So there have been a lot of changes in my life, goals, and schedule since my last post. In my first post I mentioned wanting to post daily, that has been changed to weekly. There is still the possibility of a second post in a week if I think of something I really, really want to write about immediately, but that will be more an exception as opposed to the rule. This is to hopefully avoid burnout, a problem I am well acquainted with from past endeavors. A friend suggested this course of action and I have chosen to act on that suggestion.
Secondly I have started a new certification course for my work that will be taking a lot more time than I had initially thought. The course will be a major focus of mine up until I take the exam in July. My hopes of possibly getting a Kickstarter up in November are gone, and February is much less likely. I am probably going to shoot for mid to late summer 2018 at this point so that I can focus on my studies. This is a frustrating situation but it is where I am, I am not giving up on Enchanted Kingdoms but I am slowing down on its march towards Kickstarter. However on the brightside I am improving myself and am no longer going to be rushing or hurrying to get this to Kickstarter. If things progress faster on their own and I can get things to launch I will definitely still do so. I am just not going to push the envelope. This also means I have more time to respond to and make changes based on feedback. So there are some silver linings.
At this point I am really close to a printable playtest book for Enchanted Kingdoms. I need to type out monster information for the beastiaryy and clean up the places where names are incongruous. For example the 3rd and smallest action type is sometimes called a bonus action and sometimes called a swift action. I need to pick one and stick with it. I want to get a working map prototype, and a few more things into the lore and setting area smoothed out as well. So if your one of the people I asked to playtest that is in the works. Hopefully in the next week or two. Depends on how quickly I can figure out my new schedule that includes study time.
Enchanted Kingdoms is intended to be a very bright type of fantasy. It draws from cartoons and happier legends and folklore. It definitely has it’s dark and menacing factors but as a whole it is more light and fun. Or at least it is intended to be in concept. DMs and their players get to decide how that plays out at the table. When looking at the more skill centered character I chose to return to the gaming roots for the class. I have currently labeled the class the Thief and included Burglar and Pickpocket talents at first level. I also decided I wasn’t really keen on the “assassin” aspect of most rogues in games since D&D 2nd edition. However trying to keep some viable combat options available to players I gave the class the ability to finesse their weapons, use their Agility instead of Might. I also added Throwing Weapon and Two Weapon Fighting talent paths. I feel like those are very skills based combat styles. I won’t lie, a lot of video games give the Thief class Two Weapon Fighting also, so that backs up my change in my mind. The “Backstab” talent/ability still exists in the game but is now a part of the Hunter class. I will talk about Hunters more in their own post.
The Thief class is also tied to the Duskfall realm. The Duskfall realm, or Duskfalls for short, is one of the 2 reflections of the Enchanted Lands. As reflections of the Enchanted lands they have a nearly identical lay out as the normal world but it is altered by their aspects and denizens. The Brightwylds are a land of Light and Life while the Duskfalls are lands of Shadow and Decay. As a result of this connection the Thief class gains shadow based abilities that allow them to cloak themselves in darkness, and eventually others as well as even teleport in shadows. More about the Reflections will be in a later post as well, but I felt some context was needed for those Thief powers.
I'd stick with Swift Action, but don't do the 4E thing and say "everyone gets a Standard, Move, Swift" because then you avoid people hemming and hawing and looking for Swift Action things to do on their turn.
ReplyDeleteIf you just say somewhere else entirely that a Swift Action "is like a Free Action but you only get one for free, and then it uses up your Standard", people only care about it IF they have something that uses a Swift Action.
Also, Swift Action doesn't sound as odd to me as Bonus Action does.
Thieves could backstab in 2nd Edition D&D, and it was a LOT more restrictive as to when you could do it, so if anything 3E made it less "assassin-y" and more like you're taking cheap shots when enemies are distracted.
So I'd give them some ability to get a bonus when teaming up with allies if you want to emphasize underhanded-but-not-assassin behavior.
Like I said I just moved that over to the Hunter class. I will cover it more in that post but I figured it fit there because hunters kill things.
DeleteUpdated the post to reflect the 2nd edition information. I honestly only ever played 2nd like 4 times ever, and not for a whole bunch of years. Didn't really care for it. Thank you for correcting me on that one. Many stories and fairy tales use theives as skilled individuals without the whole killer aspect and so that was what I ran with. Really alot of the classes went in a blender and came out different.
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