I've always liked this campaign setting, as a world, and am beginning to brainstorm on reworking the concepts for pathfinder, whether they be used in Cerilia or Golarion in the end I'm unsure. I am not very fond of what Birthright.net has come up with for a 3.0/3.5 conversion. For one they introduce a 7th ability score for blood which is rolled, and their rules still contain random tables for bloodline abilities.
This seems antithetical to the feel of 3.x, and making everything about choice. In fact it feels an awful lot more like the 2e psionic wild talent system, where one guy could get Psionic Disintegrate at 1st level and make his DM cry like a baby. However people feel about XPH psionics (that's not what this topic is about, so let's leave the endless debate and flame out) they shoehorned a previously alien and unbalanced system into the form of 3.5 to mimic the progression of the Wizard.
My current concept is to make a Scion class with choosable abilities, similar to Rogue Talents or Barbarian Rage Abilities. There would be a Blooded Scion feat available to anyone, much like Wild Talent/Hidden Talent, to represent a more tainted bloodline. Lesser Blood Abilities choosable between levels 1-8, Major 9-14, Great 16-20. In order to get some greaters you would have to have the lesser, similar to Rage/Talents that require the same.
It's just a rough idea at this point, and I haven't started doing the actual bookwork. I would also like to point out that at this point I have no desire to change/update the Doman level rules, as my purposes would be to have adventures in Cerilia not necessarily run a PBP wargame as awesome as that would be. I just want a more coherent, elegant, and compatable system for people of noble/divine blood, hopefully something general enough that one would be able to use the concept of blood abilities in another setting.
What do you think?
Birthright has always been one fo my favourite settings and when the Kingmaker AP came out I started wondering how long it would take to make the player's kingdom big enough that the BR domain system would make more sense...but anyway...
BR allowed players of certain classes to 'rule' more effectively over holdings they were suited to but having a Scion class means they'll have to water down the progression of thier chosen class to concentrate on improving their bloodline.
I hear what you're saying about choice though. My take would be to give everyone Minor Bloodline Strength and let them chose a power (subject to derivation). As they build up their bloodline strength (if they so chose) they get to chose another power, or enhance the one they have. (I would still make them roll for the actual score).
Obviously the powers need some work to retune them to a place between 3 and 4, but this keeps the orignal flavour of the rules (a system running alongside the main D&D set), lets the players get on with being fighters/clerics/wizard/thieves and saves the hassle of designing a new character class. On the other hand it might warrant a Prestiege Class, which could allow some extra benefits and more Bloodline Points.
Cheers
Mark
Birthright has always been one fo my favourite settings and when the Kingmaker AP came out I started wondering how long it would take to make the player's kingdom big enough that the BR domain system would make more sense...but anyway...
BR allowed players of certain classes to 'rule' more effectively over holdings they were suited to but having a Scion class means they'll have to water down the progression of thier chosen class to concentrate on improving their bloodline.
I hear what you're saying about choice though. My take would be to give everyone Minor Bloodline Strength and let them chose a power (subject to derivation). As they build up their bloodline strength (if they so chose) they get to chose another power, or enhance the one they have. (I would still make them roll for the actual score).
Obviously the powers need some work to retune them to a place between 3 and 4, but this keeps the orignal flavour of the rules (a system running alongside the main D&D set), lets the players get on with being fighters/clerics/wizard/thieves and saves the hassle of designing a new character class. On the other hand it might warrant a Prestiege Class, which could allow some extra benefits and more Bloodline Points.
Cheers
Mark
Well I guess that's sort of the point, getting blood abilities for free on top of all their other stuff unbalances things in the favor of people with a strong bloodline. That was precisely the problem with 2nd edition wild talents. 3.5 and Pathfinder have moved more and more towards keeping everyone even on a resource scale. Point Buy for instance gives everyone the same resources to make a character. I don't like the idea of leaving that to a die roll.
However, I am fine with there being a series of feats that allow you to have abilities along the same line. You still have to spend character resources to get the power, kind of the underlining balancing mechanic in PF.
My thought was putting all the domain level rules as an addition to uses of Leadership, adding your bloodline level (generally half your character level) to your leadership score for the purposes of determining followers (but no cohort) and to domain level rolls (diplomacy, warcraft, etc).
I'm not adverse to a bit of random rolling myself and if the players all start out at the same Bloodline Strength the variance is kept down.
I do like the idea of the Leadership Feat providing bonuses to the domain rolls and the Bloodline bonus for followers. And if the Bloodline score isn't to be used then Feats seem the the best way of increasing your Bloodline abilities.
Cheers
Mark