Low magic campaign ruleset [3.5]

[TheThan]

Introduction
One of the major mechanical problems in dungeons and dragons is the reliance upon magical gear. Much of the game relies upon the acquisition of gear, such as armor class, melee and ranged damage and attack bonuses.

This rule-set sets out to correct this design flaw, making the game playable in campaigns set in a world where magic items, weapons and gear are not easily acquired and magic in and of itself is rare, frightening and dangerous to use. If anyone wishes to evaluate and critique them feel free to post away.


The rules:

Attack Bonus:
Every character gains a bonus to their base attack bonus equal to ½ their character level (rounded down). This bonus is in addition to their normal BAB, and any other bonuses they may have.

Armor class:
All characters gain a bonus to their armor class equal to ½ their character level (rounded down). This bonus is a “class bonus” and stacks with all other bonuses (armor, deflection, dodge etc). This bonus applies to their touch AC, and they retain it when they are caught flat footed.

Damage bonus:
All characters gain a bonus to their melee or ranged damage rolls equal to ½ their character level (rounded down). This represents a character’s skill with their chosen weapons. This bonus only applies to magic spells that have the ray or touch descriptors and that actually do damage (like shocking grasp or scorching ray for instance).

Ability scores:
Every level where a character would gain an ability score increase, they gain an additional point to place into their stats, they may if they choose place both stat points into a single ability.

Damage reduction:
One of the greatest problems with low magic settings is that of damage reduction. Without magical or alchemical gear, characters cannot effectively fight creatures with DR. They simply cannot deal enough damage to it to kill it before they succumb to the monster. The answer to this problem is to simply reduce the effectiveness of damage reduction. The damage reduction of all monsters is now halved (rounded down). For example, a gargoyle with DR 10/magic now has DR 5/magic.


Spell failure chance
When a spell caster of any sort attempts to cast a spell, he must roll a percentage chance to fail that roll. The percentage chance is static and set at 30%. If the caster fails, he simply fails to cast the spell, the spell slot is then used up for that day. This does not stack with arcane spell failure, however a caster that passes his miss cast chance, must roll for ASF as usual.

Magic weapons:
Normally magic weapons give a bonus to attack rolls, damage rolls and often times some other property such as flaming. However with these rules the standard bonuses a magical weapon would normally grant will quickly allow anyone with a magical weapon to out pace his party members. (Remember this is low magic not no-magic). To counter this, the maximum enhancement bonus on magical weapons and armor is halved to +2 (that’s rounded down). So instead of +5 maximum enhancement bonus all weapons can have up to a +2 bonus. Also any other properties cannot exceed a +3 enhancement limit.

edit:
made changes to the spell mist cast table and added rules for magic items.

[Ashtagon]

Attack bonus and AC bonus: These balance each other out for PC vs NPC encounters. For PC vs monster encounters, it achieves your goal though. Note that it will also raise the feel of battles toward cinematic sooner than vanilla, as mid-level PCs will be far more powerful relative to low-level when compared to RAW.

Damage Bonus and DR: Again, these are going to cancel each other out in any encounter that has both involved. If no DR is involved, it will make battles more swingy if NPCs are involved, or easier if monsters are involved.

Spell Miscast: if you don't give a caster some kind of reliable way to inflict damage, you may as well just ban them entirely. And permanently losing a spell slot? That's just mean. Make it a DC 25 Will save to recover, made each day, at least (and even that's a bit tough I think).

[Omegonthesane]

Attack Bonus:
Every character gains a bonus to their base attack bonus equal to ½ their character level (rounded down). This bonus is in addition to their normal BAB, and any other bonuses they may have.
This makes Fighters even less important. I'd make it a bonus of 1/2 their normal BaB rounded down, so full BaB classes become somewhat decent in a fight at high levels.


Armor class:
All characters gain a bonus to their armor class equal to ½ their character level (rounded down). This bonus is a “class bonus” and stacks with all other bonuses (armor, deflection, dodge etc). This bonus applies to their touch AC, and they retain it when they are caught flat footed.
Make this contingent on what armour you're proficient with. Wizards should be less able to take, dodge, or otherwise survive hits than fighters.


Damage bonus:
All characters gain a bonus to their melee or ranged damage rolls equal to ½ their character level (rounded down). This represents a character’s skill with their chosen weapons. This bonus only applies to magic spells that have the ray or touch descriptors and that actually do damage (like shocking grasp or scorching ray for instance).
Again, it should be half your BaB not half your character level. Besides, a pure caster who cares about weapon damage even at level 1 is probably not being played as intended.


Ability scores:
Every level where a character would gain an ability score increase, they gain an additional point to place into their stats, they may if they choose place both stat points into a single ability.
This is fine.


Damage reduction:
One of the greatest problems with low magic settings is that of damage reduction. Without magical or alchemical gear, characters cannot effectively fight creatures with DR. They simply cannot deal enough damage to it to kill it before they succumb to the monster. The answer to this problem is to simply reduce the effectiveness of damage reduction. The damage reduction of all monsters is now halved (rounded down). For example, a gargoyle with DR 10/magic now has DR 5/magic.
Also, make everything count as magic for the purpose of overcoming DR X/magic, and only for that purpose.


Spell miss-cast table:
When a spell caster of any sort attempts to cast a spell, he must roll a percentage chance to fail that roll. The percentage chance starts at 20 % and increases by 5% for each spell level (starts at 20% for Cantrips/Orisons, increases to 25% for 1st level spells, 30 for 2nd level spells).
Too nasty. The Suel Arcanamach sacrifices being as powerful as a real caster for not putting up with a 20% failure chance. I'd make it a Concentration check as if you'd taken damage, but without a DC increase for points of damage taken (as you haven't actually taken damage).


The caster fails to cast the spell, he looses that spell permanently

The caster fails to cast the spell, he looses one spell slot of that level spell permanently. |
Not even worth considering. Permanent loss of anything is too high a price when death itself isn't permanent.


The caster accidentally targets the wrong person (or area), the Dm chooses the new target.

The spell explodes in the caster’s face, he takes 1d6+ spell level damage.

The caster fails to cast the spell, he may act normally.
Fine.


The caster accidentally casts the wrong spell, the dm chooses which spell and all targets for it.
Too much effort and highly illogical in flavour.


The caster spell is more powerful than intended; the dm applies a meta-magic feat (his choice) to the spell being cast. The spell does not take up higher spell slots.
Miscasts should hurt you. I say the caster chooses the feat as if he actually had it, and takes temporary Constitution damage equal to the metamagic adjustment as too much of himself enters the spell.


Something weird happens. Upon successful completion of the spell, the caster is teleported into a random square in the immediate area.
Sounds like it should be Conjurations only, as that's where all the teleporting is.


Something horrible happens, upon successful completion of the spell, the caster transforms into a frog, squirrel or other harmless woodland creature.
Should be Transmutation only and have a limited duration.


The caster gains a 25% miss chance when he is attacked.
Nuuu. Miscast should always be Bad for the caster.

[Myou]

This (http://www.zipworld.com.au/~hong/dnd/innate_magic.htm)may interest you.

[Omegonthesane]

Spell Miscast: if you don't give a caster some kind of reliable way to inflict damage, you may as well just ban them entirely. And permanently losing a spell slot? That's just mean. Make it a DC 25 Will save to recover, made each day, at least (and even that's a bit tough I think).

I moslty agree that he's gone too far against spellcsaters in the 1st release of this, but nothing should be absolutely reliable. A fighter's sword can miss, a ranger's arrow can miss, so a caster's spell should be able to miscast.

Where you got it right is that casters need a mostly reliable way of dealing damage or debuffs. Like, something that is almost certainly not going to fail 3 or 4 times in a row. Maybe even have a clause that if they miscast twice in a row they can take 10 on their next don't miscast check.

[Ashtagon]

http://warheart.rpg.sk/

This url has a reasonable set of rules for a low-magic setting. Worth looking into.

[TheThan]

I was considering going with a static 25%-30% spell failure chance that stacks with all other spell failures. Instead of the whole miss cast table. But I wasn’t sure if that was enough of a drawback to spell casting.

Also I considered allowing the damage bonus to overcome damage reduction, but I felt that combining that with the 50% loss of DR on all monsters was a little too much.

I want this variant to be generic enough to be used for any sort of low magic campaigns. So you can use it in a classic medieval fantasy or say a swashbuckling high seas adventure game.

[Comet]

One of the major mechanical problems in dungeons and dragons is the reliance upon magical gear. Much of the game relies upon the acquisition of gear, such as armor class, melee and ranged damage and attack bonuses.

I don't think this is so much a flaw, but rather a feature. D&D 3.5 was designed to simulate stories of grand heroism and everyday magic.
As such, I've never understood the need to forcefully remake it into a low-magic game. Too much work for me and there are other games out there that do the job better.

The mechanics do look good enoug at first glance, though I'm a far cry from an expert. Sorry I couldn't bring anything truly constructive to the table, just wanted to present my opinion on the subject.

[Roderick_BR]

Attack and damage bonus: An interesting idea. How about making it that the Weapon Focus/Specialization feats scale with BAB (and make Weapon Specialization available to all classes). So your character can become an expert with a chosen weapon, maybe with more if they want to spend more feats. Fighters could benefit from specializing in more than one weapon.

Armor class: I'd suggest seeing the defense rules in the UA http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/adventuring/defenseBonus.htm , though they can be a bit high if you'll let it stack with armor. Basing it off BAB would help balance meelers and casters/rogues.

Ability scores: You could also make it 1 point for every 2 levels, instead of 2 points every 4 levels. Allow a little more customization earlier.

Damage reduction: Keep the alchemical weapons, so characters can have "special weapons". Halve only the xxx/magic ones, or simply find a material to replace the /magic part.

Spell miss-cast table: I think it weakens casters too much, and slows down the game. My suggestion is using a sorcerer variant, like the battle sorcerer, only reducing his spells/day instead of spells known, so you have a less cast-ish character. Or even, allow only half/minor casters. Keep paladins as divine casters in place of clerics (with the alignment variants), and bards/beguilers as arcane casters. This way you have a little bit of magic for your players, withou having to nerf their casting. Or replace everything with the NPC adept class (with maybe a few more class features to make up for lower power).

[Omegonthesane]

Or replace everything with the NPC adept class (with maybe a few more class features to make up for lower power).

Isn't the NPC adept class tier 4 as it is? If you want normal DuntD magick then that's fairly weak, but "low magic, nothing explicitly magickal" knocks out the top two tiers and most of tier 3.

[TheThan]

I don't think this is so much a flaw, but rather a feature. D&D 3.5 was designed to simulate stories of grand heroism and everyday magic.
As such, I've never understood the need to forcefully remake it into a low-magic game. Too much work for me and there are other games out there that do the job better.

The mechanics do look good enough at first glance, though I'm a far cry from an expert. Sorry I couldn't bring anything truly constructive to the table, just wanted to present my opinion on the subject.

Part of many heroic fantasies is that the character(s) develop their skills and become powerful. Sure they may find the occasional magic item but for the most part their gear is mundane. They develop the skills they need to defeat whatever BBEG they are up against, rarely relying on the magical overcome their adversaries.

As far as game design principles go, I believe that any character should stand on its own two feet without the crutch of magical gear. Any system that forces the DM to “give” the players gear in order for them to be remotely competent at what they do is flawed. The game should not force the Dm to give his players magical gear so they defeat an appropriate level encounter.

Also from the perspective of a Dm, I hate the idea of “giving” out loot. My players earn every piece of equipment they have. The players should be rewarded for doing great things. That’s why they’re the big damn heroes after all. Doing something mundane and being greatly rewarded for it is not as exciting and doesn’t really hold with a lot of heroic fantasy traditions. For example, defeating a simple highway bandit is hardly heroic and is something the local constable can deal with. Why should the heroes be rewarded with magical gear for doing that? But if the heroes slay the dragon, rescue the princess and generally save the day; that’s heroic and is worthy of a big reward.

Besides these rules are not designed to represent a grim and gritty reality, instead they are designed to reduce the importance of magic and magical items in a game.


Why is it when someone comes up with a variant, others assume you haven’t done your research? Anyway, about the defense bonus. The problem I have with it is that it does not address the same problem I’m addressing. It replaces the standard armor class rules with a variant system, for campaigns where wearing armor is not appropriate, such as a high seas swashbuckling game. It’s an alright system for such settings.

What my system does is replace the need for magical gear. Now instead of needing to acquire magic armor or weapons, they receive that bonus as they progress, it stops the need for “magic shops” and prevents the Dm from being forced by the rules to dish out magic items.

[TheThan]

Ok guys I made some changes to the OP.

I changed the spell miss-cast table into a static 30% spell failure chance. I also added rules for magic weapons and armor. I’m still interested in what people have to say.

[Eldariel]

As it stands, AC is completely trivial by these tweaks. Magic boosts AC from 4 sources (Shield, Armor, NA, Deflection) and indirectly through stats and misc bonuses, while To Hit gains only 1 type of bonus (Weapon Enhancement) along with indirect stat bonuses and misc bonuses. Mundane AC caps at Mithril Mechanus Gear or 22, unless you use a Tower Shield which gets you to 26.

An average level 10 Fighter has 10 points of BAB, 5+ Str, +1 Mw. Weapon and feats and so on (not to forget battle modifiers like charge, flank, higher ground, trip, flat-footed, etc.). At this point, it's fine, but the AC doesn't scale at all from that point.

This means that losing access to magic cuts into AC much more than into To Hit...and AC is already behind in scaling. BAB already is a steady increase in To Hit; I don't think a further increase is called for. If you give a bonus on To Hit-scaling, you definitely need to scale AC even more.

[Friend Computer]

One of the major mechanical problems in dungeons and dragons is the reliance upon magical gear. Much of the game relies upon the acquisition of gear, such as armor class, melee and ranged damage and attack bonuses.

This rule-set sets out to correct this design flaw, making the game playable in campaigns set in a world where magic items, weapons and gear are not easily acquired and magic in and of itself is rare, frightening and dangerous to use. If anyone wishes to evaluate and critique them feel free to post away.
The problem with the ruleset is that it seeks to replace magic, and not reduce it.

For example, all this does is add features to characters so that magic is less important to them, but it has no impact on the importance of magic to the rest of the world, i.e., MONSTERS.

For a low magic campaign, you do not need all these rules, what you need to do is reduce the magical treause given and eliminate magical treasure sold while reducing mid-level threat and eliminating high level threats.

In short, imagine a world where almost everyone is level 1, and the most powerful caster before the PCs was CL10, and prior to that and since, casters have usually capped at CL6.

Of course, this will mean that higher level campaigns will be harder to believably pull off (why didn't this dragon take over the world? Why didn't the outsiders take over Prime Material? Why have the CR4 critters in the Dark Forest not carved an empire for themselves when most people don't rise above lv2?).

So in short, the game doesn't have many problems at all. It is just the oft-made assumption that everyone is at least level 6 and that apprentice wizards can cast Charm Deity 6 times a day.

That is not the case. What level is the mass of the population at? level 1 should take up 70% of the population. Level 2 maybe 25%, level 3 maybe 4%. Levels 4, 5 and 6 take up the remaining one percent.

Most people have 6 10's and 11's in all abilities. You have to be pretty dumb to get an 9, and I doubt anyone here is more than a 12. Assume that 80% of the population has no modifiers for abilities (prior to racial stuff).

Now that sounds boring doesn't it? Well, if you aren't playing E6, then yeah, it will be. Your Level 15 fighter will be taking over a city each hour.

Well, when you hear about that level 10 commoner blacksmith making swords, they aren't going to be Masterwork, they are going to be more than razor sharp, lighter than light and DAMN they will be pretty. Way more than mere 'masterwork'.

For a "masterwork" 'component' the PHB lists a DC of 20. Well, for a "Super Masterwork" +2 'component' have a DC of 25, and for "Epic Masterwork" +3 have a DC of 30. Or something.

And how to deal with monsters? Add +1 CR to each 3 the monster has.

So yeah.
*waits for someone to tell him he is an idiot*

[Another_Poet]

Introduction
Ability scores:
Every level where a character would gain an ability score increase, they gain an additional point to place into their stats, they may if they choose place both stat points into a single ability.

I think it would be more fun if you got 1 ability score point every 2 levels instead of 2 points every 4 levels. You progress at about the same rate but you feel like you get to bump your stats more because it is happening more often. Players love bumping their stats. 4 levels is a long time to wait already, so if you're doubling how much you give them you may as well spread it out too.


Spell failure chance
When a spell caster of any sort attempts to cast a spell, he must roll a percentage chance to fail that roll. The percentage chance is static and set at 30%. If the caster fails, he simply fails to cast the spell, the spell slot is then used up for that day. This does not stack with arcane spell failure, however a caster that passes his miss cast chance, must roll for ASF as usual.

You need to fix this, not for game balance (it's fine) but for boring players to death. 30% miss chance is fine, but having players feel cheated is not fine. I would take a cue from Pathfinder and 4e and allow each caster class to have some power they can use unlimited times. Consider a Conjuration specialist in Pathfinder: he can cast a ranged touch, 1d6 acid dart with a 30' maximum range as a standard action, and he can do it unlimited times. He can do it every round all day if he wants. Give your casters something like this so that they can choose to be effective in combat without risking all their spell slots. That way they can save their 70% disintegration or 70% fireball for the big epic battles. Gambling away your class features is more fun if there is a consolation prize for losing.

ap

[Omegonthesane]

Give your casters something like this so that they can choose to be effective in combat without risking all their spell slots. That way they can save their 70% disintegration or 70% fireball for the big epic battles. Gambling away your class features is more fun if there is a consolation prize for losing.

ap

Maybe miscast spell slots, unlike properly cast spell slots, can be regained with a few rounds/minutes of meditation and/or repreparation. Fluff-wise... well, it's pretty vague how the magic is meant to work, you could say that bungling a spell leaves the slot misaligned in a repairable way (although that's easier to believe for prepared casters than spontaneous ones).

[acpfunfun]

How about these apples...

I'm currently running in a campaign where everyday folks start an inquisition if they see any magic or magic users. This means that magic stuff is pretty darn scarce. Attack stats are not really an issue as there are many non-magical and some quasi magical methods to improve those. The down-side to this is the players are hamstrung by low ACs. There's nothing really out there (outside of combat tactics and thick metal armor) to improve it. Additionally, the DM has seen fit to put us up against big nasties from the past where magic was plentiful (think Eberron) or from other planes... they seem to have no problems defending themselves supernatural style (NA, DR, Magic etc...) and still have all the benefits of the 3.5 Attack/Damage rules.

So, need some advice on how, as a player, I can pump up my AC through non-magical means (other than running away constantly).

[imp_fireball]

Ability scores:
Every level where a character would gain an ability score increase, they gain an additional point to place into their stats, they may if they choose place both stat points into a single ability.


What about +1d4 that can be applied to a single stat, or multiple once the point value is rolled?


Magic weapons:
Normally magic weapons give a bonus to attack rolls, damage rolls and often times some other property such as flaming. However with these rules the standard bonuses a magical weapon would normally grant will quickly allow anyone with a magical weapon to out pace his party members. (Remember this is low magic not no-magic). To counter this, the maximum enhancement bonus on magical weapons and armor is halved to +2 (that’s rounded down). So instead of +5 maximum enhancement bonus all weapons can have up to a +2 bonus. Also any other properties cannot exceed a +3 enhancement limit.

Instead, I think you should just multiply the cost of any magic item (creation in XP and GP, standard price at a break even vendor (the price of each item listed in the actual books), etc.) by a factor of 10. Then compare it to WBL - that's the relative power in magic items the character can get at X level (plus or minus a level of uncertainty whenever the GM wants to reward players a little beyond WBL or penalize them by making them lose items, or loot relatively little from a higher CR encounter, etc.).

Include a note saying that a GM can always multiply it by more or less (instead of the straight 10) if they wish to tweak their settings to a precise level that they find wanting.

That way, magic is powerful as it rightly should be - it's good for settings where there is 'low magic' but where it exists, it can be quite powerful, or merely tip the scales slightly.


So, need some advice on how, as a player, I can pump up my AC through non-magical means (other than running away constantly).

Tome of Battle. Many of the maneuvers are extraordinary.

Also uber-charger barbarian that power attacks for huge damage. Isn't too hard to optimize.


(although that's easier to believe for prepared casters than spontaneous ones).

For spontaneous ones, you could say that their energy would never be fully expended on the spell if it fizzed out before completion.

[Roland St. Jude]

Sheriff of Moddingham: Thread Necromancy. Please don't.