Book of Shadows: The Shadow Dancer

This is the first archetype I decided to do for the upcoming Book of Shadows-Shadow Themed Archetypes series. The original shadow themed class, now a roguish archetype, Shadowdancer.




Tell me what you think down in the comments below!

In other news, the summer blogging schedule will be Mondays and Thursdays as I am spending the other days of the week working as fast as I can to get a playtest packet out for you guys to try Chronicle and Tale.

Til Thursday, happy shadowdancing, Arcanists!

RPG Weapons- Up Your Arsenal

I cannot stress how sick I am of watching varying online communities bicker and argue over what is possible with what weapons in whatever RPG, and what was "historically accurate". Most of it boils down to common sense. Either way, as a fencer and martial artist, these squabbles are extremely irritating. Today, on this extra rant-fueled article in the Mage College, we will look at the historically inaccurate "argument", we'll analyze the design space of weapons, and I will offer my ultimate opinion on weaponry.

People Tend to be, Historically, Inaccurate

If you have ever used the term "historically accurate", when talking about weapons in D&D, Pathfinder, 7th Sea, Cypher System, etc. but have never practiced a martial art, learned stage combat, or researched weaponry, and instead are quoting some movie, or something you heard from some friend who knows equally little as you, I want you to go to the other room, and cast stinking cloud centered on yourself. This is your punishment.

I saw someone on a forum based in an extremely toxic community say, "historically speaking dual-wielded weapons weren't identical weapons in each hand." I chimed in that he was wrong. He quoted the rapier and dagger, and said that was generally it. Well, the hole in his argument was that he only accounted for a couple of centuries only in Europe. The Japanese sai, kama, and tonfa, the African eskrima, Chinese warfan, butterfly swords, the use of Krabi in the Thai style of Krabi Krabong. Half of this you can find on the Wikipedia article called "Dual Wield." 

Calling anything in tabletop RPGs "historically inaccurate" indicates that you have chosen to scrutinize aspects you don't like, and blatantly ignore the aspects of the game that are still historically inaccurate. How about the fact that just anybody can throw a dagger 30 feet and cause damage to an enemy in D&D 5e? Have you thrown a dagger before? Throwing knives, the balanced, thrown version require hours of practice and you're telling me that any old wizard can throw one and expect to hit reliably someone at least half of the time? You might be asking if I have tried throwing throwing knives before. The answer is, "YES! Every summer, for 10 years, because I grew up at Renaissance Festivals! That is a thing you get to practice!"I digress, interestingly it is easier to throw axes than knives. Given the shape of the axe (especially axes made for throwing) the head of the axe aids in the rotation, and occupies a a much wide space in the weapon than the point of a dagger. 

Another example of a historically inaccuracy that everyone seems to neglect, is that if armor have strength requirements, why don't weapons? My friends and I have dabbled in a number of sword styles, and regardless of the weapon you are using, your arms will tire quickly depending on the pace you are fighting at. Heavier weapons are, you guessed it, heavy! Great swords are monstrous pieces of steel. I tend to think of the German zweihander when we are talking about "great swords". We're talking a sword that could be as long as 5' 9" (180 cm). These monstrous weapons weighed between 4.4 and 7.1 pounds (2-3.2 kg). You're telling me that your character is so strong that he is swinging this monstrous piece all day without suffering any strain or exhaustion? According to D&D, a dwarf can reasonably use this weapon without issue when he is effectively shorter than the weapon. That's not to say that people who are of shorter stature can't use a weapon such as a claymore or zweihander, but the technique would have to be very different if the weapon is larger than the wielder. Of course, this is overlooked, because a great sword does a 2d6 damage. If the damage is good, how can we complain?

On the other end of the spectrum, shorter weapons, such as knives, axes, and shortswords have really no draw back except for using a smaller dice. Everyone should know that is perfectly historically accurate. If you did not read that last line in a sarcastic tone, go back and try again. Shorter weapons are generally much harder to wield against someone who is using a weapon that has sufficient length. In roleplaying games, this disparity is frequently overlooked. Smaller weapons tend have smaller damage dice in games, it's generally hard to kill anything in a roleplaying game with just a knife. Now, compare that to how many deaths have occurred throughout human history because of knives. Do I need to bother saying that it is "historically inaccurate"?

I mentioned the rapier and dagger combo earlier, but has anyone else noticed that most roleplaying games have no idea what a rapier is? Cypher system has it categorized as a light weapon and only deals 2 points of damage. D&D 5e upgraded its damage dice from 3.5's 1d6 to 1d8, but no longer has an increased critical hit chance, and weighs a pound less than the scimitar, but it is not a light weapon. For those of you not sure what a rapier is, watch the BBC's Musketeers, or Princess Bride. The swords that 90% of your protagonists wield are rapiers. They aren't terribly weighty, they are just long. They are specialized to be a thrusting weapon, and were often accompanied in duels with a dagger, or cloak. So, of course, they shouldn't be easy to use with anything in your offhand! That would be historically accurate if they could just be wielded all willy-nilly with some form of accompanying weapon!

If it isn't obvious. the take-away here is that there is a lot overlooked in these tabletop games. The more is overlooked the more inaccurate something is going to seem in a game. The reason being is that a games mechanics are abstracted representations of a real or quasi-real concept. (Can I get an "Ooo" for the use of fancy language?)

That's Not a Knife! This is a Knife!

No...that's actually a d4, you're holding. It hurts if you step on a d4, but that's not a knife. It just represents a knife. How do we know it's not club? Because we can add our dex bonus, or attack creatures at a range of 30 imaginary feet and it counts as a light weapon,.Well, it could be a light hammer... wait, no, you can only add strength to your damage if its a light hammer. Despite these nuances, you still have a d4 in your hand. The nuances are the representations that differentiate one weapon from another. Without them, the obvious choice would be to take the best option, as far as the dice are concerned, and leave it at that. Just as the abstraction of the weapons makes the game easier to manage, regulating potential damage is also necessary. If everyone does the same amount of damage all the time, it is pretty much a question of who hits most, than offers no variety and isn't very fun. If weapons are different, the system is more interesting, but you can't make weapons clearly better than another. Just like in real life, weapons are situational. In a cramped hallway, wielding a longsword is not as easy as wielding a shortsword in the same environment. RPGs do not include rules that reflect this. It is expected, or at least hoped, that the GM will take this into consideration. However, we rarely see this, in part to poor game mastering decisions, but to explicitly include this in all the rules would be very weighty. Looking back at how 3.5 and Pathfinder handled weapons seems like a lot compared to 5e or more narrative focused games like Cypher System or 7th Sea. The major concern in games like D&D and Pathfinder is that the system must remain (mostly) unabused. It is definitely easier to stab with a knife than to swing a great sword, but if the rules reflected it, knives get to attack more. Then you have to consider reach to balance that out, then eventually your comfortable blanket of abstraction is lost. To include these details will not only strain your abstraction but your system entirely. 

Using a Weapon

In my games, whatever the system, despite my knowledge of weaponry, I accept these games for what they are, fantasies based on reality. So what if someone wants to use a rapier and dagger but they haven't got the dual wielder feat? Might you assume for this one combination that the character is trained to do so? If someone is a master knife thrower, so be it! These characters are supposed to be heroic characters. These are characters who are some of the best of their own worlds. Unless it is something absolutely game breaking (Looking at you 3.5 Monkey Grip feat), what is the harm in it? If some aspect of a weapons description harms or helps a character in a situation (such as wielding a knife in a grapple versus a spear) consider that!

I know in Chronicle & Tale weapons will have properties that represent the real world components, but there will always be room for the fantastic as well. I suppose you'll have to wait for the first playtest packet. 

Homebrew Reward Promotion: College of Medicine

Today's Hombrew Reward goes out to Inaq a.k.a. @Radibaghdadi. I was asked to create a healing Bard, and hopefully I succeeded. Thus I present to you the Bard College: The College of Medicine. Now all of you can finally impress your family and friends by telling people you're a doctor and it will only partially be a lie!




Throughout this week, the Mage College makes up for lost time as we continue our look into death in rpgs, binary/pass fail, and Gestalt as a concept.

Don't think I've forgotten about the Summoner, as time goes on I will take steps to further its production. Also, if opportunity presents itself, I may be able to do a playtest report for Chronicle & Tale in the coming months.

Til then, do no harm, Arcanists!

Back with an Announcement!

Class is back in session here at the Mage College, as summer opens up, so do the possibilities for creativity. My finals are in, and unless something really unforeseen happens, I have my Bachelor's Degree! Though that isn't the announcement I'd like to make:

I, with the playtesting, brainstorming help of some friends, am creating my own tabletop RPG. What you can look forward to:

• High fantasy RPG gaming, based in narrative, supported by rules and mechanics
• Fast character creation with lots of options, semi-classless system. Make the character you want by combining 4 themes of your choice from a huge list into every character. 
• Only 4 ability scores, balanced so that their is not one over powered skill (looking at you, Dexterity)
• Players always feel like they have options in and out of combat. 
• Combat is dynamic and dangerous.
• Mercurial magic, slotless casting, and spell crafting are standard parts of the system. 

I hope to have a print and play copy ready by the end of Q3 this year.

Working title is Chronicle & Tale, or CAT if you will. First campaign setting to follow after will be Chronicle & Tale: Tylvein.

Promotion Reward Archetype: Circle of the Mist

This archetype was created for the awesome Maxine Baughman. She's a multi-talented multimedia presence who has been an awesome help welcoming me to the Twitterverse and has already helped a bunch by sharing and supporting the blog! Definitely check out Maxine's twitter: @Maxine_Baughman. Follow her, retweet, etc.

Without any further ado, by request I present the trickster-esque Druid Circle: Circle of the Mist!

 

Ranger Conclave: Crimson Seeker

Today's homebrew is the result of a poll I posted on twitter. Thank you to the voters in the Twitterverse. You voted, and I delivered. Here's rehash of 4e's Crimson Hunter, remade into a Ranger Conclave.

Feedback is always very welcome. For those of you on twitter, there will be more polls to come for what you want to see. If anyone has any requests of what you want to see in the future let me know in the comments, in an email, or on Twitter.

But for now, happy hunting!

The Archmage’s Alternate Rules: Part 1

The Archmage’s Alternate Rules: Part 1

One of the most fun aspects of any tabletop roleplaying game is being able to tinker with the rules and create an experience that you and the rest of your group is interested in having. Over my course of GMing in Dungeons & Dragons there have been several rules we have expanded on and revised over time for the sake of our game. Some of these you may have seen me mention or explain before, but I wanted to give an idea of all rules currently used or considered for any 5e game that I run.

“Spider-Sense Initiative” or Awareness Initiative

A lot of us are familiar with Spiderman. If Spiderman was a D&D character, his initiative would be ridiculously high, but any of us who know anything about Spiderman know that it is arguable as to whether his initiative is based on his Dexterity, i.e. his superhuman reflexes, or his famous and extra-quotable “Spider-Senses”. Essentially, Spiderman’s reaction time are always augmented by this 6^th sense that gives him omnidirectional awareness of the world around him. We could argue one of three things, Spiderman has a super high Dexterity, he has the Alert feat, he combines his Dex & Wisdom on his initiative rolls, OR he can use his Wisdom modifier on his initiative checks… plus having Alert.

In many turn based video games, there is often a speed factor in combat. Pokemon is a prime example. I have Pikachu, have Blastoise. I use Thunder, you had a Blastoise. Speed factors, like Initiative assume it is only based on reflexes. Though Spiderman, and real life beg to differ. Awareness plays a tremendous part in response time. 3.5 highlighted this well their rules for the “surprise round.” In lieu of this, there is a “surprised” state in 5e. Surprise and awareness are not two halves of the same coin. Surprised creatures still roll initiative, they just can’t move or act. However, awareness and perception play no greater part in initiative. It is you’re surprised or you’re not. In this contest everyone but Dexterity based characters loses. Fast characters, yet again have the upper hand.

What about creatures that are just aware, and ready to act? In a real fight, the guy who is more ready, is usually the winner, not the guy who is faster. The guy who is faster has a physical advantage, but it is not the only factor.

So we have two versions of the Awareness Initiative:

A creature may use its Dexterity or Wisdom modifier to determine its initiative bonus.

OR

A creature adds its Dexterity + its Wisdom modifier to determine its initiative bonus.

In this style of initiative, the first rule allows characters with high Wisdom scores to compete with characters with high Dexterity scores. If your healer closer to first, he has less work to do early on, but if he is always going last, he has the hardest job.

The second version allows the two concepts of Speed and Awareness to play a direct roll with each other as they do in more realistic situations. With a lower attribute with either, the character will be, naturally, less ready to fight, but that is more of a reason to be careful choosing your ability scores, however, this doesn’t doom characters to always go first or last still, it gives a better chance to characters of more mediocre stats. If you have +3 in Dex, and a +1 in Wisdom, congrats! You now have a much higher chance of going before say, an adult red dragon who would only get a +1 to initiative rather than a flat +0. Solars, the Fabio-esque celestials, would get an other worldly +13 to their initiative which is more befitting than just a +6 because (sarcasm warning) a level 1 halfling rogue is, of course, almost as likely to be as fast as an archangel in combat readiness. If you look at the Monk, you may notice that the Monk’s Unarmored Defense bonus is based off of this same formula. Monks, would of course, have amazing initiatives. Have you seen a Jet Li movie? If you can move like that, there is no way you aren’t ready for a fight.

Of the two, I am more likely, with my player’s permission, to use the second of the two. It will create a more interesting dynamic for players, and alter how battle tends to go. Keep in mind, should a character get a bonus to initiative from a class feature, it will propel them ahead, but no more than it already does. Should you use this rule, be careful with your dump stats.

Ready and Waiting rule

I have encountered another problem regarding initiative: How does it feel when you roll a natural 20 on initiative, and the guy who rolled a 15 goes before you? Same team or not, it doesn’t feel great. Your character was ready and waiting to act. There is no reward for it. Traditionally, we like to be rewarded for natural 20’s and punished for natural 1’s. Like may be a strong word, but it is tradition. To right this, I employ what I call the Ready and Waiting rule: 

When a creature rolls a 20 on an initiative check, the creature has advantage on the first attack roll or ability check it makes in that encounter. If a creature rolls a 1 on an initiative check, it has disadvantage on its first attack roll or ability check it makes in that encounter.

In essence, it is a pretty simple rule for a simple concept, if you are at your most ready, you should have the highest chance of success, at your most unprepared… well, the opposite.

Morale Advantage/Disadvantage

Aside from being shaken, as we once called it, or frightened, there is very little that is representative of the emotional effect that the events of the game have on the characters. DM_Starhelm, aka Andy told me about a method used in one of the many podcasts he listens to, in which on a natural 1, when the character fails at whatever they are trained at, the GM asks the player, what went wrong in the fiction of the game. If that isn’t enough and you want some backup to your natural 1’s and 20’s I recommend the following:

When you roll a 20 on an ability check, you gain advantage on the next ability check you make within the next minute. When you roll a 1 on an ability check, you gain disadvantage on the next ability check you make within the next minute.

This rule is reflective of a character’s confidence, and hitting a “streak” of sorts. People have off days, and on days, people perform better when they are confident and less so when they are shaken by something. I would rather see this system used than the cockamamie idea that a natural 1 or natural 20 cause the impossible to happen. You can’t intimidate doors, you can’t seduce mindless undead, if you fall a distance of 2 feet, you don’t explode on impact! A natural 20 meant you did your utmost, not that reality now bends for you. A natural 20 is not always an automatic success, because I can try to jump into a different dimension by using a human slingshot, a radio antenna, and a copy of Hitchhiker’s Guide. I promise you it will not work 5% of the time. If we want to reward/punish these numbers to make more interesting gaming, use these play forward rewards/penalties. If you think advantage or disadvantage is too much, add or subtract an extra half of your proficiency modifier to the next roll instead.

Exploding Dice

In a previous article, I wrote about exploding dice. Essentially when you roll damage from an effect, if you roll the maximum number on a damage die, roll another of the same type and add it to the roll. If you roll the maximum number again, do it again. Continue this process until no dice have rolled the maximum number. As a personal rule, I tend not to use this with things like persistent damage like poisons and the like, because no one wants to die from a bad cut from a Sword of Wounding, but that’s just me.

However, I did not expand upon two important rules I learned to add later on: Healing, and how to handle critical hits. To keep healing from being disproportionate, because miracles do happen, actual healing die (not temporary hit points) do explode. If damage explodes only, that makes healing far less effective, especially if someone only has a 1^st level Cure Wounds waiting.  This also, makes healing potions far more effective. Rolling 2d4 + 2 can be a disastrous waste of an action/bonus action. It may save a life, but on a result of 4 (1+1+2), that grants you one more hit, which may turn the tide of battle, but that isn’t really healing. It’s practically only triage, at that point.

Exploding dice are to add a new element of danger into the combat to emphasize lethality. Critical hits as they have existed in table top gaming can be pretty weak. No one likes rolling a 1 on a critical hit and doubling it, or as 5e has, rolling snake eyes on a critical hit. Critical hits can feel seldom critical. All of that design space went to people like rogues, paladins, and even my own duelist and slayer. Exploding damage however, explores this pretty well. However, when you introduce exploding damage dice, what happens to critical hits? A “critical” hit can be weaker than an exploding die. To fix this, I introduced the following rule on top of exploding damage:

When you score a critical hit, rather than rolling twice the damage dice, maximize the damage from each die, and roll the damage dice once adding it to the maximum result. When you roll the damage dice, any exploding dice still apply.

For example, if you have 1d8 damage with a Strength +3 from a longsword, and you score a critical hit your damage will become 1d8 + 11 (3 +8). Having a starting point assures that critical hits will be at least as good as a normal exploding dice, with the potential of being better. However, I would also recommend an alternative. Damage as good, but as my wizarding friend Nick, would remind me, damage is a stupid use of a spell. Extra damage alone, may not be as good. So thus why critical hits on a natural 20 could, and probably should have a little bit more oomph to them. Fighters, Hexblades, and Magus (Mage College Homebrew) have an expanded critical hit range. If critical hits alone are rewarded then these three classes, (two if you don’t want to use Magus), will be even further augmented to be more dangerous than they already are. Setting an extra effect on a natural 20 levels that playing field in doing damage and adding an effect. This brings us to a rule I call Effective Critical. Effective Critical is partially based in Monte Cook’s Cypher system, Dungeon World, and real world combat application.

In Cypher System, on a critical hit, the player gets to add a minor or major effect to the attack, depending on a roll of 19 or 20, and this is, in part, discussed by the player and GM. Dungeon World is very based in narration and the method of deciding how things occur play out more like a discussion between player and GM. In a real world fight a critical hit is reflective of placing a strike exactly where you want it. Combining these aspects, it encourages narration and creativity. Effective Critical works as following when applied by itself to the normal game:

When you score a critical hit with a roll of 20 on the die, in addition to dealing extra damage, with the help of your DM you may determine an additional effect to try to apply as part of the critical hit. The DM should specify a duration for the effect, and any conditions that apply at their discretion.

Should you fear that the granting something through this kind of dialogue may be a bit much, you can instead add the following stipulation:

The creature must roll a saving throw as determined by the DM to resist the effect after damage is rolled, receiving the full effect on a failed save, and a lesser adverse effect on a successful save. The saving throw DC is 8 + the attacker’s proficiency bonus + their attack modifier.

With the Exploding Dice mechanic attached to the DC variation add the following line:

For every damage die that explodes as part of this critical hit, increase the DC to resist the adverse effect by 1.

Example effects:
On a failed Constitution saving throw the target is stunned until the start of your next turn, on a successful save, it has disadvantage on attack rolls and ability checks, and can’t use reactions.

On a failed Constitution saving throw the target is blinded for 1 minute. At the each of the end of its turns, it may repeat its saving throw at the end of each of its turns to end this effect. On a successful save, it has disadvantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks, attack rolls, and Dexterity saving throws.

By opening the discussion for these effects to take place, critical hits will feel more “critical”. One of D&D’s weakness is that called shots tend to be a mess. With this modification it puts a little bit more control in player’s hands with DMs help, and will make fights more interesting. Do not hesitate to use this rule against players as well, the same goes for any combat rule, unless you want to give your players a definite example, but we don't need kid gloves on do we?

Wrapping Up

I will work on a compendium of these extra rules for D&D 5e that I have come up with or developed, and that will be a separate page. You may notice I have changed a few things in the lay out, there is now a link to the "Laboratory" which is a link to the google drive folder that houses all the available homebrew at the top of the page. You can now search the blog, and more easily look through previous articles by month.

Coming this week:
New Ranger Conclave: The Crimson Arrow
The third and final draft of Slayer

Next week:
We take a look at how to create the perfect Summoner.
The Worst Status Condition: Death
Magus: Version 2

Duelist: Final Draft (?)

It with much pleasure I present the potentially final draft of the core Duelist class. This potentially final copy includes the two-weapon favoring Tempest, and the Master Thrower. Major changes are the number of talent points you get (half level + talent) and Unparalleled Talent now just only restores 4 talent points.  If you have comments or suggestions, go ahead and let me know.

Any archetype posted for Duelist after this will be added on in separate files.

A lot in store this week. Til then, happy dueling, Arcanists.

Tabletop One-on-One, Part One.

When I first started GMing tabletop games, I thought the idea of playing one-on-one, GMing for a single person was entirely possible, but what  I didn't realize is that it is an entirely different game. My first major experience with this was my friend Mike DMing for me as my favorite PC. I later carried this story on to DM for my wife in the same fashion, and we now have one-on-one tabletop gaming as one of our favorite pass times. There is a very strange dynamic to one-on-one games, and there are a few things to take into consideration before you as a GM or a player wade into a one-on-one game:


The Difference

In a one-on-one game the focus can and often does shift from a party-centric story to a player character centered story. This will allow your player to really dig into playing the type of character they want to and make decisions as their character would. This will also help the GM learn the character, and later, should the character be incorporated into a group, the player and the GM will be able to understand better how to keep the character involved in the story. This player-centric story can be a lot of fun to create, and usually has a plethora of good roleplaying opportunities. This is especially good for players who are newer, or even more quiet at the table.  However, these new perspective means several shifts will occur in the mechanics and the dynamic between the GM and player. As this is a brief summary we'll skim these before we visit them in full articles.

Harder On Everyone?

In terms of playing difficulty, unless the GM runs a a GMPC or uses a hireling system of some kind, your challenge ratings for enemies won't be accurate as they would in a four person party. If a gm for a one-on-one player is going to challenge that player. It is important to carefully consider the character that the player is using to create challenges. Some systems like the newer Scarlet Heroes has rules to fix the scale for one on one play. Scarlet Heroes' fix for this is using a different damage system and what is called a "Fray die" that sort of cinematically help deal with "minions," so solo characters can deal with larger encounters faster and with the odds less stacked against them. 

It may also be difficult for the player at times to feel in charge of the story, and they could very well feel like the story idea that the gm is offering doesn't match up with their character. Sometimes, it is better to resolve it to be more sandbox like until something more attention grabbing comes along. In a one-on-one session, the player may feel less compelled to follow what will feel more like a "generic quest for some adventurers." The very nature of this style of session is to allow the character navigate as they would like. To some degree, this style of game allows the GM to be more reactionary than proactive. The player will innately indicate where they want to take the character by asking questions. Railroading a player in this style of session will only upset them as much as any other player.

Even though the player is in charge of where they are going and constantly telling the GM where they're are headed to next, it is still, coincidentally, more work for the GM in these kinds of things. The GM is not planning in advance but instead needing to react to the desires of the player. Of course, this isn't always the case but it is common for the GM needing to either improvise more, or plan accordingly after the fact.

Easier On Everyone!

However, ultimately, one on one can allow the player and the GM to take more time with their roles. Because of my own one-on-one sessions, my homebrew setting has been much more fleshed out, making larger games much easier to manage. With the player at the forefront of the story, the party decision discussion which can be overly long, and with the wrong players take most of a session, the story moves faster, and you can accomplish more. In another interesting note, the GM gets a better glimpse as to how player mechanics work and why. Rather than having to try to acclimate to four character classes to GM for, the GM will become very familiar with a single one, and may very well gain a better insight as to the design ideas behind the class. I don't think that without my extensive experience with these kinds of games/sessions that my homebrews would be as cohesive as they are.

Another reward to one on one sessions, is that because they follow a single player, that player could even create other characters that should they not feel like playing one story one week, they can instead use another character allowing them to stay interested in the game without boredom. Probably one of the worst feelings is being "stuck" with a character you don't like.

Communication between the GM and player is, of course, easier. It is a 1:1 ratio, and therefore the game that the two want to play can be made more easily. Sometimes when a party has a problem with the GM communication can be less direct and there can be more drama, confusion, and general lack of fun while forgetting the key idea of the game; Having fun.  Though mechanically the styles are different, one-on-one games are an awesome way to hang out with a friend who may be too busy to join a full game, or for you guys to scratch that gaming itch.

Summing Up

One-on-one games are big topic to cover, and I would definitely attest that with a bit of practice, the pros outweigh the cons. I will be talking more about this in the future, as you may be able to tell in the title. Next time we approach this subject, we'll talk more about the mechanical end of things and what it does to the story.

Til then, happy one-on-one-ing, Arcanists. 

The System is Your Console

Establishing Complexity and Choosing a Game

In a recent article, I talked about starting a game and what it requires, and in case you are a firm believer of "TL;DR" (too long didn't read), what it boiled down to is meeting the basic needs of the game: players, a comprehensible system, and a GM who is willing to "make it work."  Keep in mind, what it is important in this context is that these base elements are important to form a new group consisting of new players a new GM, and an entirely a new game. Any combination of these will require some degree of simplicity. Once a group has taken off and learned to play a tabletop roleplaying game, then it is time to choose that delicious layer of complexity that adds all the fun rules we like using (and hopefully not abusing). This is metaphorically, like selecting the type of video game that we feel like playing, we have all agreed that we want a particular experience.

The Engine of Complexity

We very well may have chosen a game we want to play, but there is an important aspect in choosing a system, and this extends to any system not just the ones I mentioned previously. The system you choose better be able to accommodate the game you want to play. To continue our video game analogy, based on the hardware in a Sega Genesis, we couldn't play Bethesda's Skyrim as we know it today. Though, we can definitely play the original Sonic the Hedgehog on any modern console with no difficulty.  In fact, this very phenomenon is why we see remakes and rehashes of old games, we want the ability to play things we enjoy in an updated fashion. (More on this later)

Aside from remaking a game, we may want to choose what game we want to play, and then choose the console to play it. For instance, for the longest time, Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus was only on Playstation 2. If I wanted to play that game, I needed to use my Playstation 2 and not my Playstation 3, but sometimes, we find that rather than buying the new remake, we can just save the money because we still have the console and game. As DM Starhelm likes to remind me, in tabletop games the systems and the games are often mistaken for being one in the same. The way I play Dungeons & Dragons is not the way your group plays it because Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition may be the game, but it is more liken unto the console, what I do with the hardware (the base rules) as a GM is entirely up to me. There are, in video games, good games and bad games, just as in tabletop gaming there are good games and bad games, because you guessed it, we may all be playing Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition (Wizards of the Coast brand new console) but we aren't playing the same game. 

Choosing an Engine

Therein lies the beauty of choosing a system. I have been playing the master(sword)piece that is Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild because I can't play it on my Playstation 4. At the same time, we have the option of playing the game on both the Wii U and the Nintendo Switch. There we reach the secret of choosing the system, what do I need and want? The Switch is marketed for being portable, and a new revolution in gaming with friends. I own a Wii U and I generally, if I am out somewhere, I don't have the time or need to play a video game, so the Wii U fits me just fine, and how else am I going to play Super Smash Bros.? The analogy is continued here as we see that I have my reasons for playing the game on the console I have. To step back into our situation of choosing the system for the game, the way you want to play, that game you have chosen to share, unlike a console which generally are fairly universal aside from peripherals and available games, will dictate which tabletop roleplaying systems are right for your group and your game. Let's take a brief rundown of some examples and my subjective and objective thoughts on them: 

Dungeons and Dragons 3.5

I have no inherent problem with 3.5 other than balancing issues, but that is part of my reasoning for my choice, it is not an objective expression, my own conclusion from my observations. 3.5 is good for games in which character diversity is paramount to you and your group and you all have little complaint for diversity and want more exact rules. This system may be more work for your GM and players overall depending on the game you want to run and how you handle it. Homebrewing is much harder in 3.5, mind you but there isn't much that is not covered here. Definitely for groups that want a game and story with a more "hardcore high fantasy". If you want to feel like your characters go from 0 to legendary hero in this, this system is great, just be aware of obvious rules issues and broken characters.

Pathfinder
I personally like this system a little more than 3.5 but it is undoubtedly based in it (and there for backwards compatible) this game is more balanced with the same level of diversity that 3.5 offered, with similar rules. Major changes are an increased diversity of characters through archetypes while arranging the system so prestige classes aren't necessary, but math gets slightly heavier here. Broken characters can still occur, but players are more likely to have a far more balanced time. New material is still being made for this system by the publisher and a lot of good 3rd party publishers alike. The feeling of growing in leaps and bounds and becoming a legendary hero is also in this system and good for a game that has a high fantasy feel while also having "realistic" rules but with more balance than we saw in 3.5. 

Dungeons and Dragons 4th Edition
This system is controversial, but it is balanced, and that may be some people's gripe with it, but it is great for new players and GMs alike, as the system is written in full acknowledgment that it is a game you are playing with the flavor and fiction being left entirely to the players and GM. This system breaks a few standard conventions concerning D&D but if the players want an experience where not much can be broken, and the playing field is fair, in a sort of Justice League everyone is a hero kind of way, welcome to D&D 4th edition. Although, one thing to remember is that this game leaves very little to rules arguments and can be good for having a solid system in which a story can be crafted around. 

Dungeon World and Other PBTA Games

The games that are based on the Apocalypse system that I have mentioned are completely fine systems, and very engaging for both the GM and the players. Some of my favorite sessions have actually been in this system because it is less bound to a huge stack of rules. Alternatively, what is important to remember is that a large amount of what you feel your character can do is up to you and your GM. Unlike D&D, your character class isn't going to explicitly tell you how things work in the fiction of the game while giving you your own unique mechanic. Class features in this game are light and are very driven by the story and how you play not by what your class is, or "who" you are. This game will feel odd to many D&D veterans because they like having those huge blocks of text that make them feel like they have a list of cool stuff they can do, when in this system, the power to be cool is inside of them all along. 

Mutants & Masterminds
This system has a decent following, and can be used to tell essentially any superhero or high power anime/JRPG-esque story. The main consideration is that it is a lot of work at first and without a well read GM, the rules can be daunting, especially for players. Though it has its rewards and you can play superheroes and all that it entails and the rules for player creation are very open, it can be a nightmare to keep it all straight. GMs unfamiliar with the possibilities can be surprised by what their players are capable of and then you may have a problem. The GM being surprised by a decision is ok, but being unaware of a mechanic or power in their game until the moment of can be disastrous. Days of planning can be undone simply because of the "Chunky Salsa Effect". A friend's campaign was abruptly ended when the players essentially create the perfect death trap of cascading damage for the main villain within the course of a couple sessions, and the main damage source was the building damage thanks to the "Chunky Salsa Effect" or the property of energy reflecting off unbreakable walls, magnifying damage and ultimately turning the villain/victim into...well... a thick, chunky salsa like paste. One can be sure that the GM was surprised. If your group can handle it and keep it all straight and want to bench press continental shelves, then have at, just be prepared. 

 

The Start Button

This list doesn't incorporate all the systems out there, but it gives you a glimpse of what systems are good for, I DM and play a lot of 5e (clearly, look at this blog), but at times I miss Pathfinder because of the open options. It is up to everyone (EVERYONE) in the group to decide. No one like being lost in rules, or being beaten up without a clue in Smash Bros. Like any other time, tabletop roleplaying games are about cooperation and cohesion with your players-- your friends. Without that, you have an impending melee, brawl, or dare I say, Mario Party on your hands.

In the Beginning

Now that I am back to my computer after four days of feeling like the dead, I figured I would start in a vein of articles directed towards those just joining us, but, veteran arcanists, don't fret, you'll be able to take something away from these as well.

While I was at PAX East, I met a lot of fellow nerds out there who either hadn't experienced both sides of tabletop roleplaying (usually GMing), didn't know how to adapt to a new edition of Dungeons & Dragons, or haven't played in any capacity altogether. So, we'll start from the beginning, and I will try to keep this brief, as some arcanists don't have the same attention span for long articles. 

Getting Started

My story may not be ideal, but I was thrown into Dungeons & Dragons as the GM in a random week in November of 2013. I was an avid Magic: The Gathering player at the time, but was still pretty reluctant to play Dungeons & Dragons. In my mind, that D&D stigma that we're just seeing lift was pretty real. I had played once or twice in a terrible introduction to the game in a group of ten people in 4th Edition, in a story that didn't make much since with a character I didn't know how to play. Effectively, at the start of my role as Game Master, it would be the first time I really played Dungeons & Dragons. DM Starhelm, who was also in this original game, was technically more equipped than I was, given his long history of his nose buried deep in R.A. Salvatore novels, having an eclectic understanding of the fantasy genre, and being able to argue Lord of the Rings like he went to law school in Minas Tirith. In fact, he read fantasy novels more than he did homework when we were in highschool. But nope! It was me; I was to be GM.

We were using not just 3rd Edition, either, but 3.5. Some of you who have played and DM'ed 3.5 may be wincing at the thought of this poor, new GM running a game of 3.5 for the first time ever. In retrospect, I wince at the thought too. So, I got myself generally acquainted with the rules, looked at character creation, monsters, magic items, and so on. Fortunately my background in Magic gave me a decent leg-up as far as the fantasy setting is concerned.  After I had became passingly familiar with the rules, I dove into the story. I came up with a general setting, inspired by 16th century Europe, the characters for the story I wanted to tell, and most importantly the villain. I spent more time than anything on that villain. He's actually, in our most recent iterations of the setting, still an important character and ally these days but generally everyone's favorite companion NPC/DMPC. Creating that villain the way I did, I think saved the game overall (I'll get there). Since then, I rose to be a lot of people's favorite GM, and at least good in the eyes of others. 

Key to Success

What was my secret? Well, if I can be frank, I didn't have a damn clue what I was doing, and that worked! It was because I went in willing to accept things rather than to reject them that I created a game people wanted to play. Don't get me wrong, saying "No", as a GM is important. In my first session, I butchered the concept of AC and Reflex saving throws, but it made for an awesome encounter because I at least got the scene right. DM Starhelm's half-elf rogue got into a very Jason Bourne fast paced scrap in an alleyway with a baddie, and it turned out great. It doesn't hurt if you have a group of new players, to tell them to pick up dice, establish some quick rules, and then referee. At least not at first. It is pretty proportional to experience level (player, not character). Together, the GM and players will learn the game they are trying to play. This is indicative of a different facet that wasn't attributed to me. I may have had some natural understanding based on my acting/improv background but that wasn't it. New groups, players, GMs are best suited to simpler systems. Systems that generally avoid heavy math and complex rules are best. For this I have two major recommendations: D&D 5th Edition, or Dungeon World. Some GMs say that 4th Edition is easy to run and I would agree, but I will save that argument for another time.

For those of you that don't know Dungeon World, it is a Powered by the Apocalypse system, which long story short, uses 2d6 for standard roles in place of a d20. Checks are made with three degrees of success: Failure, Partial success/ success with a compromise, and total success, all augmented by ability scores that work similar to the d20 system. This system takes the narrative or fiction of the game and makes it the driving mechanic. In fact, I have run the same 5 minute demo for people that Starhelm ran for me, and it has gotten the point across every time. Most people who have tried the Starhelm Trial, as I like to call it, usually feel much more confident about trying tabletop gaming. The secret behind this is it boils down to abstraction, which I will also get to in a later article. Essentially, abstraction is the process in which the dice roll, and the action it represents feel farther apart. Example:

Faranir, Vagabond Prince of the Wood Elves, is in a sparring match against Dagna, Dwarven Champion of Morgrath. Dagna uses a huge shield making Faranir's thrown weapons much less effective. So Faranir, being the scoundrel he is, gets an idea. He charges Dagna and full on flying drop kicks Dagna, using that shield's mass against the dwarf to knock him over. Well, as a GM how do we resolve this, is it an attack? Is it an ability check? Do we roll one roll for each leg that hits, considering what the terrain is and the weight difference between these two fighters? Is it a trip? A bull rush? Does it do damage? Are Dagna's parents proud? Why doesn't Faranir just throw Falcon at Dagna instead?  Let me stop you right there. We'll resolve this in Dungeon World first:

Faranir rolls 2d6 adding his strength modifier, and he rolls a 10. Success, Dagna falls back. Faranir also hits the ground, and immediately kips up to make a follow up attack. Done.

And in 5e:

Faranir rolls a Strength (Athletics) check contested by Dagna's Strength (Athletics). As he hits the ground, he uses his Athletics feat to use 5 feet of movement and stand up, and he gets ready for another attack.

Simple. That is what makes an amazing first game. Simple rolls, simple decisions. If you keep your game simple as you start, you can slowly build momentum into more complexity. Tomorrow we'll talk more about choosing a system, and I promise it won't be what it seems. So with this simple answer think it over, and tell me what you make of it. As the week progresses, I'll start to give my two cents about how complexity can work in.

For now, enjoy this magic item:

Orb of Confounding Simplicity
Uncommon
This silver, metallic orb weighs no more than a pound hovers gently 5 feet above the surface below it as long as it is at rest and not held by a creature or put into a container. In all other respects it acts as a normal ball of its size and material.

Duelist 2nd Draft, Now with Arcane Blade!

Today I have included the second draft for the duelist, which now has the Arcane Blade duelist archetype which is based on the old 3.5 Arcane Duelist. I have expanded the abilities of the archetypes, as my original design was to be mechanically liken unto a spellcaster's ability to drop effects while still having the ability to actually participate in combat. Let me know what you think!

New Warlock Patron: The Sands of Time

Surprise everyone! Enjoy a new Warlock Patron, the Sands of Time! I decided to dip into the chronomancy theme for once, let's see where it takes us! Feedback always welcome!

That's Not a Knife

THIS is a Knife

Today, I introduce you to Falcon, the Flying Blade. In the Tylvein Campaign Setting, Falcon awaits a master with a steady hand and the heart of a gambler as only the bravest put their faith in a thrown weapon. Falcon is the ultimate throwing knife; It may not be sentient but it is blessed with the spirit of a falcon and perches well in the hands of a fighter, ranger, or rogue, but is not picky as it merely seeks to continue to hunt once more.

Archmage Derek's Handy Dandy Resource Guide

So, today I figured I would point you guys in the direction of what I use to enhance my games beyond the core material and the WoTC's Unearthed Arcana.

Forged in Magic

Most notably as of late is Paradigm Concept's Forged in Magic, Reforged. You can find it on drivethrurpg.com. This is over 400 magic items that all work in 5e. There are a few exceptions as the main idea of the book is to supplement their own Arcanis campaign setting. So some changes and DM rulings are necessary but  97% of this book works with no changes. There are tons of great items here with great art that DM Starhelm and I took a fast liking to.

What is most notable and a really fun system to play with, Paradigm Concepts introduces an expanded rune system for augmenting items. It makes more common items more unique and creates the greater likelihood that magic based societies like Eberron can function in 5e. Attunement is a beast for a different day, but 5e sort of destroys the ease of magic items even in established Forgotten Realms canon. (We're looking at you, Jarlaxle Baenre!)

In a quick breakdown of this system, any mundane item has three rune "slots", uncommon runes take one, rare take two, and very rare, three. The two dozen or so runes that have varying levels of power. There are even an advanced way to combine runes together in a couple different fashions. The only oddity is that the rules acknowledge legendary runes but don't include examples of any. I tweeted at Paradigm Concepts they said left it open for DMs to craft their own legendary runes at their discretion. I really like that model for gaming. Were I to create my own game, I would be inclined to leave a majority of rulings open like that for the DMs and players to hash out together. So, kudos to them.

I have made my own adjustments to these rules as, to my knowledge, only mundane items are accounted for, so I rule in my game, based on the Dungeon Master's Guide's Moonblade, that legendary items have seven rune slots. Working backwards, I have established that uncommon magic items have four slots, rare have five, and very rare have 6. This opens up the variety of weapons/items you can have and is a fun time experimenting.

Matthew Mercer

I'm going to try to be as neutral about this as possible because I am a huge fan of the multifaceted talent that is Matthew Mercer. Matthew Mercer is a voice actor (most famous for Overwatch's McCree), nerd, and the DM/host of Geek and Sundry's popular livestream, Critical Role. Mercer has released several supplements onto dmsguild as pay as you want pdfs. These include the Maestro Bardic College, Gunslinger, and Blood Hunter. I've allowed players to use the Gunslinger fighter archetype once or twice, and one of our tech powered recurring big baddies, Imry, has been a gunslinger in a few incarnations. It isn't especially difficult to include it as it is basically a conversion of Pathfinder's Gunslinger. Ironically, he wrote Gunslinger before "High Noon" was even a thing. Blood hunter is a little more complex and not for any new player. It is well balanced as Mercer is an experienced gamer and has collaborated with the D&D design team before, thus I trust his work and judgement as a DM and designer. I haven't had the opportunity to play or DM for a Maestro bard. I'd like to see it in action, but no one has brought it up. Ultimately, use Mercer's materials at your own discretion with respect to your campaign setting and players. Guns in a D&D campaign is a touchy subject as is. 

The Not Really Complete Series

The very talented Faolyn on reddit came up with The Not Really Complete Tome of Sells, and The Not Really Complete Encyclopedia Magica. These are conversions of a plethora of spells and magic items respectively from other editions of the game. I use the magic items more than the spells because my players tend to want a greater variety of items (or at least seem to appreciate it), and the introduction of new spells to classes beyond wizard can get a little messy. That is also a topic for another day. Since these are conversions from previous editions and pathfinder, they are easy to use and they very rarely will create that sort of weirdness that occurs when a homebrewed rule/item/class doesn't entirely fit the setting or tone of a game. I highly recommend them, there are some very fun items in the Encyclopedia Magica. I need to review the Tome of Spells more, but that may be a good topic for another day.

Incarnate: Last of The Lacers

I saw this supplement on r/Unearthed Arana some time ago, and was immediately intrigued by it. As I have expressed before, I feel like homebrew can be a hit or miss, but I am a huge fan of Avatar: The Last Airbender, and the creator of this supplement, Alex Tanner really does bring the feel of Avatar to life with this pdf. To be clear, I haven't used this yet, but I have taken a great amount of time to inspect this work, and it seems to be pretty solid, as long as you are not playing the "Incarnate" you should find yourself about on par with any other player. I would highly encourage the use of the lacers (Don't say bender, don't say bender) when anyone expresses interest in playing a Way of Four Elements Monk. I am not against the WoFE Monk, but it is probably the most hated on Monastic Tradition. There is even a lacer tradition for monks in the supplement. It is definitely worth checking out, especially if you are a fan of The Last Airbender/Legend of Korra. The lore is pretty well defined, so as long as monks are in your game, lacers shouldn't be too invasive. 

Tribality

Tribality Publishing's work is good. Mind you they have a number of writers on board, so content will vary, but currently I am using Tribality's Rich Howard's Alchemist in place of the Unearthed Arcana Artificer and added the Superior Attunement feature at 5th level, and again at 15th level. In a game of DM Starhelm's last night I used the class as is to create a poisoner forensic investigator, it may very well be one of the best characters and sessions I have ever played. Tribality's articles often include other interesting little additions here and there, like the Chrono Rogue archetype inspired by Overwatch's Tracer. Overall, they do good and interesting work.

Angry GM

The Angry GM may be one of the saltiest, most cantankerous writers in the tabletop community, but he knows what he's talking about. He has dozens upon dozens of articles there are all based on running a better game. He offers variant rules, and even just changes to the gaming mindset that are very insightful. If you're a DM, you should at least try to be familiar with some of his articles, and form your own opinions about the topics. 

Wrapping Up

It isn't my job or purpose to tell you guys what to do, how to play your game, but these are, as a player and DM my strong recommendations of good 3rd party places to add more to your game. If you want more from me as a 3rd party source, in my article above this I will introduce you to one hell of a knife.

Find the resources here: 

Paradigm Concepts on drivethrurpg 

Matthew Mercer on dmsguild

Faolyn's Not Really Complete Tome of Magic
Faolyn's Not Really Complete Encyclopedia Magic

Incarnate: Last of the Lacers

Tribality

The Angry GM
DM_Starhelm

Your Father's Lightsaber

Not As Clumsy or Random as a Base Class

I consider the thaumaturge officially dead at this point. This may come as a shock, but once again, in the simplest implementation, Wizards of the Coast, have defeated Thaumaturge with a single archetype. I'm not upset by this, but in fact, I'm amazed. 

When I was working on my associate's degree, I had a programming teacher named Tom. Tom was always pressing that we program in a more elegant fashion. He would often criticize long drawn out programs consisting of long lines of computer code when in reality, the same effect could be accomplished in considerably less. Whenever Tom revealed this "secret" to us, I was never upset or frustrated but inspired to be as proficient in design. By the end of the class, I had learned this supposed elegance and rose to the top of my programming class.

A More Elegant Weapon

The thaumaturge was a fun idea. It combined the ideas of all of the arcane classes and added it to the spectrum with one major flaw. It was such a pain to balance! Then a week ago, the Lore Master archetype for the wizard class is released. I read it and immediately realized they had achieved everything I wanted to with one major difference: It took up all of four class features. For those of you who haven't read the lore master, you can find it here. It comes along side some really cool content for warlock. The ability to modify your spells on the fly were what I wanted from an Intelligence spellcasting class. It was not school specific either! What I spent weeks on, I could have done in no time. 

A More Civilized Age

For those of us that play 5e, we live in a very comfortable lap of constant updates from the creators and designers, a comfortable and understandable system to tinker with, and  large homebrew communities. Now I'm not saying I won't homebrew anything again, but what I do definitely encourage you to do is to compare the two; Lore Master to Thaumaturge. When you see the similarities/differences, you will understand what I mean. Homebrew content is great as long as the official material does not out do it. The work will become obsolete, and that is a constant fear of any creator such as myself. I have a hard time using my own work though, I do use Tribality's Alchemist rather than the WoTC Artificer, because of the time that was put into it, and how well made it was. My problem is, if I use a homebrew class, I am always thinking too critically about how something will turn out, or how something compares to a similar class.

Don't think that I have forgotten about Summoner though. I hope to work on it more as my schedule begins to relax, I do have an abstract concept though.



This week's homebrew is an item made for the Tylvein campaign, Tide&Tempest, Twins of Storm and Sea:

Creativity and Interest

Before we continue the design discussion, I'd like to get some feedback from you guys, first what is your favorite class? Go ahead answer this quick poll and let us all know.

I have a theory concerning what people expect from design. As I tend to view things from the perspective of a player, I tend to look at other aspects of the game through the lens of a rogue. I value three aspects of a class more than anything else, its damage, its usefulness in terms of skills, and how well does it avoid getting hit. I fully admit that I don't have much a fondness for druids or barbarians, and I haven't played them in any edition. As a DM, I understand their place, and what people like about them. I am slated to be playing a barbarian soon, but it will definitely be tempered by how I play my other characters. My barbarian isn't so much going to be an unintelligent hulking brute, but instead a warrior who relies on his instinct and his anger to solve problems. Although he is a well trained fighter, he comes from a sophisticated and intelligent nature-loving civilization. He is in all senses, one of their well-groomed predators

It isn't only my preference of class that shapes my play style. Thematically, I tend to enjoy swordsmen and swashbuckling. I prefer intelligent and complex characters over simplistic characters. My favorite D&D setting is the Feywild, as I have a fondness for Shakespeare's Midsummer's Night Dream and constantly draw from it when using aspects of the Feywild. My favorite video game series is Final Fantasy (Just beat Final Fantasy XV, in case you were wondering). My favorite movie series is Star Wars. Each of these has a driving force on my expectations, my preferences, and at times even my GMing style. Let's take a look at those and draw from what I normally want as a player and GM. As a real-life fencer and swordplay enthusiast, I love any chance I get to make combat feel more compelling. My love of swashbuckling themes only reinforces this. My love of the Feywild will tend to lead me to want to incorporate it in varying degrees in a campaign. As a fan of games like Final Fantasy I prefer things that are flashy and visually compelling. Star Wars has taught me that usually the best struggles are struggles of the heart, and that the greatest monsters aren't very alien at all. Ever notice that most of the Sith Lords we see from Episode I to Episode VII are all human, with the exception of Darth Maul? It has also taught me that there is nothing like a good show stopping lightsaber duel, but we'll categorize that under swordplay.

So what has this got to do with anything? Interests fuel expectations and creativity. If all of the above are examples of what I prefer in sci-fi/fantasy, it may be evident what themes you can expect me to enjoy as a player, and what I create as a GM. The inherent obstacle is to be able to expand from this and do more and enjoy more then one's predisposition. You can only use the same themes so many times before it gets stale. Branching out, even with the influence of your core interests and expectations is better than not moving from that.

This same concept also applies to homebrewing player options. A creator may tend to be biased with his or her favorite aspects of an existing class or race and aspire to create something too similar. In terms of creativity when it comes to the rules, what is ultimately most important is objectivity. You can say, "I want to mix X with Y." After that, leave those classes alone, and work farther outside those classes to see what similar implementations you can find. For example, when working on the slayer class, Starhelm said, "Hey for killing people outright, maybe do it like Destroy Undead." As I said in my last article, slayer is a thematic mix of ranger and rogue, but in this case it was more helpful to look at cleric which is totally unrelated in terms of theme.

Ultimately, our core interests should be a starting place, but only a wide lens can capture our potential as players and creators. Happy gaming, and see you all on Friday.

Tinkering in the Lab: From Concept to Creation Part 1

The Homebrewing Process

On Monday, we discussed what homebrew does to a game and I presented the Starhelm Homebrew Protocol. Over the next couple articles I will take us through my process of homebrewing after going through the questions presented in the homebrewing protocol as I introduce the three base classes that are coming out in The New Challenger Pack.

Homebrew: The Concept Stage

When we start homebrewing we usually have a concept in mind, if we didn't then we've already hit a wall. Usually homebrew starts by wanting something you have noticed is missing or not fully supported in your game. Before you start you try to answer the protocol's first question: "Can what you want flavor-wise be achieved through archetypes, multiclassing, or simple flavor changes or interpretations?" This stage requires the most legwork. You must be extremely well-versed in the system you are working in. Sometimes, what you want in a more concise manner is officially released later on, or at least the same concept is covered in a different way.  I'll cover that phenomenon later. Usually, in the case of D&D 5e and Pathfinder you have the additional option of creating a homebrew as opposed to another base class (or some other form of rules) the d20 system has one of the most "hackable" structures. The Apocalypse System is also constantly being used as a base to create new systems. Dungeon World, Masks, and City of Mist are all derived from the Apocalypse World game system. (Which I highly recommend trying in one of its forms, Starhelm and I are to try City of Mist soon) This characteristic of some games determines if homebrewing is possible or not. So, for our purposes, we'll focus our discussion on D&D 5e, as usual. 

The Magus versus Question 1

So more specific than a concept, in homebrewing we also have a specific character in mind. In the case of The New Challenger Pack, I have three characters in mind. You guys asked to see a 5e version of the Duskblade/ Magus, so you're getting it. When I changed from Pathfinder to 5e, my Magus character, who you have already met, (see Clash and Conflict: Combat Made Compelling), Arrador, suffered conceptually in 5e. My only option was to make him an Eldritch Knight from the Player's Handbook. Well, not only would it hurt how it felt to play him, his spell casting would be heavily diminished. So, in order to maintain his spellcasting, I had to multiclass into wizard, which as many of you know and I have said previously, multiclassing is harder on a character's progress. However, for the sake of his spell strike ability, one might suggesting converting into Paladin, further stressing the character's concept, and adding on a slew of abilities he never had. Although Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide's bladesinger is thematically close to Magus, it does not have enough combat support, the focus is still being a wizard. Compare the war domain cleric to paladin. If there can be those two similar concepts, why can't there be a magus/duskblade class? Eldritch Knight still focuses on being magical, but a lot of the Eldritch Knight's most notable flavor heavy abilities come later in the game. Why be left out? Let's also examine my other homebrew that is comparable, the War Mage thaumaturge. The War Mage is focused on spellcasting and is more similar to the evoker Wizard than the Eldritch Knight or Magus. multiclassing in Eldritch Knight and War Mage could be an interesting combination, but there are several redundancies between them, such as the proficiencies, extra attack, and the spell casting and attacking abilities. multiclassing would also inhibit the ability to attain the higher powered abilities of one of these classes. Question 1 for the Magus is answered. We can create in the half-caster design space that Paladin and Ranger exist in. 

The Duelist vs Question 1

The second class concept that I am incorporating is the Duelist (may be renamed later to Myrmidon), the Duelist 3.5 class was a fairly weak prestige class that had a hard time keeping up with other PrCs. The class was best designed for fighters, rogues, and swashbucklers to use. The Daring Outlaw build quickly made this class obsolete. Several other classes rose in similar design spots, such as the Shadowblade, and the Arcane Duelist that all fit into that same design space of the mobile fighter with abilities that helped them interact in combat and manipulate the opponent. Pathfinder's Swashbuckler really brought the concept of the Duelist to life while further improving on the 3.5 PrC as well. As I discussed it before, I played with Daerthalion's concept a lot from his start in 3.5 but I didn't fully do my research back when. It caused a messy design that I tinkered with over and over. Even though I love the Swashbuckler archetype from Sword Coast Adventurer's guide, and if a DM said, "Only use that." I would gladly do so. The part of me that doesn't want to compromise often gets the better of me. Fortunately for me, I have to work on a new iteration of Daerthalion, so here we are. When I had his crazy bladesinger/swashbuckler combination it suffered from MAD (Multiple Ability Dependency). I liked the concept of a swordsman who uses essentially hedgemagic on top of swordplay. Magic isn't the main concept behind the duelist, it is that finesse with a weapon, the embodiment of a fighting style. The question is does the concept of the duelist fit into fighter? From the concept I would want to bring to it, perhaps. However, if you look at the Pathfinder Swashbuckler, it doesn't fit into fighter by utilizing different aspects of mobility, evasion, and being an all around swiss army knife on the battlefield. A rogue in 5e is more of a glass cannon with evasion tacked on. Fortunately they have a d8 hit die rather than d6 like previous incarnations. Mobility and skill is the hallmark of rogue, sneak attack helps them level their damage. The swashbuckler archetype augments the mobility of the rogue further and guarantees sneak attack more often making it a more offensive rogue option. It doesn't offer the same utility as say, monk. Within monk is where we find the most similar concept to what we want. Monk has a lot of utility and greater mobility than the rogue. The monk offers a more supernatural version of this design while limiting what they can use and modifying the damage dice of whatever they prefer to use. They also can net more attacks on demand, and have an extremely high evasion against damage. However, the concept of the monk and duelist differ while sharing similar concepts, a highly trained fighter and has a specific set of usable weapons. The class we are after also has similarities to the superiority dice driven archetypes, especially the Battle Master, the battle master is a fighter with greater utility, but a far more limited utility. It is between the lines of fighter, rogue, and monk that we will find duelist. This multiclass would be a disastrous combination if not designed perfectly, especially if we use all of the approximate archetypes too. The duelist thus far, can move on to question 2 of the protocol. 

The Slayer vs Question 1

The slayer is a class introduced in Pathfinder that touches on the highlights of ranger and rogue without incorporating spellcasting. My character concept that inspires the slayer is a character you may meet soon named Akyas. Akyas is a Drow who served as an investigator, assassin, and spy for his city. He is a tactician above all else, and he uses his detective like ability in every situation. Immediately we approach rogue and three of it's archetypes, Mastermind, Inquisitive, and Assassin. The Revised Ranger would easily incorporate more of the assassin like stealth abilities but Akyas has very little experience with nature, what he understands is how creatures (mostly humanoid) behave. In tandem with this knowledge, he employs his training that focuses on ambush tactics, ending fights faster than most combatants. This could be a multiclass build, but it forces a very difficult choice upon the player. As I have envisioned Akyas, he would be something very similar to the Assassin's Creed brand of assassins. This is not entirely a perfect example because the settings of Assassin's Creed and D&D work differently. The design space that I find Akyas' concept hovering around is located between fighter, ranger, and rogue. This homebrew concept lie in a gray area. The multiclass option seems to suggest that I may not get everything I want, and works out of what feels like a losing compromise, and after having tested them, it feels like more convoluted than were I to pick a base class. I do know that I can try to design a class that will function as well as other classes and uses other concepts in it as archetypes. In this case we will use the other questions to determine whether this is viable or not. 

The Integrity of Setting

At this point we must now test each concept against question two, to see how well it integrates as part of the main setting for D&D 5e based on question two of the Starhelm Homebrewing Protocol:
Does what you want conflict with the setting for the game you are trying to play and is more suited to be created in an entirely different game?
We can pretty quickly sort through all three of these homebrew concepts. The magus is yet another telling of the "gish" concept, and as we said falls anywhere between eldritch knight, bladesinger, bard, and paladin. With some work in the fiction behind the magus class we could very aptly place the magus into a setting, consisting of orders of duskblades, kensai, hexblades and the like. Nothing is radically upset by the implementation of a new hypothetical order of warrior mages into the setting, with a little bit of creative backstory as to how they function in the world, you have yourself a magus. Final Fantasy's Genesis Rhapsodos, Dragon Age's Knight-Enchanter, and Guild Wars 2's Revenant characters are all examples of what would represent a magus. They employ magic into their fighting boosting their combat abilities by harnessing magic, channeling it through their weapons or in the form of spells.

The duelist, would not in principle upset the idea of the fighter, rogue, or monk. If we in our setting, wanted to play a character such as this, perhaps, to differentiate from the fighter, the duelist is less a combatant who has a preferred fighting style, but like the monk, is trained in a certain path of fighting, honing his acrobatic and athletic skill, while mastering a single style of combat and weapon, some may be magically augmented, or have learned to control particular energies and incorporate it into their swordplay. There would potentially be many mundane duelists of course, fencers, pit fighters, and the like. It may take more differentiation than a fighter to make that clear but no more than it took to differentiate, say, fighter from monk. Mechanically, they are totally different, but one might argue that a monk could be a brand of fighter. I would imagine that duelists work in a sort of an exclusive master and apprentice nature. That in order to fully learn to be a duelist, someone who is not only a fighter but a master of a style of fighting and not only the broad spectrum, an intense regiment of training is necessary. The three musketeer's D'Artagnan, Princess Bride's Inigo Montoya, and Sword Art Online's Kirigaya Kazuto (Kirito), would all be examples of Duelists. These characters wield their weapons as not only extensions as themselves.

The slayer is perhaps the easiest. There are many possible archetypes, but I would imagine that on top of standard assassins, slayers tend to also be employed in assassin organization, as spies, and as bounty hunters. Granted, rangers don't have to be solely nature oriented, but I would imagine that rangers, would be the fighter-like comparison to the slayer. In essence, the slayer is a killer. That is where his specialty lies. I'd imagine such characters as Ezio Auditore, Dishonored's Corvo Attano, and Splinter Cell's Sam Fisher are all good examples of the type of style that slayers embody. They can hold their own in a fight, and especially Ezio's case, can fend of multiple attackers at once, but are most dangerous when they are after a particular target at a time. They come in many different forms, from slayers that focus on leading a team and serving and orchestrating large attacks. Some will dismantle an entire fortress leaving a pile of bodies in their wake. Other seek their target, never noticed, and slipping away like the wind. They are not the elaborate infiltrators assassins are, they are living weapons, forces of  destruction.

The three of these, I believe, can be integrated into a D&D setting with minimal issue, none of them in concept upset the idea of already existing aspects of the game. The most important question comes next:

Does what you want make another player option obsolete, or too heavily overlap with another player option?

Protecting the Old While Creating the New

This is the part where you must already have some idea as to how to implement the homebrew. You can't simply take pieces of various similar classes and mash them together. One of the flaws of the 3.5 system was often times one class be irrefutably better than another. This is where an intimate knowledge of design comes into play.

My designs are not complete, but I will give an example of how I am implementing each class, and you can see where the challenge is.  As I previously discussed, the magus class is based on the duskblade from 3.5 and the class of the same name from pathfinder. The 5e paladin sits around the same design space. However, what is often the best implementation that I discovered while creating the thaumaturge, was that what is best for these hybrid-esque classes is to find a method to employ similar features that work differently. For example take Arcane Strike feature:

Beginning at 2nd level, once per turn whenever you hit a creature with a melee attack, you deal an extra 1d6 force damage for every level of spell slot you have remaining. 

This is, of course, analogous to Divine Smite, but it works somewhat differently and creates a different dynamic between spellcasting and the feature. As I have DM'ed for various paladins, I find that they prefer Divine Smite over their spellcasting, and rarely use their available spells. In this model for the magus, the advantage of using spells will be netting different effects for the sake of overcoming challenges. Paladins normally would happily trade spells for damage, as their spells usually affect only one target to begin with. As I have played a paladin before, I found myself desperately wanting more area effect spells. The magus will have plenty of this type of spell to go around where the trade in damage is acceptable, hitting more creatures and in the long run doing potentially less damage. 

In the case of the duelist, the duelist uses a resource called Talent. Similar to the variance of the thaumaturge, the duelist has a different source and use of Talent depending on the type of duelist they are. Each duelist has a number of talent points equal to a mental ability score. So in the case of the Fencer, it is called Prowess and is based on the fencer's intelligence score. Unlike the thaumaturge, the base class progression gives abilities that each talent can access, but also abilities each archetype has specific to it. The talent points of a duelist fluctuates. Whenever they reduce a creature to 0 hit points with a duelist weapon, or score a critical hit with a duelist weapon, they regain a talent point. Each archetype offers a third method. In the fencer's case, a successful parry and riposte (you'll see).
Given the ability score rules, we can assume the max talent points a duelist will ever have is 6. Monks do not replenish ki until a short rest, but they have far more ki points than a duelist will ever have of talent points. If you will, duelists are to monks as warlocks are to sorcerers. The types of abilities we will want to incorporate are going to be abilities that are less powerful than monk's uses, to where it is acceptable if they happen more frequently. That is demonstrated from the warlock's at will abilities. That will be key in implementing the duelist and differentiating it's abilities from the monk's.

The slayer's concept demands the most attention to the rules as it deals with, for lack of a better term, straight up murdering people. What is also important is to not interfere with rogue's design space. Rogue has the highest amount of consistent "burst" damage in the game. In fact, it is one of the appeals of the class. That being said, it is necessary to create a similar appeal in slayer without stealing the main concept of the class. For instance, let's remove the idea of utilizing sneak attack to create an assassin. Not to say we won't use a form of "burst" damage in slayer, but I am sure it will not be anywhere near as much as the eventual 10d6 that rogue boasts and will not use the same conditions that sneak attack requires. That is a huge difference in choosing a class, and choosing between the two classes. You may prefer a set of conditions for the burst damage over another, if you feel like your party is mostly spell casters, or other characters that do not "flank" much than sneak attack will be harder for you to achieve. Take for instance the 6th level ability of Slayer:

Eliminate the Weak
Beginning at 6th level, whenever you hit a surprised creature with a weapon attack and its challenge rating is below a certain threshold, it must make a Constution saving throw or be reduced to 0 hit points. 

The thresholds work almost exactly like Destroy Undead, later on the slayer will be able to stealthily cut his way through opponents that would normally take longer for other characters to deal with despite the power level. It also alleviates potentially bad damage rolls. Nothing hurts more than watching a 6d6 sneak attack be plagued by 1's. Four 1's, a 5 and a 6, is only 16 damage, plus whatever weapon damage is not very much. This guarantees that the slayer will have a very different role in infiltration than the rogue and could be very valuable. However, this way, it is still valuable to have a rogue in a fight.

This way we answer three of the five questions in such a way we can move on. The next part is less about balance, and more about the philosophy of the game. Next time, we'll take a look at the final two questions, and discuss what is important about the integrity of the game balance for the sake of the players and the system itself in part 2.

Hang-ups about Homebrewing

To Brew or Not to Brew: That is the Question

Yesterday I got a chance to talk with my good friend, GMing accomplice, and personal co-DMing referee, DM Starhelm regarding his stance on homebrewing for a roleplaying game, predominantly in the instance of homebrewing in D&D. So before those of you that adore homebrewing whip out your torches and pitchforks, wait 'til the end of the article, please. 

He and I agreed on 99.97% of the issue of homebrewing. While I often approach homebrewing from a stance of "Let's all be creative", he remarked that homebrewing isn't a bad thing, but when poorly handled it detracts from the base game. D&D specifically is about a scope of limited creativity and then using story to bring those rules to life. For instance in 3.5 people often said fighters were boring. Well, if the fighter class was boring, then perhaps one wasn't being truly creative; not the design team, but the player. He reminded me that the more open a system becomes, the harder it is to not only govern the system, but the harder it is to actually create something in D&D because the openness becomes paralyzing. I entirely agree with him in that regard. Some games have a principle of "you can make whatever", like my favorite example of my least favorite game, Mutants and Masterminds. In Mutants and Masterminds, there are no classes. Through some odd number of points you buy the entirety of your character. I can't stand that about a game. I like being shown where something can go, and on top of that, it leaves less to GM intervention. For example, there is a time travel power that in my most recent play of the game, the GM would not let anyone take it. As a principle time travel is a huge mechanic that leans entirely on the support of the GM. To DM Starhelm and I, that violates some of our major philosophies (strong word, I know), concerning the relationship between players, the GM and the rules. Character abilities shouldn't make more work for the GM. Ever. Things like 5e's Know Your Enemy, the legend lore or commune spell, are about communication with the GM. It invites the occurrence of more players being told no when the player rules are supposed to be an inclusion of what is possible for the players outside of DM intervention. 

What Starhelm finds most entertaining about a system like D&D 5e is that the focus is on creating things with the tools provided. "If a player wants something too far outside those parameters then they may be looking for a different game entirely," he said. He isn't wrong. Let's get that out of the way. He is not wrong. Especially in regards to 5e, 5e scaled back the vast expansion of what not only were constant exceptions to the rule but constant re-explanation (in the form of Prestige classes or variants). The system is no no longer breakable, you can't have an overpowered character because of some ridiculous clause in the rules that is exploitable due to a massive oversight in design. 

Starhelm also would prefer to have fully explored what a game has to offer before turning to an alternative method, rule system, or class and subsequent features. His love of gaming is a perfect example of truly loving tabletop gaming and respecting the initial vision of that system. That stood out to me as something I often miss; roleplaying games aren't different implementations of the same method, they are vehicle to explore a type of game and the stories that can be told with those systems specifically.  He quoted one of our favorite tabletop-centric bloggers/writers, the Angry GM. "Roleplaying games are not so much a game but a console. The stories told with them, those sessions are the game." In other words, it is how you use the capabilities of that console to make and play the games that are available or that you create. In real life, I own three modern video game systems, a Wii U, a 3DS, PS4, and a gaming computer. There are definitely different things that I set out to play each one for. I am more likely to play my Wii U with friends over, my 3DS when I am out and about or bed ridden, my PS4 for single-player games, and my computer when I am playing something that requires me to have more precise control through mouse and keyboard. I have a purpose for each one. With each one, I prefer different types games. Table-top gaming is no different. I love D&D and I probably like it the best because I am most familiar. For an overall swashbuckling adventure I'd prefer 7th Sea, Super heroes, I'd prefer Cold Steel Wardens, and futuristic roleplay I'd definitely say Numenera. Starhelm, I believe is right. I do have preferences when it comes to gaming. So that being said, why do I bother with homebrew?

First, I am not stopping, so don't worry about that. My opinion hasn't changed, if anything as I tend to have Starhelm do, I drew my guidelines from what he said and refined them along side my already existing guidelines. So I present to you The Starhelm Homebrewing Protocol that I name after my dear friend that I now use as a guide and cautionary measure.

 

The Starhelm Homebrewing Protocol

1. Can what you want flavor-wise be achieved through archetypes, multiclassing, or simple flavor changes or interpretations?  
2. Does what you want conflict with the setting for the game you are trying to play and is more suited to be created in an entirely different game?
3. Does what you want make another player option obsolete, or too heavily overlap with another player option?
4. Do the requirements of what you want put too much stress on the game's system? 
5. Does what you want slow the game or detract from the fun of other players?

If you answered all of these questions with a no, then go right ahead. Question 1 is hard to get past because with some instances you may get close but not where you want something, maybe it doesn't suit how you'd like to play or it doesn't work like you hoped due to strain on the rules. (such as Multiple Ability Dependency) However, if you answered yes to any of them, you have your answer. 

Special thanks to DM Starhelm for his time, input, and continued effort to help me be a better GM.