# E6: The Game Inside D&D (new revision)



## Ry

_This is E6’s fourth iteration here at EN World; there’s been an explosion of interest in it lately, and I have revised it again here.  Enjoy!_

*E6: The Game Inside D&D*

*What is E6?*

Earlier this year Ryan Dancey suggested that D&D has four distinct quartiles of play:

Levels 1-5: Gritty fantasy
Levels 6-10: Heroic fantasy
Levels 11-15: Wuxia
Levels 16-20: Superheroes

There’s been some great discussion about how to define those quartiles, and how each different quartile suited some groups better than others.

E6 is a game about those first 2 quartiles, and as a result, it has fewer rules, a low-magic flavor, and it is quick and easy to prepare.  I have playtested the system extensively with my crew, and it works as intended.  There seems to be a lot of lively debate about E6, and some real interest in how it works, so I've revised it here.

*How E6 works*

Like D&D, E6 is a game of enigmatic wizards, canny rogues, and mighty warriors who rise against terrible dangers and overcome powerful foes.  But instead of using D&D’s 20 levels to translate characters into the rules, E6 uses only the first 6.  E6 is about changing one of D&D’s essential assumptions, but despite that it doesn't need a lot of rules to do so.

In E6, the stats of an average person are the stats of a 1st-level commoner.  Like their medieval counterparts, this person has never travelled more than a mile from their home.  Imagine a 6th-level Wizard or 6th-level Fighter from the commoner's perspective.  The wizard could kill everyone in your village with a few words.  The fighter could duel with ten armed guards in a row and kill every one of them.  If you spot a manticore, everyone you know is in terrible, terrible danger.  Against such a creature, the wizard or fighter may be your only hope.  E6 recognizes that 6th level characters are mortal, while providing a context where they are epic heroes.

Levels 1 to 6 was the period where a character comes into his own, where a crash course in action and danger transforms them from 1st-level commoners into capable fighting men (or corpses).  Once transformed by their experiences, a character’s growth is no longer a continuous, linear progression.  There are still major differences between the master warriors and the veteran mercenaries, but it's not a change of scale.

*Rules*

Character progression from level 1 to level 6 is as per D&D. Upon attaining 6th level, for each 5000 experience a character gains, they earn a new feat.  A diverse selection of feats should be made available in any E6 campaign, however, feats with unattainable prerequisites under this system remain unattainable.  

For the purpose of experience awards, treat each 5 feats as +1 CR (or level), to an upper limit of 20 feats.  After this, a ratio of 10 feats to 1 CR can be used, as it becomes more and more difficult to bring all a character’s feats to bear in a given situation.  Alternatively, and at the GM’s option, player-characters with more than 20 feats can simply be always treated as if they were level 10 for experience and challenge purposes.

*For the GM*

E6 isn't just a change for the players:  Monsters are presented differently than in d20.  Just as level 6 parties in D&D aren’t expected to tangle with monsters higher than CR 10, the mighty monsters of E6 require special consideration for presentation in-game.  E6 characters aren't intended to go up against high-level D&D threats under the same circumstances as high-level D&D characters; those creatures, if they are defeatable at all, require the kind of resources and planning far beyond the typical D&D encounter.

In terms of raw rules, CR 7-10 monsters are an excellent guide for what E6 characters can handle.  As they rise to around the 20-feat range, the range is more like 7-12.  Beyond that, a DM should take monsters in the CR 7-12 range and use feats (and to a lesser extent templates) to advance them.  Hit die or class-based advancement beyond CR 12, or base monsters above CR 12 should generally be avoided as straight-up fights.

Of course, not every monstrous encounter is a straight-up fight. For example, insane horrors from another age might be a reason to run, and there is little a character could do in the face of an angry Titan. But these situations don’t call for direct confrontation, except with some special resource or amazing circumstance. Perhaps, in a special ritual with the presence of 20 mages, a Titan can be bound to the mortal realm (lowering its stats to an Aspect of Kord), with whom the players can do battle. Again, that's far from a straight-up fight with a CR 20 creature, but we can console ourselves with the fact that it's probably a very memorable encounter.

If, as a result of the restrictions on items, an item cannot be created, then it should not be distributed as normal treasure.  Like high-level monsters, such items should be placed carefully and built to make sense in the context of your game.  For example, a +4 sword can’t be made by a human wizard, but it could be crafted by a Titan (which makes for great god-stats).  That's a sword that no mortal can make.

E6 will always inherit D&D's balance issues at the same level, especially issues that result from scenarios where those characters D&D characters have long periods of downtime.  The best approach is to be cognizant of these issues when considering what feats to allow in your E6 game.

[sblock=On Allowing Feats]There are 3 philosophies on what feats to allow in an E6 game, each more generous than the last:
1)	The Cautious Approach
2)	The Gestalt Approach
3)	The Lean Upward Approach

The Cautious Approach is exactly what it sounds like – a GM chooses what feats to allow in his E6 game very, very carefully.  This GM does not make exceptions or new feats to accommodate players chaacter concepts - he chooses what feats to allow and the players agree to work within that framework.

The Gestalt Approach dictates that if an ability can be learned under 6th level, then it’s learnable via some chain of feats.  The Gestalt Approach usually means all WotC sources are available, as well as a few extra feats to provide ways to learn class features.  These can be done on an ad-hoc basis for a given player or they can be gathered from sources like the Book of Unusual Feats.  The Gestalt theory is the one used in playtesting.

The Lean Upward Approach looks at the Gestalt Approach and says “6th level plus many feats is clearly more powerful than 6th level.  Thus, it won’t be game-breaking to allow feat chains that bring characters from 6th level to 8th level, although this progression should be quite slow.”  GMs who like the Lean Upward approach might have feats to bring BAB to +8, or to gain 4th level spells, or 8th level class features, additional hit dice, and so on.[/sblock]
[sblock=Benefits of E6]1. Very fast play at every level of the campaign.
2. Focus on planning, not levelling. To defeat the black dragon Zolanderos, the CR 10 terror of Staunwark Island, the heroes will need help, special resources, and information. I want to further encourage party-directed adventuring, and if the heroes want to take on something 4 to 6 CR above them, then that's what they will require.
3. A low magic game that everyone knows how to play.
4. Never a need for meaningless encounters. The players can be involved in a dozen or so major combat scenarios (perhaps more than one encounter each) and have proven themselves and made a major accomplishment. See Lord of the Rings movies, or most fantasy novels.
5. Classic monsters stay classic throughout the campaign; Chimeras and Aboleths start scary, and stay scary. Dragons are always exciting encounters.
6. Even legendary heroes remain mortal; while a 6th level fighter who has taken toughness several times can take on a good mob, he isn't invulnerable. The sorcerer's 6d6 fireballs are phenomenal, but not so powerful that he can destroy a village and not fear retaliation.
7. Quicker prep. Make a 1st, 3rd, 5th, and 6th version of a sorcerer, and now you have a whole sorcerous dragon-cult that can last you through your whole campaign.
8. You can put what you've learned of the rules to good use. It's hard to know every 4th through 9th level spell out there; they're the ones we see the least. But we've seen 0th through 3rd level spells many, many times, and mastery over them is relatively simple.
9. E6 is a great system for on the fly GMing.  If you’re reasonably familiar with what a 2nd level threat looks like, power-wise, you can probably get away with running it without stats handy.[/sblock]


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## Ry

*Feats*

*Extra Feats*

I consider these feats to be necessary even with the Cautious Approach; along with the SRD feats, they provide for a minimal level of continuing advancement for E6 characters, and address issues like removing negative levels.

[sblock=The Feats]*Expanded Spell Knowledge*
You learn new spell(s) whose level equals half your caster level (round down, and treat a new 0th-level spell as ½). Thus, a sixth level Sorcerer could learn one 3rd level spell, one 1st and one 2nd level spells, three 1st level spells, or 6 0th-level spells.

Expanded Spell Knowledge [General]
Benefit: You learn 1 or more new spells known, with spell levels totalling to half of your caster level (round down, and treat a new 0th-level slot as ½).  Thus, a sixth level Sorcerer could gain one 3rd level spell known, one 1st and one 2nd level spell, three 1st level spells, or 6 0th-level spells.  This feat cannot provide spells known of a level higher than you can already cast.
Special: You may take this feat multiple times; each time you take it it provides more slots.

Expanded Caster Stamina [General]
Prerequisite: Character Level 6th
Benefit: You gain 1 or more new spell slots, with spell levels totalling to half of your caster level.  Treat 0th level spells as ½.  Thus, a sixth level Wizard could gain one 3rd level slot, one 1st and one 2nd level slot, three 1st level slots, or 6 0th-level slots.  This feat cannot provide spell slots higher than you can already cast.
Special: You may take this feat multiple times; each time you take it it provides more slots.


*Restoration*
Prerequisites: 6th level, ability to cast 3rd-level divine spells, Wisdom 18, Healing 9 Ranks
Benefit: You can use _Restoration_, as the spell (paying the material component), with a casting time of 1 hour.

*Stone to Flesh*
Prerequisites: 6th level, ability to cast 3rd-level arcane spells, Intelligence 18, Craft (Alchemy) 9 Ranks
Benefit: You can use _stone to flesh_, as the spell, with an expensive and secret magical ingredient with a market value of 1000 gp and a casting time of 1 day.

*Wondrous Rings*
Prerequisites: 6th level, Craft Wondrous Item
Benefit: You treat rings as wondrous items for the purpose of meeting item creation prerequisites.  You must still meet caster level requirements for any ring you create.[/sblock]

*Extra Feats for Ability Advancement*

If you want your characters to be able to improve their abilities slightly above their natural aptitudes, then you can use the following:

[sblock=Ability Feats]*Ability Training*
You spend time honing one of your Abilities: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma.
Benefit: Choose one Ability; you qualify for the Ability Advancement feat for that Ability.
Special: You can gain this feat multiple times, its effects do not stack.  Each time you take this feat it applies to another ability.

*Ability Advancement*
Your training pays off, and one of your Abilities increases.  
Benefit: Choose one Ability.  You gain a permanent +2 bonus to that ability.
Special: You can gain this feat multiple times, its effects do not stack.  Each time you take this feat it applies to another ability.[/sblock]


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## Ry

*Faq*

*The E6 FAQ*

*Using E6*

_Q: So characters just stop levelling at 6?_
A: That’s right.  Characters who have reached level 6 have proven themselves, but this extremely rapid growth does not go on forever.  Instead, they master specialized techniques, or become more versatile.  This stage of a character’s development is represented by gaining new feats.

_Q: Does E6 change the stacking rules?  For example, can I take Weapon Focus twice and have it stack?  Can I take Skill Focus twice and have it stack?_
A:  The stacking rules remain the same as in standard D&D.

_Q: What if I want there to be a higher level magical effect, but still use E6?_
The rules for rituals in Unearthed Arcana are an excellent fit for E6, to support things like opening portals to another dimension, higher-level divinations, and so on.  When a spell is a 3-day event requiring 20 mages, it’s more of a plot point than a spell itself, and that maeks it a great a springboard for challenging the players.

_Q:  As a DM, I like running things on the fly.  Can E6 support that kind of play?_
A:  Absolutely.  A DM that knows how to estimate the abilities of enemies in the low-level range can use that knowledge throughout the campaign.  Likewise, familiarity breeds mastery – and for feats, spells, and monsters, there is more chance for a DM to become familiar with abilities in an appropriate range to the PCs, even if he is using a diverse selection of monsters.  Furthermore, Dungeon Masters can get much more mileage out of their previous work: The stats of a 5th-level sorcerer written for 4th level PCs is still a useful tool months of gametime later against characters who are 6th level +10 feats.

_Q: Can you make high-level items as a low-level caster in E6? _
A: No, caster level requirements for magic items are treated as hard requirements.  

_Q:  If a character took multiple classes, or Prestige Classes, suddenly you've got a guy with saves that are seriously out of whack.  Is this a game-breaking issue? _
A:  If you multiclass that much, you're probably doing it to get the saves.  In that situation, your saves _are_ your special ability.  Moreover, saves are passive abilities; the player doesn't control when their character uses a save, which gives them limited appeal compared to stuff the player can control.  So if a player goes after them like crazy, and succeeds in having really exceptional saves – let them have their fun.

_Q: I prefer stopping at around 8th level, does that work for this system? _
A: The system will probably work about as well at 8th level, but note that “Epic 6th” characters do end up being more powerful than regular 6th level characters.  Epic 6th may be what you want for a game that sits at the power level for Level 8, and Epic 8th may cater more closely to Level 10 style play.

_Q: Does E6 work with a slower progression to level 6?  Does it work when characters are created at 2nd level?_
Yes and yes.  I've tried both during my playtesting period.  I'll be starting my new game at 3rd level.

_Q: I’m not a big fan of experience points.  Do you need a strict XP system to make E6 work?_
A:  An ad-hoc "gain a feat" approach would work absolutely 100% with this system.  I used to do that with other systems (power up when the story makes it appropriate) and given the fact that the upper end of the power curve flattens off, that method should go very smoothly with E6.

_Q: Can you use Prestige Classes with E6?_
A: I’d recommend taking the same approach you take in your regular D&D game.  If you allow Prestige Classes there, feel free to allow them here.  Of course, characters capped at 6th level can usually take at most 1 level of a Prestige Class.

_Q: With only 6 levels, how do races with a level adjustment work?_
If you use races with a level adjustment, the 6th level cap is a big issue. Use the point buy rules in the DMG as follows:
LA Point buy
+0 32
+1 25
+2 18
+3 10
+4 00

Thus, +LA races should start with zero LA, but use the point buy listed here.  Keep in mind the difference between LA and racial hit dice (the two combine to give starting ECL).

[sblock=Why is E6 designed this way?]_Q: Where did E6 come from?_
A:  E6 was inspired by the article _Gandalf was a Fifth-Level Magic User_ by Bill Seligman.  The article was published in The Dragon (which became Dragon magazine) in issue #5, March 1977.  When I first had the concept of E6, where we used the first six levels for the whole game, my very first step was pitching it to my players.  Some thought it was a great idea, and the rest were willing to give it a try, so I gave it a shot.  E6 worked really well for our tastes, and we've done lots of playing inside E6 since then. Back then E6 was a lot more convoluted than it is now: there were intricate quasi-gestalt rules and several other little things that weren’t so much about the cap as they were about my group’s thoughts on D&D class balance. Over time, we found that the only rules we were really using (on both sides of the screen) were the feat rules, and that was producing a great play experience. So when I returned to E6 just recently, that’s how I wrote it up: As it was actually played.

_Q: Why 6th level for the cap?  Why not 12th, or 20th? _
A: My experience in D&D is that at around 6th level the characters are really nicely balanced, both in terms of balance against other classes, and against the CR system.  Also, there was an element of setting assumptions; each class is strong enough that they're well defined in their role, but not so strong that lower-level characters don't matter to them any more.  

_Q:  How did you arrive at the cost of 5000 xp per feat post 6th level?_
A:  Originally, I considered that if I wasn’t giving level 7, maybe 2 feats for the same price would be a good comprimise (3000xp / feat).  That way they would have this great feeling of advancement without popping the top off the power level."  But in play, the players found it was so fast that they did not have time to enjoy their new abilities.  There just wasn't time in-game for their characters to grow, so I upped the cost to 5000 xp, and it works like a charm.

_Q: Why not use [system of character points / experience purchases / incremental gestalt rules] instead of E6?_
A:  Feats, if they don't work out in a particular case, are less controversial to tweak than, say, the XP table.  If you find out that the XP table, or stats, or whatever else you've changed doesn't work for some players, it's a big deal to change it because it then affects everyone - and sometimes has effects that cascade through the system.  

I have found that if a feat is too good, it's not that big a deal to say "Hey Ned, I think the feat I made for you is too good, but I don't want to take it away from you.  I think it should have a prerequisite, like Skill Focus (Knowledge - nature) instead of being straight-up available.  I'd like to leave you with it but say that your next feat needs to be that knowledge thing, rather than take it away now.  We could do that, or if you want you could swap it out for something else.  What do you think?"

It's important to me to keep the rule changes minimal, because players really don't want to read a lot outside of the game and they get frustrated if there's too many house rules.

2 years ago (before E6 was called E6) I worked up these complex gestalt XP-buy rules, but eventually my players and I realized that with all the options available all that was really getting used were feat purchasing, because they were so easy to approach.

_Q: Why not just stop advancement at 6th, and have characters just not advance after that, or slow experience down so much that you can game for years and never get higher than 6th level?_
A: In my experience, players prefer to have characters that can grow – and have that growth reflected in the mechanics of the game.

_Q: I like high-magic, high-powered campaigns.  Is E6 for me?_
A: Probably not.  Just as D&D can’t be all things to all groups, E6 caters to a specific set of tastes.[/sblock]


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## Nifft

Question: how do you count the CR of a level 6 NPC with a bunch of extra feats and/or loot?

Question: _wish_ and Inherent bonus stacking. There are still ways to get _wish_es, but getting 5 in a row is a problem. How do you account for Inherent bonuses, and how do you account for CR of NPCs who have such bonuses?

Cheers, -- N


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## Ry

5 feats : 1 CR is a good ratio for the first 20 feats or so.  After that it gets hard for a monster / NPC to really bring more than 20 feats to bear.  Like anything with the CR system, this guideline does not override the DM's responsibility to use his or her own judgement.


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## Ry

As to inherent bonuses... huh?  How do characters get wishes?


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## Ry

*Ry's Drama Rules*

These house rules go well with or without E6, and I recommend them.

I use these rules in my game to reduce lethality, make sure that the PCs are the stars of the show, and provide a stunt mechanic without slowing down play with new odds or modifiers.  These rules assume that Players Roll All the Dice, which I recommend for all campaigns, Epic 6th level or not. 

[sblock=Conviction]Player Characters have a pool of Conviction, which functions like Action points. All PCs get 6 Conviction. Conviction is replenished whenever the party has a night of complete rest. 

Conviction can be used in the following ways:



		Code:
	

Cost Result
1     Roll an extra d20, keeping the highest*
2     Re-roll a d20**
2     Take an extra move-equivalent action @
3     Take an extra standard action @
* Declare before any roll
** Declare after any roll
@ On your turn only

[/sblock]
[sblock=The Death Flag]The death flag is definitely designed for campaigns where characters can't come back from the dead.  This lets those campaigns get rid of random lethality without eliminating death altogether as a possibility.  This is done with a change in the "social contract" between players and GM.  Whereas in standard D&D the player is at the mercy of the DM and the rules, with the death flag the player decides when the stakes of a conflict are life and death.

As an Immediate action, a player character can choose to raise his Death Flag and gain 6 Conviction instantly (even if this brings their total Conviction pool above 6). 

When the death flag is raised, the normal rules for death apply. If the death flag has not been raised, then the character, if killed, is treated as reducing the player character to 1 hit point above death. The Death Flag can be lowered by spending 6 Conviction.[/sblock]
[sblock=Raising the Stakes]
At any time, a player can choose to make a 'raise' before rolling their d20s.  The terms of the raise are up to the player, but the GM can either accept ("Call") or decide "no bet."

For example: "I attack the goblin, raise you a decapitation frightening his buddies against me falling prone."   "Call."

"I attack the goblin, raise you 2d6 damage against 2d6 damage" "Call."

Modifiers will be left to the standard underlying rules, and raises based on odds that are too strong will simply be declined.  So if the fighter has a 95% chance of hitting the goblin, the raise of "I do an extra 5d6 or take an extra 5d6 damage." would be declined.  Instead, a raise could be : "OK, if I hit, I decapitate the goblin and his friends are frightened.  If I miss, I'm on the ground grappled by 5 goblins and I take 2d6 damage."

This can be used also to bypass other less fun mechanics "OK, I walk up to the sorcerer and hit him with my dagger.  I raise grappling him against getting knocked back 10 feet and taking 2d6 damage from cracking my head on the pillar."[/sblock]

*Reading the Players*
When a player spends Conviction, they're saying "Hey, this is important to me. I want my character to have been the one that pulled this off - or at least, put everything into trying."

When a player raises the Death flag, they're saying "This is worth staking my character's life on."

When a player Raises they're saying "Hey, I have an idea to make this more exciting.  What do you think?"

When a DM declines a Raise they're saying "Cool idea, but I'm not quite ready for that to happen right now."

*Playtesting*
I have used Conviction in many, many sessions, the Death Flag was only used in one-shots so far, and I have not had a chance to playtest Raises yet.  I will be using all 3 in my new campaign.


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## Nifft

rycanada said:
			
		

> As to inherent bonuses... huh?  How do characters get wishes?



 From the traditional mythical sources: demons (glabrezu), djinn, efreeti.

Cheers, -- N


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## Ry

Hmm... I'm not sure.  Whatever method you would use to evaluate the CR of a low-level encounter that had the benefit of a wish spell in D&D would be the best to use here.  I mean, if the wish's results are like a template, compare to a template's CR change.  If they up a stat by 2, then treat it as 2 feats like Ability Training / Advancement, above.  But inherent bonuses are an even deeper corner case in E6 than they are in D&D.


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## Nifft

In regular D&D, I'd use wealth-by-level / wealth-by-CR guidelines and count a Tome of Blah in with the equipment.

But, you see, at CR 6 that is too much wealth.

So, I guess this goes back to the earlier question: how do you account for wealth in CR?

 -- N


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## Ry

Whatever CR bump D&D gives for wealth, you can give for your wealthy NPCs.  As you can see above, you can use 300*CR as the experience award, so if you think the wealth of the NPCs ups their CR by 2, add 600 xp to the encounter's award.


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## Ry

Also, I think your idea of making neg levels nonpermanent (or changing the level of Restoration or using a ritual) is fine; I kept it as a feat because I wanted to restrict all my low-level tinkering to new feats where possible.


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## Cheiromancer

rycanada said:
			
		

> Experience is awarded at a rate of 300 * CR defeated, and kept constant.




So 12 gnolls are worth as much as a mature adult white dragon? 

I think this formula might be a bit *too* simple.


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## Ry

I was writing, earlier, something where characters grew 1 CR : 5 feats, but that doesn't hold up on the long term.  300*CR is the rate for level-appropriate encounters.  

But I'm open to suggestions.


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## Cheiromancer

Why not play by the book?  That gives the same xp when CR = level.  Maybe add an LA (value to be determined by playtesting- +1/5 feats sounds about right).  It'll break down eventually, but it will work longer and for a broader range of challenges than a linear formula.  

If monsters are advanced analogously to PCs the formula will hold up longer:  Base monsters up to CR 6 or so, improved with templates and feats, but not extra hit dice or high level spellcasting.


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## Ry

Can I get some help with the wording?  As I discussed above after 20 feats it becomes harder to bring all your feats to bear in a given combat, so here's my next try:

For the purpose of experience awards, treat any character or monster as 1 level (or 1 CR) higher for each 5 extra feats up until they have earned 20 extra feats, and 1 level higher per 10 extra feats after that.


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## Alisair Longreach

The way I deal with Negative Energy levels and ability damage in my campaigns is that I, as the DM, always consider a PC's saving throw to remove them to be successfull. No bookkeeping and happy players.


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## Khuxan

I've discovered D&D Miniatures are well suited to Ry20. The vast majority are CR <7*, and of those that are above CR 6, a fair amount are monsters that can still be used in a way. In fact, it's quite fun to look through my above-sixes and work out where each one belongs in a Ry20 campaign: 
the CR 11 Stone Golem that guards the entrance to an ancient kingdom... 
the CR 8 Warforged Titan whose creation ended a border dispute between two nations... 
the CR 9 Aspect of Orcus isn't an Aspect, it's the Orcus... 
the CR 8 Efreeti you hope stays in its lamp - because if it broke free, it could raze cities... 
the CR 7 Yuan-ti Abomination which heads the empire-spanning Slithering Cult... 
the CR 7 Bulette that destroys every caravan to venture through the Wastes... 
the CR 13 Huge Red Dragon that is the first dragon, the dragon from which all others sprung...
the CR 8 Treant which is the heart of the deepest forest in the land...

*From the ones I've got. I've not bought them in a while, so I'm not sure how they've changed.


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## Ry

That is one sweet list.


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## Nifelhein

This is a sweet system


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## Ry

Thanks Nifelhein.  I'll be starting a new E6 campaign that will run weekly (and possibly monthly in a parallel game) with the first session in a week and a half.  If you get a chance to try it out, definitely post about it here!


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## Nifelhein

You really should make a pdf out of this all you know, for portability. I am not sure if I will ever get a chance of running it, but if anyone wants me to GM D20 again, this will be it, that is for sure.


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## Ry

Note:  E6 Setting discussion has been kicked off here.


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## Dragonblade275

*Questions on the Death Flag*



			
				rycanada said:
			
		

> When the death flag is raised, the normal rules for death apply. If the death flag has not been raised, then the character, if killed, is treated as reducing the player character to 1 hit point above death. The Death Flag can be lowered by spending 6 Conviction.



Question(s) concerning the Death Flag.
1.  Is 1 HP above death 1 hit point or -9 hit points (dying per the normal rules)?  In other words is there still a chance that the character will die if he or she does not stabilize?

2.  Is it impossible for a character to die if the death flag has not been raised?​


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## Shazman

I really like the idea of E6.  You still get some advancement, but you don't run around with gobs of magic items and spells at your fingertips.  Combats are shorter and more memorable at the same time. Characters get better, but don't become a bookkeeping nightmare.  That being said, I prefer to run pre-published adventures since I don't have time to write my own.  How would E6 work with pre-published adventures such as Red Hand of Doom, Expediton to Castle Ravenloft, Eyes of the Lich Queen, or Expedition to the Demonweb Pits? Some of the threats towards the later end of these adventures are CR13 or higher.  How much alteration would be required to make them fit into E6?  I really like Paizo's 1-20 adventure paths, but I'd say the later half of them would be exremely difficult to do in E6. What are your thoughts on this?


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## Shazman

Another thing for consideration is the fighter.  If everyone gets tons of feats, there isn't much incentive to play a fighter.  As it stands, practically everyone that wants a good "fighter" in E6 will play a fighter 4/hexblade 1/barbarian 1 or a warblade.  Maybe give the fighter access to feats no one else can have. For example, only fighters can take martial training and martial stance feats from the book of nine swords, or feats like improved critical and greater weapon focus/secialization have prerequs of fighter level 6 plus specialization with the weapon.  Also, I think there should be some way for attack bonuses to scale.  Some CR 10 critters will probably have AC's that are beyond the scope of warriors to hit with only weapon focus, a +1 weapon, and low level buffs to help them out.  Maybe a feat similar to epic prowess that can be taken a mximum of three times or so would be warranted.


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## DogBackward

If you want to leave fighters as viable classes, you could just say that fighters, and only fighters, gain feats every 3000xp instead of 5000, and only if you have 6 levels of fighter. That way, a fighter will _always_ have more feats than the other classes, even after "Epic" levels.


----------



## Ioreck

Well, heres my version of E6 (i homebrew alot, but i figure any imput is good imput)

while i do this, i have the levels spread out, so slow xp gain.

However, at the usual xp markings (where you level up in normal dnd), you still get the feat and ability up.

you can edit this to get the class ability too.  For feats, just say rather than levl rq, you need a fighter with X exp.

then he can get his weapon mastery and such.


----------



## dagger

rycanada said:
			
		

> _Q: Does E6 change the stacking rules?  For example, can I take Weapon Focus twice and have it stack?  Can I take Skill Focus twice and have it stack?_
> A:, and keeps skills in line with the other setting assumptions.  A character with 9 skill ranks, a +2/+2 feat bonus, and a +3 Skill Focus bonus makes for a true master of that skill.  This person can take 10 and do better than an untrained person could do even with a 20.





Looks like you left something out.


----------



## DogBackward

I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure he means "no". Yeah, fairly certain...


----------



## Aage

Ioreck said:
			
		

> while i do this, i have the levels spread out, so slow xp gain.
> 
> However, at the usual xp markings (where you level up in normal dnd), you still get the feat and ability up.




Exactly what I planned to do, except ability up... I'm also remaking the character classes (minor changes) to better suit a 6 level progression...


----------



## Ry

The stacking rules remain the same as in standard D&D.  I will fix the original post


----------



## Ioreck

The only reason I unclude ability up is i use elite array stats, not 32 point buy (25 point buy).

But I cap out stats at 16.  you cant assign higher than 15 as a starting character.
- i fully believe there is a physical limit to how strong a human can be.


----------



## Ry

To all: I may not be able to respond to each individual post anymore, they are getting hard to keep up with if I am going to 
1) write a setting/adventure for E6
2) prepare some kind of basic pdf (please bear with me, I hate and suck at layout)
3) playtest E6

But for Shazman; one great thing about E6 is that it lets you improvise a lot.  E6 characters really can't take on level 20 enemies.  If you look at the TItan, that's an overbuilt Goliath for an overbuilt David.  But you can do substitution for almost anything.  I want to help with that, and I certainly think it's doable for the adventure paths (using monsters with simpler stats in the place of wayy too complicated monsters with ridiculous stats).  If you run E6, you can get very good at reusing stats very quickly.


----------



## Ry

Dragonblade275 said:
			
		

> Question(s) concerning the Death Flag.
> 1.  Is 1 HP above death 1 hit point or -9 hit points (dying per the normal rules)?  In other words is there still a chance that the character will die if he or she does not stabilize?
> 
> 2.  Is it impossible for a character to die if the death flag has not been raised?​




1.  -9, but more severe cases cause for severe measures.  The GM can decide that it will take days before the character reawakens from their coma.  
2.  With the death flag mechanic, the player chooses when their character is on the line.  So yes, it's impossible for a player-character to die if the death flag has not been raised.  

#2 asks the players to take responsibility about death in the same way the rest of the system asks the DM to take responsibility for creating appropriate challenges.  If you think #2 would a problem for your players, then I'd recommend against using the death flag in your game.  Conviction works fine with or without the Death Flag.


----------



## Ioreck

Why is the whole cr rating in the MM a problem??

You have a group of level 6 adventurers.  You want to put them to the test by making them fight a titan.  But oh no, the as-statted titan in your MM is waaay beyond their power!  What do you do?

It really isn't hard to turn a CR 21 monster into say a CR 12 one.

What I'd do is simple: take away his enchanted gear, drop his hit die, etc etc until you have a suitable challenge!

Swap chain lighting for lightning bolt ans such.

Honestly, all I'd do is make a hill giant a bit tougher.


----------



## kaomera

For a Titan, a Hill Giant is CR 7. Make it huge (or bigger) and bump it's Int and/or Cha up (I'd probably leave the rest of it's stats alone, of course it's overall AC goes down a bit...). Gestalt with Sorcerer (or Wizard, or Cleric...) for 5 or 6 of it's 12 hit dice. Then add a few extra feats...

or:

*
Barbaralkis, Titan of the Wild Peaks*
Huge Giant (Native Outsider, Chaotic)
Hit Dice: 6d12 + 48 (92 hp)
Initiative: +6 (+2 Dex, +4 Improved Initiative)
Speed: 50' (fly 40' with winged boots)
AC: 21 (-2 Size, +2 Dex, +5 Natural, +6 _+1 breastplate of light fortification_), touch 11, flat-footed 19
Base Attack / Grapple: +6 / +21
Attack: Granite Edge (Huge _+2 Dancing Battleaxe_), +15 melee (3d6+7/x3) or
     or Huge Masterwork Composite (20 Str) Shortbow, +9 ranged (2d6+5/x3)
Full Attack: Granite Edge (Huge _+2 Dancing Battleaxe_), +15/+10 melee (3d6+7/x3)
     or Huge Masterwork Composite (20 Str) Shortbow, +9/+4 ranged (2d6+5/x3)
Space/Reach: 15'/15'
Special Attacks: Spells (Druid 5/4/4/3)
Special Qualities: Animal companion (dire mountain goat), darkvision 90', fast movement, low-light vision, nature sense, rage 2x / day, regeneration 10*, resist fire 10, resist nature's lure, scent, trackless step, trap sense +2, wild empathy, wild shape (2/day), woodland (mountainside) stride
Saves: Fort +13, Ref +4, Will +9
Abilities: Str 25, Dex 14, Con 23, Int 16, Wis 15, Cha 16
Skills: Climb +8, Concentration +11, Handle Animal +4, Heal +13, Intimidate +12, Jump +12, Knowledge (Nature) +11, Listen +7, Spot +7, Survival +13
Feats: Alertness, Awesome Blow, Brew Potion, Cleave, Combat Casting, Craft Magic Arms and Armor, Great Fortitude, Iron Will, Power Attack, Quick Draw, Improved Bull Rush, Improved Initiative, Improved Toughness, Self-Sufficient, Snatch, Toughness (x2), Track
Environment: the Wild Peaks
Organization: Unique
CR: ~12 (?)
Treasure: As above, plus _minor ring of fire resistance_ and _winged boots_
Alignment: Chaotic Neutral

* Barbaralkis cannot regenerate damage dealt to him in melee by any creature that knows his true name.


----------



## Aage

One thing I noticed when looking at my classes was this

*Base attack bonuses:*


		Code:
	

Good	Medium	Poor
+1	+0	+0
+2	+1	+1
+3	+2	+1
+4	+3	+2
+5	+3	+2
+6	+4	+3

The medium progression's advantage over the poor is somewhat minor, so what I did was I changed the progressions to 2/3 and 1/3 (instead of 3/4 and 1/2)... Which gives us:

*Base attack bonuses:*


		Code:
	

Good	Medium	Poor
+1	+0	+0
+2	+1	+0
+3	+2	+1
+4	+2	+1
+5	+3	+1
+6	+4	+2



Just a thought...


----------



## Shazman

rycanada said:
			
		

> To all: I may not be able to respond to each individual post anymore, they are getting hard to keep up with if I am going to
> 1) write a setting/adventure for E6
> 2) prepare some kind of basic pdf (please bear with me, I hate and suck at layout)
> 3) playtest E6
> 
> But for Shazman; one great thing about E6 is that it lets you improvise a lot.  E6 characters really can't take on level 20 enemies.  If you look at the TItan, that's an overbuilt Goliath for an overbuilt David.  But you can do substitution for almost anything.  I want to help with that, and I certainly think it's doable for the adventure paths (using monsters with simpler stats in the place of wayy too complicated monsters with ridiculous stats).  If you run E6, you can get very good at reusing stats very quickly.




That's not really what I'm looking for.  If I had the time to rework every encounter in an adventure to make it suitable for E6 characters, I might as well write my own.  I wouldn't mind doing it if I had the time, but I don't.  I may be able to substitute similar weaker creatures for the challenges, but completely reworking creatures isn't an option for me.


----------



## Ry

Shazman said:
			
		

> That's not really what I'm looking for.  If I had the time to rework every encounter in an adventure to make it suitable for E6 characters, I might as well write my own.  I wouldn't mind doing it if I had the time, but I don't.  I may be able to sustitute similar weaker creatures for the challenges, but completely reworking creatures isn't an option for me.




Fair enough; E6 has different assumptions than D&D, and that has a real impact.  Compatibility with high level adventures is lost by design; E6 keeps the "heroic fantasy" vibe, while those high level adventures start requiring superheroics.

Just curious - which AP are you looking at running?


----------



## Ry

Draft character sheet for upcoming game.


----------



## Evilhalfling

Here is a list of all minor wondrous items that require only spells 3rd lvl or lower to create, 
and do not have specific restriction : ie creator of any ioun stone must be 12th level
some medium wondrous items are include, if I noticed them, or they fit a formula (creators level must be 3 times bonus granted etc... 

I would HR quaals tokens back in, despite needing a 5th level wizard spell to create...

Elixir of love 150 gp
 Unguent of timelessness 150 gp
 Dust of tracelessness 250 gp 
 Elixir of hiding 250 gp 
 Elixir of sneaking 250 gp 
 Elixir of swimming 250 gp 
 Silversheen 250 gp 
 Elixir of truth 500 gp  
 Bag of tricks, gray 900 gp 
 Hand of the mage 900 gp 
 Bracers of armor +1 1,000 gp 
 Cloak of resistance +1 1,000 gp 
 Pearl of power, 1st-level spell 1,000 gp 
 Phylactery of faithfulness 1,000 gp 
 Salve of slipperiness 1,000 gp 
 Elixir of fire breath 1,100 gp 
 Pipes of the sewers 1,150 gp 
 Dust of illusion 1,200 gp 
 Brooch of shielding 1,500 gp 
 Necklace of fireballs type I 1,650 gp 
 Dust of appearance 1,800 gp 
 Hat of disguise 1,800 gp 
 Pipes of sounding 1,800 gp
 Amulet of natural armor +1 2,000 gp 
 Horn of fog 2,000 gp 
 Robe of bones 2,400 gp 
 Sovereign glue 2,400 gp 
 Boots of elvenkind 2,500 gp 
 Boots of the winterlands 2,500 gp 
Candle of truth 2,500 gp 
Cloak of elvenkind 2,500 gp 
Scarab, golembane 2,500 gp 
Necklace of fireballs type II 2,700 gp 
Stone of alarm 2,700 gp 
Bag of tricks, rust 3,000 gp 
Chime of opening 3,000 gp 
Horseshoes of speed 3,000 gp 
 Rope of climbing 3,000 gp
Dust of disappearance 3,500 gp 
Lens of detection 3,500 gp 57 
Bracers of armor +2 4,000 gp 
Cloak of resistance +2 4,000 gp 
Gloves of arrow snaring 4,000 gp \
Restorative ointment 4,000 gp 68 
Pearl of power, 2nd-level spell 4,000 gp 
 Circlet of persuasion 4,500 gp 7
 Slippers of spider climbing 4,800 gp 
Bracers of archery, lesser 5,000 gp 
Helm of comprehend languages and read magic 5,200 gp 
Vest of escape 5,200 gp 
Eversmoking bottle 5,400 gp 
Sustaining spoon 5,400 gp 
Boots of striding and springing 5,500 gp 
Wind fan 5,500 gp 
Amulet of mighty fists +1 6,000 gp 
 Horseshoes of a zephyr 6,000 gp 
 Pipes of haunting 6,000 gp 
 Gloves of swimming and climbing 6,250 gp 
Circlet of blasting, minor 6,480 gp 
Horn of goodness/evil 6,500 gp 
Bottle of air 7,250 gp 
Periapt of health


Medium Items 
Bracers or armor +3 
Amulet of NAC +2 
Boots of haste 
Cloak of Arcadia
Minor cloak of displacement


----------



## Aage

Even though they aren't available by the rules (caster level 8th (would be possible with artificier actually)), I'd allow the stat boosters (gauntlet of ogre power, gloves of dex, cloak of cha and so forth), but only the +2 version of them... Seems fair as the spells creating those items are 2nd level...


----------



## Quartz

I must confess that while I love the idea of a breakpoint (after all d20 puts it at 20th level), I have real issues with the breakpoint being at 6th level. Looking at the base character classes, so many of them define themselves over 3-6 levels. Fighter gets Specialisation at 4th level, Knight gets his Challenge ability at 4th level, Druid gets Wildshape at 5th level, rogue... well you get the drift. This makes it exceedingly difficult under E6 to make decent multiclass characters. Putting a breakpoint at 8th or even 10th level (with a maximum of 3rd or 4th level spells) would make much more sense to me, allowing players to have an X3 / Y5 or A4/B4. Now, I'm fully aware that this is entirely a personal preference, but I would urge *rycanada* to give some consideration to this and to how to adapt his system to this.

Secondly, and I appreciate that this is from a Powergamer / Mechanic POV but I think it's worth addressing, the ethos behind E6 seems to me to entirely obviate the fighter class as a PC class for a longer-term campaign, and obviate more than dipping into most full BAB classes. Why should a player care about feats when she can take them later? It's special abilities that count. Why take more than 2 levels of Barbarian? Why take more than 2 levels of Ranger? Why take more than 2 levels of Monk, even? Only spellcasters won't dip. Take a 6th level Cleric. Two Toughness feats and he's now got the HP equivalent of a fighter. Not that he needs them because he can take Item Creation feats and make himself magic items (+2 armour, +2 weapons) where the non-spellcaster cannot.


----------



## Ry

You can get them with the Item Creation class ability of the Artificer, which you could allow as a feat chain under Gestalt Theory.  That'd keep to the RAW + feats that E6 encourages.

Edit: Oops, didn't realize they required CL 10.  Never used them in the playtesting.


----------



## Aage

This is the reason why I'm remaking my classes to be balanced towards this kind of campaign. Who would take level 5-6 barbarian to get imp. uncanny dodge and trap sense +2? I know I wouldn't, picking up to levels of psion, or bard or whatever would be better... I feel that it is important that every character gains something at their "high" levels, to make it worthwhile...


----------



## Evilhalfling

Aage said:
			
		

> Even though they aren't available by the rules (caster level 8th)



By the rules I was  using they would be allowed, every supplemental source says that caster level is not a prerequisite to creating the item, it is merely the level used if trying to dispel the item, and what you base the items saving throws on.  Several items have specific caster limits listed, such as ioun stones, and many with numeric bonuses.  

Even just using Core and not FAQ, sage advice, rules in Magic item Compendium - using the caster level of the item as a prerequisite is still a judgment call.  (pearl of power has a caster level of 20, and the prerequisite that you have to be able to cast spells of the pearls level.  This makes no sense if caster level 20 is required for all pearls)  

I left off the stat boosters as a choice, regular D&D requires these items to face certain CRs - and I really appreciate the freedom from this that 6e allows.  If these items are in your game they will be ubiquitous, because for their price there is nothing that gives you as powerful an advantage.


----------



## Ry

Quartz said:
			
		

> I must confess that while I love the idea of a breakpoint (after all d20 puts it at 20th level), I have real issues with the breakpoint being at 6th level. Looking at the base character classes, so many of them define themselves over 3-6 levels. Fighter gets Specialisation at 4th level, Knight gets his Challenge ability at 4th level, Druid gets Wildshape at 5th level, rogue... well you get the drift. This makes it exceedingly difficult under E6 to make decent multiclass characters.



Check out the gestalt approach to feats (noted in the "allowing feats") - you will probably want to use that approach if you use E6, which lets other characters pick up 6th level-equivalent abilities.



			
				Quartz said:
			
		

> "Secondly, and I appreciate that this is from a Powergamer / Mechanic POV but I think it's worth addressing, the ethos behind E6 seems to me to entirely obviate the fighter class as a PC class for a longer-term campaign, and obviate more than dipping into most full BAB classes. Why should a player care about feats when she can take them later? It's special abilities that count. Why take more than 2 levels of Barbarian? Why take more than 2 levels of Ranger? Why take more than 2 levels of Monk, even? Only spellcasters won't dip. Take a 6th level Cleric. Two Toughness feats and he's now got the HP equivalent of a fighter. Not that he needs them because he can take Item Creation feats and make himself magic items (+2 armour, +2 weapons) where the non-spellcaster cannot.




The E6 answer to that is that at 6th level d20 exhibits excellent balance between the classes and between different builds (this isn't just my opinion, see threads / polls about it in the D&D rules forum).  Also, with the gestalt approach to feats, everyone can eventually pick up other classes' abilities.

For more detail, check out the discussion of the fighter issue in the old E6 thread.


----------



## Ry

Here's a printable .rtf version of E6.  This isn't pretty because I'm really not a layout guy.

But the price is right


----------



## pallen

rycanada said:
			
		

> *Extra Feats*
> *Expanded Spell Knowledge*
> You learn new spell(s) whose level equals half your caster level (treating 0th level as ½). Thus, a sixth level Sorcerer could learn one 3rd level spell, one 1st and one 2nd level spells, three 1st level spells, or 6 0th-level spells.
> 
> *Expanded Caster Stamina*
> Prerequisite: Character Level 6th
> Benefit: You gain new spell slot(s) whose level equals half your caster level (treating 0th level as ½). Thus, a sixth level Wizard could gain one 3rd level slot, one 1st and one 2nd level slot, three 1st level slots, or 6 0th-level slots.



Do we round up or down for characters with odd caster levels?

Also, wouldn't these feats give bards access to 3rd level spells (which they can't have at 6th level normally)?  Maybe specify that characters can only take spells/slots that they already have access to?

I love the idea of the system, and am in the process of cajoling my players into giving it a try.


----------



## Scurvy_Platypus

Quartz said:
			
		

> Secondly, and I appreciate that this is from a Powergamer / Mechanic POV but I think it's worth addressing, the ethos behind E6 seems to me to entirely obviate the fighter class as a PC class for a longer-term campaign




In regards to this particular point, I'll simply post a link to my response again to the fighter class disappearing: http://www.enworld.org/forums/showpost.php?p=3628452&postcount=302

As for the rest of it...

People already do dip, multiclassing is rampant (most people like how easy it is to multiclass), and I really don't see how 6 levels total of people dipping into other classes is really going to be a big deal. E6 isn't exactly trying to fix this sort of thing, it's specific goal is to get people to a certain level of power and then freeze things there.

I personally don't really see a lot of the "problems" that people are talking about, other than "such and such is now out of the reach of characters because it requires level X."

Dipping being encouraged, not much point to playing a fighter, and so on... that's just built into D&D already. All E6 really does is happen to highlight what's sitting there in the system.

Me? I'm one of those odd people that's thinking of taking it all the way to 10. wah0000!!11!1 I dunno though, because there's something pretty compelling about stopping at level 6 too. When I can get the group to play it, we'll just have to see how things shake out.


----------



## Ry

pallen said:
			
		

> Do we round up or down for characters with odd caster levels?
> 
> Also, wouldn't these feats give bards access to 3rd level spells (which they can't have at 6th level normally)?  Maybe specify that characters can only take spells/slots that they already have access to?
> 
> I love the idea of the system, and am in the process of cajoling my players into giving it a try.




Good luck with convincing your players!  I'd love to hear how it goes for other people.  I had some reluctant players once upon a time, but they were willing to give it a try and now they prefer it to regular D&D (much to the chagrin of another GM I know).  If E6 helps the GM stay enthusiastic for their game, it's good for the players too.

For the feats, I updated the wording in the first post to match the rtf file I just posted.  That should fix the bard thing.


----------



## Shazman

I'm running the Savage Tide path now.  I'm not downing E6, but it seems that eventually PC's abilities will become static.  There's only so much feats can do without additonal hit dice and class abilities. Hit points can scale somewhat with improved toughness and toughness, but what about saves and attack bonuses?  Once your character has 40 feats and has defeated every CR 12 encounter around, what do they do next?  If they try to move on to tougher challenges, they are toast because a 6th level character, even with gobs of feats, can't face those challenges.   It seems like things could get very monotonous after the first 10 or so bonus feats.  I guess that's to be expected because it doesn't look like E6 is designed to be for long term campaigns.


----------



## Ry

You make it sound so brutal; like the PCs will be bored to tears from fighting CR 12 encounters but die horribly as soon as they fight a CR 13. 

I'm pretty sure that's not an implication of the rules, but I admit not having run it past 20 feats.  What I can say definitively is that E6 has stayed the heroic fantasy game that I wanted for longer than D&D did.


----------



## Ry

Scurvy_Platypus said:
			
		

> Me? I'm one of those odd people that's thinking of taking it all the way to 10. wah0000!!11!1 I dunno though, because there's something pretty compelling about stopping at level 6 too. When I can get the group to play it, we'll just have to see how things shake out.




Have fun!  My only cautious word to you is that if you do go to 10, you may find your players taking on CR 14 threats quite handily before too long, and those can be a pain to prepare.


----------



## Shazman

rycanada said:
			
		

> You make it sound so brutal; like the PCs will be bored to tears from fighting CR 12 encounters but die horribly as soon as they fight a CR 13.
> 
> I'm pretty sure that's not an implication of the rules, but I admit not having run it past 20 feats.  What I can say definitively is that E6 has stayed the heroic fantasy game that I wanted for longer than D&D did.




I didn't mean that once they fight CR 13 creatures they are history.   What I meant to say is once you start getting past CR 12 creatures (the break point you suggested earlier) that it would be increasingly more difficult for the PC's to face these challenges and survive.  I've personally experienced how brutal CR 13 creatures can be against a party of 5 9-10th level characters that were optimized pretty well and played by experienced players. D&D is and always has been about advancement.  Your characters grow in power and versatility as the campaign progresses.  That's part of the fun of the game.  In 3.5 the increasingly complex nature of characters at high level is problematic for many players and DM's.  I know that E6 is an attempt to address this problem, but maybe it goes a little too far.  One one extreme you have E6. On the other you've got epic level characters using 10 splatbooks and rampant multiclassing that are a bookeeping nightmare.  Too many options and things become too complex to run smoothly, too few options and stagnation and boredom occur. IMHO a happy medium between the two would make gaming more satisfying for most gamers.


----------



## Ry

Well, again, we'll just have to disagree on that.  I think that a small amount of growth + the fact that the world changes as a result of players' actions = not static, but you should use whatever works for your games.


----------



## phindar

Yeah, considering my group tends to lose interest mechanically around 12th level, I think a level cap would be much more likely to be a long term game for us.


----------



## Nifelhein

Ryan, I am working on makign some graphical addition to your final pdf, I am also considering a layout option for it, any preference for fonts for headers and the like? Also, what size would you like to see in it? I kept the one from the rtf right now.

I will try and have some preview for you soon. 

Also, to use the OGL you must not use the D&D name at all.


----------



## Ry

Oh, you're right, I forgot to do the search/replace for D&D to d20.  Thanks for catching that.

Honestly, I'd like it to look professional.  If you have lots of fonts, easily readable is my favorite; nothing garish or intricate.  A little use of color would be nice too: I have a color printer and I love to use it.

If I could make one request: Could you post your source file here along with the .pdf once you're done?  I'd like it to be something that if someone acquired some art, they could just add it to the document and build off of the layout work that was already done.  

I had considered shopping it around to other developers to try to get them to produce it, but I realized that declaring the whole thing OGC and posting it here was probably the faster way to get it into peoples' hands.  Clearly, I was right.

Thanks, Nifelhein!


----------



## Hierax

Rycanada, I like what you are doing with e6 and it seems to be working well for you!

Personally, I'd adapt your system slightly starting with: 

- *8th Level Cap:* because 4th Level Spells are still not the problematic ones that the 5th Level ones cast by 9th Level characters. Also some of the Feat prerequisites seem to fit better here, particularly for Fighters with +8 BAB.

- *Slower Level Advancement:* Less XP or greater XP needed to advance each level. At least twice as much to keep roughly the same time to get to the top (I'd make it even slower than that but that's because I think that 3e advancement is way too fast).

- *Feat per Level:* to give more of the rewards at each step of the way.

- I'd also have the "name level" 9th and 10th Levels act as an end-game Epic Advancement Quest that a character would have to really work towards like the old Basic/Expert/etc. D&D's quest for divinity (not just something to be advanced into with XP).

That said, we'll each find our own "Sweet Spot" for some levels 1-3 would be best, for you 1-6, for me 1-8, for the default D&Der's 1-20.

Anyway, great idea keep on running with it...


----------



## Nifelhein

Hmmmm, I think I can work with a little bit of color on headers to make them a bit different but I thought the whole thing should look simple and clean. I am still working on a border right now so I am not yet sure how it will look like, nothing very fancy too. I have quite a bit of fonts but am not sure I have the right one. I was thinking of doing the E6 into a sort of logo, any thoughts on it?

And no problem, I will hand you the PSD files of the artwork and also the source I will use to generate the pdf just to make sure you have them in case I vanish in thin air. Plus that way it will be easier to update.

I will see what I come up with and egt back to you once I have something to show.


----------



## Ry

Sounds good.  For color I did just mean the headers; my ideal is like the PHB but without anything behind the text (2E monster manual with slightly larger fonts).  But honestly, do your thing, and don't feel the need to listen to me.  E6's rtf is rough because _I suck at layout_.


----------



## Ry

Thanks Hierax!  If/when you use it, let me know how it goes!


----------



## MrNexx

I'm unlikely to get to use this anytime soon, but I just wanted to say that it looks fantastic; the most exciting idea I've seen for D&D in a long time.


----------



## Shazman

I still think that E6 is a great idea.  It's a great break when you've been in a high level campaign for a while, and I would like to give it a try.  Of course, it might be difficult to convince some of your gamers friends used to planning their characters out for 20 levels to freeze their advancement at 6th level.  Anyway, I just thought of a question that I don't think has been covered here.  Is the leadership feat available in E6 (I'm assuming yes since in the current RAW it is), or would it be done away with?  If you can get leadership, what happens to your cohort? Do they increase in level until they get to 6th level and then gain feats like PC's, or do they stay at 4th level and get extra feats after that?


----------



## Ry

Nifelhein, if you want to show me the file before you post it here my e-mail is
ryanstoughton(iwonderwhatgoeshere)hotmail.com


----------



## Ry

Mr Nexx and Shazman: Thanks!

Since by the RAW they stay 2 levels behind the PC, I'd say give them feats on top of 4th level.


----------



## Shazman

I see a lot of 4th level bards and marshalls that stay as far away from melee as possible in E6's future.


----------



## Ry

That's fine by me.  I see cohorts as sidekicks, although sometimes they become an excuse for twice as many actions (which is fine if you have, say, 2 players).


----------



## Ry

Thinking about the upcoming campaign reminded me of this:

In my campaign, and in all the playtesting, I don't use the alignment rules.  At the same time, no one used alignment-impossible class combos (but this was not my determination).  Good, Evil, Law, and Chaos are subtypes and that determines who gets splorked by aligned damage.


----------



## joela

*Alignment a non-issue?*



			
				rycanada said:
			
		

> In my campaign, and in all the playtesting, I don't use the alignment rules.  At the same time, no one used alignment-impossible class combos (but this was not my determination).  Good, Evil, Law, and Chaos are subtypes and that determines who gets splorked by aligned damage.




So one didn't need to be LG to be a paladin or NG to be a ranger?


----------



## Ry

I wrote it as "Alignment is not used.  You should replace any character design focused on alignment with one focused on other elements of your character, such as your history, personal beliefs, affiliations, and so on."  

The players were fair with it.


----------



## Hisik

rycanada said:
			
		

> The E6 answer to that is that at 6th level d20 exhibits excellent balance between the classes and between different builds (this isn't just my opinion, see threads / polls about it in the D&D rules forum).  Also, with the gestalt approach to feats, everyone can eventually pick up other classes' abilities.
> 
> For more detail, check out the discussion of the fighter issue in the old E6 thread.




On this fighter topic, previously they were able to display their combat aptitude through the sheer number of feats they possessed, but with every class gaining bonus feats at 6th, the fighter has lost his "shtick". 

Have you considered using your CONVICTION alternate rules as a possible fix? Allow fighters to display their combat aptitude through the number of conviction points they possess. 

I would recomend having a fighter gain an additional conviction point at both 5th and 6th level. This brings them to 7 and then 8 points daily, and encourages someone to follow the fighter class to its conclussion at 6th level. I understand how this could be seen as unfavorable as it uses an alternate rule system and I also realize that your intent is to keep the core E6 to as few changes as possible (generally feats only). However this is a simple change, and could just be added to the conviction rules as an alternate, alternate rule. 

Food for thought.
Hisik


----------



## Ry

I think that would be very viable - kind of like having a fighters-only feat that gives 2 Conviction.  

The reason I wouldn't put that in the rules is I don't want there to be any kind of necessary connection between the drama rules and E6.  E6 can work w/o the drama rules, and the drama rules can work w/o E6.


----------



## Hisik

Yah, makes sense.

And because I forgot to mention it earlier, thanks for posting your idea for E6 Rycanada, I'm finding it a perfect match to a lower powered campaign I have done a bunch of work on in the past. I really can't get over how much I like it. 

Simple things for simple minds...  

Hisik


----------



## DogBackward

So, what's wrong with just allowing to Fighter to continue gaining more feats than everybody else? Like I said, it keeps them viable without having to go through random additions. Full-class Fighters get 1 feat every 3000xp instead of 5000xp... there, still a reason to take Fighter 6.


----------



## Hisik

DogBackward said:
			
		

> So, what's wrong with just allowing to Fighter to continue gaining more feats than everybody else? Like I said, it keeps them viable without having to go through random additions. Full-class Fighters get 1 feat every 3000xp instead of 5000xp... there, still a reason to take Fighter 6.




Well, I guess I would say that previously fighters had more feats then everyone else, and now everyone else has that same advantage, but I'm not sure that giving fighters more again is necessarily balanced. 

I can agree that random additions are not what we're trying to acomplish here (which was why I pointed that out as I posted my thoughts about using a conviction bonus). That said, granting fighters feats at different xp amounts strikes me as fairly random as well. The idea that all classes gain a new feat every 5000xp is the strength (and core) of this idea. I would think that a better way of addressing a fighter deficiency would be achieved during the 6 class levels they progress through, not after (thus after 6th level every class follows the same rules).

In any case, I agree that no change is better then too many. Personally I'll be skipping the gestalt addendums and raise dead/restoration feats, and just stick to the basics.

With Conviction!
Hisik


----------



## Sqwonk

DogBackward said:
			
		

> So, what's wrong with just allowing to Fighter to continue gaining more feats than everybody else? Like I said, it keeps them viable without having to go through random additions. Full-class Fighters get 1 feat every 3000xp instead of 5000xp... there, still a reason to take Fighter 6.




The fighter would be getting a new feat almost every other session in my group.  That is a little too quick.  The players need time to play with their "new toy" before they get another one.  I would probably change 5,000 exp to maybe 10,000


----------



## Ry

E6 play is over a long period: The fighter will have 5 feats to other characters' 3 if the prices were to change like that.  THe fighter would have 25 when the others had 15.  By my estimate, that's a difference in CR of at least 1.5, and probably more like 2.  That goes too far to fix a problem that I think is pretty minor to begin with.


----------



## Cheiromancer

A minor patch to the fighter would be a general feat that can be used to purchase two feats from the fighter list.  Make Fighter 6 a prerequisite.  

As far as xp goes, I think that 300 * CR2 / level would be better than 300 * CR.


----------



## Ry

Cheiromancer said:
			
		

> As far as xp goes, I think that 300 * CR2 / level would be better than 300 * CR.




I already corrected that in the rtf, giving a feats:CR ratio of 5:1 for the first 20 feats, followed by 10:1 (although the DM has the option of treating the 10:1 period as just staying at CR 10).


----------



## joela

*Fighters and my two copper pieces*



			
				rycanada said:
			
		

> E6 play is over a long period: The fighter will have 5 feats to other characters' 3 if the prices were to change like that.  THe fighter would have 25 when the others had 15.  By my estimate, that's a difference in CR of at least 1.5, and probably more like 2.  That goes too far to fix a problem that I think is pretty minor to begin with.




Unlike, apparently, the bulk of DnD players out there, I don't play fighter, preferring magic-users. Thus, take the following suggestion with a grain of salt:

Why not double the number of feats a fighter can take from levels 1-6? That way, they'll have access to all those tactical feats at an earlier level plus maintain their "feat" schick after 6th level that everyone's so concerned about.


----------



## Ry

My favorite suggestion so far is 1 feat per level for the fighter, but as I said, I'm not implementing it because the problem isn't big enough to merit tripping my players up with low-level rules changes.

E6, Drama rules, and No Alignment easily fills a whole page of house rules.  The players don't want to read how I fixed the fighter, rebalanced the dwarf, toned down the cleric, and finally gave the Orc Wizard/Paladin build the boost it needs.  That way lies madness.  Developers have done lots of my work for me already; I'll just tackle the big stuff and let the rest stand.


----------



## DogBackward

The point is that fighters become even more pointless with E6. Early on, you get some cool feats and such, which almost makes up for all of the unique abilities and class features that other classes get. After 6th level, though, everybody else is taking all the same feats that you have, since there are only so many to take, and you get so many. Very soon, the fighter's bonus feats become completely outstripped by the bonus feats that everybody gets after 6th level.

There's no real reason to play a fighter unless you're just dipping, or you know the game won't get far past that 6th level mark. Which is alright, I guess, as there are plenty of fighter-like classes that can take the primary melee place. But I was just trying to make a way to keep the fighter while making it still viable to play.

Alright, how about this: every 2500xp, a 6th level fighter can trade a single feat he has for any other feat he meets the prerequisites for. You can't trade away a feat that is a requirement for another feat you have, however.

This allows the fighter an extra bit of versatility, allowing them to remove feats that are useless later on. And, if they hear early on about an enemy, then gain some xp on teh way to fight them, they can "retrain" to better combat that particular foe when they get there.

Edit: Crosspost. I see your point, I guess. I'll just use that in my own E6 game, then. Once I get it running...


----------



## Ry

DogBackward; try it out and let me know how it goes in play.


----------



## DogBackward

Sure, no problem. However, I don't have a tabletop group anymore, so I play over RPoL. Forum-based gaming goes pretty slowly, so it may be a while before I can get back to you.


----------



## Ry

You should check out some local meetups; I was really surprised at how cool the people at my local meetup were, and I went from 1 game every 6 months to about 1 a week practically overnight.


----------



## DogBackward

Yeah, I found one meetup in my area, but... well, they weren't all that inviting, really. I'm pretty much stuck online. It's better, though, in certian ways. it's slow, but you tend to get a lot more roleplaying out of your characters, because people have more time to think out their actions, and what their characters would do. As opposed to tabletop, where most people just do the first thing that comes to mind, which is what _they_ would do. Also, posts tend to be a lot more descriptive, and nobody's worried about wounding stupid in front of their friends.

It's a little harder to run heavy combat, but I don't use grids and such anyway. Overall, it's a lot more conducive to roleplaying. I'd still like a nice, fast-paced tabletop game, but I can deal with the RPoL stuff for now.


----------



## joela

*Every odd number*



			
				joela said:
			
		

> Why not double the number of feats a fighter can take from levels 1-6? That way, they'll have access to all those tactical feats at an earlier level plus maintain their "feat" schick after 6th level that everyone's so concerned about.




Another option is to allow fighters to get two feats instead of one every odd 5k xp; i.e., two feats at 5k xp; 15k; 25k; etc. This prevents the fighter from being _more_ front-loaded in terms of feats compared to the other classes _and_ discourages any form of dipping from CL's 1-6 while maintaining one of the fighter's major forte, which are numerous feats.


----------



## Shazman

I think that the best approach are a few feats that only a 6th level fighter is eligible to take.  If the casters get feats to be better at what they do, the same should be done for the fighter.  That's what I tried to do with my feats on the E6 feat thread.  Other classes might need some individual feats as well to compete with the warblade or barbarian, but I'd stick to balancing the core classes for E6 this early in the game.


----------



## kaomera

More fighter-only feats couldn't hurt (as long as they're balanced), but really I don't see the problem with the Fighter. You're getting four more feats than anyone else, access to Weapon Specialization (which is even more worth he feat, IMHO, in an EL6 game), full BAB, d10 hit dice... About the only real problem is that you're still really hurting for skills. If you allow Able Learner for all races, or add more feats that add skills to your class list (like City Slicker) then you could get three instances of Open-Minded with those four feats, but that only works out to an extra 2.5 skill points per level, and you're stuck with no more than 4 ranks in any cross-class skill...

I'm thinking of showing up at a local D&D meetup in the near future (only, unfortunately, it's only really "local" on a cosmological scale...), and I've been thinking of even possibly running something. Usually for a one-off I'd do something a bit higher-level; I prefer lower-level stuff, but a lot of players don't get that many chances to play at higher levels... I may end up doing EL6, instead. I think that a one-shot with level six plus, say, ten or so feats could be really cool. I'm even tempted to try and do characters up on-sight, but I'm not sure it would work out (given a limited time-frame) even with EL6 characters being so much easier to run up than a 15th or so level character... (If I get my act together and actually run something I'll be sure and post an after-action report...)


----------



## chris.crouch

Hierax said:
			
		

> ...
> - *Slower Level Advancement:* Less XP or greater XP needed to advance each level. At least twice as much to keep roughly the same time to get to the top (I'd make it even slower than that but that's because I think that 3e advancement is way too fast).
> 
> - *Feat per Level:* to give more of the rewards at each step of the way.
> ...




I like the idea of slower advancement, but I think it'd be better if you got the extra feats _between_ levels, sort of at the half-level points.

That way you would have advancement happening on the same timescale as standard, but less advancement at each advancement point (if that butchered piece of english makes any sense to anyone else).

Chris


----------



## Kunimatyu

This is a brilliant idea - it keeps the basic structure of D&D, but preserves the sweet spot as long as possible!

I think I'll be giving this a whirl the next time I run D&D. I get fed up with the ridiculous nature of certain elements -- particularly 4+ level spells -- and I can't help but think that this is one of the simplest tweaks possible to make the game conform to the genres I want to play, as opposed to getting into fantasy-superheroes.


----------



## Ry

Thanks!  It's really nice to see all these people "getting" E6.


----------



## Ry

chris.crouch said:
			
		

> I like the idea of slower advancement, but I think it'd be better if you got the extra feats _between_ levels, sort of at the half-level points.
> 
> That way you would have advancement happening on the same timescale as standard, but less advancement at each advancement point (if that butchered piece of english makes any sense to anyone else).
> 
> Chris




You mean, like

1000 Level 2
3000 (Level 3 feat)
6000 Level 3
10000 (Level 4 ability point)
15000 Level 4


----------



## Shazman

kaomera said:
			
		

> More fighter-only feats couldn't hurt (as long as they're balanced), but really I don't see the problem with the Fighter. You're getting four more feats than anyone else, access to Weapon Specialization (which is even more worth he feat, IMHO, in an EL6 game), full BAB, d10 hit dice... About the only real problem is that you're still really hurting for skills. If you allow Able Learner for all races, or add more feats that add skills to your class list (like City Slicker) then you could get three instances of Open-Minded with those four feats, but that only works out to an extra 2.5 skill points per level, and you're stuck with no more than 4 ranks in any cross-class skill...
> 
> I'm thinking of showing up at a local D&D meetup in the near future (only, unfortunately, it's only really "local" on a cosmological scale...), and I've been thinking of even possibly running something. Usually for a one-off I'd do something a bit higher-level; I prefer lower-level stuff, but a lot of players don't get that many chances to play at higher levels... I may end up doing EL6, instead. I think that a one-shot with level six plus, say, ten or so feats could be really cool. I'm even tempted to try and do characters up on-sight, but I'm not sure it would work out (given a limited time-frame) even with EL6 characters being so much easier to run up than a 15th or so level character... (If I get my act together and actually run something I'll be sure and post an after-action report...)




Yeah, but the fighter 4/barbarian 2 also has access to weapon specialization, and he's only one feat behind the fighter 6.  He's getting a boost in saves and ability scores (while raging), skills, mobility, and hit points for one less feat.  That's a no-brainer decision, especially when you throw in extra rage, shock trooper, and leap attack.


----------



## Kunimatyu

It really seems like fighter is a lost cause at this point, guys -- it's underpowered anyways, and if you're playing in a game with access to splatbooks, you have many (too many!) solid options available.


----------



## DogBackward

Well, I've always given fighters 4+int skill points, any two skills as class skills, and every other feat (2/6/10/14/18) as Wildcard Feats (see below). Maybe changing all the Fighter Bonus Feats to Wildcard feats, as well as the extra skill stuff, would make them worthwhile. The Wildcard Feats alone may actually do it, as they're a pretty cool unique ability, representing a very broad area of training expertise.
[sblock=Wildcard Feats]I got the idea from the Iron Heroes book, but thought the 1/day part was a little stiff.

Basically, certain Bonus Feats* become Wild Card Feats. They are left blank. At any time, you may concentrate for one full round. If you do, you may choose any Fighter Bonus Feat you qualify for, and this feat fills the Wild Card Feat slot. The feat is 'learned' until you use another Full Round action to 'learn' a different one. If you use this ability to learn a feat that grants extra HP and later trade that feat for a different one, you lose the HP that was granted by the feat, as if it were gained through a Con increase.

* All of them, in the case of the E6 Fighter.[/sblock]That was an old house rule of mine, and I completely forgot about it for this. It seems like it would work, an Wildcard Feats are a very good reason to stay full Fighter.


----------



## Kunimatyu

Oh, and for arcane casters who want nifty metamagic options, but can't quite put them on spells, here's a feat that takes care of that:

*Sudden Metamagic:*
When you take this feat, select a metamagic feat. As a swift action once per day, you may apply this metamagic feat to a spell you cast with no adjustment to the level of the spell cast.

Special: You must have a number of Sudden metamagic feats equal to the level increase of your chosen metamagic, minus one, to take this feat. For example, Empower Spell, which boosts the level of a spell by 2, has a prerequisite of 1 Sudden feat. Split Ray, which has an increase of 1, would have no prerequisites.


----------



## Ry

Wildcard feats could also be used with the Conviction rules, something like "2 Conviction to reset the Wild Card"


----------



## DogBackward

Well, I use Action Points that recover 1/day rather than x/level, but I suppose that'd work just as well. The first use, of course, would be free, but changing it once it's chosen could require an AP/Conviction thingy.


----------



## Ry

Conviction, if you see there, is actually 6/day.  

usually makes for some exciting days,


----------



## Shazman

What about Ebberon-style action points?  To get action points, the characters need the Heroic Spirit feat (ECS).  It can be taken multiple times, and they would refresh every 5000 exp.


----------



## Ry

Eberron's action poitns are too weak for my tastes.  I've used Conviction for ages and it delivers the goods


----------



## TheCrazyMuffinMan

This whole E6 concept is gaming genius, and solves the common sticking points of inflated HP and superheroism (not that I'm bothered by either in the normal D&D game and similar RPGs), without having to resort to ludicrous amounts of abstraction.


----------



## Ry

Thanks TCMM!  I feel pretty good about it.  It's also 100% OGC, and I hope that some of this attention means people will get a chance to use it.


----------



## Shazman

I have one more question.  What happens to special mounts, animal companions, and familiars after 6th level?  Do they get a feat for every extra hit die they get or maybe every 10000 exp the PC gets?


----------



## Kunimatyu

I'm trying to come up with a good way to convert Warlocks gaining LesserInvocations to E6, and not having the easiest time doing it.

They should have the ability to do so, because a Warlock stuck with one Least Invocation while his wizard buddy takes lots of additional spell slots doesn't work quite right, but Extra Invocation normally grants an invocation one type lower than your highest-powered Invocations(ie. in E6, only Least)

So, what's the right way to bring them over?

a) Don't -- and then wonder why nobody plays them anymore.
b) Let Extra Invocation grant additional Lessers -- after all, Wizards get an additional 3rd spell per feat, right?
c) Let Extra Invocation grant Lessers on a 2 feat: 1 Lesser basis.
d) Let Extra Invocation grant Lessers on a 3 feat: 1 Lesser basis.

Thoughts?


----------



## iceifur

Kunimatyu said:
			
		

> I'm trying to come up with a good way to convert Warlocks gaining LesserInvocations to E6, and not having the easiest time doing it.
> 
> So, what's the right way to bring them over?





Well, you could always say that the warlock has to have at least twice the number of Least Invocations as Lesser Invocations, and then modify the Extra Invocation feat accordingly.

For example, the first time someone takes the Extra Invocation feat, they gain a Least Invocation (total Invocs: 4 Least, 1 Lesser). The next time, they can gain a Lesser (total: 4 Least, 2 Lesser); the next two times, two more Least Invocations (total: 6 Least, 2 Lesser); the next after that, another Lesser (total: 6 Least, 3 Lesser); and so on, and so forth.


----------



## Ry

Shazman said:
			
		

> I have one more question.  What happens to special mounts, animal companions, and familiars after 6th level?  Do they get a feat for every extra hit die they get or maybe every 10000 exp the PC gets?




No, but there are feats in a few different books for upping your familiar, mount, or animal companion.


----------



## Ry

Re: invocations, I think Icifur's method is the way to go, but I would write it as a "Greater Extra Invocation" feat with the prerequisites he described (because I prefer to add a feat rather than rewrite anything).


----------



## Shazman

rycanada said:
			
		

> No, but there are feats in a few different books for upping your familiar, mount, or animal companion.




So in other words, don't bother getting these.  They are mostly liablities anyway except for a druid's animal companion at lower levels.  PHBII has some good alternate class features that are superior to these anyway.  I also agree that warlocks should get an extra invocation feat.


----------



## Ry

*Graeter Extra Invocation*
Prerequisites: Extra Invocation
Benefit: You gain a new invocation of the best type you can cast. 
Special: You must always have at least twice as many Least Invocations as Lesser Invocations


----------



## Dragonblade275

DogBackward said:
			
		

> Well, I've always given fighters 4+int skill points, any two skills as class skills, and every other feat (2/6/10/14/18) as Wildcard Feats (see below). Maybe changing all the Fighter Bonus Feats to Wildcard feats, as well as the extra skill stuff, would make them worthwhile. The Wildcard Feats alone may actually do it, as they're a pretty cool unique ability, representing a very broad area of training expertise.
> [sblock=Wildcard Feats]I got the idea from the Iron Heroes book, but thought the 1/day part was a little stiff.
> 
> Basically, certain Bonus Feats* become Wild Card Feats. They are left blank. At any time, you may concentrate for one full round. If you do, you may choose any Fighter Bonus Feat you qualify for, and this feat fills the Wild Card Feat slot. The feat is 'learned' until you use another Full Round action to 'learn' a different one. If you use this ability to learn a feat that grants extra HP and later trade that feat for a different one, you lose the HP that was granted by the feat, as if it were gained through a Con increase.
> 
> * All of them, in the case of the E6 Fighter.[/sblock]That was an old house rule of mine, and I completely forgot about it for this. It seems like it would work, an Wildcard Feats are a very good reason to stay full Fighter.



I think this is the option that would fix fighters for E6.

Personally, I like the fighter class even in standard 3.5 and I don't really see why folks think it is underpowered next to other martial classes.  But, wildcard feats would seem to be the solution for the fighter.


----------



## Kunimatyu

Another fighter fix, though this one involves Book of Nine Swords:

Disallow crusader, swordsage, and warblade.

Martial Study (new maneuver) and Martial Stance(new stance) are allowed for all classes, but fighter levels count as initiator levels (so a fighter can learn 3rd level manuevers, but nobody else can)

You also introduce the following feat:
Martial Recovery
Prereq: Fighter 6
Benefit: You may recover an expended maneuver with a full-round action.


----------



## Shazman

I like 3.5 fighters as well.  They are a good fit for a skilled combat oriented character, especially if you are using feats from the PHB II.  If you want lots of feats, play a fighter.  For hardcore powergamers/optimizers, the fighter is considered sub-par because he gets no class abilities other than bonus feats.  They are just used as a quick 2 level dip to get a few bonus feats. Feats are generally weaker than class abilities, especially spells.  In E6, the fighter eventually only has a few more feats than everyone, so there isn't as much incentive to play one.  That's the main concern some of us have for the E6 fighter.  I think the feats I came up with were a good start for making a Fighter 6 attractive in E6.  They were pretty potent, and only a fighter could get them.  He still, however, has to spend a considerable amount of feats to get them, so he will be fairly high "level" before he has access to them.


----------



## Shazman

Kunimatyu said:
			
		

> Another fighter fix, though this one involves Book of Nine Swords:
> 
> Disallow crusader, swordsage, and warblade.
> 
> Martial Study (new maneuver) and Martial Stance(new stance) are allowed for all classes, but fighter levels count as initiator levels (so a fighter can learn 3rd level manuevers, but nobody else can)
> 
> You also introduce the following feat:
> Martial Recovery
> Prereq: Fighter 6
> Benefit: You may recover an expended maneuver with a full-round action.




I like that one.  I love Tome of Battle.  That would definitely make me want to play a fighter.


----------



## DogBackward

Thanks Dragonblade, I really liked the concept in Iron Heroes, but didn't like the way they executed it.

As for the ToB, I wouldn't really be all that against adding Warblade maneuver progression to the Fighter straight on. Take away the Warblade's maneuvers, and the Warblade and Fighter seem about even, to be honest. Higher HD and Skills, combined with the Battle "x" abilities, Uncanny Dodge setup and fewer bonus feats traded for the Fighter's big list of bonus feats and higher armor proficiency, and ranged weapon proficiency. Hell, I'd probably still choose Warblade over Fighter even without the Maneuvers.

Although I will admit that the ToB maneuvers are a little higher in power than some other low-level things, and they will tend to overshadow low-level mages quite often. Normally, this wouldn't be a problem as a 20 level progression still balances out with mages at later levels. In E6, though, that eventual balance doesn't really come, unless you've got a mage with well-planned feats.

There are a lot more little details and minor changes for an E6 game than are readily apparent from the desctiption... Not a bad thing, but I think it'll take a little more thought to run it than I had figured on.


----------



## Ry

Bah.

-- doesn't own ToB.


----------



## DogBackward

It's worth it, really. Makes pure melee combatants mechanically fun again. There are a few balance issues to watch out for, but it's mostly well done. The Swordsage is a little up in power level, and there are a few Maneuvers that could do with some nerfing, but other than that it's great.


----------



## joela

*Could you...?*



			
				rycanada said:
			
		

> Bah.
> 
> -- doesn't own ToB.




rycanada, could you check with your players if they ever felt their E6 fighters were ever underpowered compared to the other classes?


----------



## TheCrazyMuffinMan

Rycanada, later on I might post a thread based on my idea for my level-less system, with rules details and the like. It may intrigue you, because it's got roughly the same idea behind it (minimizing abstraction, inflation and superheroism).


----------



## Kunimatyu

TheCrazyMuffinMan said:
			
		

> Rycanada, later on I might post a thread based on my idea for my level-less system, with rules details and the like. It may intrigue you, because it's got roughly the same idea behind it (minimizing abstraction, inflation and superheroism).




You have to admit, though, one of the strengths of the E6 system is that it doesn't really have a boatload of new rules, just a few new feats and the level 6 cap + feat advancement rules. Taking away advancement does get rid of one of the primary motivations people have for playing D&D.


----------



## TheCrazyMuffinMan

Kunimatyu said:
			
		

> You have to admit, though, one of the strengths of the E6 system is that it doesn't really have a boatload of new rules, just a few new feats and the level 6 cap + feat advancement rules. Taking away advancement does get rid of one of the primary motivations people have for playing D&D.




I hear ya man. E6 is a very efficient system and it covers a lot of bases. I'm seriously considering running an E6 someday, if not several.

In the case of my levelless thing, advancement is done via XP purchases for class powers, feats and skills. Max HP is equal to Constitution, and Spell slots are based on the ability prime requisite for the class using that spell. Spell levels are replaced with spell XP costs and spell/ability prerequisites.


----------



## Ry

The players in my game thought it was a little underpowered but not importantly so.  We still had a 6th level fighter in the mix (halfling with 2 short swords actually), as well as characters who took just 2 levels.  I've made comments several times about how there are viable fixes if you want to fix the fighter, but I'm not going to drill down to the level of rebalancing classes in my own game.  

The players appreciated Core+Small house rules that add on top of core instead of Core+Changes within Core that affect how Core interacts with everything else.


----------



## TheCrazyMuffinMan

rycanada said:
			
		

> The players appreciated Core+Small house rules that add on top of core instead of Core+Changes within Core that affect how Core interacts with everything else.




I take it the hypothetical Level-free thing would be a shining example of changes to the core. If so, I'll see what I can do to minimize side-effects to removing level-based advancement. This is my last comment on "E1" ITT unless you request a comment. I'm glad your players were satisfied with the overall experience.


----------



## Ry

TCMM - Your E1 system definitely would need its own thread; it would get lost here anyway.  I originally was thinking of doing something similar to that but the level of playtesting I thought it would need was prohibitive - still, if you can make it work, go nuts!  Some others have mentioned Buy the Numbers (EN Publishing product) and that might help as a backbone to what you're doing.   Cheers!


----------



## Shazman

rycanada said:
			
		

> The players in my game thought it was a little underpowered but not importantly so.  We still had a 6th level fighter in the mix (halfling with 2 short swords actually), as well as characters who took just 2 levels.  I've made comments several times about how there are viable fixes if you want to fix the fighter, but I'm not going to drill down to the level of rebalancing classes in my own game.
> 
> The players appreciated Core+Small house rules that add on top of core instead of Core+Changes within Core that affect how Core interacts with everything else.




A halfling fighter with two short swords?  A d4 plus minor strength bonus for damage?  That would look underpowered no matter how you cut it.  Though, it's good to see that your players enjoyed the campaign.  That's what really matters.


----------



## MidnightChampion

*Too much Conviction?*

First off, E6 sounds like a fantastic idea. When it comes to system tweaking, striking a balance between "what makes sense" and "playability" usually results in "too many house rules."

I personally have no experience running higher level D20 campaigns; in fact, I'm in the process of running my first 3.x game, and the PCs are around 4th level right now - which basically means I don't have a clear feel for the problems that E6 "solves" related to higher-level campaigns. I am, however, running in a low-magic, gritty setting that E6 seems to fit quite well.

I did want to sound off on the Death Flag rule. I LOVE it. In a world where resurrection doesn't exist, and having been a player who's put loving time and effort into developing a character, I am loath to allow PCs to die due to bad dice rolls; and yet, I feel guilty at times for fudging things so that the PC can be saved.

The Death Flag answers these concerns for me nicely; it gives the player control over the destiny of the character, and allows them the opportunity to choose to make heroic sacrifices at dramatically appropriate times.

The thing I'm not too sure about is the number of conviction points. 6 per game day seems awfully high to me. I was curious to know how this has worked out in your playtesting/gaming experience. It seems to me that unless you tend to have more than one combat encounter per day, it gives a distinct advantage to the PCs when each one can, for example, roll twice for each of 6 attack rolls and choose the better. Perhaps it's just my perception, but I'd be grateful for some more explanation of your experience with it.


----------



## Ry

I admit that I hand out a lot of Conviction.  6/day is a lot.  But it's become the cornerstone of my games.

6/day has been the difference between a rinse-repeat dungeon run over a 3-day period and a continuous, dramatic assault on an enemy's stronghold.  

But more importantly, Conviction is about sharing the spotlight.  Everybody has this limited resource in the same supply, so everybody knows how much of a sacrifice it is to take that extra move action to get into range of the lich, and then roll 2d20 to make that hit that you hope to god downs it.  So people pay attention when another player uses Conviction.  Moreover, once one character's Conviction is used up, the other charcters - by virtue of still having Conviction left - proceed to take those important, central actions.

I am convinced that balance in an RPG is about what people are paying attention to.*  If it stops on one PC too often, or we only care about the camera when it's on one PC, it's not balanced. If the camera moves from PC to PC and we care about each PC's actions, then it's very well balanced.  Conviction has, in my experience, improved the balance of my game.  
* (although there's something else, not quite the same as balance, that's about using appropriate challenges - I use monsters whose CRs are in the usual range, but I like to make my combats meaningful so that usually means there's a few more combatants, or the battle flows more naturally from one dungeon room to the next, making the situation more difficult to match with the action-drama vibe)


----------



## joela

*without conviction*



			
				rycanada said:
			
		

> I admit that I hand out a lot of Conviction.  6/day is a lot.  But it's become the cornerstone of my games.




How'd E6 handle before you implemented Conviction? I like the similar Action Points but many DMs don't. I know from experience APs can change the game flavor, especially at lower levels.


----------



## Ry

Before Conviction E6 was "just" low-level D&D.  That worked but it wasn't as action-adventure as I was looking for.  I do think they work separately.  That's why I kept the Drama rules in a separate section - they're not necessary to E6, but they're rules I do use.  The last time I switched threads someone asked that the Conviction rules get posted right below E6 so they didn't have to flip between two webpages, so I included them both in the main E6 document.


----------



## Swanky_Yankie

After months of lurking I had to create an account just to congratulate rycanada on his fascinating E6 system and the equally fascinating discussion it has spawned. Well done! 

About the Fighter balancing issue, here's my attempt at a simple, elegent approach that (hopefully) gives level 6 Fighters a bone without changing their core rules:

When choosing an Extra Feat, a level 6 Fighter may pick a fighter bonus feat that has a fighter level requirement higher than 6th so long as his 6 levels of Fighter + his total number of Extra Feats equal the fighter level requirement for that feat. The Fighter must meet all other Prerequisites for that feat. 

For example, a level 6 Fighter may take Greater Weapon Specialization (requires fighter level 12) as his sixth Extra Feat (6 levels in Fighter + 6 Extra feats).

This effectively gives the Fighter access to special abilities in the mid-to-end game that other classes simply can not get. It is balanced by the fact that the feat must have the fighter bonus feat Special description, and the Fighter must meet all other prerequisites for the feat in question.

For additional balancing, DMs could create a feat(s) that Fighters must take to gain this ability. For example:

*FIGHTER MASTERY [Fighter]*

Your Martial prowess is without peer. Through training, dedication, experience, and blah blah blah you can take feats that Clerics and other mooks can't. Hot .

*Prerequisites*

Fighter level 6th

*Benefits*

See my previous blurb.

*Special*

Only 6th level Fighters can take this feat so nyah.


----------



## Ry

Swanky_Yankie said:
			
		

> After months of lurking I had to create an account just to congratulate rycanada on his fascinating E6 system and the equally fascinating discussion it has spawned. Well done!




Thanks Swanky!  Or is it Yankie? 

I really think this is a great way to have more fun with your game of D&D.

There's been a lot of great suggestions for the fighter lately but I'm going to stay out of the fighter discussion for reasons posted earlier.    I'm gonna focus on setting and getting my game ready


----------



## joela

*setting*



			
				rycanada said:
			
		

> ...on setting and getting my game ready




Will you be starting a new forum on E6 settings or one detailing your game? Or did you do either one already?


----------



## Ry

There's a thread on an E6 setting in Plots & Places, but it hasn't gotten very far.  Mostly people seem to be going in different directions, and I went back and forth on a few ideas.  

I have this really great concept for a game but I don't know if I have enough time to get it together.  I'm trying to create a setting of big, teetering dominoes just waiting for PCs to push them, but I also want to have fidelity with my other setting design advice (the amusement park method).


----------



## Kunimatyu

rycanada said:
			
		

> There's a thread on an E6 setting in Plots & Places, but it hasn't gotten very far.  Mostly people seem to be going in different directions, and I went back and forth on a few ideas.
> 
> I have this really great concept for a game but I don't know if I have enough time to get it together.  I'm trying to create a setting of big, teetering dominoes just waiting for PCs to push them, but I also want to have fidelity with my other setting design advice (the amusement park method).




I'm currently looking at The Dictionary of Mu ( http://www.bobgoat.com/mu/ ) as a potential basis for my E6 setting. If nothing else, it'll be a fun read. Wilderlands of High Fantasy would probably also work very well.


----------



## joela

*Wilderlands*



			
				Kunimatyu said:
			
		

> Wilderlands of High Fantasy would probably also work very well.




Very. Plenty of places for both low and high (by E6 standards) magics (City of Mages) plus everything in between.


----------



## chris.crouch

rycanada said:
			
		

> You mean, like
> 
> 1000 Level 2
> 3000 (Level 3 feat)
> 6000 Level 3
> 10000 (Level 4 ability point)
> 15000 Level 4




Pretty much, although I was adding in the idea of getting a bonus feat every level, so something like:

1000  bonus feat
2000  Level 2
4000  (level 3 feat)
6000  Level 3
9000  bonus feat
12000 Level 4
16000 bonus feat
20000 Level 5
25000 (level 6 feat)
30000 Level 6
(numbers just made up - I'd certainly tweak them a little)

although I like your idea of adding the level 4 ability bump as a separate thing.

Note that I'm not sure that slower advancement is necessary, just that if I were going to do it this is what I'd do.
----

Another tweak that I'd make to E6 is changing the ability feats so that Ability Training isn't a 'dead' feat:

Ability Training
You spend time honing one of your Abilities: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma.
Benefit: Choose one Ability; you qualify for the Ability Advancement feat for that Ability. _You also get +1 on all skill and ability checks based off of that ability._
Special: You can gain this feat multiple times, its effects do not stack. Each time you take this feat it applies to another ability.

Ability Advancement
Your training pays off, and one of your Abilities increases. 
Benefit: Choose one Ability. You gain a permanent +2 bonus to that ability. _ You lose the benefit of the Ability Training feat for that ability. _
Special: You can gain this feat multiple times, its effects do not stack. Each time you take this feat it applies to another ability.

Chris


----------



## DogBackward

What would be so bad about just saying that Ability Training gives +1, then Improved Ability Training gives a stacking +1? Sure, somebody could take a +1 to an odd stat, but is that really so bad? If somebody has an odd score, why should they have to waste a feat and get an ability point they don't need? They can't use level-based increases to shore it up, so they're stuck with an odd score they don't want.

Personally, I think I'm just going to have Ability Training provide a +1 Inherent bonus, allow it to be taken multiple times and stack, with a maximum of +5 to any one ability. But that's just me.


----------



## Kunimatyu

DogBackward said:
			
		

> What would be so bad about just saying that Ability Training gives +1, then Improved Ability Training gives a stacking +1? Sure, somebody could take a +1 to an odd stat, but is that really so bad? If somebody has an odd score, why should they have to waste a feat and get an ability point they don't need? They can't use level-based increases to shore it up, so they're stuck with an odd score they don't want.
> 
> Personally, I think I'm just going to have Ability Training provide a +1 Inherent bonus, allow it to be taken multiple times and stack, with a maximum of +5 to any one ability. But that's just me.




I don't know if I want PCs raising things that much, but it doesn't seem unreasonable to have Ability Training that grants +1 to a stat, able to be taken once per stat, and then Greater Ability Training, prereq Ability Training, that also provides +1 to that stat, ablle to be taken once per stat.

It mirrors feats like Spell Focus/Greater Spell Focus and Spell Penetration quite well, I think.


----------



## Kunimatyu

Oh, and while I'm getting tired of adding these tiny houserule fixes (as they really don't overly affect the system as a whole), I'm going to try one more time to fix the fighter, completely OGL.

Change the fighter level prereqs for Greater Weapon Focus/Specialization to "fighter level 6".

Change the "BAB +8" requirement in Improved Critical to "fighter level 6".

Doesn't require any additional splatbooks, it removes a few PHB feats from the "useless to E6" list - it's all good.


----------



## Dragonblade275

Kunimatyu said:
			
		

> Oh, and while I'm getting tired of adding these tiny houserule fixes (as they really don't overly affect the system as a whole), I'm going to try one more time to fix the fighter, completely OGL.
> 
> Change the fighter level prereqs for Greater Weapon Focus/Specialization to "fighter level 6".
> 
> Change the "BAB +8" requirement in Improved Critical to "fighter level 6".
> 
> Doesn't require any additional splatbooks, it removes a few PHB feats from the "useless to E6" list - it's all good.



I'd probably do that, too, for E6.  I don't really see how that would unbalance anything too much.  And, the fighter would be a valuable class by having access to Improved Critical, too.


----------



## Matrix Sorcica

Kunimatyu said:
			
		

> I don't know if I want PCs raising things that much, but it doesn't seem unreasonable to have Ability Training that grants +1 to a stat, able to be taken once per stat, and then Greater Ability Training, prereq Ability Training, that also provides +1 to that stat, ablle to be taken once per stat.
> 
> It mirrors feats like Spell Focus/Greater Spell Focus and Spell Penetration quite well, I think.



And the epic feat that grants +1 to a stat can be taken multiple times, so I don't feel it will be unreasonable.


----------



## DogBackward

The game I plan on starting one RPoL is going to be a psionics-only game (a recent decision). Have you tested E6 out using psionics? If so, are there any different things that need to be accounted for?

One thing I think is that the Increased Manifesting could allow new powers learned without worrying about keeping more of lower levels or anything. Most fully augmented low-level powers are nearly as powerful as the higher level powers, so that shouldn't be a problem, especially with only three power levels available. I think I'd just use the "learn three levels worth of powers" option, and leave it at that.

Anyway, if you haven't tested it using psionics, i'll be sure and let you know if there are any differences. As I said before, though, it may be a while since RPoL is slower than normal gaming.


----------



## Ry

I haven't tested it with psionics, but I am HIGHLY, HIGHLY interested in how an all-psionics E6 game would look.  Do let me know what your setting is like, too.


----------



## DogBackward

Well... I like to do at least semi-original stuff, so it'll be a little different than your usual background. I'll beusing a monotheistic settin for the main "goodguy culture", with the only ones able to use psionics being those who have been "blessed" with a small piece of the main deity's soul. This also allows the deity to speak with them mentally, which adds a great way to convey plothooks as well as add a cool new element to the game. Any psionic character could well have their god's voice commenting on their actions and such through the entire game.

I also want to get away from teh ubiquitous nature of crystals. I'll keep a small group that still use crystals for power, but I think it lends a bit too much of a sci-fi feel to have them all over the place. In generaly, I'm gonna treat psionics much more mystically than most think of it. It's not a science, it's quite literally a blessing from God.

Once I get the game going, actually, I'll post a link to it here for you. I'll leave all the posts public, so anybody that wants to check out the game in action can pop in and look around.


----------



## Ry

Dogs in the Mystical, Monster-infested Vineyard.

I like


----------



## DogBackward

Uh... I have no idea what that means.

Anyway, random thought... this system would be just about perfect for Eberron. One of the main ideas is that anything above level 5 is very rare, right? I've always thought that the PC's being so much higher level than anybody else kinda ruins that effect, especially since once you have to start creating higher-level threats, that whole idea falls flat.

With E6, nobody anywhere is above level six, without being monstrous in some way. So, it really enforces the idea of incredibly power being incredibly rare. And those big beasties in Eberron that are supposed to scare the crap out of everyone? Well, they really do, now.

I don't like running other peoples' settings (I got Eberron for material to steal...), but I still think E6 would be great for those who do run it.


----------



## Ry

Dogs in the Vineyard is an RPG where the players take the roles of holy men / cowboys in a setting that riffs off of pre-statehood Mormon Utah.  The thing has had excellent reviews, it's one of these indie RPGs that's very, very tightly written around its premise.


----------



## TwoSix

DogBackward said:
			
		

> Uh... I have no idea what that means.
> 
> Anyway, random thought... this system would be just about perfect for Eberron. One of the main ideas is that anything above level 5 is very rare, right? I've always thought that the PC's being so much higher level than anybody else kinda ruins that effect, especially since once you have to start creating higher-level threats, that whole idea falls flat.
> 
> With E6, nobody anywhere is above level six, without being monstrous in some way. So, it really enforces the idea of incredibly power being incredibly rare. And those big beasties in Eberron that are supposed to scare the crap out of everyone? Well, they really do, now.
> 
> I don't like running other peoples' settings (I got Eberron for material to steal...), but I still think E6 would be great for those who do run it.




I made a post about that same idea on Wizard's site...some people agree, some don't.


----------



## Ry

E6 was crossposted to WotC forums?  After what happened at GiantITP and therpgsite, I'm afraid to look ...


----------



## DogBackward

Well... now I wanna see what happened on the giant forums...


----------



## Ry

It wasn't as bad, but it was still a good example of why you need the whole E6 explanation and not just.  

"Hey, what if after 6th level, you stopped levelling, and just got feats?  Sounds cool, right?"

"Right?"


----------



## TwoSix

rycanada said:
			
		

> E6 was crossposted to WotC forums?  After what happened at GiantITP and therpgsite, I'm afraid to look ...




Well, I posted it on the Eberron forums, because I'm particularly in using E6 to run Eberron.  It didn't generate a whole lot of interest, sadly.  I'm way too afraid to post it on a heavily trafficed spot like the Classes forum.


----------



## WhatGravitas

TwoSix said:
			
		

> Well, I posted it on the Eberron forums, because I'm particularly in using E6 to run Eberron.  It didn't generate a whole lot of interest, sadly.  I'm way too afraid to post it on a heavily trafficed spot like the Classes forum.



Well, from my point of view, E6 is a pretty good fit for Eberron, especially because the Eldritch Machines, Creation Forges, Schemas and Artifact spells offer a way to introduce "high-powered" stuff even on lower levels.

(personally, though, I prefer E7 in combination with Arcana Evolved, therefore I've never really posted here - in AE, at least IMO, 7th level is a better breaking point, because 4th level spells there are a bit weaker than in D&D, the half-casters get there "0"-entry for 3rd level spells, the absence of sorcerers, and it is the last level before the second attack for 3/4-BABs (so full BAB remains special, unlike E8), and all classes, except Warmains, get a cool goody on 7th).


----------



## joela

*E6 Midnight*



			
				Lord Tirian said:
			
		

> Well, from my point of view, E6 is a pretty good fit for Eberron




I'll have to check my books, but E6 may be useful for an alternative Midnight campaign. I mean, E6 was partially developed with LoTR in mind (e.g., Gandalf as a 6th level wizard, 5th level Aragorn, etc.) 

Hmmm. 3rd level DnD spells may be too powerful even for that campaign, never mind the "weak" Cure Light Wound spell   !


----------



## TwoSix

Lord Tirian said:
			
		

> Well, from my point of view, E6 is a pretty good fit for Eberron, especially because the Eldritch Machines, Creation Forges, Schemas and Artifact spells offer a way to introduce "high-powered" stuff even on lower levels.
> 
> (personally, though, I prefer E7 in combination with Arcana Evolved, therefore I've never really posted here - in AE, at least IMO, 7th level is a better breaking point, because 4th level spells there are a bit weaker than in D&D, the half-casters get there "0"-entry for 3rd level spells, the absence of sorcerers, and it is the last level before the second attack for 3/4-BABs (so full BAB remains special, unlike E8), and all classes, except Warmains, get a cool goody on 7th).




Exactly...Eberron has powerful magic, but I don't think it needs to be right in the spellbook or spells known of a PC.  Magic in Eberron should be a function of time and resources, not individual power.  Plus, once I houserule dragonmarks to make them accessible, dragonmarks become really strong choices for PCs, since they might be the only way to cast certain 4th and 5th level spells, and shows why the Dragonmarked Houses are so dominant.

E7 sounds really good for all the reasons you mentioned...the only reason I wouldn't do it in Eberron D&D is the 4th level spells, which are so strong!  AE is a much better fit for that.


----------



## Nifelhein

joela said:
			
		

> I'll have to check my books, but E6 may be useful for an alternative Midnight campaign. I mean, E6 was partially developed with LoTR in mind (e.g., Gandalf as a 6th level wizard, 5th level Aragorn, etc.)
> 
> Hmmm. 3rd level DnD spells may be too powerful even for that campaign, never mind the "weak" Cure Light Wound spell   !




Are you kidding? From Against the Shadow, "the" Midnight fansite: Midnight E6 and Mn6 Variant Classes (E6 applied to Midnight, compacting classes to make them balanced with only 6 levels.


----------



## joela

*Midnight sites*



			
				Nifelhein said:
			
		

> Are you kidding? From Against the Shadow, "the" Midnight fansite: Midnight E6 and Mn6 Variant Classes (E6 applied to Midnight, compacting classes to make them balanced with only 6 levels.




Oh! Thanks!


----------



## Nifelhein

My pleasure, as Nightfall says, I am his Midnight counterpart.


----------



## joela

*Probs with E6*



			
				rycanada said:
			
		

> Before Conviction E6 was "just" low-level D&D.




On the face of it, E6 sounds like a simple yet beautiful implementation of DnD in emulating many a fantasy novel w/o massively modifying the rules. Personally, I can't wait to approach my players about giving it a shot. 

However, all the reading and discussion in the world can't substitute actually play. As far as I know, only rycanada has actually used E6 in real-world scenarios. ry, could you share with us any major issues that you faced in your games? What did your players dislike about the system? And what did you do, if anything, to resolve it?

Thanks!


----------



## Ry

There was another GM that ran it, I think it's Chocobo over at RPG.net that was surprised to see that they'd used basically the same thing (he thought I was the same guy).  They said it worked great.

Honestly, my guys have tried a few systems, and the complaints when I started E6 back in the day were about random lethality and the ineffectivness of Eberron-style action points.  I've used Conviction since then, that worked great to solve the drama issue.  The death flag is my solution to lethality, but has only been playtested once since.

My previous games had lots of complaints about my endless and hard-to-keep-track-of tweaking.  E6 solved that (even though I still was occasionally making up or adding feats to the available pool).


----------



## Shazman

New feats aren't exactly tweaking, just adding new options.  Feats are a standard part of the game.  Otherwise, every splatbook would be "tweaking".


----------



## Ry

Yep.  That's why they liked it.  I used to be an incorrigible tweaker.  E6 helped me let go


----------



## Ry

Oh, and please let me know about these happy cross-postings  

The Midnight one was cool.


----------



## Hierax

*D&D Calibrating Your Expectations*

FYI, Here's an interesting E6 related article (mentioned by another poster on another message board):

*D&D Calibrating Your Expectations*:
http://www.thealexandrian.net/creations/misc/d&d-calibrating.html​


----------



## Ry

Oh, yeah.  That's a great article; it really hits on what E6 is about.  I think it was linked in E6's previous thread (man, this thing is getting a lot of posts).


----------



## WhatGravitas

rycanada said:
			
		

> Yep.  That's why they liked it.  I used to be an incorrigible tweaker.  E6 helped me let go



Hehe! Funny, after I've read E6, I feel the same. I'm a tweaker as well, and... I'm usually never happy. But E6? Great concept... I can channel all my creative overflow into new feats, thus my players will never really feel "cheated", because nothing changes, you just more goodies to choose.

Now, I'm off to convincing my group of the awesomeness of E6 (or AE7 in my case).

(heck, I've even thought of abandoning AE for D&D with E6)


----------



## Ry

I want to hear all about AE7, honestly.  I've got AE and I thought there would be issues (quickling faen unfettered builds, sorcerous blast-heavy magisters) but if they don't materialize that would be _fantastic_.


----------



## Ry

Lord Tirian said:
			
		

> (heck, I've even thought of abandoning AE for D&D with E6)




I see you're also an incorrigible editor (so we have 2 things in common)

D&D with E6 can handle a LOT of concepts, thanks to splats.  There's something like 60 base classes now... and a nigh-infinite supply of feats.  Just crack open a dragon magazine and it goes from "Cool feat, but I'll never use it because I don't get enough" to "Cool feat!  I'm so going to take that!"


----------



## joela

*feats*



			
				rycanada said:
			
		

> ... and a nigh-infinite supply of feats.




That's a gross, gross, understatement. Has anyone complied a list, book, or pdf of either every OGL(?) Feat out there or even closed ones (or both)?


----------



## Dragonblade275

Crystal Keep's file is pretty good.  Referencing many of WOTC closed content stuff.

http://www.crystalkeep.com/d20/index.php

And, the Net Book of Feats has over 1,000 OGL feats and counting.

http://datadeco.com/nbofeats/

There seems to be no shortage of feats.


Edited to add:

This pdf of feats looks promising, too.  Though, I don't have it, yet.

http://enworld.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=21389&


----------



## joela

*AEG feats*



			
				Dragonblade275 said:
			
		

> Edited to add:
> 
> This pdf of feats looks promising, too.  Though, I don't have it, yet.
> 
> http://enworld.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=21389&




There are reviews here:
AEG Feats


----------



## knight_isa

*Conviction*

Have you used Conviction to dual-roll (and take the higher) or re-roll anything other than d20s, like weapon/spell damage?  I've seen crits at key moments flop, doing much less than regular max damage, and 10d6 spells do 14 points of damage (save for 7).

I could also see a desire to re-roll cure spells cast in the midst of combat that heal the minimum amount.  Heck, since I have the players roll for the random encounter check, I could even see a desire to re-roll that.

If you haven't done it, do you see anything wrong with it?  At the moment, I can't see that it'd change play much more than your current Conviction rules do.


----------



## Ry

I did allow the re-rolls you were talking about, although the only thing that was ever used was a few re-rolls of one's own damage dealt.  This was very seldom used though; I'm not sure why.


----------



## Shazman

I recently thought of another implication that is a result of E6's level cap.  It seems that it would make playing a human much less desirable.  With only 1 level based ability score boost and less powerful ability score boosting items, the +2 to an important stat for playing a half-orc or dwarf (for example) seems much more valuable. You are only losing one feat, and you will get that back your first 5K of experience after 6th level.  Have you noticed less human PC's in your game?  What do you think of having the ability score boosts at 3rd and 6th level instead of at 4th and 8th?  I know this is tweeking, but it really doesn't change the game that much.


----------



## Kunimatyu

Shazman said:
			
		

> I recently thought of another implication that is a result of E6's level cap.  It seems that it would make playing a human much less desirable.  With only 1 level based abiltiy score boost and less powerful ability score boosting items, the +2 to an important stat for playing a half-orc or dwarf (for example) seems much more valuable. You are only losing one feat, and you will get that back your first 5K of experience after 6th level.  Have you noticed less human PC's in your game?  What do you think of having the ability score boosts at 3rd and 6th level instead of at 4th and 8th?  I know this is tweeking, but it really doesn't change the game that much.




I think this is a very valid point -- like the fighter, anything that grants bonus feats is now significantly less powerful. Fighters can be fixed by granted them powerful Fighter6-only feats, but humans need something else -- even the extra skill piont doesn't matter, since the Open Minded feat grants extra skill points when taken, and can be taken repeatedly.


----------



## Ry

Humans are still the most common choice in my E6 games so far.


----------



## Shazman

Your group must not be powergamers then.  Lots of players would say I'll play a half-orc for the strength bonus.  I can always get feats later.


----------



## Kunimatyu

Yeah. I'd rather set up a little fix so as not to give the powergamers an advantage.


----------



## Ry

That's a fair assessment; traditionally, my guys get their kicks being in-character commando/engineers rather than by tweaking stats.  They still choose solid builds, but they don't, say, go to Wizards.com and look for 1337/m0zt br0k3n bildz. =)


----------



## TheCrazyMuffinMan

rycanada said:
			
		

> That's a fair assessment; traditionally, my guys get their kicks being in-character commando/engineers rather than by tweaking stats.  They still choose solid builds, but they don't, say, go to Wizards.com and look for 1337/m0zt br0k3n bildz. =)




Ryan, which build do you prefer for E6? In general? I personally think a carefully-designed rogue would have my use, though Clerics (as they are in the classic game), are worthy of love for their Spellfeats, and the fact that they remain extremely useful in the service of their respective deities and functions (thanks to the above spellfeats).


----------



## jonrog1

I love this, and not just because I was thinking of some way to do this with spellcasting classes only, to create an adjustable "FX level" for a campaign.  And you did it better and faster.  @&^@^$%

This may work particularly well with True20, as character advancement is done solely with feats in that system.  Only three classes, and you assemble feat chains to create heroic "paths" similar to D&D classes.

I still could use a little more clarification on converting creature abilites over to feats, but I'm going to post E6 up over at the True20 boards if you're okay with it.  They're a canny, very positive bunch over there.


----------



## Ry

Favorite class:  Right now I'm leaning towards Paladin; there's already great feats for Extra Smiting, Extra Turning, and lots of cool stuff to spend your turn attempts on.


----------



## Koewn

Shazman said:
			
		

> Your group must not be powergamers then.  Lots of players would say I'll play a half-orc for the strength bonus.  I can always get feats later.




I agree with that.

Consider the Half-Orc as a Fighter.

+2 STR
-2 INT
-2 CHA

It would take 20,000 XP (both ability feats for INT/CHA) to bring that up to +0, and then another 10000 XP for STR:

+4 STR
+0 INT
+0 CHA

whereas the Human can only get +2 STR, ever, with 10k XP.

(I'm ignoring the 4th level ability boost here)

Unless you're making a build with some serious multiple ability requirements, you're almost always better off choosing a race that has a +2 to a primary stat.

Heck, I'd go Dwarf for the extra 12 HP at 6th level from obtaining +4 CON. That's like an entire (good) hit die, for anybody that's not a CHA based caster.

For savvy gamers (I won't even go as far as saying power-gamers here; most players would not choose a Half-Orc for a bard, for example) optimal race/class selection isn't a mere afterthought in a game that's open to all the choices in the SRD. Add into that the fact you can "buy" your way out of the ability penalties (at least to +0), it starts becoming a no-brainer.

You don't see that in standard DND since the ability boosts are few and far between.

I don't know how it would be fixed, or if it needs fixed. Turning the notion that "human extra feat is the best!" (at least in my school of char-creation) is a bit of an odd thing. 

Going "dwarf" makes CHA the ultimate dump stat. Who wouldn't give up -2 CHA for 12 HP, if you don't need CHA? It's only a -1 to CHA skills, for most people. 

Anyway.


----------



## joela

*True20*



			
				jonrog1 said:
			
		

> ...but I'm going to post E6 up over at the True20 boards if you're okay with it.  They're a canny, very positive bunch over there.




Could you post the link to the post when you do it? Thanks!


----------



## DogBackward

While not neccessarily a fix, per se, I use a different set of stats in my human only games. And I have lots of them... it seems to work really well. Instead of set stats, I like to model human diversity and adaptability by giving a set of options for all cultures and groups.

[sblock=Modified Humans]At first level, a human may choose any two of the following abilities. This replaces the normal Bonus Feat and Bonus Skill Points gained at each level. All other attributes of the human race remain the same.

*Ability Points*
The human gains +2 ability points to spread among their abilties, using the standard point-buy costs. This means that while you could shore up a low score with +2, you could only add +1 to a 14 or 15, and you can't add anything to a 16 or higher.

*Bonus Feat*
The human gains a bonus feat, which may be any single feat for which you meets the prerequisites. Alternately, you may choose to "save" this bonus feat, taking it at any level after 1st, using your increased abilieties to allow you to qualify for higher-power feats.

*Diluted Blood*
Choose elf or orc blood, or any other race that has a half-human version. You are considered to be a member of this race for the purposes of prerequisites for feats and abilities, prestige classes, magic items, and anything else that works only for the chosen race. While you do not have much blood, you have just enough in your distant past.

*Skill Training*
Choose any two skills that are not class skills for you. These skills are now considered class skills for all of your classes from now on.

*Skill Points*
You count your Intelligence bonus as 2 points higher for the purpose of determining your skill poitns at first level and beyond.

*Environmental Focus*
Choose one of the environments listed below. You gain a +4 bonus to Fortitude saves and Survival checks made to avoid environmental hazards in the chosen environment, such as inclement weather, heat or cold, or other natural dangers.

*Favored Class*
Choose any one class. This class is considered a favored class for you. This is in addition to the human's normal ability to ignore their highest level class when determining XP penalties, essentially giving you two favored classes; your highest class and the class you choose for this ability. If the favored class gained from this ability is also your highest-level class, then the next highest level class you have ceases to apply instead.[/sblock]


----------



## Kunimatyu

jonrog1 said:
			
		

> I still could use a little more clarification on converting creature abilites over to feats, but I'm going to post E6 up over at the True20 boards if you're okay with it.  They're a canny, very positive bunch over there.




Why, thank you! 

More seriously, E6 may tempt me from True20 into D&D again, as it fixes the problems I had with D&D, even if True20 is easier for sci-fi/modern settings.

(Oh, and in my opinion, the True20 boards are the place to be if you want to see people hashing out  issues with d20 and trying to evolve it to the next level. I know that at least a few mechanics from Star Wars Saga Edition appear to have been cribbed from the board.)


----------



## Ry

I'm hoping to get that .pdf from Nifelhein soon.  Once I get that, I'll do what I did last week and ask for a threadlock and I'll repost.  When I re-post, I'm going to post a separate thread for the discussion of rebalancing existing D&D elements for E6 purposes, but try to bring adding feats to E6 back into the main discussion thread.  I'd like to move the core discussion from "hey, what's E6?" to "hey, what can we make with E6?"

But before we get to that does anyone have other suggestions for what needs to go into the FAQ, or the rest of the document?


----------



## Ry

I'd love to see happy fun time cross-posting!  But put a link here - I usually keep to my subscribed list and rarely have any idea what's happening on boards in general.


----------



## TheCrazyMuffinMan

rycanada said:
			
		

> I'm hoping to get that .pdf from Nifelhein soon.  Once I get that, I'll do what I did last week and ask for a threadlock and I'll repost.  When I re-post, I'm going to post a separate thread for the discussion of rebalancing existing D&D elements for E6 purposes, but try to bring adding feats to E6 back into the main discussion thread.  I'd like to move the core discussion from "hey, what's E6?" to "hey, what can we make with E6?"
> 
> But before we get to that does anyone have other suggestions for what needs to go into the FAQ, or the rest of the document?




Sample E6 charsheets for both conventional AND unconventional character classes, at 6th pre-feats, and at 6th post-feats. That would help people get more into the mindset of E6, and it answers that question in the quote. What can we do with E6?

Also, monsters that would be serious business at E6, adjusted for E6, would work wonders too.

Edit: Am I saying E6 enough? 

E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6E6


----------



## Shazman

Yeah some good iconic mosnters past say CR8 that are toned down for E6 would be nice.  Something like a dragon, a beholder, a lich, and maybe a giant of some kind.


----------



## WhatGravitas

rycanada said:
			
		

> I want to hear all about AE7, honestly.  I've got AE and I thought there would be issues (quickling faen unfettered builds, sorcerous blast-heavy magisters) but if they don't materialize that would be _fantastic_.



Sorcerous blast-heavy magisters and unfettered builds? What issues do you mean (specifically)?

Concerning the unfettered quicklings:
Well, 7th-level gives them +3 AC bonus by class, which about makes up for the restriction to light armour (granted, they're a bit better, due to the higher max. Dex-bonus). While they're ahead of most ACs due to the parry, they still suffer from the d8 as HD and on 7th, their Sneak Attack is only +1d6. They're still very good light fighters, but I doubt they'll outshine anyone.

Concerning the magister:
Granted, _sorcerous blast_ is very good, but even on 7th, a magister with Int 18+ will not churn out more than 6 of them per day (by weaving down the 4th-level slots). A dedicated evoker wizard on 6th can already toss 4 _fireballs_ a day.
The big benefit of the sorcerous blast (variable damage type) isn't that big, because on 7th, you see much less resistances or immunities - this aspect only comes into play later.

And the power of spell-templates and the Modify Spell-feat? Well, ladening is a still a huge cost, especially if you only have so many slots, and the various other templates need a costly material component worth 25+ gp. On higher level, that's basically a non-cost, but when facing encounters around CR 5-6, your average treasure is about 2,000 gp, meaning it's 500 gp per party member - blowing up components worth about 5% of your personal treasure isn't that cool.

If you now consider that all classes in AE are a bit more durable (higher HD, esp. the frailer ones), it becomes much less scary - or is about on par with the power of a D&D wizard chucking _fireballs_, but without the combat-ending power of _colour spray_, _black tentacles_ or the world-altering powers of _scrying_ or _lesser planar binding_ (since this stuff is higher level stuff in AE).

On another note: Many of my players (i.e. all  ) dislike the fact that after 6th (or 7th), you won't get any hp without the Toughness feat. I'm musing about this rule:

For every feat gained after 6th level, your max. hp increases by +1 (if a non-full BAB-class).

Even with a load of feats, this increase isn't that big, thus still preserve the feeling of being vulnerable, but show some accumulating "sturdiness".


----------



## green slime

But those power gamers are relying on being able to keep playing E6 well beyond 6th level. Where in fact, the DM may well pull the plug at 6th+3, which lessens the impact of the powergaming.


----------



## Koewn

green slime said:
			
		

> But those power gamers are relying on being able to keep playing E6 well beyond 6th level. Where in fact, the DM may well pull the plug at 6th+3, which lessens the impact of the powergaming.




True, but much of the point of E6 is to go far beyond 6th without moving the general power level past "stupendous".

On another note....

Ry, what do you think about little sub-chapters at the end of the E6 document describing either "how to" or "ramifications of" using other OGL systems with E6?

I was thinking about a little "here's how True Sorcery plays out" chapter.


----------



## Ry

I'd love to see it, but as I haven't run such games I'm not the one to write it.  But if someone ran such a game I'd love to include their take.


----------



## green slime

Koewn said:
			
		

> True, but much of the point of E6 is to go far beyond 6th without moving the general power level past "stupendous".




Yes, but any system is open to abuse by players willing to spend time, effort, and forethought. A quirk of the E6 system is just that all characters accumulate loads of feats given a lengthy campaign. This has two effects:

It cheapens the fighter's 4 feat advantage (1st, 2nd, 4th, and 6th). Eventually, he'll run out of interesting fighter feats.
Humans may be less popular, due to the superior abilities of the demihumans.

Both of these issues are only issues within the context of people min-maxing/powergaming.

There are various ways with which a DM can tackle this issue, and I suggest that the E6 document state the issue, and provide various ideas how to circumvent it, without actually doing away with it. Because correcting it is adding probably going to add just more tweaking to the core rules.


----------



## jonrog1

Discussion thread opened at True20 boards here.


----------



## Kunimatyu

Oddly, I'm less excited about E6 in True20, mostly because I can think of a couple immediate problem spots, and the strict feat categories (Warrior, Expert, Adept) with few prerequisites are harder to parse out.


----------



## mfrench

green slime said:
			
		

> It cheapens the fighter's 4 feat advantage (1st, 2nd, 4th, and 6th). Eventually, he'll run out of interesting fighter feats.




People say this frequently, but I have a hard time believing it.  One of the premises of the system is to introduce lots of new feats.  Just looking at the Complete series, there are great tactical feats (Combat Brute, Shock Trooper, Elusive Target), each with pre-reqs to take.  Most people won't have the +6 BAB to ever qualify.  You can round out a guy with Unarmed Strike, Combat Reflexes, Improved Init.  I had a melee guy do this in one of my games: he got very versatile, so that in any situation he had something to do, even if the situation's parameters meant that his 'main shtick' wasn't appropriate.

If a player wants to be a fighter, couldn't a willing DM create or dig up other feats that suit the player's vision?  A fighter remains the only option for wearing heavy armor and being in melee without being held to a strict code of ethics.  He also remains the only class with tower field proficieny (others can get it, but then the fighter's another feat ahead, isn't he?).


----------



## Kunimatyu

mfrench said:
			
		

> People say this frequently, but I have a hard time believing it.  One of the premises of the system is to introduce lots of new feats.  Just looking at the Complete series, there are great tactical feats (Combat Brute, Shock Trooper, Elusive Target), each with pre-reqs to take.  Most people won't have the +6 BAB to ever qualify.  You can round out a guy with Unarmed Strike, Combat Reflexes, Improved Init.  I had a melee guy do this in one of my games: he got very versatile, so that in any situation he had something to do, even if the situation's parameters meant that his 'main shtick' wasn't appropriate.
> 
> If a player wants to be a fighter, couldn't a willing DM create or dig up other feats that suit the player's vision?  A fighter remains the only option for wearing heavy armor and being in melee without being held to a strict code of ethics.  He also remains the only class with tower field proficieny (others can get it, but then the fighter's another feat ahead, isn't he?).




I really don't see how it'd be difficult for a Barbarian, say, to pick up all the feats you've described in a few "levels" after 6th. Giving the fighter Improved Crit + Greater Focus/Spec with prereq fighter level 6 -should- fix the problem, though.


----------



## Ry

Right, the half-orc barbarian can get them eventually, but the human fighter can get them first.  I'm still not convinced the human or the fighter needs to get any special attention.


----------



## Koewn

Ry, I've proposed a one-shot to my group, we'll see how it goes over. E6 with  a slightly simplified True Sorcery, in a couple months.

They're about 10 1/2th level or so now.

I'm going to whip up a bunch of pregens; and I'm wanting to present that same level of ability, in so much as it's possible. An earlier post suggested 5 feats=1 CR, I'm looking at about a 4.5 CR increase over 6th level, so 22 feats? 

Sound right?

I'm probably looking at 3 players for this one, and going with the tried and true "big bad guy plus lots of mooks" method. Bit of a dungeon crawl, probably. 

So, with mooks...should the assumption be that X amount of 1st level mooks being a problem for a 3 person party at 6th be the same amount of problem at E6+22?

(The current party is all half/quarter casters, so the lack of big-boom spells is already something I am used to, I'm mainly speaking melee.)


----------



## Ry

You will need more mooks, or better tactics for the same mooks.  I'd say double the number you would think of for a 6th level party; with 20 feats (especially gained all at once rather than organically in game), I wouldn't be surprised if you see Reaching Raging Whirlwind Great Cleaving with a glaive.

Also, show off other things you can manage along with the mooks; give the mooks higher ground, roll barrels full of burning oil down at them, and try to take advantage of range.


----------



## wraith428

*New Spells*

Have you give any thought to how classes with dedicated/restricted spell lists can advance their spell knowledge.  I'm talking Warmage, Dread Necromancer and Beguiler types.  You presented a feat to expand known spells for Sorcerer types, but was wondering your thoughts for these classes?


----------



## DogBackward

Just allow them to take the same feat as the Sorceror, but restrict their spells known. Beguilers get Enchantment and Illusion, Warmages get Conjuration and Evocation, and Dread Necromancers get Necromancy. Easy.


----------



## Ry

Dog's suggestion sounds good to me.

Nifelhein, FYI another guy sent me a .pdf version of the file, I'll post it here after I get a chance to do some revisions on it.


----------



## Kunimatyu

DogBackward said:
			
		

> Just allow them to take the same feat as the Sorceror, but restrict their spells known. Beguilers get Enchantment and Illusion, Warmages get Conjuration and Evocation, and Dread Necromancers get Necromancy. Easy.




I'd agree, though I'd restrict warmages to Evocation, since Conjuration includes teleportation and summoning as well.


----------



## MrNexx

http://www.snotling.org/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=2854&forum=2


----------



## Nifelhein

rycanada said:
			
		

> Dog's suggestion sounds good to me.
> 
> Nifelhein, FYI another guy sent me a .pdf version of the file, I'll post it here after I get a chance to do some revisions on it.




Okay, I am actually still working on the border, I have been too lazy to do much work this week but I am pretty sure I am near a good one for it. Did he just pdf-ed it or he edited and did some graphical work as well?

Once I am done I will let you know though.


----------



## Ry

Here's what J.A. Dettman did:

(Just E6, not the drama rules in this document for the reasons mentioned before)


----------



## Nifelhein

It looks really good, the whole side bar bothers me a bit but it looks good. I was aiming for a more graphical one, it still needed a lot of work but here is a preview of the file with a border, I used the one you posted earlier and changed any D&D to D20, but text is not something I worked on here (neither the formatting of the text).

I wanted to add a heraldry to the shield and work more on the sword. The wooden frame needs some more texture and is still a bit rough.


----------



## mfrench

Nifelhein:

I tried to download yours, but when I opened it, I got an error.  Perhaps the problem is on my end, but maybe not.  Anyone else have problems?

Ryan:

I finally started the thread I said I'd start a few weeks ago about building an E6 campaign.  It is here.  Hope that you enjoy it!


----------



## MrNexx

Something that came to me while I was doing the dishes about this... it also does a great job of explaining why elves haven't taken over the world.  Sure, they live for centuries, but if they, like everyone else, are capped at 6th level, then the human ability to breed faster becomes a real advantage.


----------



## Ry

Yep.  It also legitimizes some elven badasses in my campaign; they've been around long enough to pull together a LOT of feats.  But they're not silly / invulnerable, and they're not just a few levels from the PCs being able to kick their asses, or vice versa.


----------



## Dragonblade275

Yep.  I remember a thread on the WOTC boards where someone suggested that elves must have a learning disability in standard DnD d20 to be able to live that long and still not be several levels higher than the majority of the shorter lived races.

I like E6 more and more the more I think about it.  Perhaps, E6 is my 4th Edition?


----------



## Dragonblade275

*E6 Gestalt Variant*

Ryan,

How did your complicated E6 Gestalt rules work (that you mentioned before)?

I'm imagining a variant on E6 where characters can begin becoming Gestalt characters after 6th level.  In this variant, they would choose a class and add whatever portion of that class' abilities were new to them in lieu of a feat every 5,000 XP.

So, a 6th level Elven Wizard decides to improve his combat ability.  Instead of taking a feat, he gestalts into the fighter class.

He already has the base wizard abilities of BAB +3; FORT +2; REF +2; WILL +5; and spellcasting, summon familiar, scribe scroll, and a bonus metamagic feat.

Now, gestalting into fighter, he compares the 1st level of fighter with what he's already got.  Since the BAB and saves of the 1st level fighter aren't better than what he's already got, none of these improve.  But, he does pick up the armor and weapon proficiencies of being a fighter and one fighter bonus feat.

Continuing this route... He could eventually be a full Gestalt Wizard6/Fighter6 with the following:

BAB +6; FORT +5; REF +2; WILL +5
Wizard: 6th level spellcasting ability; summon familiar; scribe scroll; 1 bonus Wizard feat
Fighter: Light, Medium, & Heavy Armor Proficiency; Shield & Tower Shild Proficiency; Simple & Martial Weapon Proficiency; and 4 fighter bonus feats.

Of course, he'd still be subject to the normal arcane speall failure percentages while in most armors without additional feats.

And, note that none of his base abilities ever rise above the maximum for a 6th level character.

Any thoughts?

My first thought would be that the XP cost of doing this should be different (more than) the XP cost of a feat.

My second thought is that many older elves would be double, if not triple gestalts with multiple feats on top of that.  Thus supporting the popular idea of the Elven Fighter/Wizard.


----------



## Ry

Sorry Dragonblade... those notes were junked and are now over 3 years in the past.  I really can't remember them.  I know the idea was something like "Now that you've gained level 7, you're a gestalt Wizard6/Fighter 1, which of course is mostly the Wizard6, but you get a feat for fighter 1.  Level 8 is Wizard6/Fighter2, and so on."  But don't hold me to that design - that was something I abandoned.


----------



## Ry

Here's my two good ideas, but they're in their earliest, earliest stages.  These are long term projects but will hopefully be a decent home for things I want to point people to.

I'd like to make an E6 setting out of online freebies.  I think that's a great conversation piece, and mfrench's campaign is following essentially the same process.  I reserved esix.pbwiki.com for the purpose of such a thing.

I'd also like to make a 100% OGC E6 setting.  I reserved ogcesix.pbwiki.com for that purpose, but it will take a while before I get all the material I've written for it into place.


----------



## Dragonblade275

Thanks, anyway, Ryan.

Though, the idea that the standard XP for level 7 would be needed to become a Gestalt Wizard6/Fighter1 would be good.  That way, it caosts more to gestalt than to buy a feat.

Did you just abandon it becuase the players weren't using it?  Or, were there other issues?


----------



## Ry

There were several options in the system at one point; you could use xp to buy up BAB to +6, to increase stats 1 point at a time at 500*new stat level, and buying off level adjustment with XP.  For a while we were even trying to price all the different class features to break it down further.  I can't honestly remember what particular moment lead to us abandoning it, but the main thrust was that everyone shied away from the other system and went straight for easily-approachable feats.


----------



## Ry

I remember that the uneven gestalt thing created a lot of questions, like, what do you do when you gain a HD in the second class that's better than the one in the first class?  There are answers but it bogged down in a bunch of rules to handle those situations.


----------



## Dragonblade275

Thanks, Ryan.

I didn't even consider the HD issue.  For me, it probably wasn't that big of an issue because our group uses a fixed number of HP for each level (usually max HP).  So, the Wizard6 who gestalts into Wizard6/Fighter1 would lose 4hp and gain 10hp.

I can understand the difficulties that would be present when HP are rolled, though.  I'd imagine that you'd need to roll to see how many HP your character lost and then roll to see how many your character gained from the new class (if the HD type was bigger for the new class).

I agree that there are answers and that some of them might be complicated.

Come to think of it, I didn't even think of what would happen with skill points, either.  Ahh... The ripple effect of changing one seemingly simplistic thing!


----------



## Ry

Dragonblade275 said:
			
		

> Ahh... The ripple effect of changing one seemingly simplistic thing!




Exactly.


----------



## TinSoldier

This looks very interesting... I followed MrNexx's link from snotling.org.

I've never played a game past the early levels though, but I've read a lot about the difficulties of playing higher levels.


----------



## Ry

Welcome TinSoldier!  

To all:  The .pdf I was talking about is available at both wikis now.


----------



## Ry

One thing that's striking me is how much free material there is out there that's really aimed at lower-level characters.  The E6 Free Stuff setting could be a lot easier to put together than I thought.


----------



## Nifelhein

mfrench said:
			
		

> Nifelhein:
> 
> I tried to download yours, but when I opened it, I got an error.  Perhaps the problem is on my end, but maybe not.  Anyone else have problems?




Should work with Adobe Reader v7 or above. I tried opening the attached file and it worked for me just fine.


----------



## green slime

mfrench said:
			
		

> People say this frequently, but I have a hard time believing it.  One of the premises of the system is to introduce lots of new feats.  Just looking at the Complete series, there are great tactical feats (Combat Brute, Shock Trooper, Elusive Target), each with pre-reqs to take.  Most people won't have the +6 BAB to ever qualify.  You can round out a guy with Unarmed Strike, Combat Reflexes, Improved Init.  I had a melee guy do this in one of my games: he got very versatile, so that in any situation he had something to do, even if the situation's parameters meant that his 'main shtick' wasn't appropriate.
> 
> If a player wants to be a fighter, couldn't a willing DM create or dig up other feats that suit the player's vision?  A fighter remains the only option for wearing heavy armor and being in melee without being held to a strict code of ethics.  He also remains the only class with tower field proficieny (others can get it, but then the fighter's another feat ahead, isn't he?).




The problem being just that: not the number of feats available, but the number of feats available for which the character meets the prerequisites: Not everybody is going to create fighter characters with Dex 13, Int 13, Wis 13, Cha 13.... In order for their fighter to get enough "interesting" feats (Dodge, Expertise, various Exalted feats,...) It is also worthy to note, that this is more difficult with a lower starting point buy. Additionally there aren't going to be so many opportunities to raise stats quite so much to qualify either. YMMV.

THe fact remains, the four feat advantage of the fighter starts to pale over time: the longer the campaign goes on for, the less of a percieved benefit the fighter gains for being just a fighter. In essence, at the most, he is one feat-chain ahead of a Barbarian or Paladin. Which feels significant when the fighter player is the only one to complete a feat chain in the party. But when everyone has three or four, the fighters additional feat chain may start to feel insignificant.


----------



## Ry

green_slime, I don't think that's correct.  For one, if you're using the gestalt or lean upward approach to feats, nobody's class features are sacred.

Secondly, I don't think the four feat advantage of the fighter starts to pale over time.  I think it's weak because it's weak at 6th level, if at all. 

Think of it as fruit:  
One basket ("6th-level fighter") has a cantaloupe, 3 spartan apples (character feats) and 4 granny smith apples (fighter feats).  
The other basket ("6th-level Barbarian") has a watermelon (more hp, less armor), 3 spartan apples (character feats) and some tangerines (barbarian class features).  

If you add a spartan apple to each basket, they're both 1 spartan apple better.  You could say that the Barbarian and Fighter baskets are more similar now, but if you say the Barbarian basket is more valuable than the Fighter basket, you should take out the identical stuff (spartan apples) and look at what they don't share (cantaloupe + granny smiths vs watermelon + tangerines)


----------



## DogBackward

It's not always that the feats aren't _powerful_ enough, it's that they aren't nearly _unique_ enough. Anybody can get them, really, except for one or two that are Fighter-only, and that just doesn't cut it. A class's entire set of class features simply _should not_ be something that everybody can get, given enough time.

I like the Wildcard feats because, while anybody can get the feats, only the Fighter can swap them around at will. That combined with the mechanical boosts (more class skills and skill points, d12 HD) make the Fighter worth choosing. Otherwise, it's far too bland.

Even in normal D&D, I rarely see anybody play fighters, because there's so much more out there that is much more interesting. And with E6, where these 6 levels are all you get, _ever_, having worthwhile and interesting class features is vitally important.


----------



## Ry

DogBackward said:
			
		

> It's not always that the feats aren't _powerful_ enough, it's that they aren't nearly _unique_ enough.




I'm going to ask in General for an OGC soldier class.


----------



## joela

*fighters*



			
				DogBackward said:
			
		

> Even in normal D&D, I rarely see anybody play fighters, because there's so much more out there that is much more interesting.




Really? I see the opposite. What I've seen are players, though, who min-max their feats, especially if the DM allows things like Flaws. Wizards, from my experience, tend to be least played, especially at lower levels.


----------



## kaomera

DogBackward said:
			
		

> Even in normal D&D, I rarely see anybody play fighters, because there's so much more out there that is much more interesting. And with E6, where these 6 levels are all you get, _ever_, having worthwhile and interesting class features is vitally important.



I've seen the opposite complaint, that because every Barbarian or Scout or whatever gets the same class features, they're "not much fun to play" compared to a Fighter that can have any number of different feats... Obviously this is less of a problem with more and more alternate class features available, but for every new alternate class feature there are several if not dozens of new feats.

There is the potential issue of running out of good feats to take, but I've been ignoring that on the grounds that if any character runs out of worthwhile / interesting feats, then IMHO E6 kind of flounders overall. So that puts the Fighter _n_ feats ahead, and they aren't going to be minor, start-of-chain feats. Rather you're going to see the Fighter having at least an entire extra feat chain as compared to other characters. As far as ability scores go I can see going two ways: Str, Dex, and Int 13+ (for Whirlwind Attack) or Str 13+ and Dex 16 (for Manyshot and/or Improved TWF). Either leaves 17 build points out of 32...

I do have to reluctantly agree that it's probably better to run a Fighter 4 / Something 2 than a straight Fighter 6. Take Barbarian: Now if I'm actually interested Rage, I'm going to play a Barbarian 6, and build for maximum Strength as opposed to a more balanced set of ability scores for a Fighter. However, _if_ the character is Chaotic, then I think that Fast Movement plus Uncanny Dodge is worth at least a feat, probably more. I don't think that an extra two or so hit points is really all that significant, and I usually run with house rules that suppress the saving-throw "jump" from multiclassing, but even if I'm going to choose never to use Rage (and if nothing else it's a nice ace in the hole) I think that with the extra four skill points and more options for class skills I would not hesitate to take those two levels of Barbarian...


----------



## HeinorNY

Hello all. Nice work!

I like E6 the way it is, but i still don't feel 100% happy with the character development divided in two steps: level up and feat buying.
What about putting everything together?
Since the target of this system is to create characters with ECL 10, or strong enough for CR7-12 encounters, (but keeping the lvl benefits(hp, saves, bab, skills) in order to maintain the low and gritty fantasy feel at the 6th lvl) what about stretching the xp table, so when the character reachs lvl 6 he is actually the most powerful character possible, and achieves the power level or sweet point for this system?

Here is my idea:



		Code:
	

Level	XP	Class Bonus Feats
1	0	2
2	5.000	2
3	15.000	3
4	35.000	3
5	65.000	5
6	115.000	5


The xp is set at maximum 115.000 because thats the amount of xp a character will have when he is lvl 6 with the extra 20 feats. His power level will be enough to fight cr 7-12. The other purpose of this is that character can spect to gain new stuff until his maximum level, and not just get everything at lvl 6, and then only feats.

The "class" before bonus feats is because I'm planning to create lists of bonus feats for all classes, so there are reasons to level up in all of them, regardles of the class abilities.

thanks again for all the work done, the basic idea of E6 is exactly what I was looking for. 

-----------------#-----------------#-----------------#-----------------#-----------------#

Thinking better, every commoner would receive 2 extra feats. too powerful.
What about this:



		Code:
	

Level	XP
1	0
2	6.000 
3	18.000 
4	36.000 
5	72.000 
6	120.000


Using that xp chart, characters gain 1 extra feat for every 6.000 xp he gains. So he gains extra feats between levels. A character with 12.000 is still level 1 bu gains an additional feat.If he goes up to 18.000, he gains another feats and levels up. What do you think?
After lvl 6, the XP gained could be used to increase the maximum amount of Conviction points the character gains each day.


----------



## Cheiromancer

Hi ainatan!  I like the way you think:  In the other thread I proposed the idea of never actually eliminating level advancement, but just requiring exponentially more xp.  And a "heroic start" of third level.  For example



		Code:
	

Level	XP   Class Bonus Feats
3	0	 0
4	5.000	 0
5	10.000   0
        15,000   1
6	20.000	 1
        25,000   2
        30,000   3
        35,000   4
7	40.000	 4
        45,000   5
        50,000   6
        55,000   7
        60,000   8
        65,000   9
        70,000   10
8	80.000	 11
...
9       160,000  26


You'd get *something* every 5,000 xp.  If not a level advancement, then a bonus feat.

I think this hybrid method would be how I would use E6.


----------



## HeinorNY

I see what you mean.
The power progression is almost the same. I prefer to start at level because i like to have players starting at lvl 1 as normal people, and becoming heroes as they gain lvls, but that's just taste. 
I think we agree in the concept. My idea is to make the character development more regular. If level 6 + 20 feats is the maximum level of power a person can have, or the ideal level of power a character should have to keep the setting's low-fantasy flavor, then from the metagame perspective it should be an end-game target, not something you achieve in the first 10 or 15 sessions.
It is also a cosmetic preference


----------



## Thaedrus

*Changing the advancement*

The problem with gaining feats throughout the advancement to 6th level is that you change the fundamental assumption of this idea. 

The original idea was that a sweet spot exists at 6th to 9th level. this is where most players have the most fun. So getting to 6th level early is a good idea. Then the issue arrises that after power level higher than 9th, it becomes more work and book keeping for all involved, and the fun diminishes. So the level cap solves this.

Your idea would solve the higher power level problem, but not the issue that it is still more fun to play between levels 6 and 9. 

The strength of E6 is that it allows early advancement to 6th, but prolongs the sweet spot for gaming. I like the original much better.


----------



## Shazman

I agree.  Getting to sixth level in 3.5 D&D does happen relatively quickly, but I wouldn't slow advancement to such a crawl.  Character advancement is one of the main driving factors of D&D.  It is one of the most entertaining and rewarding aspects of playing.  If you have to play once a week for hours at a time for 6 months to get from 1st to 2nd level, you have removed one of the most enjoyable aspects of the game.  That may work for you and your group, but it will most likely be rejected by most groups.  "Freezing" advancement in the 6th to 9th level range preserves the "sweet spot" of the game.


----------



## HeinorNY

Thaedrus said:
			
		

> The problem with gaining feats throughout the advancement to 6th level is that you change the fundamental assumption of this idea.
> 
> The original idea was that a sweet spot exists at 6th to 9th level. this is where most players have the most fun. So getting to 6th level early is a good idea. Then the issue arrises that after power level higher than 9th, it becomes more work and book keeping for all involved, and the fun diminishes. So the level cap solves this.
> 
> Your idea would solve the higher power level problem, but not the issue that it is still more fun to play between levels 6 and 9.
> 
> The strength of E6 is that it allows early advancement to 6th, but prolongs the sweet spot for gaming. I like the original much better.




I understand and agree with you. As you said, the sweet point is between levels 6 and 9 but that's also very subjective and depends on the group.
I have a question BTW, if the point is to make characters have an ECL 10, why not just cap the level at 10? If 6 is the sweet spot, then giving lots of more feats won't eventually make character more powerful anyway, only in a different way?
While I'm asking these question I try to answer them, because I want to understand the concept behind E6. Prolly the answer is that by capping the game at level 6 and then only giving feats to characters, you would effectively raise the power lvl to ECL 10, but in a different way that keeps the low-fantasy flavor of the game.
But if the sweet spot is at lvl 6 plus feats, then why not just starting the game at lvl 6 anyway? Why force the player to pass through all the 5 levels of boredom before it?

As I said, it's all a matter of taste. I'll prolly use my idea because I want to keep the level advancement as part of the fun of the game. My group enjoy leveling up, at any level, 1st to 2nd is as fun as 15th to 16th. The espectative to reach a new level is an important part of the overall fun of my group, so I want to keep it lasting as long as possible.


----------



## HeinorNY

Shazman said:
			
		

> I agree.  Getting to sixth level in 3.5 D&D does happen relatively quickly, but I wouldn't slow advancement to such a crawl.  *Character advancement is one of the main driving factors of D&D. *  It is one of the most entertaining and rewarding aspects of playing.  If you have to play once a week for hours at a time for 6 months to get from 1st to 2nd level, you have removed one of the most enjoyable aspects of the game.  That may work for you and your group, but it will most likely be rejected by most groups.  *"Freezing" advancement in the 6th to 9th level range preserves the "sweet spot" of the game*.




I hope you understand that your bolded statements are opposite to each other. You can't have them both. Or you have advancement, or you have the game frozen at the sweet spot.
The original idea kills, as you said, one of the main driving factors of D&D. In exchange it adds the possibility to keep the game running at the sweet spot levels.
I also like the original idea. I'd rather lose the level advancement element of the game in order to keep the feel of the mid-levels.
What I'm trying to do, maybe unsuccessfully, is to somehow make those two elements, the ones I bolded in your post, be possible to co-exist, through the entire campaign.
Of course you could say that feat gainning at every 5000 xp somehow replaces the fun element of level advancement. That would be a valid point. But a subjective one. I personally don't think it does.


----------



## Kunimatyu

ainatan said:
			
		

> I hope you understand that your bolded statements are opposite to each other. You can't have them both. Or you have advancement, or you have the game frozen at the sweet spot.
> The original idea kills, as you said, one of the main driving factors of D&D. In exchange it adds the possibility to keep the game running at the sweet spot levels.
> I also like the original idea. I'd rather lose the level advancement element of the game in order to keep the feel of the mid-levels.
> What I'm trying to do, maybe unsuccessfully, is to somehow make those two elements, the ones I bolded in your post, be possible to co-exist, through the entire campaign.
> Of course you could say that feat gainning at every 5000 xp somehow replaces the fun element of level advancement. That would be a valid point. But a subjective one. I personally don't think it does.




Ainatan - define "level advancement" and definite "character advancement". It'll help me get an idea of where you're coming from.


----------



## HeinorNY

Kunimatyu said:
			
		

> Ainatan - define "level advancement" and definite "character advancement". It'll help me get an idea of where you're coming from.




Since I'm mainly a D&D and D20 system player, to me both are the same. To advance your character you need to gain levels, or find magic items


----------



## Kunimatyu

ainatan said:
			
		

> Since I'm mainly a D&D and D20 system player, to me both are the same. To advance your character you need to gain levels, or find magic items




What's important about gaining levels?


----------



## HeinorNY

Kunimatyu said:
			
		

> What's important about gaining levels?




In D&D it's one of the major fun elements of the game. Much of the game is focused on developing your character, making him stronger and powerful. Gaining levels is what is it all about.


----------



## Kunimatyu

ainatan said:
			
		

> In D&D it's one of the major fun elements of the game. Much of the game is focused on developing your character, making him stronger and powerful. Gaining levels is what is it all about.




What, precisely, about gaining a level is important to you as a player of D&D/d20?


----------



## HeinorNY

Kunimatyu said:
			
		

> What, precisely, about gaining a level is important to you as a player of D&D/d20?




Is this an interview??? Are going to make up a personalized RPG system just for me?


----------



## TwoSix

ainatan said:
			
		

> Is this an interview??? Are going to make up a personalized RPG system just for me?




I think what Kunimatyu's getting at is that you're employing some circular logic.  In d20, you advance by getting levels.  It's fun to advance, therefore I need to level to have fun.

But if you can advance by gaining feats, isn't that the same fun?

If it isn't fun to gain feats, why not?  What makes gaining a feat somehow different than gaining a level, fun-wise?


----------



## HeinorNY

TwoSix said:
			
		

> I think what Kunimatyu's getting at is that you're employing some circular logic.  In d20, you advance by getting levels.  It's fun to advance, therefore I need to level to have fun.
> 
> But if you can advance by gaining feats, isn't that the same fun?
> 
> If it isn't fun to gain feats, why not?  What makes gaining a feat somehow different than gaining a level, fun-wise?




Because when you gain a level, you gain HD, BAB, Saves, skills, feats, class abilites, maybe spells, maybe your familiar/animal companion gets better,  you know, all this stuff that makes you feel the character really got better. If you only gain a feat, well, it's just a feat.
It is subjecitve. I don't feel feat gaining can entirely replace level advancement as the "character development" fun element of D&D. Maybe just a little. To gain a new feat is like 20% of the fun of really gaining a full new level.


----------



## Kunimatyu

TwoSix said:
			
		

> I think what Kunimatyu's getting at is that you're employing some circular logic.  In d20, you advance by getting levels.  It's fun to advance, therefore I need to level to have fun.
> 
> But if you can advance by gaining feats, isn't that the same fun?
> 
> If it isn't fun to gain feats, why not?  What makes gaining a feat somehow different than gaining a level, fun-wise?




This is what I what getting at, albeit in a very roundabout way.


----------



## HeinorNY

Kunimatyu said:
			
		

> This is what I what getting at, albeit in a very roundabout way.




I'm sorry, socratic methods don't really work that well with me. Same way with hypnotism and jedi mind tricks


----------



## Kunimatyu

ainatan said:
			
		

> It is subjective. I don't feel feat gaining can entirely replace level advancement as the "character development" fun element of D&D. Maybe just a little. To gain a new feat is like 20% of the fun of really gaining a full new level.




Interesting -- my group seems to get far, far more excited about feats than levels with just numerical bonuses.

Unfortunately, unless a magical 4th Edition shows up that solves all of these concerns, you're left with two basic options:

1) Play D&D straight up, with level-gaining but a system that rapidly dissolves into chaos at the higher levels.

2) Play E6, where levels cap, but advancement through feats continues.

At this point in time, it's not possible to have all of the benefits of levelling without some annoying drawbacks. I will also point out that even massively successful games based off the levelling mechanic (World of Warcraft, looking at you) have caps where further level gain is impossible and character advancement only occurs through item acquisition. At least with E6, once you reach the level cap, you get to keep getting new abilities, too.


----------



## Ry

Here's how I see E6 vs. D&D, in terms of power levels. 

Character advancement in D&D is an upward sloping curve; levels are a linear, but the feats and magic items that get added on top makes the progression even faster.  As players get better and better combinations of items and feats and class abilities, they can combine them in better and better ways.  This leads to levelling out of the Heroic Fantasy quartile (6-10) and into the Wuxia quartile (11-15).  The Wuxia quartile is also more complex, which is another mark against it for some.

[sblock=DnD]
	

	
	
		
		

		
			





[/sblock]

Levelling in E6 is like D&D till 6th level, and you always get the fun of advancing.  But the advancing after 6th is slower, and while you keep getting closer and closer to CR 10 power level, you're getting there slower and slower; feats always add a mechanical benefit, but the combinations and permutations of the feats and items you've acquired don't "crack the top" of CR 10 power level.  

[sblock=E6]
	

	
	
		
		

		
		
	


	




[/sblock]


----------



## HeinorNY

Kunimatyu said:
			
		

> 2) Play E6, where levels cap, but advancement through feats continues.




But what if advancement through feats is not cool enough? What if character instead of leveling up to 6 and then start getting feats, he leveled in a slower rate, but get all those feats he would gain later through normal leveling?

I'm not an ECL savvy, so I ask you, what is the ECL of a 3rd level character with 3 extra feats? What about the same character with 7 extra feats?


----------



## MrNexx

http://www.criticalfumble.net/forum/showthread.php?t=5465

Another thread.


----------



## HeinorNY

What must I do to get the green line? With lvls, feats and magic items?


----------



## Ry

Mr Nexx... thanks for the threadlink... man, seems like I ran over another dog over there.

ainatan, honestly it sounds like you just want to slow down D&D's normal progression.  You could do that in a few different ways, the simplest being cut down on experience and pace your campaign to end around 10th.


----------



## HeinorNY

rycanada said:
			
		

> Mr Nexx... thanks for the threadlink... man, seems like I ran over another dog over there.
> 
> ainatan, honestly it sounds like you just want to slow down D&D's normal progression.  You could do that in a few different ways, the simplest being cut down on experience and pace your campaign to end around 10th.




Maybe, do you think a 10th level character is as powerful as a 6th level character with 20 extra feats?
I don't want to simply slow it down. Using that xp table i proposed when a character gets 115.000 xp he will have the same numbers, HD, BAB, skills feats, etc as the same character using original E6 rules. The only difference is that the power comes in a different progression, more evenly distributed along all levels, so the green line. Maybe it's not the best way to do it, maybe not as fun as E6, but I prefer a regular power progression.


----------



## Ry

I don't know how to get a really smooth line like that, but you should watch out for accidentally replacing a smooth line with some very steep stairs.  I doubt you're looking for a really stratified world.  

I think about 20 feats is about +4 CR, but it's hard to pull out more than +4 CR from feats alone.  But YMMV; I don't have the playtesting resources or expertise to retool the progression to a straight line.


----------



## TinSoldier

I didn't realize that MrNexx had posted it in the Einstein thread over at CF. I started a new thread there before I realized it.

Here's the link:
http://www.criticalfumble.net/forum/showthread.php?t=5523


----------



## TheCrazyMuffinMan

It's still good to know that even with material power increases as graphed, it can still work without going from Gritty fantasy to Heroic fantasy to Final Fantasy (not invoking Remathilis' law. This distinction is STRICTLY referring to effective power levels.)


----------



## HeinorNY

> watch out for accidentally replacing a smooth line with some very steep stairs.




That's a good advice. Thanks


----------



## Daelkyr

*Another pdf*

For some reason, I felt inspired to try my own hand at a pdf for E6.

Not much, but here it is.

On a side note, love the idea, can't wait to test it out on my players.

But here's a question:

Is there any feat that will advance you skill cap after lvl 6? I play Eberron and would like to ensure that the Greater Dragonmark is available.


----------



## joela

*What about the DM?*

Looking over the various cross-links and the rants and raves against E6, a thought struck me. 

So far much of the discussion on E6 has been focused on the impact the variant has the the players and their PCs. BABs are frozen at 6th, no 4th level spells, yaddayaddayadda.

But what about the DM's POV? While the system may at first it may look like a gawddess sent ("Yay! No worries about sending a pit fiend and its krew to even challenge the PCs."), won't there be times you'd like to try out such creatures? Or what about higher level spells or psionics (e.g., Foresight, Shapechange, etc.) that look really kewl. And I've read plenty a PrC which grant abilities that would be interesting to try out as either a PC or as an NPC against the PCs.

Should one simply "scale down" such encounters/spells/classes? Or resist the temptation and figure out another way to make kobolds/orcs/gnolls more challenging yet again?


----------



## Jondor_Battlehammer

What about a feat that bump up your caster level by 1 or 2. This would allow a caster to still increase damae and duration, but in a costly maner. It would also allow for higher level artifice.

A simillar feat could be given for "effective" BAB, allowing for higher level feats. This feat would also stack as effective fighter levels for fighters only. Weapon supremacy would be a nasty feat under these rules, but what if you had to sacrifice 6 or 12 feats for it?


----------



## mfrench

rycanada said:
			
		

> ... man, seems like I ran over another dog over there.




Yeah, with all the time you spend killing these people's pets, how do you still find time to game?

"Hey, someone on the internet that I've never met enjoys a different part of gaming then me!  **Curse curse curse curse curse**"


----------



## Shazman

ainatan said:
			
		

> I hope you understand that your bolded statements are opposite to each other. You can't have them both. Or you have advancement, or you have the game frozen at the sweet spot.
> The original idea kills, as you said, one of the main driving factors of D&D. In exchange it adds the possibility to keep the game running at the sweet spot levels.
> I also like the original idea. I'd rather lose the level advancement element of the game in order to keep the feel of the mid-levels.
> What I'm trying to do, maybe unsuccessfully, is to somehow make those two elements, the ones I bolded in your post, be possible to co-exist, through the entire campaign.
> Of course you could say that feat gainning at every 5000 xp somehow replaces the fun element of level advancement. That would be a valid point. But a subjective one. I personally don't think it does.




The point I was trying to make is advancement should still be there, but in a way that preserves the "sweet spot" feel that is the essence of E6.  You rapidly reach 6th level, and then you still have some advancement via feats you get fairly rapidly, probably every 2 sessions or so. One of the most rewarding parts of leveling is picking your feats, especially since it doesn't happen very often unless you are playing a fighter or psychic warrior.  It's fun but also difficult since you have to be very picky with your few feat slots.  In E6, you don't have to be so picky because you can eventually get most of the feats you want. It just seemed to me that your system would have players playing for a very long time before getting these rewards.  I would rather get a feat on a farily regular basis than play for six months before I get that level and several bonus feats.  I believe most players would feel this way as well.


----------



## Ry

I just wanted to pass this along, it's J A Dettman's layout of the Raising the Stakes in .pdf format.

This is the most up to date version I've written, but I know it probably still needs more editing.


----------



## HeinorNY

Shazman said:
			
		

> I would rather get a feat on a farily regular basis than play for six months before I get that level and several bonus feats.  I believe most players would feel this way as well.




I understand and agree. 
Based on this quote, what do you think about my second xp progression? There you also get a feat at a regular basis, every 6000xp since level 1, but gain levels slower.

Nobody answered me about the ECL of a 3rd level character with 3 extra feats. It's not a challenge, I really want to know that in order to improve my idea for my group. Thanks.


----------



## Cheiromancer

Reply 255 has really stretched the screen.  It makes it hard to read the posts. 

I wonder if putting those graphics in sblocks would help?


----------



## Ry

Cheiro  - done.


----------



## knight_isa

ainatan said:
			
		

> Nobody answered me about the ECL of a 3rd level character with 3 extra feats. It's not a challenge, I really want to know that in order to improve my idea for my group. Thanks.




Well, I'd say it's pretty close to 3.

1. 3 extra feats at first level is _probably_ about ECL +1.  I'm no expert here; it's just a gut feel.  If you buy _Unearthed Arcana_'s argument that the benefits for an ECL +1 race start to pale in comparison to the level adjustment around level 3 (and thus like the optional rule to buy it off), then I think it's safe to say that it's still close to 3.  Maybe 3.5-ish.

2.  This is based entirely upon anecdotal evidence, but I've seen more than one thread about DM's giving players a feat every level instead of every third level.  IIRC, they reported noticing almost no power difference.  The only real difference that I recall hearing about was that more players chose "sub-par" feats because they had so many feats they could burn a few feats on "in-character" feats without skipping over the more powerful feats.

I'm about to start a campaign (hopefully next week) using the feat/level, so I'll see then (well, kind of--there are only two players left since the rest moved out of state).  We'll be starting at third level.  I ran E6 (well, E8, actually) passed the players, but they weren't too enthused, so we're not going that route at the moment, though.


----------



## tvar

rycanda, can you (or anyone really) give some of your thoughts about what some of the difficulties are for adapting E6 for some other "sweet spot" other than level 6?  I was personally thinking of trying it out for level 12 (yeah, it's much more powerful than 6, but I actually enjoy play a lot at that level, and it is before some of the more "world shattering" spells enter the picture).

It was mentioned briefly at the beginning of this thread (I think) that it becomes more difficult to figure out CRs at higher levels.  Can you expand on that?  Are there other difficulties that you foresee?

And thanks for developing this.  Great work!


----------



## White Whale

I think the E6 idea is interesting, but like some other posters I feel the advancement beyond level 6 may be a bit dull. 

This made me think of a gestalt system similar to the one Dragonblade275 suggested, and I don't think there would be that much hassle to do actually:
-all numbers (saves, BAB,...) are equal to the maximum achievable with any composition of 6 levels of the character.
-Hitpoints are given at each level up. However, the character's hitpoints may not exceed the maximum that any 6 levels of the character's classes could be.

Example for explanation - Clr4/Ftr2/Rog3
BAB = 5 (Ftr2/Clr4)
REF = 4 (Rog3/Clr3)
FORT = 7 (Ftr2/Clr4)
WILL = 4 (Clr4/any2)
Max Hitpoints = 52 + 6*CON (Ftr2/Clr4)

If this character now advanced as a barbarian next level, this would be the result:
BAB = 5 (Ftr2/Bar1/Clr3)
REF = 4 (Rog3/Clr3)
FORT = 8 (Ftr2/Bar1/Clr3)
WILL = 4 (Clr4/any2)
Max Hitpoints = 56 + 6*CON (Bar1/Ftr2/Clr3)

...and of course the character gained all abilities of the barbarian level.

IMO, this approach seems more interesting than E6. It gives more abilities that are not out of hand powerwise, and it encourages multiclassing. It is probably more powerful advancement than E6 though, and I would ban prestige classes entirely.


----------



## green slime

I would like a clarification on your *death flag* rule.

Is it raised only for the encounter, the adventure, or does it stay raised until the character can afford to spend 6 conviction points to lower it again? Because then theoritcally the character could wander around for years under the "death flag", which sort of makes me wonder if such a character would have their maximum conviction points raised by 6 for the entire duration?

Some of my players seem to accept death rather easily.


----------



## Jondor_Battlehammer

It would essentially make every PC the same. By the time you got to higher levels, everyone would be some variation of combatant/caster/skill monkey (6). E6 as it stands makes you six level choices very important.

I would also say that granting max HP would be a good idea in general. I know your achieving it as a cap, not a per level grant. But max HP seem to fit E6. I may just be saying that since I already grant max HP in a normal game.


----------



## Ry

green slime said:
			
		

> I would like a clarification on your *death flag* rule.
> 
> Is it raised only for the encounter, the adventure, or does it stay raised until the character can afford to spend 6 conviction points to lower it again? Because then theoritcally the character could wander around for years under the "death flag", which sort of makes me wonder if such a character would have their maximum conviction points raised by 6 for the entire duration?
> 
> Some of my players seem to accept death rather easily.




The intention is that PCs never regenerate to more than 6 Conviction.  So if a PC raised their flag, they get 6 extra, and while this gives them more than their maximum (6) they won't regenerate these extra; the extra points stick around till used but a PC won't regenerate past 6.


----------



## Ry

tvar, I don't know that much about high-level play (which for me is anything over 10) because my d20 games have tended to end around 10th or earlier when I wasn't using E6.  I also have run a homebrew a lot.

But this is my thought:  In a 12th level capped world, the players can do a LOT of stuff.  They can acquire a LOT of items.  Between the feats available, the spells available, and the number of magic items that the PCs could find or create in such a world, I think that the PCs could get up to 20th-level abilities with enough time and development.  This is because they can use their wealth of items (that they can legitimately create) as leverage in combination with feats and the other abilities they have.  

So I would expect that if you used E6 at 12th level, you'd find it a slower progression between 12th and 20th than D&D, and if that's the game you want, excellent.  But I doubt that you'll see the speed of play and prep that really shows up with E6.


----------



## Kunimatyu

White Whale said:
			
		

> I think the E6 idea is interesting, but like some other posters I feel the advancement beyond level 6 may be a bit dull.




How familiar are you with the eight-book Complete series, the Races series, the Spell and Magic Item Compendiums, Player's Handbook II, Heroes of Horror/Battle, the Dragon Compendium, and Dragon Magazine?

I find that many of the feats and spells in these sources offer a tremendous amount of variability, far more than higher-level class abilities. While Core-only E6 could get dull, I think, E6+additional WotC material could keep the game going for a very long time.

For instance, let's take Complete Scoundrel's Luck feats. Ordinarily, they're pretty neat, but not really possible to get more than 1-3 of unless you're giving up some very key feats. With E6, you can take almost the entire chain, and be the Luckiest Hero Ever. And then, if you want more to do, you can learn the Spring Attack chain, or pick some some tactical feats, etc, etc. That seems way more fun than a few additional BAB and some minor always-increasing abilities, AND it doesn't become impossible to DM well, like D&D's higher levels.


----------



## HeinorNY

I'll playtest my slower progression to see what comes out of that. I'll tell if it worked well or not and how.
See you next year


----------



## joela

*E6 Video games*

I don't play video games or on-line rpgs, but from what I understand from those who do and comments on this thread, E6 actually is closer to emulating those games than DnD. How? Apparently in many of those games, your PC stops leveling up like E6 and you have to rely on magic items to power up. In E6, feats seem to represent said items, though such items continue to exist. Standard DnD, on the other hand, has PCs with Dragonball Z increasing powers AND magic items. 

Thoughts?


----------



## Kunimatyu

joela said:
			
		

> I don't play video games or on-line rpgs, but from what I understand from those who do and comments on this thread, E6 actually is closer to emulating those games than DnD. How? Apparently in many of those games, your PC stops leveling up like E6 and you have to rely on magic items to power up. In E6, feats seem to represent said items, though such items continue to exist. Standard DnD, on the other hand, has PCs with Dragonball Z increasing powers AND magic items.
> 
> Thoughts?




It's hard to provide a catch-all term for RPG videogames. Some, like World of Warcraft, have a level cap and advancement beyond that is limited to items. Others have a levelling system that will likely not be maxed out by the game's end, unless you specifically devote a lot of time to levelling up.

In comparison to most RPGs videogames, D&D spells are far and above more powerful and gamebreaking. A higher level spell in a videogame typically just does more damage, whereas D&D spellcasters can create impermeable walls of force, create waves of Con-damage green slime, or summon extraplanar creatures more powerful than they themselves are.

While I don't want to see D&D become overly videogamey, I do think that R&D could stand to kick higher-level spells in the teeth so that things aren't so ridiculous.

-----

All that being said, I don't think E6 has more in common with videogame RPGs than bog-standard D&D. Videogame RPGs are notorious for always-increasing stats, such that boss monsters in the early game will often become standard enemies later in the game. In E6, since the power curve is smaller, you won't have nearly the disparity.


----------



## joela

*Jumping from E6 to E7*

I don't remember who mentioned it, but if the DM wants to change the E6 campaign level to E7 or higher, s/he might consider having the PCs undergo the Test-Based Prerequisties  over at UA.Let them defeat a 7th level fighter or wizard or whatever within a certain time frame. Or perform quests worthy of such a level. Maybe a E6 cleric/druid's deity requires them to defeat that "vengenance duplicate' from BoED or something. In any event, moving up a level is a major event, one that stresses the PC, and probably shouldn't happen more than once a campaign year (aka DM's approval).


----------



## White Whale

Kunimatyu said:
			
		

> How familiar are you with the eight-book Complete series, the Races series, the Spell and Magic Item Compendiums, Player's Handbook II, Heroes of Horror/Battle, the Dragon Compendium, and Dragon Magazine?
> 
> I find that many of the feats and spells in these sources offer a tremendous amount of variability, far more than higher-level class abilities. While Core-only E6 could get dull, I think, E6+additional WotC material could keep the game going for a very long time.
> 
> For instance, let's take Complete Scoundrel's Luck feats. Ordinarily, they're pretty neat, but not really possible to get more than 1-3 of unless you're giving up some very key feats. With E6, you can take almost the entire chain, and be the Luckiest Hero Ever. And then, if you want more to do, you can learn the Spring Attack chain, or pick some some tactical feats, etc, etc. That seems way more fun than a few additional BAB and some minor always-increasing abilities, AND it doesn't become impossible to DM well, like D&D's higher levels.



I guess it's a matter of preference. Clearly, the E6 system will give more feats than the system I outlined. I don't know what you mean with "minor always-increasing abilities", but my gut tells me that adding a levels worth of abilities is usually more powerful than a feat. Also, with my system I would give a feat every third level as usual. And yes, I'm familiar with several of those books you mentioned.

I don't see how this system becomes any more impossible to DM than the E6 system. Please share your thoughts, as I am very interested to hear them. I have not actually tried any of these variants, so I'm probably overlooking something


----------



## Ry

ainatan said:
			
		

> I'll playtest my slower progression to see what comes out of that. I'll tell if it worked well or not and how.
> See you next year




Yes!  That's what it's all about: less talk, more play.


----------



## Evilhalfling

joela said:
			
		

> I don't play video games or on-line rpgs, but from what I understand from those who do and comments on this thread, E6 actually is closer to emulating those games than DnD. How? Apparently in many of those games, your PC stops leveling up like E6 and you have to rely on magic items to power up.
> Thoughts?




Guild Wars [mmorg] does this, with the level cap at 20, which you reach after ~30% of the game.  After that you increase in power with minor changes to magic items (ie getting a weapon that gives + 30 hp instead of +27 (to a base of 450 hp) and getting new elite spells (stolen from the dead bodies of boss monsters, although you can only bring 1 elite spell with you at a time) 

In some areas every monster you face is lvl 24-28, teamwork, preparation and tactics are the only way to triumph.  It is very much like E6.


----------



## Ry

One thing that should work in E6 is quick 5-feat "templates" that add +1 CR based around particular themes, i.e.

*Biter*
Ability Training (Strength), Ability Advancement (Strength), Weapon Focus (Bite), Power Attack, Improved Natural Attack (bite)


----------



## Kunimatyu

rycanada said:
			
		

> Yes!  That's what it's all about: less talk, more play.




I'm not going to be able to do that until September, when I move to Davis and find a new group. I may see about running a few playtests of E6, where I make 6th level PCs with 10-12 feats and see how they play versions a range of CRs.


----------



## Shazman

rycanada said:
			
		

> One thing that should work in E6 is quick 5-feat "templates" that add +1 CR based around particular themes, i.e.
> 
> *Biter*
> Ability Training (Strength), Ability Advancement (Strength), Weapon Focus (Bite), Power Attack, Improved Disarm




Wouldn't Improved Natural Attack (Bite) fit the biter theme better than Improved Disarm?


----------



## Ry

Oi, yeah, good idea.  I forgot about that feat; I thought of improved disarm because I think of the best animal-vs-human fights as ones that temporarily even the tool-use odds.


----------



## Shazman

Well if you go strictly by the book, there aren't too many things that have a bite attack that can pull off the 13 int to qualify for improved disarm.  If it's a racial thing like the wolf's trip attack, that's a different story.  Usually grappling is the tactic used by monsters to neutralize weapon use.  

Here are some more feat templates:

Tough: Ability Training (constitution), Ability Advancement (constitution), Improved Toughness, Endurance, Diehard

Brute: Ability Training (strength), Ability Advancement (strength), Power Attack, Improved Bullrush, Improved Sunder

Thick-skinned: Improved Natural Armor x3, Toughness x2

Quick: Abiltity Training (dexterity), Ability Advancement (dexterity), Combat Reflexes, Dash, Improved Initiative


----------



## Ry

Nice!  

If only I had a _legion_ of Shazmen; then my plans for world domination would be complete.


----------



## joela

*Selling E6*



			
				Kunimatyu said:
			
		

> I'm not going to be able to do that until September, when I move to Davis and find a new group. I may see about running a few playtests of E6, where I make 6th level PCs with 10-12 feats and see how they play versions a range of CRs.




When you do, could you share how you're "selling" E6 to potential players? That's been one of my biggest obstacles so far with the variant. While some of my fellow DMs have found it intriguing, they've pointed out that DnD players, both within our group and in general, are going to see all those nifty high-level abilities in the PH and other books suddenly out of reach. 

What have y'all done to sell E6? Personally, I'm thinking moving my offer to E9.


----------



## joela

*Section*



			
				rycanada said:
			
		

> One thing that should work in E6 is quick 5-feat "templates" that add +1 CR based around particular themes, i.e.
> 
> *Biter*
> Ability Training (Strength), Ability Advancement (Strength), Weapon Focus (Bite), Power Attack, Improved Natural Attack (bite)




Does this go into the E6 Feat thread as well?


----------



## tvar

rycanada said:
			
		

> _Q: With only 6 levels, how do races with a level adjustment work?_
> If you use races with a level adjustment, the 6th level cap is a big issue. Use the point buy rules in the DMG as follows:
> LA Point buy
> +0 32
> +1 25
> +2 18
> +3 10
> +4 00




I was looking for this rule in the DMG and couldn't find it.  Does anyone have a page number?

I mean, I think I can figure it out.  These are the same points as used to buy attributes, right?  So if you are LA0 you get 32, if you have LA1 you only get 25, etc.  Is that how this variant works?

EDIT:  Based on my interpretation, it seems like you would probably have a lot of players opting to be half-dragons (and maybe half-celestials/fiends too).  As a half-dragon who buys the LA3 with points you could have these stats:  str 18, dex 12, con 14, int 10, wis 8, cha 10, which would normally cost you 30 points (so you're only really losing 2 points) and you gain all the other benefits of half-dragon, like +4 natural armor, immunities, breath weapon, natural weapons, etc.  Am I misinterpreting these rules?


----------



## joela

*Another E6 sighting*

Over at Sutekh .


----------



## Ry

Oh, BTW, session 1 of the new campaign went great, but it was really about Raising the Stakes more than E6 (as the characters were all first level).


----------



## Ry

tvar said:
			
		

> I was looking for this rule in the DMG and couldn't find it.  Does anyone have a page number?
> 
> I mean, I think I can figure it out.  These are the same points as used to buy attributes, right?  So if you are LA0 you get 32, if you have LA1 you only get 25, etc.  Is that how this variant works?
> 
> EDIT:  Based on my interpretation, it seems like you would probably have a lot of players opting to be half-dragons (and maybe half-celestials/fiends too).  As a half-dragon who buys the LA3 with points you could have these stats:  str 18, dex 12, con 14, int 10, wis 8, cha 10, which would normally cost you 30 points (so you're only really losing 2 points) and you gain all the other benefits of half-dragon, like +4 natural armor, immunities, breath weapon, natural weapons, etc.  Am I misinterpreting these rules?




No, that's a correct interpretation.  When I say "by the DMG" all I mean is to use the DMG's point buy rules (like page 2 or something, don't have the book with me).  The rule I put here is not a DMG rule.  This isn't a perfect fix; just the closest I could get with what I had to work with.  Feel free to suggest another, but this is the one that comes up on top when alternatives to LAs are tossed about in the rules forums.


----------



## DogBackward

Why don't you just leave LA as it is, then allow it to be bought off? Even if you start at first level, you can allow LA. If you have LA +1, you start as a 1st level NPC class (Warrior, Expert, Adept, Aristocrat, Magewright from ECS). Once you hit level two, you become a 1st level PC class with LA +1.

If you have LA +2, you start as a 1st level Commoner. Once you hit level two, you become a 1st level NPC class with LA +1. Once you hit level three, you become a 1st level PC class with +2 LA.

You could extend this to allow LA +1 and +2 to start as NPC classes, and allow LA +3 and +4 to start as Commoners.

Then, once you hit ECL 6, you can spend xp to reduce your LA. 4000xp, +100xp per LA to reduce it by one step. So, to take LA +4 to +3 (and thus gain your third character level) would cost 8000xp. Then to go from +3 to +2 costs 7000xp, and you then gain your fourth character level. And so on until you're at level six like everybody else. If you started with a high LA, you'll be behind your buddies by several feats, and still at a lower power level at low levels.


----------



## Shazman

I suppose that could work, but I like the reduced point buy better.  It's simple and easy to use.  Besides most of the races with an LA above +1 are going to be subject to DM approval even more so than other things.  If you want to play a drow in a party of elves, that's probably going to be shot down because of possible interparty conflict issues, or even worse, playing a half-fiend in a party with a paladin and LG cleric.  Even if you have a very lax DM that allows anything, you shouldn't be so much more powerful than PHB races that it throws the campaign out of wack.  A half-dragon is still 2 points behind a human.


----------



## Ry

One thing the multitude of discussions on the various boards has lead me to is a greater appreciation of the Lean Upward approach to feats, especially as it regards single-classed characters.  

For example, I don't find it especially good that Int 18 characters can't take advantage of their 4th-level spell slot (not that I want to allow unrestricted 4th level spells, such as Reincarnation, but for metamagic purposes the ability to gain 0 4th-level spell slots has some appeal).  Likewise, I agree that there should be the ability for the druid to turn into Large creatures; it's a signature Druid ability.  I'm almost convinced that 6th level fighters should have the ability to take a pair of feats to be treated as 8th level fighters, although with no BAB advancement. 

Note that these are just offshoots of the discussions and the feats I've re-read as the discussions have brought them up, not actual play.


----------



## Dragonblade275

rycanada said:
			
		

> I'm almost convinced that 6th level fighters should have the ability to take a pair of feats to be treated as 8th level fighters, although with no BAB advancement.



I would definitely think that a 6th level Fighter in E6 should be able to get Improved Critical.  Just changing the pre-req's from BAB+8 to Fighter 6th Level should be good.


----------



## Shazman

Yeah, I don't see why a Fighter 6 in E6 couldn't qualify for Improved Critical as well as Greater Weapon Focus and Specialization.  Just make the prerequs Fighter 6 plus weapon specific feats lower in the Weapon Focus chain of feats.  So the fighter 6 gets a total of +2 to hit and + 4 to damage with his chosen weapon, and has higher chance of crtting.  The fighter 4/barbarian 2 still has a +3 to hit and +4 to damage (or +5 with a two-handed weapon) while raging and using his chosen weapon.  It seems to balance things out so that a dip into barbarian isn't a no-brainer choice for every fighter.


----------



## Dragonblade275

I agree.

I think E6 might benefit from feats that encourage single classing over multi-classing.  For instance, I think feats with a Pre-Req of Ranger 6th that allow abilities like: Woodland Stride and Swift Tracker to become available would be nice.

I'm planning to go through many of the classes and prestige classes and try and convert many class abilities into feats at some point in the future.


----------



## Kunimatyu

rycanada said:
			
		

> One thing the multitude of discussions on the various boards has lead me to is a greater appreciation of the Lean Upward approach to feats, especially as it regards single-classed characters.
> 
> For example, I don't find it especially good that Int 18 characters can't take advantage of their 4th-level spell slot (not that I want to allow unrestricted 4th level spells, such as Reincarnation, but for metamagic purposes the ability to gain 0 4th-level spell slots has some appeal).  Likewise, I agree that there should be the ability for the druid to turn into Large creatures; it's a signature Druid ability.  I'm almost convinced that 6th level fighters should have the ability to take a pair of feats to be treated as 8th level fighters, although with no BAB advancement.
> 
> Note that these are just offshoots of the discussions and the feats I've re-read as the discussions have brought them up, not actual play.




I'm somewhat concerned that some of the Large forms (Lion, Dire Ape, Dire Wolf are the significant ones) will allow the Druid to be just as combat-effective as the fighters -- leaving the Druid with Small/Medium creatures means they're mostly on-par with fighters, but not completely.

I will also not be allowing 4th level spells (there's too many nasty ones, like Evard's, Solid Fog, and the like), though I may allow certain 4th level spells to be learned via feats and cast once a day (like your Restoration feat et al), in particular, spells like Wall of Fire (a classic), and perhaps Fear.

It's strange, but I can't find a spell anywhere that can frighten a single target over 5HD -- Fear can do it, but it's a big cone effect, so you'd think there'd be one somewhere.


----------



## green slime

Kunimatyu said:
			
		

> I'm somewhat concerned that some of the Large forms (Lion, Dire Ape, Dire Wolf are the significant ones) will allow the Druid to be just as combat-effective as the fighters -- leaving the Druid with Small/Medium creatures means they're mostly on-par with fighters, but not completely.
> 
> I will also not be allowing 4th level spells (there's too many nasty ones, like Evard's, Solid Fog, and the like), though I may allow certain 4th level spells to be learned via feats and cast once a day (like your Restoration feat et al), in particular, spells like Wall of Fire (a classic), and perhaps Fear.
> 
> It's strange, but I can't find a spell anywhere that can frighten a single target over 5HD -- Fear can do it, but it's a big cone effect, so you'd think there'd be one somewhere.




Rycanada was talking about "for *metmagic* purposes", which I assume to mean the ability to cast an _enlarged fireball_, as opposed to actually gaining any real 4th level spells...


----------



## Matrix Sorcica

Daelkyr said:
			
		

> For some reason, I felt inspired to try my own hand at a pdf for E6.
> 
> Not much, but here it is.
> 
> On a side note, love the idea, can't wait to test it out on my players.
> 
> But here's a question:
> 
> Is there any feat that will advance you skill cap after lvl 6? I play Eberron and would like to ensure that the Greater Dragonmark is available.



Create one that requires skill focus in the skill and lets your skill rank be considered 3 higher for the purpose of qualifying for other feats?


----------



## Ry

Actually, there's a feat in Phil Reed's 101 More Feats called Skill Beyond Your Years, it's OGC.  You pick a skill and it raises your max ranks in that skill from Level+3 to Level +5.  This doesn't actually provide the 2 skill points, though, so an E6 character would have to choose Open Mind (for 5 points) and have 3 extra left over.


----------



## Cheiromancer

I'm kinda puzzled by these attempts to break the level 6 ceiling (4th level spell slots, feats to increase skill rank caps, Improved Critical, large Wildshape, etc.)  If you want to get access to level 7 or 8 abilities, allow level advancement at long intervals.  If you are going to take away the most distinctive feature of E6 (a hard level limit), then why not be straightforward about it?


----------



## Ry

Well, the argument that's rolling around in my head goes like this:

6th plus a bunch of feats is more powerful than 6th.  Some class features that are slightly above the cutoff match with the power level of E6, but help by adding definition to some classes in a way that doesn't pop the top off of the power level.

Again, this is stuff rolling around in my mind.


----------



## Shazman

These adjustments would be necessary for a long term E6 campaign that has the characters facing increasingly difficult challenges.  Eventually, standard feats aren't going to cut it.  They will need feats that duplictate some (not all) higher level class abilities to prevail or the campaign will fall apart.


----------



## Kunimatyu

green slime said:
			
		

> Rycanada was talking about "for *metmagic* purposes", which I assume to mean the ability to cast an _enlarged fireball_, as opposed to actually gaining any real 4th level spells...




That might work, though I think that the Sudden feats, plus (maybe) an Extra Sudden Spell that granted one additional use from the Sudden feat of your choice would be the best way to do it.

After thinking about it some more (though this is WAY house-rule territory), I think I'd allow a druid to transform into certain animals, but I'd do it via spells, so a 3rd level spell might allow a druid to transform into a Dire Wolf. I wouldn't allow spellcasting in this alternate forms, and the forms would be using the new polymorph subschool (ie. flip open the Monster Manual and use that creature's stats exactly), so that would probably decrease the power enough to allow some nice combat forms.


----------



## Kunimatyu

Shazman said:
			
		

> These adjustments would be necessary for a long term E6 campaign that has the characters facing increasingly difficult challenges.  Eventually, standard feats aren't going to cut it.  They will need feats that duplictate some (not all) higher level class abilities to prevail or the campaign will fall apart.




What class abilities would those be? Most classes have gotten most of their unique powers by 5th level, and everything after that is merely additional uses (also granted by feats) or minor ability tweaks that aren't that useful.

Beyond 4th level spells, which start tilting the spellcaster-mundane balance, I'm not sure what really makes the difference here.


----------



## Ry

Shazman said:
			
		

> These adjustments would be necessary for a long term E6 campaign that has the characters facing increasingly difficult challenges.  Eventually, standard feats aren't going to cut it.  They will need feats that duplictate some (not all) higher level class abilities to prevail or the campaign will fall apart.




I wouldn't say "fall apart" - I'd say there's room to manoeuvre in terms of what you allow.

I like the idea of a feat for 6th level druids where you choose 1 Large animal that you can wildshape into.


----------



## Dragonblade275

rycanada said:
			
		

> I like the idea of a feat for 6th level druids where you choose 1 Large animal that you can wildshape into.



That actually sounds pretty good.


----------



## RigaMortus2

I just read the first couple pages, and I think the theory behind this E6 idea.  So I had some thoughts (perhaps others had already mentioned them)...

1) I've been playing with max hit points per level for some time now.  I wonder if E6 would be unbalanced if I did the same?

2) Perhaps a choice at each level after 6th.  At each 5,000xp after 6th level, you can choose one of the following:
(a) A bonus feat you meet the prereqs for
(b) +1 BAB
(c) 1 Hit Dice woth of hit points (in my case, it would be max hit points)
(d) Gain class abilities as if you gained an additional level in a class.  In other words, if you were a 6th level Rogue, and you selected this option, you would get the class abilities of a 7th level Rogue (+4d6 sneak attack), but nothing else.

Thoughts?

A question though...  What happens to skills?  These don't seem to improve beyond 6th level.  Is that a problem?


----------



## Ry

Hi Rigamortis!  Check out the FAQ in the E6 .pdf (hosted at the OGC E6 wiki)

1) I think max HP works fine
2) I'm not for these (except a of course) because IMO it allows everything out of D&D.  The big thing with E6 is that some things don't get in.  Unless you were thinking these could only be taken once, in which case it's the Lean Upward approach (again, see the faq in the .pdf)

A question for the regulars: How often do you game?


----------



## Dragonblade275

rycanada said:
			
		

> A question for the regulars: How often do you game?



About once a month... But, it's usually a marathon session.  Two (or maybe three) 6 to 8 hour blocks over a weekend.


----------



## Kunimatyu

rycanada said:
			
		

> A question for the regulars: How often do you game?




For the past year I've done a weekly D&D game and a biweekly True20 game. The D&D campaign just finished, the True20 is about to, and once I take my RPG sabbatical, I intend to start back up with a game of E6.


----------



## Thaedrus

*E6 analysis*

So as not to thread jack, I posted a related thread here http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=202033


----------



## stoneshape

Hi all

I have three related questions concerning BAB 6 1.

1st, In standard D&D how much is that second attack worth? What about the third and fourth extra attack?

2nd, In standard E6 how much is that second attack worth?

3rd, In standard E6 how much is that second attack worth if only the fighter could obtain it?

thanks


----------



## TwoSix

Cheiromancer said:
			
		

> I'm kinda puzzled by these attempts to break the level 6 ceiling (4th level spell slots, feats to increase skill rank caps, Improved Critical, large Wildshape, etc.)  If you want to get access to level 7 or 8 abilities, allow level advancement at long intervals.  If you are going to take away the most distinctive feature of E6 (a hard level limit), then why not be straightforward about it?




To my mind, the point of E6 isn't being capped at 6th level abilities, it's to maintain the game at the sweet spot of the second quartile of D&D (the "heroic fantasy" quartile).  Since the quartile is from 6th-10th level, 6th level lets you stop level advancement at the lower end and then get to the fun part of feat advancement all while staying in the sweet spot.  Giving out some slightly higher level abilities won't break the quartile, as long as you don't give out some of the gamebreaking spells that exist at 4th and 5th spell level.


----------



## Ry

TwoSix said:
			
		

> To my mind, the point of E6 isn't being capped at 6th level abilities, it's to maintain the game at the sweet spot of the second quartile of D&D (the "heroic fantasy" quartile).  Since the quartile is from 6th-10th level, 6th level lets you stop level advancement at the lower end and then get to the fun part of feat advancement all while staying in the sweet spot.  Giving out some slightly higher level abilities won't break the quartile, as long as you don't give out some of the gamebreaking spells that exist at 4th and 5th spell level.




TwoSix has nailed it here.  The goal of E6 is heroic fantasy; the principles of E6 are familiarity and speed (hence minimal changes).  The cap at 6th level is the means to that end.


----------



## TwoSix

rycanada said:
			
		

> TwoSix has nailed it here.  The goal of E6 is heroic fantasy; the principles of E6 are familiarity and speed (hence minimal changes).  The cap at 6th level is the means to that end.




There are three main reasons to keep the cap at 6, I feel.

1) Limit commonly available magic to 3rd level.  High enough to produce fantastic effects, low enough to not impact game complexity meanigfully.

2) Limit skill bonuses to about +15, give or take.  This allows for the "Einstein was a 5th level physicist" feel.

3) Overall power balance between the classes is very solid at 6th level.  Spellcasters have come into their own, while pure fighting classes have gotten their 2nd attack.


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## Thaedrus

The absolute spell level can be capped at 3rd level and skill levels can be capped at +15 while still giving access to higher than 6th level abilities. This may have consequences for class balance though.

Standard D&D caps spell level at 9, even though taking (the level +1)/2 mechanic would imply that there should be a 10th spell level at a level 20 cap. Maybe 3rd level spells are all that you get, even though you can get say 8th level abilities.


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## TwoSix

Thaedrus said:
			
		

> The absolute spell level can be capped at 3rd level and skill levels can be capped at +15 while still giving access to higher than 6th level abilities. This may have consequences for class balance though.
> 
> Standard D&D caps spell level at 9, even though taking (the level +1)/2 mechanic would imply that there should be a 10th spell level at a level 20 cap. Maybe 3rd level spells are all that you get, even though you can get say 8th level abilities.




In my own game (not for E6 a whole), I'm more than comfortable with that.  Heck, most of the feats in the PHB2 I'd let a E6 fighter have, although maybe not till they were at 6+15 or 6+20 feats.


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## Ry

For E6 as I present it, I'm more comfortable adding feats slowly to the system, for reasons I detailed in the FAQ.  But I think everybody's getting on the same page here, and I like that.


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## Evilhalfling

rycanada said:
			
		

> A question for the regulars: How often do you game?




3-4 times per month ~ 5-6 hrs per session.

_Stoneshape:
1st, In standard D&D how much is that second attack worth? What about the third and fourth extra attack?_
 The 2nd attack is Huge in standard- especially early, Full BAB characters normally will have enough other bonuses to hit with the 2nd attack much of the time – as an example 2 full BAB PCs in my group are at +12/+7 and +11/+6 while the cleric is at +8-10 depending on buffs. The 3rd attack is useless, until you get a 4th, then the 4th is useless. For 2 weapon fighters the first -5 is actually a -7 and it will hit rarely, but can occasionally add up, esp. with SA or other bonus damage. 

_2nd, In standard E6 how much is that second attack worth?_
Close to the same – you can get enough bonuses to make the attack important, 

_3rd, In standard E6 how much is that second attack worth if only the fighter could obtain it?_
Way too much – Barbarians, Rangers and Paladins would be inferior to a straight fighter.
The other abilities don’t even come close to making up for it.


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## TwoSix

rycanada said:
			
		

> A question for the regulars: How often do you game?




About 3 times a month, 4 hours a session, although right now we're doing Saga.


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## joela

*Gaming*



			
				rycanada said:
			
		

> A question for the regulars: How often do you game?




Two weekly campaigns and one monthly.


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## Ry

If anyone has some well-vetted statblocks of 6th level characters that we could play with by adding feats to, that would also be much appreciated.  Since I use methods like Able Secretary/Best Friend to ballpark things, or work straight from MM plus suites of feats, it would help me a lot if we had a few examples as "baselines"


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## Kunimatyu

rycanada said:
			
		

> If anyone has some well-vetted statblocks of 6th level characters that we could play with by adding feats to, that would also be much appreciated.  Since I use methods like Able Secretary/Best Friend to ballpark things, or work straight from MM plus suites of feats, it would help me a lot if we had a few examples as "baselines"




I'll see if I can stat up a few -- if I do, they'll be Level 6 folks with 5-10 extra feats tacked on.


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## Ry

If at all possible, can you show them at 6th before feats, and then add some feats?


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## JanusDreamweaver

As strictly a player, I would love to be in a campaign using this system.

Reminds me of playing Champions. You create your character as a certain level (usually decided by damage and defenses) and from then on your character develops new abilities.


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## Ry

Welcome to EN World JanusDreamweaver!

Also, thanks!  There have been those (at sites like therpgsite and giantitp.com) who have claimed no player would ever want to touch this system.  While I have proof otherwise (my original E6 game, and the new E6 game I've recently recruited for) I appreciate knowing that it's not all DMs and designers who can see the appeal.


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## Ry

OK, this thread is getting unmanageably large (at least for me) - I know there's stuff I missed so I'm going to create a new thread, link the .pdfs in the first post, and ask this one to be closed.


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## Ry

Go here for your E6 fix:

http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=202109


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