Forge Engine combat turns description...

One of the unconventional elements of the Forge Engine RPG is the structure of the turns.   Traditional RPGs have a round/turn structure where each character has a discrete turn within each round.   Their actions occur within their own turn, and time passes in a strangely linear fashion which requires some mental gymnastics to unravel.   Once each character's round is over, play passes on to the next character in the initiative order, etc...

The Forge Engine's combination of an Energy action economy and a system of actions and reactions that are individually costed means that the traditional linear round structure can be replaced with a more non-linear 'do what you want as long as you have the Energy' structure.   Characters can jump in and out of the action as long as they have enough Energy to perform their action; whether it's moving, attacking, reloading, or some other costed action.

As with any system, there are several caveats.   First, characters can take reactions before their first turn in combat, but they can't take actions.   Second, if a character is surprised, they can't take actions or reactions until their first turn, which means that they can't spend Energy to dodge when they're being attacked.

(Dammit, that should be 'Character #2' up there, not Character #3...)

So, what other RPGs have non-traditional round and turn structures for combat?

Forge Engine Character Sheet

The first thing I look at whenever I check out a new RPG is the character sheet, because you can tell so much about a game just from this one element. This is the character sheet for the Forge Engine RPG I'm working on.

Feedback, questions, and discussion are always welcome.

Playtesting the Forge Engine

Tonight was our first playtest of a new game system I'm working on called the Forge Engine, which is an Abilities and Skills based d10 system:

•   Ability and skill based system (classless)
•   Give players freedom to craft their own characters
•   Increased power through larger dice pools (d10 dice)
•   Opposed rolls for combat to keep participants engaged
•   Skill challenges against static difficulty numbers for simplicity
•   Dice pools give degrees of success (or multiple hits for combat)
•  Combat rolls combine abilities, skill, weapon, and armor into one resolution step
•   Energy depletion system reflects fatigue from exertion
•   Meaningful decisions for players during critical situations
•   Variable Energy economy replaces discrete action economy

Luckily, we had a pre-game run-through yesterday that ironed out a lot of kinks, so tonight's game went surprisingly well (apart from almost getting killed by a pack of mutant rats).

And as an interesting experiment, I'm a player in the playtest, not the GM.   This gives me a much better perspective on how the system is working, and gives me more time to help the GM and the other players.

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No, I'm not dead.   I've just been working on Hero Kids and its adventures, which are available at DriveThruRPG:

Hero Forge Games at DriveThruRPG

Review: Heroes Against Darkness Gets 4E Right (Allegedly)

Looks like the release of the print version of Heroes Against Darkness has shaken out some new fans.

+John Bell - The Retired Adventurer - has posted a review of Heroes Against Darkness on his blog:

Heroes Against Darkness Gets 4e Right

"I mention all of this because Heroes Against Darkness is a 4e heartbreaker, and a really good one." 

"There are lots of little tweaks like this that I really like. The GM advice chapter is also pretty meaty, and I'd feel fairly comfortable giving Heroes Against Darkness to a new roleplayer as their first adventure game."

"Heroes Against Darkness in general has the feel of 4e done right. I don't say that as someone who hated 4e and wanted it to be fundamentally different, but as someone who played it and felt that the game didn't live up to its own promise. If that sounds like the kind of thing you'd be interested in, go check it out."

It's not all flowers and holding hands though, 'cos John has a couple of criticisms:

"The not particularly serious one is that there's some extraneous swearing in a couple of chapters. I'm not a prude, but it kind of comes out of nowhere and doesn't serve much purpose."

Now I'm a fairly conversational writer, so sometimes more colorful turns of phrase slip into my works.   As far as I can tell, in reading Heroes Against Darkness you'll get one 'shit' and one 'crap'. You've been warned!

The second criticism is more serious:

"The more serious one is the underdeveloped skill system. Skills are mentioned in a couple of places: Each class has some suggested skills they should have, and there's a big list of possible skills, but the actual rules for skills are totally missing, from how many skills characters should have, to how and when they select those skills, to what skills do or how one uses them, to how one gets more. As a quick set of house rules, I'd imitate 4e somewhat: Having a skill would grant a +5 on any checks related to that skill. Character would select say, four at the start and could add another every other level."

I deliberately left the skill system out of Heroes Against Darkness, but its absence has been noted.   But all is not lost, and we've had a few discussions about it over at RPGnet:

RPGnet thread: [Heroes Against Darkness] This is my kind of D&D clone

Thanks for John for taking the time to review Heroes Against Darkness.

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Head over to DriveThruRPG to pick up a print edition of Heroes Against Darkness:
DriveThruRPG - Heroes Against Darkness

Sneak peek at a Hero Kids character

So while all of the helpful playtesters are putting Hero Kids through it's paces, I reckon it's a good time to show everyone else what a 'Hero Card' looks like for one of the heroes that's included in the game.  From the card you might be able to work out the basics of the system itself.

First, each of the heroes has four main attributes:
•   Melee (dice pool for melee attacks)
•   Ranged (dice pool for ranged attacks)
•  Magic (dice pool for magic attacks)
•  Armor (dice pool for defending against enemy attacks)

Plus a number of attacks and actions:
•   Normal Attack (melee, ranged, or magic)
•   Special Action (usually a special attack or other action)
•   Special Ability (a passive ability based on the hero's specialty)

Finally, heroes can also have these items and skills:
•   Healing Potions (these are used in combat to heal the hero)
•   Inventory Items (these can be used in adventuring)
•   Skills (these can be used in adventuring or role-playing)

Hero Kids works as a simple skirmish game or as a full RPG, and the characters themselves have layers of complexity so that they are usable by kids from 4 to 10.  Younger kids just have to use their dice pools and their Normal Attack, while older kids can use tactics and their heroes' Special Actions and Abilities to tackle hard combats and other adventuring and role-playing obstacles.

If I've designed the Hero Cards it right, this example card should pretty much tell you about the underlying mechanics of the game and the possible and probable variations in the heroes that come with the game.

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Looking for something more complicated, look no further:
Heroes Against Darkness: Downloads.

What to Steal From D&D Next!

Now that I've had time to think about some of the things that those crafty designers are WOTC are doing for D&D Next, I think that a few of their changes to that game are worth pursuing for future versions of Heroes Against Darkness.

Things to steal from D&D Next:
•   Slower scaling progression
•   Resistance reduces damage by half
•   Vulnerability takes critical damage
•   +1 to a starting ability score for class

Scaling Progression

While Heroes Against Darkness follows D&D's +1 per level progression, D&D Next casts this aside and goes for a completely flat ability score progression and relies on HP increases to simulate the relative power of high and low level combatants.

While I don't think that totally flat progression is desirable (because it reduces the players' ability to feel that their characters are developing in a meaningful way), I do start to worry when characters start to reach +10 (or more) once they're at Level 6.   To test out this feeling, I posted a poll on RPG.net, which asked the respondents how fast they thought their character's main ability score bonus should progress.

Here are the results:

+1 per level by tables (e.g. D&D 1-3rd Eds): 10.45%
+1 per level by mechanics (e.g. D&D 4th Ed): 16.42%
+1 per 2 levels (e.g. +1 to primary ability every level): 10.45%
+1 per 4 levels (e.g. +1 to primary ability every second level): 22.39%
+1 per 8 levels (e.g. +1 to primary ability every fourth level): 11.94%
No progression ever: 28.36%

The results here show that about 27% of respondents want some form of +1 per level, and another 28% want no progression ever.   Obviously these two groups cannot be reconciled.   Based on this statistically insignificant sample, I reckon that the sweet spot is probably somewhere around +1 every third level.   This gives players some progression and control over their characters, but it also keeps the escalation of the bonuses (and the scores themselves) under control.

Resistance

My previous plan for resistances in Heroes Against Darkness was to reduce the damage by an amount that is derived from the monster's ½ Level bonus.   D&D Next makes resistance a simple half damage.   While the half damage from D&D Next doesn't reflect the power of the monster (a powerful monster can completely negate the damage in Heroes Against Darkness), the simplicity of the maths makes it easier to run.

Vulnerability

As with the resistances, vulnerabilities in Heroes Against Darkness are currently calculated from the monster's ½ Level bonus, like this:

"Vulnerable Cold: +5 damage per ½ Level of the attacker from cold sources."

This could be simplified by switching to critical damage for vulnerability:

"Vulnerable Cold: Attacks from cold sources deal critical damage."

Ability Score Bonus for Class

The final immediately worthwhile design element from D&D Next is the association of a character creation ability score bonus with the class, separate from the traditional bonus that is derived from the character's race.   This change gives players greater freedom to mix and match classes and races (rather than having to choose the most optimal combination).

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Check out the game that the D&D designers should be stealing from:
Heroes Against Darkness - Game Rules.

D&D Next: Deeper Thoughts

For the last five weeks (or so) we've been playing the D&D Next playtest (as have much of the rest of the D&D fraternity).   I've already posted my early thoughts on what they're doing with the system, but these weeks as a player have given me plenty of thinking time.

My thinking has been prompted by D&D Next, and has focused on a few of the key areas of that game and whether there are any lessons here for Heroes Against Darkness:

•   Bounded accuracy vs. +1 per level
•   HP escalation
•   Monster XP values
•   Defenses vs. saving throws

Bounded Accuracy

One of my first posts here on the Heroes Against Darkness blog tracked the entrenchment of and changes to the +1 per level progression through each of the editions of D&D.   As that post examines, +1 per level has been a key feature of D&D for about 30 years.   Over time the mechanics of the progression have changed; starting with Character To Hit and THAC0 tables, then becoming Base Attack Bonus (BAB) progression, and finally its most elegant and internally consistent design: 4th Edition's combination of ability score increases, magic weapons, and the 1/2 level bonus.   Notwithstanding the fact that 4th Edition's actual implementation of +1 per level was slightly flawed (because it got out of whack at higher levels), I used a simplified version of this for the +1 per level progression in Heroes Against Darkness.

My mistake was that I assumed +1 per level was forever.

I was wrong...

The recent playtest for D&D Next covers 1st to 3rd levels, and during that progression the pre-generated characters see no increase in their attack bonuses or the underlying ability scores.   The D&D Next design team call this 'Bounded Accuracy', and it basically zeroes out all of the increasing progression (for attacks, saves/defenses) and replaces it with only one moving part, hit points.   So in the old days, your 8th level fighter was better than a 1st level fighter because he has (generally) +7 extra to his attacks, +7 to his AC, and 7 extra levels worth of hit points.   In D&D Next (as it stands) the +1 per level progression is gone and the only advantage that the 8th level fighter has over the 1st level counterpart is the additional hit points.

If you're in the mood for killing your babies, I think that the zeroing out of redundant moving parts is a fantastic idea.

+1 per level is mostly redundant because it increases for both the attacks and Defenses (at least in 4th Edition), so when you're fighting monsters of your equivalent level then it is effectively static (because your attack bonus will be cancelled out by the monster's increased defenses/saving throws).   I say it's mostly redundant, because when you're fighting monsters of higher or lower levels, the disparity between your attack bonus and the monster's higher or lower defenses/saving throws is a factor and it effectively simulates the relative capabilities of the combatants.

But.   Hit points already does this.

The higher level monster already has more HP and the lower level monster already has less HP.   So the change to bounded accuracy means that your attacks and defenses are relatively (or entirely) static and you have the same chance of hitting a higher level monster as you do a lower level monster. In fact, the whole idea of monster levels may have also been zeroed out, with the monster's HP becoming its only variable.

But.

As these rules are presented so far in the D&D Next playtest, there is no progression at all (at least none in the first three levels).   There's a possibility of them allowing +1 to one or more ability scores at 4th Level, but that only translates into an actual increase to a modifier every 8th level!   I'm not sure that I want to play a game where my character's only development and progression over time is his (or her) hit points.

HP Escalation

The introduction of bounded accuracy (why can't we just call it +0 per level!) has put more emphasis on the amount of HP that characters have at the start of the game, and the amount that they gain each time they reach a new level.   One of the areas of Heroes Against Darkness that I'm thinking about closely is the HP escalation at higher levels.   Basically, the removal or reduction of +1 per level means that you have the opportunity to scale back the HP increases that characters see over the course of the supported level scale, meaning that 'high' level characters end up with 60 (or so) HP instead of 120 HP.

Monster XP Values

It does make we wonder, if they went to all the trouble of zeroing out other areas by introducing bounded accuracy, why haven't they also zeroed out the monster XP values (which are all multiples of 25).

Defenses and Saving Throws

The reintroduction of saving throws to D&D Next is another area I'm conflicted about.   Actually, that's not entirely true.   I'm not conflicted, I think that it's a truly retrograde step.

D&D 4th Edition replaced the earlier saving throw sets (either five or three) with a set of four Defenses, which included armor class.   The advantages of this were:

•   It moved all dice rolls to the attacker
•   It clarified which defense an attack was against
•   The Defenses could have bonuses added separately

When D&D Next was first announced, the designers talked about doing away with Defenses by having attacks made against ability scores, which struck me as a fantastic idea because it removed the additional layer of abstraction and removed some numbers.   However, in the playtest documents it's clear that they weren't able to execute this idea, probably because of the relationship between ability scores and ability modifiers (there's a blog post in that chestnut).   I think that they would not have been able to reconcile the fact that ability scores increase by 2 for every 1 point that modifiers increase, leading to the 'Defenses' (the ability scores) outrunning the attack bonuses (the ability modifiers).

Instead, we've ended up with a fairly complicated hodge-podge of numbers and modifiers for the saving throws (makes you wonder why they didn't just go back to Defenses, but I imagine that the grognards wouldn't have a bar of those).

Here's what we have now:
•   The spellcaster has a Save DC (say around 14).
•   The spellcaster also has a Spell Attack bonus (around +4).
•   Some spells are cast against the target's AC, in which case the spellcaster rolls and uses their Spell Attack bonus to beat the target's AC.
•   Other spells are cast allow an saving throw and specify an ability, so the target rolls and adds their relevant ability modifier to try to beat the spellcaster's Save DC.
•   To further complicate the issue, there are other spells that offer no defense and no save.

Frankly, it's a mess.   You've got numbers flying back and forth across the table.   You've got three different resolution mechanics for different spells.   And all because they wanted saving throws back.

That's the price of progress (sarcasm).

Of course, there is a way of using ability scores as Defenses, but it requires the designers to kill one of D&D's most sacred cows.   And that is another blog post for another time...

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Head over to the game rules download page and see why defenses are better than saving throws: Heroes Against Darkness - Game Rules.

More AnyDice d6 Dice Pool Probabilities

Following my previous exciting and enigmatic post about d6 dice pool probabilities, I've also run the same combinations of dice pools through AnyDice to see what the probabilities are when you take the cumulative totals of the pools, rather than just the highest of either pool.   The results are (obviously) a lot different.

First though, here's the AnyDice code:

---

function: opposedhighestcume of A:n and B:n
{
      if A >= B { result: 1 }
      result: -1
}

output [opposedhighestcume of 1d6 and 1d6]
output [opposedhighestcume of 2d6 and 1d6]
output [opposedhighestcume of 3d6 and 1d6]
output [opposedhighestcume of 4d6 and 1d6]

output [opposedhighestcume of 1d6 and 2d6]
output [opposedhighestcume of 2d6 and 2d6]
output [opposedhighestcume of 3d6 and 2d6]
output [opposedhighestcume of 4d6 and 2d6]

output [opposedhighestcume of 1d6 and 3d6]
output [opposedhighestcume of 2d6 and 3d6]
output [opposedhighestcume of 3d6 and 3d6]
output [opposedhighestcume of 4d6 and 3d6]

output [opposedhighestcume of 1d6 and 4d6]
output [opposedhighestcume of 2d6 and 4d6]
output [opposedhighestcume of 3d6 and 4d6]
output [opposedhighestcume of 4d6 and 4d6]

---

That code outputs either -1 or 1, depending on which pool 'won':
•   1: Attacker's total is higher (or ties, which is also a win).
•  -1: Means that the second pool 'won' and the attack was unsuccessful.

Here are the results for the cumulative opposed checks, with ties resolved in favor of the attacker:

Attacker's pool (down the left)	1d6	2d6	3d6	4d6
1d6	58%	16%	3%	0%
2d6	91%	56%	22%	6%
3d6	98%	85%	55%	26%
4d6	99%	96%	81%	54%

Here again are the previous results for the 'highest dice' opposed checks, with ties resolved in favor of the attacker:

Attacker's pool (down the left)	1d6	2d6	3d6	4d6
1d6	58%	42%	34%	30%
2d6	75%	61%	53%	48%
3d6	83%	72%	65%	60%
4d6	88%	79%	73%	69%

That's all pretty boring, right?  

Well, hopefully it will make sense one day. :-)

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Check out Heroes Against Darkness, which has a dice mechanic no one could call innovative: Heroes Against Darkness - Game Rules.

AnyDice vs. a d6 Dice Pool Mechanic

I've been mulling over a set of super-simple RPG rules for kids (maybe from 4 and up).   As part of this I've been thinking about a simple (but playable) dice mechanic that involves opposed pools of d6s, with only the highest dice counting for each of the participants (and ties resolving in favor of the attacker, although this could change).

I've finally managed to get AnyDice to spit out the probabilities I was after for the opposed dice pool mechanic (gosh I hate it when people get excited about their 'new' dice mechanics).

This code for AnyDice spits out the amount by which the highest dice of the first dice pool is equal to or greater than than the highest dice of the second dice pool:

---

function: opposedhighest of A:n and B:n
{
      if A >= B { result: A-B }
      result: -1
}

output [opposedhighest of 1@1d6 and 1@1d6]
output [opposedhighest of 1@2d6 and 1@1d6]
output [opposedhighest of 1@3d6 and 1@1d6]
output [opposedhighest of 1@4d6 and 1@1d6]

---

•  -1: Means that the second pool 'won' and the attack was unsuccessful.
•  0: Means the highest dice of each pool were tied, which can be resolved in favor of the attacker or the defender.
•  1+: Higher numbers represent the disparity between the attacker's highest dice against the defender's highest dice.

Here are the results for the opposed checks, with ties resolved in favor of the attacker:

Attacker's pool (down the left)	1d6	2d6	3d6	4d6
1d6	58%	42%	34%	30%
2d6	75%	61%	53%	48%
3d6	83%	72%	65%	60%
4d6	88%	79%	73%	69%

And, here are the results with ties resolved in favor of the defender:

Attacker's pool (down the left)	1d6	2d6	3d6	4d6
1d6	42%	26%	17%	13%
2d6	58%	39%	28%	21%
3d6	66%	47%	35%	27%
4d6	71%	53%	40%	31%

What does it mean?   Which one is better?   

I'm not sure yet, but I'll let you know!

---

Check out Heroes Against Darkness, which has a dice mechanic no one could call innovative: Heroes Against Darkness - Game Rules.

Remaking Magic: 4 Pages of Spells Per Class

Of all of the decisions I've made during the development of Heroes Against Darkness, the page limitation on spells per class is - at first glance - amongst the most arbitrary.  However, my hope is that this limitation actually reinforces the game's goal of balancing the magi and martial classes.

Over the course of the 10 levels of full support in Heroes Against Darkness, the martial classes have about 17 powers.  These 17 powers include a few common ones, like Rally, Melee Attack, and Ranged Attack, and then unique powers for each class which two are gained each level up to Level 5, and then one per level until Level 10.  All in all, each martial class's 17 powers takes up two pages.  By way of contrast, each of the magi classes has spells from the Common Spells list (which is itself three pages) and from the class's unique list which I deliberately limited to four pages.  The spells generally take up a little more space on the page than the martial powers, so the four unique pages of spells for each magi class gives them about 35 spells, which is twice as many spell powers as the martial characters have martial powers.

I previously wrote about the number of pages that some other fantasy RPGs have dedicated to their spell lists:

RPG Round-Up: How Many Pages of Spells!?

Here's the breakdown, for your convenience:

D&D Systems

System	Pages of Spells	Player's Guide Pages	Percentage	Notes
Basic D&D	4	64	6%	Combined Player's and DM's Guide
Expert D&D	8	64	13%	Combined Player's and DM's Guide
AD&D	60	128	47%
AD&D 2nd Edition	118	256	46%
D&D 3rd Edition	115	286	40%
D&D 4th Edition	39	316	12%	Cleric, Paladin, Warlock, Wizard

Non-D&D Systems

System	Pages of Spells	Player's Guide Pages	Percentage	Notes
Castles & Crusades	53	128	41%
Dragon Warriors	35	106	33%
Dragon Age	4	64	6%	Level 1-5 only
Dungeon Crawl Classic	44	147	30%
Heroes Against Darkness	23	102	23%
Pathfinder	150	396	38%
Savage Worlds (Explorer's Edition)	10	159	6%
Savage Worlds: Fantasy Companion	21	158	13%	Includes spells in the Explorer's Edition
Savage Worlds (Deluxe Edition)	11	159	7%
Swords & Wizardry	24	70	34%
Warhammer Fantasy Role-Playing (2nd Edition)	23	189	12%

Maybe it's unfounded, but my feeling is that games that dedicate a disproportionately large number of their pages to spell lists are more likely to focus more on magi classes at the expense of other classes.  More pages of spells gives magi more options and tempts the games' designers to create more and more specialist spells, which are themselves likely to stomp on the specialties of other classes.  So each extra page of spells for the magi increases the scope of that class and when that is not matched by a corresponding increase in the capabilities of the martial classes, then the relative power and utility of that magi class increases.

Obviously, magi do offer a level of complexity in play then martial characters, and the magic system in Heroes Against Darkness still offers that complexity (and more through the flexible anima system).  Hopefully the game finds a balance between the complexity of the magi classes with the utility of the martial classes.

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Check out Heroes Against Darkness over at the downloads page: Heroes Against Darkness - Game Rules.

Remaking Magic: Blood Anima

One of the deliberate features of the magic system in Heroes Against Darkness is the strict limits on the amount of anima that is available to magi. Level 1 magi have about 9 anima and by Level 10 they have about 15 anima.  This is combined with the rules that limit the amount of anima that magi can spend in a single turn: Level + 1 anima.

Rule:  Maximum anima points is 5 + Wisdom bonus. Rule:  Magi spend anima points to cast spells. Rule:  All spells have an anima points cost. Rule:  Variable anima cost spells must have at least 1 anima spent on the variable X component. Rule:  Magi cannot spend more than Level + 1 anima points in a single turn. Rule:  Magi can end the ongoing effects of their own spells as a move action.

The combination of these two rules means that magi have a virtual abundance of anima at lower levels, but at higher levels they have the potential (and risk) to 'spend' their anima very quickly, or to eek out lesser amounts over more rounds.

But there's always another option.  Once magi are out of anima they can choose to use blood anima to pay for their spells:

Rule:  Magi can overspend anima at the cost of 4 health points per anima point. Rule:  Magi cannot overspend anima on healing spells.

Each blood anima costs 4 HP, so magi will generally be able to afford an extra blood anima each level they gain, in addition to the four or five that they have at Level 1.  So by Level 10, a brave magi has almost 30 anima at their disposal, rather than the nominal value of 15, which is their actual anima.

A curious person would ask, simply:

What is the point of blood anima?  Why not just double the amount available anima (or ramp up to the higher amount) and get rid of the blood anima?

Why indeed...

In combat warriors and their ilk 'spend' their HP to defeat enemies.  Blood anima introduces a risk/reward mechanic for magi classes.  The player of a magi character can choose to operate within the limitations of their normal anima or they can choose to use their blood anima to increase their round-to-round power at the risk of their character's safety.  The also combines with the Rally power, making that power all the more effective when used by a character whose anima and health are depleted, compared to a magi who has only used his (or her) anima and is otherwise on full HP.

---

Check out Heroes Against Darkness over at the downloads page: Heroes Against Darkness - Game Rules.

Remaking Magic: Avoid All Absolutes

Yet another of my self-imposed 'rules' for Heroes Against Darkness is to avoid the sorts of absolute effects of earlier (and future!) versions of D&D.  The history of D&D is littered with absolute effects, here are a few of the more egregious that come to mind:

•  Immunities (such as the Dwarven immunity to poison that has reappeared in the D&D Next playtest)
•  Weapon Requirements (creatures that are only vulnerable to +1 or better weapons?!?)
•  Massive Damage (creatures taking more than 50 HP damage in a single attack must save or die)
•  Sleep Immunity (Elves are immune to sleep effects)
•  Attacking Low-Level Enemies (Fighters can make multiple attacks against enemies of 1 HD)

Each of these examples has an absolute effect and has no regard for the magnitude or potency of the effect, nor the relative strength or weakness of the target and the attacker.  But these are mechanical examples, and we're here to discuss magic, so how about some examples of D&D spells that have absolute effects:

•  Magic Missile (always hits, even targets that have cover or high magic defense)
•  Sleep (affects 4 HD of creatures, or creatures with less than 10 HP each in the D&D Next playtest)
•  Knock (opens any old lock, no waiting)
•  Power Word Kill (target with up to 100 HP must make save or die)

In Heroes Against Darkness I've tried to kill the sacred cows, to remove the anomalies and exceptions and layers that are gumming up the works of D&D, and to get rid of the evidence of the biases and idiosyncrasies of the designers behind the systems.

•  Why does Magic Missile automatically hit?  Because someone decided to make an exception.
•  Why does Knock open any lock?  Because someone didn't have a rogue/thief with the party that day?
•  Why can't clerics use edged weapons?  Because someone misunderstands or misrepresents a piece of history.
•  Why can magic-users only use daggers or staffs?  Because someone likes it like that.
•  Why does sleep affect 4 HD of creatures and not 5 HD?
•  Why do fighters only get attacks against 1 HD creatures  What about 2 HD creatures?  Why are they so different?

Heroes Against Darkness avoids these sorts of absolutes by using inclusive design, rather than specific design (such as for equipment proficiencies), by using Defenses and Attacks to determine whether an attack hits or not, and by applying costs to spell components to ensure that the overall cost of a spell is proportional to its actual power.  The one area where I am most likely to have made arbitrary decisions in Heroes Against Darkness is in the assignment of martial powers to each level.  It's here where I've had to make judgements of the relative utility and required skill level for each of the powers, and it's here where I'm most likely to have erred.  So if you find evidence of my idiosyncrasies and biases, let me know so I can take them out the back and put them on the spit with the rest of the sacred cows!

For further reading, check out these articles by Sean Reynolds:

Fewer Absolute Effects (Variant Rule) - Part 1
Fewer Absolute Effects (Variant Rule) - Part 2

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Check out Heroes Against Darkness over at the downloads page: Heroes Against Darkness - Game Rules.

D&D Next: Difficulty Trends in D&D...

There's already been a lot of discussion about the advantage/disadvantage mechanics in D&D Next, but here are a few more quick thoughts about this mechanic and the general trend in D&D for each edition to become easier than the last, and easier than any other version of the game (apologies in advance).

First, a quick look at the the impact of the advantage/disadvantage mechanic on the hit probabilities in the game.  At normal difficulties advantage (and disadvantage) are worth the equivalent of +4/+5, and they also double the chance of a critical. It's a very powerful feature.  It looks like anything except for +2/-2 has been replaced with advantage and disadvantage, so players don't have to remember lots of different bonuses or penalties.

One of the main aspects of difficult in RPGs is the chance of hitting your enemy (along with HP differential and number of enemies).  D&D Next continues the gradual and incremental increase in hit chance for the player.  Monster ACs in the updated Caves of Chaos module (generally) range between 13 and 15 (ACs in the 4th Edition module Keep on the Shadowfell were 15 to 18).  Most of the pregens are attacking with +6, so players only need to roll between 7 and 9, giving them 55% to 70% hit chance, 10% better that 4th Edition.

Between advantage/disadvantage, higher starting HP, more forgiving death rules (- Constitution), gameplay tuning for an entire day of adventuring (so players can bail when they're depleted), and the general hit chance rules in 5th edition, D&D Next is very 'friendly' for players and it represents the long trend of coddling players.

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Heroes Against Darkness downloads page: Heroes Against Darkness - Game Rules.

D&D Next: Playtest Impressions

The other day I posted my early thoughts and opinions of the playtest rules for D&D Next and tonight we finally got a chance to play the rules.

First some background.  

Those of you who are close followers of my adventures will know that a just a year ago I GMed a Basic D&D campaign starting with the Keep on the Borderlands.  In that campaign, the players' characters were hired to rescue the son of a noble who'd been captured by a group of monsters from the Caves of Chaos.  The players had reached the caves overland, passing the tower of one of their mentors, and then through the forest.  At the ravine of the Caves of Chaos, they explored the kobold lair (the first cave on the right), then the goblins' cave on the left, which I think took them through to the next set of caves where I had the noble's son held captive.  They rescued to boy and returned to the keep, then struck out for civilization rather than returning to the caves.  I mention this because our recent familiarity with some of the cave systems is a factor in how we approached the playtest.

In the year between playing Basic D&D and this D&D Next playtest, we've had a long campaign using my Heroes Against Darkness system.  We wrapped up that campaign just a couple of weeks ago to give D&D Next a go for a while.

So tonight five of us we met for our Monday night game, I played the cleric of Moradin, we had the cleric of Pelor, the wizard, and the fighter.  For this adventure we'd been sent to the Caves of Chaos to rescue a young dwarf (from my cleric's tribe) who'd been captured by orcs.  With this set up, we found ourselves standing at the yawning entranceway of the infamous Caves of Chaos.

At this point I took a timeout and we agreed that because we'd recently played the caves, we wouldn't go into the caves that we were familiar with (the goblin cave on the left and the kobold lair on the right).  This was also good because I've read about a hundred write-ups of people fighting the damned kobolds and rats (and killing 1/round), and frankly I'm sick of hearing about those little bastards.

We made our way down into the floor of the ravine, searching for tracks that would indicate which of the caves was the lair of the orcs that we were looking for.  Unfortunately, we rolled pretty poorly (and one of the players forgot to add his Nature Lore) for the tracking, and we weren't able to discern anything informative from the multitide of footprints over the ravine floor.  Without any clear direction, we picked the second cave entrance along the left side of the ravine as our first one to explore.  

As we neared the cave we saw that this one had an actual door, as opposed to the others that were simply open cave mouths.  We thought that this would make the cave more secure, so we scrambled up the shale slope (Dex check DC 11) and approached the door.  The door was heavy and wooden, reinforced with solid metal plates.  A thorough investigation (Wis check) revealed that one of these metal plates swung open to reveal a latch for the door.  After some discussion about whether the latch was trapped, we opened the door to reveal a corridor that plunged into darkness.

Now three of our four characters have low-light vision (the two dwarves and the elf), but the human would have been blind in the dark of the cave, so we elected to have the wizard cast a couple of light catrips, one on his quarterstaff (which we only later realized that he doesn't have in his inventory) and the other on the fighter's shield.  The light revealed that the corridor ran about 30 feet to a four-way intersection.  Straight ahead it continued in stairs leading up.  The corridor to the right immediately turned again backwards towards the entrance.  And the corridor to the left soon turned right.  We headed right to investigate the corridor that headed back towards the entrance, and as we rounded the corner it immediately turned again forming a dogleg.  As we continued around the last turn of the dogleg, we saw that the corridor opened into a room some distance ahead.  Unfortunately, the inhabitants of the room noticed us and three figures sprang from their room towards us.  I immediately cast Crusader's Strike (1d6 extra damage on a hit for 1 hour).  We quickly recognised them as hobgoblins, and realizing that this was not the orcs' cave, we turned and Hustled our way out of the caves.  

When we reached the entrance we scrambled up the slope around to the precarious area above the cave mouth.  We waited there for the hobgoblins to emerge and hoped that they wouldn't notice us.  Six hobgoblins emerged from the cave moments later.  Three immediately ran down the path towards the ravine floor (we bypassed this on the way up).  The other three stayed at the entrance, with us perched just above them, and looked around.  It didn't take them long to look in our direction, so our wizard opened up with a Burning Hands (with advantage for surprise) at the three immediately beneath us, hitting two with its full effect and partially catching the other.  The wizard had let go of his handhold to cast his spell and almost tumbled over the edge and down to their ledge.  Having taken them by surprise, the fighter shot one with his crossbow, killing it, and the other cleric used his searing light to kill another.  Luckly for us, the hobgoblins had emerged with crossbows, and the four remaining beasts proceeded to pepper us with shots, hitting a couple of us, including my cleric for 5 HP.  For the next turn, I could do nothing (I didn't have a ranged weapon or spell I wanted to use), the fighter was busy reloading his crossbow (taking a full turn so that he didn't have to attack with disadvantage), so the wizard and the cleric of Pelor used their Magic Missile and Searing Light to kill the last of the hobgoblins that had been damaged in the first fiery attack.  The remaining three hobgoblins had thrown down their crossbows and run back towards the cave entrance below us, so the fighter tried to shoot his crossbow but lost his footing and slid down the slope into the middle of the monsters, who promptly wailed on his ass and did some damage.  I slid down after him and positioned myself next to him to use my character's Defender theme to protect him (While you are using a shield, when a creature withing 5' of you is attacked, as a reaction you can give the attacker disadvantage on the attack).  The next round we managed to cut down two of the hobgoblins, and the third chose to flee back into the cave.  I pursued him, but soon remembered that I didn't actually have a ranged attack, so I immediately retreated back out of the cave.

We regrouped and gathered up the six heavy crossbows (50 GP each, but three of them slightly charred!), giving one to the fighter and I took his light crossbow.  We also used the opportunity to find some shelter to rest and use the other cleric's healer's kit to recover a bit (I got a 2 for my hit dice roll, boo).

The next two caves looked very different.  High up on the left slope was a small, natural-looking cave.  Further along the left slope at our current level was a large, imposing looking entrance.  We chose the small natural cave and scrambled up the slope to investigate.  We entered the cave in normal order (fighter, cleric of Moradin, wizard, cleric of Pelor).  As we shuffled along the tight cave, the cleric of Pelor identified the footprints and smells as animal-like, which we various interpreted as a bear or wolves.  While we discussed this, an arrow flew past us from deeper in the cave.  Another arrow followed in the time it took us to realize that this cave was the den of a pack of gnolls, so we quickly retreated and fled down the slope (luckily without anything in pursuit).

We decided to head for the large cave entrance, and on approaching it my dwarf cleric discerned that the entrance was carved and decorated by humans.  Sensing something interesting, we entered this large cave.  This cave had spluttering torches to provide illumination, so we switched off our light spells.  The entrance passage was carved and worked, unlike the earlier caves, and soon joined up with a 20' wide corridor that stretched off to the left and right.  We cautiously made our way to the left along the wide coridoor, trying to keep to the shadowed areas between the weak torches.  We came to an Y intersection, and took to fork to the left.  Rounding a rubble-filled corner, we soon heard the sound of moaning, so we sent our most dexterous character ahead to investigate, and he returned with word of a large throne room, with a dozen skeletons standing guard.  Relishing the opportunity to smite some undead, we decided to strike the inert skeletons, then fall back into the corridor so that we could attempt to use Turn Undead as many of them as possible.  The plan worked perfectly, with the four of us crushing one skeleton with our first blow and damaging two others before retreating to the corridor.  The skeletons followed and walked straight into the my Turn Undead, which held all of them but three.  What followed was a slaughter as other characters ganged up on the skeletons one at a time (while I kept them turned), first attacking with advantage while they were 'turned' and following up with spells if the melee attacks weren't successful (the wizard attacked last using Shocking Grasp to gain advantage from their metal armor).

After the last of the skeletons was reduced to shards and dust, we investigated the throne.  We detected nothing magical, and unsuccessfully searched it for secret compartments, so had to settle for just prising out the four garnets that were inlaid in it.

We returned to the Y intersection and followed the other path.  We heard the noise again, and this time we identified it as moaning.  After a few more steps, we found a large empty room filled with zombies.  This time the other cleric managed to 'turn' seven of the zombies, leaving only a few still mobile.  As with their skeletal cousins, we made short (but boring) work of the zombies.

We backtracked to the main 20' wide corridor and followed it past the entrance tunnel and about another 100' feet on, where it turned to the left and then headed up a slope.  The corner had two doors, one straight ahead and another in the right wall.  We heard voices and stopped to listen, eventually identifying three humans speaking common in the room behind the door straight ahead.  We did a quick stocktake and on finding that were were all in pretty good condition (I was on 14 HP, having only take 5 HP from the hobgoblins and recovered 2 HP from the rest), we decided to open the door and storm the room to surprise the humans.

The fighter approached the door and threw it open, but found that the humans (cultists in red and black robes) were sitting at a table about 20' away down a connecting corridor.  He charged down the corridor and attacked, but failed miserably (rolled a 1 and without any advantage).  I followed and attacked the closest of the humans, missing, and then stepped next to the fighter to give him the benefit of my Guardian power.  The wizard and other cleric followed, and attacked too, with some success.  The enemies then attacked, striking the wizard a strong blow for 8 HP, and sending him running back down the corridor in fear of his life.  Another human who'd been lying on one of the beds in the room joined the fight, but the wizard made short work of them with his Shocking Grasp, which gains advantage against enemies in metal armor (as it also had with the skeletons earlier).  

With the four cultists dead, we stripped their robes and set their bodies in their beds, then paused to decide what to do.  Which is where the session ended.

Quick thoughts:

•  Advantage got a large look in, but we were never attacked by baddies with advantage.  We also never had disadvantage.  We found a couple of ways to gain advantage, such as when we surprised the hobgoblins with the Burning Hands
•  I used 1 spell Crusader's Strike, and then forgot that I had it on!
•  The fights were quick, but not particularly interesting (especially the ones where we shut down the undead)
•  We managed 5 encounters in a 3-hour session
•  I like saving throws using your ability scores, because they really streamline all the different numbers
•  I'm intrigued by the flattened maths, but worry that it's always going to feel like 1st level
•  In the current implementation, the clerics and wizards seem to get a lot more escalation at higher levels than the fighter
•  We avoided the rats and the kobolds, so we didn't have any of the encounters with 15+ enemies each with 2 HP
•  The extra starting HP makes the game much more forgiving that Basic D&D (for example, that 8 HP hit from the cultist would have killed a Basic magic-user dead dead).
•  The only modularity apparent in the system (removing Backgrounds and Themes) makes your character suck more, (as I feared)

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You could be playing Heroes Against Darkness instead: Heroes Against Darkness - Game Rules.

D&D Next: Early Thoughts and Opinions...

I've been looking forward to the D&D Next open playtest for quite a while.  I previously blogged about some of the expectations that I had of this new edition and ways to approach making a modular edition of D&D:

•  Mechanics of Attack Bonus Progression
•  D&D 5th Edition DDXP Play Report
•  Making D&D 5th Edition Modular - Part I

Now that the open playtest is here, let's take a look at what the edition actually looks like right now.

+1 Per Level Progression

Well, the designers at WotC have been true to their promise and appear to have flattened the progression curve.  The level steps for Level 2 and Level 3 don't appear to include any increases to characters' attacks, although the fighter does get +1 to damage at Level 3.

My current assumption is that characters will gain some kind of ability score increase(s) at Level 4.  If 4th Edition is a guide, then this increase could be +1 to two different abilities.  All-in-all, this makes for a very flat progression, where characters are only gaining +1 to attacks every 8 levels!

I have nothing against flattened progression, but I do wonder whether players will missing out on some psychological reinforcement that comes from seeing their attacks growing more powerful.  The other issue with the lack of any meaningful progression is that the game then has no way of simulating the skill differential between higher and lower level characters.  The second consequence of this change is that now magic weapons are far more valuable than they have been in any other edition of D&D, which I don't think s their intention (or maybe it is their intention).

Personally, I think if they're getting rid of the ½ level bonus (as used in 4th Edition), then they should offer ability score increases for more often, such as every second level.

HP and Healing

The pre-gen characters in the playtest start with their Constitution + Class HP (6 for fighters, 4 for clerics, 3 for rogues, 2 for wizards).  As they level up, characters only gain Class HP, no Constitution bonus.

Characters also have a number of Hit Dice (d12 for fighters, d8 for clerics, d6 for rogues, d4 for wizards) equal to their level, which can be 'spent' during a Short Rest to regain HP (although in the rules they say this requires a healing kit, which has only 10 uses).  This means that characters can regain about one-third of their total HP during an adventure day without resorting to magic.  This is interesting in that it offers far more mundane healing than any other edition except for 4th Edition.

At a Long Rest characters regain all of their HP and all of their Hit Dice - very 4th Edition.

Vancian Magic

Vancian magic is back for the Wizard pre-gen (yeech).  And making an unwelcome return with this is the absolutely terrible situation where a spell's level is different from the character's level.  Seriously, would it have killed them to spread the spells out so that spell level is equal to character level?

Modularity

There's no sense of the modularity in the playtest documents except that the characters display different sorts of ability types, including Vancian casting and at-will powers.  Again we can only assume that later releases will develop some modular elements.

Proficiencies and Equipment

D&D Next divides weapons and armor into nice groupings (Basic, Finesse, Martial, Heavy weapons), but they then go and ruin the simplicity by using specific language for the weapon proficiencies of wizards (daggers, slings, and quarterstaffs only) but all of the other classes use weapons based on the categories.  Weird.

Attack Bonuses

Just a few notes here.

It looks like fighters and wizards score (somehow) a total of +3 to their attacks, fighters get this for melee and ranged attacks and wizards get this for the magic attacks.  For the melee and ranged attacks, +2 of this seems to come from the character's proficiency but +1 of it is a 'mystery' bonus that I can't account for.

It also looks like monsters have a +2 attack bonus, probably from some underlying proficiency bonus.

Monsters

Monsters have no level (listed), but they do get lots of HP.  Even the toughest monster (the gnoll pack lord) has only 66 HP and +6 to attack (+4 from his 18 Str and +2 proficiency).  To be fair, that gnoll has a few special actions (no, they're not 'powers', really) that make it stronger than the 66 HP would suggest.

Action Economy

So they've gutted the action economy from 4th edition, and have an ad hoc series of actions.  First, characters can perform one action each turn, they can also move during their turn (before, after or split around their action), there are also a series of 'incidental' actions that are 'free'.

The problem with this ad hoc codification is that it introduces silly situations like the Healing Word spell, which when cast allows the caster to make a melee or ranged attack or to cast another 'minor' spell.  How much ink is going to be spent so that they don't have to codify certain spells or incidental actions as Move Actions or Minor Actions?

Save of Die

Maybe it's a mistake, but there's a save or die effect on the Medusa, where you have to avert your eyes to avoid her Petrifying Gaze.  If you avert, you are disadvantaged against her (always roll two dice and take the lowest).  If you're surprised or don't avert your gaze, you just save vs petrification (Constitution vs. DC 12) or permanently turn to stone.

Advantages/Disadvantages

After all of that D&D Next does something that I consider wholly unnecessary: it introduces an Advantage/Disadvantage mechanic to the game.  Sometimes the game will specify that you have advantage or disadvantage, such as when attacking a paralyzed character or when your character is blinded.  When you have advantage, you roll two d20s and take the higher result. When you have disadvantage then you roll two d20s and take the lower score.  It does make me wonder whether they'll change the name of the system to dd20 now?

My problem with the advantage/disadvantage mechanic is that D&D already has a bunch of mechanics for bonuses and penalties to attacks and ability tests, so I don't understand why the game needs another way of representing these adjustments, especially a mechanic that only has one magnitude.  Also, don't think that this entirely replaces bonuses and penalties.  Advantages and disadvantages work alongside bonuses and penalties, so if you're prone you take -2 to attacks, but if you're blinded then you have disadvantage on your attacks (but attackers don't seem to get advantage against you, which is weird).

Summing Up

So, all in all I'm interested in this flattening of the progression curve, but the rest of it isn't really grabbing me.  It looks like they're really trying to target the OSR crowd, but the cost of accommodating those players is pretty high for the rest of us.

We're playing a session of this on Monday, so it'll be interesting to see what the other guys think!

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You could be playing Heroes Against Darkness instead: Heroes Against Darkness - Game Rules.

Remaking Magic: No Redundant Spells

In this entry in the Remaking Magic series, we take a look at the steps taken to ensure that no spell gets left behind.

The side-effect of changing most spells to have scaling X is that they never become redundant as the character gains levels.  In the previous examples, Burning Touch and Burning Ray, the spells are just as useful at Level 10 as they are at Level 1.  As the caster's level increases, they can put more anima into the X component of the spell, and make them a lot more powerful based on the circumstances they find themselves in.

Wherever possible the spells in Heroes Against Darkness avoid fixed bonuses or penalties and instead offer the player the choice of how much anima they want to expend on each spell.  Now, nothing in the world is perfect, so here are some spells that do have fixed effects or scale without costs.

First, Befriend offers a slightly scaling bonus to Charisma tests:

Befriend (1 Anima)

Spell Effect	Add Magic bonus to Charisma ability tests (Cha).
Target	Single target
Attack	Magic vs. MD
Duration	1 hr + 1 hr per level
Range	5'

Second, Tremble is another example. This is one of a number of spell variants that have large penalties but only over a short single-turn duration.

Tremble (2 Anima)

Spell Effect	Decrease target's Ranged bonus by your Magic bonus.
Target	Single target
Attack	Magic vs. MD
Duration	End of target's next turn
Range	10' + 10' per level

Interestingly, Tremble has a sister spell called Quake, which does scale but doesn't actually make it redundant:

Quake (X Anima)

Cost	1 anima for each -1.
Spell Effect	Decrease target's Ranged bonus by X.
Target	Single target
Attack	Magic vs. MD
Duration	1 rnd + 1 rnd per level
Range	10' + 10' per level

In the case of Tremble and Quake, Tremble offers a large penalty in the short term, while Quake offers directly-costed penalties over a longer duration.

The use of X costs for a large number of the spells in Heroes Against Darkness means that players have genuine choices in how they use their anima and which spells they use in the process.

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Check out Heroes Against Darkness over at the downloads page: Heroes Against Darkness - Game Rules.

Remaking Magic: Balance

Heroes Against Darkness employs a number of techniques to keep magi relatively balanced against the martial classes.

First, the combination of the total pool of anima that magi have (5 + Magic Bonus) plus the speed with which they can spend their anima (Level + 1 anima per turn) limits the speed with which they can deal damage and their total potential amount of spell damage.

Rule:  Maximum anima points is 5 + Wisdom bonus. Rule:  Magi spend anima points to cast spells. Rule:  All spells have an anima points cost. Rule:  Variable anima cost spells must have at least 1 anima spent on the variable X component. Rule:  Magi cannot spend more than Level + 1 anima points in a single turn.

Second, not all magi are focused on dealing direct damage.  The warlock, which is the primary damage-dealing magi class, can deal 1d8 damage per anima.  Necromancers also deal 1d8 damage per anima, but they have less flexibility in the range of damage dealing spells.  Canonates' divine magic only deals 1d6 damage per anima against normal enemies, but this increases to 1d10 against undead.  Furthermore, each time that a spell has some additional component (such as range, targeting non-Armor Defenses, effect area, miss damage, duration) then these components are specifically included in the cost of the spell.  Let's take a look at some examples of magi's direct damage spells.

The Burning Touch spell allows a brave warlock to deal the highest possible damage:

Burning Touch (X Anima)

Cost	1 anima per dice of damage.
Target	Single target
Attack	Magic vs.  AD
Damage	Xd8 + Magic Bonus
Range	Touch

The added range component of Burning Ray means that the warlock has to spend 1 anima to not get whacked in the head with a sword:

Burning Ray
(1 Anima + X Anima)

Cost	1 anima + 1 anima per dice of damage.
Target	Single target
Attack	Magic vs.  AD
Damage	Xd8 + Magic Bonus
Range	10'+10' per level

The electrical nature of Shocking Ray means that it is cast against the target's Evasion defense, rather than their Armor defense, with +1 anima for the non-Armor defense and another +1 anima for the ranged attack:

Shocking Ray
(2 Anima + X Anima)

Cost	2 anima + 1 anima per dice of damage.
Target	Single target
Attack	Magic vs.  ED
Damage	Xd8 + Magic Bonus
Range	10'+10' per level

Finally, martial characters are not limited to a single weapon damage increment, rather their weapon damage increases as they gain levels.

Melee Attack

Condition	Target in melee range.
Attack	Melee vs.  AD
Damage Level 4: Level 8: Level 12:	Weapon + Melee 2d Weapon + Melee 3d Weapon + Melee 4d Weapon + Melee

All of these factors interact in complicated ways, but the general result is that magi can deal damage faster than martial classes in the short term, but in doing so they deplete their anima and soon have to Rally or use blood anima.  Martial classes can deal a slightly lower amount of damage with each hit but over an extended duration, making them the backbone of any party in longer fights. Ultimately this means that magi can have a big impact early in a balanced encounter, but they can't win it single-handedly.

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Check out Heroes Against Darkness over at the downloads page: Heroes Against Darkness - Game Rules.

Remaking Magic

Let's get this out of the way: I strongly dislike Vancian magic.

When I started work on Heroes Against Darkness we'd just finished playing a long 4th Edition campaign followed by a shorter Basic D&D campaign.  The switch from 4th Edition to Basic was caused by a general dissatisfaction with 4th Edition (don't get me wrong, I'm not a hater) and frustration with the final module that we played (Pyramid of Shadows).  The experience of playing some Basic reminded me of why I stopped playing that edition all those years ago:

•  Class as race
•  Spell level != character level
•  Slow non-magical healing
•  Clerics get no spells at 1st level, but elves get one?!?
•  Arbitrary lists of armor and weapons for magic-users and clerics
•  Tables (to hit), tables (saving throws), tables (thieves skills), and more tables (every damned ability score has a different one)!

Now I could whine about Basic all day, but at the time it was state of the art.  Things have moved on since then, with a lot of mechanical improvements, simplification and consolidation of separate sub-systems, and better scaling for all systems.

Sadly, one of the areas where things haven't moved on in D&D-land (at least until recently) has been the magic systems.  Until 4th Edition folded martial and spell powers into the AEDU powers system (At-Will, Encounter, Daily, Utility), D&D had stuck with the same system of Vancian spell-casting, on top of which they layered various fixes to address specific and general issues (spell resistance, casting feats, spontaneous casting, various dalliances with psionics, etc).

It's a relic of the past that should have been discarded from D&D shortly after it was introduced.  It doesn't work particularly well on an intellectual, mechanical, or gameplay level.  Furthermore, it leads to the unfortunate (literal and figurative) explosion of spell-caster power as they advance in levels while the other classes are stuck with a more linear increase in power.  And if you've read some of my earlier posts, you'll know that Vancian spell systems are a terrible waste of pages in game rule systems (compared to the amount of space dedicated to non-magic classes), occupying up to half of the total pages in some editions' player's guides (AD&D 2nd Edition and Pathfinder being the notable examples of this).

So when I decided to make my own system, the major area I wanted to rework was the magic system.  I began with the simple goal of implementing a magic system based on spell points (anima), and from there my goals evolved as I implemented the system and learned more and more about it in its evolution through playtesting.  Eventually my goals were:

•  Magi classes must be balanced against other classes
•  Spells shouldn't become redundant
•  Spells shouldn't scale without additional costs (Fireball)
•  Magi enhance other classes, not replace (Knock, Invisibility)
•  No magic can break the game or the GM's narrative control (Fly, Overland Travel, Teleport, Scry)
•  No spells should have absolute effects (Finger of Death, Sleep)
•  Allow casters to deplete HP to cast spells (blood anima)
•  Just four pages of spells for each magi class

This was going to be one post, but it's turned into a monster so I'll cover each of these areas in separate posts, so stay tuned!

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Check out Heroes Against Darkness over at the downloads page: Heroes Against Darkness - Game Rules.