Looking under the hood

Looking Under the Hood

The original idea for Forbidden Skies was to design something completely system-less.  The reasoning behind this was that I could run it using, say 4th Edition D&D rules one day while one of my friends could use Pathfinder for it or, if it ever struck me to do this, I could run the campaign world with Savage Worlds or some other system.

While this is still something I am toying with (at the very least, the "World" portion of this project will be written as "system-less" as possible), recent events have pushed me towards a different approach.

 The Engine

Right now, the game runs on an engine similar to 4th Edition D&D, but, in light of recent developments, I have begun to rethink this.  So, while I will still base the game on 4E's "basic" system, the progression of PCs/monsters, the classes and the races will all go through some amount of change. How much change is still up in the air: I will not be using the standard at-will/encounter/daily/utility power scheme, but I won't go back to a "Vancian" system either, classes will go through a major overhaul with the Warlord most likely not being part of the rules (probably folded into the fighter), etc.

Modding it up

 Along with some changes to classes, I decided to change the way skills work.  In 3/4E, they are bound to an ability score, making them feel "static" in my opinion.  By "freeing" them from those restrictions, I believe skills will gain in uses and become an essential tool in role-playing with their uses depending more on creativity than on rote uses.  A character could roll, for exemple, Wisdom + Arcana to perceive magical energy or Dexterity + Perception to search some hole in a wall for a switch or a secret compartment, etc.

Feats, as they are known in 3/4E, are gone.  I have felt for a while that they were too broad, and that a lot of them were traps for gullible/inexperienced players.  Do metamagic abilities belong on the same list as "toughness"?  Of course not.  A lot of those abilities are now folded into the character progressions.

Another problem I perceive with the base D&D rules for the past two editions of the game is multiclassing.  In 3E, it was mostly a trap, with saving throws taking a plunge unless you were careful what classes you were combining, and caster classes having no reason to do so unless it increases their caster level and spell progression.  Fourth Edition had a different problem, with multiclassing eating up precious feats.  Both editions missed their mark, and did not succeed in scratching the itch I had for 1st/2nd edition-style multiclassing.  I took inspirations from those versions of the game and from a concept developped at the tail-end of the latest edition (Themes) to replicate, in some ways, the multiclassing experience of previous iterations of D&D.

An early decision in the design process was to throw out alignments as a game mechanic.  Further along, I decided to remove them completely from the game, and replace them with a concept from (of all places) d20 Modern: affiliations.  While those are nice for intelligent creatures, I also added the concept of "motivations" to monsters and adversaries.  Those provide me, or anybody who wishes to run the game, to quickly see what is the driving force behind a creature's behaviour (is it territorial, motivated by greed or a simple, mindless force of destruction).

Finally, I wanted to give each class its own distinct power usage scheme, its own mechanics for gaining and using abilities.  Recent experiences have made me reconsider the differering methods of obtaining abilities, but the method by which classes use them will be different depending on the player's choice of class.

The Concept Car

I need to put this car analogy thing away...

Right now, I have four classes and four races in an early stage of development.  I hope to be done with them in early october, and plan on playtesting until late december while still working on the other classes I have planned and mapped out.  I believe the final "game system" document will contain 12 classes, some classic to a D&D-like game, others, different interpretations of well-known archetypes.

Next time, a quick look at the divine in Forbidden Skies, and how folk perceive it.

As usual, thank you for reading, and be well

E.L.F
AKA The Choice