Classes and Class Abilities

Not sure what to call this, despite classes not existing.

Each level, you get 1 Ability. Maybe it'll be called a feat, a power, a skill, wtf ever. Let's just call it an Ability for now.

Example abilities:

• ability score increase
• super power (spider climb, swim speed, transformation, flight, etc)
• core powers of a given spellcasting school (e.g. fire, force, blood)
• a group of related martial abilities (e.g. Group Combat - cleave, etc)

Assumptions:

• ability scores are tweakable at level 1, but do not increase afterward
• "races" are configurable at level 1 (i.e. Origins), but do not improve on their own (although some Abilities may be enabled by race)

Not sure:

• core numbers for checks vs DC and damage: are they improved by taking Abilities, or inherent to level?

Ability Tree

Root:

• General abilities
• Heritage abilities
• Learned abilities
  • Martial
  • Magical
  • Other?

General Abilities

ideas:

• initiative
• hero points
• action points

Heritage Abilities

All:

• ability score increases

Sylvans

• Fey Form
• Fey Step improvement
• Charm
• Glamour improvement
• Iron resistance etc

Netherkind

• Resist holy symbols
• Improved regeneration
• Hunger training etc

Learned Abilities

Martial

• Dodge (doesn't cost a reaction)
• Parry (doesn't cost a reaction)
• Two Weapon Fighting (bonus attack with offhand, bonus parry?)
• Cleave

Magical

Meta:

• Dominance (improved control of summons, win Cha contests)
• Faith (?)
• Sympathy (understanding of sympathetic magic)
• etc (most come with a wealth of useful basic abilities to detect and work with magic; useful but not necessary to take more than one)

Spellcasting:

• Fire (flames! etc)
• Frost
• Force
• Blood
• Empathy
• etc

Supernatural Powers:

• Force Shield (you can manifest a shield of force at will)
• Minion (you have a summonable minion of rank 1)
• See Invisibility
• Spider Climb

IMPORTANT NOTE

Spellcasting abilities give seed powers (e.g. Flames, Push, Contagion). To cast spells, you use one or more seeds, then add modifiers as you see fit, then roll a skill check. Failure, mixed success, and complete success are all options. It's highly customizable.

There are also non-spellcasting powers. Supernatural Powers are simple, reliable, narrow in scope, and don't have any rolls involved (typically). They may have specific weaknesses (e.g. Spider Climb lets you run at full speed on any surface, except if it's greasy you can't stick at all, or something), but you need not worry that you'll roll a nat 1 at the wrong time.

Supernatural powers are not exclusive with Spellcasting--something that a supernatural power can do can also be doable through Spellcasting. The tradeoff is that Spellcasting is usually more broad per AP spent.

TO BE DETERMINED: is the list of supernatural powers basically the "spell list", and the Spellcasting abilities are based on those? Or, are supernatural powers pre-configured using Custom Powers? Bleh.

Perhaps this:

• For 1 AP, you can take any Seed, gaining the ability to cast whatever spells based on that seed. (Modifiers are free) (Some seeds could indeed cost more than 1 AP, but w/e)
• Thereafter, you can roll-to-cast using that Seed whenever you want.
• For 1 AP, you can also take any pre-configured Seed + Modifiers and make it a permanent ability that you don't have to roll for, given:
  • Its DC doesn't exceed (some formula) to keep balance. Essentially, it's something you could take 10 on
  • If it has a cost (Mana rules TBD) you still have to pay it, but it should be less. Mana costs (or whatever) are part of the balance between Spellcasting and Supernatural powers. Ideally this would be simplified for non-casters (i.e. daily/encounter/recharge/at-will).
  • There might be a mechanic to achieve "mastery" of a roll-to-cast spell and gain the ability to skip the roll.
  • There might be a mechanic where a pre-configured (i.e. written down) combo of seeds and modifiers is slightly easier to cast than one you make up on the spot.

IDEAS TO CONSIDER If custom powers are going to automatically get better with rank, and spellcasting implicitly gets better as your numbers improve, maybe martial abilities should get better too. Example:

• Cleave: your melee attacks are chain 1 per rank.
• Parry: you can parry once per round per rank without spending a reaction.

Numbers

Sigh.

Maybe the problem is the sheer number of skills. There are only 6 ability scores to divide points among, but there are far more skills. And yet, it's probably unnecessary to actually have dozens of skills.

Why can't it just be ability scores? To hell with proficiency? Let's consider the cons:

• Unrealistic that a totally nonmagical human fighter could work his way up to draconic strength
• Not ideal for ability slots to compete with "must-have" ability score improvements

That's...about it, I think?

Maybe if we just ignore the first point, we could go with a simple level-based progression, i.e. X points at level 0, +1 ability score point per level. You know: the exact thing from 5e Adv.

Experiment 1: Kaine

Even with a silly amount of stat points in Str, the numbers feel low. There needs to be a proficiency bonus.

How about 4e style, wherein:

• Proficient skills get full proficiency bonus: +1/level
• Non-proficient skills get partial bonus: floor(+1/2 levels)
• All saving throws are non-proficient

Results: I'm liking it so far. He attacks and defends at +25, but has a +7 Dex save.

Now, we need to talk about skills.

Skills

Skills aren't as good as Feats or Powers. It's nice to get a modest bonus to checks (you know, at level 2? Or 4? Or something), but that's not nearly as good as Powers and Feats. So...?

Ideas:

• Combat skills grant more than just + to DC; they also gate damage up-ranks. (This can work for magic too)
• Add magical skills; not Sympathy/Faith/etc, but Spellcraft, and perhaps Concentration and Willpower. Those three operate more like traditional skills anyway.
• Spellcasting powers could be skills? (I really don't like this; I like the either-or approach for Sp vs Su)

Approach 1

5 free skills, 1 AP per extra skill.

This doesn't address the fairness problem, but rather incentivizes you to keep skill count down. Good for party balance, although it suffers because combat skills are more useful than non-combat ones.

Approach 2

X free skills, +Y skill per level

Let's say 3 at level 1, 1 every 4th?

Addresses fairness, but seems arbitrary. Still favors combat skills.

Approach 3

d20 style. You get X skill points per level. Proficiency bonus = SP spent on the skill. You can divvy them up however you want. And yes, Int gives you extra points, retroactively.

Takes up more space on the character sheet. Still favors combat skills, but the assumption should be that most PCs need 3-4 of those tops, so they should be able to branch out a little bit if they have, say, 4+Int skills.

RELATED IDEA Powerful heritage abilities are cool, but what about the Heritage "hero" that grants abilities such as increased skill points, more reactions, etc?

Combat vs Non

Quick notes:

• Str: Heavy Melee, Parry, Block
• Dex: Dodge, Light Melee, Ranged
• Con: Endurance?, avoid Wounds
• Int: Spellcraft
• Wis: Concentration
• Cha: Willpower

Crazy idea:

• New combat skills:
  • Fighting
  • Agility
  • Endurance
  • Intellect
  • Discipline
  • Willpower
  • Charisma
• Not skills:
  • Athletics (Agility or Endurance)
  • Acrobatics (Agility)
  • Deception (Charisma)
  • Persuasion (Charisma)
  • Intimidation (Charisma)
  • Investigation (Intellect)
  • Melee (Fighting)
  • Ranged (Fighting)
  • Spellcraft (Intellect)
  • Concentration (Discipline)
  • Parry (Fighting)
  • Dodge (Agility)
  • Block (Endurance)
• TBD:
  • Stealth
  • Perception
• Doesn't exist:
  • Str/Dex/Con/Int/Wis/Cha

Say what? Yeah, will need a different approach to numbers (maybe back to proficiency bonus). Super-powered beings will need abilities that specifically describe their superpowers (e.g. heavy lifting, bonus melee damage, super fast movement, etc)