This is an unorganized list of things and ideas I think are important to what I'm trying to do, along with sources in some cases (where I think a good idea or implementation exists).
First, let's get some rough required elements for a "D&D". This is my (initial, first, rough, undeveloped) list; yours might be different (and if it is, I'd love to hear about it).
Attributes
I don't like "Ability Scores", because I want to use "Ability" as a specific thing a character can do, or a modifier to a thing any character can do. So Attributes tell you what a character is made of. Abilities tell you what he can do.
I'm going with STR / DEX / CON / INT / WIS / CHA. I don't necessarily love them, but they're definitely not bad when interpreted in the "modern" sense, meaning WIS has picked up a lot of Perception, CHA is useful to summoners, etc.
I'm also implementing Armor Class and Hit Points. By which I mean, I'm going to call them that, and they will be used in the same way. But they will almost certainly be calculated differently. I'm saying I'm going with the D&D base set of physical combat abstractions: 1) how hard is it to incapacitate or inconvenience you, and 2) how much of it you can take. If you are reduced to 0 HP, you are not necessarily dead, but most likely will be unless someone helps.
Race
Gotta go AD&D here. I won't do it the same way, but Race-as-Class has never worked for me.
Dwarf, Elf, Gnome, Halfling, Human.
Class
Let me say up front that I don't like Classes as they have been implemented in the games I know about. There are two schools of thought: 1) Old School (pronounced "better"), which says you roll attributes and HOPE you play a class you dig. The friction between what you wanted and what you got is half the fun of the games of my childhood ("Dude, I can't wear armor?"); and 2) the Pansies, who say, "Decide what you want. During character generation you're going to get so many dice rolls and points to buy things with nothing is impossible."
1) isn't perfectly correct either; especially as a fan of mechanics, if I want to see how spell duels work, I'm making two mages. The dice are relevant, but I'm deciding the final scores. Right?
But the point is that I think Class is a requirement if I'm going to call the game a D&D, so I'm doing it, but hopefully (I have a concept) in a way that does what is needed better.
Skills
I'm not doing Skills. I understand why they can be good, and relevant, and blah blah blah. But I think the MASSIVE amount of bloat is not worth it. One of the reasons people love Moldvay so much is that it's small. 1e, too. In 2e they had the right idea--let's incorporate 10+ years of playtest data and fix some things and add what people are house-ruling--but it was the beginning of the end for many D&D fans. That's why BECMI, Moldvay, 1e, OD&D, etc. have a following, imo. They're just massively smaller, tighter games. So, my D&D will be too.
Critical Hits
I'm going to include Critical results, but in a different way, including specific effects.
Magic
I don't know yet. Systemically, this is probably my least favorite system in canonical D&D. I am inclined to go Power Words, and I need to pull Ars Magica off the shelf.
--
Within those things, here's some stuff I dig:
13th Age has some kickass mechanics for combat. The fighter's choice moves especially. I also really like the Icon idea--not gods, but people you need to know about.
Pathfinder kinda cracks me up. The discussions I see on Reddit just baffle me--it's so blatantly a contest to see who can come up with a way to theoretically do a lot of damage. That's cool, I actually like that, and hope I can satisfy Munchkin types with my ruleset. But isn't there anything else in the fifty seven million pages of books worth talking about? I like Pathfinder; it does what it sets out to do well. And I think about the top 20% or so of rules is really good stuff.
From Warhammer (I only have 1e), I like the idea of "careers", meaning a way to develop a character with transient focuses. So you can start as a Dwarf Cobbler, but work your way up realistically into a Soldier or Mercenary gig and retire middle-class, fat, and happy. Your buddy who started as a Human Noble is going places you are not. But so what? Are you telling me the Dwarf Cobbler story isn't a good one? The point is that you can move a character through phases where your development focus changes. I dig that.
From Dungeon World, some of the class moves are really great. And the idea of building a Steading by descriptors is right up my alley.
From Rolemaster, those beautiful, beautiful crit tables. If you don't want to use them, don't. But I'm telling you, when you tell the Rogue he's lost an arm at 1:45a when he has a mouthful of pizza, you'll be glad they're in there.
Wednesday, August 26, 2015
Let's Make a D&D
Partially out of frustration, partially out of curiosity, and partly because I geek like that, I'm going to write a D&D, and talk about how and why here.
Let's establish that I want to make a D&D. I'm aware that term is intellectual property that belongs to someone else, so it won't make the box cover, don't worry. What I mean is that I don't want to make a "retro-clone" or something that gets tagged #OSR. I want to make a D&D.
By which I mean, there is no other game even close in terms of identity. Nearly everyone involved in RPGs knows what D&D is "about". And most of them have a decent clue about the mechanics. So what I want to do is take that concept in their heads--what D&D "is"--and make a game that tries to do those things.
So when I say "Let's Make a D&D", what I mean is, "Let's Build a Set of Rules That Does What People Think of as D&D".
To which you're ready to respond, "Wtf? That's every fantasy game." Right. But almost all of them do what D&D does in the same way. Pathfinder (obviously), the OSR stuff (obviously), etc. The one exception I know that's gotten traction is Dungeon World.
And I think that's a good model. What DW does is take many of the D&D-specific "tropes" and make them work mechanically differently, almost always in service of creating drama and narrative momentum. That's the new part. There are classes and levels, but they're handled in more of a "feat" fashion. You still roll to-hit, and I think you even add an Ability modifier. But the results are different--they're not just "you may roll your damage dice" or not.
For what it's worth, I think Dungeon World is a great game--it generates more smiles per time unit than anything else I'm aware of. But I don't enjoy it at all. It rewards the part of RPGs I find the least interesting--the RP. So I give it a 10/10, but I also gave away my hardcopy.
The point is I think Dungeon World does what I want to do--it's a legitimately new way to do an old thing. So I want to make a Dungeon World. Except what I want to make is an anti-Dungeon World.
(Somehow I managed to omit this paragraph from the post:
And what I mean by that is I want to focus on mechanics. Types of random distributions and to what they are best applied. Class (as in C/F/M-U/T) as a way of granting more specificity to a character instead of just restricting him. Blah blah blah. Follow-up posts will be roughly organized by mechanical topic.)
Sorry and thanks for reading all that. Here's the point: I'm going to write a game that is basically going to be a "remix" rather than a "reskin". I'm going to take as many things that make D&D "what it is" as I can and try to make them work better. We have almost 40 years with this stuff. It can be done.
Let's establish that I want to make a D&D. I'm aware that term is intellectual property that belongs to someone else, so it won't make the box cover, don't worry. What I mean is that I don't want to make a "retro-clone" or something that gets tagged #OSR. I want to make a D&D.
By which I mean, there is no other game even close in terms of identity. Nearly everyone involved in RPGs knows what D&D is "about". And most of them have a decent clue about the mechanics. So what I want to do is take that concept in their heads--what D&D "is"--and make a game that tries to do those things.
So when I say "Let's Make a D&D", what I mean is, "Let's Build a Set of Rules That Does What People Think of as D&D".
To which you're ready to respond, "Wtf? That's every fantasy game." Right. But almost all of them do what D&D does in the same way. Pathfinder (obviously), the OSR stuff (obviously), etc. The one exception I know that's gotten traction is Dungeon World.
And I think that's a good model. What DW does is take many of the D&D-specific "tropes" and make them work mechanically differently, almost always in service of creating drama and narrative momentum. That's the new part. There are classes and levels, but they're handled in more of a "feat" fashion. You still roll to-hit, and I think you even add an Ability modifier. But the results are different--they're not just "you may roll your damage dice" or not.
For what it's worth, I think Dungeon World is a great game--it generates more smiles per time unit than anything else I'm aware of. But I don't enjoy it at all. It rewards the part of RPGs I find the least interesting--the RP. So I give it a 10/10, but I also gave away my hardcopy.
The point is I think Dungeon World does what I want to do--it's a legitimately new way to do an old thing. So I want to make a Dungeon World. Except what I want to make is an anti-Dungeon World.
(Somehow I managed to omit this paragraph from the post:
And what I mean by that is I want to focus on mechanics. Types of random distributions and to what they are best applied. Class (as in C/F/M-U/T) as a way of granting more specificity to a character instead of just restricting him. Blah blah blah. Follow-up posts will be roughly organized by mechanical topic.)
Sorry and thanks for reading all that. Here's the point: I'm going to write a game that is basically going to be a "remix" rather than a "reskin". I'm going to take as many things that make D&D "what it is" as I can and try to make them work better. We have almost 40 years with this stuff. It can be done.
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