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Fairy Lisa
2015-01-13, 05:00 AM
First, I apologize if this is not the correct place to ask this, but I think it is.

When do you decide it's time to basically create a game system to match your setting? What I mean is, when does a setting depart so much from the tone and style of the game system you were planning to use that it's time to consider an alternate system?

Also related question but for people on 5e or 3.5/Pathfinder: do you or would you consider bringing back class/race restrictions in order to make the system conform to your setting?

OttoVonBigby
2015-01-13, 07:05 AM
As to the first question, I considered this a few times with my 3.5 fantasy setting. The thing that kept me from doing it was knowing I intended to use most of the monsters and spells that were already in all these books I had, ready to go. That would be a needlessly large wheel to reinvent. And I've found (thanks in large part to this forum) that 3.5 is eminently jury-riggable.

Regarding the latter question: here's my "Prohibited Classes" houserule--
"A starting character may not take levels in the listed prohibited class or classes for her race. At the DM's discretion, however, she may take levels in a prohibited class after character creation if the circumstances of the campaign are unusual enough to warrant it."

Most races only have one prohibited class (and some, like humans, have none). So, for example, the prohibited class for halflings in my setting is barbarian. Strictly speaking, of course, if somebody insisted on playing a halfling barbarian and could come up with a suitable backstory for how that could happen (e.g. raised by a wild half-orc community or something), I'd probably waive that rule, possibly with changes to any racial traits that might be based on social upbringing rather than genetics.

But I also give a level-1 bonus feat for a race's favored class (or classes--half-elves can pick any), which is strong inducement to start with that instead of something weird (I don't do multiclass XP penalties).

jqavins
2015-01-13, 12:45 PM
First, I apologize if this is not the correct place to ask this, but I think it is.

When do you decide it's time to basically create a game system to match your setting? What I mean is, when does a setting depart so much from the tone and style of the game system you were planning to use that it's time to consider an alternate system?

Also related question but for people on 5e or 3.5/Pathfinder: do you or would you consider bringing back class/race restrictions in order to make the system conform to your setting?


Let n be the number of new classes required for your setting, with Xi for i from 1 to n being those classes.
Let αi be your effort involved in crafting each class, and βi be each player's effort in understanding the new clsss.
Let m be the number of players.
n
Then let NC be the total effort involved in new classes. NC = Σ(αi + mβi)
i=1
Now, let q be be number of...



There is no rule. If making the system fit your setting is more trouble than making up a whole new system then it's time to make one up. Another way to look at it is that when your collected house rules make a book, you've already made a new system, but probably not a good one, so if that seems to be where you're heading the change course and make a new system instead.

Deepbluediver
2015-01-13, 03:48 PM
When do you decide it's time to basically create a game system to match your setting?
Depends on just how different you want your setting to be, but in general I'd say it's when the mechanical rules start to heavily interfere with the story you want to tell.


Also related question but for people on 5e or 3.5/Pathfinder: do you or would you consider bringing back class/race restrictions in order to make the system conform to your setting?
Eesh, that's tricky. Player-choice is one of the biggest benefits of tabletop RPGs. It's something I would definitely discuss with my group first before trying it out, especially if they are heavily into roleplaying.

What I might do is have a few core-classes that anyone can use, like the Fighter, Rogue, etc, and then offer other classes as race-specific alternatives. For example, Orcs can't be Wizards, but Elves can't be sorcerers. The key here is to come up with convincing lore-explanations for why certain races can't be certain things, and make sure you're players are willing to go along with them.

For example, in LotR the Elves where creations of the good god(s), and orcs/goblins where elves that had been mutated by the evil god, which explained why they couldn't do much of the magical stuff that elves could.
(that's kind of a simplification and any real Tolkenite should feel free to correct me)

Fairy Lisa
2015-01-14, 12:25 AM
I'm definitely adding races, classes/subclasses and monsters. Basically a whole campaign setting. It's a group of new players so relearning isn't an issue, they're learning everything already and their only expectation is "role playing is involved".

But I'm swapping the cosmology out. And the magic system, I don't know how easy to swap that out in 5e is. Thematically it doesn't fit at all. Everything else, I feel 5e works fine, the mechanics are fine, even ideal, and if the core classes don't work I can just make new ones, and actually I don't necessarily have to do that, new context specific subclasses will also work in many cases.

I'm mainly worried that gutting and replacing the magic system will break the rest of the game system in ways I didn't intend. And this is not a low magic setting either which makes it even more important to me.

jedipotter
2015-01-14, 12:48 AM
When do you decide it's time to basically create a game system to match your setting? What I mean is, when does a setting depart so much from the tone and style of the game system you were planning to use that it's time to consider an alternate system?

The day I bought the 3.0 Core Books back in 2000. I immediately disliked all the nerfs and saftey nets 3E added to the game. I backed up to 2E quick and started my conversion.

A was hugely disappointed with 3.5E and how Wizards could not be bothered to ''fix everything''. That is when i really kicked into gear.




Also related question but for people on 5e or 3.5/Pathfinder: do you or would you consider bringing back class/race restrictions in order to make the system conform to your setting?

Nah, I never really liked them. The idea that an elf could not be a paladin makes no sense. Prestige classes are just fine for that sort of thing.

jqavins
2015-01-14, 10:02 AM
I'm mainly worried that gutting and replacing the magic system will break the rest of the game system in ways I didn't intend. And this is not a low magic setting either which makes it even more important to me.
Well, that's a real worry. But you'd have the same or worse if you redo everything as if you only redo a big piece of it. Every new system needs play testing to work out the bugs, and the more you make new up the truer that will be. Starting the whole thing over does not help.

Fairy Lisa
2015-01-15, 04:19 AM
Thank you. I think I'm going to have to probably throw out the existing CRs on monsters, at least the ones I want to keep and adapt, and recalculate new ones, but on the whole I want to keep the basic rules like the advantage/disadvantage system and basic class structure if not those exact classes or subclasses.

Thanks for your feedback everyone!

Fairy Lisa
2015-01-16, 02:23 AM
Nah, I never really liked them. The idea that an elf could not be a paladin makes no sense. Prestige classes are just fine for that sort of thing.

Meant to answer you sooner, but forgot to, sorry.

The reason is because Elves and Humans never encountered each other before. If classes represents professions, specialties and/or castes, then while there will be some commonalities basic to any kind of civilization with the same needs, especially when civilization is essential to growth/evolution, other things will only superficially resemble each other.

Both might have casters but casters that work in different ways or have different spells. Differences are going to exhibit themselves.

But if Elves went to the Human continent and converted to their religion there, there wouldn't be any reason why that Elf couldn't become a paladin, whereas paladins just don't exist on their home continent. That might be reflected in future campaigns, but in this world, for the first campaign, Elves and Dwarves don't know about Humans and Halflings and vice versa.

If I stick with 5e though, this will probably be represented by subclasses more than actual classes, at least in most cases, and not so much because Elves can't be paladins as paladins don't exist in Elven culture, yet at least.

Knaight
2015-01-16, 02:34 AM
I generally play generic systems that can essentially handle anything. When I decide to make a new system, it's because I feel like making a new system, not because an older one can't handle it.

Fairy Lisa
2015-01-16, 06:21 AM
I generally play generic systems that can essentially handle anything. When I decide to make a new system, it's because I feel like making a new system, not because an older one can't handle it.

Are these published systems? Books or forum posts, it doesn't matter how they're published, it's just I'm interested in case I decide to make a system.

nonsi
2015-01-16, 05:13 PM
When do you decide it's time to basically create a game system to match your setting? What I mean is, when does a setting depart so much from the tone and style of the game system you were planning to use that it's time to consider an alternate system?


For me it was never a decision, but something that was there and just had to come out.
And it wasn't an alternate system as much as system correction & improvement.




Also related question but for people on 5e or 3.5/Pathfinder: do you or would you consider bringing back class/race restrictions in order to make the system conform to your setting?


No way. Not ever.
If a dwarf could wield divine magic or invocations, why the heck not arcan magic?

Deepbluediver
2015-01-16, 05:46 PM
No way. Not ever.
If a dwarf could wield divine magic or invocations, why the heck not arcane magic?
You can make whatever rules for magic that you want, and if someone wanted to say there was some genetic component to some kinds of abilities, then that would be a legitimate thing to bake into their setting if they wanted.

For example, suppose you have one race that was "made in the image of the gods" and another that...wasn't. If the god-like race could use divine magic, then maybe the non-god-like race learned how to use arcane magic to compensate. Or maybe they figured out arcane magic first and the god's favored children needed something to match that. There are all kinds of lore-based reasons you could come up with, that can even help set the stage for kicking off various conflicts.
So long as you're consistent and tie it into the lore decently (aka not arbitrarily being an arse about it) then I think it's a workable way to do things.

D&D moved away from that I think because they wanted to provide a framework that would let anyone tell any story they wanted. If a DM has a story in mind that they want to tell though, then it makes sense to develop a system of mechanics that meshes with that.

Jendekit
2015-01-16, 11:09 PM
Also related question but for people on 5e or 3.5/Pathfinder: do you or would you consider bringing back class/race restrictions in order to make the system conform to your setting?

The only times that I have used race/class restrictions was when a class either a)was restricted based on a racial caste system (a setting where Elves ruled and humans were forbidden from learning arcane magic, any sorcerers found amongst humans were immediately put to death) or b) a new race that had never encountered any of the previous ones appeared. The latter one was used in a setting with a custom built race called the Mak Murkanth. They had a nomadic, tribal society and had encountered the human kingdom less than six years before the start of the campaign, and as such they had a completely different class list available to them.

falsedot
2015-01-17, 05:24 AM
D&D moved away from that I think because they wanted to provide a framework that would let anyone tell any story they wanted. If a DM has a story in mind that they want to tell though, then it makes sense to develop a system of mechanics that meshes with that.

Just dont forget that se players are not there to listen the DMs story but to create a story. Assuming that you have player buy-in and are ready to waive the restrictions in an exceptional situations I dont see a reason to have a hard rule that might frustate someone. I'd prefer something "sneakier" like ability score manipulation: if you dont want halfling barbarians add a con penalty and give some nice bonus for other classes instead of banning it. Then again, you might get a horribly underoptimised halfling barbarian i.e. belkar :b

Or in the elves as children of gods example, you can boost their divine powers while boosting arcane for humans (note that I didnt say nerf divine for humans and arcane for elves)

In the end, what Im trying to say is that, imo, it is better to have mechanics that encourage the players to avoid what you dont want (and have 99% of the players follow) than having a hard rule (and make exceptions for 1%).

Deepbluediver
2015-01-17, 10:09 AM
Just dont forget that se players are not there to listen the DMs story but to create a story.
Alright, yes, technically everyone is there to make a story together, and you don't want to railroad players from place to place just to look at all your fancy worldbuilding. But a DM can still have a game-type in mind, and specific plot-points that they want players to find and investigate. If the DM was trying to recreate something like LotRs, then you can decided whether your adventuring party wants to sneak in the back door, raise an army and march it right at the BBEGs front door, if you try to end things quickly or clean up all the little problems he's creating first, etc etc etc. Those are all choices the players make but at the end of the day you are still going to have to find someone way to fight the boss the DM wants you to fight (unless you decide to switch sides and join him I guess).