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Message: <blockquote data-quote="doctorbadwolf" data-source="post: 8884997" data-attributes="member: 6704184">I’d like to poke at alt dice mechanics, but I’m open to sticking with 1d20+mod against a DC. So, my own game uses 1d12+Xd6 dice pool, and all checks are skill checks where the X above is the number of applicable skill ranks (plus or minus any advantages or disadvantages). The system uses numerical mods very sparingly, and resolution has a 5-step success ladder (total fail, mitigated fail, partial success, total success, critical success), so it feels pretty different from 5e before you even get into different models for PC options, differing focus, and different style of advancement. So I don’t think I’d use that as the base chassis, necessarily. I also like a 3d6, roll under attribute value + skill bonus. Give attribute numbers that make 3d6 have a good success rate, and circumstance bonuses and penalties go from 1-3, and force or allow rerolls of extreme results. Ie, with a +1 bonus, you reroll 6s. With a -1 penalty, you reroll 1s. (Because you want lower rolls)That probably feels pretty different (esp with roll under), too, but I think it preserves 5e’s vibe of knowing fairly well what a roll will result in before you look at any modifiers.I want to stick with class based, but I’m open to a different model that still makes characters that feel similar, and accomplishes the class building goals in the OP. I figure different classes, with similar but different concepts, like priest instead of cleric, knight, archer, and swashbuckler instead of fighter, Jack or thief and assassin instead of rogue, etc. I’d want to use a different mindset to determine what classes the game has. Like what you do, so a heavy beefy warrior that goes hulk smash is a Warrior, an armored defender/tactical-type is a knight, and a light and fast small weapons user might be a Swashbuckler. Ranged weapons expert is an archer. Magic, I think is the hardest part. Making a whole spell list that remains 5e-like but isn’t “D&D spells” is a sticky wicket. And a lot of work. My current idea is to delineate a specific number of cosmological areas (planes, moons, planets, “worlds”, whatever), with corresponding types of magic, and esoteric ideas that can be leveraged by priests, mages, esoteric scholars, etc, giving common threads that are easily understood and referenced to provide part of the “weird” and “wondrous” in the game. For example: 13 types of magic, called Houses, and corresponding to elements of the cosmology themed on a similar paradigm to the zodiac. Each House describes a type of magic, a constellation and the section of the star field it “rules”, and a part of the cosmology (realms or worlds or whatever). So, The constellation Ferruset rules over the 3rd House, and is the House of Iron, which relates to heavy metals, magnetism, the metallurgy, and governs magic that involves moving objects around affecting the properties of heavy elements. Magic without a long spell list. Rather than making every magical thing you can do into a distinct singular power, each magic type has 1-3 basic signs or glyphs that cost nothing to use so long as you have learned them. (Essentially cantrips) You can combine glyphs to create a spell, and you can empower glyphs (including as part of a spell) by spending focus or energy or whatever. Spells can get complex enough that they take multiple actions or rounds or longer, and the really wild stuff might take an hour to cast and a good chunk of your daily energy to power.</blockquote>

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