Saving Throws

I've been dissatisfied with saving throws as normally presented for a while now, primarily because their progression curve is just so confusingly uneven - in LotFP, for example, they generally jump up by two every three levels, but sometimes it's three, and sometime's it's five. Secondly, the periodization - if saves are another method of making characters more survivable the more player time is invested in them, I'd prefer them to scale up in tandem with that time investment, rather than at every third level.

I also really liked Gus L.'s idea of decreasing Death Saves. It's a crutch that helps out starting characters but automatically falls away as they (and the player) gets more experience, it telegraphs the idea that you can't expect to be saved from the consequences of your mistakes as you keep playing, and finally, it works pretty well as an implied aging mechanic. 

So, thinking about it further, I decided to go with a four-save system - Body, Reflex, Mind, and Luck. The first three is the basic three-save system. Body protects you from poison and exhaustion. Reflex protects you from triggering traps. Mind is rolled against magical effects, both live and device-based. Luck is your "Save vs. Death."

Here's the basic progression:

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19
Body	17	16	15	14	13	12	11		10		9		8		7		6		5
Reflex	14		13		12		11			10			9			8			7
Mind	15			14			13		12		11		10		9		8		7
Luck	8			9			10		11		12		13		14		15		16

In the same vein of a decreasing Luck score, I wanted each save to behave differently. All of them slow down after level 7, in keeping with the general idea of higher levels providing diminishing returns. (Originally I tried slowing down after level 10, but the progressions I used lined up better at level 7, with all four saves lining up for levels 7, 13, and 19.) 

Therefore, the Body save starts high and rapidly increases - +1 every level, followed by +1 every other level - reflecting your character starting a bit doughy but quickly becoming much tougher, in time to protect against the more powerful poisonous monsters they're likely to face at higher levels. 

Reflex starts high, but only gets +1 every other level, followed by +1 every third level. This way, you start out comparatively well-protected against traps, but it doesn't increase as quickly as the dangers you face - you'll be forced to rely more on your own wits and attention to your surroundings than the saving throw. 

Mind saves take the opposite tack - starting fairly high, but getting a +1 only every two levels at first, then increasing to +1 every other level. I wanted this to reflect the relative rarity of magic-using enemies in the early levels, but with an accelerating scale of improvement as they become harder for players to simply avoid. It also makes in-game sense to me, with the characters gaining better abilities to fight magical effects as they are brought in more direct contact with them.

Luck takes the same scale as Mind, but decreases. -1 every third level, then -1 every other level. 

With a basic progression figured out, I whipped up four specific save progressions:

	Lucky						Physical
Level	1	7	13	19		Level	1	7	13	19
Body	16	10	7	4		Body	14	8	5	2
Reflex	12	9	7	5		Reflex	13	10	8	6
Mind	14	12	9	6		Mind	16	14	11	8
Luck	6	8	11	14		Luck	8	10	13	16
	Divine					Arcane
Level	1	7	13	19		Level	1	7	13	19
Body	17	11	8	5		Body	15	9	6	3
Reflex	10	7	5	3		Reflex	15	13	11	9
Mind	15	13	10	7		Mind	12	10	7	4
Luck	9	11	14	17		Luck	10	12	15	18

Divine, of course, can be used for clerics, paladins, etc. Arcane gets applied to magic-users and illusionist types. Physical for fighter types. "Lucky" for thieves and halfling types. I'm working on a seven-class system for Veil, which applies the Lucky progression to the Pioneer (a frontier-styled Specialist), the Arcane to the Magus and the Illusionist, the Divine to Assassins and Clerics (due to Assassins being based on the original religious Hashishin order) and Physical to Fighters and Barbarians. 

Ley Magic

Why do wizards lair in isolated valleys or remote mountains? Why do they build homes so far from the industrial towns where bookbinders, tanners, inkmakers and the other skilled artisans upon which they depend can be found? Why don't the royal courts keep hordes of low-level magicians running around at all times, armies of them ready to jump up at their call? And why are the lairs of wizards so impenetrable, filled with arcane traps and strange mazes, yet a military fortress restricted to the age-old use of portcullises and blind corners? Why, moreover, do the orcs not come pouring over the hilltops, forcing timid village-people to undertake the works of industry of which they are incapable? Why are we not ruled by dragons, or subjugated by cloud giants, greater than us in both strength of body and strength of mind?

In a phrase, it is because of ley lines.

Magic, like water and light, is not intrinsic to every part of the world. It flows, in great ethereal rivers, pooling in some places and running dry in others. Like flame, it can burst up suddenly in new places, and like sandstone, great weights of it can compress and push unmovingly into the soil. And, like water and light, it changes the nature of the land that it permeates. Long ago, when life was new, mana had its own subtle pull on the forms that it took. Some men grew to be larger and hungrier. Some dogs learned how to swim through magic the way other dogs learned how to swim through the seas. Most learned nothing, for they lived in areas where mana flowed too fast to take root, or was too scarce. A rarer few gorged themselves on it, and drank some of the wells dry.

Now, these magical creatures require ley energies in the same way they require air and food. A satyr could no more live in town than a hawk could roost beneath the oceans. As mundane humans began to learn the arts of society and technology, they also learned that neither art was much use against a frog that could breathe fire, or a wolf whose teeth pierced the very soul. Like the satyr and the hawk, humanity found its niche.

Of course, every artist has dreams, and seeks constantly to improve upon her works. It was only a matter of time before humanity learned to drink magic for itself, or systematically bind it and then burn it off in massive rituals. The former have come to be called, variously, mystics, wizards, mages, warlocks, witches, and druids. The latter, of course, is 'worship,' and it allowed humanity to clear out new, safe regions where it could build farms and cities, unmolested by arcane beasts.

Spellcasting

The mystic may bind one mana die (a d6) to herself per level. Spells are without level, and may be cast by throwing any number of available mana die and scoring higher than a 5. The "level" of the spell is determined by the number if dice thrown, and the spell takes two actions to prepare per die thrown, plus one more action to release. (In other systems, consider each die to take half a round to prepare, so a sixth level spell requires three rounds to cast.)

Each die that comes up equal to or lower than the number of dice thrown is lost. Each duplicated roll causes one point of lethal damage, as the expulsion of mystical energy stresses and damages the mystic's body. (So, a double would cause 2HP damage, triples 3HP, two doubles 4HP, etc.) None of these conditions affect the actual casting of the spell.

Additionally, any casting rolls of 15 or higher lubricate the flow of energy, allowing the mystic to instantly prepare another spell at any power level. Rolls of 30 or more actually attract energy to the spell's location, replenishing one spent mana die. Every multiple of 30 after that replenishes an additional mana die.

Limits to Spellcasting

Replenishing lost mana dice requires sleeping within a strong ley line or ley circle. A full eight hours of sleep replenishes 1d6 lost mana dice (apply WIS modifier). Stronger wells may replenish 1d8 or 1d10, while weaker ones might only return 1d4. These places are uncommon and likely to be guarded by jealous mages, or homes to dangerous magical creatures - the specifics, of course, will greatly determine the availability and power of magic in your campaign. Rarer, weaker, and more dangerous ley circles will restrict the mystic's power, and more common or stronger ones will commensurately increase it. 

A mystic can retain 1 spell per point of intelligence she has. Moreover, the retention of a spell necessitates the presence of some form of mana reserve - the mystic must have one mana dice per retained spell, or lose 1 HP per day, per excess spell. 

Learning a new spell - even one previously known - is an expensive and time-consuming process, requiring access ley energy the expenditure of 2d10x100 GP and 4d6 consecutive weeks of research and practice. If interrupted, the procedure must be started from scratch. Before rolling, a mystic can choose to rush the process, or work with more rudimentary materials - one can halve the total of one roll, at the cost of doubling the other. 

Crafting

Yes, yes, I haven't been providing a whole lot of context on overall structure. It's my blog. Like I mentioned last time, you can take a Specialization every third level. They're not like classes - you can take a different one each time, etc. There will ultimately be seven, not including change class/alignment, which requires no further explanation.

Anyway, I'm taking a page out of Numenera here:

"Crafting" is a specialization available to Lawful or Neutral characters. Each time you specialize in Crafting, you can put a word into each of the following blanks:

"I can use my [tool] to make [material] into [object]."

Everything else, of course, is dependent on what we know about the real world. This is a mundane, not a magical skill (though if you wish to insert spells, you are free to, so long as you can cast them). Therefore, combinations that obviously don't work, such as "I use my fork to make air into battleships" means nothing more than your character specializes in waving around cutlery and shouting like a madman. Lesser failures are, of course, still failures - you need wood and feathers to make arrows.

The effects are the logical results of attempting to make the object using the named tool and material, which of course means that complex objects will need extra descriptors, and you can build on them with additional specializations. So, you might start with, "I can use my adze to make wood into canoes," then later expand it to "I can use my adze and sewing kit to make wood and hides into (better) canoes." Or you can use additional specializations to learn how to make multiple objects. 

Class System

The above, from Wikipedia, is my class and multiclassing system. It comes from Talysman's post on the three-role class system, which recognizes that there are three basic archetypes inherent in the early game, which also comport with archetypes present in fiction - the fighter, the wizard, the trickster. The fighter approaches problems directly, with force or toughness, the wizard, using magic, and the trickster, indirectly, but without magic - applying her own cleverness and skill.

Therefore, I have:
The Warrior: Receives training in two different weapons per level, and reduces Death and Dismemberment Table rolls by one, per level.
The Mystic: Receives one extra spell die per level, and can craft magic items using a system I have yet to satisfactorily determine.
The Spy: Receives training in climbing or swimming, per level. Receives training in stealth, per level. Begins with literacy in native language, and can use the Lore system to gain knowledge of additional languages or scripts, or otherwise rumors and gossip.

Each of these is one of the "primary" colors - say the Warrior is red, the Mystic is blue, and the Spy is green. Overlap represents a "dual-class" - which I'm constructing to be a fully-fledged class, since that is much clearer and easier to conceptualize than a hyphenated Franken-class. So: between the Warrior and the Mystic is the Warlock, who gains weapon training at the cost of crafting ability. Between the Warrior and the Spy is the Assassin, who retains the weapon use, stealth, and terrain abilities of both classes. And between the Mystic and Spy is the Trickster, which is a stealthy spellcaster.

Obviously, there's no reason to mix between any of the derived classes - there's absolutely no reason to be 1/4 this and 1/3 that, or to pursue any of the more esoteric shades of green. There is, of course, the central mix of all primary colors - the polymath, who is stealthy, gains some weapon abilities, and is a spellcaster.

Incomplete, as usual. But I think I'm going to do away with separated hit die progressions, attack-bonus tables, and definitely with weapon and armor restrictions. That way, each class is as concise as possible, and imposes much less upon your character's stats and abilities.

The Dragon, A New Character Class

I'm in the process of pondering my own ideas of classes, races, and race-as-classes, and I came upon Grognardling's old posts about unconventional classes. One of those mentioned was, "Dragon."

Firstly, I have no attachment to (or even much knowledge about) extant D&D dragon rules and lore, so I'm ignoring basically all of it. The class, I believe, works better in settings without tons and tons of dragons running around, as D&D and Pathfinder imply by having, like, four different types of dragons with seven colors for each, all running around.

The central idea for this class is that you get extreme power at the cost of extreme specialization and little flexibility. They age with level, which is pretty quick for any animal - but it helps explain why there aren't tons of "dragon litters" running around all over the place and allows the dragon to advance within the same ballpark as the rest of the party. Obviously, this hasn't been playtested yet.

As far as the "Alien Mind" problem goes, I'm not really interested in adjudicating player behavior, beyond mechanics and NPC reactions. Even if I did put in non-mechanical behavior guidelines, that would still be a human guessing at alien psychology, and I don't think I'm any more capable of it than my players are.

THE DRAGON

Saving throws as Halfling. Experience Point progression as the S&W Monk.

Dragon level advancement is accompanied by growth in size, toughness, and abilities. When a dragon reaches the end of a size category, it cannot level up further until it builds a nest out of precious gems and metals worth its current experience point total in silver pieces. The dragon must sleep within for one week to become a whelp, one month to grow to juvenile size, and one year to become an adult.
Dragons are also, generally, supremely wise and strong creatures, and add 1d6 to each of their ability scores, though 18 remains the maximum.

Dragon Sizes

• Nestling: Levels 1-5. Hit Dice: 1d6. Two claw attacks, each dealing 1d4 damage. AC: as leather. 
• The nestling dragon is green, brown, or white, depending on its birth environment, and about the size of a large cat. It cannot yet fly, nor can it speak any language other than draconic. 
• Whelp: Levels 6-10. Hit Dice: 1d12. Two claw attacks, each dealing 1d8 damage. AC: as chain.
• The dragon whelp gains language abilities, and can hover or glide, but remains incapable of true flight. Whelps are about the size of a man.
• Juvenile: Levels 11-15. Hit Dice: 1d20. Two claw attacks, dealing 1d10 damage, and one bite attack dealing 2d6 damage. AC: as plate.
• Juvenile dragons are ten feet long and about six feet tall. They gain full combat flight capability, but treat every hour of extended flying as a forced march Juveniles, no longer small enough to hide effectively, generally develop bright colors, like red, blue, or bright bronze.
• Mature: Levels 16+. Hit Dice: 1d20. Two claws dealing 1d12 damage and one bite dealing 3d6 damage, plus an extra 1d6 per five levels. AC: as plate, plus 2 per five levels. Adult dragons may fly freely. Older dragons begin to fade in color, with the oldest becoming dark indigo or jet-black.

Dragon Spellcasting

Dragons are innately magical creatures, though it takes time for their abilities to truly develop. They still require spellbooks to record and learn spells (though draconic runes usually suffice) but need not spend time memorizing spells. 

Nestlings can prepare 1 first-level spell per day, though they can never use Read Magic.

Whelps can cast Read Magic at will, an unlimited number of times each day. From 6th level on, they use the Elf's spell slot progression.

Dragon Breath

Dragons aren't born with the ability to breathe fire or lightning, instead developing more powerful breath weapons as they mature. A dragon's choice of breath weapon is final and cannot be changed. Most breath attacks are assumed to automatically hit since they affect huge areas, though they are technically projectile weapons and can be treated as such if necessary - such as during an epic dragon vs. dragon sky duel.

Nestlings and whelps have the choice of either acid spit, or paralyzation gas. 

Acid spit has a range of 10 feet per level, and deals 1d4 damage for a number of turns equal to the dragon's level, unless cleaned off. Acid spit hits only one thing, and must roll to hit like any other ranged weapon.

Paralyzation gas can be projected 2 feet per level, and forms a spherical cloud with a radius of 1 foot per level. 

A juvenile dragon develops a true, extraordinarily powerful breath weapon. The dragon has the choice of spitting lightning, breathing fire, or breathing frost.

Lightning affects a straight line with a range of 200 feet, plus 20 feet per level, inflicting 2d6 damage to everything hit. The lightning gains 1d6 damage every fifth level.

Flame and frost breath hit a 30 degree cone to a distance of 30 feet, plus 10 feet per level. They inflict 2d6 damage to everything they hit, gain 1d6 every fifth level, and will do flamey and frosty things to whatever they hit, contingent on your system's rules for flamey and frosty things.

After each breath weapon use, the dragon must make a CON check. If failed, the dragon's breath glands are exhausted - it must make a new CON check each week, and cannot use the breath weapon again until the check is successful.

Dragon Abilities

Dragons can climb and swim freely, with no penalties. Dragon combat movement is effectively twice that of a human, though they are less capable of disposing of waste heat, and march at similar rates. Mature dragons are capable of extended, high-altitude flight and have an overland movement rate triple that of an unencumbered human.

Dragons lack opposable thumbs, and thus cannot effectively hold or use weapons, items, locks, etc. Dragons also cannot effectively use any sort of armor or clothing, due to their musculature. Suits of fitted dragon armor are possible, but they will be either extraordinarily restrictive, or wear out quickly. Smaller items may work, if they are custom-made. Since dragons are universally viewed as the capricious and terrifying destroyers of cities and eaters of maidens, there are very few smiths willing to work on equipment for them, or even a town guard that won't attack on sight. 

Dragons require 1 ration of food per level, per day, and 1 ration of water per two levels, per day.

First Level as Survival Horror

Some tangential thoughts prompted by a discussion at The 9 and 30 Kingdoms:

What I value most in a class system and rule-set are the principles of definition through play, and the ability to play with understanding as little of the complete system as possible. Though I'm currently using LotFP's class system with few modifications (save the magic system), I'm working on a three-class system with "specialist classes" that are sort of like prestige classes, but available after 3rd level and with no other requirements. Basic classes would be reduced to the three archetypes - fighter, mage, thief.

As it is, each class knows some of the elements of each of the other classes - thieves and mages know how combat works and can use some weapons and armor. Mages and fighters have a limited ability to find and disarm traps. Everyone's a little bit of a jack-of-all trades, enough to give a bit of leeway in adverse circumstances.

What if, instead, the only "combat system" available to a mage was, "The orc stabs you in the guts and you die?" Obviously, this would absolutely require the dungeon to be structured such that every problem lent itself to all three conflict-resolution systems, or at the very least, complete avoidance. The "obviously present" trap becomes paramount. And it would also require the GM to be open to players creatively forcing problems into their niche ("All I can do is attack? Well, I attack the trap mechanism!"). But if Amnesia: The Dark Descent could get away without letting the character attack the monsters, at all, ever, why can't a dungeoncrawl?

So far, I've been assuming only one player. A party composed of characters like this wouldn't be immune to the survival-horroresque problems faced by the single character - as each individual is still only capable of one type of action, and vulnerable to all the others. Teamwork becomes an absolute necessity. And, most of all, creative play becomes the only possible way to survive.