What other fantasy games are out there?

[jian]

It’s not just the die roll but the all-or-nothing element. Fundamentally, I think 5e went about reducing mod bloat entirely the wrong way. If I really wanted to run it, I'd probably see if SotDL boons/banes would port over without breaking anything.

I’m personally a big fan of Advantage/Disadvantage but I’d really rather 5E picked one mechanism and stuck with it - for instance the added or subtracted dice of Bless/Bane or Bardic Inspiration.

(I can totally see why you’d do that - it allows granularity for increasing the size of the Inspiration die and also the bard doesn’t get to sing “stab, stab the ogre in the kidneys” to help the rogue backstab people - but I’d probably still prefer one mechanism.)

If you like you could just say Advantage/Disadvantage is +/- d6 to keep it in line with everything else, or maybe scale Advantage/Disadvantage dice with level like the proficiency bonus (d4 at 1st to 4th level, d6 at 5th to 8th level, d8 at 9th to 12th, etc.).

 

[Thomas Shey]

I’m personally a big fan of Advantage/Disadvantage but I’d really rather 5E picked one mechanism and stuck with it - for instance the added or subtracted dice of Bless/Bane or Bardic Inspiration.

The problem was they bought themselves trouble from the start; its a system that encourages trying to find Advantage somewhere every time you can, and then not bothering anything beneficial again (and avoiding Disadvantage when you can, but then again not caring about any other problem once you do). The fact the two cancel out and then can't have anything further done, meant they were inevitably going to invent modifiers-that-aren't-Advantage-or-Disadvantage in some places just so they'd reliably matter. This is an issue bigger in my view, that the D20 itself (though I'm not a giant fan of that either).

(I can totally see why you’d do that - it allows granularity for increasing the size of the Inspiration die and also the bard doesn’t get to sing “stab, stab the ogre in the kidneys” to help the rogue backstab people - but I’d probably still prefer one mechanism.)

If you like you could just say Advantage/Disadvantage is +/- d6 to keep it in line with everything else, or maybe scale Advantage/Disadvantage dice with level like the proficiency bonus (d4 at 1st to 4th level, d6 at 5th to 8th level, d8 at 9th to 12th, etc.).

Like I said, that doesn't actually address the biggest problems I have. Boon/bane has the advantage that it doesn't, per se, stack, but its also not pointless to have two or three things that benefit you.

 

[aramis erak]

Having now read Pugmire (which is great, just a really well streamlined version of 5E, I’d definitely consider running it) and the Great Cat Conspiracy (the adventure), I’d say:

Spoiler

It definitely could be interpreted as a reference to slavery and the Underground Railroad, though the main piece of evidence there is that the resistance leader is named Harriet. But I’d actually mostly say not - the slaves in question are prisoners of war (cats) and poor people (dogs who went to the Dobermans for charity and were forced to work in the mines), and the main plot is about restarting a recent war by setting up a false flag murder (of the PCs). So I’d take it as references to lots of historical events mostly related to cruelty, capitalism, and exploitation of all kinds, certainly including US chattel slavery but also the Gilded Age, especially regarding exploitation of poor workers and manifest destiny warmongering.

Look at the one in Monarchies

Spoiler

Where there's much clearer racism. Focused upon rats and mice.