When is it too much?

[Janx]

Given that my campaign world is a sea-going 16th century feel to it, I was in the same boat. My strategy from the beginning was to design only what I needed, as I needed it.

I made a world map (using a fractal generator)
Named all the main races and their homeland (5-6 races, easy)
I restricted the PCs to just human and specific classes (the humans are just discovering the world)

My class restrictions was to remove Ranger, Druid and Sorceror (humans had a specific magic angle).

I made up the name of one "human" god and said he was "good"

Then we started playing. I didn't even have ship stats until the third game, when I watched Master and Commander and got inspired. A new ship design spreadsheet arose, and we're set again.

I changed nothing in the classes or races, merely culled what I didn't want to deal with.

When we added a Cleric in the fourth adventure, I had to decide on what Domains to give him. Law and Protection. Done.

My most recent add-ons were a fluff piece for the Monk's dojo (being a martial artist, I had plenty of flavor text) and a fluff piece for the religion so the Cleric has a sense of feel for his chosen deity. Both documents were about 3 pages long.

And that is that. The paladin with a 6 Dexterity wears heavy armor (so he doesn't get hurt). Noone else does, because drowning sucks (the Paladin has lost one set of plate due to rapid stripping while sinking). The elves have cannons. The humans don't. War is hell.

Janx

 

[S'mon]

Oh BTW I have GAZ9 The Minrothad Guilds, which you should find inspirational for naval adventuring - I'll bring it this evening.

 

[diaglo]

Oh BTW I have GAZ9 The Minrothad Guilds, which you should find inspirational for naval adventuring - I'll bring it this evening.

you can never go wrong using some of the older material

 

[nopantsyet]

Lots of good replies--I would add one thought. It's too much when your players are burdened by new rules. I really like S'mon's advice to try to work within the existing rules as much as you can, then tweak from there. I've done that with great success.

Consider changing/limiting available armor and weapons--restrict it to light armor and light or medium weapons. Make flavorful weapons like trident + net martial instead of exotic, maybe introduce some other weapons.

Emphasizing the role of skills can go a long way to help define and differentiate same-class PCs. One tweak that's worked well for my group is a skill swap. Each PC is allowed to swap two class skills for two cross-class skills. I started that in an all-barbarian campaign, and it worked so well we've made it a house rule.

If you force all players to be rogues, consider allowing them limited multiclassing opportunities into other classes, modified appropriately. Don't change the mechanics of core classes, just tune them to the flavor of your campiagn. Mixing rogue and fighter levels can make a great swashbuckler --martial feats can help define a unique fighting style. Focus the ranger options to make it a nautical class. Try to envision the various classes in your setting and tweak them to fit.

But to reiterate what's been said before: Keep it simple. Tweak for flavor and focus, but keep the mechanics your players know and love. Each group has a different threshold, but if it's fun and easy for you and your players, it's not too much.

 

[S'mon]

Re feats shortage for Rogues - if this seems a problem one could give them bonus feats as fighters, or even just give them a feat/level instead of 1/3 & 1/2. This would work best for PCs starting at 1st level, with most NPCs being low-level too. A less radical option that wouldn't cause GM headaches would be just to give them a bonus feat at 1st level, like Midnight does for some races, so human Rogues would get 2 bonus feats, giving 3 total - enough to play around with.

 

[randomling]

Bonus feats might work, yeah - and if near-everyone's a rogue I don't necessarily have to worry about the power-level hike. There will also be some character background/profession things that will determine your starting cash, give you a handful of free skill ranks and in some cases an extra feat.

Cutlass: yeah, I'll add the cutlass (longsword, not scimitar stats, you think?) and the rest can pretty much be feats. Not sure about trident and net being martial, they're not very, um, swashbuckly.

Cool cool!

 

[S'mon]

Quint Rogue's pirate archetype - looks good, some of the other archetypes & prestige classes could be used too. In general they're a bit weak, I've pencilled in some changes just now that I'll use for my Borderlands campaign.

Pirate archetype:
+2 competency Balance, +2 to all attacks when on a ship (!), +2 comp Kno (seamanship), Kno (ocean lore) as class skill, proficient cutlass (longsword)
& lose some wpn proficiencies & all armour profs

 

[randomling]

+2 to attack when on ships? Yikes, that's a bit too good!

+1 IMC, I think.

 

[Celtavian]

re

We play with quite a few house rules. It took along time to work them all in. It can be difficult to work in several rule changes at once because it destroys the familiarity of the game (I believe Monte Cook mentioned something about this when 3.5 came out). If the DM is the only person familiar with the game, the players find it more difficult to get into character because they are trying to remember all the rules changes rather than just playing. This can lead to boredom.

I would suggest integrating rules changes slowly giving players time to grasp the changes while testing how effective the changes are at improving game play. That should be your primary objective when making rules changes: improving gameplay from some standpoint whether it be balance, verisimilitude, ease of use, etc. If a change is so complex that it hurts gameplay while offering very little advantage over the current rule, you shouldn't waste time continuing to use it.

It takes alot of work to build a world and alter the game. It is a slow process that takes alot of time and effort on the part of the DM. You should definitely focus on your current needs rather than detailing everything out beore you start. Definitely, definitely work on the material that you will be using immediately before you work on material that you may use down the line.

World building is hard work, but very gratifying. I find most of the changes we have made to the core rules improve some aspect of our gameplay without bogging it down.