Complexity

[rabindranath72]

Or, you could try to maximize fun rather than how quickly and easily actions are resolved..-nah, who'd want that?

Nice humour
"Fun" for me is NOT spending 4 hours to resolve a combat encounter. Enough said. YMMV.

Cheers,
Antonio

[warzen]

"Fun" for me is NOT spending 4 hours to resolve a combat encounter. Enough said. YMMV.

nor spending 4 hours to create the NPC for this combat encounter, which is even worse, IMHO.

W.

[rabindranath72]

"Fun" for me is NOT spending 4 hours to resolve a combat encounter. Enough said. YMMV.

nor spending 4 hours to create the NPC for this combat encounter, which is even worse, IMHO.

W.

Ah yes, I forgot this. Some of the points above also address character creation.
Thanks for the reminder.

[Clovenhoof]

It may sound tempting to just "remove AoOs and anything that relates to them". But that won't work without a complete overhaul of the entire system including classes, unless you are willing to throw game balance overboard.

For example, Barbarians, Nomads and Pirates have the Mobility chain that revolves mainly around AoOs: first it improves defence against AoOs, then later it lets them avoid AoOs altogether.
So if you take AoOs out of the game, these three classes get... NOTHING. They are better at avoiding _nothing_. So they are put at a disadvantage against all other classes that get special abilities which don't revolve around AoOs. Of course you can think up a different boon for them, but that's exactly what I'm talking about: you can't just say "No AoOs in our game" without having to tweak the whole system.

[rabindranath72]

It may sound tempting to just "remove AoOs and anything that relates to them". But that won't work without a complete overhaul of the entire system including classes, unless you are willing to throw game balance overboard.

For example, Barbarians, Nomads and Pirates have the Mobility chain that revolves mainly around AoOs: first it improves defence against AoOs, then later it lets them avoid AoOs altogether.
So if you take AoOs out of the game, these three classes get... NOTHING. They are better at avoiding _nothing_. So they are put at a disadvantage against all other classes that get special abilities which don't revolve around AoOs. Of course you can think up a different boon for them, but that's exactly what I'm talking about: you can't just say "No AoOs in our game" without having to tweak the whole system.

Nah, simply take Mobility from d20 CoC. It works, I did it

BTW, this speaks loads of the design quality of d20 3.x: making its parts so intertwined with each other, that removing one piece makes the whole house fall. Nice.

Oh, and also "throwing game balance overboard" may not be as bad as it sounds. First, because there is not proof that the actual system is really "balanced" (whatever it means). Actually, I have seen more unbalanced games in 3.x than in any other systems.

Second, because the DM is there for a reason. If I see something is not working, I can replace it with something else.

[rabindranath72]

Remove all classes, but one. Remove all saving throws, but one (call it "resist doom"). Make all weapons do 1d6 damage.
There's a lot of things that can be done to speed up the game.

Actually, there IS a game this simple, and it is actually quite FUN. It is called TWERPS. Try it, you might find that you MAY have fun even with just one stat and no skills/feats/whatever.

[LilithsThrall]

Or, you could try to maximize fun rather than how quickly and easily actions are resolved..-nah, who'd want that?

Nice humour
"Fun" for me is NOT spending 4 hours to resolve a combat encounter. Enough said. YMMV.

Cheers,
Antonio

Feats are not what slows down combat.
Though it might be useful to list what does slow down combat at all levels of expertise and see if any of those things can be removed.

[LilithsThrall]

"Fun" for me is NOT spending 4 hours to resolve a combat encounter. Enough said. YMMV.

nor spending 4 hours to create the NPC for this combat encounter, which is even worse, IMHO.

W.

Not including magic items/equipment, does it really take you four hours to create an NPC??? I can do it in about 10 minutes.

[warzen]

"Fun" for me is NOT spending 4 hours to resolve a combat encounter. Enough said. YMMV.

nor spending 4 hours to create the NPC for this combat encounter, which is even worse, IMHO.

W.

Not including magic items/equipment, does it really take you four hours to create an NPC??? I can do it in about 10 minutes.

Not using d20, it's taking me about 2 to 5 seconds, to a peak of 30 sec for really important NPCs.

W.

[Hoghose]

Why did this topic revert to some kind of subjectivity stand-off? If someone likes to remove all feats or add some of his own, then fine. Gaming is all about having fun, aint it?
There is no right or wrong about having different opinions so please quit it with the sarcastic remarks about others preferences. We all like different things. Rules are not written in stone. Period.

[rabindranath72]

"Fun" for me is NOT spending 4 hours to resolve a combat encounter. Enough said. YMMV.

nor spending 4 hours to create the NPC for this combat encounter, which is even worse, IMHO.

W.

Not including magic items/equipment, does it really take you four hours to create an NPC??? I can do it in about 10 minutes.

Which magic items?! there are not so many in the game to "choose from".
Try creating a 10th level soldier with the _correct_ number of skill points, ability score advancements (including intelligence!), _correct_ number and satisfied requirements of feats in 10 minutes. I offfer you a beer if you can come with such a feat.

[LilithsThrall]

nor spending 4 hours to create the NPC for this combat encounter, which is even worse, IMHO.

W.

Not including magic items/equipment, does it really take you four hours to create an NPC??? I can do it in about 10 minutes.

Which magic items?! there are not so many in the game to "choose from".
Try creating a 10th level soldier with the _correct_ number of skill points, ability score advancements (including intelligence!), _correct_ number and satisfied requirements of feats in 10 minutes. I offfer you a beer if you can come with such a feat.

I was talking about the d20 system in general, not the Conan system in particular. In the Conan system specifically, you're right. Magic items/equipment isn't that big a deal.
To determine the character's skill points at any particular level, take the character's base skill points and multiply by level. This is your non-Int skill points. Now, take the character's skill points from INT (not including stat increases from level increases) and multiply by the character's level. This is your INT skill points.
Then determine the level when the character's INT increases to an even number. Subtract this number from the character's current level and add this number to your INT skill points. Determine the next level at which the character's INT increases to an even number and repeat until you've reached the character's current level.
Now, spend your INT and non INT skill points.
Your done.
Seriously, there are complicated things in the Conan system (like figuring out the spell progression to work for for a Sorcerer PC). But the Scholar rles aren't part of the general d20 rules (and my earlier comment was about the general d20 rules). However, determining skill points for a character of a given level isn't one of those complicated things.

[Sutek]

nor spending 4 hours to create the NPC for this combat encounter, which is even worse, IMHO.

W.

Not including magic items/equipment, does it really take you four hours to create an NPC??? I can do it in about 10 minutes.

Not using d20, it's taking me about 2 to 5 seconds, to a peak of 30 sec for really important NPCs.

W.

Um...it takes that long in d20. For me, anyway. d20 is the easiest, most flexible RPG engine going, as far as my experience goes, for delivering flexibiltiy on top of depth.

However...

Has the Conan 2ed combat been streamlined?

I love the Conan setting but I'm a bit concerned that the combat system is a bit too involved. As I mentioned in another post, I would like to introduce my 8 year old to it.

D20 sounds relatively straight forward, roll over a DC. But how does the combat work?

Also, can AoO be dropped without upsetting game balace? And does combat suffer if you don't use minatures?

Thank you in advance

This is what we should be discussing.

Is comebat streamlined? Not really, but with lower massive damage saves and the game's reliance on that mechanic to drop loads of bad guys in any given combat almost single handedly. Basically, if you deal more than 20 points of damage ina single strike, that baddie has to make a FORTITUDE save or just...well...die. It's just like a comic book or rip-roaring movie. PCs wade in and lay low the evil hoards.

AOO is a freebie attack, and although some classes have built-in increases towards dealing with AOOs, you can easily ignore the rules for AOOs. Simply tell your 8 year old, "...but you get the drop on him and get another attack!" It's the same thing, but you deliver it in a narrative way instead of a "by the book" way. If he wants to learn the real way later, then you can get complicated.

Mainly though it's Feats and Grappling that cause combat to bog down.

I say give it a shot/

[rabindranath72]

For my wife who hates complex systems, I designed some Hyborian Age rules which use the old red box Mentzer D&D, which might be good enough for your son. Just introduce him to the atmosphere and some dice rolling!
If you want them, I can mail them to you (just drop me a PM).

Cheers,
Antonio

[thulsa]

For my wife who hates complex systems, I designed some Hyborian Age rules which use the old red box Mentzer D&D, which might be good enough for your son. Just introduce him to the atmosphere and some dice rolling!
If you want them, I can mail them to you (just drop me a PM).

While I personally prefer d20/3E (but think there is room for improvement/streamlining), I would probably enjoy playing in a rules-lite system as well.

I came across the following a while back, and find it interesting:

http://www.philotomy.com/

Even more so because his campaign (ie. the adventure) is very Conanesque:

http://www.philotomy.com/lost_city.html



- thulsa

[rabindranath72]

Oh yes, I know the guy! He is a frequent poster on Dragonsfoot and on the TrollLords forums. He has lots of interesting ideas!