Steampunk Rome rules voting thread

[Silence]

Ok, so we've been having a discussion over here on a new RP system, and we're working on what rules system to use.

Basically, Romans invent steam engine about 200AD. Technology goes nuts.

Choices:

D&D 3.5 or D20 modern
D&D 4.0
Combination of D&D 3.5 and 4.0
Other (Please suggest)

[Vadin]

This would be crazy awesome if we could make this a 4E setting. 4E is also far easier to balance in terms of monsters, races, and classes than 3.5 is. Plus martial classes can operate alongside steampunk/caster classes in 4E and seem just as useful.

So, 1 vote for 4E.

[alexeduardo]

D&D 3.5 or D20 modern

I don't know about you, but I worked long and hard to go to the USA and get my 3.5 books, I would sure like to use them once more

[thevorpalbunny]

D&D 3.5 or d20 Modern. Because I would like to use this setting without having to re-stat it for 3.5 or writing several books' worth of house rules to make 4e usable.

[Vadin]

Dude, are you kidding me? 4e is incredibly usable. Have you tried it yet? It's so logical, streamlined, and easy to work with! No guessing about monster CR, just 'I want this to be a level X monster that fills Y role, here are the rules for how to make that balanced.' The DMG has handy guides for creating everyhting from classes to feats to monsters to whatever. It's all so easy, but the results still end up incredibly diverse and unique.

In 3.5 I had to guess with stats and keep comparing everything against monsters that had poorly assigned CRs in the first place. And the 'CR' itself was an ill-designed concept that really, really needed a more solid mechanical base...

In short, you can find all the 4e books online via torrents and rapidsearch and stuff for free (I'm required to say its very illegal to do that and I don't adivse it). You already have all the 3.5 stuff, yes, but download/purchase (download) 4e, try it out with your group, and then come back and tell me it isn't so much easier to play and design for.

Just sayin'.

[cabbagesquirrel]

4th edition if you please, the rules are stream lined and you can carry on about all the house rules you like, but house rules have always been part of any dnd edition to help functionality.

i like 4th better but i have both 3rd and modern rule books so i dont mind lol.

[Fan]

I vote 3.5 or d20 modern because I HATE 4ed, because it nerfed the wizard down to the meatshields level. TT__TT

[weishan]

3.5 or d20 modern

[Eita]

3.5/4E hybrid. I liked it in the first thread, I like it know. We take the parts of 4E that were actually good (read: the parts that fixed things that were broken) and keep a creamy core of 3.5.

Also, 4E is bad because it gets rid of the distinction that made 3.5 so good. Fighters rocked at low levels because they could kill everything and keep going, and then rocked more at high levels because they took awesome PrCs and added in a house-rule or two that a guy could take Eldritch Knight so long as he met the int requirements for "ability to cast spells" and then went with the Sorcerer spell-list..

[Tempest Fennac]

I'd say D&D 3.5 or D20 modern due to knowing how that system works.

[AgentPaper]

I vote 4th edition. All of the arguments against it are completely irrelevant seeing as how we would be making all of the classes and monsters and races ourselves.

[Vadin]

I HATE 4ed, because it nerfed the wizard down to the meatshields level. TT__TT

Also, 4E is bad because it gets rid of the distinction that made 3.5 so good. Fighters rocked at low levels because they could kill everything and keep going, and then rocked more at high levels because they took awesome PrCs and added in a house-rule or two that a guy could take Eldritch Knight so long as he met the int requirements for "ability to cast spells" and then went with the Sorcerer spell-list..

By giving all of the characters powers that work differently and have unique effects and are all balanced? By making every character useful at every level in every combat? By not having totally broken spellcasting and totally underpowered melee classes? Or was the broken spellcasting a good thing like the underpowered melee classes? [/rant]

I apologize, I'll be stopping that now. It just seems like there have been quite a few knee-jerk 4eOMG reactions in here, and I felt it only fair to respond with my own 4eOMGstfu reactions.

[alexeduardo]

Dude, are you kidding me? 4e is incredibly usable. Have you tried it yet? It's so logical, streamlined, and easy to work with! No guessing about monster CR, just 'I want this to be a level X monster that fills Y role, here are the rules for how to make that balanced.' The DMG has handy guides for creating everyhting from classes to feats to monsters to whatever. It's all so easy, but the results still end up incredibly diverse and unique.

In 3.5 I had to guess with stats and keep comparing everything against monsters that had poorly assigned CRs in the first place. And the 'CR' itself was an ill-designed concept that really, really needed a more solid mechanical base...

In short, you can find all the 4e books online via torrents and rapidsearch and stuff for free (I'm required to say its very illegal to do that and I don't adivse it). You already have all the 3.5 stuff, yes, but download/purchase (download) 4e, try it out with your group, and then come back and tell me it isn't so much easier to play and design for.

Just sayin'.

c'mon, you cant expect me to believe here in frostwire I can find eveythi...

wow

well, you can use cyberpunk if you want to, 'CAUSE I GOT IT ALL!

[thevorpalbunny]

By giving all of the characters powers that work differently and have unique effects and are all balanced? By making every character useful at every level in every combat? By not having totally broken spellcasting and totally underpowered melee classes? Or was the broken spellcasting a good thing like the underpowered melee classes? [/rant]

I apologize, I'll be stopping that now. It just seems like there have been quite a few knee-jerk 4eOMG reactions in here, and I felt it only fair to respond with my own 4eOMGstfu reactions.

I could explain why 4e sucks, but The Alexandrian has already said it more eloquently and concisely than I ever could. Just read this and the rest of the article series. If you still think 4e is superior (or anywhere close to 3e's equal) after you have then you are clearly part of the (extremely small) target audience.

EDIT: That series didn't contain everything I remembered. I also recommend reading I Miss My Ten-Foot Pole and as a completely separate complaint, Re:GSL

[Vadin]

Did I hear someone say cyberpunk and 4e?

[AgentPaper]

I could explain why 4e sucks, but The Alexandrian has already said it more eloquently and concisely than I ever could. Just read this and the rest of the article series. If you still think 4e is superior (or anywhere close to 3e's equal) after you have then you are clearly part of the (extremely small) target audience.

EDIT: That series didn't contain everything I remembered. I also recommend reading I Miss My Ten-Foot Pole and as a completely separate complaint, Re:GSL

I don't see how these arguments come into play when we are making the content ourselves. It's not like we're gunna just go over the normal 4E rulebook, and re-name everything to sound like something from Steampunk Rome, we're making a whole new system with 3.5 or 4E as the basis for the rules of combat and classes and such. Just because 4E has no ten foot poles or flasks of oil does not mean that we can't put in it our system.

Seriously, name one part of 4E that you hate that isn't going to be changed anyways with our setting. Just one.

[thevorpalbunny]

1. The lack of non-combat mechanics that work.
2. The lack of a combat system that is interesting. (Padded sumo wrestling)
3. The disassociated mechanics.
4. Mechanics which accomplish the opposite of what they set out to do.

The 10-foot pole isn't the disease, it's just a very revealing symptom.

[Arioch]

This sounds cool. If I can, I'd vote 4e.

[AgentPaper]

1. The lack of non-combat mechanics that work.

Huh? I don't even know what you're talking about here. If you're complaining about the skill system, that's got to be one of the easiest things to change to work how we want.

2. The lack of a combat system that is interesting. (Padded sumo wrestling)

I don't see what would keep us from reducing the starting and overall HP that players get. Actually, I think it would be cool if we use "wounds" instead of HP in the first place.

3. The disassociated mechanics.

Erm, what?

4. Mechanics which accomplish the opposite of what they set out to do.

Are you saying you WANT mechanics to do this? Or that 4E has them and you don't want them? Also, point to the mechanics that do this.

You have to make more sense to count as a valid argument. I have no idea what you're talking about for most of those. And I still think they can be changed rather easily for our setting.

[Vadin]

1. The lack of non-combat mechanics that work.
2. The lack of a combat system that is interesting. (Padded sumo wrestling)
3. The disassociated mechanics.
4. Mechanics which accomplish the opposite of what they set out to do.

The 10-foot pole isn't the disease, it's just a very revealing symptom.

Question, this is really just curiosity, not trying to start anything, but have you played 4e yet?

[thevorpalbunny]

No, and I don't want to.

Disassociated mechanics are ones which have no relation to the in-game world. For example, the skill challenge system is highly disassociated; there is no in-game reason why it should be harder to climb a wall in a 3/2 skill challenge if you first fail at a Search check to find the secret door than to have never attempted to find it. Instead of having to succeed three times before you fail twice, you now have to succeed three times before failing at all. There is no in-game reason why; in both situations you don't know about the secret door and are trying to climb the wall. But because you examined the wall, it is now less forgiving.
Other examples include daily abilities for non-magical characters (Just do that trick you used on the goblin warchief this morning. Sorry, I can't. Why not? Umm. . . good question.) The only reason is "That's a daily ability. I've already used it today."

An example mechanic which accomplished the opposite of what it intended: the standardization of ability structures and the supposed "elimination of the 15-minute adventuring day" by providing every class with encounter abilities. The introduction of daily abilities means that in any 5-man party in 4e (as recommended) vs. a standard 4-man party in 3.5e (wizard, cleric, fighter, rogue), there are now 5(+) reasons rather than 2 for the party to stop after their first encounter. There were others, but I have no desire to keep re-writing arguments that, as I said, Jason Alexander wrote more eloquently and clearly.

[Vadin]

On the daily abilities topic, you do understand that most of the fighter's daily abilities aren't even attacks, right? They're stances ala ToB that last until the end of the encounter. Also, characters in 4e aren't utterly useless after they use up all of their daily abilities. Those are usually saved until a hard fight shows up, and if one doesn't show up all day, the characters are still fine.

Skill challenges...yeah, those need some work. A little bit of homebrewing on these very boards though came up with a pretty good solution. It should be noted, however, that not every out of combat skill check is a skill challenge, though.

Clearly, though, you're quite adamant about refusing to try out 4e and nothing anyone says can or will change your mind because you're absolutely sure that its absolutely terrible and nobody at all in the entire world will ever play it because its so bad.

After this, I will end my discussion and render it a lost cause: give 4e a shot. It's easy to pick up and even easier to homebrew for. Before you parrot what somebody on the internet said, give the system an honest try without looking for things in it to hate. It really is pretty awesome.

[Rogoroth]

I know it´s not a choice but if you really want crazy d20 steampunk and want to stay within 3,5 or something similar.

Warcraft the Rpg

Seriously, it has steamtech rules and a magic system that in my (biased) personal opinion is better than the vancian 3,5 D&D magic.

Of course ordinary 3,5 with arificers as crazy steam scientist would also work.

Edit:

On the daily abilities topic, you do understand that most of the fighter's daily abilities aren't even attacks, right?

Shenanigans!
Daily abilities of the warrior, not counting paragon classes.
attacks: 17
Stances: 6
Misc: 7

Aanyway with that out of my system, I have played 4e and I can´t say that it is the huge improvement that I felt it was going to be as I read about it.
Seriously as flawed as 3,5 is it has something that 4e will never ever have... soul.

Also I hate the new duergar fluff... bah poisonous beard spines my ass.

[thevorpalbunny]

Also, characters in 4e aren't utterly useless after they use up all of their daily abilities. Those are usually saved until a hard fight shows up, and if one doesn't show up all day, the characters are still fine.

I'll let it drop after this, but this rebuttal is completely irrelevant. In 3.5e, wizards at high levels have virtually unlimited spells, yet parties feel obligated to stop once they run through their top two or three spell levels. A 20th-level evoker doesn't care how many times per day he can cast a magic missile or even chain lightning, he cares how many times he can cast meteor swarm.. No one cares that they can always use their encounter abilities, they care whther they can use their most powerful abilities, the dailies.

[Vadin]

Shenanigans!
Daily abilities of the warrior, not counting paragon classes.
attacks: 17
Stances: 6
Misc: 7

Aanyway with that out of my system, I have played 4e and I can´t say that it is the huge improvement that I felt it was going to be as I read about it.
Seriously as flawed as 3,5 is it has something that 4e will never ever have... soul.

Also I hate the new duergar fluff... bah poisonous beard spines my ass.

So you caught me! Slightly under half of his daily abilities aren't attacks.

I wouldn't call it quite as flawed as 3.5, considering that there have yet to be any pun-pun/hulking hurler abuses.

And fluff? Fluff is immaterial, mutable, and inconsequential. I mean, we're going to be homebrweing everything anyways, so fluff problems aren't really...relevant. But...whatever.

[Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll]

I say 4e, but with severe modifications, including adding more static abilities, like we had in 3.5. I liked static abilities.

[Emperor Tippy]

I vote 3.5 because since you will be chucking most of the rules anyways you may as well go with the more versatile system.

[thevorpalbunny]

I wouldn't call it quite as flawed as 3.5, considering that there have yet to be any pun-pun/hulking hurler abuses.

Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition was released in 2000. It was updated to 3.5 in 2003. Pun-pun showed up in 2005. There are no pun-pun-like abuses in core 3.5, nor in core 4e. I will make you a bet. If in June of 2013 (5 years after 4e is released) it has not yet a) been taken off the market or b) found to have at least one huge gaping hole to be exploited (a la pun-pun), I will, for free, send you all my 3.5 books and get a set of 4e books (I don't own a paper copy). If either has happened, you will send me all of your 4e books (also for free). Interested?

[Vadin]

Sure thing. If theres a pun-pun in 4e, I'll buy a set too. I've only got electronic copies. Other people I know have the paper copies, but I don't think I'm quite at liberty to send you theirs...

[thevorpalbunny]

Now the only question is how much money I have just won. . .