Love Letter to D&D

So I was thinking about what I said in my last blog post about making my own “love letter” to D&D – what would that mean to me? What could I do to make it my own? I spent so much time playing only 3.5e and Mutants and Masterminds that I now feel so free and open playing and running Cortex Plus, Edge of the Empire, and similar, more story-oriented games.

It seems to me the height of hubris to assume that I know better than WotC or Paizo what D&D “should be” – which is why my link above to @TheAngryDM‘s rant about “love letters” seems appropriate. Of course I don’t know better. For anyone but myself that is. I would totally play the heck out of the game I’m outlining below. And if anyone else would too, I’ll put more time into it.

I’ve Got a Feeling
I would, of course, want it to “feel” like D&D. Ya know, just like any other similar project (including Pathfinder, Dungeon World, 13th Age, D&D Next, etc). What are the elements that do that for me? I’d want a kick-in-the-door kill-monsters-take-their-stuff go-on-quests-for-kings kind of feel. How can I leverage (see what I did there?) my new knowledge and experience of story gaming to increase the awesomeness of that kick-ass adventuring feel?

So I’ve seen Fate Accelerated‘s Approaches. I’ve seen Leverage‘s Roles. I’ve seen 4e’s party roles. Is this something that can guide the focus of character creation and advancement? I think that I fully intend to take the abstraction 4e started to its logical conclusion. There are no classes, or races, or flavor. There’s no need to reskin, when all you have to do is skin. Right? So there’s no Rogue and no Sorcerer. There’s a Duel/Smash character with focus on sneaking and conditional damage, themed with martial training and skills. There’s a Duel/Control character with focus on multiple targets and lasting damage, themed with magic from within.

Duel, Smash, Control, Protect, and Support.
In fact, these might well be Approaches or Roles in a possible Fate or Cortex Plus variation. But we’re not stepping away from D&D’s six stats, or the d20, or Hit Points. Those things are, as Next’s research has suggested, too much a part of the experience. You could think of them as classes, whittled down as seen in d20 Modern and Star Wars Saga Edition. Perhaps more accurately, (at least with what I have in mind) they would be like Edge of the Empire’s careers. You choose a specialty during character creation, and feats and talents outside your wheelhouse are not forbidden – just more expensive. Which brings me to another tangent.

A Matter of Experience
Every edition of D&D I’ve played has used Experience Points. A player character gains between dozens and thousands of these things upon defeating an enemy or completing a quest. Rack up a few thousand, and the PC gains a level – a package deal of multiple measurable gains in power. In fact, the concept is pretty integral to the D&D experience. So I’m still waffling about this, but hear me out.

Each talent, every feat, all the stat bumps, and certain other advantages would cost varying quantities of Feat Points, Talent Points, and Character Points. A PC might get between 1 and 3 of each of these every session. The GM decides how many of each based a rubric I haven’t come up with yet. Soo… no distinct levels then. By doing this, each advancement could therefore cost different amounts to characters with different roles. You want to attack multiple foes? That costs a lot less for a Controller than a Duelist. Healing? Your Support guy will find it cheaper than the Smash player. And so on.

Aspects, Distinctions, and Descriptors, Oh My!
So what does all that mean? The no fluff. The anything-goes-but-some-things-are-cheaper-than-others setup. The heavy disconnect between who your character is, and what your character can do. Well, you simply name the elements as you pick them up. That 1d10 melee damage you can do all day long? Call it a longsword. By doing so, you make it susceptible to rust, but not anti-magic fields. Call it an eldritch strike. Same cost, same rules, different corner cases – and obviously different story implications. Is your generic healing divine? Better stay on good terms with your deity. Is it due to a commanding force of personality? Your blinded and deafened party member probably won’t benefit.

This is a gaming mechanics conceit that requires trust on both sides of the table. I’d first seen it used to great effect in Mutants & Masterminds, but the same idea guides the entire engine behind Fate and Cortex Plus. Fate’s Aspects all give a standard +2 to a roll, but what changes is how and when to use them. In Marvel Heroic, Captain America and Wolverine both pull out the same d12 for Godlike Durability, but it means different things at different times.

Advantage and Threat
Yep. Basically everything I said in Hacking Threat and Advantage applies here. And for an example of how this could work? Let’s say it costs 5 Advantage to prone an enemy. There’s gonna be a feat or talent that reduces that number – cheaper for Smashers and Controllers than Protectors and Supporters. Likewise, you could pick up the counterparts, increasing the Threat needed to do the same to your character. A dwarf-like race might need 5 extra Threat to prone, for example.

And if you haven’t played WFRP or Edge of the Empire, here’re a couple examples of how this crazy mechanic works! The separate axis allows you to gain an advantage while still failing your intended task, and vice verse. So let’s say you roll well on your attack, but horribly on advantage? You just did a ton of damage to your target, but now you’re prone. You must have overextended or something. Roll with it. You fail a Diplomacy check, but have tons of advantage? The king refuses to lend you his guard and ships, but your quest now has financial backing. Check out Order 66 (a podcast devoted to Edge of the Empire) and listen for @Fiddleback‘s segment “Skill Monkey” to get more thorough exploration of success/failure vs advantage/threat.

So When Can I Play?
Aw geez. I dunno. This is essentially just an outline. But I think it’s the first time I’ve ever come up with anything creative that doesn’t leech off of anybody else’s IP (examples include Final Fantasy, Zelda, Lone Wolf, Bleach, Diamond Throne, Starcraft, Sliders). It would be different enough from every game it steals from so as to be obviously different. Heck, maybe even Kickstarter material. Lemme know what you folks think.

4 thoughts on “Love Letter to D&D

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