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Weiser_Cain
2010-01-18, 09:32 PM
So I wanted to put together a class system, not in D20 and with one tester, me (with my limited pnp experience). What sort of things can I do to get this to work? Or can it work?

Glimbur
2010-01-18, 09:49 PM
I wouldn't do this alone.

First, put down your basic mechanics. If it's not d20, what is it? Then build a couple classes (between five and twelve should be good). Run some numbers to see if a couple of different builds that cost about the same (levels and such) can match up (not necessarily head to head, but everyone should be able to help with most goals), think about how you want the parties to work together, and get a skeleton of how everything should work.

Step two is to stash your ego and defensiveness in a bottle. It'll only get in the way of step three.

Step three is to get a group of people with the inclination and experience in breaking things to look at it. You could post it up on boards and see what responses you get, but remember that you are then not screening your beta testers and sometimes you get what you pay for.

Weiser_Cain
2010-01-18, 10:36 PM
Let's see (gets notes)...
Big Racial abilities
(Flight, extreme height and strength, passing through metal at will, immunity to change)
Random innate abilities
(Fire starter, Drain Life on contact)
Free skill system
(You're rewarded skill points along with XP, you can spend them anytime)
Strong branching classes and Big penalties for picking a class you shouldn't
(Basically each race has been min-maxing for ages but you can unlock skills)

Glimbur
2010-01-18, 10:56 PM
Interesting. What's your basic conflict resolution system? For example, in d20 you roll a 20 sided die, add modifiers, and compare to the correct difficulty. In Dark Heresy you roll d100, add modifiers, and compare to your skill. There are many other, stranger resolution systems out there, but without one the game is just Pretend. Which is ok, if that's what you're going for, but then you just have a setting, not a system.

Random innate abilities, meaning when you make a character you roll on a table to see what you can do? Is there a separate table for each race, or one general table? That will require careful balancing; or an acceptance of sub-par characters dying.

Weiser_Cain
2010-01-19, 01:08 AM
Accuracy - Dodge + ?die roll for hit.

There are world reasons why you wouldn't want too strong an innate ability, since once you get to the level it can take over for a class skill you're the equivalent of a dnd sorcerer and some wizards will want your magic infused blood...

Actually now that I've slept on it I'll just work on the setting some more and maybe it'll become popular enough some day that someone else will do this for me. Thanks though.