And in the [13th Age] things began to ... Escalate!

Tox

Mikey CTS wrote: »

So I'm working on creating my own setting, with new Icons and everything. I want to include the Shifter race from 4e, however I'm having difficult thinking of anything fun and dramatic to do with their powers. I was hoping for suggestions!

Here's some suggestions from Vault of the 13th Age:

Longtooth Shifters
Racial bonus: +2 Strength OR +2 Wisdom

Longtooth Shifting (Racial Power): Once per battle, while staggered, you can spend a recovery without healing as a quick action. Instead, heal hit points equal to one recovery die + Constitution modifier at the end of each turn until the end of battle (5th level: double the amount; 8th level: triple).

Adventurer feat: Also reroll natural 1 on damage rolls.

Champion feat: You gain a bonus recovery.

Razorclaw Shifters
Racial bonus: +2 Dexterity OR +2 Wisdom

Razorclaw Shifting (Racial Power): Once per battle, as a quick action while staggered, grant yourself a +1 bonus to AC and PD until the end of the battle.

Adventurer feat: Also gain a +2 bonus to disengage checks.

Champion feat: You gain a +1 bonus to disengage checks while not staggered.

captaink

New owner of the core book here. I liked it a lot, I have 13 true ways on order.

Is it just me or are humans and wood elves the clear winners in terms of racial abilities? Humans get a straight up bonus feat on top of a really good racial, as well as more stat flexibility. Meanwhile Wood Elves have a decent shot at a whole extra action, which is quite nice. Compared to stuff like Half-orcs and Dwarves, they seem overwpowered.

Tox

captaink wrote: »

New owner of the core book here. I liked it a lot, I have 13 true ways on order.

Is it just me or are humans and wood elves the clear winners in terms of racial abilities? Humans get a straight up bonus feat on top of a really good racial, as well as more stat flexibility. Meanwhile Wood Elves have a decent shot at a whole extra action, which is quite nice. Compared to stuff like Half-orcs and Dwarves, they seem overwpowered.

It's less significant than you think. That extra feat is ... nice? But honestly feats are a lot more toned down for the most part compared to D&D.

Wood Elves do have a very good racial power, but surprisingly it's rather well balanced.

Ardent

You might be surprised how good the other racial abilities are, honestly.

Tox

I honestly find the racial powers to generally be little more than a nice little bonus flavor that helps inform the character. Most of them don't seem particularly uber or signature enough for any build to need any particular racial power

captaink

Hey GMs (and players), what are some ways you have actually used 5s and 6s in relationship rolls? The book is heavy on advice, but light on examples of how to actually use them in a story.

MsAnthropy

captaink wrote: »

Hey GMs (and players), what are some ways you have actually used 5s and 6s in relationship rolls? The book is heavy on advice, but light on examples of how to actually use them in a story.

While I love 13th Age in general, I never used the icon rules as written. I usually asked for rolls before starting a new story arc, which I would use to flag which icons were involved. Otherwise, I’d use alternate rules for icon tokens (http://slyflourish.com/icon_rolls.html) on a per session/adventure basis and let the players figure out what the effects and costs were.

Mikey CTS

Speaking of Icons, writing my own setting I've found new uses for them. Probably the biggest one is world building. Identifying the powers in your world that are competing really helps flesh out a world. It makes it easy to figure out the central conflicts in your world. Once you identify who the heavy hitters in your world are, everything begins to flow together surprisingly organically. Even if I end up running a game that doesn't use the Icon rules, Icons as a world building tool is incredibly useful. It's something I will always use for now on, at least in the background.

astrobstrd

I've kind of merged runes from Glorantha and Icons in my Dynasty Warriors themed setting.

Runes are almost entirely mechanical in how I use the 5's and 6's. While Mentors/Adversaries use the rolls for social and story encounters as well as access to temporary magic items.

The GM guide that comes with the screen has really good advice for using Icon rolls as well.

Tox

Bumping this because with some of the news out of WotC, I've seen more and more folks looking for alternatives

webguy20

So im starting up an online game with a mix of my game groups and will be running the spelljammer setting using 13th age.

I haven't ran 13th age since it was first released. Are there some good onboarding resources to get folks up to speed on the system? Everyone is coming from at least a couple years experience with 5th Ed, so none of them are d20 newbies.

Tox

webguy20 wrote: »

So im starting up an online game with a mix of my game groups and will be running the spelljammer setting using 13th age.

I haven't ran 13th age since it was first released. Are there some good onboarding resources to get folks up to speed on the system? Everyone is coming from at least a couple years experience with 5th Ed, so none of them are d20 newbies.

For you or the players or yourself? In either case certainly the 13th Age SRD site

For you I'd definitely check out the Book of Ages.

I don't think there's really anything like a quick start guide, but the book itself is pretty well laid out, imo

webguy20

Excellent. I have the core physical books and all the PDFs from the sale a few years ago anyways. Ill take a look at book of ages.

Mostlyjoe13

I just got Shards of the Broken Sky recently (hardback on the way) as well as Book of the Underworld. I'm still trying to come up with a game I'd run. But damn if I really want to play.

For my birthday this year I got the majority of the books in the line so it's been very awesome reading.

Mostlyjoe13

To round out my books I just got the Book of the Demon. I want to base my game around a Demon Market now. It's too cool an concept not to play with. That is one thing I am adoring about the more recent 13th Age books, they are adding way more places and themes to play with. The Bestiary books were awesome enough, but 2 knocks it out of the park with little world building segments.

webguy20

My group are rolling stats right now. roll 4d6 drop the lowest, Must have two stats 15 or up, and one stat 9 or under. Had some interesting results so far!

Tox

webguy20 wrote: »

My group are rolling stats right now. roll 4d6 drop the lowest, Must have two stats 15 or up, and one stat 9 or under. Had some interesting results so far!

Mind if I ask why you all decided to roll stats?

webguy20

Tox wrote: »

webguy20 wrote: »

My group are rolling stats right now. roll 4d6 drop the lowest, Must have two stats 15 or up, and one stat 9 or under. Had some interesting results so far!

Mind if I ask why you all decided to roll stats?

because like 80% of the people I play with REALLY enjoy doing it, and It doesn't bother me too much.

Also, one of my min/max buddies wants to play this class, For those of you with more experience, exactly how broken is this? I'm going to review it later, but I figured I'd ask for help. thematically we've got a pretty good backstory to explain it, that will be real neat to play out as he levels up.

https://13thage.org/index.php/classes/633-abomination

DevoutlyApathetic

webguy20 wrote: »

Also, one of my min/max buddies wants to play this class, For those of you with more experience, exactly how broken is this? I'm going to review it later, but I figured I'd ask for help. thematically we've got a pretty good backstory to explain it, that will be real neat to play out as he levels up.

https://13thage.org/index.php/classes/633-abomination

It doesn't look absurd. The AC is about monk level on average though monks would spend more time with less AC and a little time with more AC. Roughly the same for unarmed damage.

The real issue is going to be the talents of which there are a bunch to choose from. The couple I read didn't seem outrageous.

webguy20

Awesome, thanks for the review!

Brody

DevoutlyApathetic wrote: »

webguy20 wrote: »

Also, one of my min/max buddies wants to play this class, For those of you with more experience, exactly how broken is this? I'm going to review it later, but I figured I'd ask for help. thematically we've got a pretty good backstory to explain it, that will be real neat to play out as he levels up.

https://13thage.org/index.php/classes/633-abomination

It doesn't look absurd. The AC is about monk level on average though monks would spend more time with less AC and a little time with more AC. Roughly the same for unarmed damage.

The real issue is going to be the talents of which there are a bunch to choose from. The couple I read didn't seem outrageous.

I looked at a couple reviews of the PDF class bundle this is in, and they author seems pretty well liked by the community at large, so I expect there wouldn't be any glaring issues.

Brody

Its been a while since I've done a deep dive on the system. The idea was to break the triangle, iirc, but I don't actually remember how well that worked out in play?

Tox

Brody wrote: »

Its been a while since I've done a deep dive on the system. The idea was to break the triangle, iirc, but I don't actually remember how well that worked out in play?

I ... do not understand what you are referring to here. Which system? What triangle?

Brody

Tox wrote: »

Brody wrote: »

Its been a while since I've done a deep dive on the system. The idea was to break the triangle, iirc, but I don't actually remember how well that worked out in play?

I ... do not understand what you are referring to here. Which system? What triangle?

Sorry, I meant Holy Trinity. Tank -> Healer -> DPS.

webguy20

So my session zero went real well. The guy playing the abomination flavored him as a dwarf turned magically into a loaf of bread "Crumb". He attacks with bread based powers like the pita punch. Tox went through with me and helped tone down the class. It really was a do it all class, and in a group of 6 folks I didn't need that stepping on folks toes. In a 2 or 3 person group though, it could cover a lot of bases for a melee class as written.

I've pretty much got 4 out there characters with rich and weird backstories, and two playing it straight folks, which is perfect. One of the "normal characters" has a family, which, I do plan to leverage, but not just like "They died". At some point the city they are based out of will get attacked by an overwhelming force, and the players will have the opportunity to escape. Will they go back for his family, or not?

Brody

Yeah, looking at sword mage and Warlock from that book, and they definitely range from op af to generally balanced.

Tox

webguy20 wrote: »

So my session zero went real well. The guy playing the abomination flavored him as a dwarf turned magically into a loaf of bread "Crumb". He attacks with bread based powers like the pita punch. Tox went through with me and helped tone down the class. It really was a do it all class, and in a group of 6 folks I didn't need that stepping on folks toes. In a 2 or 3 person group though, it could cover a lot of bases for a melee class as written.

I've pretty much got 4 out there characters with rich and weird backstories, and two playing it straight folks, which is perfect. One of the "normal characters" has a family, which, I do plan to leverage, but not just like "They died". At some point the city they are based out of will get attacked by an overwhelming force, and the players will have the opportunity to escape. Will they go back for his family, or not?

Did your Ranger end up going for any Druid talents?

webguy20

Tox wrote: »

webguy20 wrote: »

So my session zero went real well. The guy playing the abomination flavored him as a dwarf turned magically into a loaf of bread "Crumb". He attacks with bread based powers like the pita punch. Tox went through with me and helped tone down the class. It really was a do it all class, and in a group of 6 folks I didn't need that stepping on folks toes. In a 2 or 3 person group though, it could cover a lot of bases for a melee class as written.

I've pretty much got 4 out there characters with rich and weird backstories, and two playing it straight folks, which is perfect. One of the "normal characters" has a family, which, I do plan to leverage, but not just like "They died". At some point the city they are based out of will get attacked by an overwhelming force, and the players will have the opportunity to escape. Will they go back for his family, or not?

Did your Ranger end up going for any Druid talents?

No but he did take the Cleric Spell, Bless.

Mostlyjoe13

Book of the Underworld physical copies should start showing up now. Got mine and it's smexy! Still trying to pick my favorite element from it, but fighting against Ettercap Monks....has it's appeal. I also got The Overworld and Beyond 3pp product and yes, planar adventures is right in my wheelhouse. When I run a game I might feature it.

I have the PDF for Dark Pacts & Ancient Secrets but I'm iffy how much I want to allow in my game. I'm debating getting Dark Alleys & Twisted Paths as well. But 3pp is hit or miss with me.

webguy20

@Mostlyjoe13 Can you link to the Overworld and beyond product? Sounds like I could use that in my Spelljammer-esque campaign.

Brody

Does book of the underworld have any additional character options?

Brody

We seem to have settled on a party, my excitement is building. Ranger, rogue, cleric, necromancer.

webguy20

2nd session of 13th age down. It went well! My players got a bit of story, fought some corsairs. The wizard crit on his acid arrow, did like 30 damage to the commander. Between a couple other hits and the other enemies dying I played it up that as the commanders turn came up, he begged for mercy to end up being melted by the ongoing damage halfway through his spiel. The players seemed to enjoy that. Two of the regular bad guys did end up surrendering, and they were let go! I was surprised.

Brody

Crits can be absolutely ridiculous damage in this game.

The DM for the campaign we're just spooling up (session 0 was Tuesday, and I am excite) reminded me that when we tried the back of the book module, our party managed to kill the final boss in 2 rounds of combat.

webguy20

Yea the one guy who is playing an abomination has extra damage abilities that trigger off his crits too. They really make him a damage dealer.

Brody

Does anyone have experience with making power cards in Roll20 for this?

webguy20

Brody wrote: »

Does anyone have experience with making power cards in Roll20 for this?

You mean on the 13th age character sheet? It's not too hard, the biggest thing is when it needs to roll dice, you have to do a bit of scripting to make it work.

Brody

Yeah, just having a hard time parsing the syntax for it. And the area to type stuff in is small so its a bit of a pain to see what I've even typed. Its almost like I need to make the cards in excel/sheets, and then copy the text over, just so its a little bit readable.

webguy20

Brody wrote: »

Yeah, just having a hard time parsing the syntax for it. And the area to type stuff in is small so its a bit of a pain to see what I've even typed. Its almost like I need to make the cards in excel/sheets, and then copy the text over, just so its a little bit readable.

If you're not, pop the character sheets into a new window, its a button near the top of the sheet. It makes it a lot more user friendly to input stuff. I do agree that the syntax is a bit byzantine.

captaink

Ordered a bunch of stuff since Pelgrane has a 4 for 3 deal on right now. Bestiary, Book of Loot, Book of Ages, and Shards of the Fallen Sky.