Would you buy "d20 Future"

[Ron]

With Sci-Fi, you can't divorce the setting from the system, so there's no point in trying.

And as for armor in Star Wars. Why would anyone want to wear armor that (as far as the movies go) attracts fire and never once blocks a hit?

I'd be far more satisfied with they used this mechanic in the game. It would closely follow the movies and it would not fool anyone about where this rule would stand in terms of realism.

 

[Moon_Goddess]

So I believe you agree with me. I don't see any reason to have a rule saying that you cannot use armour in streets. But I would advise the GM to consider people wearing armour to be interpreted as a menace and, thus, calling the attention of the police force. This is all restriction you need about wearing armour.

Are you seriously suggesting balancing an advantage with "people will be afraid of you?" The good roleplayers (who really don't need balance considerations) won't ever use armor. While the munchkins (who do) will simply not care what anyone thinks.

 

[denzoner]

now I'm confused...

I was thinking that D20 Modern was going to be the Core Rules for all types of Modern adventures.

The first Supplement for D20 Modern was going to be Shadow Chasers Campaign Setting (WotC's take on the World of Darkness). Then there was going to be the Gamma World Campaign Setting (post holocaust, i might have made this up). Then I was hoping that WotC was going to re-visit all the other TSR trademarks with more Campaign settings, such as BootHill and Top Secret (SI), and maybe even Star Frontiers.

This is how I'd like WotC to handle the D20 Modern Supplements and Campaign settings. It'll keep the books cheaper and they'll come out faster. (They wouldn't have to keep rewriting classes,races & combat rules over and over)

Also, since it's been reported that D20 Modern will be Open Source, we'll see other Classic companies come out with their own Campaign Settings, like (hopefully) Dreampod will release Cyberpunk Campaign Setting for D20 Modern, West End Games will release Paranoia Campaign Setting for D20 Modern, etc. We can only hope.

Of course Star Wars and CoC will always be exceptions because of their trademarks and marketability.

D20 is the Current State of RPGs, we need to look at it like a car's gasoline engine, innovation is fine but the tried & tested Internal Combustion engine works so well, why bother changing it. It allows for more time for developers to come up with the important stuff like cool stereo systems, hi-tech interiors, comfy-chairs and safety devices. In the case of RPGs, the writers have more time to come up with better adventures and settings and allows the GM's more time to develop their campaigns instead of learning a completely new RPG system just to change time periods or genres.

and I'm not opposed tweaking and customizing! Back to the car analogy, tweaking and custom jobs make it Fun and Personal.

Who knows what future our beloved RPGs will have. I doubt we'll be seeing D&D Campaign Setting for Advanced G.U.R.P.S. (or some other New Trendy RPG System) but you never know! (and SJ is a genius)

...

 

[Ian O'Rourke]

It appears that defense was introduced as a way to incentive characters not to use armour. The problem is that wearing armour is very useful in combat, in all eras. The real issue with armour is that you cannot use it all the time: it restricts your movement, it's uncomfortable and would probably wears out the users (perhaps subdual damage could be given after long use), and finally, using armour is menacing and could be social unacceptable in many regions (as in CoC d20).

My greatest fear is that the genius at WotC will think of introducing these concepts in the next revision of D&D.

Wearing armour is useful to characters in all eras - but not all in all genres. You seem to be under the mistaking beliefe that reality even applies in some games. Star Wars is a setting/genre which repeatedly shows that armour has zero effect at all. Only the bad guys wear it in the most part, and the heroes of the story rarely do. In fact, at most armour is an excuse to look cool and hang good weapons off (such as in the case of Boba Fett). Realistic no. In genre? Yes.

As for the VP/WP issue - it has nothing to do with making armour unfashionable - but it has everything to do with making the game play a certain way. Note in the below explanations I'm not saying either is better, they are just different.

In a pure HP system characters have the resource HP, and this is quantifiable resource, your character is pretty much alive until he runs out. As a result he can make decisions based on how much HP he has left.

This is not the case with VP/WP, as even if a low-threat Battledriod happens to get a critical his blaster damage goes straight to WP and will cause serious harm. As a result, this tends to enforce a certain style of play, which suited to Star Wars. When the characters outnumbers by enemies that are individually not a threat (they shoot stormtroopers down like skittles) they still run - because one could get lucky. In a pure HP system - they rarely get that lucky as they have to deplete HP.

I doubt they will ever turn D&D into a VP/WP system because HP works for that system - it's all about choice to gain a certain effect. In D&D you regularly go up against creatures that can cause masses of damage - as a result single pool of depleting HP works. How would D&D change if the large damaging attack of a dragon went to a persons WP of 14 when it got a critical? Charactrer mortality would significantly increase.

In Star Wars the major enemies use blasters and as such the range of damage applied to your character pretty much always falls within a certain range.

Another reason for VP is it works well in lightsaber duels, very little else can represent the cut and thrust of the fight withought having rediculous situations like a character taking too many lightsaber hits. As a result the VP loss could be a parry, or a last minute dodge.

Can the same be done with HP? Probably, but I must admit I view all HP damage as real damage, but not all damage is equal. 40 points to the 10th level fighter is graze to a 10th level Mage its a serious wound, etc.

While in a VP/WP system only WP is real damage, the rest is grazes, blocks. dodges, whatever.

Anyway, the choices are a tool to enforce genre, it's nothing to do with realism.

 

[Heap Thaumaturgist]

I'll probably make this a full thread...

I'd buy a D20 Future if it were alot like Alternity. I LOVED the idea of Alternity, a generic "modern to future" sort of game system that you could scale anywhere from modern to far future and between.

Unfortunately the actual mechanics of Alternity left something to be desired in application and structure.

About all I liked from it was TSR incorporating damage-absorbing armor.

I'll kiss the man that provides me a modern-to-future game set for D20 using damage-absorbing armor and a scalable damage/health system that I can keep gritty and dirty.

Some people like the Star Wars feeling of bebopping around without armor blasting hordes of mosquito baddies, but a couple of us have dark dirty futurescapes they'd like to run with the relative simplicity and familiarity of D20.

And I'd pay for it, too. Give me a hardbound with black and white artwork. Hell, give me a soft-bound. Just give me it in a nice bound volume I can hand to my players and say: "This is what you need to learn."

--HT