While I (slowly) read through the rules, I thought it would be good to post some comments, questions and the like, and in the process perhaps generate some discussion regarding 3rd Edition and how it relates to Mystara.
But before we begin, one caveat: I am right now at the very beginning of the Player's Guide, and a total 3rd Edition newbie. So please humour me for now, and understand that I am very much in the process of learning the system.
With that said, here are my first few comments, and some questions.
Player's Handbook
Page 6, last line of Dice section.
"With these dice, a roll of 70 and 1 would give you a result of 71, and a result of 10 and 0 would be 100."
I checked in the errata and this was not mentioned. Surely this isn't right - I thought a roll of 00 and 0 was 100?
Chapter One: Abilities
Raising abilities... Hmm, you can imagine my first reaction to seeing that chart that goes up to 45 for ability adjustments. I guess they don't need an Immortals set for 3rd Edition, since the players can raise their ability scores while they are still mortal.
All in all I think it's not necessarily a bad idea, but personally I would put some stricter limits on it - such as maintaining mortal power limits. Still, it's nice to have a system for this, unlike OD&D and presumably AD&D.
Chapter Two: Races
Interesting how far they go in defining the races in the core system. In many respects they fit with Mystara's races not too badly, but in many more they are quite different. I'm curious, is this something that is set in stone? Or would a Mystara 3rd Edition conversion also convert these basic descriptions, and adapt them to better reflect Mystaran races?
I'm not especially keen on the names that they chose for some races, but they're just guidelines... right?
The description of gnomes seems to fit Mystara to a tee, right up until they mention illusionists. Is it just me, or does the illusionist link seem welded on artificially? All the other details of gnomish culture seem quite well linked with each other, but then suddenly illusions are shoved on at the end. Hmm...
Elves being less than 5 feet tall seems a little strange to me... I would never have imagined a short elf being the same height as a tall dwarf.
Despite all these complaints/comments, the race chapter seems like quite a good chapter. It's nice to have all these things pulled together.
Which of course brings up the question of, "What about all the optional Mystaran races?" Or indeed optional races in general. Are these covered elsewhere, or are they outside the scope of the core rulebooks?
Perhaps more importantly, what races would be covered for a Mystaran Races chapter? Would it revise the main 7 races?
>Page 6 Dice err... surely a typo--the way we read dice hasn't changed.
>Ability Raises, aka Stat Pumps, remember, 3e was designed by relative newbies in the field of RPGs by people who were introduced to the game during the hey-day of 2e when min-maxing and power-play was very popular.
Aside from that, if the DM sets level limits, then the mortals have a finite number of stat pumps--which Immortals would be able to exceed... (As-is, there are no level restrictions)
> Races (and pretty much everything "standard") is default for a Greyhawk campaign, where they all fit. As for names, we use our own. Gnomes: replace illusions with a propensity for tinkering... Elves: make them taller... Halflings: change their physical description to be less kender-ish and more hobbit-ish
Converting races, "I" think they're fine as-is, and am using them that way in my own project. (only changes to the core races are regional options which all races get)
The M3E team found it suitable to change a few relatively minor (but, I feel pointless) details, such as Elves get +2 INT instead of DEX. Which is inferred in the OD&D game RULES, but not by the Mystara SETTING--I left them as-is
> Other Races... We would have to create new/unique races such as Shadowelves, Rakasta, Hutaakan, Lupins, etc... All the various subraces and monster races are detailed in the Monster Manual (nearly all the goblinoids have a "Monster as PC Race" section at the end)
>Covered Races. In my own project, the focus will be on the (expanded) KW. I'm including the core races (and their sub-races) the Hutaakan, Lupin, and Rakasta... All the SC races will be left out to be included in a later manual...
On a closing note: I shied away from 3e myself (actually, I downright refused to support WotC in any form whatsoever)... but time wore on and my addiction.. i mean, hobby... got the better of me, and my players (all of which are newbies compared to me) didn't want to play anything but the newest (which by that time was 3.5)... only one of my current players ever played 2e, and one played classic (my wife, and only for a few months while i was teaching her to be my DM's assistant). Now they're all WotC zombies who can't remember that D&D is a R-O-L-E-playing game. I'm slowly trying to remedy that by sneaking in a diplomatic module here and there, but they're working on a FR campaign until I get the first part of my project done.
Roger
Player's Handbook
Page 6, last line of Dice section.
"With these dice, a roll of 70 and 1 would give you a result of 71, and a result of 10 and 0 would be 100."
I checked in the errata and this was not mentioned. Surely this isn't right - I thought a roll of 00 and 0 was 100?
That's not an error. Today's d10s are sold in two forms, one die has the tens (e.g., 10, 20, 30) printed on them and the other has the ones (e.g., 1,2,3). You just need to buy some new dice.
--Ray.
That's not an error. Today's d10s are sold in two forms, one die has the tens (e.g., 10, 20, 30) printed on them and the other has the ones (e.g., 1,2,3). You just need to buy some new dice.
Yes, that is a typo... the tens-dice run from 10 to 90 and 00... so a roll of 10 and 3 would be 13... rolling 00 and 3 would result in 03... and lastly 00 and 0 makes 0 or 100... The typo is in reading the 10 and 00 numbers backwards, as the tens-dice represents the digit, not the actual number.
Roger
That's not an error. Today's d10s are sold in two forms, one die has the tens (e.g., 10, 20, 30) printed on them and the other has the ones (e.g., 1,2,3). You just need to buy some new dice.
--Ray.
Tens dice have been around for a long time - I believe since before OD&D came to an end. I know what the discussion is about.
However, if 10 and 0 means 100, then what does 00 and 0 mean?
Can someone check what the 3.5 rulebook says for this? I'd be willing to bet it says 00 and 0 is 100, even if they never put it in the errata for 3rd Edition.
>Ability Raises, aka Stat Pumps, remember, 3e was designed by relative newbies in the field of RPGs by people who were introduced to the game during the hey-day of 2e when min-maxing and power-play was very popular.
It's probably where the audience lies, I suppose. But I prefer to have my PCs earn their power slowly and never get to the stage where they feel they are invincible.
I suppose you're right about the 2nd Edition comment. I never moved the AD&D at all, so I don't really know much more than the names of the books, though.
Aside from that, if the DM sets level limits, then the mortals have a finite number of stat pumps--which Immortals would be able to exceed... (As-is, there are no level restrictions)
I guess the description of Warduke in that D&D Alumni article has confused me a little, then. He had insane stats that would easily outclass many Immortals. Perhaps some of the boosts were item-based...? Or are 3rd Edition NPCs allowed to just break the rules?
Now that I think about it, +1 to one stat every four levels doesn't sound too bad at all. Even if you applied that rule to OD&D, it would still only result in +9 points, which is not a big deal if you start out with non-super characters.
> Races (and pretty much everything "standard") is default for a Greyhawk campaign, where they all fit. As for names, we use our own. Gnomes: replace illusions with a propensity for tinkering... Elves: make them taller... Halflings: change their physical description to be less kender-ish and more hobbit-ish
Ah, okay. So that means that you can redefine as necessary, then?
Converting races, "I" think they're fine as-is, and am using them that way in my own project. (only changes to the core races are regional options which all races get)
The M3E team found it suitable to change a few relatively minor (but, I feel pointless) details, such as Elves get +2 INT instead of DEX. Which is inferred in the OD&D game RULES, but not by the Mystara SETTING--I left them as-is
Well, actually it wasn't the stats and abilties so much that I was talking about, but the descriptions of character, physique, society, and so on. But I see what you're getting at.
I don't think either way is wrong. Mystara = OD&D has a pretty solid argument behind it too, so in the end it comes down to personal preference only, I think.
Anyway you already stated that you are the final word in your project, which under the circumstances seems like the only way to go. ;)
> Other Races... We would have to create new/unique races such as Shadowelves, Rakasta, Hutaakan, Lupins, etc... All the various subraces and monster races are detailed in the Monster Manual (nearly all the goblinoids have a "Monster as PC Race" section at the end)
I see. Does this mean that there is still a distinction between "monster" and "PC race", then?
>Covered Races. In my own project, the focus will be on the (expanded) KW. I'm including the core races (and their sub-races) the Hutaakan, Lupin, and Rakasta... All the SC races will be left out to be included in a later manual...
I'm assuming this includes the PC series races too? Of course Skygnomes are already present anyway as gnomes...
On a closing note: I shied away from 3e myself (actually, I downright refused to support WotC in any form whatsoever)... but time wore on and my addiction.. i mean, hobby... got the better of me, and my players (all of which are newbies compared to me) didn't want to play anything but the newest (which by that time was 3.5)... only one of my current players ever played 2e, and one played classic (my wife, and only for a few months while i was teaching her to be my DM's assistant). Now they're all WotC zombies who can't remember that D&D is a R-O-L-E-playing game. I'm slowly trying to remedy that by sneaking in a diplomatic module here and there, but they're working on a FR campaign until I get the first part of my project done.
Very interesting to hear your comments on this, Roger.
Having fallen prey to the whole trading card thing myself while I was at university, I can sympathise with you not wanting to support Wizards of the Coast. I don't have anything against them personally, though, as my allegiance lay elsewhere.
Anyway, whether we like it or not supporting Wizards means supporting D&D, and 3rd Edition is the only real way to do that now. I have recently come round - ever - so - slightly - to the notion of trying out 3rd Edition. Maybe. It's not so much a matter of getting up-to-date, or discarding OD&D - which I am still quite happy with - but rather of supporting the hobby in general.
After all, the current state is that no new Mystara stuff is getting printed, but it could be much worse: we could be part of a dead or dying hobby, doomed to only last one generation. That would be much worse.
Page 6, last line of Dice section.
"With these dice, a roll of 70 and 1 would give you a result of 71, and a result of 10 and 0 would be 100."
I checked in the errata and this was not mentioned. Surely this isn't right - I thought a roll of 00 and 0 was 100?
How odd... in the italian handbook it's written correctly that "a result of 0 and 00 would be 100"... it must be an error of first edition 3.0
Chapter One: Abilities
Raising abilities... Hmm, you can imagine my first reaction to seeing that chart that goes up to 45 for ability adjustments. I guess they don't need an Immortals set for 3rd Edition, since the players can raise their ability scores while they are still mortal.
All in all I think it's not necessarily a bad idea, but personally I would put some stricter limits on it - such as maintaining mortal power limits. Still, it's nice to have a system for this, unlike OD&D and presumably AD&D.
Ability Raises, aka Stat Pumps, remember, 3e was designed by relative newbies in the field of RPGs by people who were introduced to the game during the hey-day of 2e when min-maxing and power-play was very popular.
Aside from that, if the DM sets level limits, then the mortals have a finite number of stat pumps--which Immortals would be able to exceed... (As-is, there are no level restrictions)
I absolutely don't agree with you. In my opinion the new system of ability is much best of that old one and it's not been introduced for min-maxing and power-play. It's more realistic a Titan with Str 40 rather than 25... the old system was "anthropocentric" and totally unreal. Now the maximum score for a human at the creation is always 18. Let's think to a fighter with str 18(it means that he's one of the stronger men of the world...): with the increase of the ability scores he can reach str 23 at level 20th... a hill giant have str 25 and 12 HD... I don't think that a 20th level fighter is power-play...
Perhaps more importantly, what races would be covered for a Mystaran Races chapter?
Sure shadow elves, rakasta, lupins, hutaaka... perhaps also diaboli, phanatons, tortles, pegataurs. The others would be better in another handbook as "Races of Mystara".
Yes, that is a typo...
You're right! I double-checked against the v3.5 SRD.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/theBasics.htm#dice
It is the same as the old skool way. Now my group has to change the way we've been reading the d% for the last 2 years!
--Ray.
How odd... in the italian handbook it's written correctly that "a result of 0 and 00 would be 100"... it must be an error of first edition 3.0
Perhaps they fixed it in the translation. Anyway, I'm glad that it got fixed eventually. ;)
I absolutely don't agree with you. In my opinion the new system of ability is much best of that old one and it's not been introduced for min-maxing and power-play. It's more realistic a Titan with Str 40 rather than 25... the old system was "anthropocentric" and totally unreal. Now the maximum score for a human at the creation is always 18. Let's think to a fighter with str 18(it means that he's one of the stronger men of the world...): with the increase of the ability scores he can reach str 23 at level 20th... a hill giant have str 25 and 12 HD... I don't think that a 20th level fighter is power-play...
I don't think we really disagree, actually, because in OD&D monsters didn't have stats at all (except intelligence, which was a late addition). I agree that giving stats to monsters is good - now that you point it out, I notice that all monster descriptions have their own ability stats. Definitely a move in the right direction.
And of course it makes sense for monsters not to be limited to human realms of strength, dexterity, etc.
All I was reacting against was the idea that PCs and other humans could raise their abilities - based on one NPC's profile, which remains rather insane. But I now see that the system for raising stats is quite good.
Of course, I would still put limits on natural mortal advancement in my campaign, though. ;) So I suppose we do disagree on that.
I guess the description of Warduke in that D&D Alumni article has confused me a little, then. He had insane stats that would easily outclass many Immortals. Perhaps some of the boosts were item-based...? Or are 3rd Edition NPCs allowed to just break the rules?
Rember that Warduke in Dragon Magazine was a Epic Character, a mortal that can withstand a God (as Diomedes withstood Ares, or Eracles withstood Apollo), and still he is not comparable to the avatar of a God (take a look at "Deites and Demigods" or "Faith and Pantheons").
I don't think we really disagree
I see ;)
Rember that Warduke in Dragon Magazine was a Epic Character, a mortal that can withstand a God (as Diomedes withstood Ares, or Eracles withstood Apollo), and still he is not comparable to the avatar of a God (take a look at "Deites and Demigods" or "Faith and Pantheons").
Please remember that I don't know anything about 3rd Edition except the first two or three chapters of the Player's Handbook. :embarrass But I am very grateful for you taking the time to explain things to me.
I see, so Warduke is definitely not a normal character, then. Yes, there is certainly ample mythological basis for such characters. And Wrath of the Immortals even mentions the possibility of using them in OD&D.
One question: are deities in 3rd Edition comparable in any way to OD&D Immortals? There are no rules for playing them, right? Can you even compare their powers, or are the systems too different?
One question: are deities in 3rd Edition comparable in any way to OD&D Immortals? There are no rules for playing them, right? Can you even compare their powers, or are the systems too different?
There are Divine Ranks, which determine how powerful a deity is, but the systems, at least to me, seem a little to far apart. Deities and Demigods has a lot of info all of that, and you can see some of it in the 3.5 SRD webpages.
I, at first, had zero interest in 3E, but I played Neverwinter Nights and once I got the hang of the ruleset, I saw a lot of possibilities for Mystara and my campaign. So now I can blame the game for getting me into all those monster conversions ;)
I absolutely don't agree with you. In my opinion the new system of ability is much best of that old one and it's not been introduced for min-maxing and power-play. It's more realistic a Titan with Str 40 rather than 25... the old system was "anthropocentric" and totally unreal. Now the maximum score for a human at the creation is always 18. Let's think to a fighter with str 18(it means that he's one of the stronger men of the world...): with the increase of the ability scores he can reach str 23 at level 20th... a hill giant have str 25 and 12 HD... I don't think that a 20th level fighter is power-play...
Maybe I should rephrase my statement to read that 3e is designed to make power-play easier--as opposed to being designed for poer-play. (Although there is a definite hack-n-slash focus.)
I don't think either way is wrong. Mystara = OD&D has a pretty solid argument behind it too, so in the end it comes down to personal preference only, I think.
Agreed, and I completely understand, but the focus of my own project leans more towards the concept of "convert Mystara to 3e" not "modify 3e to fit Mystara" as the M3e group appears, imo, to be doing.
Anyway you already stated that you are the final word in your project, which under the circumstances seems like the only way to go.
Yes, I did say that, but understand that my project isn't tailored to MY campaign, but is intended for the wider fan community--so I have taken a stance of changing as little of the already-set rules as absolutely possible. Otherwise I'd make such restrictions as limiting class selections for demihumans, and number of classes available to humans. Which are both rules used in my games.
(FYI: IMC, humans may take 1 base class and 1 prestige class; demihumans are limited to 2 base and 1 prestige; dwarves are incapable of any arcane magic whatsoever; elves must have some arcane AND fighting ability, be it ranger or bard or wizard/fighter; etc.)
Ah, okay. So that means that you can redefine as necessary, then?
Yes. The actual rules themselves (the part in the SRD), I'm not changing in my project, but the descriptive text (the important part, IMO) will be re-worded to fit the setting.
I'm assuming this includes the PC series races too? Of course Skygnomes are already present anyway as gnomes...
If someone is willing to do the work and submit it to me, then yes, but I cannot as I no longer have the books (and I never had PC3 and 4).
I see. Does this mean that there is still a distinction between "monster" and "PC race", then?
No. The base monster is usually a template to which PC classes can be added. You will understand more when you get to the MM.
One question: are deities in 3rd Edition comparable in any way to OD&D Immortals? There are no rules for playing them, right? Can you even compare their powers, or are the systems too different?
They can be made compatible (which 'Rise of the Immortals' will try to do). Deities are given stats, and are all 30 HD Outsiders with 30-50 Character levels. Deities and Demigods, however does not provide for level advancement, which will have to be added. How I'm going to work it out is by having the Immortal, upon ascention, keep his mortal class levels and 15 HD... With the additional HD by way of "Immortal Class levels"
I guess the description of Warduke in that D&D Alumni article has confused me a little, then. He had insane stats that would easily outclass many Immortals. Perhaps some of the boosts were item-based...? Or are 3rd Edition NPCs allowed to just break the rules?
I've only glanced over the article. I haven't checked it to see how he ended up with a 36 STR, but at level 18, I find it extremely hard to believe. Will have to get back on that, unless someone else wants to check first. If I were to guess, they might have figed a bit of the numbers to make him more of a badass, but I really don't know--I've haven't read the epic rules yet.
Sorry about flopping back and forth, I hope you can all make sense out of it.
Roger
I'm not especially keen on the names that they chose for some races, but they're just guidelines... right?
Aren't the races just the same as they were in earlier editions of the game? Offhand, I think they only have humans, halflings, elves, half-elves, half-orcs, gnomes, dwarves. Nothing new and unusual that I recall. Was there something in particular you didn't like?
The description of gnomes seems to fit Mystara to a tee, right up until they mention illusionists. Is it just me, or does the illusionist link seem welded on artificially? All the other details of gnomish culture seem quite well linked with each other, but then suddenly illusions are shoved on at the end. Hmm...
This is a holdover from earlier editions (AD&D), where gnomes were often illusionists. It didn't really fit the description, and in fact got changed with the rules revision, where they no longer had illusionist as a favored class, but instead Bard is now considered a favored class for gnomes. It was kind of weird, too, since they only had a specialist portion of a class as favored, where other races have entire classes.
Frankly, I don't think Wizard fits the description of the elf in the PHB, either. Their description seems more appropriate for the Sorcerer class, which is the way I house rule it.
Which of course brings up the question of, "What about all the optional Mystaran races?" Or indeed optional races in general. Are these covered elsewhere, or are they outside the scope of the core rulebooks?
There are some general guidelines for them in the DMG, and some information about them in the MM, but it's not all in one place. Other books have come out that have done different things with them- either providing Level Adjustments to more powerful races, or providing Monster Classes (like the OD&D racial classes) to account for the difference.
Perhaps more importantly, what races would be covered for a Mystaran Races chapter? Would it revise the main 7 races?
As far as the PHB descriptions, many other products have come out that have revised/expanded/completely changed the racial descriptions of the various races for their particular campaign- sometimes keeping their racial abilities, sometimes altering them. So that isn't really a big issue. The 3 Core books are just that- core D&D; something you can play right out of the books. Tailoring things to specific campaigns is something that can be done with optional rules or house rules, and there are guidelines in the DMG, but they are basically beyond the scope of the 3 core books.
As for Mystaran races- I wouldn't revise the descriptions in the PHB too substantially myself. I might alter the halfling's nomadic description somewhat (it doesn't really fit with the Five Shires model), and the gnomes as described don't really go with the gnomes as described in PC2: Top Ballista.
Other races- I'd probably add the Rakasta and Lupin, since they have become somewhat tied to the idea of Mystara. I'd add shadow elf as a sub-race of elf (though very few other "sub-races"; I dislike the proliferation of them, especially when there doesn't seem to be any real need. Unless there are substantial physical differences, I don't feel they are justified.)
I'm torn on half-elves. On the one hand, I think they are interesting mechanically (they revise them a bit in 3.5, too), and there are justifications for them in Mystara, despite the "no true half-elves" disclaimer put in a couple of sources (as I pointed out in this post once).
On the other hand, it seems to me that half-elves really wouldn't last beyond the immediate first-generation (after that, blood becomes too diluted), so they really would still be a rarity. I don't really know where to place myself on the issue now.
>Ability Raises, aka Stat Pumps, remember, 3e was designed by relative newbies in the field of RPGs by people who were introduced to the game during the hey-day of 2e when min-maxing and power-play was very popular.
I don't think that's a fair criticism. Monte Cook and Skip Williams (two of the credited designers of 3.0) were hardly newbies- Cook had a lot of work for TSR back in the day (notably on Planescape, but even our very own Glantri: Kingdom of Magic), and Skip Williams has been the sage of "Ask the Sage" in Dragon forever (until very recently). Not so sure about Jonathan Tweet (the other credited designer), but I'd guess he's hardly a newbie. There were also tons of other folk involved, most of whom were old TSR hands as well.
That being said, I will agree that I think the current Computer Game mentality- of power-gaming (which, sadly, has a lot of negative connotations associated with the term) and character building definitely had an impact on the way the game turned out. Similarly, the design definitely was an expansion of ideas that were introduced in 2E, particularly the character customization ideas of the Player's Option series of books.
Agreed, and I completely understand, but the focus of my own project leans more towards the concept of "convert Mystara to 3e" not "modify 3e to fit Mystara"... my project isn't tailored to MY campaign, but is intended for the wider fan community--so I have taken a stance of changing as little of the already-set rules as absolutely possible. Otherwise I'd make such restrictions as limiting class selections for demihumans, and number of classes available to humans. Which are both rules used in my games.
I think this is the best way to handle it as well, Roger. Once this is done, or even while it is being done, optional rules can be noted such as class selection limits or mortal ability limits if desired.
I don't think we really disagree, actually, because in OD&D monsters didn't have stats at all (except intelligence, which was a late addition). I agree that giving stats to monsters is good - now that you point it out, I notice that all monster descriptions have their own ability stats. Definitely a move in the right direction.
I really like the full stats for monsters as well. Plus they're adjustable if you wanted to make an individual weaker or more powerful than the average one. Something to keep in mind regarding strength scores is that size plays a part in it.
A medium sized creature such as a human with a strength score of 14 is actually not as strong as a carrion crawler which also has a 14 in strength because it is a large creature. I didn't realize this until I was doing the horse breeds.
Maybe I should rephrase my statement to read that 3e is designed to make power-play easier
True, but at least the system doesn't make you play that way. You can set the 'power level' of a campaign by the ability scores 'point buy' method.
There are Divine Ranks, which determine how powerful a deity is, but the systems, at least to me, seem a little to far apart. Deities and Demigods has a lot of info all of that, and you can see some of it in the 3.5 SRD webpages.
Thanks for the info. I suppose I should go and read that too, but I'll deal with the three books I have here first.
I, at first, had zero interest in 3E, but I played Neverwinter Nights and once I got the hang of the ruleset, I saw a lot of possibilities for Mystara and my campaign. So now I can blame the game for getting me into all those monster conversions ;)
Hmm, I'm starting to see a trend here...
Maybe I should rephrase my statement to read that 3e is designed to make power-play easier--as opposed to being designed for poer-play. (Although there is a definite hack-n-slash focus.)
I suppose you could say that it depends on the players more than the rules in the end. That's certainly how it used to be with both D&D and AD&D.
Agreed, and I completely understand, but the focus of my own project leans more towards the concept of "convert Mystara to 3e" not "modify 3e to fit Mystara" as the M3e group appears, imo, to be doing.
I think I'm still quite far away from ever putting a system over the setting, but I know what you mean.
Yes, I did say that, but understand that my project isn't tailored to MY campaign, but is intended for the wider fan community--so I have taken a stance of changing as little of the already-set rules as absolutely possible. Otherwise I'd make such restrictions as limiting class selections for demihumans, and number of classes available to humans. Which are both rules used in my games.
I didn't intend to imply that your project will only be of interest to you. :embarrass But it's interesting to hear that you restrict classes in your campaign nonetheless.
Yes. The actual rules themselves (the part in the SRD), I'm not changing in my project, but the descriptive text (the important part, IMO) will be re-worded to fit the setting.
Cool, that's what I thought. Most of the actual racial abilities are not that important as far as I'm concerned, and anyway at a glance they reflect reasonably well the previous systems. (Yes including OD&D.)
If someone is willing to do the work and submit it to me, then yes, but I cannot as I no longer have the books (and I never had PC3 and 4).
Actually I meant that the gnomish description fit Mystara gnomes quite well, and skygnomes are just gnomes who live in the sky, basically, so I don't think they really need to be covered. It's just their culture that's different from regular gnomes; PC2 did give them some specific sky-orientated abilities, but they're not that important in my opinion.
No. The base monster is usually a template to which PC classes can be added. You will understand more when you get to the MM.
Okay, sounds interesting. That might be a while, though... ;)
They can be made compatible (which 'Rise of the Immortals' will try to do). Deities are given stats, and are all 30 HD Outsiders with 30-50 Character levels. Deities and Demigods, however does not provide for level advancement, which will have to be added. How I'm going to work it out is by having the Immortal, upon ascention, keep his mortal class levels and 15 HD... With the additional HD by way of "Immortal Class levels"
I don't exactly understand at this point, but hopefully I will at some point in the future. Having rules for Immortals in the new system would be very nice.
Aren't the races just the same as they were in earlier editions of the game? Offhand, I think they only have humans, halflings, elves, half-elves, half-orcs, gnomes, dwarves. Nothing new and unusual that I recall. Was there something in particular you didn't like?
I was referring to the names (suggested names?) given under each race's description. But now I realise that those names are presumably suited to Greyhawk, right? And therefore can be completely ignored for Mystaran campaigns.This is a holdover from earlier editions (AD&D), where gnomes were often illusionists. It didn't really fit the description, and in fact got changed with the rules revision, where they no longer had illusionist as a favored class, but instead Bard is now considered a favored class for gnomes. It was kind of weird, too, since they only had a specialist portion of a class as favored, where other races have entire classes.
I knew about the AD&D gnomes being illusionists thing, but I always thought that they lacked the technology link. Were AD&D gnomes similar to OD&D gnomes, then, aside from the illusionist thing?Frankly, I don't think Wizard fits the description of the elf in the PHB, either. Their description seems more appropriate for the Sorcerer class, which is the way I house rule it.
I'm still just starting to read the class section, but I think I understand what you're getting at - studied magic versus natural magic, right? GAZ5 made some steps towards making elven magic more natural too, though I suppose it depends on your image of the elves whether they should usually be sorcerers, or they just get schooled in magic as standard.As far as the PHB descriptions, many other products have come out that have revised/expanded/completely changed the racial descriptions of the various races for their particular campaign- sometimes keeping their racial abilities, sometimes altering them. So that isn't really a big issue.
I see. So the scope of any 3rd Edition Mystara project could be quite big, then, allowing adaptations and tweaks to a lot of different things. (Of course it's mostly the descriptive and flavour text, and less often rules.)As for Mystaran races- I wouldn't revise the descriptions in the PHB too substantially myself. I might alter the halfling's nomadic description somewhat (it doesn't really fit with the Five Shires model), and the gnomes as described don't really go with the gnomes as described in PC2: Top Ballista.
Interesting... Other than the illusionist bit, I thought that gnomes were one of the races that fit best with the Mystaran version. Halflings were obviously one of the least similar, perhaps because the race itself differs so much across the campaign settings.Other races- I'd probably add the Rakasta and Lupin, since they have become somewhat tied to the idea of Mystara. I'd add shadow elf as a sub-race of elf (though very few other "sub-races"; I dislike the proliferation of them, especially when there doesn't seem to be any real need. Unless there are substantial physical differences, I don't feel they are justified.)
I agree with you here. Incidentally, what is the major difference between elves and shadow elves rules-wise? Sensitive skin, better vision in the dark? There's not that much, surely.I'm torn on half-elves. On the one hand, I think they are interesting mechanically (they revise them a bit in 3.5, too), and there are justifications for them in Mystara, despite the "no true half-elves" disclaimer put in a couple of sources (as I pointed out in this post once).
Interesting. I agree with your questioning of the "male babies always stillborn" rule, I too always felt it was rather arbitrary and somewhat silly.
Of course the other justifications for half-elves are there in droves, what with the "elven bloodlines" in the Yavi, the half-elves on the Savage Coast, and so on.On the other hand, it seems to me that half-elves really wouldn't last beyond the immediate first-generation (after that, blood becomes too diluted), so they really would still be a rarity. I don't really know where to place myself on the issue now.
Hehe, yes this is indeed an issue. It certainly explains why there is such a lack of half-elf settlements! Statistically there can't be that many half-elves around at any given time, and the chances are that they will end up re-entering one population or the other, and their children will end up being closer to elf or human than half-elf.
I suppose the only real justification for them as a major race is that they are predisposed to adventure, so there is a disproportionate amount of adventurers compared to half-elves in other professions... ...?
Incidentally, has anyone else ever wondered why there are no half-dwarves? Half-ogres? I always wondered why it's only the elves and the humans that get to genetically mix.
This is where the answer is almost certainly Tolkien, of course.
Thanks for the info. I suppose I should go and read that too, but I'll deal with the three books I have here first.
FWIW, most of the info is now available as part of the d20 SRD. Divine Ranks, Epic levels- can all be read about (the mechanics) in the SRD. A good online readable version is here- Hypertext d20. Otherwise, it can all be downloaded and printed from the Wizards' site here. The Deities & Demigods and Epic stuff is all mostly 3.0- some of the Epic information has been updated to 3.5 in various products, but I don't know if the SRD reflects that.
Considering that the two books came out at almost the same time (D&DG, then Epic a few months later) there really should have been more overlap between them. There was a bit, but looking at them both, I (and others I've seen discuss the matter) get the sense that the two groups working on the products didn't work very closely to get their material to jibe with each other. As a result, the D&DG information (particularly the Divine Salient Powers- akin to the Immortal Special Abilities of WotI) seems sort of weak or otherwise duplicates information from the Epic Level Handbook. They also both seem to have dropped the ball in some respects as to information that could have been really useful (notably, crafting of Artifacts. Nothing in D&DG, and only information on creating +6 and better items in ELH).
I was referring to the names (suggested names?) given under each race's description. But now I realise that those names are presumably suited to Greyhawk, right? And therefore can be completely ignored for Mystaran campaigns.
I believe so- though it shows how closely I read the PHB, I guess (since I don't remember those names). If they are the same names as given in the Living Greyhawk guide (something like Dwuur for Dwarves, etc.) then yeah, they're just the Greyhawk names.
Greyhawk was assumed to be the "default" campaign for purposes of the PHB- that's why names like that, and the Greyhawk gods (Pholtus, Vecna, etc.) are the proper nouns that are used- mainly just to provide an example.
I knew about the AD&D gnomes being illusionists thing, but I always thought that they lacked the technology link. Were AD&D gnomes similar to OD&D gnomes, then, aside from the illusionist thing?
I think it was a cross-blending, actually. From what I recall of AD&D gnomes (going back to 1E), they were mainly tricksters and illusionists- kind of the stereotypical fairy gnome. Dragonlance, with its Tinker Gnomes, really pushed the ball forward as far as presenting them as technological wizards, to the point where (for a time anyway) it seemed as if that was the new "standard" in gnomes.
The OD&D gnomes seemed to have followed a similar transition- their appearance in the Basic and Expert sets were pretty much identical to Dwarves (their stats even reflected this), but changed into more technological marvels with the advent of Gaz7: The Northern Reaches, and then further with PC2: Top Ballista (which also distinguished between Sky and Earth Gnomes).
3E seems to have tried to blend both aspects together, with the results that (as you noted) didn't seem to work out quite as well. They even seem to have acknowledged this, as they made some minor changes to the class in 3.5 (notably, the Bard favored class; can't recall offhand if there was anything else).
I'm still just starting to read the class section, but I think I understand what you're getting at - studied magic versus natural magic, right? GAZ5 made some steps towards making elven magic more natural too, though I suppose it depends on your image of the elves whether they should usually be sorcerers, or they just get schooled in magic as standard.
Partially the studied vs. natural idea, but also the personality issue- the description of the elves personalities (as tending towards chaotic, being somewhat flighty) fits more closely with the description of the Sorcerer than the Wizard (in the same book- the Wizard's scholastic nature doesn't really mesh as well). Just based on those descriptions as given, they don't seem a good fit.
As you say, though, it depends on how you look at it- and just by changing the description of the Wizard or Elf a bit would go a long way to reconciling the two concepts.
In the version of the 3E Mystara campaign book that I've been working on for a while now (a long while, admittedly) I have a sidebar in there that talks about this a little.
I see. So the scope of any 3rd Edition Mystara project could be quite big, then, allowing adaptations and tweaks to a lot of different things. (Of course it's mostly the descriptive and flavour text, and less often rules.)
Very much so, I think. Which is why I think it has not ever proceeded very far- for one thing, I know the M3E project often got hung up on trying to do too much- one second they'd be working on the PHB race descriptions, the next they'd be working on rules for Immortality- it was all over the place (I've had the same problem, frankly). A tighter focus for the initial conversion idea would need to take place, then expand from there.
Another problem would be all of those adaptations and tweaks you mention- there is not always a meeting of the minds about what exactly needs to be preserved, what should go, what should change, etc. Roger mentioned earlier about one of the things that the M3E project got hung up about (the stat changes to elves)- there was a lot of discussion and delay about that, which I agree totally with him is a very minor point.
Interesting... Other than the illusionist bit, I thought that gnomes were one of the races that fit best with the Mystaran version. Halflings were obviously one of the least similar, perhaps because the race itself differs so much across the campaign settings.
I think the major changes to the halfling were due to their similarity to Hobbits, and WotC wanted to finally get away from that image. The end result is that they changed quite a bit from their previous appearances.
I kind of like the gnome there myself, to be honest, but the reason I mentioned it as possibly being eligible for a change goes back to my second point above- that mechanically, they are quite different from their PC2 counterparts (particularly if you consider the Skygnome), and that might be (and has been) quite a point of concern for a lot of people in their conversion efforts.
I agree with you here. Incidentally, what is the major difference between elves and shadow elves rules-wise? Sensitive skin, better vision in the dark? There's not that much, surely.
Not much, but enough, I think, to make a change. They would have Darkvision instead of Low-Light Vision (which is a change). I'd also give them a bonus to their Listen skill (the Gaz mentions their radar-like ears) above what normal elves get, perhaps reducing their Spot and/or Search skills to compensate. Of course, giving them Light Sensitivity (see orcs and drow in the MM) would also be sufficient compensation, now that I think of it.
Interesting. I agree with your questioning of the "male babies always stillborn" rule, I too always felt it was rather arbitrary and somewhat silly.
Of course the other justifications for half-elves are there in droves, what with the "elven bloodlines" in the Yavi, the half-elves on the Savage Coast, and so on.
Yeah- then there are the NPCs: the Glantrian ambassador to Karameikos in Gaz1 has elfin features (and is a human from the Belcadiz lands; arguably the most likely source of half-elves in the KW IMO- Belcadiz/Human blends); one girl in Gaz4 is mentioned as using her infravision to assist in baking, though she is of mixed parentage (and couldn't be an elf, according to the Gaz5 ruling on human/elf offspring); and there are the hints in Gaz7 that one of the clans of Vestland have elf-blood (can't recall which clan offhand, though).
I suppose the only real justification for them as a major race is that they are predisposed to adventure, so there is a disproportionate amount of adventurers compared to half-elves in other professions... ...?
That's a good point. Given that they don't seem to fit in much, they might be more inclined to go wandering and adventuring that other races would. I hadn't thought about that. I think I would allow them as PCs, but wouldn't overly populate Mystara with them as NPCs. Just the occasional rarity, and some NPCs who had obvious elven heritage. That would probably still fit with the notion of half-elves as being rare on Mystara.
Incidentally, has anyone else ever wondered why there are no half-dwarves? Half-ogres? I always wondered why it's only the elves and the humans that get to genetically mix.
Havard has-
Halfbreeds
Would have sworn he had another thread here at one point called "Why no half-dwarves on Mystara?" or something.
Plus, there is the elf/dwarf couple in Thunder Rift. I think it mentions that the elf-woman was pregnant, but I don't recall for certain.
They can be made compatible (which 'Rise of the Immortals' will try to do). Deities are given stats, and are all 30 HD Outsiders with 30-50 Character levels. Deities and Demigods, however does not provide for level advancement, which will have to be added. How I'm going to work it out is by having the Immortal, upon ascention, keep his mortal class levels and 15 HD... With the additional HD by way of "Immortal Class levels"
Rise of the Immortals will be interesting to see, but I personally don't think that 3.5 Deities and Demigods works well with it. The book was written with basically a deliberate ignorance of Epic-level rules mechanics, and has some very unbalanced abilities (compare Divine Weapon Specialization or Increased Energy Resistance against gamebreakers such as Power of Nature or Alter Reality).
I'd personally be much happier seeing the core mechanics of Deities and Demigods run through a meatgrinder for balance, and a Mystara Immortals project rebuilt on a broader and more playable focus. 'Course, I'd also like to see Immortals-based RP as focusing much more on deific responsibility and interaction than high levels of personal power (because hey, if all you want is a dungeon crawl through the depths of Pyts, the Epic Level Handbook is riiiight over there), so make of that what you will...
Havard has-
Halfbreeds
Would have sworn he had another thread here at one point called "Why no half-dwarves on Mystara?" or something.
Might well have had. ;)
In general I think it gets too annoying having separate stat blocks for every possible interracial mix out there. Most half-breeds IMC will be played using either of the parents racial features (not both), but may have stats and appearance suggesting unusual heritage.
I allow 3.5E Half-elves IMC, but they are not considered True Half-elves. Those are a separate LA+1 Race...
Plus, there is the elf/dwarf couple in Thunder Rift. I think it mentions that the elf-woman was pregnant, but I don't recall for certain.
Yep, she gets pregnant, but she is killed before the child is born due to everyones apparent disgust at this union (So much for the Thunder Rifter tradtion of tolerance. What tradition? Oh right...)
Im still toying with the idea of having a Dwelf (Dwarf-elf) somewhere in Thunder Rift, a unique creature hiding from the world.
As a general comment, I prefer using the 3.5E races as are. In most Mystara campaigns I'd also allow Rakasta and Lupins as standard races if any of my players ever asked to play one.
STATS:
Not sure if anyone already stated this, but comparing ability scores between OD&D and 3E doesnt really work. People, especially heroes are expected to have a higher stat average than in previous editions. It might take some time to get used to, but I dont think it is a problem really.
IMMORTALS:
I'd love to see a decent ruleset for Immortals under 3E. I agree that it should be based on Deities & Demigods, though I'm not sure if the Epic rules should be used on Mystara or not. If they are, then they need to be incorporated somehow with the Deties book. Sorry, no good sollutions here..
Håvard
I guess the description of Warduke in that D&D Alumni article has confused me a little, then. He had insane stats that would easily outclass many Immortals. Perhaps some of the boosts were item-based...? Or are 3rd Edition NPCs allowed to just break the rules?
Yeah, 3rd Edition allows item-based boosts as well as boosts from wish spells and level-ups in the 'default' statblock. Enough wishes cast in rapid succession can grant up to a +5 bonus to any stat - so Warduke could have started his career with stats of S 17 I 13 W 15 D 16 Co 17 Ch 15, gotten +4 to S from levelling, been hit with fifteen wishes to boost S, Co and Ch by +5 each, then put on the amulet of health and gauntlets of strength he's listed as owning to get the statline listed in the Alumni article. Fair by the rules as written, tho probably straining suspension of disbelief somewhat.
There's a lot of potential for powergaming in 3rd Edition... in both the good and bad sense.
Stats (and stat gains) - as people have tried to convey above (but I don't think anyone stated clearly) the new system means all creatures have values for the 6 stats based ont he same table (OK there are specific exceptions, e.g. Undead don't have constitution). This is why the table goes up to 45, and why the stat gains every 4 levels are not over powered. Also the power growth is now linear not exponential, a simple +1 every even level.
Note: under the new rules it is impossible to memorise 9th level spells without a 19 intelligence so you need some form of stat gain.
Also, although some monster Challenge Ratings are plain wrong, they have tried to balance them for characters with a fair amount of magic items as they go up levels - a 16 or 17th level character is expected to hve a number of stat-boosting items on top of the base gains.
Classes - If you go back to AD&D once characters reached 10th level (or before) their abilities tended to freeze. Except for spellcasters (for whom the progression of spells continued) character pretty much gained hit points and THAC0 improvements only past this level. BECMI D&D dodged this problem to a degree, because the way the books came out meant they got to think about new abilities for characters at the higher levels (few though they were). Also Weapon Mastery (that horribly broken but fun mechanic) meant characters kept improving. 3rd Ed changes this totally Most classes continue to improve in capability up to 20th level (where Epic rules take over). In fact if you are playing a class that does not get any new special abilities as you level (eg cleric - spellcasting, BAB, skills and saves are the only changes after 1st) then it is wise to look at prestige classes to add flavour to your character. (Interestingly Fighter can be the hardest one to decide on here - do you give up all those lovely free feats for prestige class abilities?)
Races - yes you can make up your own, but with Savage Species there are rules for adapting pretty much every monster race as a character race. This should simplify adapting Mystara races for PC use.
I hope this helps.
One other thing I was thinking about, if you want to represent elves as the fighter/wizards of BD&D the perhaps the Bard class would be a good starting point - just remove the bardic abilities and perhaps replace them with a few more spells?
Regards
Gary
I think mechanically most of the races are fine as is. I would however change the halflings to more represent the hobbit-esque race of Mystara.
You don't really need to change the mechanics of the halflings though, just their name, appearance and manner. Besides, Hin can be really tough.
There is an Arcane Warrior class in Dave Arneson's Blackmoor, which could also be used to simulate the Classic D&D elf, but for Mystara IMHO, a multiclassing Elf Wizard Fighter would have the same effect, and the Favored Class: Wizard ensures that every elf has a talent for magic.
Same thing with the other races, you dont really need to change them.
Oh, but for new races, I already mentioned that I'd allow Lupins and Rakasta. I think it would also be reasonable to allow these as separate races:
Shadowelf
Sea Elf (Minrothad)
Morigswerg
Håvard
Now they're all WotC zombies who can't remember that D&D is a R-O-L-E-playing game. I'm slowly trying to remedy that by sneaking in a diplomatic module here and there, but they're working on a FR campaign until I get the first part of my project done.
You know, that last paragraph removes anything meaniful in your previous paragraphs.
You don't really need to change the mechanics of the halflings though, just their name, appearance and manner. Besides, Hin can be really tough.
I agree with this- mechanically, I think the halfling is fine. It is the description that I think should be revised a bit.
There is an Arcane Warrior class in Dave Arneson's Blackmoor, which could also be used to simulate the Classic D&D elf, but for Mystara IMHO, a multiclassing Elf Wizard Fighter would have the same effect, and the Favored Class: Wizard ensures that every elf has a talent for magic.
Definitely agree here. I'd actually probably allow characters to use the Apprentice Class rules from the 3.0 DMG (that for some reason got abandoned in 3.5) if they were really set on having a Fighter/Wizard (or some other combination) from the start.
You know, that last paragraph removes anything meaniful in your previous paragraphs.
That was intended as a joke towards my players, some of which lurk on these boards. I didn't mean to suggest a poor quality of RPers on the board... Sorry if I made that impression.
Roger
Yes, I am feeling myself more and more being pulled into 3rd Edition... It's an extremely surprising result, not at all what I was expecting when I bought the books.
I felt the same way. I went from OD&D straight to 3.0, completely skipping over AD&D. I looked at AD&D but for some reason it didn't appeal to me; although I did steal some ideas that became house rules. In retrospect, I believe it was the fact that on the one hand it was fairly similar to OD&D with additional features, but OTOH all my Mystara material was OD&D so why bother to convert.
I saw the 3.0 books in the store and glanced over them but they didn't grab me. It was one of my original players who bought me the books as a present. He didn't live near me anymore (sometimes out of the country) so it wasn't as if he was trying to change anything. After reading them through and getting a better picture of the system, I did convert a newly begun campaign that my brother and I had started (at least he only lived 20 minutes away :D ). This was about 5ish years ago.
:evillaugh
Muahahaha!!!! Ve haff brought another vun over to our side!!!
I hope it's not the DARK side!!! Fun aside, I've always maintained that Mystara is a setting, not a rules set. Flavour is the moreso the responsibility of the DM, IMHO.
I really like 3E overall, although I will say that, compared to OD&D, it requires a lot more preparation time. It's definitely not as easy to just have a pickup game at a moment's notice, which is too bad.
This is very true, although as you gain experience (as a DM - not a character
) you learn how to 'simulate' some details without having to formulate them all. Still, sometimes I still think about running an OD&D campaign.This led me to wonder how much the rules have been changed, added to, etc. since the original books that I am reading now. Could someone fill me in (briefly) on the general state of things? Specifically, which books are the most useful or interesting, which to avoid, what to read first (other than the three I have), etc.
If that sounds like a task in itself, giving me some links to explore would be almost as good. I've been looking at the reviews and descriptions on amazon.com so far, but right now I just want to hear straight answers rather than comparative reviews.
(In case you're wondering, I'm still in the character class chapter. :embarrass Reading is extremely slow lately because of work and the wonderful distraction that is the internet... ;) )
Specifically, which books are the most useful or interesting, which to avoid, what to read first (other than the three I have), etc
Personally I find "Savage Species" , "Unearthed Arcana" and DMG 2 to be both interesting and useful , especially as a GM converting Mystara to 3rd ed.
The "Complete ...." books add a lot of options for players but vary in quality IMHO. I found "Complete Warrior" the most useful and probably "Complete Divine" the least. I haven't been impressed with the "Races of ...." books at all. The enviroment books - "Frostburn" , "Sandstorm" and "Stormwrack", I find to be both useful and interesting and can add a lot to any campaign. The creature books - "Draconomicon" etc look great and have a good level of detail but aren't essential. "Tome of Magic" is probably the best looking book Wizards have yet done but can be hard to incorporate into a campaign. I have a personal liking for the "Book of Vile Darkness" too but it's far from essential.
Hope that very brief summary helps.
This led me to wonder how much the rules have been changed, added to, etc. since the original books that I am reading now. Could someone fill me in (briefly) on the general state of things? Specifically, which books are the most useful or interesting, which to avoid, what to read first (other than the three I have), etc.
The update to the core books to version 3.5 was the biggest change- and one that was for the better. There is a pdf on Wizards site that details many of the changes from 3.0 to 3.5 as it relates to the 3.0 products, so it doesn't completely negate your purchase.
Other books that are useful:
Savage Species- Its 3.0, but has a lot of info on playing monstrous races as characters.
Unearthed Arcana- not much use to me, beyond the idea of racial class levels and the prestige class versions of paladins, rangers and bards.
Environmental books- Useful but not necessary. I got the most out of Stormwrack
Complete Series- Depends on your preferences- I got a lot out of Complete Warrior and Complete Divine. The other two were worthless based on my campaign style, but may be useful to you if they cover characters types you play often.
Libris Mortis, Draconomicon, Lords of Madness- LM was very useful (our campaign has an undead uber-villain), Draconomicon wasn't bad, LoM is good, but not really applicable to Mystara beyond the Beholder info.
Book of Exalted Deeds/Vile Darkness- Only useful if you have definite good and evil in your campaign. I should note as well, they do deal with mature themes, so they don't play nice with youngsters in a group.
Edit:
I thought of two more that may interest you:
Heroes of Battle and Heroes of Horror- I have Heroes of Battle and it has some good things related to a campaign that involves warfare, specifically the affects of ranks and decorations on one's ability to lead. Its biggest shortfall IMHO is the lack of a mass combat system on the order of the War Machine (still the best
)Heroes of Horror focuses on adventures with a horror theme. I don't have it, but I know Andrew was considering adopting the "taint" rules for use with the Red Curse.
This led me to wonder how much the rules have been changed, added to, etc. since the original books that I am reading now. Could someone fill me in (briefly) on the general state of things? Specifically, which books are the most useful or interesting, which to avoid, what to read first (other than the three I have), etc.
That's a tough question for sure. For one thing, there was a revision that came out after the books you have now (called, oddly, 3.5- story on that below). The changes there were generally just clarifications, but there were some big revisions. Much of the changes came about from comments and errata from the player community, and changes/updates that came from some of the source books that came out after the "core" books.
So you're dealing with two things- books that support and make use of the rules you have, and books that came out after the 3.5 books.
Plus, the books themselves cover such a diverse array of things, that you'd have to be more specific as to what you were looking for. Rules sorts of sourcebooks, campaign (and more descriptive) types of books, and Wizards of the Coast only or 3rd party books? (Because the d20 game system was put into an Open Source situation, where 3rd parties could use the core mechanics of the system and produce d20 compliant and labeled sorts of products).
If that sounds like a task in itself, giving me some links to explore would be almost as good. I've been looking at the reviews and descriptions on amazon.com so far, but right now I just want to hear straight answers rather than comparative reviews.
Links I can do for sure:
The d20 System: Links to and explanations behind the Open Source d20 concept and the Open Gaming License.
System Reference Document: This is the latest version of the 3.5 d20 system used in D&D games. It also has been updated with the rules from Deities and Demigods (not updated to 3.5 as yet), the Epic Level Handbook (only partly updated to 3.5), and the Expanded Psionics Handbook (a fairly substantial revision of the 3.0 Psionics Handbook).
The Hypertext d20 SRD: This is a browser friendly version of the SRD above, and includes the Open Gaming Content from the WotC produced Unearthed Arcana book, which was all about different options and things to do in d20 games. (That book, btw, is actually very well done, and contains a wealth of variant rules and things- some of which were directly brought over from other WotC products, such as the Taint rules from Oriental Adventures; Vitality and Wound Point alternatives to Hit Points, from d20 Star Wars and d20 Modern; and Sanity rules from d20 Call of Cthulhu. It also has a lot of interesting sidebars- not in the Hypertext document- about the ramifications of using these variant rules, and suggestions for ways to incorporate them.)
Enworld.org: Named after its creator, Eric Noah, this site was the biggest and most successful of many 3rd Edition "scoop" sites that popped up when the news of the new edition first came about. Eric Noah passed the baton on the site to it's current moderator, Morrus (though Eric still posts there), who turned it into a much bigger operation. The reviews sections became a lot more prominent (though the conversions section sort of faded away), he started the ENworld publishing division, and the message boards have become a major community into themselves. The reviews are sort of hit and miss, although some of the regular reviewers do a really excellent job. Also, again, the message boards there are generally first rate, with tons of subdivisions, a lot of creators posting there, and you get a pretty quick turnaround on questions.
v.3.5 Revision Update Booklet: This is a quick summary of the changes between 3.0 and 3.5, along with suggestions for updating various 3.0 products to make them compliant. Some of the changes here are not completely accurate, though- in particular, many of the monsters have been updated in various 3.5 products subsequent to this, and have some changes not listed here.
Web Enhancement Archive: WotC has come out with a number of additions to their published products- usually information that was cut for space reasons.
Excerpt Archive: Actual bits from WotC products. They put these out a month or so in advance of release dates, and will give you a glimpse of what you're getting.
RPG.net: Another review site, this one isn't as comprehensive as ENWorld's, nor is it exclusively d20 products, but it is still kind of useful.
As for specific products, that's kind of another post in itself, and I'll need to think on it a bit.
I thought of two more that may interest you:
Heroes of Battle and Heroes of Horror- I have Heroes of Battle and it has some good things related to a campaign that involves warfare, specifically the affects of ranks and decorations on one's ability to lead. Its biggest shortfall IMHO is the lack of a mass combat system on the order of the War Machine (still the best
I recommend getting GRR's The Black Company. It has a a mass combat system that is very similar to the Mentzer War Machine, but based on 3.5 rules.
Håvard
I recommend getting GRR's The Black Company. It has a a mass combat system that is very similar to the Mentzer War Machine, but based on 3.5 rules.
That does sound interesting- I had heard that they came out with rules for the Black Company novel series, but never followed up on it (I've only read the first book, which was good, but I haven't gotten back to the series yet and didn't want to be spoiled.)
Special thanks to Andrew for all those links and explanations. If I could make a suggestion, mightn't it be a good idea to add a short D&D 3rd Edition section to the Mystara FAQ (if you haven't already?), basically comprising the links you just gave me. I'm pretty sure I'm definitely not the only one who they could benefit.
One book I didn't see mentioned is the Epic sourcebook. I've read some pretty awful reviews of it, but I would have thought it would be quite useful for Mystara campaigns, given the scale of the OD&D system. Does anyone have any comments about it? Is it as bad as I am reading it is?
Special thanks to Andrew for all those links and explanations. If I could make a suggestion, mightn't it be a good idea to add a short D&D 3rd Edition section to the Mystara FAQ (if you haven't already?), basically comprising the links you just gave me. I'm pretty sure I'm definitely not the only one who they could benefit.
Not a bad idea. There is a short 3E section already, but it doesn't really explain the concept much. Consider it done.
One book I didn't see mentioned is the Epic sourcebook. I've read some pretty awful reviews of it, but I would have thought it would be quite useful for Mystara campaigns, given the scale of the OD&D system. Does anyone have any comments about it? Is it as bad as I am reading it is?
Epic has its good and bad point. The system for creating Epic level characters is pretty good, and I think it is fairly balanced- it doesn't have an eternally powerfully scaling system, but keeps things reasonable, IMO. It could definitely use some clarification in parts, and the Epic Feats are, for the most part, really good (a lot of them have been clarified and updated for 3.5 in various products).
The Epic spellcasting system seems good to me (never used it in actual gameplay), though I think it could benefit from a bit more explanation of various spell seeds and costs.
The Epic magic item creation is where I think they really dropped the ball in this book. It basically just extends item creation beyond +5. They really should have used this section to discuss things like artifacts and relics and things of that scale, rather than just +8 flaming longswords.
The monsters section boasts a couple of Mystaran critters, which is cool (the Umbral Blot, aka the Black Ball, and the Brain Collector, albeit a more powerful version of same).
The rest of the book is kind of dull, IMO. There is a little bit of discussion about Epic level games, and an Epic Level campaign setting (some outer planar city). This section should have been the bulk of the book, and really should have delved into things like dominions and rulership, types of campaigns, possibly even mass combat. I haven't seen the book Power of Faerun yet, but from the excerpts and what I've heard about it, it is the sort of book that ELH should have been in many ways.
This section should have been the bulk of the book, and really should have delved into things like dominions and rulership, types of campaigns, possibly even mass combat. I haven't seen the book Power of Faerun yet, but from the excerpts and what I've heard about it, it is the sort of book that ELH should have been in many ways.
Power of Faerun is ok (admittingly I've only quickly flipped through it). It does deal with higher level campaigns and has some crunch with it, but it tries to build off of previous products that not everyone will have access to. In the section dealing with large scale warfare, it uses the rules from Heroes of Battle and applies it to Faerun, but it can feel like its little more than giving various ranks and decorations Faerunian names. There is a merchant-type prestige class in it with an arcane spell list. In short, it is useful for showing how high -level characters and 3.0 can mix while shying away from high-level dungeon crawls, but it is very targeted to FR.
I recommend getting GRR's The Black Company. It has a a mass combat system that is very similar to the Mentzer War Machine, but based on 3.5 rules.
I'll look into that. I got Fields of Blood to see if that was any good, which would work great if using it didn't mean redoing all dominion and army info to their system (which is very different.)
Anyway, I have some new questions. The character classes seemed rather interesting, and I have begun to see some great possibilities for existing Mystara characters - for example, it's easy to explain Haldemar's thief abilities in 3rd Edition, just by giving him some thief levels in addition to his wizard class. This seems rather cool.
But how do you convert levels from OD&D to 3rd Edition? Mystara has a lot of high level characters, but from what I understand even the epic levels system only goes up to 30, which means a 1:1 conversion is not possible. (It might not be desirable even if it were possible, of course.) I seem to remember some discussion of this before, but now that I've read the rules for characters I'd like to hear how you all do conversions.
Of course the other question is which characters to give extra levels and in what skills. Presumably this can be done based on the character descriptions, but it might be quite a hard thing to do. Do a few extra levels in bard or rogue take away from a character's wizarding levels? In OD&D the character may just have been a wizard, and of course character level and class level were the same. But in 3rd Edition, they are different. Should the OD&D level and the character level be kept consistent? Or perhaps it doesn't matter adding the extra multiclassing levels and thus increasing the overall character level.
I would be very interested to hear your thoughts on this.
I'm quite impressed thus far with the system. It seems to have discarded most of what I didn't like about AD&D, while keeping quite a lot of the things I like about OD&D, and solving some of its problems too.
The skills system seems to me like an upgraded version of the OD&D skills system that was introduced in the Gazetteers, but much more defined, more flexible, and with great rules for improving skill levels. I like it a lot, to the point where I would most likely use it (or a variant) even if I played an OD&D campaign again.
The rules for jumping seem unnecessarily complex, though... Did that get fixed in 3.5?
I'm still busy reading the Player's Handbook, now almost finished the skills section. It's taking a while because work has gotten busy again, so I've had no time even for mapping this week, let alone reading.
Anyway, I have some new questions. The character classes seemed rather interesting, and I have begun to see some great possibilities for existing Mystara characters - for example, it's easy to explain Haldemar's thief abilities in 3rd Edition, just by giving him some thief levels in addition to his wizard class. This seems rather cool.
But how do you convert levels from OD&D to 3rd Edition? Mystara has a lot of high level characters, but from what I understand even the epic levels system only goes up to 30, which means a 1:1 conversion is not possible. (It might not be desirable even if it were possible, of course.) I seem to remember some discussion of this before, but now that I've read the rules for characters I'd like to hear how you all do conversions.
Multiclassing in 3.0/3.5 is one of the best aspects of the system- it is very flexible and allows you to build a very unique character/NPC, especially when prestige classes come into play. There is no upper limit on epic levels, you can continue gaining XP and abilities because most are given at set points, iea feat every three levels. The method of conversion I use is the first fourteen levels convert 1 to 1. All levels beyond that convert to 1 to 2, so a 36th level character in OD&D is a 25th level character in 3.0.
Of course the other question is which characters to give extra levels and in what skills. Presumably this can be done based on the character descriptions, but it might be quite a hard thing to do. Do a few extra levels in bard or rogue take away from a character's wizarding levels? In OD&D the character may just have been a wizard, and of course character level and class level were the same. But in 3rd Edition, they are different. Should the OD&D level and the character level be kept consistent? Or perhaps it doesn't matter adding the extra multiclassing levels and thus increasing the overall character level.
I would be very interested to hear your thoughts on this.
Spellcasting and multiclassing can take a bit of getting used to. Generally you only gain spellcasting levels when you take a level of that class. For every level of Wizard you take, you gain a level of Wizard spellcasting. If you then take a level of Rogue, you do not gain a spellcasting level. If you take a level of sorceror, you gain a spellcasting level in sorceror only (the base class spellcaster levels do not stack at all). Some prestige classes that have spellcasting do stack with other spellcasting levels- they might have a notation like +1 arcane spellcasting level which would bump up your wizard, sorceror or bard spellcasting by a level (if you were a wizard 10/archmage 1, your wizard spellcasting level would be 11).
Since any character can take (almost) any skill, you don't always need to multiclass to reflect things about their character. In your Haldemar example, he could invest some skill points in Hide and Move Silently, and get the Stealthy Feat, and would be fairly decent at sneaking around (and thereby eliminate the need for Rogue levels.) But, if you want him to have Sneak Attack, Evasion and other Rogue abilities, then he would have to multiclass.
I'm quite impressed thus far with the system. It seems to have discarded most of what I didn't like about AD&D, while keeping quite a lot of the things I like about OD&D, and solving some of its problems too.
The skills system seems to me like an upgraded version of the OD&D skills system that was introduced in the Gazetteers, but much more defined, more flexible, and with great rules for improving skill levels. I like it a lot, to the point where I would most likely use it (or a variant) even if I played an OD&D campaign again.
The rules for jumping seem unnecessarily complex, though... Did that get fixed in 3.5?
The OD&D skill system is in some respects very similar to the 3.0 skill system. The feat system also borrows some from the OD&D skill system. As far as complexity, some skills require a lot of rules knowledge to implement as originally designed. To be fair, they try to account for more variables than any prior system and there is a method to their madness. Supplemental sources do add new and interesting twists to the use of many of these skills, as well add a few new ones.
I don't believe Jump is any less complex in 3.5
Hope that helps.
But how do you convert levels from OD&D to 3rd Edition? Mystara has a lot of high level characters, but from what I understand even the epic levels system only goes up to 30, which means a 1:1 conversion is not possible. (It might not be desirable even if it were possible, of course.) I seem to remember some discussion of this before, but now that I've read the rules for characters I'd like to hear how you all do conversions.
The Epic Rules provide the table to extend the classes to level 30 as an example, but it actually is designed so that theoretically, it can scale infinitely.
As for conversions, there have been different methods proposed over the years (and there have been a couple of threads, though I can't seem to find them offhand). The rule that the seemingly defunct 3E conversion project came up with was a 1-to-1 conversion up to level 16, then every two levels thereafter equal one level. Thus a 36th level character would be a 25th level Epic character.
I use a similar method, but give the 36th level character a little "boost" (for going all the way to the top), and convert 1-to-1 for each level up to 15, then every 2 thereafter (so a 26th level character is a 26th level Epic character).
The reasoning is sort of a combination of the old 2E standard of every 2 levels after 10= 1 AD&D level, and splitting the breakdown into the BECMI standards- 1-3 is Basic; 4-14 is Expert; 15-25 is Companion; 26-36 is Master. (Thus, 1-15 3E would be Basic/Expert, 16-20 would be Companion, 21-26 would be Master).
The breakdown for demihumans is a bit different. The 3E project has a variation on their webpage that is different from mine. I don't recall specifics of mine at this point, though I do have a breakdown at home. One of the things that I know is different from mine is that I allowed for both classes to attain equal levels, rather than top them out like they would have been in BECMI. IE, an Attack Rank K halfling in my conversion would convert as a level 26 character rather than a lower level. One of the things about 3E seems to be really trying to balance things out, and it seemed counter to that ideology to penalize maxed out characters. I was initially in favor of more of the approach the 3E team took, but it was an argument by (IIRC) James Ruhland that convinced me otherwise. It all depends on whether a conversion of the letter of the RAW is more important to you than the spirit.
In any case, I always take those conversions as just guidelines, though. For one thing, with the demihuman level conversion, there is a lot of leeway between the attack ranks and levels (for instance, a 10th level elf under my system comes out to something like a 13th level character, but the next attack rank- D- bumps it to 15); for another thing, some characters actually should be more powerful than level 26 (such as the feats of Palartarkan, or long-lived Barimoor or Hapthuthep the Thothian lich). In such cases, I try to go by the descriptions of the characters for my basis of conversion.
The rules for jumping seem unnecessarily complex, though... Did that get fixed in 3.5?
Yes. They got overhauled quite a bit.
BTW, in case you are interested, I've done a couple of 3E conversions of characters that are available on the Vaults. Among them are an Epic Level version of Prince Kol, former sheriff of Seashire Jaervosz Dustyboots, ex-ogre king Prince Alebane, and some others. I still have to go back and fix Jaervosz- that version has the Track feat but no skill points in Survival (d'oh!); in retrospect, I'd probably also make him a Ranger/Rogue rather than a Fighter/Rogue.
There is also the ongoing Converting K:KoA NPCS thread to check out.
I'm now onto the combat chapter. Feats was a reasonably quick read, I can understand how these could be expanded very easily, but I'm a little wary of the complexity that all that choice could add in. Ah well, it does mean a lot more options and customisability later on, which is definitely a good thing. Still, they're a little intimidating at first.
The combat rules seem very nicely done, in fact to me they are highly reminiscent of various Games Workshop games I played back home. What this boils down to is that they have basically miniaturised (sorry bad joke) the D&D combat system - which is no bad thing. It certainly makes things like tactics a little more viable.
Attacks of opportunity seem like an interesting idea, and I'm really liking the combat system in general so far. Reversing AC to bring it in line with the base d20 game rule was an obvious but far-reaching change, and it works out very nicely.
Having read this far, there is one thing that has bothered me from the start, and I just can't get used to: why on earth did they decide to write everything using the feminine 3rd person pronouns?
It's really jarring to have your train of thought interrupted while trying to absorb a rule by the appearance of an unexpected function word like that.Whoever thought up the idea of writing like that deserves a thorough talking to.
Having read this far, there is one thing that has bothered me from the start, and I just can't get used to: why on earth did they decide to write everything using the feminine 3rd person pronouns?
My understanding of the situation is that the trend really first developed in the 90s "politically correct" era. The first trend was to alternate gender pronouns- use male in one paragraph, female in another- in order not to offend anyone by the constant use of masculine pronouns. It kind of flipped to the other side- notably in TSR/WotC products- where they just use the feminine pronoun almost exclusively. I think it may just be an American thing, though.
I agree it is definitely distracting.
I'm now onto the combat chapter. Feats was a reasonably quick read, I can understand how these could be expanded very easily, but I'm a little wary of the complexity that all that choice could add in. Ah well, it does mean a lot more options and customisability later on, which is definitely a good thing. Still, they're a little intimidating at first.
You get used to the core feats after a while; I can basically pick a character's feats if I'm just using the ones in the core without even needing to look at the book. It may seem intimidating, but compare it to the number of spells in the core, and it suddenly seems WAY smaller.
The combat rules seem very nicely done, in fact to me they are highly reminiscent of various Games Workshop games I played back home. What this boils down to is that they have basically miniaturised (sorry bad joke) the D&D combat system - which is no bad thing. It certainly makes things like tactics a little more viable.
The thing I like is that there are multiple good approaches to combat for the fighting classes, depending on your choice of equipment. It is equally viable to be:
lightly armored and fast
heavily armored and slow
user of missile weapons
user of reach weapons
fight with multiple weapons
fight with weapon and shield
etc, etc. 0,1,2E you might as well just take a sword and heavy armor and a shield, as there's no real incentive to do anything else. But now there is.
Attacks of opportunity seem like an interesting idea, and I'm really liking the combat system in general so far. Reversing AC to bring it in line with the base d20 game rule was an obvious but far-reaching change, and it works out very nicely.
It takes a while to get a hang of what causes AoOs, but they add a nice tactical element to combat.
Having read this far, there is one thing that has bothered me from the start, and I just can't get used to: why on earth did they decide to write everything using the feminine 3rd person pronouns?
Whoever thought up the idea of writing like that deserves a thorough talking to.
See, I've been playing 3E since it came out 5 years ago, and I never noticed this at all. Nor heard anyone I know ever mention it. So, to my limited experience, this isn't a problem for most people.
You get used to the core feats after a while; I can basically pick a character's feats if I'm just using the ones in the core without even needing to look at the book. It may seem intimidating, but compare it to the number of spells in the core, and it suddenly seems WAY smaller.
I haven't got to the spells yet, but I must admit the feats chapter seems like nothing compared to the spells chapter, in terms of sheer size alone.
The thing I like is that there are multiple good approaches to combat for the fighting classes, depending on your choice of equipment. It is equally viable to be:
lightly armored and fast
heavily armored and slow
user of missile weapons
user of reach weapons
fight with multiple weapons
fight with weapon and shield
etc, etc. 0,1,2E you might as well just take a sword and heavy armor and a shield, as there's no real incentive to do anything else. But now there is.
That does seem extremely nice. I'm looking forward to trying this all out, though I don't know when or how I will get the chance...
See, I've been playing 3E since it came out 5 years ago, and I never noticed this at all. Nor heard anyone I know ever mention it. So, to my limited experience, this isn't a problem for most people.
I'm afraid that you are most likely in a minority in this case. Wizards of the Coast are by no means the first company to use the feminine pronoun in this way - I distinctly remember my cousin complaining about the same thing when he was into Vampire the Masquerade.
The fact is, Wizards' choice in this matter is actually rather controversial. Check out this page on Wikipedia. Here's a pertinent excerpt:
"She" and "her" are sometimes, though very rarely, used in a parallel way to refer to a person of unknown gender. More commonly, those who agree that always using "he" is offensive to women but dislike singular they and other gender-neutral pronouns sometimes alternate between "he" and "she."
When it comes down to it, using "she" universally is just as politically incorrect as using "he", with the added bonus that "she" will draw attention to itself much more effectively than "he". This is the part which I dislike: readers are used to reading "he" as gender neutral from habit and tradition, but such is not the case with "she" - which constantly draws unwanted attention to itself as a non-standard, un-English usage.
The worst part is that I have yet to get used to it to the point of it ceasing to be distracting, and friends who have the same problem tell me that I likely never will.
The bottom line: consider yourself lucky that it hasn't bothered you. I hope my drawing your attention to it won't spoil that for you. ;)
It takes a while to get a hang of what causes AoOs, but they add a nice tactical element to combat.
True. Something to keep in mind regarding AoOs and movement is to remember that moving out of a threatened space is important, not moving into one. This little thought has helped our group out alot.
When it comes down to it, using "she" universally is just as politically incorrect as using "he", with the added bonus that "she" will draw attention to itself much more effectively than "he". This is the part which I dislike: readers are used to reading "he" as gender neutral from habit and tradition, but such is not the case with "she" - which constantly draws unwanted attention to itself as a non-standard, un-English usage.
I'm in the same position as you are Thorf. Been using 3.x for about 5 years and it still messes me up sometimes. I naturally read 'he' as neutral (unless the context reveals otherwise). Same thing goes for 'mankind' - I automatically think all people; not all males
. Using 'she' is not politically correct - it only pacifies certain people and suffers from the same flaws as what some say afflict the term 'he'. Changing it all to 'she' doesn't serve any purpose that I can think of.Sorry for the slight rant. It just makes reading a little more 'work' for me :P .
I have now read as far as the Magic chapter. The last few rules of the Combat chapter were rather hard to take in, but I think I have a reasonably good grasp of the combat system in general. It sounds like it could be a lot of fun, with quite a lot more room for tactical combat than OD&D provided - though at the expense of a certain amount of narrative freedom, of course. I'd be interested to hear how long combats tend to take. Would I be right in thinking that things flow quite smoothly with an experienced group?
At this point, I'm eager to get on to reading the Dungeon Master's Guide, and I have even managed to drum up a little excitement about the Monster Manual. (I'm not usually that excited about reading monster descriptions...) But before that, the Spells chapter, which is somewhat monstrous in itself, is looming in my path. Still, even there I will be interested to see which spells were chosen, and how many of my old OD&D favourites are present in some form or another.
The last thing for now is that I've been trying unsuccessfully to find out more about the font used for the book titles for 3rd Edition. In fact I posted a thread about it here. It's a rather nice-looking font, so I'm finding it hard to believe that no one has come up with an answer, or at least made a good clone of it, over the past 6 years. Does anyone have any more info on this?
I have now read as far as the Magic chapter. The last few rules of the Combat chapter were rather hard to take in, but I think I have a reasonably good grasp of the combat system in general. It sounds like it could be a lot of fun, with quite a lot more room for tactical combat than OD&D provided - though at the expense of a certain amount of narrative freedom, of course. I'd be interested to hear how long combats tend to take. Would I be right in thinking that things flow quite smoothly with an experienced group?
Combat runs smoothly once the players know how their feats, spellcasting and spells work. Note that I don't use miniatures and try to keep the "tactical element" to the minimum to make more room for narration. This does affect the usefulness of certain feats somewhat, especially the ones involving AoAs which I suspect appear less frequently IMC.
At this point, I'm eager to get on to reading the Dungeon Master's Guide, and I have even managed to drum up a little excitement about the Monster Manual. (I'm not usually that excited about reading monster descriptions...) But before that, the Spells chapter, which is somewhat monstrous in itself, is looming in my path. Still, even there I will be interested to see which spells were chosen, and how many of my old OD&D favourites are present in some form or another.
There were huge chunks of the DMG that I found useless, while others especially concerning creation of NPCs, XP awards, Magic items etc that I found very valuable. I love Monster books so I guess my feelings about the MM differ from yours, but every time I pick up a new monster book, I look for critters that look like they could belong in Mystara....
Håvard
PS: Sorry, can't help you with the font
1-to-1 up to level 12, then 1 level for every three... means 36th level OD&D = 20th level v3.5. This works if you assume that Epic Level (21st level+) are "Exalted" level beings/low-level Immortals.
1-to-1 up to level 14, then 1 level for every 2... means 36th level OD&D = 25th level v3.5. This makes a 26th level or Master level OD&D character 20th level in v3.5, which equates most Master level characters with Epic level characters.
A similar result can be had with 1-to-1 up to level 18, then 1 level for every 3...
18 = 18
19, 20, 21 = 19
22, 23, 24 = 20
25, 26, 27 = 21
28, 29, 30 = 22
31, 32, 33 = 23
34, 35, 36 = 24
This keeps a lot of the characters in the Gazetteers at around the same level.
1-to-1 level adjustment. This will provide for ALOT of epic level characters, especially in Alphatia, but I will put a Base Class limit at 20th... So a 36th level magic-user would convert to 20 Wizard/10 Aristocrat/6 Expert... or some similar NPC combination, thus limiting their power, but not robbing them of hard-earned levels (especially considering the XP gap--ODD at 36th level averages 3 million, while 3e at the same level is barely more then half a million.) True, XP is awarded differently, but still...
Roger
Although I haven't tested it yet, here is what I plan to do, if it will work:
1-to-1 level adjustment. This will provide for ALOT of epic level characters, especially in Alphatia, but I will put a Base Class limit at 20th... So a 36th level magic-user would convert to 20 Wizard/10 Aristocrat/6 Expert... or some similar NPC combination, thus limiting their power, but not robbing them of hard-earned levels (especially considering the XP gap--ODD at 36th level averages 3 million, while 3e at the same level is barely more then half a million.) True, XP is awarded differently, but still...
I must admit, I've wondered why no one seems to have suggested this method. Yes, it will result in 36th level characters being hugely powerful. But they were also very powerful in OD&D, so I don't see it as that big a problem. In fact, the gap it would place between starting out PCs and the world's mightiest rulers seems like it could be a good thing.
But the real reason that I would consider doing this is that - just as Roger said - it allows the addition of multiclassing across the board, while staying true to character levels.
Which brings me to my other point, which is wondering why existing NPC conversions don't seem to take multiclassing into account. It seems to me that all kings and queens, and most nobles should have at least a few levels of artistocrat, to reflect the experience they have gained while ruling rather than going out adventuring. Sure, it's not necessary in order to give them political skills, but it seems a lot more realistic.
The other point is that it seems to me that multiclassing should be a relatively commonplace thing, especially when it involves two classes, one of which is a favoured class.
I'd be very interested in hearing more on these matters.
I must admit, I've wondered why no one seems to have suggested this method. Yes, it will result in 36th level characters being hugely powerful. But they were also very powerful in OD&D, so I don't see it as that big a problem. In fact, the gap it would place between starting out PCs and the world's mightiest rulers seems like it could be a good thing.
There were a lot of arguments pro and con both on the M3E conversion project as well as here and on the MML at various points. I was initially a proponent of doing the 1-1 conversion myself, but eventually was won over to a different method for a couple of reasons.
The biggest, IIRC, was that the conversions from AD&D to 3E keep a 1-1 conversion, but the conversions from OD&D to AD&D used a different method. This was done for various reasons (and, arguably, maybe not completely well conceived- the method itself went through a couple of variations), but generally, it seemed to keep the power levels more or less consistent between versions. A 36th level OD&D wizard had a lot more spell slots than a 20th level AD&D wizard, but that seemed to be kind of an exception to the rule. Fighters were more or less equal (actually, I think AD&D fighters might have had a slight edge), thieves were about the same, clerics, etc.
It's been a while since I looked, but it seems to me that this was more or less the case. In any case, it made transitioning between the three various editions (including the limited AD&D Mystara products) easier.
Also, while Master level characters are pretty powerful (again, possibly moreso than their AD&D counterparts), Companion level characters certainly weren't quite in the Epic ranges (and, if you kept a 1-1 conversion, about half of the Companion level characters would be Epic). The Epic rules don't quite reach massively overwhelming proportions, true, but some of the feats Epic characters can accomplish are certainly, IMO, beyond the range of Companion level characters- and many Master level characters as well. Epic Spellcasting, certainly, is quite a bit beyond what you could accomplish with OD&D rules. There were some definite (rare) cases that suggested its possibility, though never provided rules for such (the feats of Ar and Atruaghin, to name two).
Which brings me to my other point, which is wondering why existing NPC conversions don't seem to take multiclassing into account. It seems to me that all kings and queens, and most nobles should have at least a few levels of artistocrat, to reflect the experience they have gained while ruling rather than going out adventuring. Sure, it's not necessary in order to give them political skills, but it seems a lot more realistic.
I've wondered the same myself- many of my conversions (albeit in incomplete form) do what you suggest. My version of Stefan Karameikos, for instance, (which I touched on briefly here), made him more of a Fighter/Aristocrat than straight fighter. It seemed to be more in keeping with his background and abilities, even if it did make him slightly weaker in straight combat (but let's face it, Stefan shouldn't be engaging in one-on-one combat in any case- he's a leader of men, and is surrounded by warriors). I've done a number of conversions of d'Ambrevilles that have multiclassed as well.
I think the situation primarily comes down primarily to a metagaming situation- as Players, we tend to look at NPCs the way we look at our characters- as adventurers. As such, we don't want to sacrifice power and combat ability (the cornerstones of most adventures) for versatility and character. If you give Stefan fewer Fighter levels, or Jaggar some Fighter levels and reduce his Wizard levels, it is seen that you are making them weaker (and, at least in the case of Stefan, for combat purposes you are). The problem is that these NPCs aren't necessarily supposed to be opponents of the PCs, or at least not necessarily physical opponents, so it is in many cases a false perception.
IMO, 3E allows for more versatility than ever to reflect a character's true abilities according to his background and role in the campaign, and certain changes (both in statistics and in DM/Player perspective) may need to be made to depict that. it's a tough course, though, and there is certainly a lot of grey area both in the general topic, as well as when it comes to specific characters.
As an example, Jaggar's description and personality would certainly seem to make him more martially inclined than other wizards- suggesting that giving him some Fighter levels would be in store. Some argue against this idea, suggesting that him losing Wizard levels makes him less powerful, or at least less powerful than other wizards. Which is true from a spellcasting standpoint, but does it really make him less powerful? By 3E standards- which does a more complete and thorough job of balancing classes than previous editions (though, obviously, it's not perfect), he's just as strong in combat situations as other characters of his level; not as good as a straight fighter or wizard, but more versatile. Does he need that extra 9th level spell to be as deadly as another wizard? Depends, I guess. IMO, he is more accurately reflected as a multiclass, but in the view of others, it may be more important that he be a superior mage.
Certainly an interesting topic of discussion, though.
Certainly an interesting topic of discussion, though.
Yes, I agree. Thanks for your detailed analysis, you've given me a lot to think about.
I don't have time for a detailed reply right now I'm afraid, so just a few short comments.
First, as far as I am concerned any argument that based on the AD&D conversion is unlikely to sway me. I think I made my feeling about those conversions pretty clear in the Karameikos: Kingdom of Adventure conversion thread. :embarrass And of course in addition to the conversions being (in my opinion) rather poor, there is also my disdain for AD&D in general, and perhaps more importantly my lack of in-depth knowledge of the system.
On the other hand, the other arguments you outlined above are quite convincing. Comparing power levels between the games is always going to be quite subjective, though. I don't yet know exactly what being an epic level 3rd Edition character means, so there are still some parts of the puzzle missing for me. But I still find it hard to swallow that Companion and Master should be anything but the top of the scale.
Unfortunately that's all I have time for, so the rest will have to wait till later.
And of course in addition to the conversions being (in my opinion) rather poor, there is also my disdain for AD&D in general, and perhaps more importantly my lack of in-depth knowledge of the system.
You are, of course, refering to the BD&D to 2e conversions - not the 2e to 3.5e conversions of Ray and myself. ;) Although if the source is 'flawed'...
I included some NPC classes (in some conversions - maybe not as many as I could of) as well as the standard classes.
As an example, Jaggar's description and personality would certainly seem to make him more martially inclined than other wizards- suggesting that giving him some Fighter levels would be in store.
I quite agree with this as my conversion of him will (hopefully) I get around to converting the G:KoM NPCs. I just need to convert the spells, the secret crafts, the... first.
Of course, if you're not limited to the SRD more options come into play such as (off the top of my head) the Warmage class.Regards
Gary
You are, of course, refering to the BD&D to 2e conversions - not the 2e to 3.5e conversions of Ray and myself. ;) Although if the source is 'flawed'...
Absolutely - and I'm sorry if I implied that your conversions were flawed. I don't mean to say that the current conventions are bad or don't work; I just want to have a discussion about whether it is in fact the best way to do things. And if it is, I will be happy to be persuaded of that. ;)
I quite agree with this as my conversion of him will (hopefully) I get around to converting the G:KoM NPCs. I just need to convert the spells, the secret crafts, the... first.
Since you've mentioned it, I've been meaning to ask: what is the rationale for sticking completely to the SRD?
Absolutely - and I'm sorry if I implied that your conversions were flawed. I don't mean to say that the current conventions are bad or don't work; I just want to have a discussion about whether it is in fact the best way to do things. And if it is, I will be happy to be persuaded of that. ;)
That's Ok I realised what you meant.
Since you've mentioned it, I've been meaning to ask: what is the rationale for sticking completely to the SRD?
Just that everyone has access to the SRD (even if they've never bought a 3.0/3.5 book in their lives). Personally, I own most of the non-setting specific books, so the NPCs in my campaign are (for the most part) different to the ones I posted.
Regards
Gary
I just want to have a discussion about whether it is in fact the best way to do things. And if it is, I will be happy to be persuaded of that. ;)
Thorf,
I don't think there is a "best" way to do things as far as conversions go. Maybe it could be said that there "is no wrong" way. In my case, I owned K:KoA but not Gaz1 so I was limited by the source. Another consideration was the 2e to 3e conversion document by WotC. It was very useful in eliminating some choices in converting skills over to 3e's skills. Also used was the 35e update booklet but beyond these additional documents, everything else was just my opinion as to what would be correct for my campaign. I think everyone should change the NPC's to fit their own version of Mystara.
--Ray.
Since you've mentioned it, I've been meaning to ask: what is the rationale for sticking completely to the SRD?
I see Gary's already responded, but yeah, my answer is pretty much the same: sticking to the SRD (or the Core books) is pretty much the only way to ensure that all the relevant information is usable to everyone. If you start using all sorts of random books- while there are a lot of cool feats, abilities, etc, in them- you are automatically alienating some people from being able to make ready-to-play use of your characters.
Which is, IMO, one of the hardest parts about the conversion (or even just character generation) process.
As an example, see "the Rusalka" in my Gazetteer NPCs thread (can't find the thread offhand, but the link is to the post on the Vaults).
Someone asked what the Goad feat and Force of Personality feats were for/did (both are from Complete Adventurer). I thought they both suited her well, but someone without that accessory would have to come up with new feats. Maybe not a huge deal, but it is a consideration to take into account.