Rules discussion--

[Ameena]

Hmm yes, lol. I'm sure he'll be doing a lot more than just knocking people unconscious later on, though .

[raixel]

K, so I'll be combining the stats as LB stated, cuz that seems to be the genera1l consensus. OB and Ian, is this cool with you?

[oh_brother]

Yes, fine with me. Seems like a good compromise.

[beowuuf]

I'll PM you privately about how much I've screwed you over, my sources, and what you might find works/doesn't work as I'm seeing it.

[ian_scho]

I am completely lost as to the rules. Never seen them. Is the d20org site comparable?

[Ameena]

Oh good I'm not the only one .
There isn't actually a character creation guide on the d20org site - I checked . However, I have access to PDFs of what looks like every DnD 3.5 book ever written (the list is loooong ), so if you want we can meet on Skype some time and I can send you whatever you want. So far I've downloaded the PHB, MMI and MMII, and Savage Species (which tells you how to make various monsters into playable races), but I can get more if you want to see any of them.

[ian_scho]

Oh good I'm not the only one .
...I have access to PDFs of what looks like every DnD 3.5 book ever written (the list is loooong ), so if you want we can meet on Skype some time and I can send you whatever you want.

That's brilliant, ty! I'll stick to a basic human, me thinks. This stuff is complicated enough (for a noob) as it is. I'm sure others will help.

[beowuuf]

The d20 website has most of the thigns you need, actually. I kinda cheated the spells, obviously, though you can see the bones I worked on for spell selection.

For skills, there are far more skills - some I combined, some I dumped, based on what you guys would be doing in a dungeon. Still, all the mechanics and references are the same, even if you used a diffrent name.


Yeah, character creation can't be released as a free resource (part of the OGL license) though character creation is reasonably simple:

- roll for your six scores (3d6 as a basis, though most people use thigns like 4d6 drop lowest, etc)
- pick a class/race as documented and swap around the scores to the abilities you want high/low.
- Create all the rest of your stats (and get your skill points) from your class and race info, also documenting your class/race powers.
- pick your skill point allocations (Raixel will need to rule on what skills are combined, and how that affects you class skill points), remember to add class/race bonuses and remember humans get more skill points at each level.
- pick one feat for 1st level, one feat for 3rd, 6th, 9th etc level. Note that humans get one extra feat at 1st level. SOme classes get feats from a specific list at certain levels.
- you get to add one point to a single ability score at 4th, 8th, 12th level etc
- starting money is not given, though equipment costs are. However,it's campaign specific usually, so Raixel would need to say.

And done

Sounds like everyone is riolling new characters then? So I guess you can reduce the levels. And I'm free to do mean/nice thigns to you all in my game without affecting Raixel's game!

[ian_scho]

I couldn't do two of these at once Beo!

[Ameena]

Ahh, boring human eh? Well, they do get some other stuff (maybe to make up for being so boring ) - I know they get extra feats somewhere along the line...dunno if their skills are affected too. I wonder if that technically makes them more complicated, in a way, than the other "basic" races? And you don't get cool stuff like night vision and all that .
It seems odd to me (having had a quick skim through the character creation bit in the PHB a few days ago) that it asks you to roll up your ability scores first and then allocate them after picking your class and race, when it'd be simpler to put all the ability score-sorting stuff together and pick your class and race first and then deal with stats scores. Oh well, there's nothing saying you can't just do char gen in whatever order you feel like (Well alright, that'd be a bit silly trying to pick your skills before you knew what class you were playing, lol).
As mentioned, Ian, if you need any PDFs of various books, give me a tell on Skype - I'm not sure any of the files will fit into an e-mail, unfortunately, as I recall the size limit for attachments being quite small (it's been ages since I tried sending anyone a file that way).
What kind of classes is everyone playing? Or rather, what kind of roles? I'm not entirely sure but I think my char is gonna end up quite good at sneaking around and tracking stuff, and also at causing enemies to, you know, abruptly start leaking vital fluids all over the place and have limbs missing and stuff . Well alright, there's no actual mechanic in DnD (as far as I know) for the effects of lost limbs...I suppose it's got a younger audience in mind than, say, the Warhammer 40k games (in which one of my Dark Heresy chars did temporarily lose a leg but had it reattached by another party member once we got to a medical facility...I'd've been able to regrow it not too long after that anyway as I took the appropriate spsychic power the next time i levelled up ), so you can't have bits of anatomy go flying all over the place as they get hacked off by the overenthusiastic approach the party may end up exhibiting . But, you know, were limb detachment possible (or at least, the ability to cause a head to be a bit les firmly attached to the torso than usual), my character would most definitely go for that kind of approach were she to come across someone she really didn't like very much. She's umm...rather unlikely to end up being the group diplomat, just so you know . I had also conceived of the idea that possibly she could have already met one of the group members before the game starts (due to umm...certain things about her nature, it is possible that fitting in with the goup entirely from scratch, as it were, might be slightly difficult, though this will also depend on the nature of the other group members themselves), but Raixel hasn't got back to me on that one yet so I'll leave it resting for now .

[beowuuf]

Sorry to confuse, Raixel will be doing her game as a continuation of mine (ish), so there will be no swap over. Well, except for me, I'm running my character early through an intro story so she can test stuf out, including my character. My character is a ranger, though he's not powerful enough to be a striker. He's probably more a defender in that regard. Really, his only great mechanical trait was going to be his tracking, so if you're covering that too I might need to rethink the concept. We can have two trackers, or course, but that was his primary thing.

And the group will actually want to be with your character, right? We're not going to end up killing them and you have to roll a new one?

[Ameena]

I can't say whether the group would be willing to associate with my character 'cause I don't know the nature of the group's characters. Mine isn't gonna be going around deliberately trying to kill people or anything - her alignment doesn't fall within the "Evil" section. She can just be a bit...touchy about some things, but there are a couple of aspects to her personality which mean that she should want to be with the group as long as they're willing to accept her. I just hope we don't have anyone in the group who's all self-righteous and stuff with all high morals etc and a problem with people getting severely mauled if they enter combat with my character (who also won't be averse to savaging someone from behind if she gets the chance) . She's not gonna just attack random people, though - her attacks wil generally have to be provoked. Just don't count on her necessarily leaping in to save your hide if you get attacked and she doesn't respect you enough .
I'm not 100% sure exactly what abilities I'm gonna have - I can't remember them off the top of my head or the levels at which I get them but I'm also not sure what level we're starting the game at so I don't know how many of those abilities I'll be starting with. But I will have access to tracking-type abilities as we go, likewise sneaky stuff, as I mentioned.

[Lord_BoNes]

Raixel, I must blame you for putting this idea in my head, as you mentioned something about lycanthropys (werewolves) earlier in the discussion:
For my character, I was hoping to be a human/werewolf hybrid... Imagine a human parent and a werewolf parent (obviously in the non-transformed state) having a child. The main reason I want to be a hybrid is because in most mythological worlds/stories, a werewolf hybrid can transform at will (instead of only being able to transform under the light of a full-moon) and can also de-transform just as easily...
Take the "Harry Potter" series for instance, one of the characters (professor Lupin from "Prisoner of Azkaban") is a werewolf, he gets married to a human witch and they have a child down the track... that child is born half human and half werewolf, and he can transform at will, once he practices.

Now, I understand that this would make my character more complicated (especially once the other party members know about it) but my characters abilities could be balanced out for gameplay's sake, but here's my ideas list of how to work things:
- the actual transformation takes 1-2 rounds, roll DC 10 to succeed transforming after 1 round, or be stuck taking 2 (and become VERY vulnerable, maybe -5 AC for the duration of the transformation)
- being rendered unconcious, stunned, shaken, paralized, etc. at any point stops the transformation.
- only get the -/silver resistance when I'm in my completely transformed state
- increased stats when fully transformed (+1 to +4 bonus agility/strength, roll 1d4 for these whenever I transform) I think that a transformed werewolf should be faster than normal (+agility) and stronger than normal (+strength)
- decreased stats when fully transformed (-2 to -8 penalty wisdom/charisma, roll 2d4 for these on transformation) I think that a tranformed werewolf is definately not going to being thinking completely clearly (-wisdom), nor very capable of convincing others what to do (-charisma)
- possible minor bonus to hp regeneration when not in combat (1-2hp a round for my normal form, 3-4hp when transformed)
- increased senses in my human state (+5 or +10 to perception rolls, due to having hightened senses... but I'd also be more susceptable to blinding, deafening, etc. for balance)
- extra vulnerable towards silver weapons in my human state (1.5x or 2x normal damage, for balance)

What do you guys/gals think?

[Ameena]

Just one point - Lupin's first appearance is in "Prisoner of Azkaban", not "Chamber of Secrets"...and isn't that kind of a spoiler for anyone who might not have read it yet?
Anyway, if you go to the lycanthrope page on the d20srd.org site, lycanthrope is a template you can put onto any normal race to give them lycanthropic abilities (there's not just werewolves but other species too - weretigers, wererats, etc). You can be an afflicted lycanthrope (was made a lycanthrope by being bitten by one or whatever, you're unable to control when you change form...though if you're aware of your affliction I think this gives you a vague degree of control) or a natural lycanthrope (born a lycanthrope, able to control when you change form). In fact, here's the page - http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/lycanthrope.htm - I think you can plonk the lycanthrope template onto any natural humanoid race.
A lycanthrope was something I looked at when trying to decide my character's race - I thought of a naturally-lycanthropic Tiefling whose alternate form is that of a wererat. Ended up discarding that idea in favour of something else but you won't find out what till you meet her in-game .

[Lord_BoNes]

I like the idea of a weretiger myself... and I'm wanting to go a natural, not afflicted... but, I wish to make it so that if I attack someone/something, then I can't pass the "disease" on. In other words I can bite or claw away at things, without worry of turning them into a weretiger too.

[beowuuf]

Only the bite attack transfers lycanthrope in hybrid/animal form, so it can be a deliberate thing or not.

[ian_scho]

Shounds intereshting Mishter Bhones....

[ian_scho]

I've pm'd you a Boo via Skype Ameena which means that you can send me the Character Creation book pdf if you can.... It's my username + @hotmail.com, or I have my Skype account on this evening! ty

[Ameena]

Sure, no probs . I'm on Skype now and just got your tell, though I suppose you'll notice that if you're around as well .

[beowuuf]

If I can actually get skype working, does that mean we could do a two player Ameena-run game sometime?

[Ameena]

Oh gawd, you want me to think up ANOTHER campaign? Well actually I'd probably leave it open for the current one to continue once you get the Main Quest done, or a new one could start but in the same country - there's gonna be plenty of places in it and I'm sure you won't visit them all . I still don't quite know the scale of the map so I don't know how far away various places are from each other, and so on. That reminds me...I'd better have a look through the PHB for the bit on travelling distances and work out from there exactly how far it was to Farwatch from where you started .
I have no idea how well I'd do with two different players both trying to do stuff at the same time but we could always try it, maybe...possibly...eventually...like, you know, when the current campaign finishes. Which is probably gonna be aaaages . Right now I'm sorting out stuff for the current campaign, putting together the scenes for some fights which you may or may not get to at some point reasonably within the nearish future .

[beowuuf]

Travelling distances are in...umm...travel section

I beleive you can travel move+2 miles an hour. Or km. It's something like that! Though that just sounds wrong as a walker (you can manage around 3 miles an hour for a fast walk, five miles an hour for a jog/run)

[ian_scho]

A Skype game sounds great but it's my lack of free time (not next week though!) that's the problem.

Thanks sooo much for the file Ameena, I may end up with a female nun (yay a monk) but it really depends on the other chars. Now I just need to read the 600 pages of the book now...

[Ameena]

Lol I'm sure you won't need to read all of it - I expect half of it is gonna be on spells and items and stuff to do with levels and classes and stuff that don't apply to you . I think just the char creation, class, and race sections are probably enough to start you off for now . You can look through the class section for whatever you think you want to be, and then find a race that suits it (stat bonuses etc)...well, or you could sod compatibility and play a halfling warrior or a dwarf wizard or a tiefling cleric, lol. I can send you PHB2 if you want a greater list of choices, or Savage Species or something if you want to play as something a bit...different .

[raixel]

K, so, I'm opening the floor top discussion about the condensed skills. I'll list my personal pros and cons about what I think about them.

Cons:
a) Condensing the skills leads to a disbalance in the amount of points a character gets on each level as being too high, as I stated in the char creation thread. Especially for some skills, like athletics, where you are condensing down 5(!) skills to one. So 5 skill points to get a point in each suddenly makes it 1 point for 5 abilities. And the more skills you condense, the greater the balance gets screwed with.
b) It seems unneeded, and a lot of extra work on the DMs part to keep remembering what has changed. And the DM is already strugglling to deal with the straight 3.5 changes from her home campaign. (ok, that ones biased, but hey!)
c) Take stealth for example. Hide and move silent are NOT the same thing, and shouldnt be the same roll. A charcter might be able to hide well, due to size or what have tyou, but not move silently. Or vice versa.
Same goes for athletics. Just because you can jump, it doesn't mean you can climb, swim, balance, or tumble. How come a huge half orc fighter can tumble?
d) Some classes have certain skills others dont. For instance, a fighter has climb, swim and jump. But by using "athletics" the fighter suddenly gains the ability to balance and tumble, thereby totally making it easy for pretty much every char to do everything.
e) Similar to the skill argument above, you are suddenly making it so a lot of skills become class skills. If one char has a skill that is combined but not the others, he suddenly gets all of them?

Pros
a) Since we have a lot of class holes and I was planning on giving Ameena's char rogue skills, it allows the extra points to come in handy to fill the class roles taht we are lacking.
b) More class points for the players? (although I'd just raise the DCs, anyway)
c) easier to deal with for those of us who are less experienced with the game.

So, as you can see, I'm pretty much against it. I think it can mess with game balance too severly to warrant using in most cases. After all, if everyone can climb, swim, jump, ect all with just one roll, pretty much every character is equal and there is no specialization. I really don't want to use them, or if we do, modify it. Or add points to skills normally, but average it out. Something. For now, I think we should just use the normal 3.5 skills and see how it works, maybe condense em later.

Any body have an idea or opinion? I'm down for condensing if thats what everyone agrees upon. But I just don't want it to give everyone a ton of skills. Not saying Beo's formula didnt work, juts that I'm a meaner DM than him <g>

[beowuuf]

I'll preface by saying I not only have no problem with the split skills, but I actively think we should use the split skills, since it then lets everyone use the same normal 3.5 rules. And you much prefer it, and you are far more experienced than I am!

My choice on mixing in some d20 LWRPG/4th edition style condensing came from having a far more contained/controlled environment, and my own DMing style. Another con you forget is feat choice - some feats give +2 to similar skills, and skill focus then gives a +3 to one. By condensing skills, many of the +2 feats make less sense to take and the +3 focus becomes more powerful in many cases. Inflating skill bonuses a little more.

I like narrative, and as a DM condensed skills made mechanical decisions less fiddly, and allowed for more abstraction. Conan the Barbarian leaps at things, climbs things, swims. He's just a physical person. He's a lumbering hulk, so he doens't tumble or balance well. In a show or book the heros spot someone/something or they don;t, the heroes avoid detection or they don't. So for me, condensing skills down to these broader strokes wasn't much of a problem and keeps narrative flavour and kept things more epic. After all, the ability score bonus already reflects a person with x attribute is good at all these things at once at low level. It doesn't need to come down to a person misses hearing something because they put all their points in listen, or the hero can hide well if he stays still but can't go anywhere.

To some of the con points:
- Athletics was climb, swim and jump, while acrobatics was tumble and balanace. Athletics still did combine three skills, however they didn't feel exciting. And the ACP when wearing armour for low skill combat characters take these skill out anyway
- I intelligently made combined skills class or not for a class, depending on what they had. I think for many it balanced alright without much decision.


Anyway, more just wanting to give my opinuion on why I chose them, but I'd still nominate the normal split skills for this game. Easiler to combine them later at worst, and lets everyone get a feel for 3.5 properly to judge the system.

[ian_scho]

Can you fill the class holes with NPCs? The party can still be a separate unit but even a mercenary troop will have a wagon+canteen!

[Ameena]

Personally I'd've put Tumble under Acrobatics rather than Athletics, unless it is a Str skill rather than a Dex one (haven't checked)...though I don't recall whether Acrobatics was up for consideration as a condensed skill. Balance would certainly be Acrobatics, though. Any Str-based movement is Athletics, whereas Dex-based ones are Acrobatics.
You can also just modify the DCs depending on what someone wants to do. So, say the big, uner-strong orc in his heavy plate armour wants to climb up a wall, he rolls a straight Athletics check because he's strong enough to heave his weight up there with no great problems. But say he then has to try and swim somewhere. Well, instant -5 or something to the roll because of his plate armour dragging him down. Situational modifiers, I think they're called.
Also, I reckon it makes it easier if you have a shorter list of skills overall, rather than this massive long list that you need to look through every time you want to do something. But I'm big on narrative and would prefer the mechanics not to get in the way.
Hmm...I suppose it looks like what I'm saying is I prefer condensed skills. That said, I've never actually played 3.5 like this (I've played Neverwinter Nights but that doesn't count because it's all done by the computer - it's not like I actually got to roll my own dice ). I know it's a lot more mechanically fiddly than 4th, but not quite how much. So I've only ever done DnD one way, and that's the nice and easy way with a shorter skill list that uses situational modifiers depending on what you want to do .

[beowuuf]

The armour thing has an offical stat called an Armour Check Penalty, and exists in both versions. Just the check penalty is like -1 or -2 in 4th edition due to how their skill checks re balanced, whereas in 3.5 os can go up to higher faster for the heavier armours.


The 4th edition skills still show the ways they used to be split - for example DC modifiers for listeing or looking are listed separated in the perception skill, etc. So it's nothing more complicated than that.

[raixel]

*puts hands over ears and goes LALALALA at the mention of 4th edition* Oh, wait, you got the condensing from 4th, beo? In that case, no, we are not using it! Never will I allow that travesty to sully my gaming table! Forsooth, I say, and begone foul spawn, from the depth from whence you came! (joking, kind of).

Um, really though. I don't wanna mess around with condensing skills, at least at the start. Judging by my previous post and what you guys said back, I dont even know what skills condense to what, and Ive already got my hands kinda full with life, work, and running 2 games and dont want to be having to learn a bunch of new stuff. I just think it'll be easier for all involved, cuz we all have access to the same materials, and dont have to worry about suddenly realizing game balance is fukt 3 months in, or that the DM has been rolling acrobatics instead of um, whats the other one? Oh yeah, athletics, for the NPCs the entire time.

Beo, you make a good point. My DMing style is very heavily reliant on skill checks, in case you havent noticed . Its cuz my plot outline is extremely abstract in my notes. I found the more you detail your plot, the more players will blow a hole in it. So I use skill checks as a way to shape the plot without railroading the players in one direction. (for example, the turtle encounter outline was just the hollow, the turtle, the stuff in the nest, the pond, and the erlosss. It was totally up to you what happened there. It wasn't like I had notes that said "the player can try and jump off the top of the hollow and if he fails a DC# check <blank> happens, if he passes <blank> happens")

It seems to me based on our DMing styles, beo, that in my campaign, having jump and climb as distinct skills is much more important than in your campaign cuz overall skill checks are more (I dont want to say "important" cuz that comes across wrong)umm...weighty, i guess you could say, in my DMing style.

Also, I'm already messing around enough playing a straight 3.5 game. And btw on that note, if i say something thats obviously a screw up cuz Ive been playing the 3/3.5 hybrid for 12 years(well ok, like um not 12 for the hybrid, but as we kinda just integrated 3.5 instead of switching...), please let me know. Ive been trying to re-familiarize myself with straight 3.5 and double checking everything on the d20 SRD(the only 3.5 main book I actually own is the MM, the others belonged to my ex-roomie), but as some of the differences are so subtle I might screw up.

And yeah, Ian, I'm already planning on running at least 1 NPC., and I just worked out a way to give Ameena's char rogue skills without condensing or having too little skill points.

So, Ameena, since you seem to be the one most comfortable with the condensed skills, would you be willing to try it split? I'm always down to help you if you dont know a rule or are confused. After all, the goal is to have fun!

I'm sure you'll get it real quick. If it helps, you could put the 3.5 skill under the "heading" of the combined skill. For instance you could have "athletics" in all caps as kinda like a title, then underneath that climb, jump ect, then Stealth with hide and MS and so on. So then it wouldnt be hard to search through, and if you wanted to make a roll (say a climb), you could think "ok, I want her to go up the wall, in my game to would be athletics, so..." and then it would be easy to find, as opposed to trying to look through a mess of skils.

And if you want to do something, but arent sure of the skill, just roll what you think is right, or a straight d20. I'm not gonna get mad and be like "WTF You roilled jump when it shoulda been climb RAAAAAAHHH!" or something. I'll just put the correct mod on. And most of the time, you cann narratively tell me what your char is doing, and I'll tell you the appropriate rolls.