Over the months, in various discussions with acquaintances and fans, there basically emerged two possible paths that a 4th slate could take: Monstrous Races, or, what I dubbed "Heroes of Wrath & Redemption."
The first idea is probably one that appeals to the interests of a specific segment of tabletop gamers. I think the demographic is probably a cross-section of the DMs who get heavy into the "monster manual" side of running RPGs, and the players who are always looking for more and more options. While monsters generally use the same basic mechanics of the system, a lot of times they get abilities that are never presented as PC options. Some suggested "classes" for a slate consisting of monstrous races were:
- Dragon
- Drider
- Sphinx
- Centaur/Minotaur
The reason I can't see myself writing this sort of content, is simply because I don't fit into the demographic of people interested in those options. I've always come at gaming more from the "player" side, rather than the DM side, so my interest in monstrous creatures hasn't really ever been there. I don't have the breadth of knowledge (in terms of mechanics) nor a grasp of the appeal (in terms of flavour) to really present those options in a meaningful way. It's one thing to be able to mechanically analyze a class that you've never played (but one which interests you) and do a thumbnail sketch of it; this is essentially the process that produced the Warlord and the Spellbinder, amongst other examples in TNP.
The other big sticking point is that it doesn't quite conform to my ideas about fantasy games, in general. A lot of people are of a mindset akin to "anything you can't do in real life, should be in a fantasy game." My own perspective is more along the lines of "there should be some fantastic and impossible things going on, but the characters should be relatable." Now, this is sort of where we end up with elves that are just tall humans with pointy ears, and dwarves that are just short, fat humans with beards. But I think that having characters be close enough to our day-to-day selves (perhaps just with one or two characteristics taken to extreme) makes them more... well, human. So I can't really see myself writing player options that make the characters something else -- at least not without the help of people who are really passionate about that conceit, and that design space.
Now, the second part kind of hits at something that was touched on in my most recent post. By and large, the classes that are presented in TNP come from a handful of books in the 4th Edition D&D line:
- Player's Handbook 1
- Player's Handbook 2
- Heroes of the Fallen Lands
- Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdoms
There are some outliers, of course: shades of "Heroes of Shadow" can be seen in the Blackguard, Necromancer, Assassin, and School of Trickery subtypes (and I'd argue that the Acrobat is a cousin of the Executioner, as well.) The Skald and the Barbarian lean heavily on their counterparts from "Heroes of the Feywild," while the Monk and Swordmage appear in 4th Edition in the PHB3 and "Forgotten Realms Player's Guide," respectively.
So who got left out?
Well, everyone from PHB3 not named "Monk" for starters. The other notable exception would be the Avenger (PHB2).
Let's run down the list, and see where the problems start to crop up:
Avenger sort of suffers the same fate in TNP as it did in 5th Edition; with its main mechanic (Advantage) being made universal, the class loses a lot of its weight. Taking it a bit further, with this game obfuscating things like weapons, armor, and ability score usage, it would be difficult (if not impossible) to really mechanically represent the Avenger within the system. Some players have suggested that the Paladin (particularly the Blackguard archetype) as well as the Swordmage or even a great-weapon Fighter could simply be reflavoured as an Avenger.
My preliminary thoughts about what an Avenger would look like in this system pointed me in the direction of the d4 or d6 framework; low HP, but potentially large weapon damage from using the "double roll and stack" mechanic. This ends up overlapping the Acrobat and Fighter design space a bit too much, though (and arguably those are already cramped by classes like Guardian, Adventurer, and Barbarian.)
Psionics as presented in 4e (namely the power point classes) might not stretch beyond one class, within the TNP ethos (where classes are able to have more than one Role.) Porting in that whole subsystem for such a small payoff hardly seemed worth it; the other problem they present is that while historically they represent a different power source (or at least, a different way of "doing" arcane magic), they really... couldn't, in this system.
Runepriest is another example of a 4e class I was always interested in, but never had a chance to play. With regards to its possible place in TNP, I always saw it more as a subtype for either the Cleric or the Paladin. The "rune state" mechanic effectively functions as a stance, which maps closely to Paladin auras -- the rest is just fluff. The alternative would be to slot it in as a Cleric subclass, which would mean bumping the Invoker in some way or another. I always saw Invoker as a d6 class (akin to a blasty, sorcerer type) or a d10 class (damage-stacking, surge-burning) but I never saw it really as more than an subtype within a bigger class, and I didn't see a fit for it as a Paladin archetype (since Paladin is a decidedly melee class, and Invoker is ranged.) Do you split up the Rogue, and put Sorcerer with Invoker? And then do you add Avenger onto Assassin? Or staple Assassin onto Fighter?
In short, the Runepriest sort of falls victim to it necessitating a whole game of "musical chairs" in order to fit in where it should (and even that "where" was never clear.) This happened a bit, back when the design transitioned from Beta 3 to Beta 4, but I would really need to have an overarching change in the framework to want to do something like that again -- not just to accommodate one class.
Seeker has sort of the same problem that Avenger does; it uses an unconventional ability score for its attack stat, and that doesn't translate to this system at all. I think the Hunter from Essentials (also represented in TNP) does the "bow-wielding controller" niche adequately -- if somewhat more "safe" or "mundane" in design than the Seeker.
Some other classes that got tossed around were the Vampire (or perhaps a "Blood Mage"), as a d4 class -- with Druid-like mechanics for extra HP, a reserve-based mini-game, or potentially other effects while Bloodied. Since each slate is intended to have both a healer and a defender, either Artificer or Ardent would have to make an appearance, with perhaps roles stapled onto an Avenger or Death Knight class, in order to cover all the bases. Elementalist as an unconventional, ranged, d12 class also sparked my imagination a bit.
Ultimately, the trouble with "Heroes of Wrath & Redemption" is a combination of factors. There isn't much of a unifying theme, in terms of either flavour or mechanics; in a lot of cases, they seem like classes that are just "this class, but" or "this other class, only more." There would be a lot of overlap with those classes that are currently using the Divine and Shadow power sources, so the temptation is there to just restructure all the slates from the ground up -- making them conform more closely to Power Sources, for example. But the biggest problem is that almost all of the suggested classes would need mechanics custom-built (or at least completely reinvented to fit the system) in order for them to function, and I'm just not sure the design space is really there, for most of them.
What do you think? Are there ways some of these idea could be implemented in TNP?
Is an entire 4th slate viable, or should some of these classes just appear as options for the existing roster?
What do you think? Are there ways some of these idea could be implemented in TNP?
Is an entire 4th slate viable, or should some of these classes just appear as options for the existing roster?
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