I've seen lots of mention of wishes for a Pathfinder Light system, which never really seemed to take off. And apparently, most of these suggestions where about discarding feats, less class features, and so on.
However recently, I've come to think that the complexity of the game (which is a problem inherent to the d20 system) could be reduced by approaching the issue from a different direction.
I think that the system of class features, skills, and feats is not actually the problem. That part is actually very easy and all the problems really come from using 6 books with character options at once and already planning ahead 10 levels in advance.
I think the real issue is all the rules for everything else. There is attacks of opportunity, moving through difficult terrain, getting grappled, reach weapons, range increments for ranged weapons, effects of wind, holding your breath, crafting magic items, figuring out which bonuses stack and which don't, 5 foot steps, falling prone, being at 0 hp, recovering from negative hit points, moving through snow, fighting on slippery surfaces, and many other more.
I believe that the whole game can become a lot easier if these things get an overhaul.
The great thing about this approach is, that making characters and most regular uses of skills and attacks remain unaffected and those things that change would be the ones that people have difficulty remembering anyway, because they come up so rarely. Which is partially because nobody wants to look them up again all the time.
And it would also much less work than going over all the classes, races, and feats and rewriting half of it.
Now, for this thread, I mainly want to collect what people think which parts of the rules would benefit most from being replaced by something simpler.
This is not about what you think is "too difficult" or not, or what "already works, if people would just read the rules carefully", and things like that. Everyone can play the game as written in the CRB if they want to. This little project is directed entirely at people who would like to have a simpler game, for whatever reason. Also, any ideas don't have to come in a single package, it should be easily possible to pick some of the options and don't use others.
For now, let's just collect what could be done in a simpler way. How to do it will come later.
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Here my own list of things that I want to change:
- No Combat Grid: Most games work without one, and so could a d20 game like Pathfinder.
- -> This directly affects Attacks of Opportunity.
- Rules for 0 and negative hit points.
- Penalties for range increments.
- Grappling
- Moving on unusual terrain