how do you feel about e6?

[questionmark693]

Im getting ready to start a new campaign soon, and I came across e6 recently, so I thought about using it as the basis for a campaign. But first I thought I'd check, what has been the experience of the playgrounders with this variant?

[Zaq]

It's a hell of a lot saner than non-E6 in a lot of ways. It's not a magic cure-all, but it's still a hell of a lot of fun. I heartily recommend it.

Plus, you can play a T1/T2 character and not feel guilty about it!

[Calimehter]

I'm a huge fan. E6 is a lot better for portraying classic sword and sorcery style fantasy fiction IMO.

[dextercorvia]

I really like it. I like low-level play. I also like feeling less guilty about playing casters, as Zaq said. I like the feats instead of levels thing after 6th.

[JusticeZero]

Runs great. You do have to think about how to deal with nasty status effects like death, though. You can do it by adjusting spell levels, adding special resources in setting, or luck points, though my personal favorite is the "Zero is a speed bump" rule. That is, any damage that takes you into the negatives gives you a Fortitude save to end up at zero, else you go to exactly - 1 hp and are nauseated. Regardless, you are also exhausted. Additionally, healing from negative numbers cannot heal anyone to higher than zero, regardless of size of heal. Healing someone from zero is as normal.

[Malroth]

I Hate it. It is an exercise in eternal mediocrity capable of portraying only helpless cannon fodder dying horribly against foes they will never have any hope of surpassing.

[Zaq]

I Hate it. It is an exercise in eternal mediocrity capable of portraying only helpless cannon fodder dying horribly against foes they will never have any hope of surpassing.

You, good sir, are either being facetious, or you had (or, I hope this wasn't the case, were) a terrible GM.

[dextercorvia]

I Hate it. It is an exercise in eternal mediocrity capable of portraying only helpless cannon fodder dying horribly against foes they will never have any hope of surpassing.

You have clearly never read the e6 Balor challenge.

[Blackhawk748]

While having never actually played E6 i imagine it would feel a lot like playing Fable, your powerful without being truly ridiculous (this is of course assuming you played Fable without Time Stop lol)


You have clearly never read the e6 Balor challenge.

.................what.

[dextercorvia]

.................what.

Read for yourself (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?160998-Optimize-or-Die-Playgrounders!-E6-Balor-Challenge-Thread)

I broke the intent of E6 wide open with 9th level spells to do it (The Naenhoon Effect). But, several people defeated the Balor and stayed within the usual parameters (more or less anyway).

[Blackhawk748]

Holy frea.... I dont even.... wha....... wow, just wow.

[Malroth]

The E6 balor challange is what convinced me that E6 characters are hopelessly underpowered by default since the amout of high optimization build perfection required by the entire team combined with months of prep work for what in a normal campign would be a single full round of attacks from a low op barbarian.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

It's a superb idea, but the implementation should slightly vary depending on the group's style. It's especially good if you have a mix of players who optimize and players who insist on playing mundane classes in a party with Tier 1's.


The E6 magic item list is limited to anything with a default caster level of 6th or lower. This does not take 6th level builds with a higher caster level into consideration. It's also just incorrect since the errata made it so an item's caster level is not one of its prerequisites (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/magicItemBasics.htm#casterLevel), you can make a +1 Speed weapon with a caster level of 5th for example.

Incantations (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/magic/incantations.htm) can be used to duplicate higher level spells, but only for very specific applications. This opens up a lot of possibilities, such as summoning an Efreet to gain wishes, or summoning a powerful outsider capable of using spell-like abilities at a high caster level to aid in creating a magic item with a high caster level prerequisite. They could also be used to crate teleportation effects, though the destination and/or source would be specific to a given incantation. They can be used to emulate a specific spell to meet a prerequisite of creating a magic item.

A Mystic Ranger (Dragon 336) with the Wildshape Ranger (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/variantCharacterClasses.htm#ranger) variant will be the most powerful character in the game.

A Kobold can get Wizard 9 spellcasting at 6th level with the proper tricks.

Be careful of certain level-adjusted races/templates, due to exchanging the LA for a reduced point buy. A Water Orc (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/races/elementalRacialVariants.htm#racesOfWater) Half-Goristro (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/we/20060630x&page=1) (bottom of the page) will begin play with Str 28, Dex 6, Con 22, Int 6, Wis 6, Cha 6, +5 natural armor, two slam attacks which each add 1.5 Str to damage, resistances, immunities, DR, SR, spell-like abilities such as Levitate, etc. Here's an example of one with three class levels (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?342092-Help-me-build-a-Thug-NPC#3), though that one used the elite array instead of zero point buy. I can almost guarantee that someone will want to make a Pixie Warlock, but at least that's not as game breaking.

An Item Familiar (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/magic/itemFamiliars.htm) that begins as a +1 Quarterstaff (or Elvencraft Composite Longbow) can be upgraded to a magical staff with charges of spells as well as a Runestaff (MIC p224) as though the owner possessed all the necessary item creation feats. Ancestral Relic (BoED) or an OA Samurai can do similar things, though this has a hard limit to the item's potential magical value.

[The Grue]

The E6 balor challange is what convinced me that E6 characters are hopelessly underpowered by default since the amout of high optimization build perfection required by the entire team combined with months of prep work for what in a normal campign would be a single full round of attacks from a low op barbarian.

...what

You look at a 6-HD character only being able to defeat a freaking Balor with extreme optimization...and from that conclude that E6 characters are hopelessly underpowered?

Mayhaps try recalibrating your expectations? The intent of the E6 subsystem is that high-CR things like balors, archdevils, Great Wyrm dragons etc should be exceptionally difficult to defeat for a bunch of wittle mortals.

[dextercorvia]

The E6 balor challange is what convinced me that E6 characters are hopelessly underpowered by default since the amout of high optimization build perfection required by the entire team combined with months of prep work for what in a normal campign would be a single full round of attacks from a low op barbarian.

So, you don't like E6 because regular E6 characters can't take on a CR20 threat?

[Malroth]

A Bad DM is still going to think a CR 24 creature is a good matchup for 4 lv 6s and an average DM is still going to turn to a random page of the monster manual and say "hey this looks cool" so you're still going to be fighting balors and ancient dragons on a regular basis, The difference is in a standard campaign you'll eventually catch up in power if you get lucky enough to survive.

[The Grue]

A Bad DM is still going to think a CR 24 creature is a good matchup for 4 lv 6s and an average DM is still going to turn to a random page of the monster manual and say "hey this looks cool" so you're still going to be fighting balors and ancient dragons on a regular basis, The difference is in a standard campaign you'll eventually catch up in power if you get lucky enough to survive.

A bad DM is a bad DM, and there's no rules system printed that can compensate for it.

A good DM...wouldn't do that, because they know the limits and capabilities of the player characters they're working with? Again I think you need to recalibrate your expectations here. Chief among them, the intent of E6 that, because your characters aren't growing in power exponentially, they don't have to face hordes of balors and dracolichs every other weekend.

I think I see where the flaw in your reasoning is; this part right here:


you're still going to be fighting balors and ancient dragons on a regular basis

In fact, in an E6 game, this is untrue.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

The E6 balor challange is what convinced me that E6 characters are hopelessly underpowered by default since the amout of high optimization build perfection required by the entire team combined with months of prep work for what in a normal campign would be a single full round of attacks from a low op barbarian.

In E6, there's nobody capable of calling a Balor to the material plane in the first place. Things like this just aren't present in the game, unless the DM puts one there for story reasons, in which case he'd better have a story-specific method of enabling the PCs to defeat or banish it otherwise he's a bad DM.

A good DM does not "turn to a random page of the monster manual" to determine what the party fights, he creates balanced encounters that are challenging yet within their capabilities. If you open a random page in the MM to determine what your party encounters, you are not a good DM. A given area will not have monsters from the entire book's CR range, because the stronger ones would have wiped out the weaker ones long ago. A proper monster ecosystem includes creatures within a range of similar CRs, so any monster should be capable of defending itself against any other monster it happens to cross paths with, and that other monster will be aware of that and probably not want to fight. If you play in a nonsensical setting where you're just as likely to run into a Goblin as the Tarrasque, regardless of the party level, then your DM has done a very poor job of developing that setting.

[AuraTwilight]

It's really awesome, but my group are Tippy-level psychotics who enjoy high-level play and unsustainable nutty shenanigans.

[heavyfuel]

Im getting ready to start a new campaign soon, and I came across e6 recently, so I thought about using it as the basis for a campaign. But first I thought I'd check, what has been the experience of the playgrounders with this variant?

I like it, I really do. I've played in an e6 game before, and right now I'm DMing one. The most fun about it is how it breaks the routine... In regular D&D, any martial, non ToB character will spend his actions "I charge with pounce and full attack him". It gets old quickly. Not with e6. Since you have tons of feats, there are plenty more options available to you, so you don't find yourself doing the same stuff over and over again.



It's a hell of a lot saner than non-E6 in a lot of ways. It's not a magic cure-all, but it's still a
hell of a lot of fun. I heartily recommend it.

Plus, you can play a T1/T2 character and not feel guilty about it!


I really like it. I like low-level play. I also like feeling less guilty about playing casters, as Zaq said. I like the feats instead of levels thing after 6th.

Can you? Really? I still felt somewhat guilty when the Fighter was hitting things really hard (Dungeoncrasher will practically instagib most people) but I was running around throwing Chained Twined Quickened Fell Drain Reach Inflict Light Wounds with DMM.

[Zanos]

Honestly, E6 bothers me because it assumes that creatures exist that are more powerful than a character with 6 class levels and arbitrarily limits the PCs to six levels. It certainly keeps the game at an "acceptable" fantasy level, but arbitrary limits bother me a lot when everything in the world doesn't have to follow them.

Also I find the amputation of 3/4 of a patient to be an extremely archaic method of medicine.

[The Grue]

Also I find the amputation of 3/4 of a patient to be an extremely archaic method of medicine.

I think you have the wrong thread. This one's about E6, not medicine. :smallwink:

[dextercorvia]

Can you? Really? I still felt somewhat guilty when the Fighter was hitting things really hard (Dungeoncrasher will practically instagib most people) but I was running around throwing Chained Twined Quickened Fell Drain Reach Inflict Light Wounds with DMM.

Oh, the tier gap is there from level 1, but it is less pronounced in usual play at level 6. I'm not sure you were using DMM correctly, though. It is a divine feat, and can therefore only be used once per round. How were you mitigating the rest of that?

[PsyBomb]

I tend to play E6 Prestige variant and abolish metamagic level mitigation tricks. Given that (and assuming you don't end up past 6 feats or so) the game is incredibly fun and much more balanced than normal.

[heavyfuel]

I'm not sure you were using DMM correctly, though. It is a divine feat, and can therefore only be used once per round.

Uhhh... Really?

*flips vigorously through complete divine*

God dammit...


Oh well, guess I kinda cheated a little... Does that answer that "Can you cheat on D&D" question that's been floating around in the front page for days now? :smallbiggrin: Guess I owe the DM an apology, maybe get him some beer.

Thanks for clearing that up

[dextercorvia]

No, problem. It is still possible with lots of feats and Arcane Thesis.

[Flickerdart]

I like E6, but not because it keeps people evenly-powered. You'll always have people who figure out the best way to set things on fire starting with level 1, or people who can't tell which side of the sword is the pointy one no matter how far into Epic they go.

The reason I like E6 is because it changes two games. It changes the playing game, sure - there are no longer any powerful things running around that aren't treated as the world-shattering threats they're supposed to be, PCs don't casually toss around the wealth of kingdoms, and the DM can run their pet gritty dirtpunk adventure for infinity time without the characters "outgrowing" it once they learn teleport and zip on over to somewhere that doesn't brew mead made out of equal parts blood and mud.

But it also changes - radically - the building game. Planning epic 20-level builds that really come together "any time now" is out of the picture. Front-loaded melee classes no longer have to worry about what happens when their class starts giving them weekly 3rd level spells and nothing else for features.

Instead, everyone starts having to consider the vast pool of feats and thinking "what should I take in my 6 levels so that I can be good at all the things I want to be good at?" Things, plural, mind you - you no longer need to scavenge for plusses just so that your +4 to bull rushing won't become obsolete as soon as everything around you starts getting Huge+ in size. Take many feat chains! Take that reserve feat you've always wanted! Want to dabble in Incarnum, or binding, or martial strikes? Take all that stuff too!

If you look at it in the right way, E6 is wonderful and liberating. It's certainly not a replacement for D&D 3.5, but it's a very interesting companion.

[heavyfuel]

No, problem. It is still possible with lots of feats and Arcane Thesis.

I don't suppose there's a divine version of it? The feat says "arcane spells", so no arcane thesis for clerics without Spell Domain

[Sartharina]

In some ways, I find e6 to be liberating.

In others... I feel that a lot of martial classes get screwed over, because they have 9 levels of class features spread over 20 levels.

[Thiyr]

I think I'd love E6. I love the -idea- of it. Limitation breeds creativity and all that. And there's something to be said about asking yourself "What do I want to play", and being able to answer "Well, whatever I decide, 6 levels of ranger is probably gonna do it well".

That said, my only time getting close to playing it was an e8 game that ended at level 7 due to falling apart. Which helps me to see an issue that i know others have mentioned prior. All those delicious bonus feats you get at the end of your career are cool. but from levels 1 to 6, there's no real difference between e6 and normal d&d aside from that expectation of how far you'll go. I think a solution I saw posed was getting a feat halfway between each level, to speed up that process, but stock e6 does have that issue.

Still love the concept though.

[Flickerdart]

Starting E6 at level 1 is for chumps. Start at 6 with half a dozen bonus feats already in your pocket, and crack some skulls!

[dextercorvia]

I don't suppose there's a divine version of it? The feat says "arcane spells", so no arcane thesis for clerics without Spell Domain

No, but if you want to chain twin repeat damage spells, wizard/sorcerer does that better anyway. Inflict is a pretty weak seed.

[Pilo]

I am DMing an E6 game and I have fun with it, as do my players.

However I allowed some prestige classes as base class for characters, most of them are fluff related, and I put animate dead on Level 3 spell list for arcane casters that have it, so necromancer may have fun too(as cleric).

It is easier to prepare game because of less spells and contents to look after. And even at level 6+, level 1 goblins can be dangerous.

I like it because of the scaling of D&D, at higher level you have more HPs so monsters deal more damage. And the scale is generaly the same, a gob deal 1d4 damages when PC has 8hp, Balor deals 20d6 when PC has 160.

So E6 kind of reduce the maths.

[Millennium]

A Bad DM is still going to think a CR 24 creature is a good matchup for 4 lv 6s and an average DM is still going to turn to a random page of the monster manual and say "hey this looks cool" so you're still going to be fighting balors and ancient dragons on a regular basis, The difference is in a standard campaign you'll eventually catch up in power if you get lucky enough to survive.
Yes, but a bad DM is going to screw up encounters on any system. It's true that e6 doesn't fix that, but neither does any other system.

[JusticeZero]

Plus, E6 avoids some immersion problems with leveling. Take the video game Oblivion. Your character leveled up a lot. As you leveled, so did the stuff you encounter. So at the start, you stumble across some Bandits and they are wearing leather armor and come at you with steel swords. A bunch of levels later, you walk back into the same bandit hideout. Now, all the Bandits are hard-core combat machines wearing expensive and fancy super gear (which is a bit sub par compared to your own super-gear) and you say "Wait, where were these guys before?"
In standard, you are always deprived of resources in your build, trying to stay ahead of the curve as all the store keepers and Bandits and monsters continually grow in power. You always have to be aware that the townspeople didn't send you out to save the town from goblins because they needed saving, but because as revealed later, the innkeeper is too high level to get XP from goblins anymore.
E6, you set up the setting and go. It is obvious where the small, medium, and large threats are, and everyone can eyeball it. Nothing actually "goes grey".

[Blackhawk748]

Plus, E6 avoids some immersion problems with leveling. Take the video game Oblivion. Your character leveled up a lot. As you leveled, so did the stuff you encounter. So at the start, you stumble across some Bandits and they are wearing leather armor and come at you with steel swords. A bunch of levels later, you walk back into the same bandit hideout. Now, all the Bandits are hard-core combat machines wearing expensive and fancy super gear (which is a bit sub par compared to your own super-gear) and you say "Wait, where were these guys before?"
In standard, you are always deprived of resources in your build, trying to stay ahead of the curve as all the store keepers and Bandits and monsters continually grow in power. You always have to be aware that the townspeople didn't send you out to save the town from goblins because they needed saving, but because as revealed later, the innkeeper is too high level to get XP from goblins anymore.
E6, you set up the setting and go. It is obvious where the small, medium, and large threats are, and everyone can eyeball it. Nothing actually "goes grey".

So its closer to how Skyrim functions. And im playing through Oblivion again and i forgot how silly bandits in Daedric armor are

[Flickerdart]

D&D was never supposed to act like a video game. You don't fight the same old orc pirates in the same village harbour when you're level 20 as when you were level 5. You might fight planar pirates who are trying to ransack Sigil with their Planejammers and dragon armada, but that's a threat of a completely different scale.

Quite frankly, when you're the D&D equivalent of having Daedric Plate, bandits should run as soon as they've heard your name. They are basically a non-entity in your worldview.

I think the reason a lot of people don't get this is because of cartoons where, say, the entire Justice League shows up to stop a bank robbery. "Realistically" they should send like, Booster Gold and Plastic Man, but there's no reason for Superman or Green Lantern to get involved in anything less than planetary scale. Unless there's nothing else for them to do, but then it's not a fight - you just say "Superman punches the robber repeatedly, congratulations, you won" and move on to Starro eating Jupiter again.

[Blackhawk748]

Oh i know, but it was still silly. My group rarely goes over level 10, mainly because past that point the stuff your fighting can destroy entire armies and we just feel silly, unless of course we are in the mood to destroy armies, then we lay waste to entire countries.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Plus, E6 avoids some immersion problems with leveling. Take the video game Oblivion. Your character leveled up a lot. As you leveled, so did the stuff you encounter. So at the start, you stumble across some Bandits and they are wearing leather armor and come at you with steel swords. A bunch of levels later, you walk back into the same bandit hideout. Now, all the Bandits are hard-core combat machines wearing expensive and fancy super gear (which is a bit sub par compared to your own super-gear) and you say "Wait, where were these guys before?"
In standard, you are always deprived of resources in your build, trying to stay ahead of the curve as all the store keepers and Bandits and monsters continually grow in power. You always have to be aware that the townspeople didn't send you out to save the town from goblins because they needed saving, but because as revealed later, the innkeeper is too high level to get XP from goblins anymore.
E6, you set up the setting and go. It is obvious where the small, medium, and large threats are, and everyone can eyeball it. Nothing actually "goes grey".

So its closer to how Skyrim functions. And im playing through Oblivion again and i forgot how silly bandits in Daedric armor are

That's why, when playing Oblivion, you pick a class that levels up from skills that you never intend to use. If you want to make a Thief, and level up your sneak, speechcraft, mercantile, security, and acrobatics skills, the opponents are going to severely outlevel your combat capabilities. If you choose to play a Mage instead, and still use and level up those same thief skills without casting any spells, you'll be amazing at those skills but still be a 1st level character encountering 1st level opponents. Or do it with a custom class and get stealth specialization, but pick skills you'll never use as your major skills, since specialized skills level up faster.

[Zanos]

That's why, when playing Oblivion, you pick a class that levels up from skills that you never intend to use. If you want to make a Thief, and level up your sneak, speechcraft, mercantile, security, and acrobatics skills, the opponents are going to severely outlevel your combat capabilities. If you choose to play a Mage instead, and still use and level up those same thief skills without casting any spells, you'll be amazing at those skills but still be a 1st level character encountering 1st level opponents. Or do it with a custom class and get stealth specialization, but pick skills you'll never use as your major skills, since specialized skills level up faster.
Or just get some mods.

[JusticeZero]

So its closer to how Skyrim functions. And im playing through Oblivion again and i forgot how silly bandits in Daedric armor are
Mmhm. Only it's worse, because if you run into the stuff that is already fixed, you start wondering how any of it holds up. At a certain point, the lesser mooks you fight in standard games are each individually powerful enough to singlehandedly destroy the entire kingdom you spent the first ten levels in, and yet they are still treated as mooks.

Another issue is that in a standard game, it is actually easily possible to outlevel your own campaign nemesi unless you continually advance them. Once, one of the ___ was a boss fight. Then, it was a mook. Then, you hit the point where the party can't get any XP for defeating them... do you keep using them? The campaign was all about the hordes of them and now you have to contrive a new batch of enemies that are so powerful as to make the horde laughable. It's like sending in the army and having the army decide that it's a better use of their time to train rats to fight the enemy instead of using their tanks and bombers, because they can't get XP for fighting the locals and the locals can't fight them until they've defeated enough rats of various levels of training. And the army in turn was sent by hordes of godzilla monsters who twiddle their thumbs waiting for the army to be overwhelmed. The cake is just way too thick and your party can ascend too fast for the story. E6 you send in the army; the party starts by bushwacking single enemies, then builds up to be able to fight the main force, but the power level band is tight enough that you don't need to build extra layers in.
That's why, when playing Oblivion, you pick a class that levels up from skills that you never intend to use. And that doesn't seem at all ridiculous and immersion breaking to you? That you are, essentially, enforcing a very bizarre build choice on yourself in order to prevent yourself from gaining levels? Seems like an argument in favor of E6 to me...

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

And that doesn't seem at all ridiculous and immersion breaking to you? That you are, essentially, enforcing a very bizarre build choice on yourself in order to prevent yourself from gaining levels? Seems like an argument in favor of E6 to me...

No, no, no, your character is naturally good at casting spells but he would rather be a sneaky thief! You'll inevitably cast some spells and level up, as every character eventually gets a repertoire of utility spells, but maybe casting spells makes it too easy and your character would rather be sneaking.

[Blackhawk748]

No, no, no, your character is naturally good at casting spells but he would rather be a sneaky thief! You'll inevitably cast some spells and level up, as every character eventually gets a repertoire of utility spells, but maybe casting spells makes it too easy and your character would rather be sneaking.

So basically your playing a rogue with a coupe levels of sorc. i think i did that once, it was actually a lot of fun.

[Blackhawk748]

It's like sending in the army and having the army decide that it's a better use of their time to train rats to fight the enemy instead of using their tanks and bombers, because they can't get XP for fighting the locals and the locals can't fight them until they've defeated enough rats of various levels of training. And the army in turn was sent by hordes of godzilla monsters who twiddle their thumbs waiting for the army to be overwhelmed. The cake is just way too thick and your party can ascend too fast for the story. E6 you send in the army; the party starts by bushwacking single enemies, then builds up to be able to fight the main force, but the power level band is tight enough that you don't need to build extra layers in.And that doesn't seem at all ridiculous and immersion breaking to you? That you are, essentially, enforcing a very bizarre build choice on yourself in order to prevent yourself from gaining levels? Seems like an argument in favor of E6 to me...

This is doable, though its a giant pain in the rear end to do properly and believably and it usually ends with some devil/beholder/illithid/fallen god thing being the inevitable mastermind and you usually spend your last 3 levels hacking through all of its "crazy experiments" or whatever on its personal demiplane. Like a said doable, but difficult.

Also another point for E6, its all about the classics. An Orc Warchief can remain a credible threat, well forever. Trolls are still frightening and Minotaurs will make people crap bricks, and dont get me started on running into a mind flayer.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

So basically your playing a rogue with a coupe levels of sorc. i think i did that once, it was actually a lot of fun.

It doesn't really compare to D&D, since everyone in the Elder Scrolls games can cast spells regardless of their character class. It's more like playing a naturally psionic race Rogue, who may take feats that are active when he's psionically focused (Speed of Thought, Up the Walls), but never uses any of his natural psionic powers or takes a level in any psionic class.

[Socksy]

A Bad DM is still going to think a CR 24 creature is a good matchup for 4 lv 6s and an average DM is still going to turn to a random page of the monster manual and say "hey this looks cool" so you're still going to be fighting balors and ancient dragons on a regular basis, The difference is in a standard campaign you'll eventually catch up in power if you get lucky enough to survive.

I agree with every single thing you've said in this thread.

[Tvtyrant]

I love E6. The combat is quick, low level enemies are still a threat in numbers, and the party has lots of room for tricks.

[Jergmo]

I love E6. But E6 alone was not enough of a balancing act for me.

I use E6, Generic Classes, and Vitality and Wound Points as variants, and it's been a very balanced and interesting way to play for me and my players, so far.

Generic Classes don't get a lot of love, but I feel it allows for much more flexible and in-depth character designs than the classes as printed. It could be literally anything you want, between all of the feats there are printed in the Completes alone.

[The Grue]

I agree with every single thing you've said in this thread.

Then I'll direct you to my rebuttal of the post you quoted (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=17727615&postcount=17).

As well, here's (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=17727661&postcount=18) some other responses (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=17729846&postcount=34) to that post.

Basically, every objection Malroth has raised to E6 has been based on false assumptions about what E6 is. If somebody wants to say that they don't personally enjoy E6 for reasons X, Y and Z, that's one thing. Fabricating straw men to present as objective justification is quite another, and borders on fanboyism.

[jiriku]

I'm starting my first E6 game this Friday, and while my only experience is character creation, I've been delighted so far. I'm a plan-ahead type who likes to build 20-level builds for my character, and usually the progression is laid out nice and neatly and all the choices are obvious. But now... I just can't do it. There are about 50 feats that all look good for my character, and about 20 of them would be a perfect fit for the concept, but each has its strength and each has its weaknesses, and there's really no choosing one over the other. Really, I could pick any one of a score of build paths and be happy. I guess the character will just have to grow organically in response to what's happening in the game as he levels. Which is... liberating. I'm looking forward to it.

[Dusk Eclipse]

Starting E6 at level 1 is for chumps. Start at 6 with half a dozen bonus feats already in your pocket, and crack some skulls!

That would be the best way to tempt me to play E6, I really, really hate low levels.

[Undertucker]

I love E6. But E6 alone was not enough of a balancing act for me.

I use E6, Generic Classes, and Vitality and Wound Points as variants, and it's been a very balanced and interesting way to play for me and my players, so far.

Generic Classes don't get a lot of love, but I feel it allows for much more flexible and in-depth character designs than the classes as printed. It could be literally anything you want, between all of the feats there are printed in the Completes alone.

I also use the Generic Classes in the E6 game I DM, though I've opened up the feat options to some more class abilities as well as using various other rules specific to my setting. Since E6 is all about the feat progression and that's also what the Generic Classes are all about it actually works quite well together.

My players seem to be enjoying the lower overal power of the E6 system, plus I really like how easy it is to knock up encounters in the relevant CR brackets.

[Socratov]

Well, I recently started an E6 game and I like it. We've started at lvl 3, but I think the feats will be good to me (I'm a Warlock, so more feats at lvl 6 means more invocations). I found that not being able to go past 6 is especially binding for gam breaking skills (like diplomacy), though with a bit of optimisation it can still be done (recently built a character achieving default 51 on his diplomacy check). So, it feels good to be a tiny bit more constricted, making character building a bit more of a challenge, all the while opening up viable combinations of classes because the relative power level has dropped, making some investments more viable.

That said, it doesn't substitute the feel of epic 20 lvl dnd where you are close to being a god at lvl 20

[Coidzor]

Im getting ready to start a new campaign soon, and I came across e6 recently, so I thought about using it as the basis for a campaign. But first I thought I'd check, what has been the experience of the playgrounders with this variant?

I like the idea, but I'm not one for playing only E6 & abandoning the rest. Not that theres very many who do to my knowledge. Variety is the spice of life, so if ya wanna try... try! there's always hinky bits, but it's a little harder to hit them egregiously on accidental, iirc. :)

Also, I'm weird & use it as inspiration for various people having diff level caps for various reasons.

I want to play a game sometime that starts in e6, goes for a while, say a few feats after level 6, & then breaks into E12, & then eventually to the normal level cap of 20, with various quests culminating in winning the new level cap. & breaking into level 21 and godhood as the campaign finale.

as said. I am weird. xD

Another case in point being my idea for level 0 where instead of a HD, one just gets their Constitution Score in HP & some skillpoints, maybe on the skillpoints, too.

[Firechanter]

For the main question,
"how do you feel about e6?":

Boring as hell. Advancement stops just a tad before things are sloooowly starting to get interesting. Do not want.
I could live with levelcap 13 or so, but 6 is just eternal lowlevel drudgery. If I wanted a gritty, low-powered game, I'd play something that was written for this playstyle from scratch, not a castrated version of the highest-powered game I know.

[ddude987]

While I've never played "e6" I have played in e8 and e10, somewhat pointless I suppose from the-point-of-e6-is-to-lower-the-tier-gap point of view, but because the people I play with don't play things above tier 3, or when they do play it as a tier 3, it wasn't a problem. Not to say they purposely avoid tier 1 and 2 but player tendencies is enjoying other classes.

That said, I love e6, and I recommend those that dislike it because it has the potential to have a bad gm should re-read the op. inb4youhave, go re-read it.

[Flickerdart]

I like E6 more than 8 or 10 just because of how the math works out - Fighters get their iterative attack, Sorcerers get their 3rd level spells, everyone gets a feat, the first level of most PrCs comes online. Everything cool coincides at 6. 8 is just kind of there.

[Dread_Head]

I like e6 myself and am currently planning an e6 campaign that I'll be co-DMing with my friend.


I like E6 more than 8 or 10 just because of how the math works out - Fighters get their iterative attack, Sorcerers get their 3rd level spells, everyone gets a feat, the first level of most PrCs comes online. Everything cool coincides at 6. 8 is just kind of there.

I agree with pretty much everything Flickerdart says her and additionally I feel that third level spells are more balanced than 4th level spells and thus stopping advancement at 6th level is better. At fourth level spells you get some truly overpowering spells such as Freedom of Movement, Solid Fog, Evards Black Tentacles etc. Third level spells are generally not quite as encounter shattering.

[dextercorvia]

I'm going to put out there that E1 can be a blast, as well. Most classes are frontloaded (poor Bard). You don't have the huge chasm between players who plan out all their levels and those that just pick something fun at 1st and then something else later -- because there is no later. You get a bit of that with players who plan their "epic" feats better, but it's not nearly as wide as even E6 can be.

[ddude987]

I like e8 more than e6 because medium bab classes like rogues get their iterative, which helps a lot. Also with e8 most people can fit in a couple levels of a PrC instead of just one, which is something else I like. e10 is fun, though very much out of the boundaries of the reasoning and practicality e6 brings, because you can fit an entire 5 level prestige class in, which is a lot of fun. I've noticed with my play group the game breaks down usually around level 9. Level 8 gets sluggish once everyone has a plethora of feats and way more WBL than needed.

[Flickerdart]

Medium-BAB classes don't deserve iterative attacks; those scumbag clerics and druids can just deal with not being a fighter.

[Coidzor]

Medium-BAB classes don't deserve iterative attacks; those scumbag clerics and druids can just deal with not being a fighter.

Indeed, how dare those pitiful Rogues and Scouts want to get off another precision damage attack or two in a round.

[The-Mage-King]

I... Heavily dislike it. It's like cutting off an arm because the hand's needing to be removed- Sure, it DOES get rid of the problem, but it's overkill, and opens up new problems along the way.

Just play normal D&D, and don't be a jerk.

[ddude987]

Problem with that is reguardless of being a jerk or not, just using your class features at higher levels bogs the game down, even if you aren't using the most broken spells. At the late levels with so many magic items, options, ways to break action economy, bonuses, and plethoras of attacks, the game simply gets bogged down. Not to mention one problem people haven't brought up.

Survivability gaps. Ignoring spells that make you immune to damage, unhittable, et cetra, because we will put those in the being a jerk category for this theoretical number crunching. Take a level 13 wizards hp vs a level 13 barbarian (pre rage). Let's say they both started with 14 con and the wizard has a +4 item, the barbarian a +6... The wizard has 4 + (3*13) + (4*13) = 95 hp. The barbarian has 12 + (7*13) + (5*13) = 181 hp. For the DM to tickle the barbarian, say 30-35 damage a hit, he gibs the wizard with a 3HKO. But the wizard should be far away you say. Ranged attacks, aoes, stealthed enemies... plenty of things. If the DM wants to actually threaten the barbarian, maybe a 4HKO, say 45-50 damage a shot, he 2HKOs the wizard, allowing variance.

In e6 however, lets say max level, 14 con, +2 item on the wizard, +4 on the barbarian.
Wizard: 4 + (3*6) + (3*6) = 40
Barbarian: 12 + (7*6) + (4*6) = 78
The gap between their hp is much smaller, meaning the DM can still pose a threat to the barbarian through damage but it won't be oops the wizard died.

While actual in game examples may not be fully accepted as proof of concept, I have been in games and at levels around 5 or 6 the encounters that posed threats by death appeared to be equally threatening to all players, where at higher levels deadly things were either laughable by meat sacks or posed a threat to them but ended up almost gibbing wizard, bard, rogue, et cetras sometimes even on save.

[Malroth]

no wizard would ever invest less money into con items than an equal leveled and monied barbarian. Con is a tertiary stat or worse on barbarians and the second or most important stat on all spellcasters. Martial classes also have their weapons armour and movement that they have to use WBL to improve while a +con item has often been the only item purchased by a primary caster.


12 con +4 item barbarian accompanied by a 16 con +6 item wizard is a much more common example.

[Zanos]

You're neglecting the Wizard's myriad of defensive buffs. Even without being a "jerk" a decent wizard should have a couple hour/level buffs running that make him a less than appealing target.

I also don't really have a problem with the fact that the Barbarian can take twice as much punishment as the Wizard. That's the Barbarian's job(along with killing stuff, but still.)

Also con is not a tertiary stat for Barbarians. Str is primary, mentals are basically irrelevant, and Con affects HP and Rage duration.

[Flickerdart]

Indeed, how dare those pitiful Rogues and Scouts want to get off another precision damage attack or two in a round.
TWF seems to be the classic answer to that problem even without E6.

[Komatik]

Some things can become annoying and feel incomplete. Like, a caster's spell level progression stopping at 3 isn't a problem - the character still feels whole IMO. But something like a meldshaper that just never gets access to a large number of body slots ends up feeling very, very weird.

That said, it's nice when mythical monsters are actually threats instead of barking poodles.

[JaronK]

I've been enjoying it, having done an E6 game for about a year now. I feel like I can optimize a little without breaking the heck out of everything, so I don't have to hold back as much. Plus, it feels like the game world is more… normal. Castles make sense in an E6 world. Most fantasy stuff makes sense, really. Angels are awesome and awe inspiring, many Devils are terrifying, Dragons are a thing of myth and legend. It's a lot better than "yay a dragon! Now I get to make a better zombie!" which happens in the higher level games far too often. I mean, you can do that in E6 too, but it's harder and scarier to pull off.

Now, we started adding house rules to allow for leveling up, such that you add in gestalt levels as you go. That's meant that the characters keep advancing. Yet it still feels like we're playing the game closer to how it was intended to be played than when we used normal rules at level 12.

So it's definitely fun.

JaronK

[squiggit]

It's... not too bad. You miss out a huge chunk of the (imo) more fun part of the game though and it doesn't solve nearly as many problems as it claims to and creates a huge chunk of new problems on top of that. So it's a bit of a wash... which is perfectly fine, different styles for different tastes, though it is a tad annoying seeing how many people act like it's the instant fix to every problem D&D has.

[questionmark693]

I guess for clarification, I'm not interested in it because it could fix anything...I like standard, by the book 3.5. It sits alright with me. So this wasn't something that perked my interest in contrast to normal D&D, but something I thought looked good because it was a solid system. And so far, that mindset has been validated, so I'm definitely giving it a shot :)

[Harrow]

I would probably only play an e6 game after I've already had a campaign fall apart because of issues that start to show up at high levels.

[JusticeZero]

Been there, done that, didn't enjoy it. Especially because it tends to be caused because I wanted to be support and ended up shoehorned into something considerably higher tier than the monks and fighters that everyone else wanted to play.

[Ruethgar]

I think it is awesome, but in my experience it just makes people look for ways to circumvent the limitations to achieve a similar level of power sooner.

[The-Mage-King]

Problem with that is reguardless of being a jerk or not, just using your class features at higher levels bogs the game down, even if you aren't using the most broken spells. At the late levels with so many magic items, options, ways to break action economy, bonuses, and plethoras of attacks, the game simply gets bogged down. Not to mention one problem people haven't brought up.

Survivability gaps. Ignoring spells that make you immune to damage, unhittable, et cetra, because we will put those in the being a jerk category for this theoretical number crunching. Take a level 13 wizards hp vs a level 13 barbarian (pre rage). Let's say they both started with 14 con and the wizard has a +4 item, the barbarian a +6... The wizard has 4 + (3*13) + (4*13) = 95 hp. The barbarian has 12 + (7*13) + (5*13) = 181 hp. For the DM to tickle the barbarian, say 30-35 damage a hit, he gibs the wizard with a 3HKO. But the wizard should be far away you say. Ranged attacks, aoes, stealthed enemies... plenty of things. If the DM wants to actually threaten the barbarian, maybe a 4HKO, say 45-50 damage a shot, he 2HKOs the wizard, allowing variance.

In e6 however, lets say max level, 14 con, +2 item on the wizard, +4 on the barbarian.
Wizard: 4 + (3*6) + (3*6) = 40
Barbarian: 12 + (7*6) + (4*6) = 78
The gap between their hp is much smaller, meaning the DM can still pose a threat to the barbarian through damage but it won't be oops the wizard died.

While actual in game examples may not be fully accepted as proof of concept, I have been in games and at levels around 5 or 6 the encounters that posed threats by death appeared to be equally threatening to all players, where at higher levels deadly things were either laughable by meat sacks or posed a threat to them but ended up almost gibbing wizard, bard, rogue, et cetras sometimes even on save.


So.... don't be the jerk who has to look everything up? Keep the relevant abilities on notecards, or something, and keep all your bonuses up to date? :smallconfused:


As for the damage thing.... it's still iffy. Especially since you fail to calculate in actual defenses-not immune or unhittable, but normal buffs-, which the Wizard has preloaded, and the Barb probably passed for more damage.

Also. HP math is wrong, assuming you're using average. The Wizard has more like 34 (4+(2.5*5)+(6*Con)), since it's only 6 levels, and the Barb has 68 (12+(6.5*5)+(6*Con)). What was that about a 4HKO the Barb not being a 2HKO on the Wizard? :smallamused:

[ddude987]

Hp math is correct. Half round up of each die per level, except the first which is full.

[The-Mage-King]

Hp math is correct. Half round up of each die per level, except the first which is full.

That's not average. Average is half, alternating rounding up and down, for every level after 1st. :smallconfused:

AFB, but it should be in the DMG.


You also gave an extra half to both, too.

[DarkSonic1337]

I'm very much interested in participating in an e6 campaign with gestalts. Maybe not gestalting from the beginning, but unlocking gestalt progressions as major quest rewards could be a really awesome way to keep expanding abilities without exponentially increasing power like normal leveling.

That and I really like the idea of having TONS of feats. You can take those feats that you think are cool but just never seem to have room for without sacrificing some other cool feat you want or a prereq (looking at you mobile spellcasting.)

[jiriku]

no wizard would ever invest less money into con items than an equal leveled and monied barbarian.

I have seen sooooo many wizards for whom this is not true.

[Jergmo]

Medium-BAB classes don't deserve iterative attacks; those scumbag clerics and druids can just deal with not being a fighter.

This needs to be sigged.

[Hiro Protagonest]

Do you want to run a campaign of courtly intrigue, bold exploration, or frontier protection? Then use E6. Do you want to run a campaign of Sigil intrigue, find islands in the Astral Sea, or pull a decisive strike against a demon commander that uses actual strategy? Then run a standard game.

[Brookshw]

Definitely game for it, they don't all need to be epic save the multiverse planes after all. As one of my players once commented, "you can only say split twin maximize empowered disintegrate so many times". Just another way of using the chasis that will give you another feel.

[ddude987]

That's not average. Average is half, alternating rounding up and down, for every level after 1st. :smallconfused:

AFB, but it should be in the DMG.

I thought the rules were you get average rounded up if you aren't rolling hp.

[Flickerdart]

I thought the rules were you get average rounded up if you aren't rolling hp.
You always round down in D&D.

I give my PCs rounded up HP, though - it makes everyone a little less squishy and thus I can field meaner monsters. :smallamused:

[The-Mage-King]

I thought the rules were you get average rounded up if you aren't rolling hp.

Nope. See page 198 of the DMG. Round down at Even levels, round up at odd levels.

[ddude987]

Huh never knew. Thanks. Ive always played with what people I knew called the half+1 rule when we weren't rolling, which I thought was canon.

[Hand_of_Vecna]

And that doesn't seem at all ridiculous and immersion breaking to you? That you are, essentially, enforcing a very bizarre build choice on yourself in order to prevent yourself from gaining levels? Seems like an argument in favor of E6 to me...

No, because what one line of text that I rarely look at doesn't really effect me. Also you can pick one thing you use and five things you don't so the world scales off that one thing.

The most immersion breaking thing that ever happened to me (in Oblivion) was when I was playing a high level character that had already completed a few guilds and ran into a cave where every enemy was a goblin chiefton. I laughed it off and said that I must have stumbled upon the goblin high council meeting. Then the next random cave I entered was also full of goblin chieftons.

Nowadays my biggest pet peeve (in Skyrim, Morrowind and Fallout) is having my character get treated like garbage by various factions when they should already be one of the most noteworthy figures in the territory. This is why I usually play in self-enforced hardcore mode and retire characters that finish the one or two gig storylines that make the most sense.

[The Grue]

Been there, done that, didn't enjoy it. Especially because it tends to be caused because I wanted to be support and ended up shoehorned into something considerably higher tier than the monks and fighters that everyone else wanted to play.

This sounds to me like a problem with your fellow players, rather than a flaw inherent to E6 itself.

[VoxRationis]

I haven't played it, but it appeals to me greatly. I'm much more fond of the low-level, sword-and-sorcery feel than I am of the ridiculous-scaling-300-damage-a-round sort of play. My only problem is that some of the really iconic spells from myth and legend are outside the reach of a 6th-level caster, barring some sourcebook-digging shenanigans: pretty basic ones like turning people into frogs, or even the less iconic but still appropriate-feeling dream.

[Calimehter]

I use E6, Generic Classes, and Vitality and Wound Points as variants, and it's been a very balanced and interesting way to play for me and my players, so far.

+1.

I used the above list (and a couple of extra sentences worth of house rules) to create a Dresden-style game set in 14th century Prague . . . was loads of fun.

[Calimehter]

My only problem is that some of the really iconic spells from myth and legend are outside the reach of a 6th-level caster, barring some sourcebook-digging shenanigans: pretty basic ones like turning people into frogs, or even the less iconic but still appropriate-feeling dream.

Such effects are still accessable in E6 if you go via the Incantations route from UA - this is even recommended in the original E6 article, if I remember correctly.

The big difference is that such spells are not tactical options available in 6 seconds or less, and they are not powers accessable on a whim. They are plot elements that are accessed if they are *really* wanted or desired by those accessing them, since there are significant costs and/or "casting times" associated with them.

[toapat]

From a balance standpoint, i agree moreso with the idea of E6. Its pulling a system which never really tried to present a reasonably focused powerband or set of powerbands into line within a pair of bands. I can imagine exaulted characters and what they can do, i can see low level DnD characters, but i cant really envision a the whole story of a DnD character.

From a gameplay perspective, i probably would enjoy the challenge and focus of E6