold on to their castle, etc. because it is through adventuring they acquire Reputation points. All magic items have a Reputation value, as do holdings and their staff have Reputation values.
Something like this wouldn't work well in a game where magic items are necessary character power-ups. Fantasy Craft PCs are powerful enough and can hold their own without magic, but magic provides nice bonuses when you get it and keep it.
The Crafty guys used this system because it gels nicely with many literary examples. Rarely did a sword and sorcery character keep many many items their whole career, often they went through and discarded items of power through their adventures.
In Fantasy Craft, coin comes in two varieties: coin in hand and stake. Stake is the amount of treasure PCs have stashed away for big purchases or emergencies, coin in hand is just that and it disappears after every adventure during Downtime based on how high a character's Prudence is. During Downtime a character is assumed to be spending away their coin in hand on things like drink, food, shelter, bribes, etc. The higher the Prudence, the more thrifty a character is and so is able to take their coin in hand and move it to the character's stake.
In Fantasy Craft big prizes (titles and favors, contacts, holdings, magic items) are not bought with coin, but with Reputation points earned through adventuring. PCs must convert Reputation points to Reknown to be able to acquiretitles and prizes (the more Renown, the more prizes PCs can have) plus PCs must spend Reputation points during Downtime to keep their Prizes so without enough Reputation points spent PCs will lose prizes including magic items.
PCs must continue adventuring just to hold on to their magic items, hold on to their castle, etc. because it is through adventuring they acquire Reputation points. All magic items have a Reputation value, as do holdings and their staff have Reputation values.
Something like this wouldn't work well in a game where magic items are necessary character power-ups. Fantasy Craft PCs are powerful enough and can hold their own without magic, but magic provides nice bonuses when you get it and keep it.
The Crafty guys used this system because it gels nicely with many literary examples. Rarely did a sword and sorcery character keep many many items their whole career, often they went through and discarded items of power through their adventures.
AdmundfortGeographer
Getting lost in fantasy maps
Eh, maybe a bit. The engine in Fantasy Craft evolved out of Spycraft 2.0.
catsclaw227
First Post
This is true. Even Fafhrd & the Grey Mouser were often bereft of their items, though they almost always bestowed their famous weapon names upon the replacement items.
AdmundfortGeographer
Getting lost in fantasy maps
Reputation gets you what I listed. If the only things you think you will ever acquire will be magical items, then Reputation is the thing you will care about accumulating.
Stake is your horde of accumulated wealth. You draw from your stake and coin in hand to buy "stuff".
- Weapons
- armor
- services (lodging, baths, consorts, legal advice, deliveries)
- poisons
- food and drink
- medical supplies and exliirs
- locks and traps
- adventuring gear
- vehicles and mounts (flying, land, water, military mounts, draft animals)
- plus any number of non-magic upgrades to items
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Not so much "broken" as "caused unintended consequences" ( IMHO):
multiattack powers are poorly balanced, IMO. Storm of Blades, for example, with its 3 attacks is heaps and bounds better than 5[W] powers in terms of damage. Twin Strike is also a big offender in this regard.
Stat inflation and primary/secondary stats mess up with multiclassing and defenses. The pc's lower defense will fall behind of approx. 3 points over the course of 30 levels. Since a PC's lower defense usually starts 3-5 points lower than his highest defenses, you can get to the point where either hitting his high defenses is challenging but not impossible and hitting his lowest defense is almost automatic, or hitting his low defense is reasonably challenging and hitting his high defenses is almost impossible.
Magic items that are required to make the math work at higher levels. While I understand that this is a big sacred cow, I'd rather they'd strip the attack bonus and let a magic weapon add, say, to threat range and damage. Same for magic armor, which could just give DR. The reason being that "magic" items stop being "magic" and just become routine. Maybe I'm just wearing the proverbial rose-colored glasses, but:
DM: "...so that sword is actually a +3 pigeon butchering bastard sword."
AD&D/BECMI: "WOW!"
3e/4e: " 'kay. Well, I'm level 12...so I'd say it's about right...".
multiattack powers are poorly balanced, IMO. Storm of Blades, for example, with its 3 attacks is heaps and bounds better than 5[W] powers in terms of damage. Twin Strike is also a big offender in this regard.
Stat inflation and primary/secondary stats mess up with multiclassing and defenses. The pc's lower defense will fall behind of approx. 3 points over the course of 30 levels. Since a PC's lower defense usually starts 3-5 points lower than his highest defenses, you can get to the point where either hitting his high defenses is challenging but not impossible and hitting his lowest defense is almost automatic, or hitting his low defense is reasonably challenging and hitting his high defenses is almost impossible.
Magic items that are required to make the math work at higher levels. While I understand that this is a big sacred cow, I'd rather they'd strip the attack bonus and let a magic weapon add, say, to threat range and damage. Same for magic armor, which could just give DR. The reason being that "magic" items stop being "magic" and just become routine. Maybe I'm just wearing the proverbial rose-colored glasses, but:
DM: "...so that sword is actually a +3 pigeon butchering bastard sword."
AD&D/BECMI: "WOW!"
3e/4e: " 'kay. Well, I'm level 12...so I'd say it's about right...".
I'd conceptually divide rituals into "minor" and "major" rituals - minor ones on par with Knock, major ones like Enchant Magic Item and Raise Dead. Major rituals would require either a skill or combat challenge - fight off ghosts in the shadowfell to recover the soul of your dead ally, subdue and bind an elemental to your sword, etc.
Give every class at-wills that work as basic attacks, and it solves the Melee Training problem for those that have it. The Seeker suggests that they're experimenting in this direction, with its encounter basic attacks.
I fully expect that multiattack powers will be reworked in 5e, likely along the lines of some of the assassin powers.
+N weapons are iconic to D&D and will likely stick around in some form, but I suspect a likely fix is to make them apply to damage only, with magic armor offering resistance.
Utility powers and feats are likely to need further siloing, and may end up being integrated somehow in 5e.
Interrupts, opportunity actions, and non-action triggered effects could use some cleanup and streamlining. All triggered effects should specify whether they apply before or after the triggering condition.
The game needs more rigor in its terminology, with terms like "attack" being very clearly defined.
Saving throws were a good idea, but it's become evident that they could use reworking.
Agreed that it's about time Resources and Loot became siloed.
Give every class at-wills that work as basic attacks, and it solves the Melee Training problem for those that have it. The Seeker suggests that they're experimenting in this direction, with its encounter basic attacks.
I fully expect that multiattack powers will be reworked in 5e, likely along the lines of some of the assassin powers.
+N weapons are iconic to D&D and will likely stick around in some form, but I suspect a likely fix is to make them apply to damage only, with magic armor offering resistance.
Utility powers and feats are likely to need further siloing, and may end up being integrated somehow in 5e.
Interrupts, opportunity actions, and non-action triggered effects could use some cleanup and streamlining. All triggered effects should specify whether they apply before or after the triggering condition.
The game needs more rigor in its terminology, with terms like "attack" being very clearly defined.
Saving throws were a good idea, but it's become evident that they could use reworking.
Agreed that it's about time Resources and Loot became siloed.
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