DND Tribes Game

[8wGremlin]

So I'm putting together some mechanics for a Tribes game (updated from previous concepts) using Myth-weavers to run a PBP game.

I'd like your input to check it over and see if there are any glaring mistakes, or any suggestions you can think off.

The link to the google doc is https://docs.google.com/document/d/1dPP2tTIBExJKoJkbVRkJj-T5TK3RqyVCZvabHi_M_98/edit?usp=sharing

Happy for your input.

[Lalliman]

I love this. It’s like age of empires in D&D. I’d like to try this some time as well. But first I have a lot of comments on how it could be improved.

Under Downtime Actions, you say that one unit of food or water is enough for a week, but later you say that it’s for one day. I’m not sure which would be better, but either way the penalty for having no water should be much greater than the penalty for having no food. Perhaps you get one level of exhaustion for every week without food, or every day without water. Or if you don’t want to go per day after all, maybe the character just dies at the end of the week without water.

I wonder if it’s better to have the terrain bonus be a gathering modifier, rather than free resources. For example, you gather twice as much water per action point in the arctic terrain. Or when you gather wood in the forest, you have a 50% chance to get double the normal amount. That feels more natural to me, but it’s fine as it is too. The terrains are quite unequal right now though. The coast is plainly the best one, and the desert seems like the worst.

Alchemist
I think the higher level potions should be way more expensive. A greater healing potion heals the same amount as two basic healing potions, but is superior because A) it only takes one action to drink, B) it only takes one day to create, and C) it only costs one glass. I’d say the greater should cost three herbs (twice as much as a basic plus one for efficiency) and the superior should cost six (four times as much as a basic plus two for efficiency).

Armorer
Metal armor is usually padded with cloth. Cloth can be a resource you can gather from the environment (plant fibber or animal fur). I think you should include all of the armor options, because some niche characters may want other options than the ones you listed, plus the weaker ones can be a cheap way to equip your villagers. The better armors should also be more expensive, both logically and because they can be a substantial upgrade (e.g. from leather to half plate, or chainmail to full plate). I’d design them like this.

Padded armor = 1 cloth
Leather armor = 1 leather
Studded leather = 1 leather + 1 metal

Hide = 2 leather
Chain shirt = 1 cloth + 1 metal
Scale mail = 1 leather + 2 metal
Breastplate = 1 leather + 3 metal
Half plate = 1 cloth + 4 metal

Ring mail = 1 leather + 2 metal
Chain mail = 1 cloth + 3 metal
Splint armor = 1 cloth + 1 leather + 3 metal
Full plate = 1 cloth + 5 metal

Blacksmith
Also add shields for maybe 1 wood and 1 metal.

Bowyer
Good call using hides as a material for this. I’d say add 1 wood as a component for arrows, and up the number to 20 for compensation.

Builder
I understand not wanting these buildings to be really expensive, but it doesn’t seem like these resources represent a consistent amount of material. Like, one unit of lumber can be turned into either a bow, or a 10x10 ft. wall. Obviously that’s not equal. I think you should have a look at all of your resources and divide them into common and rare ones. E.g. wood and stone are common, and thus you get larger numbers of those (perhaps as much as 5 per action point), while e.g. metal and herbs are rare, and thus you get only 1 per action point. Then you can greatly increase the cost of these buildings. And the greater availability of wood wouldn't be a big deal for the crafting of e.g. bows, because the hides are still a limiting factor. Inflating the numbers for common materials would feel more natural to me than maintaining the notion that each unit represents a nebulous, variable amount of material.

Farmer and Hunter
I don’t understand how there is meat and vegetable, and then “food” is separate from both of those. Like, what physical object does “food” represent?

Training
I think the commoners should be able to gain hit dice to some extent, so they aren’t forever stuck as 4 HP paper mache people.

In the end, there are some things that remain too nebulous for the players to make informed decisions about. Like, what does security rating actually do? What does mana do? Certain terrains give increased chances of certain events, but how substantial is that increase?

[8wGremlin]

Thanks @Lalliman excellent feedback.
I'll take a more detailed look, and incorporate some of these, thank you!