Back in the Saddle (2022)

Work on TNP will be resuming in earnest soon!
From time to time (as inspiration hit me) I'd put in some work here and there. There is a "2021" draft containing most of the rules -- but it's almost 2023! So that's well overdue for an update.

Today, I'll talk about some of the refinements and changes that have been going on. Some of the bigger ones will be expanded upon in future posts; the plan is to get back into the usual schedule (30 posts per year) and hopefully to have 'the project' done sometime in 2024, finally.

Core Mechanics

Part of getting right down to the nuts and bolts of TNP was defining the types of dice rolls that the system uses, and how they would each function. Back when the blog wrapped up previously, there was some consideration being given to the possibility of scrapping attack rolls. Instead, they've been beefed up. Defense rolls (which were made when a monster targeted a PC) have been renamed to "saving throws" -- for familiarity's sake, but also to avoid the 'defend' action potentially causing any confusion. Initiative checks have been split off from skill checks, because of the desire to keep initiative a little more flat/swingy, while wanting skills to be more of a bell curve. Finally, base damage expressions (based on class dice) will prescribe the damage of your melee basic attacks and ranged basic attacks. With few exceptions, base damage will be the only type of these "core" rolls which can have multiple dice added to it; initiative will add one or two dice, while the others will only ever use one die as a modifier.

• Attack rolls (d20)
• Saving throws (d20)
• Initiative checks (d20)
• Skill checks (d%... sort of)
• Base damage (using class dice)

For skill checks, percentile dice will be used essentially as 2d10, with the “1s” die always being the natural result, and the “10s” die only being used if Advantage or Disadvantage apply to the roll (disadvantage always takes precedence over advantage, so in the case that both would apply, the roll would be made with disadvantage.)

Bonuses & Penalties

To streamline dice bonuses, the proposed minor and major bonuses have been eliminated. Instead, each class die will offer a specific bonus, all of which have been beefed up from the previous iteration, in order to improve the overall hit bonuses and damage output. The general rule will be that you can only roll one instance of each class dice bonus (d4, d6, d8, d10, d12) but you can have all five bonuses on a given attack; only one of the dice can be used to modify the attack roll, however -- the remaining dice will be used as a damage bonus. There are (of course) exceptions to the rule, but that will be outlined in a separate post delving into the class dice bonuses a little deeper.

The bonuses for saving throws (save bonuses) and skill checks (skill rank bonuses) will be handled by "roll Xd6, take the highest." Initiative bonuses will use class dice, and utilize similar expressions to the ones used for base damage.  Another expression that will be used is "extra damage" which will be distinct from bonus damage derived from class dice bonuses.

• Attack bonus/damage bonus (class dice bonus)
• Save bonus (d6)
  
• Skill rank bonus (d6)
• Initiative bonus (class dice)
• Extra damage (d6 and/or d10)

Advantage will be used in a lot fewer circumstances (and I'm considering cutting out some of the few that are still remaining.) Expertise has been renamed to "mastery" and "combat mastery" will be sort of the new default bonus in combat, applying mastery to attack rolls, attack bonus die, base damage, and saving throws. Disadvantage will be the main penalty, as it can easily be applied to most of the 5 core rolls.

Knowledge Skills & Power Sources

The 10 knowledge skills have been re-arranged, such that each power source has 3 affiliated knowledge skills: one which is unique to that power source, and two others which will be shared with two other power sources. While knowledge checks are rolled the same way as other skills, they are leveled up separately, and are not dependent on attributes or skillsets.

• Arcane: Arcana; Religion, Dungeoneering
• Divine: Nobility & Royalty; Medicine, Religion
• Martial: Geography & History; Animal Handling, Local
• Primal: Wilderness Survival; Animal Handling, Medicine
• Shadow: Streetwise; Dungeoneering, Local
  

Part of the intent with this, is to have the class slates mostly predicated on power sources, while still allowing each slate of classes to be able to cover off most of the knowledge skills. For example, classes in the 3rd slate might not have access to the Divine power source, but by mixing and matching the Primal and Arcane power sources, they can still get access to the Medicine and Religion skills.

Status Effects & Conditions

After a few revisions, this framework has been finalized. Disadvantage on checks with certain key skills forms the foundation, with combat mastery and/or action denial being added on to flesh them out and expand the severity. There might be some room to still streamline the list, but for now I feel they are “playtest ready” -- if anything, they may need to be built into/bolted onto more class abilities.

• Disadvantage on checks: Exhausted, Weakened, Dazzled, Frazzled
• Combat Mastery + Action Denial: Shocked, Dominated, Frightened
• Combat Mastery + other effects: Incapacitated, Dazed, Fazed

Playable Classes

Carrying over from previous designs, 10 of the 15 planned classes are in a state I would call "playtest ready" although many are not necessarily "feature complete." The archetype/domain/subclass/etc. mishmash of ideas for progression has been pared down, in order to simplify things.

Every class will have 2 subclasses to pick from at the start ("level 0") and will gain a class specialization (such as a domain) at 1st level. Generally speaking, these specializations will be unique to a single class, rather than trying to write a single batch of archetypes/prestige classes that can be reused to fit multiple types of classes and class dice.

...

There's still a few more things to unpack, but I feel like that's enough to digest already. And some topics will need a bit more room to breath. As such, I'll leave it at that for now; check back around January 11th for the next post!