ALFA rules for NWN2 characters

[Veilan]

no idea if the solution is to let people invest into PCs or paths to PRCs and then find out they're dead end / nerfed a month later, say "don't take this class or this power or this feat or this spell til it's reviewed", or say "take this class/power/feat at own risk of disappointment/rebuild/retire."

We did it along your options with NWN 1, and with the set live target, that's what we'll end up having to do - there's simply no way with beta review, document compilation and training documentation to fix all balancing discussions within even this month. Not unless you summon me an army of ATDs, or at least give me a cloning machine, that is .

[Brokenbone]

I guess what the starting level for the ALFA campaigns might be, is TBD as well. This ties to ECL/LA, that is, if someone elects to play non ECL/LA, do they end up starting with more hitdice than an ECL/LA PC?

Example, if ALFA permitted up to LA+3 (svirfneblin for example), would this mean the svirf starts with one hitdie, a drow (LA+2) starts with two hitdie, a tiefling/aasimar/genasi/duergar (LA+1) starts with three hitdie, and a human/elf/gnome/halfling/halfelf/halforc/dwarf starts (LA+0) with four hitdie?

Alternate example, if svirfs were cut as a PC race, then might drow (LA+2) starts with one hitdie, a tiefling/aasimar/genasi/duergar (LA+1) starts with two hitdie, and a human/ elf/ gnome/ halfling/ halfelf/ halforc/ dwarf starts (LA+0) with three hitdie?

Sounds like a fairly key day one live decision, if some races start with "level adjustment pluses", do other races start with "actual" levels and all that comes with it? I.e., "you guys start with and develop a bunch of innate abilities, everyone else starts without those, but with the levels those innate powers were deemed to be worth."

Note I'm not opposed to LA/ECL race choices among PCs. Just the wider the spread permitted, the more dramatic the adjustments might need to be for PCs of races with a lesser LA plus (including +0).

[AcadiusLost]

I was convinced we tried to make full use of the skill entries we had, added stuff like movement skills, split lore into knowledges and dropped some NWN-only ones, just out of the top of my head :S.

On hold till Obsidian gets the instability associated with long skills.2da files sorted, unfortunately. The good news is we can still put them in after Live, since I wrote up a convo that lets players rejigger their skillpoints out of the deprecated skills and into the new ones (or reassort all skills at time of first entry after the skills go in)

[Veilan]

That is good news indeed, especially on the convo.

Although, I guess re-levelling isn't so much of a hassle now with fixed HP, hehe.

[Dorn]

I guess what the starting level for the ALFA campaigns might be, is TBD as well. This ties to ECL/LA, that is, if someone elects to play non ECL/LA, do they end up starting with more hitdice than an ECL/LA PC?

Example, if ALFA permitted up to LA+3 (svirfneblin for example), would this mean the svirf starts with one hitdie, a drow (LA+2) starts with two hitdie, a tiefling/aasimar/genasi/duergar (LA+1) starts with three hitdie, and a human/elf/gnome/halfling/halfelf/halforc/dwarf starts (LA+0) with four hitdie?

Alternate example, if svirfs were cut as a PC race, then might drow (LA+2) starts with one hitdie, a tiefling/aasimar/genasi/duergar (LA+1) starts with two hitdie, and a human/ elf/ gnome/ halfling/ halfelf/ halforc/ dwarf starts (LA+0) with three hitdie?

Sounds like a fairly key day one live decision, if some races start with "level adjustment pluses", do other races start with "actual" levels and all that comes with it? I.e., "you guys start with and develop a bunch of innate abilities, everyone else starts without those, but with the levels those innate powers were deemed to be worth."

Note I'm not opposed to LA/ECL race choices among PCs. Just the wider the spread permitted, the more dramatic the adjustments might need to be for PCs of races with a lesser LA plus (including +0).

+1

Although doesn't the XP tax on the ECL players equalise this? And is that xp managed now so that the DMs awards are also penalised for ECL as well as spawn/static stuff? (or is that dependent on the server).

I guess if there wasn't any consistent tax on exp for CL then BBs suggestions become more relevent. ALthough i'm a huge fan of starting at level one so i'd prefer we didn;t.

[Brokenbone]

Heh, don't take my above stuff as a "BB suggestion", it's just how a PnP campaign would work.

The penalization of XP (in some crazy ratios I've never needed to get a grip on), is a related but separate topic from what a newly rolled PC starts with in terms of say, hitdice. Might you start with 4 "real" ones or 3 "real" ones but be of a race where there's an imagined +1 on top? Again, it depends how high we get on ECL/LA races.

If there were such a thing as an ECL+30 race (maybe there is in some wacko epic third party sourcebook), and if ALFA were to support it, my question would be "do those mutants start with one hitdie and their 30 ECL levels worth of power, and humans start with 31 hitdice?"

While I like the level 1 start business, I'm not married to it, if it means players being able to FAIRLY start off with a broad mix of normal or powerful races.

[Mitch]

I've always been a firm advocate of starting at level one, but something I read about in the 4E philosophy kind of... opened my mind a bit.

The crux of the argument was the D&D 1 - 3.5 tended to have a kind of power/fun curve, where characters at the lowest levels have too few options/powers/abilities in ways that tend to railroad playing styles and characters at the highest levels tend to walk around like gods and need something equally god-like to be a challenge.

I think an argument can be made that a character doesn't start to really take shape until third level or so: Casters have a few spells to choose from, all characters have a little more customization through feat and skill selection to help define them, etc.

Anyway, I guess now I'm pretty firmly in the middle, not exactly convinced characters should start at a slightly higher level, but not against it either.

In the end, for me, it all comes down to role playing. If we start at level one then my character has just left the fold to seek fame and fortune as an adventurer. If we start a bit higher, well I'm a fairly young but seasoned traveller, seeking companions on my road to adventure and glory.

Personally I never cared so much about game balance since the characters I play tend to be sub-optimal anyway but I can see where, I terms of overall population and server balance, it might be prudent to have the converstion.

And just to clarify, from what I've read, for the most part, I hate the MMO-ization of 4E, but there are a few concepts that seem to make sense.

[Leevoth]

I like starting at level 1, it's just how DnD is. Playing a character from (more or less) beginning to end.

Having a character class kind of means that the character has already begun adventuring a teeny bit, or at least really thought about it, right?

[hollyfant]

What about those "background" feats, are we using those? They have no equivalent in PnP.

And per canon, the Background Traits (1st level only feats) are limited to certain classes from certain areas. I take it we're ignoring that though, unless we want to force the whole playerbase to buy a Players' Guide to Faerûn.

[Brokenbone]

http://realmshelps.dandello.net/datafind/feats.shtml

While this has all sorts of questionable stuff from Dragon magazine etc., if you click "Regional" feats from the selection list on the left side, and "All" from the resources on the right side, you will probably see some familiar feats. Don't need to have the 50 associated sourcebooks for these tidbits, I think the website overall is pretty darn good for starting off a Faerun character in PnP, I'm sure it's helpful for NWN as well.

Example, Luck of Heroes description below:

Type: Regional
Sources: Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting
Player's Guide to Faerûn

Your land is known for producing heroes. Through pluck, determination, and resilience, you survive when no one expects you to come through.

Prerequisite: Elf (Elven Court, the Forest of Lethyr, or the Yuirwood), gloaming (Sphur Upra), half-elf (Aglarond), halfling (Channath Vale or the Western Heartlands), or human (Aglarond, the Dalelands, Tethyr, Turmish, or the Vast).
Benefit: You receive a +1 luck bonus on all saving throws and a +1 luck bonus to Armor Class.
Special: You may select this feat only as a 1st-level character. You may have only one regional feat.

***

I don't think anyone bothered to enforce this first time around in NWN1, doubt anyone would bother in NWN2 either. I.e., so what if you had a "Luck of Heroes" dwarf, halfling, half-orc or gnome? Or one of the okay races above but from the wrong home region? I guess though that if this helped someone add extra depth or inspired them to look into why those regions are so special, good stuff, maybe it'll make for a more interesting background.

[Veilan]

Hm, last I recall was us limitting such "special" background feats to one per PC, moving some other very popular ones there too, so that you have to make a real choice about the feat to take.

I've never been presented with a finalised proposal for standards review, though, and I certainly don't have the time currently to try to piece it together and document what we have or haven't discussed edgewise.

Maybe holly was referring to the "custom" background feats though, like "militia" or "wild child".

[Munmun]

Huh, spellcasting prodigy has no extra requirements.

[hollyfant]

Maybe holly was referring to the "custom" background feats though, like "militia" or "wild child".

Both, actually. The Background Feats are regional feats in PnP, limited to characters from specific area. I see no real reason to implement that. Though it'll be a rare character that doesn't have either Luck of Heroes or Spellcasting Progidy

History Feats are an invention of Obsisdian, and while none of them is particularly Faerûn-shattering some can be... quirky. I'm not sure if the Merchant's Friend (the one that used to be an exclusive for the pre-order NWN2) will be added to new characters automagically (though that's easily checked). And the Natural Leader combined with the Bard class can give all others in the party +2 to their attacks, and +1 to their damage rolls. Gygax only knows what happens in a party with multiple "booster bards"...

[ayergo]

Yeah, ALFA RULES!!! For NWN2 chars!

wait... wut?