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Flying Elephant
2007-06-07, 03:20 PM
I've been looking at the Modern SRD, and am thinking of starting an IRL game of it. Does anyone have any advice/pitfalls/suggestions to give a new GM?
(I'm familiar with D&D 3.5)

Dhavaer
2007-06-07, 03:57 PM
Buying the book would be a good idea; I'm pretty sure there's a fair bit of critical stuff not in there.

It would also be a good idea to look at the Bullet Points articles on the Wizards site, as they are the closest thing Modern has to errata.

Try not to get too realistic. It's still d20, and high level characters can still take obnoxious amount of punishment without blinking.

Lord Iames Osari
2007-06-07, 04:02 PM
Isn't that what the Massive Damage Threshold is for?

Dhavaer
2007-06-07, 04:11 PM
Yes, but generally it's not terribly threatening to combat-oriented characters, who are usually the ones taking the damage.

Closet_Skeleton
2007-06-07, 04:11 PM
Don't try to fiddle with the autofire rules and believe in the wealth system.

And be really careful with how much stuff you give your players.

Zincorium
2007-06-07, 04:16 PM
Realize that automatic weapons fire, after about level 6, may not be able to hurt certain characters, and shotguns are terrible compared to every similiar weapon. Use these facts to your advantage. D20 Modern can be, and is, very lethal at low levels due to the high damage output of even basic guns, so you need to kind of baby them until they can take a bullet or two in the guts, and then after that it's going to be hard to deal significant damage to them without resorting to unscrupulous means (Arming all enemies with .50 anti-material rifles may be sound tactically, but it doesn't make sense. Unless one of the PC's is robocop, then there's precedent for it).

Closet_Skeleton
2007-06-07, 04:28 PM
Common houserules;

Shotguns currently have -2 damage and -2 attack per range increment. A common house rule is to change it to -2 damage but no attack penalty. Whether this makes sense or not is disputable but it makes them useful for shooting small targets at long ranges, which does make sense.

1.5 half times strength for two-handed weapons. As far as I know d20 modern doesn't specificaly say that strength is multiplied when you have a two-handed weapon. Most people unconsciously houserule in the strength multiplication but consider not doing so. Nobody uses a shield in d20 modern so two-handed weapons don't need an advantage, also melee weapons can easily way outstrip guns in you allow strength multiplication.

DnD conditions. d20 modern skipped out a lot of these and they can be useful.

Increasing base attack and hit dice. Some people do this because they're used to DnD, giving fast and tough full base attack while giving tough d12 hit die. I would recomend not. The base classes are designed so each 1 is best at a single thing (even charismatic with his disruptedly useless best reputation bonus). You should keep it that way. Strong may have good base attack but that doesn't mean it's the best base class. Also since average is common, poor is still useful. Keeping HD low is more realistic and also makes those guys with 1d6 useful (notice nothing has 1d4 hp in d20 modern).

Possibly increase the tough hero's skill points. A lot of people don't play tough since he has no offensive abilities and fast gets better defence. It makes as much sense for a tough guy to be skilled as it does for the fast guy, since smart hero is really the d20 modern rogue.