Rob
Okay, what follows are my notes from our one and a half playtesting sessions last weekend.
First, though, let me offer my own thoughts:
1. Combat was not slow. Given the number of PCs (nine) and in the first battle, the number of NPCs (ten to twenty), combat was at least as fast as D&D. Mainly what slowed it down was people forgetting their armor impedance, looking up spells, and discussions of movement- all of which should be negligible for a serious game. On my side of things, it was fine, and basically the same as D&D.
2. The most important change, systemically, is to change Intellect to Education, and Charisma to Presence (or maybe Willpower).
3. Exploding d4s is fine I think. People might bitch, but honestly it seemed fun for players to roll tons of dice and keep rolling the d4s on a 4.
4. A party of ninth level dudes is powerful. Characters were not overly weak. The priest and the mage were damn good. The thief and the fighter were kick ass. The only guy who seemed lost in the shuffle, besides the golem, was the Ritual mage.
5. There were some laughs over 'Gayfarers' and 'Gaya' (Gaea). They suggested 'Terra' below, but I dunno, I dated a chick named Terra in middle school. Gaea is fine, if not just Nature. The other laughs came from Godfrey's guy who could swim in plate just as easy as without, and the comedy was he was no better if he took off his armor.
6. Perception is the catch-all DM proficiency. Players searching a building? Perception check. Want to remember how many exits somewhere had? Perception. About to be ambushed? Perception. Might be nice to make this clear in the description. Also, is it clear that both players and DMs can call for checks? A player can roll Perception on their own, plus the DM can call for it.
...
Here are the criticisms from the sessions:
Should not be hard to find how many ability points you begin with. Right now you’ve gotta look through the text a lot. Should be clear.
“Agility” attribute is missing its header label in the beginning
Leadership and Inspire should be combined
Combine falling, jumping, running, and swimming into athletics 4 per grade
Shields: improve dodge instead of armor absorbance
“Proficiencies” and “abilities”, not “ability skills”
Add bookmarks to the fucking document
“Martial knowledge”- identify combatants
Why can’t mages have shields? Why is it easier to cast with a staff?
Wilderness Lore 1 per grade is cheap.
Weapons and armor should be listed in the back, and listed by class as well
Why buy worse armor? Why buy knives?
Potion of blinking… +3 to dodge, but an additional -3 to be hit?
Counterattack is not a prereq for advanced counterattack?
Cloak of Blades, reduce bonus to-hit… clarify what it is
Clarify that Handmaidens only do direct damage spells thru weapons
Increased attribute: no reason to have “1x”
Spell to give a weapon “vital strike” skill
Specify that Multiple Attacks must be in the same grade of weapon that you have Weapon Mastery in
Typo “Character’s” in Perception in GMs section
Add poison costs to Narbohring
Make the skill costs better in terms of formatting: bold, parens
Add website to every page in the book
Auto char gen website
Iron skin should be a little better- make it stack with normal armor
Archers and snipers? Sure archers get a +2 to hit at short range, but maybe there should be some archer abilities? What about special strength bows too?
Increased Endurance should retroactively affect health points, right?
Rust: broken plate mail should be 1d6, not 1d4, yes?
Faith spells should be listed by domain as well as alphabetical order
What does Blindness do? Put effects of being blind under blindness spell
Magic shield spells are too weak… maybe 50% chance of block? Or even 100% chance?
How obvious is casting? If I cast persuade on you, do you know I’m about to do this? Do your friends?
Incinerate Spell: save for half… taking 4d6 is not exactly the same as taking half of 8d6.
Spirit Armor and Magical Vestment? Do they stack with, e.g., leather armor?
Systemically, Blindness and Cure Blindness, and all similar kinds of spells, should be the same Circle.
Look at spells like Cripple- should there be an ‘area of effect’? Cripple on a large dragon vs cripple on a gnome is the same thing?
Does Fireball damage make sense?
Is Disease too powerful? If you’ve got 40 hp, isn’t this just a lot better than 4th circle spell Maim?
Difference between stunned and paralyzed? Paralyzed guys are easy to kill
Shatter is 3rd Circle? A bit weak… can’t shatter anything but glass?
Totally retarded when characters can’t read. Makes for bad gaming. Make it easier to get languages and read them. Maybe +1 skillpoint to read a language you can speak (without having to take literacy)? Or you can spend one of your free languages to get the literacy ability? Make language acquisition scale up faster, so that at 10-11 it’s two languages.
Command Confuse duration is 2-4 rounds, but in the description says it lasts 1d4 rounds.
Why shouldn’t mages just always defer to 0?
Saving throws are damn expensive. Not sure that this discourages min/maxing, seems to encourage it… players thinking is that the best defense is a good offense.
General movement and combat rule: if anyone moves a lot (between 25% and 100% total), everyone participating in that part of the combat gets only one attack.
Bonuses to Dodge for full movement action? Bonuses to attacks from charging?
What about a set of optional combat rules? Keeping a more simple set as standard, and then a bunch of more complex rules.
Paul suggested adding ‘combat stance’ declaration. This might actually be simply handled under the Perception prof… should be harder to perceive when you’re in melee, maybe against one guy or surrounded, than when you’re standing in the back observing.
Blind spellcasters only have a 10% miss chance when targeting, vs -5 to hit? Maybe a 50% spell miss rate?
What happens on a critical fumble from a backstab? What about multiple attacks from a backstab… Paul fumbled on the first attack out of three… is Dave still considered ‘unaware’ for the subsequent backstab attacks that round?
You can move 25% and attack. Why can’t you attack then move 25% away?
Target number of Perception should be the stealth check. Paul was wearing Cloak of Shadows, but it was no harder for Dave to see him, as the Perception check is just based on Paul’s grade, not actual skill
Disintergrate does or does not destroy equipment?
If you kill a mage’s golem, does the golem go insane?
Touch spells should last longer. Should last indefinitely for concentration, if all you’re doing is maintaining the spell and trying to touch with it. Then should have fall-off of one round per circle before being nullified. Or what about lasting CHA rounds? Chances are it’s gonna take two or three rounds to score a hit, especially at lower levels.
Add casting times to short spell lists at the end… lists are already there and there’s room. Or add a note to the ‘outliers’ where casting time is not –Circle.
Let’s revamp Hermetic spells. Into ‘paths’… 1st, 2nd, 3rd circle blast magic and how it all scales. Command spells are a great example of this.
“Skills” “skills” “skills”, all needs to be renamed
Ambidextrousness is better than advanced counterattack, which isn’t really all that great if you can only use it once per round.
Splint mail costs more than chain and has a worse impedance? Dude, make all the armor make sense
Random encounter list intro section- “plot-device” should not be hyphenated
Terra is better than Gaea
Healing and Perception- make them Intellect-based instead of general
Minimum impedance for chainmail (-1) and plate mail (-2)
Ritual magic under ‘Spell repertoire’: “in lieu” is not strictly right I think. Say instead “Upon purchasing Ritual Magic Potential, a mystic begins with 2 spell points, plus CHA bonus”
Hindsight and Psychometry are not balanced for their circle? Divination magic is too good.
Madness has no counteracting spell.
Time Cube should be 8 rounds for 1 round, not 8 hours for 1 hour.
People didn’t like exploding d4s.
What about constant armor impedance: leather 1, studded 2, chain 3, plate 4 or something like that?
Ritual magic seems weak.
First, though, let me offer my own thoughts:
1. Combat was not slow. Given the number of PCs (nine) and in the first battle, the number of NPCs (ten to twenty), combat was at least as fast as D&D. Mainly what slowed it down was people forgetting their armor impedance, looking up spells, and discussions of movement- all of which should be negligible for a serious game. On my side of things, it was fine, and basically the same as D&D.
2. The most important change, systemically, is to change Intellect to Education, and Charisma to Presence (or maybe Willpower).
3. Exploding d4s is fine I think. People might bitch, but honestly it seemed fun for players to roll tons of dice and keep rolling the d4s on a 4.
4. A party of ninth level dudes is powerful. Characters were not overly weak. The priest and the mage were damn good. The thief and the fighter were kick ass. The only guy who seemed lost in the shuffle, besides the golem, was the Ritual mage.
5. There were some laughs over 'Gayfarers' and 'Gaya' (Gaea). They suggested 'Terra' below, but I dunno, I dated a chick named Terra in middle school. Gaea is fine, if not just Nature. The other laughs came from Godfrey's guy who could swim in plate just as easy as without, and the comedy was he was no better if he took off his armor.
6. Perception is the catch-all DM proficiency. Players searching a building? Perception check. Want to remember how many exits somewhere had? Perception. About to be ambushed? Perception. Might be nice to make this clear in the description. Also, is it clear that both players and DMs can call for checks? A player can roll Perception on their own, plus the DM can call for it.
...
Here are the criticisms from the sessions:
Should not be hard to find how many ability points you begin with. Right now you’ve gotta look through the text a lot. Should be clear.
“Agility” attribute is missing its header label in the beginning
Leadership and Inspire should be combined
Combine falling, jumping, running, and swimming into athletics 4 per grade
Shields: improve dodge instead of armor absorbance
“Proficiencies” and “abilities”, not “ability skills”
Add bookmarks to the fucking document
“Martial knowledge”- identify combatants
Why can’t mages have shields? Why is it easier to cast with a staff?
Wilderness Lore 1 per grade is cheap.
Weapons and armor should be listed in the back, and listed by class as well
Why buy worse armor? Why buy knives?
Potion of blinking… +3 to dodge, but an additional -3 to be hit?
Counterattack is not a prereq for advanced counterattack?
Cloak of Blades, reduce bonus to-hit… clarify what it is
Clarify that Handmaidens only do direct damage spells thru weapons
Increased attribute: no reason to have “1x”
Spell to give a weapon “vital strike” skill
Specify that Multiple Attacks must be in the same grade of weapon that you have Weapon Mastery in
Typo “Character’s” in Perception in GMs section
Add poison costs to Narbohring
Make the skill costs better in terms of formatting: bold, parens
Add website to every page in the book
Auto char gen website
Iron skin should be a little better- make it stack with normal armor
Archers and snipers? Sure archers get a +2 to hit at short range, but maybe there should be some archer abilities? What about special strength bows too?
Increased Endurance should retroactively affect health points, right?
Rust: broken plate mail should be 1d6, not 1d4, yes?
Faith spells should be listed by domain as well as alphabetical order
What does Blindness do? Put effects of being blind under blindness spell
Magic shield spells are too weak… maybe 50% chance of block? Or even 100% chance?
How obvious is casting? If I cast persuade on you, do you know I’m about to do this? Do your friends?
Incinerate Spell: save for half… taking 4d6 is not exactly the same as taking half of 8d6.
Spirit Armor and Magical Vestment? Do they stack with, e.g., leather armor?
Systemically, Blindness and Cure Blindness, and all similar kinds of spells, should be the same Circle.
Look at spells like Cripple- should there be an ‘area of effect’? Cripple on a large dragon vs cripple on a gnome is the same thing?
Does Fireball damage make sense?
Is Disease too powerful? If you’ve got 40 hp, isn’t this just a lot better than 4th circle spell Maim?
Difference between stunned and paralyzed? Paralyzed guys are easy to kill
Shatter is 3rd Circle? A bit weak… can’t shatter anything but glass?
Totally retarded when characters can’t read. Makes for bad gaming. Make it easier to get languages and read them. Maybe +1 skillpoint to read a language you can speak (without having to take literacy)? Or you can spend one of your free languages to get the literacy ability? Make language acquisition scale up faster, so that at 10-11 it’s two languages.
Command Confuse duration is 2-4 rounds, but in the description says it lasts 1d4 rounds.
Why shouldn’t mages just always defer to 0?
Saving throws are damn expensive. Not sure that this discourages min/maxing, seems to encourage it… players thinking is that the best defense is a good offense.
General movement and combat rule: if anyone moves a lot (between 25% and 100% total), everyone participating in that part of the combat gets only one attack.
Bonuses to Dodge for full movement action? Bonuses to attacks from charging?
What about a set of optional combat rules? Keeping a more simple set as standard, and then a bunch of more complex rules.
Paul suggested adding ‘combat stance’ declaration. This might actually be simply handled under the Perception prof… should be harder to perceive when you’re in melee, maybe against one guy or surrounded, than when you’re standing in the back observing.
Blind spellcasters only have a 10% miss chance when targeting, vs -5 to hit? Maybe a 50% spell miss rate?
What happens on a critical fumble from a backstab? What about multiple attacks from a backstab… Paul fumbled on the first attack out of three… is Dave still considered ‘unaware’ for the subsequent backstab attacks that round?
You can move 25% and attack. Why can’t you attack then move 25% away?
Target number of Perception should be the stealth check. Paul was wearing Cloak of Shadows, but it was no harder for Dave to see him, as the Perception check is just based on Paul’s grade, not actual skill
Disintergrate does or does not destroy equipment?
If you kill a mage’s golem, does the golem go insane?
Touch spells should last longer. Should last indefinitely for concentration, if all you’re doing is maintaining the spell and trying to touch with it. Then should have fall-off of one round per circle before being nullified. Or what about lasting CHA rounds? Chances are it’s gonna take two or three rounds to score a hit, especially at lower levels.
Add casting times to short spell lists at the end… lists are already there and there’s room. Or add a note to the ‘outliers’ where casting time is not –Circle.
Let’s revamp Hermetic spells. Into ‘paths’… 1st, 2nd, 3rd circle blast magic and how it all scales. Command spells are a great example of this.
“Skills” “skills” “skills”, all needs to be renamed
Ambidextrousness is better than advanced counterattack, which isn’t really all that great if you can only use it once per round.
Splint mail costs more than chain and has a worse impedance? Dude, make all the armor make sense
Random encounter list intro section- “plot-device” should not be hyphenated
Terra is better than Gaea
Healing and Perception- make them Intellect-based instead of general
Minimum impedance for chainmail (-1) and plate mail (-2)
Ritual magic under ‘Spell repertoire’: “in lieu” is not strictly right I think. Say instead “Upon purchasing Ritual Magic Potential, a mystic begins with 2 spell points, plus CHA bonus”
Hindsight and Psychometry are not balanced for their circle? Divination magic is too good.
Madness has no counteracting spell.
Time Cube should be 8 rounds for 1 round, not 8 hours for 1 hour.
People didn’t like exploding d4s.
What about constant armor impedance: leather 1, studded 2, chain 3, plate 4 or something like that?
Ritual magic seems weak.
posted by Rob @ 11:39 AM
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