telok
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Posts: 30
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Post by telok on Oct 9, 2021 22:18:47 GMT -6
Ya, first post after a few years of check & scans. A couple years ago I grabbed the books and ran a weekly game for 10-11 months. With the onset of the plague and the shutdown of gaming (assorted personal reasons online games can't do for another year or three) I decided to reread the books and tackle some of the issues I'd run into. I ended up checking any internet mention of DtD I could search up. Spreadsheets were made, the pdfs split into individual pages, fonts extracted and loaded into OpenOffice, edits, recompiles, etc. Along the way I learned stuff like using fillable form pdfs to implement random generators and die rollers, plus getting reminded that people really can't estimate probability & risk worth a damn. It's done. Works best on a pdf reader that can do fillable forms. Indexes and key words are linked. Hard to believe its been a year and a half of lunch breaks, nights after everyone else went to bed, and occasional naps. On phone so this won't be pretty but... Book 1 book 1Book 2 book 2Android app apk drive.google.com/file/d/17eg_FBb6tS_CO-L_VGr3cb1zkgYeh2mW/view?usp=drivesdkStand alone files, all in book pdfs but separate here Character sheet drive.google.com/file/d/1-53iwYa-q0kwo8oUeoR7zqoXivv6Zncz/view?usp=drivesdkSpelljammer web page drive.google.com/file/d/1Kr-tCzxHuaf8wKvG2CFMSc9kTyPSNSZ4/view?usp=drivesdkVehicle builder vehicle builder html web page% calculator web page drive.google.com/file/d/1AfE2VxOW9t6Qz4PWABXQ2Cyvgl2VvLQs/view?usp=drivesdk% calculator pdf drive.google.com/file/d/1-5MlbX-Ql1NqNVeeMJJDs_pIi_-G7ajl/view?usp=drivesdkDice roller web page dice roller web pageDice roller pdf dice roller pdf (uses forms)Space mishap roller web page drive.google.com/file/d/1OP1ZuwtlLMZT9syqHbadtY7ppGl8qJU9/view?usp=drivesdkSpace mishap roller pdf drive.google.com/file/d/1-Cb1h2AKhIBkPvoKf-9H5DmLzvW1fIFm/view?usp=drivesdkDaemon & hero generator web page drive.google.com/file/d/145zv6s67iLpazjQIPjBkIcMrnwoaZWUl/view?usp=drivesdkDaemon & hero generator pdf drive.google.com/file/d/145F2iiIerhd-lu7DPdcsZc9gjD4ZhFPX/view?usp=drivesdkWarp perils roller web page perils of the warp web pageWarp perils roller pdf perils of the warp roller pdf (forms)Combined rollers pdf Additional vehicles doc
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Post by Divergent Reality on Oct 9, 2021 22:35:10 GMT -6
Neat
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Post by GuardianTempest on Oct 9, 2021 22:41:47 GMT -6
Welcome to the forum, feel free to wander around and take a gander at the different attractions. It's interesting to see other people make their own independent attempts. You're from the Giant in the Playground forums, are you? I've got something for you to look at then: a list of OOtS characters as DtD builds! Most of these might fly over your head since they mention homebrew but don't worry, it's all in the forum. The community here, as "seemingly-dead" as it is, has made their own attempts at revising Core rulebook material. Mostly exaltations, which you can inspect here. There's also a bunch of house rules, erratas and clarifications as well in this thread. Meanwhile, over here is the great directory, a shortcut for almost all homebrew content (except for the ones made out of here). It's almost done, the third segment is taking longer than usual on my end. Fun fact: This community was originally in Zetaboards and lasted years...until Tapatalk took over and we switched forums to Proboards. It's why a lot of old homebrew don't have much discussion on them. A lot of this hasn't been put into a PDF in years because homebrew changes more quickly than anticipated (repeatedly uploading PDFs with small changes would get tiresome). Also, we don't really have anyone who could compile a new PDF and 90% of what we have isn't tested very hard. The ongoing Play-by-Post serve as playtesting in the meantime. I will edit this post with further assessments though I apologize if I would come across as nitpicky. I'm a little upset that I'm the only regular awake at this timezone (most of the veteran members are asleep or at work). Give it 12 hours and the others would show up. EDIT: I've decided to put it into a separate post.
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Post by GuardianTempest on Oct 10, 2021 2:51:20 GMT -6
EDIT: Post rescinded, I got carried away yesterday. I'll put it back eventually. I guess the isolation really did make me go crazy. EDIT 2: Alright, enough time has passed. I've omitted mentions of local homebrew apart from a few exceptions. Original version of message remains in my clipboard manager for further insight. Disclaimer: My words are my own and does not represent the opinions of rest of the homebrew community. If the others have anything to say about your uploads then they will. Also I'm not a homebrew master, much of my stuff has holes in it (if you ever pick Gemini, don't pick the Notorious BIG asset—it's not finalized). In DtD terms I'm Level 3 but Power Stat 2 with Loco (Read As Intended ALWAYS).Beast IV: Beast of Comparison!Exaltations Chosen Interesting way of handling Devotion. Of course, the Chosen was made before the morality tables came in.
Daemonhost Ah, that's why people say it's OP (aside from the free action resonance eruption).
Promethean Ah, right, cramming more text makes it hard on the PDF makers—another reason why it was held back. Superlative Construction, the system for the core rulebook is that critical damage isn't treated separately (it's a reasonably-popular house rule though) and Prometheans are a deliberate exception.
In my opinion, I think you're mistaken on how the additive system works. You're not adding different effects, but layering them to a total. Example: You already have two points of crit damage to your left arm, the next attack to hit your right leg uses 3 crit damage if it deals 1 wound or 5 if the attack deals 3 wounds (severing the leg and killing you). This makes Prometheans very tough by comparison. I could be wrong on what you mean, I might just be misinterpreting what you typed out.
Vampire Hmm, I see you removed their Undead trait. Yes it's powerful but I think it's deliberate since a Vampire (especially a low-level one) has other ways it can get screwed over. Running out of Vitae for instance is a death sentence and they can't stay in open sunlight. They essentially have two "weakness abilities" to compensate. Other undead-based exaltations also encountered this issue but giving them Stuff of Nightmares was even worse, so they resorted to weakening their ways of healing (Harrowed for instance need to use up Resolve).
Werewolf ScrapyardDragon also subscribes to the thought that HP changes could kill a character ("you count wounds UP"), while I go with HP from stat changes are temporary ("You cound HP as it goes DOWN, free HP is free HP")—because Kingprotea is one of my favorite FGO Servant in terms of gameplay.
To be fair, the rocket tag-ish nature of combat makes it so typical fights end before you run out of Warform rounds (and if you do you can just shift back again). Some people think Sacred Hunt sucks (including myself).
ClassesRatcatcher, Scholar I'm okay with this, dunno about others. Ah, but do note that Free Study to enter Minstrel is only recommended if one of your finished classes has Charisma as a supported skill.
Peasant Mildly disagree with making Sound Constitution mandatory. I get that you want to be able to multiclass into Guardsman but (AFAIK) you can already buy optional feats from finished classes while in Free Study. The Peasant's big selling point is being able to buy ranks in any Characteristic and being easy to complete (in exchange for being kinda lame otherwise).
Other classes Personally I don't like bumping down feats from the Level their first appeared in, even though Far Shot rarely became relevant in the few sessions I've participated in. But I'm guessing some of the feats also got buffs as well.
Feats A house-rule said that Divine Bond could be used with a 100VP vehicle, which could represent an actual horse (statted via vehicle rules) or a motorcycle.
I agree with the tip on Improvisational Magic.
To be fair, Dragons are a BIG DEAL in DtD so of course their approach would be supernatural.
Fearless (Cool) is just Nerves of Steel. I think current Fearless can stand on its own since it's a combination of two other feats for the priceof one.
Racial Feats As I mentioned above, we have different interpretations of critical damage. You don't separate different crit damage attacks to the same limb, you just update it with a new value. (Two crit 1 attacks just mean you are now at crit 2 to the new limb.) Sure, it has a side effect of making Dragonborn Frenzy weaker but it is what it is.
I'm da Boss is interpreted a static bonus.
Assets Tip for Veteran o' the Wheel penalties: It can be a different kind of mechanical penalty. Examples: Begin play with Devotion 1, roll on the shock table whenever (trigger), <Race> meet you with a lower Disposition, you don't get to pick your starter package, etc.
Exaltation Assets What, no nerf for Mark of Tzeentch? Yeah, Mark of Nurgle is kinda lame at Power Stat 1, I (and others, I hope) always tries to make exaltation assets applicable at Level 1.
I like your image for the Daemonhost assets. Rider's a good girl (but not best girl for me—that would be Gareth).
Interesting choice of effect for Greed, 100 XP for potentially 300 XP worth of background dots.
I think only Legendary Hero can be bought after character creation BUT the Paragon can take multiple Exaltation assets.
I see your buffs to Ventrue and Toreador, I have no comments as I have not played a Vampire.
Hindrances Allowing four hindrances seems like a bad idea, but on the other hand it appeals to me because you can start the game with 1000 spent XP instead of 800 (and 1000 is a better number geometrically than 800—more divisors).
Making Big Britches "off-able" seems like an easy way out but then again, other core Hindrances also have saving throws.
Will to Live doesn't really seem much like a Hindrance compared to Deathwish. I like the bit about makiing it hard to avoid Pinning though.
Hmm, Vengeful revision makes it hard to play characters who do petty "poke the poodle" types like weird tsunderes and serial pranksters.
I like being able to choose the kind of Wanted you have tailing you. The SM I played with kinda allowed that as a houserule.
Wimpy is free XP for a Promethean plus it doesn't make you wimpy where it matters the most: getting hurt.
MagicI like the idea of giving free ranks to in-universe events but none of my experiences so far has that happen to me aside from a new Hero Point...and maybe a new derangement. Oh wait, that was from Insanity Points.
That's why Daggerspell Stance is a thing.
Abjuration I know a trick you can do with Wall of Force: Wrap it around someone in a spiral. If he can fly then cover the "hole" as well.
Healing You could just say "The caster and all allies within 10m"
Necromancy Wow you really buffed up Draining Touch.
Sword SchoolsAh yes, free style points. It's also a popular house rule but there were some tweaks because you could just save up on free points before spending it all on super attacks. It's also a lot wordier than before. Do you allow that? Point banking (not immediately spending your free points)?
Yeah Knockout Blow was really vague like that, the SM I played with ruled that it doesn't stack (I never used it ehough...I was playtesting a my first homebrew class at the time).
BackgroundsOne of the popular houserules has its own codified system for player-like Allies, it works slightly different to yours (namely in that each dot past the first provides an extra 1k XP). XP gain is halved, just like yours. AlignmentGood point on the force-roleplay EquipmentGood idea for the Toxic property revision. I'll use it myself...if I ever run a game.
"Wear your helmets, kids." Hah! I agree.
Great minds think alike, I also don't apply completion bonuses for Static Defense reduction.
Agreed with the encumbrance. I suggest having something for Clip 1 weapons like bows, house rules suggest giving three shots/reloads per "clip". This was mostly because artifact ammo for bows are finicky. Oh wait you already figured that out. Playing the GameThere are two schools of thought here revolving around 11kX: Either you convert or you don't. I am in the former camps since I go with the RAW interpretation of if rolled_dice =< 11 then take -2k0 and add +0k1 ALWAYS. Others disagree, as it would make 11k9 turn into 9k10 (which becomes 9k9, losing the extra bonus) and only convert if the rolled dice is 12kX or above. Others agree with you on the saving throw bit. Trivia: in an earlier version Arcana was listed as a Basic skill in the blank template while listed as Advanced in the skill descriptions—the idea is that anyone can make Saving Throws. Others made a house rule that let you use Level in place of Arcana for saving throws. Opportunity Attack is a free action, and the glossary states that you could only have one free action per turn (or round, I dunno). Great advice for the Danger Sense, "I'll steal it! No one will ever know!" Either interpretation of Delay works for me, as you're ever only doing one real action and the other is procrastinated. Brawling property states that you use Brawl (the skill) instead of Weaponry for those actions, so if you want to disarm someone with your bare hands then use Brawl (since your limbs automatically have Brawling). Fight Defensively only covers melee as you're essentially doing a careful poke with your sword (or a snap jab in boxing). I dunno how you can "fight defensively" with a gun. Shoot with your pinky out? Jamming: What? Where'd you get that? For us it doesn't mean that the gun is more likely to jam when you increase in level. If anything, increasing your level makes you LESS likely to jam (as your threshold increases). Besides, most people start with 3-4 Ballistics, what kind of Lunatic would start with- oh right, in the earliest versions of the game attacks were made with Skill+Dexterity, which made Dexterity the god stat. I like the rule of capping social drain to Fellowship as well, gives the characteristic a little more love. Personally I'd say "Charisma or Fellowship, whichever is higher" because there are characters who aren't socially dexterous but are imposing enough to get their point across (e.g. Louise Valliere from Familiar of Zero). I would allow using Composure for Fear/Insanity tests. Insanity is one of the banes of someone I know. "Permanent damage"/consequences is tricky to deal with. The StoryYeah I got nothing either, I just make up my own settings—by which I mean blatantly stealing things and saturated with crossover characters. Wanna team up with Boone and Lofn (from /tg/ lore) to fight Miko Miyazaki and Team RWBY in Kaurava I from Dawn of War: Soulstorm? I am actually serious with this pitch. I am the biggest crossover maniac in this forum. Story MasterSimple XP method 4 life. Dramatis PersonaeYeah, in the earliest edition the attacks are Ballistics/Weaponry+Dex, and it never got updated. The community made a revised version that updates their HP values to match how player HP is calculated. I kinda disagree with it since the players are Exalts, of course they operate on a bigger scale than mortals. Trying to up the HP of the mooks just makes combat a slog. So for me if I make a non-Exalt/non-important NPC their HP is just Willpower+Constitution. Also I recognize you grabbing the opportunity for that...minion squad. AAAAAAAHAHAHAHA I KNOW YOUR PAIN, ONE OF MY EXALTATION ASSETS PROVIDES MINIONS AND EQUIPPING THEM TAKES UP LIKE HALF THE PARAGRAPH. Appendixes and TablesOne of the tips I learned from weredrago2 (a veteran homebrew maker, retired a few years back) is not to go overboard with subsystems. Of course I kinda fail at it most of the time (my homebrewing style is to prioritize RAI clarity) but if opportunity arises I would like to keep it simple. Well, I appreciate these things, should be useful for less decisive SMs who aren't fond of "eyeballing it". Your Necromancy rules would be useful for the necromancer exaltations/classes, normally they'd resort to Minion Rules or refluffing existing profiles—which would be dumb if you killed an enemy Exalt. Hmm, never thought about codifying chase sequences. For me I'd just roll opposed Acrobatics/Athletics+Dexterity tests and let stunting+abstraction carry the way. I love your opening paragraph of the Antagonists section, really shows you understand the tone of the game. You've got a lot of good ideas, and whatever my feelings conclude is "bad" is only because I'm unfamiliar. Book 2 will get a separate assessment...tomorrow. Ish. Maybe. Book 2: Comparisons in the LostbeltRacesNo comment on the Kobold overhaul since I don't play the race myself (I've only played like what, 5% of available options?) On one hand I don't like rocking the boat too much, on the other hand I never really use Pheromones (a Matron Dryad was more appealing). It was the Dryad racial power that led to the spell-like ability house rule since "A Dryad shouldn't smell so good that it rains blood." If you don't like the Pheromone ability, I suggest changing the spell/effect used instead of gutting it outright. How about a free raise to social tests within 10m unless the target can't smell? Treat is as perfume instead of magic mind control. People with allergies would have every right to have a Disposition of Unfriendly (or even Hostile) towards you though. ExaltationsI don't think the Ghost Dice example was trying to imply that you can do toonforce with it. It was just a silly example to show how the die works. Not a fan of the alt rule since Perils is rather harsh. My suggestion is to include a clause for what happens if multiple 10s/1s show up.
For your question about Poltergeist, I don't think Disarming counts since it's fine control. Neither is tripping. Knock Downs though seem like it just uses brute force so I (personally) would allow it.
I would rule is as current Resolve as it would be indicated otherwise. It's not like anyone actually spends it when they could switch to violence.
The aura is the "Drawback ability" of the Dragonblooded IMO, and it's a hefty one to compensate for the quick resource recovery and not needing Aspect for the amount. Sure you could spend a lot of Breath but you'll have to sit in the corner for a while. It's a good representation of how powerful and dangerous a Dragon in DtD is. The most wonderful thing about the vanilla resource calculation is that it's very build-agnostic. Your version of needing Constitution would mean some builds are strictly worse if they don't find a way to level Con. I think your version of Dragon Skin is a waste of a Power if you invest enough Wisdom to exceed 10 AP with Monk. The community-revised version of Dragon Skin is only equal to Aspect but it can stack with other sources of armor (it's Aspect 4, I think you're entitled to "exception abilities").
Classes, Feats and AssetsClass Feats It's tied to the specific Elemental Shot level and specific Element available. If you only have Elemental Shot I (Ice) but with three uses, then that's all you're going to have (but hey, three Snare attacks is nice). Fun fact: It doesn't strictly say it has to be a ranged attack, you could use this on your sword...or better yet, add it to your fists.
Yes you can stack Unarmed Warrior/Master with Focus/Specialization. Might want to get Inheritance 4 for a pair of Power Fists.
I wouldn't allow Wholeness of Body to count as worn armor, for one thing it's not—it's just you and your body. Also the Monk's completion bonus complements that.
Racial Feats Depending on the build and homebrew used, Ancestral Recall doesn't seem that bad. Haven't played a caster Eldarin yet though, what do I know?
Ahh, the Matron. I remember the earliest cheese build in the game: The Treeminator. It's about being a Dragonblooded (Metal) Matron with a Machinator Array, a Power Armor (I think), and an arrangement of dots to speed through Peasant and reach Tactical Officer. Start the game at Level 2 with 9 Resilience. Sure your Static Defense is "Yes, you hit" but you'll be hitting hard...with 3 Brawl, hopefully.
Exaltation Assets No changing the Children of Salt? Heh, it was the asset that was being targeted when the community revisions project started out. The cheese with it is that you force your victims to take actions they didn't say they would take. For example, dodging an attack they didn't say they would or getting out of a Snare when they said they didn't. And if they said they would dodge the snare then...don't and waste their turn. This would suck really hard if it was inflicted on the players. It's quite the juggling act. Gun KataI really don't agree with what you've done to Gun Katas. I can see that you're trying to make it "symmetrical" but being asymmetrical was the point of it and it's what made them appealing over Sword Schools. Melee attacks already get bonus damage from Strength and have more ability/feat synergies compared to ranged attacks. Plus it also gives more creative room for what could be done (even though there are less homebrew katas than Sword Schools). Not to mention that some Gun Katas have Level 1 advantages or passives so there's payoff. I do agree that Exit Wound Kata is broken.
I was certain that you can't already use Trick shots with grenade launchers since the ammunition is only part of the launcher.
Clay Pigeon Speed Loader kinda makes Jumping Dove Concentration redundant in most cases except for the usual artifact ammo.
Crisis Zone No. No. NO. If you're gonna make Gun Kata more like Sword Schools then the least you could do is stick to one action. Suppressing Fire, that's it. You can already do it from an Overwatch anyway.
One way to reword Razing Storm is "double the damage dice provided by raises on a Full Auto Burst." It's clunkier but it should stack with Storm (the property).
More Dakka is concerning since it messes with the action economy. Since this attack counts as a "Full Auto Burst" it synergizes with stuff like Vampire's Celerity, Steel Rain and Point Blank's advantages. Also, since you get a free Full Auto Burst, what if I used it with a Ready or Aim action? Another inquiry: Since the action is a Full Auto Burst and not the original action, could I perform two 10-point trick shots in one turn? More Dakka is essentially "Full Auto Burst as a Half Action", so could I make a 10-point Standard Attack afterwards?
Elemental Gearbolt Well that's one way to nerf Exit Wound Kata.
Warp Weapons is kinda lame for a Level 4 "mastery".
I see, Cloud Shooting is a bit like Mosquito's Bite but not really. Very cinematic.
Point Blank You're not limited to one sword school/gun kata, you can use the action of one school with the weapon of another. Dragon's Dance wouldn't provoke if you picked something like Aim or Standard Attack (you'd look stupid to your target though).
I think Bullet Dance Technique happens on the spot.
Unarmed already implies Brawling.
Silent Scope I like this overhaul. I was miffed that BOOM! Headshot! only grants Tearing.
Tin Star They never did clarify where the unkept dice went. My assumption was to the attack roll. Vehicle RulesBehold! The Shopping Trolley of Doom! Just grab a tiny vehicle that uses Athletics, attach a Wave Motion Cannon and you're off! Trivialize all non-vehicle combat encounters! Although the thing with Gun Carts is that it's easy to break, one good hit and kiss it goodbye.
I have no further comments because I'm not the one playing with vehicles.
...apart from the particle cannons being stronger than the Core books. But then again most of them weren't meant to turn that Werewolf into mincemeat.
ShipsNOPE NUH-UH I AM NOT TOUCHING THIS SECTION I DON'T CARE HOW "BALANCED" OR "UNBALANCED" OR HOW MUCH I DISAGREE WITH IT I HAVE NO EXPERIENCE WITH THIS AT ALL GO ASK SOMEONE ELSE Weapon CreationIt's why only the earliest of the homebrew weapons tried to follow it, everyone else gave up. However the costs of the weapon mods are often used as guidelines for Sword School/Gun Kata advantages, and how rare a homebrew weapon should be with a given mod. Not to mention some homebrew interactions that use the cost of the weapon mod as a balancing factor (e.g. ability that lets you add a +2 mod or two +1 mods). BionicsMachinator Arrays (and a bunch of other effects really) don't actually add free Characteristic dots, only an "effective modifier". I made that mistake before. Trying to cap it at +5 makes investing Strength 5 pointless if you're getting the array for Resilience. AppendixPeople scared of Psychic Phenomena? Look at the play-by-post thread, multiple Psychic Phenomena rolls happened and the worst thing that happened was my PC disappearing for a few rounds. And keep in mind that was with the PCs going wild and NONE of them had any wraithbone/Adamantine artifacts nor are they Chosen of Tzeentch. It doesn't hurt that one of the PCs has a vehicle with void shieldsI really appreciate the Last Words section, thank you for that. I have no further comments, my eyes glazed over the rest as my mind desires to run the game...but I live in SEA and pretty much everyone else lives in the west. So for the three Roll20 campaigns I was part of I had to wake up super-damn-early.
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Post by Traskus on Oct 10, 2021 11:46:50 GMT -6
GT, I’m going to word this as kindly as I can: stop talking about proboards this isn’t about us.
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chippo
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Posts: 211
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Post by chippo on Oct 10, 2021 12:43:14 GMT -6
>Scared of phenomena
my first ever character was a kobold atlantean who resolved paradox at least 8 times out of 10 by deliberately causing phenomena, because it resulted in fun and crazy shit. Like causing a teleport storm in a space station. That was fun (maybe not for scrap tho).
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telok
New Member
Posts: 30
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Post by telok on Oct 10, 2021 17:38:07 GMT -6
Oh, I'll hang around.
When I was considering where to put this I decided on homebrew because thats really what it is. I tried to be pretty explicit that everything in the annotations commentary and appendices is optional/house rule territory. This should be reinforced by the 'big list of questions' attachment in book 2. The primary reason I wasn't doing the work here or relying on this board's brew was that I wanted reactions and input from people who weren't already masters of the system. I wanted the books to stand when facing a group where someone stumbled across the game, downloaded the basic rules, and ran it for their group without doing a deep dive into mechanics or forums.
Promethians & crits: is offered as an option and the SM should decide how they want to run it. We tried it both ways. Adding crit levels took people out fast, 2x crit-2 body was a kill shot and one of the most common crit results. Layering crit effects gave us more fatigue knockouts and missing limbs. Either way its something the SM needs to decide because it affects crit interaction with promethians and how they want to deal with that.
Vamps & undead: the vamps had to change a bit because the undead trait changed a bit. Originally it was technically possible to have a lich die from bleeding. And I think there was another status that got missed too. Anyways, I was looking at adding a bunch of text to either vamps or several enemy entries. Of course it also affects wraith too, since they do get the full undead tag.
Stat caps, dragon blood & bionics: I wanted to limit the number of fiddly bits & 6 stats. Power armor and its +1 str caused... issues... with a couple less rules parsing saavy players. I was aiming for simplicity and avoiding a problem I'd encountered.
Gun kata & sword schools: several players dipped book 2 classes for expanded study or a sheriff track class for the free ammo. There was also fair confusion over gun kata because they weren't like the sword schools. However nobody took a sword school (or any gk past L1) because they felt like they were "paying twice" for effects. I figured the gk change would be contraversial here, but I needed some way to compare the effects-per-dots across kata and that was the simplest I came up with. I'm also nearly unconcerned about L5 ss & gk abilities being overpowered since that's meteor storm level already.
Vehicles & gun carts: mentioned in the appendix under vehicle rule problems. There was a fair complicated spreadsheet involved over the vehicle weapons. Another consideration was getting things like the Atlas AC/20 not being able to reasonably take out a sz9 passenger van, but the WMG needing to be better than the AC/20 to justify fluff & costs. Generally it comes down to "the SM has to say 'no' sometimes". Also, additional vehicle doc attached to book 2 for sanity checking.
Warp travel: there was a nasty spreadsheet. I scraped info on early 19th century shipping & ship losses to try for a goal of ships not making a trip. Crossed that with the default navigator & pilot being 4k2 skills. Scaled to get crew quality 1 tramp freighters able to mostly make shorter trips ok, but put ultra long trips dangerous-but-do-able for high quality crews. The iterative probability of repeat rolls in-warp and multiple warp encounters was half the sheet. Could try to dig it up and post if interest.
More as I think of it. Sad face I rarely get to use comp at home much these days, so phone posting is primary if awkward.
Edit: warp stuff. We had a guy couldn't stop pushing spells. Took about a year of play for him to burn three hero points and get 100 insanity. That's where the custom warp tables came in, base ones were boring after a bit and turned out insta-kill a little too often after he got a permanent +10 on that second table roll. Play with the warp roller to get a feel for the new ones, or open the web page version in a text editor/ide to see or change the tables yourself. Getting new/non-mastery people to look at the system was what prompted the appendix on safe sex. They absolutely couldn't grok the magic system not being a death sentence.
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chippo
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Posts: 211
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Post by chippo on Oct 10, 2021 18:28:16 GMT -6
While, yes, katas are typically more appealing than sword schools, and start to be actively useful typically off the bat, making them just about the same as schools… it just makes them kinda lame. Like, Crisis Zone was great when I played a full auto heavy weapons character, because that first rank meant there was no need to brace. I eventually dropped the character (due to the shortfalls of being a full auto heavy weapons character), but I would’ve assuredly dropped them far sooner if I had to alternate every round bracing and shooting, being unable to benefit from feats that rewarded you for holding down the trigger round after round.
Having a worthwhile passive at entry allows for some fun characters to take off at the gate, and make up for hitches in functionality that might leave them feeling like FFXIII. “It gets good x y’s in” isn’t a compelling argument when the time invested to get to the somewhat fun bit is spent in boredom or frustration. Melee doesn’t have this problem so much, so sword schools can be a more high investment option without the base play experience potentially suffering.
I had to look again to make sure that this rendition of Crisis Zone gives some way to avoid bracing, and, yes, it does. It gives you sorta-kinda auto stabilized at 4. My point is, is anyone really going to make it that far just so they could have basic functionality? I know, you could use a non-heavy full auto weapon, but… why do that if you could get right to the experience you actually want?
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telok
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Posts: 30
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Post by telok on Oct 10, 2021 20:54:28 GMT -6
Isn't the only reason you'd need to keep re-bracing is if you keep moving between bursts? All heavy guns are is straight upgrades from basic guns with the bracing requirement being the only difference (well ok, you can't one-hand them either).
See, my rewriting was a response to the confusion and reluctance of players to take any gun kata for any reason except the 1 dot to get unlimited ammo. They never had issues with the ranged/melee split, ranged got cover and immunity to feint/disarm while melee had better damage and feinting. They had the objection about "paying twice" to sword schools, but they mostly considered gun kata worthless or confusing except the ammo one. It's the same thing with conjuration magic, I moved Blink to 2nd level because two people dipped back to Initiate specifically for it. It was partially the dis-similarity from the relatively more structured sword schools that turned them off to the whole gun kata system.
So I'm OK with gun kata following the sword school pattern. I didn't see any sort of 'imbalance' between melee & ranged combat, structuring them in the same manner should make it easier for novices to compare them, and it made trying for some sort of inter-kata parity easier for me. Tho looking at it again clay pigeon could maybe use another tweak.
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chippo
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Post by chippo on Oct 10, 2021 23:09:23 GMT -6
Guess that goes to show how long it’s been since I’ve interacted with heavy weapons. I didn’t understand bracing back then, and it turned out to be moot anyway when I was reminded that I had Crisis Zone.
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telok
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Post by telok on Oct 15, 2021 15:22:37 GMT -6
Errata time. Random people on the internet make terrible proof readers. Book 1: drive.google.com/file/d/1EtX_CNC7-1CCIaTu_s9jCY2lcZchQfd9/view?usp=drivesdkMyrmidon changed from bling fighting mandatory and quick draw optional to quickdraw mandatory and blind fighting optional. It was possible to not qualify for the next level. Some words changed about installing bionics. There was a font error on one letter and some of the justified spacing looked bad. Book 2: drive.google.com/file/d/1EKPMddq1mBbMTgsDI_QQmX5yIdjgH4cY/view?usp=drivesdkOrgone array was completely missing from the new weapon attributes. In the Clay Pigeon gun kata the costs for the level 2 & 4 abilities were reversed. The links in the big post will be updated when I get to use a real computer for a few minutes.
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Post by Traskus on Oct 17, 2021 8:48:44 GMT -6
Errata time. Random people on the internet make terrible proof readers. Hey, I resemble that remark!
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Post by GuardianTempest on Oct 18, 2021 18:45:57 GMT -6
I have a suggestion telok: Since you've already begun tinkering with keywords, maybe you could add one for "casting this spell doesn't provoke opportunity attacks"? Or maybe use Subtle for that.
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telok
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Post by telok on Oct 20, 2021 0:58:38 GMT -6
I have a suggestion telok: Since you've already begun tinkering with keywords, maybe you could add one for "casting this spell doesn't provoke opportunity attacks"? Or maybe use Subtle for that. I'd considered it, but generally wanted to limit modification to the most out of whack stuff, things that caused me issues in play, and obvious problems. I came at the "combat touch spells soak oppAtk" from three directions. First is some changes to spells like Energy Grasp, allowing you to hold the spell effect in hand untill your next attack or the end of your next turn (certain spells intentionally lack that wording). Second is the commentary, the issue is noted in several comments and specifically called out for the dodge/parry spells with the red exclamation marks. Third is the issue and spells getting mentioned in The Big List, the file of pre-play rules questions for SMs that's attached to book 2. Aside: Spare time working on a script to map all level 1->5 paths through classes. Intention is to make it possible to copy-paste from book format into a text file, do a few global find/replace, a one pass editing, save, open the web page, select the file, get a big list.
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chippo
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Post by chippo on Oct 20, 2021 3:40:43 GMT -6
There was another thing I wanted to comment on: Homing. It needed an effect, but my fucking god. What horror have you wrought? Accurate + free full aim? I mean, yes, there are easy ways to circumvent it with an ECM or stealth (which I’m admittedly not fully sure what the intended implementation of that was), but if you don’t have a way or don’t know how to circumvent it… the pain that’s coming to you. Given that a lot of vehicles tend to have pretty paltry SD, even an LRM could cause devastating damage to even very tanky vehicles. Accurate is a premier choice for busting vehicles, even with weapons not on vehicle scale.
There was recent discussion on our part too about what homing should do. We came to two conclusions, more or less: halve the test result again for dodging/evasive maneuvering a homing weapon or you get a free raise to hit with a homing weapon. Not tremendously powerful, but not inappropriate. On vehicle scale, where you’re not able to apply proficiency, a free +5 can do a fair bit.
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