Fantasy Age is out

[Yora]

It's a more generic and updated of the system that was first used in the Dragon Age RPG, which got quite a decent reception back at that time.

I got myself the pdf and flipping through it now. It got warriors, rogues, and mages and humans, elves, dwarves, halflings, orcs, and gnomes as default races, though creating and adding campaign specific races is recommended, and probably supported somewhere in the book.

The art doesn't look very generic though. More like mediterranean Sword & Sorcery than central European knights and castles.

[Anonymouswizard]

It's a more generic and updated of the system that was first used in the Dragon Age RPG, which got quite a decent reception back at that time.

I got myself the pdf and flipping through it now. It got warriors, rogues, and mages and humans, elves, dwarves, halflings, orcs, and gnomes as default races, though creating and adding campaign specific races is recommended, and probably supported somewhere in the book.

The art doesn't look very generic though. More like mediterranean Sword & Sorcery than central European knights and castles.

Yawn, give me a call when they have European knights and castles, Mediterranean Sword and Sorcery, Chinese Xia and Bandits, Japanese Samurai and Ninja, 'Arabian Nights', and a variety of other fantasy genres.

Otherwise, I might pick it up at some point, as long as they've retained the ability to give a warrior anti-magic. I never got around to buying the Dragon Age RPG due to not feeling confident to run the setting, but the ability to include DA Templars in my own setting would be awesome/

[Yora]

There is a warrior specialization that improves resistance to magic and lets you drain magic from mages or monsters on a hit with your weapon. There are 12 specilization in total, 12 groups of 4 spells each, and 14 monsters. It's really a basic rules set to be customized to best match the setting by the GM.

And the GM is called a GM. That's one bonus point for the game.

[Hopeless]

Picked up the pdf, after watching the Titansgrave episodes so far has left me wanting to run a Post-apocalyptic Earth future where they're not running around with energy blasters but having guns!

Currently working out the character generation, a friend is planning on running the Dragon Age Quick Starter so quite a bit of interest in this.

So will they release a Modern AGE and a Science Fiction AGE?

Only a few more weeks before the Titansgrave supplement is released of course if things run to course it might be a month or so before it reaches these shores (UK)... sigh.:smallwink:

[Yora]

I am really enjoying it so far, having read through most of it. I can see myself making this my to go system.

Could have had more monsters, though.

[Talakeal]

I skimmed the book yesterday. All in all it seems very good.

The only thing that really caught my ire was how very random character creation was. Not only did they go old school 3d6 down the line for stats, but they also have you roll randomly for racial traits, background, and social class, which is a bit mich for me.

I also cant help but wonder how games like this manage to avoid being dismissed as "fantasy heartbreakers". My only guess is using existing dragon age players to draw an existing fanbase from.

[Yora]

One thing I've often read is that the game is written and presented in a way that makes it beginner friendly by minimizing option paralysis. 3d6 in order is default because it's fasted and works even if you have no real idea what the ability scores all do. 3d6 and assign and point buy are presented as advanced options right next to it.
Special race traits (which are in addition to standard race traits) and a background trait are rolled on a random table, but again page 18 has a sidebar for selecting specific traits you want.

The same idea is also behind the Stunt system. You don't begin your combat turn by deciding whether you want to attack, disarm, knock over, and so on. First you make an attack and then maybe you get a chance to make a stunt. (And the chance to get a stunt is an impressive 44%.) If that happens, the roll also tells you how many stunt points you got. And then based on that number you start to think which of the stunts you can afford you want to use.

The game is quite different from D&D. You have character classes and levels, but they really mostly determine a frame for the pace at which you can improve your abilitiy scores, get focuses, and talents, instead of being a fully freeform point buy system. (Which again makes it much easier to handle, especially for beginners.) At it's core, it's really an ability score based system. The magic system is completely different.
This is no cheap D&D clone. It's a solid generic fantasy system that is easily adaptable to any campaign setting.

[Talakeal]

One thing I've often read is that the game is written and presented in a way that makes it beginner friendly by minimizing option paralysis. 3d6 in order is default because it's fasted and works even if you have no real idea what the ability scores all do. 3d6 and assign and point buy are presented as advanced options right next to it.
Special race traits (which are in addition to standard race traits) and a background trait are rolled on a random table, but again page 18 has a sidebar for selecting specific traits you want..

Awesome. I didn't notice the rules for point buy; as I said I just skimmed the book at a friends house while waiting for our PF game to start, but I really did like what I saw.

There are probably a few problems with the system I didn't notice, but if my first impression holds true I am probably going to try and convince my gaming group to switch from PF to AGE in the future.



This is no cheap D&D clone. It's a solid generic fantasy system that is easily adaptable to any campaign setting.


That's kind of my point. Generally when people dismiss a game as a "fantasy heartbreaker" it is because it is a unique and solid system that will never be able to pull away a large enough audience from D&D to make an impact and will be forgotten.

On the other hand "cheap D&D clones" get praised for being "OSR" or "continuation of the brand" and receive lots of praise and attention. Heck, one could argue that PF is simply a 3.5 clone with a lot of money behind it and it appears to be the dominant system on the market right now.

[Yora]

I think a lot depends on how they are following up on this. Right now, this is more of a system than a game. A good system I really like, but the content for it is bland and generic.

But there are already several campaign settings in the work. Blue Rose gets revived and has still two days to go on a Kickstarter that is already $73,000. There's also going to be Titansgrave and I think something planned for the Freeport setting. And Jack at RPG.net (no clue what his job at Green Ronin actually is) said that he is favoring a sci-fi version as one of the next projects they would work on. And I've already seen people discussing their homebrew ideas.
And with D&D having pretty much pulled out of the business it seems and Pathfinder being on the very crunch heavy end of systems, there could be a quite considerable market for the game. Depending on how they are going to handle third party licensing. If they support it, I think there's potential for a considerable amount of homebrew content being shared.

[Beleriphon]

I think a lot depends on how they are following up on this. Right now, this is more of a system than a game. A good system I really like, but the content for it is bland and generic.

But there are already several campaign settings in the work. Blue Rose gets revived and has still two days to go on a Kickstarter that is already $73,000. There's also going to be Titansgrave and I think something planned for the Freeport setting. And Jack at RPG.net (no clue what his job at Green Ronin actually is) said that he is favoring a sci-fi version as one of the next projects they would work on. And I've already seen people discussing their homebrew ideas.
And with D&D having pretty much pulled out of the business it seems and Pathfinder being on the very crunch heavy end of systems, there could be a quite considerable market for the game. Depending on how they are going to handle third party licensing. If they support it, I think there's potential for a considerable amount of homebrew content being shared.

I actually see Green Ronin doing 3rd party licenses. They've been very, very good with the M&M licenses so I would assume the same will hold true of AGE.

[Knaight]

That's kind of my point. Generally when people dismiss a game as a "fantasy heartbreaker" it is because it is a unique and solid system that will never be able to pull away a large enough audience from D&D to make an impact and will be forgotten.
They're generally neither. The bulk of fantasy heartbreakers are systems where there was clearly a lot of work put in, which might have a unique idea or two, strapped to a D&D clone, and clearly demonstrating the author's utter lack of knowledge of the entire non-D&D industry. A competent fantasy game that isn't just a D&D knockoff is an entirely distinct concept, and can include stuff made by small developers with no existing media to draw from.

See: Burning Wheel, WR&M, and yes, Fantasy Age. The last comes closest, in that there is more mechanical similarity, but it's still distinct.

On the other hand "cheap D&D clones" get praised for being "OSR" or "continuation of the brand" and receive lots of praise and attention. Heck, one could argue that PF is simply a 3.5 clone with a lot of money behind it and it appears to be the dominant system on the market right now.
A handful of clones get noticed, because they are literally just the presentation of an older game. Then there are games which deliberately follow D&D tropes and mechanics, but are clearly made by people who are at least aware of the rest of what is going on and are choosing not to use it because of a deliberate homage.

See: Adventurer, Conquerer, King; Torchbearer.

[Yora]

The thing I like most about Fantasy Age is that it gets rid of several universal elements of D&D that I've long identified as its main problems: d20 + level dependent attack bonus attack rolls, armor class arms races, and that highly unusual magic system.
I feel like it's a system that can do the same things that D&D does, but now I actually can do them in a way that I like.

[Morty]

The one thing that raises my suspicion in your pitch is that it uses the warrior/rogue/mage set-up. I don't like it when RPGs default to that.

[Anonymouswizard]

The one thing that raises my suspicion in your pitch is that it uses the warrior/rogue/mage set-up. I don't like it when RPGs default to that.

Are there any set-ups you prefer? I personally like ones along the power source line, such as Physical/Divine/Mental (Martial/Divine/Arcane in D&D, although I'm about to try one that uses Martial/Magic/Psionics).

[Yora]

Now that I am thinking about it, there is really no mechanical reason why only mages can learn spells. And warrior and rogue already seem to be almost identical, except for access to talents and specializations that are exclusive to one class. If a warrior or rogue would get Magic Points they have everything else that's needed to learn and cast spells.
I think it could actually be played classless very easily. :smallconfused:

[Morty]

Are there any set-ups you prefer? I personally like ones along the power source line, such as Physical/Divine/Mental (Martial/Divine/Arcane in D&D, although I'm about to try one that uses Martial/Magic/Psionics).

I prefer classless systems, by and large. If a system does have classes, they should have some sort of identity to them, and a reason to be separate. Warrior, Rogue and Mage tell us nothing. They tend to end up as a classless system, except with some arbitrary restrictions - as Yora pointed out. The difference between warriors and rogues is especially blurry as heck.

[Anonymouswizard]

I prefer classless systems, by and large. If a system does have classes, they should have some sort of identity to them, and a reason to be separate. Warrior, Rogue and Mage tell us nothing. They tend to end up as a classless system, except with some arbitrary restrictions - as Yora pointed out. The difference between warriors and rogues is especially blurry as heck.

Yeah, I prefer classes to be as loose as you can get (for goodness sake DH, let me buy training in a basic skill without it coming up on my chart!), but still nice and archetypal. Preferably, I'd like:
-Basic stuff, like weapon training, basic skill training, and knowledge would be free for anybody to take.
-Classes are interesting: it's not 'Warrior', it's 'Champion' or 'Gladiator' or 'Ranger' (or 'Assassin' or 'Thief'), all of which have their own area of focus. It's not Mage, it's 'Elementalist' or 'Shapeshifter' or 'Alchemist'.
-Classes give access to a broad range of intermediate level stuff, so all warrior classes can expect access to a variety of weapon training and fighting styles, rogue types lean towards 'skill training' (not clearly separated from warrior types, but non-mundane classes would tend towards weapons or skills), magical classes give access to identification of different types of magic.
-Each class get a specific thing it focuses on, it's 'master level' abilities. So Gladiators might focus on becoming awesome with one weapon, while Rangers get abilities to make use of their environment, while casting classes get access to their spell lists (the equivalent of 3.5 'minor casters' would be common in a highly restricted spell list).
-As you get XP, you can spend it on either basic abilities, intermediate abilities, or master abilities based on your class.

At this point you might was well go pure point-buy if making a generic system, but it can add flavour to characters.

[Yora]

One good argument someone made for it is beginner-friendliness. The way character creation and advancement is set up, you never get "pick four out of these 150 abilities". Instead you get "pick one of these two. Now one of these three. And now one of these other three." Which you also get with the stunts. It's not "You can attempt one of these 12 maneuvers". What you get is "You get a stunt. Pick one that has a cost of 4 or less." (And most likely you'll be considering the 4 point and 3 point stunts the most, since they are generally better than the 1 and 2 point ones.)

There is a big number of options, but at any given moment you have to pick from only a much smaller pool of choices. Which does end up a bit restrictive while not being exactly needed. But to facilitate ease and speed of play, I think it actually looks like a good approach.

[Morty]

Helping streamline things so new players aren't mired in choices is a valid concern. But it doesn't necessitate making the entire system follow an outdated scheme.

[Chambers]

I pre-ordered the book and got the PDF, I've been waiting a long time for this to come out (since Dragon Age Box 1!). I backed the Blue Rose Kickstarter as well, I think I've got a good chance of convincing my local group to give it (both Fantasy AGE & Blue Rose) a shot when they get released.

I haven't had much time to read over the PDF yet but I don't see any big surprises.

[Yora]

Having run a couple of fights with the system, it's really quite interesting to see how much difference it is from others that seemingly appear similar on first sight. Unlike D&D, character advancement happens in very small steps. A group of three 1st level characters has a decent chance of defeating a single 10th level character. Health seems to start quite high and then increase quite rapidly, but that really only extends your staying power. Gaining levels does not actually make you stronger. To become a better fighter, you need to put points in your Fighting, Strength, and Dexterity score and you only get a total of 10 advancement points by the time you reach level 20. The rules theoretically allow characters to increase ability scores to 12, but in practice it's unlikely to even get to 7. (And even with brutal min-maxing, it would take considerably more than 20th level to get a 12.)

With most weapons making between 1d6 and 2d6 damage, armor is extremely efficient. Wearing heavy mail armor that reduces all damage by 7 pretty much doubles the amount of hits you can take. Heavy plate is virtually impenetrable to weaker enemies who only can get any damage if they roll high and also use stunts to get around your armor. And that can make warriors extremely resilient. However, if you happen to end up in situations where you don't have your armor for any reason, you're in really serious trouble.
Still, a dozen orcs can probably kill any character who get to fight them alone. So even though the combat system is very simple, tactics become pretty important. You really want to use the battlefield to your advantage so that your heavy warriors can block access to the feeble mages and ranged roues and your second rank characters can deal out a lot of damage before the enemy reaches them.

[Anonymouswizard]

Having run a couple of fights with the system, it's really quite interesting to see how much difference it is from others that seemingly appear similar on first sight. Unlike D&D, character advancement happens in very small steps. A group of three 1st level characters has a decent chance of defeating a single 10th level character. Health seems to start quite high and then increase quite rapidly, but that really only extends your staying power. Gaining levels does not actually make you stronger. To become a better fighter, you need to put points in your Fighting, Strength, and Dexterity score and you only get a total of 10 advancement points by the time you reach level 20. The rules theoretically allow characters to increase ability scores to 12, but in practice it's unlikely to even get to 7. (And even with brutal min-maxing, it would take considerably more than 20th level to get a 12.)

With most weapons making between 1d6 and 2d6 damage, armor is extremely efficient. Wearing heavy mail armor that reduces all damage by 7 pretty much doubles the amount of hits you can take. Heavy plate is virtually impenetrable to weaker enemies who only can get any damage if they roll high and also use stunts to get around your armor. And that can make warriors extremely resilient. However, if you happen to end up in situations where you don't have your armor for any reason, you're in really serious trouble.
Still, a dozen orcs can probably kill any character who get to fight them alone. So even though the combat system is very simple, tactics become pretty important. You really want to use the battlefield to your advantage so that your heavy warriors can block access to the feeble mages and ranged roues and your second rank characters can deal out a lot of damage before the enemy reaches them.

How does it compare to using magic in combat? Do mages destroy entire groups with a single spell, or become entirely immune to damage?

[Yora]

There are a few spells that look a bit fishy. Rock armor gives you an armor rating equal to your Willpower score for one hour, which might quite possibly be as good as heavy leather or light mail armor, without any of the penalties. That doesn't make the mage tougher than warriors or rogues in any way, but makes a huge difference compared to other mages who don't have it.
Watery doom, the Master rank water spell, can last quite a while and deals pretty significant damage until the target makes a Stamina test to break it. 2d6+Willpower and ignoring armor can be worse than getting hit by a big guy with a two-handed sword. Though even mages with good stats might have a 30% chance that the spell fails because it's so difficult and it only hits a single target, so it's not something you'd be casting all the time.
But usually damage dealing spells only deal an average of 14 or 15 damage or 10 damage and ignoring armor, which won't even kill the weakest enemies in one go. Chain lightning can be devastating, but even a good mage might have only a 50% chance of actually pulling it of or all the magic points are going to waste. If you want to hit reliably, you have to resort to much weaker spells.

I have not seen mages fighting alongside warriors over longer adventures, but there doesn't seem much obvious potential to completely outclass everyone else.

[Yora]

On the Green Ronin forum Chris Pramas said they plan to do some free license option similar to Savage Worlds next year. Which works almost the opposite to the d20 license. For Savage Worlds, you have to you use the official logo and clearly state that it's part of the system, which with the OGL you are explicitly forbidden to do. You also can cross reference to the official rulebooks, but are not allowed to replicate the full descriptions. As a result, everything made under that license only works as an extension to the regular rulebook, you can't go completely independent under a different name.
For campaign settings, monster books, and adventures that's completely sufficient.

[Anonymouswizard]

On the Green Ronin forum Chris Pramas said they plan to do some free license option similar to Savage Worlds next year. Which works almost the opposite to the d20 license. For Savage Worlds, you have to you use the official logo and clearly state that it's part of the system, which with the OGL you are explicitly forbidden to do. You also can cross reference to the official rulebooks, but are not allowed to replicate the full descriptions. As a result, everything made under that license only works as an extension to the regular rulebook, you can't go completely independent under a different name.
For campaign settings, monster books, and adventures that's completely sufficient.

As long as it's not like the GSL I think we'll be all happy. It should be possible for third party Modern AGE and Space AGE to be released, even if they won't be complete.

At least they are telling us the plans now, rather than Wizard's of the Coast's strategy of 'if we decide to implement a licence we'll maybe tell you.

[Yora]

I think Jack Norris had mentioned on a few occasion that he would love to make an official Sci-fi version of the AGE system. Which probably would be easier than ripping out half the content from Fantasy Age and replacing it with something else.
As a basic rulebook for various extensions by several other independent writers, I think the lightweight and bare bones nature of the Basic Rulebook is actually a virtue. Having a common standard to which everyone adds setting or genre specific rules seems much easier to keep track of than multiple attempts of removing and replacing rules.