David Walter's page

I've been puttering about with working up NPCs for games lately, and something I noticed about my own style of making them has made me wonder how folks handle NPCs in their own games.

When 3.0 first came out, I did the whole 'build the NPC as a full character' routine, and kept with that through the lifespan of 3.X. But recently, after reading some things in 4e, as well as playing some good old 2e and C&C, I've noticed that I've changed my style of building characters in Pathfinder. I don't bother making them exact, or balanced. I've fallen back on my old AD&D style of statting things up for just what I need.
For example, if I needed a 6th level guard captain, I'd make him something like this (and this was made as I wrote the post, like 45 seconds to toss him together):

HD 6d8 Hp: 33 AC: 17 Str +2 Dex +1 Con +1 Int +0 Wis +0 Cha +0
Fort +6 Will +2 Ref: +3
Skills +10 if useful to a guard, +6 otherwise
Important Gear: Wears chainmail, carries a longsword and crossbow

Mage types get a bit more complex, but even then I mostly just give them a few combat spells, sometimes non combat if they are meant to be a more social encounter.
Not at all perfect, but works well enough for a quick encounter.

How many of you do similar things? Or do you prefer to make sure your NPCs are balanced and created much like PCs?

This might be a bit rambly of a post, so please bear with!

Something I have noticed in 3.X, which has carried over to Pathfinder (and don't even get me started on how bad it is in 4e), is the idea that PCs of a given level must have weapons, armor, and stat items that add up to +X bonuses to be effective at a certain level.
Magic items seem to have lost their flavor in need of the PC having a +3 sword, and people don't hang onto favorite weapons (or gear) when something with a better plus comes along, because they need those pluses to remain effective.
I kinda miss the idea of a PC using few magic items, and the game not feeling like it has magic item overload (the christmas tree effect and magic item shops are the results of this malaise).

So, I am trying to come up with some way to make items feel magical again. When a PC finds that magical sword, it is likely to be something special, have a name, and not just be a +1 bane weapon.

First I think is the need to make sure PCs get their bonuses needed, which I am still trying to figure out. It seems that it is expected that Combat (attack and damage) and Armor Class will both have +5 bonuses from magic items by the time you get to 15 or higher, and that saves will be +3 or better (this does not include special effects, JUST the base bonuses).
If that number is right, how hard would it be to dole out the pluses as something like "Destiny bonuses" to a PC over his career? Something like gaining a bonus point at X level, then another at Y, assigned as they please to Combat, Defense, or Saves, but limited to a maximum bonus based on level (with a final cap of +5). The PC then has some control over what increases fastest, at the same time getting the bonuses.

Then you can deal with magical items themselves. I still want magic to be "common". Not a low magic item campaign at all. I just want things to feel more special. Perhaps weapons and armor only gain effects (like Bane, Holy, etc), no pluses? And potions, scrolls, wands, and miscellaneous magic are more common than those?
Dealing with a favored weapon is something I would like to see too. Maybe take a page from 4e and put in a spell or item creation feat that lets a mage "move" a desired enchantment to another similar item.
Or perhaps doing something like items that grow alongside a character?
Kinda stuck here, on what to do!

Anyone have any suggestions? There are so many places in the game that fiddling with magic items can impact overall play, that it seems a daunting task when I sit down to think about it!

While I am quite pleased overall with Pathfinder, one thing I have noticed has been a bit...lacking. And that is the fighter. While it is a much more powerful class than it used to be, it still seems to be missing some "oomph", especially as they increase in levels.

So, I am working on some ideas for beefing up the fighter, to make him more equal to some of the other classes, while trying to avoid stepping on any toes of other classes. This means avoiding "spell like" effects (such as To9S did), or adding extra feats (they already have enough), or anything similar.

What I did hit upon was doing something with a fighter's training. Fighters would tend to train in particular styles of fighting, getting better and better at a particular style, or perhaps dabbling in several. While some of this can be done with feats, I have also been working on an idea for "training paths". Something that the fighter gets starting at second level, and improving from there, but able to branch out to other paths of training as desired.

Since it is a pretty long document for posting on the forums, I am instead including a link to the GoogleDocs file I wrote it up in. I am hoping that folks with familiarity with the Pathfinder (and 3.5) system will take a look and let me know what they think. It is aimed at the Pathfinder fighter, so some rules bits reference things like Combat Maneuver Bonus and the like. Anyways, please take a look if you would and feel free to give feedback!

Fighter Training Styles

Reading some other posts, I was wondering how many folks might think this is a good idea? In SWSE at least, it gave something of a death spiral, even with a hit point system, and having a consolidated way of tracking conditions really sped things up. Not sure how easy it would be to port over to 3.X, but it might be worth it.

Just a few things that I hope to see covered in Pathfinder eventually, mostly my own current nitpicks with 3.X. Leaving out the things I already see in the works for changes (like skill consolidation (very good), and giving classes more to do), here is a short list of things I look forward to seeing your take on!

Prestige Classes: I hate the current glut of them. They stopped feeling special almost immediately (part of that I know is a GM thing, you have to control what comes into the game and how easily it is gotten by PCs). Personally I would love to see Prestige Classes all be 5 levels and just ooze awesome at each level. Make them something special, not just a better base class. On a similar note however, the base, core, classes should be viable and interesting all the way to 20 (or epic levels). Looks like you have made a great start on that however so far!

Skill DCs in combat: Only way I can think to list this one. Stuff like Concentration checks and the like are WAY too easy currently. I think the introduction of the CMB you have in the first alpha release is good though, and could be easily applied to things like Concentration checks and the like, so that they remain a challenge and not just a speed bump of sorts once you get past a certain level.

Magic overshadowing Melee: Another minor peeve, which you seem to be addressing already, is how, once you get into the mid teens or higher, magic trumps melee too easily. Fighters and the like should be able to do cool stuff and contribute to the group. The stuff I have seen so far is a nice start and I hope to see that trend continue!

One Core Book: Mostly meaning the players rules here. Hopefully once you make the final release of Pathfinder, it will be in the vein of Arcana Evolved, where I only need it and don't even need to crack open my 3.X PHB unless I happen to want something unique out of it. I am a much happier gamer when I can carry around only a couple of books or so, instead of needing a small rucksack to carry to each game. :) Of course, since I moved recently and most of my gaming is now done via virtual tabletop/voice chat, that is less an issue. But it is still nice to only need to reference one book!

Magic Item Bloat: This is one I really hate. I always felt that magic items should be kinda unique and special. As it stands now, they are practically required, to the point of PCs needing magic item shops and walking around with enough magical gear to glow in the dark and read by! :) It would be nice to see a way to reduce that reliance on magical gear while not making PCs weaker, thus making actual magic items special again. That is kinda a hard one to do though, but definitely something I will be watching for! One way we handled it in a low magic game was giving PCs something every couple levels (like stat increases, but it could apply to other things. Our DM had a nice chart worked up, and it pretty much replaced bog standard magical gear like +1 rings and such, so that the actual magic items we found DID things, rather than just added to our stats, since that was not as needed).

Anyways, looking forward to seeing more on this, what I have seen so far has actually gotten me excited about DnD again, so I am chomping at the bit to see/test more!