Hey all, i been working on a new d20 system for past few years and just started by 3rd playtest group. I am interested to hear some comments from the ppl on here on the classes section. I will give some background on the system and will attached a pdf of the classes. So far the 4 core ones have been tested alot, but others still need to be looked at.


Why another D20 system?
Well the simple reason is I don’t think the rest do what I hoped things like Pathfinder was to do, fix some of the holes in the game I love. I think taking the best of all the D20 systems out there, this D20 system balances magic and might and makes the 3.5 classes fun to play for everyone. Overall there is little original, just lots of different rules and systems that I edited and make work together. Iron Heroes for their great feat and skill system, Arcane Evolved for its great magic system, Pathfinder for its changes in the classes, and my time to edited all the broken over powered spells to make them, well less broken and I hope balanced them vs each other in their level.

WHAT’S NEW?

This summary for experienced players outlines the main ways in which this games deviate from standard d20 play.

Defence: Characters have a defence score in place of an Armour Class. Armour works differently in Evolved Heroism (see below), so using the term Armour Class would be confusing. In addition, each character class provides a defence bonus to represent your skill in parrying, dodging, and otherwise avoiding blows. Some classes emphasize defences more than others. When wearing amour you use either your defense bonus( 1/2 your BAB plus a class bonus) or the armour's defense(the AC like in 3.5) whatever is higher.

Armour: Armour in Evolved Heroism provides damage reduction (DR), as explained in the “Armour and Shields” section of Chapter: Equipment. In short, when you suffer a hit, you take off how much damage reduction your armour provides against an attack, to a min of 1. You then subtract this result from the damage you suffered. Each armour using wearer level or HD to calculate the DR it grants the wearer, example full plate gives 1 DR every 4 levels.. Shields still provide a bonus to defence. Monsters get something for having Natural Armour, they absorb dmg equal each round equal to their NA( so a + 10 NA means first 10 dmg each round is absorbed before getting hurt.)

Attacks of Opportunity: Attacks of opportunity become much simpler in Evolved Heroism. You only provoke one if you take a nonattack action or if you try to move too quickly through an opponent’s threatened area.
(1) If you take a standard or full-round action that isn’t a melee attack, you provoke an attack of opportunity.
(2) If you move more than one-quarter your speed in a threatened area, you provoke an attack of opportunity. Those are the only two rules you need to remember.

Alignments: We have done away with good and evil and just kept the 3 Law, Neutral, Chaos. You are “evil” if you have taint. Only outsides have good and evil alignments, mortals do not.

Magic: Plus weapons bypass non magic armour DR, as well as count as special material like Silver or iron. There are Different ways to make magic items other than spending XP (using 2e thinking places of power or rare monster bits) . Template for spells helps offer a way to increase the power of spells. No class list of spells, everyone uses two lists, Arcane or Divine, but each is divided into Simple, Complex, and Exotic Spells. Lesser casters cast simple spells only(druids, rangers, paladins, bards), major casters cast simple and complex(Wizards, sorcerers, clerics), and you need feats to cast exotic spells. Added rarity so each spell so Common, Uncommon and rare helps control how well know spells are.

Dying: Removing True Resurrection and putting some perm things to dying even when you are bought back makes dying hurt more.

Evolved Heroism classes start out with one more feat than standard classes, though it is not as powerful as a full feat. The mastery feats allow scalable feats. There are Two types of feats: General that they get one every 3 levels starting at 5th (which are feats like skill focus, or endurance, feats that are low power or taken for RP reasons), and Elite feats that are the powerful ones like power attack and shoot on the run they get as normal( 3rd, 6th, 9th ect).


No Evolved Heroism classes have exclusive skills anyone can trap find but those without trapfinder take a +10 to the DC, that goes for trained skills, you can try to use a trained skill untrained but you have to add +10 to any DC.

Nothing has immunities anymore, where they did they either get +10 to save or a very high resistance (say 100).

Save or die spells now do stat damage on a fail save, you can still be killed by them, just not so easily.

You heal stat damage faster (1/hour instead of 1/day) since so many spells now do stat damage and any spell that does stat damage can’t be empowered to keep things fair.

Opposing checks: You get to roll as many d20’s as your stat modifier, stopping the likeness of a 10 strength wizard beating a 20 strength fighter on a bad roll.


That is a small taste, enough to give you some insight to comment on the classes i attached to the post. I would like to hear what you think of what i did to each of the classes or choose your favorite ones and comment. if anyone wants a full view of the system PM and i can send you the whole book.

Thanks for any comments anyone makes in advance.

I'd like to learn about arcana evolved, or at least what you put in your magic system.

Last sentence is confusing. Also, why not just add all concerned skills to the same skill group whenever you enter a new class? Not only is the wording confusing, but it seems to require tracing of skills to certain classes the character would have, purely for the sake of preventing multiclassing characters from having complete access to all skills. It's easier to just say 'every skill in your skill group has max ranks equal to character level +3, costing 1 skill point per rank, and skills outside of your skill group are max ranks equal to character level + 1, costing 2 skill points per rank - or skills outside of skill group can't be purchased at all.'

So, for my monk/paladin I'll choose the path of 'take more levels in monk after taking levels in paladin' because I think the code of honor for the paladin is less restrictive, even though my GM disagrees. :P

The idea of complex spells is intriguing (no clue how they work yet, haven't read that part), but I think the abilities score thing is better thought of as how it always has been - basically, just use the ability score associated with the spell (which, no doubt, associates itself with the class). Maybe the ruling could say if the spell allows more than one class to cast it, and the character has more than one of those classes (ie. wizard, cleric, druid - character is both a wizard and a druid), then they choose either ability score involved with that class. This wording wasn't really ever confirmed in 3.5e, and I'm sure that most people assume that if you're a druid and you can cast a spell from the wizard list, you could use your WIS score, or your INT score, if you happen to be also be a wizard and your INT is higher.

So if I take one level of wizard, but am otherwise a pure fighter, I can cast 4th level spells as a 10th level wizard (wizard 1/fighter 19)? Still, I like this ruling, even though it ultimately makes dipping into a caster class something that everyone will do. Unless you manage to cripple the wizard's options early on (say, a pure 1st level wizard/ECL 1, can dabble in all magic, but if you only took one level, you eventually just become a pure evoker upon taking levels in fighter, ie. - not including what should be a much greater skill in weapons - maybe you only have time to study the school your specialize in, because your character enjoys it the most? Even more so, a conjurer might specialize even more - ie. be a pure monster summoner, and the same goes with an evoker, ie. purely into fire magic). That's one way to discourage dipping, even though it might still end up more powerful than that extra feat.

Leveling Up

Poor attack progression is some weird math. Why not just make it 1/2 level? Easier than forcing players to look at tables every time.

Why are the XP benchmarks different?

The Classes

The name implies movement, like granting an extra 5ft. step or move action. Why not call it dodge?

First time you mention CMB and CMD. Reader doesn't know what those are.

Needs more rage powers! Different themes too. Some of the powers should play off the totems from 3.5e, or some of the feats. Ie. Whirling frenzy. Frenzied berserker PRC? Another capstone could be deathless frenzy, ie. Also, pounce feels more like 15th level or something.

I dunno if this would correspond with every setting. Whenever I think of dark fantasy or low/zero magic, a barbarian often comes to mind. Yeah, conan created that.

Doesn't stop barbarians from appearing in higher magic settings, of course, but I'm just saying - keep your options open. If you want a barbarian wizard, you can say that arcane feats are an assumed class feature. It shouldn't be an explicitly written class feature that comes up at a certain level. That way, it's easier for the GM to disallow if they have a certain setting in mind - otherwise, it feels like this barbarian depends on some amount of magic (or arcane magic at least; there are other types of magic too - aren't barbarians more likely into shamanism? Just imo) and will be crippled without it.

Barbarian Cap Stone

Know all rage powers? Well, that sorta throws character identity out the window.

Any other ideas? What about a barbarian that specialize in animal transformation? An agile barbarian that spits alchemists fire, harnesses chi with acupuncture and performs firewalks? A sheperd barbarian that fights with a cane and summons herds of dire sheep and/or rhinocerous (depending on the climate and region) to trample enemies? A dwarven wrestler barbarian that 'pinches' away the limbs and ears of his enemies? A Paul Bunyan barbarian that can enlarge himself with rage, uproot trees, and summon blue cows? This is a fantasy game, so anything under the sun should be considered.

Mastery Category

Maybe the barbarian can have other mastery categories besides rage? And maybe mastery categories should be limited per class rather than per character? I like the idea already, it lets a wizard actually consider themselves a pyromancer.



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All of that said, have you ever considered a system that focuses on doing more with skills? Maybe a feat that offers more skill points? No, not skill tricks from Complete Scoundrel (those are kinda silly, only allowing a character to have maybe five or so at level 20, I think it was), but something like skill talents, you could call it.

Say, a fighter that has both ride and jump (both fighter skills, normally), could throw down some more skill points that he doesn't know what to do with, in order to take up a fast mounting ability, or jump off a wall or perform flying kicks.

Or, if you want a game that focuses more specifically on character quirks and professions, the talents idea could work for a character that wants to focus on one avenue of his skill - maybe fighters jump in a different way to rogues. Alternatively again, take the GURPs route - I think GURPs has literally hundreds of skills, so when players take new classes they simply add new skills to the skill group (or the opportunity to take talent focuses; more than one talent to a given skill might cost more - two talents associated with jumping could be 3 skill points, while only one associated with tumbling is 1 skill point).

Yeah, maybe it'd be expanded skill tricks, but I was thinking of a way to make feats define a character a bit more. General feats could do that. Elite feats might open up a new set of powers, or whatever (say, with power attack, you have really powerful strikes, so you could learn some powers, such as knock back, ie.). Have a way to reward players with points to spend on powers, and the powers they choose are based on what feats they already have. Another way to do it would just be letting a feat grow with a character - a feat is more beneficial the earlier a character takes it. The first feat a fighter takes might represent his most favourite technique or the basis for his fighting style, ie.

So yeah, a bit like 4e (what could end up as a multitude of powers) - but with more character identity and less pigeon holing classes to roles or necessarily turning PCs into superheroes (so no surges, and none of the encounter after encounter in a single day - survival isn't just about winning in combat).

thanks for the comments.

magic system:
Caster get slots like 3.5 but also have a number of spells they ready.

when they choose a spell say magic missile, mage armour, and jump, they use the slots of the level to cast them and spell is not lost from memory. They use them like a sorcerer does. If you are spont caster, you dont ready any spells, just use them from your known list and then that spell is readied for rest of the day. So as the day goes on you become less and less able to choose a spell you need. Sponts cant unready spells while others can with some time.


Also given ray spells ranges never liked that they were just out to spell range.

Complex spells are just spells that a powerful, fireball, lightning bolt, fly ect, while simple spells are closer to tricks like jump.
Also have this:

Heightened Spell: A spell cast using a spell slot one level or higher than normal is called a heightened spell. Some heighten effects are just higher level spells. You can prepare heighten copies of spell if have open space. If you use a heighten effect but only have prepared the base spell, it costs you two slots to use heighten effect unless class ability says otherwise(specialist can use their school spells like this). You still have to roll to learn heighten effects (but not to know about them) like learning a new spell, but adding them does not increase the page count of spell. You unlock more power of the spell without increasing the pages in your book. This also does not count against max spells for sorcerers. You also have to be able to cast the heighten effect, so if a base spell is a simple spell but the heighten effect is complex, you have to be able to cast complex spells to use heighten effect.

Well you get caster level but not the increase in power, you can only cast 1st level spells and only ready as 1st level wizard but you cast them with CL of 10th level. Now you CAN increase your level by taking this a few times.

INCREASE SPELL LEVEL [ELITE]
Prerequisites:: Caster level higher then spellcasting class level
Benefit: When you take this feat, your maximum spell level can be one higher if your Magic Rating(CL) is higher than your caster class. You use your Magic Rating to determine your max spell level. With this feat you can cast 1 spell of a level higher than your caster class allows. (So a Wizard/Monk 5/7 would have 12th level caster level for spells but would only ready as a 5th level mage. With this feat you would get 1 plus bonus for high Intelligence of 4th level spells max. If you took this feat again you would get one 5th level and again one 6th level if taken again. Since your magic rating is 12 you could not take it again because you can’t cast 7th level spells.


What the last part of skills is saying, if your a 10th level fighter and 1st rogue, you cant add 13 points into the rogue skill group. I try to reword to make more sense thanks.


I'll look into that, it may be easier to do 1/2 level.

The benchmark are different cause 7 and 12 level are where the power level of a PC increases alot, i liked in 2e when as a wizard you had to really work to get that 12th and 6th level spells. I am planning to add in PrC in and 7th level is when they can start taking them so i want that level to be harder to get.

Cause there is a feat called that

Ah good point, i will add either a page to look it up or put it somewhere in beginning of chapter.

Yea the Barbarian needs work but no one in my test groups have played them so have had no feedback on them. I look into those you said to give me powers.

Arcane feats are like this:


ARCANE WEAPON [AB]
Drawing upon the power of magic, you imbue your weapon or fist with an arcane aura that allows you to strike with greater accuracy and to inflict superior damage.
Prerequisites: base attack bonus +1.
Uses/Day: Your base attack bonus divided by 3, rounded down, +1.
Duration: A number of rounds equal to your base attack bonus.
Benefit: You grant a single weapon (ranged or melee weapon) or other missile that you grasp an enhancement bonus on attack rolls and damage rolls. It is considered a magic weapon for the purpose of overcoming DR. The weapon’s enhancement bonus depends on your base attack bonus:


ASPECT OF BATTLE [AB]
You gather the psychic energy you have learned to manipulate in battle and form it into a mantle of power that strikes terror into your foes. In their minds, they see a horrifying war master poised to strike them down in his wrath.
Prerequisites: Mind Strike, Serpent-Eyed Strike, Charisma 13, base attack bonus +12.
Duration: A number of rounds equal to half your base attack bonus, rounded down.
Benefit: When you make a full attack, all opponents within 60 feet of you suffer a –4 morale penalty on attack rolls, checks, and saves. Creatures with fewer Hit Dice than you gain no saving throw against this ability. Those with Hit Dice equal to or greater than yours can avoid the effect with a Will save (DC 10 + half your base attack bonus + your Strength modifier). Opponents can only be affected by this power once every 24 hours. You can only choose one Arcane Battle feat to be active when making a full attack

Just some tricks that are like magic, in fact in low magic settings these would be the spells i think.

More on Mastery feats: they are from Iron heroes and are scalable.

MASTERY FEAT CATEGORIES
Mastery feats break down into the eight categories listed below. Characters gain access to feat categories through their classes; see the class descriptions in Chapter Three. A feat can belong to more than one category.

Armour: These feats cover the use of armour and other protective gear. They allow you to improve the benefits you gain from armour and shields. (Fort)

Defence: Defence feats develop your speed, agility, and ability to avoid attacks. (Ref)

Finesse: This fighting style emphasizes speed over power. A finesse fighter knows that she can land a hit if she is too quick for her opponent to make an effective parry or block. These warriors tend to value precision over brute force. (Ref or Fort)

Lore: Lore feats represent intricate, complex training that few master. (Will)

Power: This fighting style places raw hitting power over all other concerns. A power fighter would rather land one devastating blow than a dozen light ones. (Fort)

Projectile: Archers, snipers, and others who prefer ranged weapons favour these feats. They enhance your talents with ranged fighting. (Fort or Ref)

Social: The Social feats allow you to influence others, bending them to your will through your power of personality. (Will)

Tactics: The Tactics feats allow you to take advantage of your surroundings, coordinate your allies’ efforts, or lure your enemies into making a mistake. (Fort or Will)

Note: If a feat has multiple categories listed (because you can choose say Power or Finesse) you always use the save listed from above over the ones listed in entry( because most will have Fort/Ref for a Power/Fitness feat but it does not mean if you take it as a finesse feat you can use your Fort save.)

As for skills you something like that this

SKILL CHALLENGES
As your mastery of a skill improves, you can achieve more difficult feats with it. An expert climber can scale a sheer, slippery surface that a neophyte would find impossible. By the same token, a veteran learns to complete simple tasks with greater efficiency, skill, and panache. An inexperienced climber might take a while to clamber up a rocky cliff, but a skilled mountaineer can scramble up it faster. Skill challenges reflect an expert’s ability to perform routine tasks with superior grace and efficiency. They also allow you to attempt heroic deeds otherwise unavailable to you by making already difficult skill checks even harder. With a bit of luck, skill, and good planning, you can achieve the impossible.

The challenge system was designed to make skills more useful across all levels. Without challenges, your skills would become less important as you gain levels. The total result you need on a check might be low enough that, at some point improving the skill makes no difference. A skill challenge allows you to increase a skill’s Difficulty Class by 5 or suffer a –5 penalty to your check. In return, you can achieve an extra benefit in addition to the standard benefits of a successful check. If you fail due to this penalty or increased DC, you fail the skill check as normal.


I do not want to go away from the d20 system because the point of my system is that you should be able to pick up a PF or 3.5 adventure and run it with my system with very little modification. Now that is what PF said they were doing but it did not turn out this way. I been running a 3.0 adventure with my test group and up until now i did not convert any of the fights. They had a easier time so i am thinking that the PCs should have a +1 LA to them when running 3.0 and 3.5 games. It may go up to +2 by the time i am finish. I think my PCs are not as powerful as PF PCs but i have not tried to run any PF games yet. Thanks for the comments again

How does that work? You said, ready the spell and then cast it, and then it's still in your memory?
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If you want each class to be capable of great customization but able to do a multitude of things, you could have each suit a general theme.

Ie. Barbarian is typically big and strong and wild. For min/maxing, he can stop being big to get even more of the wild or of the strong. Something big would be knocking over a foe, or absorbing a hit, or traveling quickly. Something strong would be doing lots of damage, or lifting a big object and throwing it. Something wild would, of course, be rage, and accessing spirit totems and what not. He might know a bit of herbal medicine for self healing (shaman 'magic') - but it's strong and exotic stuff! Found only in places that a man with years in the wild would know to look for - only he can consume it, and it's usage would probably hurt members of other classes (they didn't grow up using it, or they simply haven't got the constitution, which is reasonable considering barbarians; whatever).

Fighter is strong and disciplined. Depending on the setting, probably served in the military or as law enforcement or as a vassal to some lord or assassin foiler, trainer, or traveling warrior of virtue. His techniques are refined and there's probably books written about them, though not necessarily. The fighter is brutal, yet civilized (enough to be a part of civilization, anyway). He could be a mercenary too, in which case, he's a scoundrel with the guise of a warrior's honor. He can be noble and honorable or crass and vane (runs the gamet of character personalities; no need to get into that, since roleplaying and mechanics can be difficult to coincide). The fighter is a bit like the barbarian, but they might not be so into the 'one hit defeats the bad guy' or 'hit and run' or other tactics they may consider to be cowardly or animalistic. Instead, they use precise tactics to defeat a foe - maybe their armor lets them outlast the foe, ie. Or their use of a reach weapon keeps it away, or combat expertise lets them fence about the bad guy until he eventually drops.

The paladin is sort of like a fighter, but has holy magic, and may be honor bound to a certain leader for whatever reason (they probably consider such a leader the champion of good or whatever and they aspire to uphold that leader's example through their own stalwart valor with a side of virtue, depending on whether or not they feel like it; it's easier than having a code, really - just make the idea of paladin more setting specific than written into the entire game) - ie. the leader could be called the 'prophet of whatever', and maybe he's a powerful cleric or sorceror (in real life, paladins were said to be sworn to Charlemagne - a great frankish king, whom united europe through christianity in the 9th century, AD). Instead of being a necessity, the code of conduct might serve to strengthen his magic in certain ways. Crusaders could reflect the more violent side of the paladin - sort of like barbarians but maybe they can inspire rage in others, and worship the god of roads (i dunno; crusaders in real life traveled really far to fight in the middle east, so they worship the god of roads to ensure that their travels are safe, especially when there's 100,000 of them traversing the roads during the third crusade - so they, may of course, slaughter innocent muslims, but that's another story!).

Bard is a story teller and performer and a bit of a fighter (they know a few martial arts that they pick up). I wouldn't focus on the performance aspect, unless you want them to have acrobatic skills as well, or able to tell jokes or use magic to transform the world into cartoon physics as a jester of sorts (not my idea; from giantitp). A 'gritty' bard would be the traveler, perhaps even the merchant, swaddled in a cloak, and traveling the road, low on rations, hoping to steal a horse or use persuasion in the hopes of joining another band for protection. They have a lot of skill points for a reason! I think that mainly they can read, and if they can't, they can recall verse very well. Knowing the words of a song is essential for delivering information - in a (mostly) illiterate world where vocal recantation is the only method of recalling information, there are those that ensure that information is correct! That could be a bard's job too. And yes, there's a certain magic that can fit into all of that - probably bordering on the arcane, due to it's near mathematically precise qualities.

The rogue is a scoundrel - but is typically urban. They'll use whatever skills come to them to survive. Eating up scraps, they don't know a fair fight, because they never evolved that way. They never learned the meaning of respect. They can be champions of the lower class, or simple stubborn thieves, hoping to do what they can before inevitably being put in prison. Many are thrill seekers, or young prodigies, or both. Others are heavy set, used to a life of back breaking labour and reliance upon craftiness. Many probably escaped being a prisoner of war or serf. While there are many peasants that become thieves, they are relatively a minor percentage to those of serfs and other slaves.

The ranger is a traveler and possibly a soldier. They are the men that hold the walls and keep the barbarians out of civilization. They are incredibly wise and their awareness alone grants them an air of mystery - so I suppose that's where the magic comes from.

Monk is a monk. Lives in a monastery. Could be a hermit living underground in a dungeon. The european one knows his way around buildings (knowledge architecture and can also be like an elf or dwarf with the search skill), knows how to pick locks (from Oblivion), can became absurdedly proficient with a few weapons of choice (exotic or otherwise; they have plenty of time on their hands), knows how to heal, and knows how to read and write. The eastern one, erm... knows martial arts, and uses eastern medicine to trascend space/time? Yeah, the latter isn't much to go on and is relatively uninspired (now you know why monks are so low tier).

those that are NOT spont caster(like clerics and wizards) have to prepare spells ahead of time like normal, but instead of using the spell and it leaving their mind, they use the level slot instead.

Example a wizard readies magic missile, jump, shield, invisibility and Alter Self.

Now he has say 3 1st level slots and 2 2nd level slots.

He casts magic missile, that uses one of his 1st level slots but the spell is still in his mind so he can cast it again and again until he runs out of 1st level slots or he can cast one of the other 1st level spells like jump or shield. It works like a sorcerer from 3.5 just they can ready new spells each day.

now the sorcerer say has same number of slots 3 1st and 2 2nd. He also can ready 3 1st level and 2nd level a day. So when he needs to cast a spell he chooses from the spells he knows(which is limited unlike wizard), casts that spell then that spell is readied and counts against his readied spells for the day. So he casts magic missile. now magic missile is readied and he has 2 1st level spells left( and 2 slots left) to choose from for the day. He can continue to use magic missile as long as he has 1st level slots or he can choose a new spell, which then becomes readied and uses a slot as well when he casts it.

Understand?

Yeah, thanks.

It's important to make sure everyone reading it understands as well.

The original sorceror didn't have to ready spells ahead of time - he could cast any spell he knows. The problem is that he isn't able to know as great a variety of spells as the wizard. That's pretty much the only distinction. Maybe he could know more if he specializes in certain schools (evocation, ie.) or flavours (fire, ie.) ...

Or how about allowing mages to cast magic in different ways based on their background or traits or feats at first level (whatever the initial character idea is)? No need to have this divide between wizards and sorcerors.
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I like your ideas on magic.

Another idea could be that higher level magic doesn't go away - it just gets weaker when you use lower level slots to cast it; or it require more lower level slots per level lower (ie. casting a 3rd level spell with 1st level slots would require 3 slots, while casting with 2nd level would be 2 - +1 per lower slot). Maybe have that in addition to the magic getting lower?

Yes well my sorcerers CAN add new spells, just it takes longer(24 hours for each spell) and can only do it 2 times a level. It does mean they could add 40 spells in 20 levels on top of the free ones they gain each level though.

The weaving i took from Arcane Evolved and i like the math it uses so.