Sunday, February 28, 2021

B/X House Rules: Custom Character Classes

I gained a couple of pages in the layout for Fang, Faith, and Legerdemain (the B/X house rules book I've been working on), and have decided it needs a Custom Character Classes appendix.

The overall system is one that's familiar (from both Dragon Magazine and 2e), but I've tried to make it more "Moldvay-like" (as much as I could). 

This is a pretty rough draft (I know there are some issues) but I'm doing a beta of it regardless. I appreciate any input people are willing to provide.

Download the Beta PDF of Fang, Faith, and Legerdemain "Appendix A: Custom Character Classes" >>

Please let me know your thoughts. For shorter comments, feel free to use the comments boxes below. If you'd rather give longer input (e.g., in a text document), or even mark up the PDF, I've set up a FileDrop you can use. Make sure to include your name (as you'd like it to appear in credits) so I can add your name to the Thanks section.

Use this link to access FileDrop. >>

Thanks!


3 comments:

  1. In general, I love it. Some classes/species could add abilities that would need to be fleshed out. "Natural Weapons" (which many species might have) needs a Factor number. This should probably be variable by number of attacks and damage.
    There should also be "Natural Magic Abilities" (a spell like ability) that could have a factor linked to the spell-level of the ability. E.g. a Devil Swine that has the 'charming' ability might have a factor of 3 (because its spell equivalent is 1st level and is usable 3x per day). Djinni would have great power at level one but would take a long time to advance levels.

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  2. 1. It's not clear if non-humans gain any benefit for the Factor 2. If yes, what. If not, then why?

    2. Without the text at the other end of the p.00 reference for Florentine fighting, that name is hyper-specific. Is that appropriate? Also the (two-handed) clause seems inaccurate. Using a polearm is two-handed fighting. Finally, there's a trailing (2) at the end of the item that looks out of place.

    3. The cost of HP/level beyond 9th seems out of proportion. The extra HP at +2 and +3 will cost tens of thousands of XP before reaching 10th level, for that fairly tiny benefit. Perhaps it could be derived from the HD/level: 1d4 & 1d6 get +1, 1d8 & 1d10 get +2, 1d12 gets +3.

    4. Follow-on to the previous, is it an option to get +0 HP/level after 9th? Is so, then and explicit +0/0 entry would be helpful. If not, then the minimum +1 (mathematically speaking) is artificially inflating the total XP cost for every class.

    5. Similarly, there's no explicit choice for a class that cannot use magic items. It looks like "As fighter" is the minimum. That is, it's not clear which Base Class Conditions are exclusive and which -- like Thieves' Abilities -- are means to pick-and-choose.

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