What if, I as a DM happen to have far too much time on my hands, and put together a system where players remain at level 1, and buy class-features, skills, HP and feats with "building points" they get at the end of each adventure. Hp will be limited to a maxed out 12 + con.
Magic is rare, need to become an apprentice to learn everything, and a master mage might have a signature lvl 2 spell or a lvl 3 that he will hand down to one apprentice one day.
3d6 instead of d20, and armor gives DR.
This way it will be gritty, realistic, and of cours WBL and CR has to be replaced with dm shenanigans.
But, the benefits are interesting.
Using a harlberd against cavalry will be good, because +2 in a system where you will have max 5 to hit, will make a lot of difference.
Dagger-rogues will never be able to take on knights in fullplate (9DR) without dirty tricks, and the mage that masters fireball will be a man of power. A 5d6 burst 60ft wide will turn the tide in a war, since max hp will be about 18 total.
To promote diversity, specializing in weapons will provide additional bonuses to the ones they have, so a harlberd will gain even more bonus against cavalry if you train with it.
The goal is realism and danger. Being surrounded by city guards will be lethal no matter how good you are, and you will have to carry appropriate weapons for each situation. Eg. shortswords against knight on horseback will be retarded.
A getting hit with a greatsword might just eat through your health and kill you, as opposed to post-level 8 play in pathfinder where a mage can eat 40 damage in one blow and continue on his business as usual.
Last, but not least, magic items will become interesting and useful. A robe of many things is frowned upon by a party rich enough to buy it, but here it might save your life.
TL;DR
Classless, gritty, levelless system. Hp maxes out, you buy each save, skill, feat, HD size increase, proficiency and spell on its own. Without level, there is no need to worry about CR, or how big the kings reward should be. Surviving is its own merit.
Yea I dont see any reason to try to do this with pathfinder. You would literally have to rework every single rule. Dnd/Pathfinder was never meant to accomplish this. There are other systems like Gurps that actually had such design goals. What is the benefit of doing this with pathfinder? I just dont see it.
I know other systems have better support for this, but I want the feats like power attack, the wondrous items from the handbook, the system with saves.
I want the class features, and other things.
I want all the items like harlberd, all the armors like they are.
Sure, a lot will be free-formed, and rules will be re-written. But I like the wands and rods of fireball, and the wide variety of spells.
In short, I like the feeling of dnd and pathfinder, the flavor.
Check here, the 'classless' PDF should be of use to you.
Wow! I'd almost forgotten that was still floating around.
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I know other systems have better support for this, but I want the feats like power attack, the wondrous items from the handbook, the system with saves.
I want the class features, and other things.I want all the items like harlberd, all the armors like they are.
Sure, a lot will be free-formed, and rules will be re-written. But I like the wands and rods of fireball, and the wide variety of spells.
In short, I like the feeling of dnd and pathfinder, the flavor.
There's no reason you can't adapt Pathfinder to GURPS. That's kinda what its made for. Hence the Generic Universal part of GURPS.
You're essentially deigning a new system that has a lot of stuff in common with GURPS. You could also find another system and use that with Pathfinder.
I know other systems have better support for this, but I want the feats like power attack, the wondrous items from the handbook, the system with saves.
I want the class features, and other things.I want all the items like harlberd, all the armors like they are.
Sure, a lot will be free-formed, and rules will be re-written. But I like the wands and rods of fireball, and the wide variety of spells.
In short, I like the feeling of dnd and pathfinder, the flavor.
The work of adding the few dnd/pathfinder specific things you do like to Gurps (or some other classless low magic system) is WAAAAY less then the work required for gutting the whole of pathfinder and building it back from the group up keeping the tiny fraction of it that you do like.
Kolokotroni and nikadeemus, thanks for your advice, I am going to take a look at GURPS, it seems i misunderstood you.
So this GURPS is easy to integrate with other systems?
The problem with GURPS it that as a DM, you basically have to create the entire world from scratch, or convert stuff from PF over to that system if you want anything more than a bland basic fantasy world. That is a huge problem, and the main reason why I never get very far into a GURPS campaign. It is so much easier to just use Pathfinder as is.
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Check here, the 'classless' PDF should be of use to you.Wow! I'd almost forgotten that was still floating around.
I know! It'd be a shame to let all that work go to waste. I bet the OP could really use it for a good base. Just cut out the HD increases or something.
The problem with GURPS it that as a DM, you basically have to create the entire world from scratch, or convert stuff from PF over to that system if you want anything more than a bland basic fantasy world. That is a huge problem, and the main reason why I never get very far into a GURPS campaign. It is so much easier to just use Pathfinder as is.
But the OP is talking about converting the entirety of the mechanics from pathfinder to something that will look a whole lot like GURPS. I am confident that is a far larger undertaking, then taking something like Golarion (where the setting products are mechanics light) and tieing it to the GURPS system.
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Hmm. Personally I wouldn't suggest GURPS.
I would suggest Unisystem. Most of the work has already been done for you.
Grab a copy of the Dungeons and Zombies splatbook. You can use it as is with Witchcraft (which is free), or for a more action-y feel, use Ghosts of Albion (Which I consider to be a better version of the system) as your core book. Additionally, there have already been some pretty good d20 to Unisystem conversions, and one that converts over all the spells in the 3.5 SRD, and includes a D&D type magic system, if thats your bag.
You could condense the skill list to match D&D, or use the one from either of the corebooks mentioned above.
Conversions
Guidelines
Spell/Magic System Conversion
And if you have any further questions, the guys on the unisystem boards are friendly and helpful. Unisystem is one of those systems that everything has been converted to (pretty much) Forums.
Unisystem is less chancey than D&D, in that you're generally rolling smaller dice(d10) with bigger bonuses. So less of the game relies on random chance, and more on your character.
Its my other system of choice. Next time I run WoD, it'll be adjusted for unisystem mechanics.
For the limits you're looking at? Cap skills at 6 ranks (instead of letting people keep buying them higher). Attributes, I'd go the route of Witchcraft, and allow each attribute to be raised once after character creation (Ghosts of Albion doesn't have that limit). The skill list in witchcraft is a bit overkill, and the one from ghosts a bit too minimalist. I'd suggest condensing the witchcraft skill list. Feel free to map them up against the PF skill list.
Heres the list I use: Academics, Animal Ken, Athletics, Awareness, Brawl, Crafts, Deception, Disguise, Drive, Empathy, Engineering, Expression, Intimidation, Legerdemain, Marksmanship, Medicine, Melee, Navigation, Occult, Persuasion, Pilot, Politics, Ride, Science, Security, Socialize, Stealth, Streetwise, Survival, Technology.
For a D&D type game, I'd drop Drive, Technology, and Re-title Pilot to Fly.
Its worth noting that Unisystem has enough versions, that if youre looking, there are at least 4 official magic systems in addition to the D&D style conversion. The one in Witchcraft is alot like d20 psionics, and the one in GoA is a refined version of the system they came up with for the Buffy RPG. No limit on spells each day. Anyone can cast magic directly from a spellbook if they know the language to read it, but it'll take minutes or hours instead of the seconds a mage could do it in, and casting spells gives you a fatigue penalties, that goes away after resting for a couple hours or spending an action point. You have to make spellcasting rolls to cast.
But the OP is talking about converting the entirety of the mechanics from pathfinder to something that will look a whole lot like GURPS.
Yes, that's exactly what I did with the Beta playtest rules for Pathfinder, as TOZ linked (albeit the exact framework is closer to Victory Games than to GURPS proper). 80% of the work has already been done.
YES!
I thank all you awesome people on this board. I began with two empty hands, and idea and a mountain of work, and now I have a whole toolbox to plunder from.
Awesome help, awesome forum and awesome people.
Thanks for the submissions, documents and critique.
The problem with GURPS it that as a DM, you basically have to create the entire world from scratch, or convert stuff from PF over to that system if you want anything more than a bland basic fantasy world. That is a huge problem, and the main reason why I never get very far into a GURPS campaign. It is so much easier to just use Pathfinder as is.But the OP is talking about converting the entirety of the mechanics from pathfinder to something that will look a whole lot like GURPS. I am confident that is a far larger undertaking, then taking something like Golarion (where the setting products are mechanics light) and tieing it to the GURPS system.
Having tried to do that, I disagree. The problem I ran into, is that there are a lot of things in PF that have no equivalent in GURPS. You end up have to actually change the GURPS system at some point.