"buying" the class features you want

[TyGuy]

I don't really know how to search for this. Has anyone come across some work that parsed out the value of each class feature for piecing together custom classes?

I'm thinking of a heavily homebrew situation in which leveling involves granting a resource (quantities depend on level gained) that can be spent to buy/unlock/upgrade class features.

But before I get too deep I was wondering if someone already did most of the work in determining the power of 2d6 sneak attack vs second wind vs third level casting, etc.

[Bjarkmundur]

We've talked about this a couple of times in the homebrew section, but I don't know about anyone who's actually done it.

Oh, and BTW, you're about to get flooded with replies talking about GURPS and how how you should just play that instead.

You're also about be told how broken it is to be able to b-line to the features you want, without thinking about natural character progression. Referring to how when learning to cast spells a character naturally starts with minor magic, which will increase his spellcasting ability via training, before he can cast major magic, and how you need to master simple weapons (which naturally leads to a higher strength score) before mastering martial weapons.

You'll also probably get a few replies talking about how this would remove a whole lot of fun features and neat flavour from the game, how levelling is also a better buy than class features, and how it would result in heavily specialised characters with little depth.
By the time you set up all the prerequisites and limitations to counter this, you'll end up with something that looks very much like 5e classes.

If the idea is to mix-n-max classes, most people will tell you to look at subclasses, and how multiclassing has evolved into 1-3 level dips. Meaning that one would almost always rather buy low level features from different classes rather than upgrading what you already have.

If you really want to put the classes in a blender, I think start simple and make a proof-of-concept.

Use the UA sidekick classes (https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://media.wizards.com/2018/dnd/downloads/UA_Sidekicks.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwjCne-W4tHhAhXFjqQKHe7LDO4QFjAAegQIARAB&usg=AOvVaw1ombQrANqnOJfNKDrs1oxO), and see if using that, alongside all general character progressions (ASI, HP, Proficiency bonus, skills, weapon and armor proficiencies, spell level), you can make a decent modular half-class based system

Good luck and have fun :)

[MrStabby]

I don't really know how to search for this. Has anyone come across some work that parsed out the value of each class feature for piecing together custom classes?

I'm thinking of a heavily homebrew situation in which leveling involves granting a resource (quantities depend on level gained) that can be spent to buy/unlock/upgrade class features.

But before I get too deep I was wondering if someone already did most of the work in determining the power of 2d6 sneak attack vs second wind vs third level casting, etc.

The problem with this is that there is no set value. It is a bit contextual.

Value of 3rd level spells? Is this with or without twined enchantment? Do you add casting stat to damage for any spells?

2d6 sneak attack? What is your crit range? What sources of advantage does the character have? How many attacks?


There is no set value to abilities, it is all contingent on what else a character has.


That said, there are some that might work as abilities to be bought.

Chanel divinity
wildshape (normal, not moon druid)

Basically does it take an action and does it not really interact with other abilities. Wild shape kind of does, but you are still better off staying in your base form is you want to be fighting in most circumstances.

[Grod_The_Giant]

I'd suggest just having your unobtainium convert into experience points. D&D is not set up to be a point buy game, and trying to hack it into one is not going to work well.

[Sigreid]

A pretty key problem is that the classes get their best toys at different levels. It makes it hard to draw a correct set of parallels.

[Waazraath]

If you want inspiration, you could check out Unearthed Arcana third edition. It had an optional system with just 3 classes (fighting, skill using, magic using), and all abilities were converted to feats (of which each class had a few extra. I don't think the result was very balanced though (or it can be, at all - it's simply not the way the system was designed.)

[JakOfAllTirades]

Oh, and BTW, you're about to get flooded with replies talking about GURPS and how how you should just play that instead.


Good luck and have fun :)

Rules-heavy point-based character creation systems don't seem to be as popular as they used to be. A lot of the old GURPS/HERO players I know have switched to lighter, faster, systems like FATE and Savage Worlds. I'd recommend the latter, although spellcasters aren't nearly as powerful in SW; they're balanced differently.

[MaxWilson]

I don't really know how to search for this. Has anyone come across some work that parsed out the value of each class feature for piecing together custom classes?

I'm thinking of a heavily homebrew situation in which leveling involves granting a resource (quantities depend on level gained) that can be spent to buy/unlock/upgrade class features.

But before I get too deep I was wondering if someone already did most of the work in determining the power of 2d6 sneak attack vs second wind vs third level casting, etc.

WotC did exactly that when making their multiclass rules, which are essentially custom class construction rules. Action Surge + Fighting Style + Second Wind is worth two levels, 2d6 sneak attack + Cunning Action + Expertise is worth two levels, etc.

[TyGuy]

WotC did exactly that when making their multiclass rules, which are essentially custom class construction rules. Action Surge + Fighting Style + Second Wind is worth two levels, 2d6 sneak attack + Cunning Action + Expertise is worth two levels, etc.

But how much of that first level is weighted in the fighting style and how much is the second wind? 50:50, 25:75?

[Max_Killjoy]

Rules-heavy point-based character creation systems don't seem to be as popular as they used to be. A lot of the old GURPS/HERO players I know have switched to lighter, faster, systems like FATE and Savage Worlds. I'd recommend the latter, although spellcasters aren't nearly as powerful in SW; they're balanced differently.

I'm an old HERO player, and I find FATE and Savage Worlds kinda... meh.

[MaxWilson]

But how much of that first level is weighted in the fighting style and how much is the second wind? 50:50, 25:75?

My point is that you've already got a custom class construction system. If you're trying to make a more granular one where you can swap out e.g. Second Wind for Expertise, I'd say "don't, but if you do you'll have to eyeball it." 50/50 seems fair in this case. But overall I'd say don't reinvent the wheel.

[Yakmala]

The difficult part of breaking down the cost of each possible class feature is that some of these features were designed to be spread out among multiple classes, and were one to combine them into a single class, where they could work in synch, without the built in penalties of multi-classing, they become a lot more valuable.

Imagine a character class with all the features of a Sorcadin or Sorlock that didn't need to slow their progression via multi-classing...

Also, if you give a feature belonging to one class to a custom class, what attribute does it use? Would all of these custom classes be SAD by default?

[MeeposFire]

I have seen homebrew ideas for this in 3e and there was the players options books in 2e that did something similar. In all of those cases none of it really worked that well. There was also the create a class option in the 2e DMG that allowed you to create a class by giving a class whatever you want and each ability made the amount of XP required to level increase by a certain percentage. For the most part not really looked at fondly as being particularly good or balanced though it was not universally terrible.

It is something that can be done but is difficult to pull off.

That said not my thing it was part of the sort of thing that really eventually turned me off 3e to an extent and the class system is very much a defining aspect of being D&D for me so it has turned me off of trying to do this in D&D.