Duke of URL
2010-08-30, 08:53 PM
Errata (as of 28 Sep 2010) (http://victoriouspress.com/forum/download/file.php?id=221)
Boundless Horizons is a full replacement for the 3.5 OGL fantasy system, focusing on balance, simplicity, and player choice. It is now available from Victorious Press as an open alpha.
You can make a direct download of the entire archive as individual files (5.6 MB) (http://www.victoriouspress.com/forum/download/file.php?id=213), in a three-volume set (book form, 4.2 MB) (http://victoriouspress.com/forum/download/file.php?id=217), or download the individual document files below.
Update (21 Sep 2010): The Invocation Magic supplement (http://victoriouspress.com/forum/download/file.php?id=220) is now available for open alpha as well. This supplement is designed for Boundless Horizons, but can be adapted to any 3.x system with minimal changes.
Overview and Administrative
License (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/license.pdf)
README (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/readme.pdf)
Basics (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/basics.pdf)
Design Notes (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/design_notes.pdf)
Sample Builds (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/sample_builds.pdf)
Characters
Character Creation and Advancement (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/character.pdf)
Races (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/races.pdf)
Base Classes (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/base_classes.pdf)
Prestige Classes (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/prestige_classes.pdf)
Bloodlines (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/bloodlines.pdf)
Racial Paragon Classes (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/paragons.pdf)
Feats (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/feats.pdf)
Skills (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/skills.pdf)
Equipment and Magic Items
Equipment (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/equipment.pdf)
Magic Items (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/magic_items.pdf)
Magic
Spell Lists and Domains (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/spell_lists_and_domains.pdf)
Spells (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/spells.pdf)
Referee's Handbook
For Referees (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/referees.pdf)
Bestiary (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/bestiary.pdf)
Combat (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/combat.pdf)
Playing Beyond 20th Level (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/beyond_20th.pdf)
Adaption Guidelines (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/adaptation.pdf)
Visit our forums (http://victoriouspress.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=36) to leave feedback, or simply reply to this thread.
Since several of the character building mechanics seem to be a bit difficult to follow, the following example has been drafted to be added to the Alpha 2 documents, and I'm including the draft here:
Monk 1 [ECL 1]
The referee chooses to use a fixed array for ability scores: 17, 15, 14, 12, 10, 8.
The player decides to create Teresa, a dwarf monk. She arranges her ability scores as Strength 15, Dexterity 10, Constitution 14, Intelligence 8, Wisdom 17, and Charisma 12. She then modifies these by her intrinsic racial adjustments (Constitution +2, Charisma -2) to have final ability scores of Strength 15, Dexterity 10, Constitution 16, Intelligence 8, Wisdom 17, and Charisma 10.
Teresa gains all of the class features of a 1st-level monk (combat technique, enhanced strike, style training I, unarmored AC bonus, weapon and armor proficiencies). She chooses the Invisible Eye style, and gains a +2 style bonus to Listen skill checks, as well as Combat Reflexes as a bonus feat.
Since a monk has a d8 hit die, she starts with 8 hit points from her class and 3 more from her Constitution bonus, for a total of 11 hit points. She has a base attack bonus of +1 and a martial rank of 1. Her base saving throws are Fortitude +2, Reflex +2, and Will +2, since they are all high saves for a monk; after adding in ability score adjustments, her saving throw bonuses are Fortitude +5, Reflex +2, Will +5.
A monk gains 4 skill points to use when choosing class skills. However, Teresa has an intelligence penalty and therefore only has 3 skill points to use. She choose to make Concentration, Listen, and Tumble focused skills (4 skill ranks each). Her remaining class skills (Balance, Climb, Craft, Diplomacy, Escape Artist, Hide, Jump, Knowledge (arcana), Knowledge (religion), Move Silently , Perform, Profession, Sense Motive, Spot, and Swim ) are familiar skills, with 1 skill rank each. All remaining skills are foreign, and have no skill ranks.
Finally, Teresa may select a feat that she meets the prerequisites for. She chooses Improved Initiative, and gains +3 on her initiative checks.
Monk 2 [ECL 2]
Teresa gains a character level and advances her monk level to 2. She gains all of the class features of a 2nd-level monk (evasion, style training II). The Invisible Eye style provides Lightning Reflexes as a bonus feat, which adds +2 to Teresa's reflex saves.
Since level 2 is not evenly divisible by 4, Teresa does not gain an ability score increase.
Teresa rolls a d8 to determine her hit points, and gets a 4, to which she adds 3 more from her Constitution bonus, for a gain of 7 hit points, bringing her total to 18 hit points. Her base attack bonus increases to +2 and her martial rank to 2. Her base saving throws are Fortitude +3, Reflex +3, and Will +3; after adding in ability score adjustments and the benefits of the Lightning Reflexes feat, her saving throw bonuses are Fortitude +6, Reflex +5, Will +6.
Teresa has already chosen class skills as a monk, so she does not choose class skills again. Concentration, Listen, and Tumble are her focused skills, and increase to 5 skill ranks each. Her familiar skills (Balance, Climb, Craft, Diplomacy, Escape Artist, Hide, Jump, Knowledge (arcana), Knowledge (religion), Move Silently , Perform, Profession, Sense Motive, Spot, and Swim ) increase to 2 skill ranks each. Her foreign skills still have no skill ranks.
Since level 2 is not evenly divisible by 3, Teresa does not gain a feat choice.
Monk 2 / Cleric 1 (2) [ECL 3]
Teresa reaches level 3. She decides she wants to multiclass as a cleric. Since she does not have Multiclassed (cleric) or Multiclassed (monk) already, she uses her 3rd-level feat to select Multiclassed (cleric) so that she can qualify. (The Multiclassed feat provides an exception to the rule regarding character advancement order.)
Since level 3 is not evenly divisible by 4, Teresa does not gain an ability score increase.
Her cleric class feature level is 2 (1 class level plus 2 monk levels / 2), so she gains all of the class features of both a 1st-level and 2nd-level cleric (two domains, channel faith, aura, spellcasting). Her monk class feature level remains 2, so she does not gain any additional monk abilities.
Teresa rolls a d8 to determine her hit points, and gets a 5, to which she adds 3 more from her Constitution bonus, for a gain of 8 hit points, bringing her total to 26 hit points. Her base attack bonus remains at +2 (+2.75, rounded down to +2) and her martial rank remains 2 (2.5, rounded down to 2). She does not gain any one-time bonuses to her high save (Will) or her medium save (Fortitude), since she has already gotten those bonuses, so her base saving throws remain Fortitude +3 (+3.4, rounded down to +3), Reflex +3 (+3.33, rounded down to +3), and Will +3 (+3.5, rounded down to +3); after adding in ability score adjustments and the benefits of the Lightning Reflexes feat, her saving throw bonuses remain at Fortitude +6, Reflex +5, Will +6.
Since she has chosen a new class, Teresa may choose class skills for it. Again, her class provides 4 skill points, but Teresa only gets 3 due to her Intelligence penalty. She chooses Concentration, Heal, and Knowledge (religion) as her focused skills. Concentration was already a focused skill, so she does not gain the one-time +3 bonus again. Heal was a foreign skill, so she does gain the +3 bonus. Knowledge (religion) was a familiar skill previously, so the +1 bonus is upgraded to +3. Her total skill ranks for these skills are Concentration 6 (6.0), Heal 4 (4.5, rounded down to 4), Knowledge (religion) 5 (5.0).
Her remaining class skills are Craft, Diplomacy, Knowledge (arcana), Knowledge (history), Knowledge (the planes), Profession, and Spellcraft. Of these, Craft, Diplomacy, Knowledge (arcana), and Profession were formerly familiar skills, and gain no additional bonuses, remaining at 2 skill ranks (2.5, rounded down to 2). Knowledge (the planes) and Spellcraft gain the +1 bonus for becoming familiar, and have now have 2 skill ranks (2.0). Her other previous familiar skills all remain at 2 ranks (2.25, rounded down to 2) and all other skills still have 0 ranks (0.75, rounded down to 0).
Since level 3 is evenly divisible by 3, Teresa gains a feat at this level, but she already used it at the first step to take the Multiclassed (cleric) feat.
Monk 2 (3) / Cleric 2 (3) [ECL 4]
When she gains her 4th level, Teresa increases her cleric level to 2.
Since level 4 is evenly divisible by 4, Teresa gains an ability score increase, and increases her Wisdom to 18.
Her cleric class feature level is 3 (2 class levels plus 2 monk levels / 2), so she gains all of the class features of a 3rd-level cleric (2nd-level spells, possible improvements to domain abilities). Her monk class feature level also increases to 3, so she gains the abilities of a 3rd-level monk as well (still mind, unarmored speed bonus +10').
Teresa rolls a d8 to determine her hit points, and gets a 3, to which she adds 3 more from her Constitution bonus, for a gain of 6 hit points, bringing her total to 32 hit points. Her base attack bonus increases to +3 (+3.5, rounded down to +3) and her martial rank increases to 3 (3.0); note that the increase in martial rank means that her Improved Initiative feat now provides a +4 bonus instead of the default +3. Her base saving throws increase to Fortitude +3 (+3.8, rounded down to +3), Reflex +3 (+3.67, rounded down to +3), and Will +4 (+4.0); after adding in ability score adjustments and the benefits of the Lightning Reflexes feat, her saving throw bonuses are Fortitude +6, Reflex +5, Will +8.
Teresa has already chosen class skills as a cleric, so she does not choose class skills again. Her focused skill ranks increase to Concentration 7 (7.0), Heal 5 (5.5, rounded down to 5), Knowledge (religion) 6 (6.0). Her familiar skills increase to Craft 3 (3.0), Diplomacy 3 (3.0), Knowledge (arcana) 3 (3.0), Knowledge (the planes) 2 (2.5, rounded down to 2), Profession 3 (3.0), and Spellcraft 2 (2.5, rounded down to 2). Her other previous familiar skills all remain at 2 ranks (2.5, rounded down to 2) and all other skills have 1 rank (1.0).
Since level 4 is not evenly divisible by 3, Teresa does not gain a feat at this level.
Boundless Horizons is a full replacement for the 3.5 OGL fantasy system, focusing on balance, simplicity, and player choice. It is now available from Victorious Press as an open alpha.
You can make a direct download of the entire archive as individual files (5.6 MB) (http://www.victoriouspress.com/forum/download/file.php?id=213), in a three-volume set (book form, 4.2 MB) (http://victoriouspress.com/forum/download/file.php?id=217), or download the individual document files below.
Update (21 Sep 2010): The Invocation Magic supplement (http://victoriouspress.com/forum/download/file.php?id=220) is now available for open alpha as well. This supplement is designed for Boundless Horizons, but can be adapted to any 3.x system with minimal changes.
Overview and Administrative
License (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/license.pdf)
README (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/readme.pdf)
Basics (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/basics.pdf)
Design Notes (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/design_notes.pdf)
Sample Builds (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/sample_builds.pdf)
Characters
Character Creation and Advancement (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/character.pdf)
Races (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/races.pdf)
Base Classes (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/base_classes.pdf)
Prestige Classes (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/prestige_classes.pdf)
Bloodlines (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/bloodlines.pdf)
Racial Paragon Classes (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/paragons.pdf)
Feats (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/feats.pdf)
Skills (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/skills.pdf)
Equipment and Magic Items
Equipment (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/equipment.pdf)
Magic Items (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/magic_items.pdf)
Magic
Spell Lists and Domains (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/spell_lists_and_domains.pdf)
Spells (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/spells.pdf)
Referee's Handbook
For Referees (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/referees.pdf)
Bestiary (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/bestiary.pdf)
Combat (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/combat.pdf)
Playing Beyond 20th Level (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/beyond_20th.pdf)
Adaption Guidelines (http://www.victoriouspress.com/upload/bh/adaptation.pdf)
Visit our forums (http://victoriouspress.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=36) to leave feedback, or simply reply to this thread.
Since several of the character building mechanics seem to be a bit difficult to follow, the following example has been drafted to be added to the Alpha 2 documents, and I'm including the draft here:
Monk 1 [ECL 1]
The referee chooses to use a fixed array for ability scores: 17, 15, 14, 12, 10, 8.
The player decides to create Teresa, a dwarf monk. She arranges her ability scores as Strength 15, Dexterity 10, Constitution 14, Intelligence 8, Wisdom 17, and Charisma 12. She then modifies these by her intrinsic racial adjustments (Constitution +2, Charisma -2) to have final ability scores of Strength 15, Dexterity 10, Constitution 16, Intelligence 8, Wisdom 17, and Charisma 10.
Teresa gains all of the class features of a 1st-level monk (combat technique, enhanced strike, style training I, unarmored AC bonus, weapon and armor proficiencies). She chooses the Invisible Eye style, and gains a +2 style bonus to Listen skill checks, as well as Combat Reflexes as a bonus feat.
Since a monk has a d8 hit die, she starts with 8 hit points from her class and 3 more from her Constitution bonus, for a total of 11 hit points. She has a base attack bonus of +1 and a martial rank of 1. Her base saving throws are Fortitude +2, Reflex +2, and Will +2, since they are all high saves for a monk; after adding in ability score adjustments, her saving throw bonuses are Fortitude +5, Reflex +2, Will +5.
A monk gains 4 skill points to use when choosing class skills. However, Teresa has an intelligence penalty and therefore only has 3 skill points to use. She choose to make Concentration, Listen, and Tumble focused skills (4 skill ranks each). Her remaining class skills (Balance, Climb, Craft, Diplomacy, Escape Artist, Hide, Jump, Knowledge (arcana), Knowledge (religion), Move Silently , Perform, Profession, Sense Motive, Spot, and Swim ) are familiar skills, with 1 skill rank each. All remaining skills are foreign, and have no skill ranks.
Finally, Teresa may select a feat that she meets the prerequisites for. She chooses Improved Initiative, and gains +3 on her initiative checks.
Monk 2 [ECL 2]
Teresa gains a character level and advances her monk level to 2. She gains all of the class features of a 2nd-level monk (evasion, style training II). The Invisible Eye style provides Lightning Reflexes as a bonus feat, which adds +2 to Teresa's reflex saves.
Since level 2 is not evenly divisible by 4, Teresa does not gain an ability score increase.
Teresa rolls a d8 to determine her hit points, and gets a 4, to which she adds 3 more from her Constitution bonus, for a gain of 7 hit points, bringing her total to 18 hit points. Her base attack bonus increases to +2 and her martial rank to 2. Her base saving throws are Fortitude +3, Reflex +3, and Will +3; after adding in ability score adjustments and the benefits of the Lightning Reflexes feat, her saving throw bonuses are Fortitude +6, Reflex +5, Will +6.
Teresa has already chosen class skills as a monk, so she does not choose class skills again. Concentration, Listen, and Tumble are her focused skills, and increase to 5 skill ranks each. Her familiar skills (Balance, Climb, Craft, Diplomacy, Escape Artist, Hide, Jump, Knowledge (arcana), Knowledge (religion), Move Silently , Perform, Profession, Sense Motive, Spot, and Swim ) increase to 2 skill ranks each. Her foreign skills still have no skill ranks.
Since level 2 is not evenly divisible by 3, Teresa does not gain a feat choice.
Monk 2 / Cleric 1 (2) [ECL 3]
Teresa reaches level 3. She decides she wants to multiclass as a cleric. Since she does not have Multiclassed (cleric) or Multiclassed (monk) already, she uses her 3rd-level feat to select Multiclassed (cleric) so that she can qualify. (The Multiclassed feat provides an exception to the rule regarding character advancement order.)
Since level 3 is not evenly divisible by 4, Teresa does not gain an ability score increase.
Her cleric class feature level is 2 (1 class level plus 2 monk levels / 2), so she gains all of the class features of both a 1st-level and 2nd-level cleric (two domains, channel faith, aura, spellcasting). Her monk class feature level remains 2, so she does not gain any additional monk abilities.
Teresa rolls a d8 to determine her hit points, and gets a 5, to which she adds 3 more from her Constitution bonus, for a gain of 8 hit points, bringing her total to 26 hit points. Her base attack bonus remains at +2 (+2.75, rounded down to +2) and her martial rank remains 2 (2.5, rounded down to 2). She does not gain any one-time bonuses to her high save (Will) or her medium save (Fortitude), since she has already gotten those bonuses, so her base saving throws remain Fortitude +3 (+3.4, rounded down to +3), Reflex +3 (+3.33, rounded down to +3), and Will +3 (+3.5, rounded down to +3); after adding in ability score adjustments and the benefits of the Lightning Reflexes feat, her saving throw bonuses remain at Fortitude +6, Reflex +5, Will +6.
Since she has chosen a new class, Teresa may choose class skills for it. Again, her class provides 4 skill points, but Teresa only gets 3 due to her Intelligence penalty. She chooses Concentration, Heal, and Knowledge (religion) as her focused skills. Concentration was already a focused skill, so she does not gain the one-time +3 bonus again. Heal was a foreign skill, so she does gain the +3 bonus. Knowledge (religion) was a familiar skill previously, so the +1 bonus is upgraded to +3. Her total skill ranks for these skills are Concentration 6 (6.0), Heal 4 (4.5, rounded down to 4), Knowledge (religion) 5 (5.0).
Her remaining class skills are Craft, Diplomacy, Knowledge (arcana), Knowledge (history), Knowledge (the planes), Profession, and Spellcraft. Of these, Craft, Diplomacy, Knowledge (arcana), and Profession were formerly familiar skills, and gain no additional bonuses, remaining at 2 skill ranks (2.5, rounded down to 2). Knowledge (the planes) and Spellcraft gain the +1 bonus for becoming familiar, and have now have 2 skill ranks (2.0). Her other previous familiar skills all remain at 2 ranks (2.25, rounded down to 2) and all other skills still have 0 ranks (0.75, rounded down to 0).
Since level 3 is evenly divisible by 3, Teresa gains a feat at this level, but she already used it at the first step to take the Multiclassed (cleric) feat.
Monk 2 (3) / Cleric 2 (3) [ECL 4]
When she gains her 4th level, Teresa increases her cleric level to 2.
Since level 4 is evenly divisible by 4, Teresa gains an ability score increase, and increases her Wisdom to 18.
Her cleric class feature level is 3 (2 class levels plus 2 monk levels / 2), so she gains all of the class features of a 3rd-level cleric (2nd-level spells, possible improvements to domain abilities). Her monk class feature level also increases to 3, so she gains the abilities of a 3rd-level monk as well (still mind, unarmored speed bonus +10').
Teresa rolls a d8 to determine her hit points, and gets a 3, to which she adds 3 more from her Constitution bonus, for a gain of 6 hit points, bringing her total to 32 hit points. Her base attack bonus increases to +3 (+3.5, rounded down to +3) and her martial rank increases to 3 (3.0); note that the increase in martial rank means that her Improved Initiative feat now provides a +4 bonus instead of the default +3. Her base saving throws increase to Fortitude +3 (+3.8, rounded down to +3), Reflex +3 (+3.67, rounded down to +3), and Will +4 (+4.0); after adding in ability score adjustments and the benefits of the Lightning Reflexes feat, her saving throw bonuses are Fortitude +6, Reflex +5, Will +8.
Teresa has already chosen class skills as a cleric, so she does not choose class skills again. Her focused skill ranks increase to Concentration 7 (7.0), Heal 5 (5.5, rounded down to 5), Knowledge (religion) 6 (6.0). Her familiar skills increase to Craft 3 (3.0), Diplomacy 3 (3.0), Knowledge (arcana) 3 (3.0), Knowledge (the planes) 2 (2.5, rounded down to 2), Profession 3 (3.0), and Spellcraft 2 (2.5, rounded down to 2). Her other previous familiar skills all remain at 2 ranks (2.5, rounded down to 2) and all other skills have 1 rank (1.0).
Since level 4 is not evenly divisible by 3, Teresa does not gain a feat at this level.