Visions of Aestia

(I originally posted this over at the True20 forums)

Having done magic and combat, the next big area to convert to True20 in a running campaign is the classes (and prestige classes).

This is really the trickiest bit - moving from very specific classes in d20 to the three generic True20 classes requires a lot of thought if you want to preserve your existing feel.

There are essentially three ways you can handle such a conversion. The easiest is simply to ‘grandfather’ in existing characters. New characters, when generated, are done up using the True20 classes, and that’s it. A popular variant is to preserve the existing characters but require that all new levels are taken in the True20 classes. This is especially handy for NPCs where you don’t really want to do nore work than really needed.

A second alternative is the total rebuild. This alternative is to rebuild the existing characters using the new classes and feats, trying to match the capabilities of the old character as closely as possible.

While these are both popular strategies (because of the low effort required), they don’t address the concerns of the world builder. The choice of classes is actually quite integral to many settings, and contribute heavily to the overall “look and feel”. In these situations, you want a conversion process that will retain the unique differences between existing classes while building on the underlying True20 mechanics. The rest of this post will concern itself with this third alternative.

The first step is to normalize the BAB and saves. You shouldn’t have to do anything here except redo the charts and eliminate the multiple attacks. Drop spells known/readied while you’re at it; with the new magic system they are no longer needed.

The next part is trimming the feats. The idea is to eliminate all the free feats and bonus feats, using the rationale that characters will receive a feat every level. Remember that we’re only doing classes here, so keep bonus racial feats.

Next, trim the class abilities that are feats in the True20 system. For example, Sneak Attack and Trackless Step can be translated directly into True20 feats; they should be dropped from class definitions.

Next take a good look at arcana. Spell-like and supernatural abilities often duplicate the effects of arcana, even if this is not instantly obvious from the wording. In most cases you’ll want to drop these abilities as the character can take a feat to learn the corresponding arcana.

At this point, you’re likely facing two scenarios. Some classes, like the standard fighter or wizard classes, will be featureless blobs. Others, like the monk or druid, will have a large number of unique abilities that have no direct analogue in True20. How can we reconcile this with our need to preserve flavour?

We have two paths open to us, and thankfully they can co-exist.

One option is to follow the example set by Blue Rose and adopt the idea of heroic paths (which in many ways are the evolution of Mongoose’s character concepts). Classes that have been stripped of everything unique can be reincarnated as a specific example of a generic class.

For example, the converted wizard can be a heroic path for the True20 adept. Pick two of the class skills as the starting skills at first level and come up with four likely feats; the obvious ones are Familiar, Imbue Item, and Power/Spell Training x2. You could give examples of specialist wizards by picking different starting spells or dropping one of the other feats to broaden the spell selection.

You don’t have to stop at first level, either; you can extrapolate feat selection all the way up to twentieth level if you are so inclined. That’s a great way to demonstrate to yourself or your players that you can build characters that are near enough to your existing possibilities.

The second option is to retain a small number of class abilities that emphasize the uniqueness of each class. In my own campaign, this is the option I’ve chosen; I have fourteen core classes that have extremely distinct roles and flavour, and they’re very deeply woven into the fabric of the campaign world.

From my own experience, I’ve retained class features for levels 1, 5, 10, 15, and 20. The first level feature is essential; otherwise there’s no real distinction between classes. I’ve chosen additional features every five levels to maintain the uniqueness of the roles. Since I am still using the standard feat progression, my classes will be slightly more powerful on average than characters built using the standard True20 roles. Luckily, the revised magic and combat systems, IMO, are a little harder to abuse than the d20 rules.

The most important bit of advice, should you also go down this route, is to make sure that any abilities you retain really are unique. If you don’t have enough abilities, or if the abilities you choose are too similar to each other or to existing feats, you’re better off shrinking the number of classes. You can always create heroic paths for classes you need to eliminate.

Ultimately, the number of classes you end up with is a function of how important class is to your campaign setting and how different your classes really are. Once you’ve gone down this route, you may surprised at how many class abilities don’t really do anything unique or interesting; there are hordes of prestige classes that just shift class abilities between existing classes or grant spells to non-spellcasters.

My conversion is still ongoing and under playtesting; I’ve eliminated all prestige classes at this point (roughly 30) and still have my 14 core classes. On the other hand, I expect to end up with close to 80 heroic paths; plenty of samples to fire the imaginations of my players and really provide flavour for the campaign world.

One final thought: fewer classes is better. If you can get away with the three True20 classes, do so - just provide three to six heroic paths for each.

(I originally posted this over at the True20 forums)

Combat in True20 is a whole new experience. The True20 and Blue Rose appendices do an excellent job of helping make the transition mechanically - the conversion process is relatively straightfoward and painless. This article is going to talk about integrating the new system into an ongoing campaign.

The biggest obstacle to adopting the new, streamlined system is player resistance. Combat in True20 is considerably more dangerous than in d20. Teams that are used to kicking in the door and going toe-to-toe are going to be in trouble; they’ll have to learn tactics and how to avoid combat through stealth or negotiation. Some people are not going to be happy.

Start by simply recalculating everybody’s basic combat stats (attack, defense, damage, and toughness). I find it makes things clearer to write the damage DC (15 +damage) next to a weapon’s final damage; it helps people gauge the relationship to toughness a bit better.

Introduce the damage track. You’ll need to run a sample combat at this juncture, so that everyone can get their heads around the basic flow of combat. Gloss over multiple attacks and AoO; you’re going to need to eliminate those, but just handwave it at this point; if you mention it too early it will colour people’s reactions negatively (unless you’ve already houseruled them away/know your group hates them).

The very next thing you do is introduce the minions rule. Take special care to emphasise this, as it causes a big adjustment in player perception. See, you’ve just demonstrated that True20 combat flows differently and is more lethal. By introducing the minions rule, you’re tamping down the overall danger level - they won’t consider “standard” encounters as overly threatening, and will instead be able to concentrate on those really critical battles.

Now, you need to eliminate attacks of opportunity and multiple attacks per round. High-level fighters may object to this, even if they don’t use the full attack action all the time. I usually point out that their (more numerous) enemies no longer enjoy these advantages, and that they no longer provoke attacks of opportunity themselves, allowing them to move about more freely and take other actions (like drinking potions) that they might otherwise be too paranoid to take. And your spellcasters will be happy.

Spend some time going over the Conviction benefits. I ended up with a half-page summary of all the things they could do with Conviction in combat; this addressed a lot of perceived issues with the new system.

Here’s how I summarized the major changes for my group.

* (new combat stats)
* You get one attack per round. If you have 2-weapon fighting, you get two attacks.
* You can spend a point of Conviction to take an extra standard action (which includes an attack!) anytime during a round.
* You can take 10 on your attack rolls except when fighting unique individuals.
* Only unique individuals can score criticals or called shots.
* If a minion fails a toughness save, they’re dead; you can choose to inflict a lesser penalty.
* You can spend a Conviction point to counter a bad Toughness save.
* (other Conviction uses)

With all that out of the way, here’s some advice on other conversion issues.

Weapons that do negligible amounts of damage (1d3 or less) can be converted to +0 or even negative values. Nonsense values such as 1d1-1 can become -3 or something similar, making the Toughness DC 12 (only a threat to unarmoured characters with low constitutions). This makes much more sense, even if it looks a little odd.

Feats that are activated by taking a “full-round attack action” can usually apply their effects to a standard attack. If really wanted, you can continue to use them as written, only now the character is giving up a move action rather than additional attacks.

In many cases, you can simply eliminate feats that adjust hit points (alternately, allow a bonus to Toughness). Feats that affect AC should add to either defense (preferred) or toughness. In many cases, you can simply eliminate the feat in question and substitute a more generic True20 equivalent. Feats that allow additional attacks should either be tossed or require the use of Conviction.