Mhoram's Overview/Review Part two – Classes and sources.
Okay the way the classes work are using the unified chart for progression – and everyone gets the same base attack and defense bonuses. ½ per level. Then add other mods like ability mods, racial mods and such.
Skills are simplified – you are trained or not. All skills are at ½ your level + ability mod (just like above). If you are trained in a skill, then you gain a +5 to it. There is a skill focus feat that gives you an additional +3. Some skills have uses that only can be used if trained. Very simplified. I both like and dislike it – without all the niggly little skill points, using skills to differentiate your characters, or add to roleplaying is difficult. I like the fact it is so bloody easy. You can have the skill bonuses of a 15th level character in a matter of moments. Can't do that in 3rd (you can thumbnail close but...).
Classes each gain some class features (used to be called class abilities) at first level. Everything after that is a power. Class abilities are a lot of the specific things the class in known for – Mages get spellbooks, Clerics get Turn undead, Paladins get lay on of hands, Rogues get sneak attack. Ect. That is all front loaded at first. (check addendum of this post for multiclassing).
After that you gain powers. Every character starts with 2 at wills, 1 encounter, and 1 daily. These are written up in a precise little stat block with name, powersource (more on that in a moment) hit and miss affects and wht you hit with. The characters gain more as they progress. In the game a character gets a feat, power or ability increase every level – so no dead levels.
What is nice about the structure of the powers is that every class gets the same amount, so every class has something “cool”. Played a 18th level fighter in a group with an 18th level mage or sorcerer. Tended to get bland. This gives mechanical things for every class to do, and know. Fighters get abilities to draw attention to themselves, extra damage, cool effects like stunning and immobilization. Rogues often make opponents attack themselves or allies (just to quick). Wizards get spells as do clerics. Paladins get nifty divine stuff.
I really like the way this works – as I mentioned last time, with the same structure, each class is it's class features and it's powers. So making new classes with a new feel is really easy, and it doesn't have to be more powerful to be special.
Power sources are interesting as well. They define the source of the powers, and give them flavor. Arcane is obviously arcane magic, Divine is from the gods (whether by spell or ability), martial is from weapons skill and training. Future sources include Primal (nature), Psionic, Ki, Shadow, Elemental.
Really the power sources and Hero style special effects for the mechanics in the power. A paladin and a fighter might both have a high level daily power that gives them 7xweapon damage, but the fighter is massive raw damage (or super skilled placement) while a paladin is channeling his gods aura through his weapon. The stark mechanics of powers lend themselves to having nifty special effects for use. Those that don't think effects based (like Hero) have said it bland. I call it freeing up for the player.
And that leads to my last point – I've seen the game called a tabletop war game because there aren't rules for roleplaying (like non combat skills), but really I see it similar to Hero. You have the mechanics in place for combat, but the rest of the character is non-mechanical – the roleplaying aspects of the game are SFX of the character. If you want a character that is great at diamond cutting, he it. You don't have to buy ranks in a skill. It is roleplaying the background and ability. A very differencing approach than previous editions, but I find it refreshing in its simplicity.
Addendum :
Multiclassing – you don't actually take a level in another class. You take a feat that gives you a class skill and a class feature, and you can take a feat to get a power from another class instead of one of your own. There are three of these (and other avenues in higher level play). If you want to mulitclass really a lot, you can take all three feats, plus the initial multiclass. If you want to splash you can just take the basic feat. If you want some special skill, take one. A fighter could just use the multiclass feat to get arcane knowledge and then later spend a feat to choose a Wizard ability – boom you have a fighter with a fireball. Great color. It is more restrictive than previous editions, but it works really well with the class structure they come up with. And with further classes coming out every year in the yearly Players Handbooks, the ability to create exactly what you want grows.
Next time Paragon and Epic Paths.
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