The Campaign Builder's Guild

Ok so i have spent the last day on and off sorting this out. I 4e its was really easy to make generic classes, all i have done is combine the Fighter and the Warlord classes into the "Martial Class" with class stats a hybrid or "in between" the two (ex. hp, healing surges, armour and weapon proficiency) and the Power lists of the two are mearged. This has also been done for the Cleric and Paladin Classes, the Wizard and Warlock, and Ranger and Rogue Classes into the Divine, Arcane, and Daring Classes respectivly. I plan on using them in my campaign to throughly play test them for balance, as i am sure their maybe openings for unbalancing power combinations.
Some may say i have taken all the flavour or fluff out of the class... thats exactly what i intended to do so you can add whatever flavour or fluff you want to your character. The class is just a tool box, fill it with what ever tools you can want out of the choices givin. Also this was done so you should be able to play with less players but still have a balanced party.

PS - I intend to follow this up with the Nature Class (Druid + Barbarian) and the Mind and Body Class (Monk + Psion) and more as they come out.

Martial Class

 

CLASS TRAITS Role: Defender-Leader. You are very tough and have an exceptional ability to contain enemies in melee. Power Source: Martial. You have become a master of combat through endless hours of practice, tactics, and your own sheer physical toughness. Key Abilities: Strength, Dexterity,  Constitution Armour Proficiencies: Cloth, leather, hide, chain mail, scale; light shield, heavy shield Weapon Proficiencies: Simple melee, military melee, simple ranged Bonus to Defence: +2 Fortitude Hit Points at 1st Level: 12 + Constitution score Hit Points per Level Gained: 6 Healing Surges per Day: 8 + Constitution modifier Trained Skills: Choose three trained skills at 1st level. Class Skills: All Build Options: Fighter, Warlord, General Class Features: Choose three at 1st level. Combat Challenge, Combat Superiority, Fighter Weapon Talent, Combat Leader, Commanding Presence,  Inspiring Word

Divine Class

 

CLASS TRAITS Role: Defender-Leader. You lead by shielding allies with your prayers, healing, and using powers that improve your allies' attacks. Power Source: Divine. You have been invested with the authority to wield divine power on behalf of a deity, to protect your faith. Key Abilities: Wisdom, Strength, Charisma Armour Proficiencies: Cloth, leather, hide, chain mail, scale, light shield Weapon Proficiencies: Simple melee, simple ranged Implement: Holy symbol Bonus to Defence: +1 Will, +1 Reflex, +1 Fortitude Hit Points at 1st Level: 10 + Constitution score Hit Points per Level Gained: 5 Healing Surges per Day: 8 + Constitution modifier Trained Skills: Religion. Choose three more trained skills at 1st level. Class Skills: All Build Options: Cleric, Paladin, Healer Class Features: Channel Divinity. Choose three at 1st level. Healer's Lore, healing word, Ritual Casting, Divine Challenge, Lay on Hands

Arcane Class

 

CLASS TRAITS Role: Striker-Controller. Your attack powers are highly damaging and often weaken or hamper the target in some way. You can elude attacks by flying, teleporting, or turning invisible. Power Source: Arcane. You channel arcane forces through extensive study, hidden knowledge, and intricate preparation. To you, magic is an art form, an expressive and powerful method by which you seek to control the world around you. Key Abilities: Charisma, Dextarity, Intelligence Armour Proficiencies: Cloth, leather Weapon Proficiencies: Dagger, Quarterstaff Implements: Rods, wands, Orbs Bonus to Defence: +2 Will Hit Points at 1st Level: 8 + Constitution score Hit Points per Level Gained: 4 Healing Surges per Day: 5 + Constitution modifier Trained Skills: Arcana; Choose four more trained skills at 1st level. Class Skills: All Build Options: Warlock, Sorcerer, Wizard, Mage Class Features: Choose three at 1st level: Eldritch Pact, Warlock's Curse, Cantrips, Ritual Casting, Implements

Daring Class

 

CLASS TRAITS Role: Striker. You dart in to attack, do massive damage, and then retreat to safety. Your attacks rely on speed and mobility, since you prefer to use hit-and-run tactics whenever possible. Power Source: Martial. Your talents depend on extensive training and constant practice, innate skill, and natural coordination. Key Abilities: Dexterity, Strength, Charisma Armour Proficiencies: Cloth, leather Weapon Proficiencies: Simple Melee, Simple Ranged, Military Ranged Bonus to Defence: +2 Reflex Hit Points at 1st Level: 10 + Constitution score Hit Points per Level Gained: 5 Healing Surges per Day: 6 + Constitution modifier Trained Skills: Stealth Choose four more trained skills at 1st level. Class Skills: All Build Options: Brawny rogue, trickster rogue Class Features: Choose three at 1st level. First Strike, Rogue Tactics, Sneak Attack, Hunters Quarry, Fighting Style

UPDATED - JUNE 12th Removed Class skills from Generic Classes, and Added Omni-Class. Much thanks to Ra-Tiel for comeing up with the point buy set up for poficiences and stuff.

Omni-Class

 

CLASS TRAITS Role: All, Any. Power Source: All, Any: When selecting a new power, you must have a power of the same source/list of a lower level. This combined with the Prime Stat used by powers will keep you from grabbing powers at will from all over to keep balance, while being much more open than the Multi-class feats of vanilla 4e. Key Abilities: Any, based on the powers you choose. Armour Proficiencies: Weapon Proficiencies: Bonus to Defence: Hit Points at 1st Level: Hit Points per Level Gained: Healing Surges per Day: Trained Skills: Class Skills: ALL Build Options: Any Class Features: Choose three at 1st level. First Strike, Rogue Tactics, Sneak Attack, Hunters Quarry, Fighting Style, Eldritch Pact, Warlock's Curse, Cantrips, Ritual Casting, Implements, Channel Divinity, Healer's Lore, healing word, Ritual Casting, Divine Challenge, Lay on Hands, Combat Challenge, Combat Superiority, Fighter Weapon Talent, Combat Leader, Commanding Presence, Inspiring Word

Point Buys System:

Armor Proficiencies
- 1 pt: Cloth, leather
- 2 pts: Cloth leather, hide, chainmail, light shield
- 4 pts: cloth, leather, hide, chainmail, scale , plate; light shield, heavy shield

Weapon proficiencies
- 1 pt: any three single simple weapons
- 2 pts: Simple melee, simple ranged
- 4 pts: Simple melee, simple ranged, martial melee, martial ranged

Bonus to defense
- 1 pt: +1 to one defense
- 2 pts: +2 to one defense, or +1 to two defenses.
- 4 pts: +2 to two defenses or +1 to all defenses

Health
- 1 pt: 10 + Con score HPs; +4 HPs per level; 6 + Con mod healing surges
- 2 pts: 12 + Con score HPs; +5 HPs per level; 7 + Con mod healing surges
- 4 pts: 15 + Con score HPs; +6 HPs per level; 9 + Con mod healing surges

Trained skills
- 1 pt: 3 trained
- 2 pts: 4 trained
- 4 pts: 6 trained

Give each player 10 points and require him to spend at least 1 point in each category. These Classes are all based on the Table on page.29 of the PHB.

Hmmm, interesting.  Not that I know much about 4e.

One thing: if you're making them generic, couldn't you drop class skills?

If this is how classes are set up in 4.0 I am going to be really excited. The layout is so much cleaner. This makes me very happy indeed. Of course it only frustrates me more in that I can't afford to buy the books right now. Ah oh well, I will get them in time I am sure.

i have layed it preatty close to how they are in the PHB, couldnt keep the blue tables and stuff in the post but i am working on a printable version layed out in colour just like the official layout, i work in MS works, so i just need to conver to PDF and i will post it if there is interest.

@Silvercat Moonpaw
I think your right, i was just trying to make it as offical as i could, to make it a clean drop in. I am still not 100% on the skill set in 4e but i think just expanding will work. But yea no point preferred skills really. its just more mandated fluff/flavour. Maybe keep they one core skill concept tho? like Arcana for Arcane Class, Religion for Divine Class tho... just cuz.

Thanks for the replies/feedback. I hope some of us here at the CBG enjoy it. I think i will :)

Someone over at the WotC boards suggested something quite interesting. Just throw classes away altogether, and give the character's just:
* 5 trained skills from the whole list
* access to powers on a simple "prerequisite" rule (*)

That would only yield a single "class" who could be customized to the ultimate degree.

(*) the rule was something like this: You get to select 3 level 1 at will powers (to compensate for certain lost class abilities certain classes would automatically grant), as well as 1 encounter and 1 daily, all from any list . You could only learn powers of the next level from any "class tree" you currently knew. Eg, if you want a level 3 encounter power from a certain list, you would need at least one level 1 encounter power from the same list.

I don't know if it would work, and it would probably be horribly broken if given someone good at numbercrunching and CO. But if the ability to optimize is equally distributed amongst all players, it could work out... sort of. :P

Something like that has occurred to me, and it seems like 4e would make this easier. There are two downsides:

First, as you mentioned, you really have to playtest the bejeezus out of something like this, with a bunch of really dedicated optimizers. They'll find the broken power combinations, then you have to fix them.

Second, it kind of breaks the whole "role" concept. If people pick and choose powers and skills across the whole spectrum, you'll get confused and overlapping "roles". Some people worry about that, I don't. But it could sure change the flavor of the game.

Well, I expect I might actually buy this edition, just for fun if nothing else. Maybe I'll wait to see what is broken before 4.5ed comes out. :)

There's a new 800-pound gorilla on the block; I figure I might at least know where it is. But only time will tell if it is as successful as its predecessors.

The problem with overlapping is easily (and sort of built in already) fixed: ability dependency of many powers. And with a "build up" rule you'd have to be dedicated to a certain focus and cannot just cherry pick your powers from all over the place.

i dont want to throw out the classes abilities all together, not all of them could just be taken as a powers, no point on loosing good crunch. So how about no extra power, just follow the table on p.29 of the PHB. and in addition to the power list also have a class ability list (channel divinity, ritual magic, inspiring word) with an open choice of two or three.

I like the open/one class idea... just combining ALL the power lists into one... i think its just a fact something isn't going to combine right... and preventing indivual combos (after playtesting to find them all) just dosent seem right... dunno definatly worth looking more into it

Rememeber the mutli-class feats are still totaly usable with the 4 generic classes, which should open things up even more (remember mutli-classing with Martial, not just Fighter powers) combined with no class skills is about as open i think the system can get, right now anyway...

you stil want some party members to have more HP than others, or armour or weapon proficiencies. Remember Arcane powers are on average more powerful than a fighters, as fighters have more HP and weapon capability. 4e is so close to being able to be classless... but it just might not be able to go all the way.

in summary one class sounds good, but you still want character differance at the table.. so it just might not be right in practice...

Quote from: Ra-TielThe problem with overlapping is easily (and sort of built in already) fixed: ability dependency of many powers. And with a "build up" rule you'd have to be dedicated to a certain focus and cannot just cherry pick your powers from all over the place.

A good prerequisite system certainly helps to reduce the number of potentially broken combinations. I'd have to buy 4e and read it to see how well that would work there. 4e prerequisites and dependencies would have been written and play-tested with class limitations in mind, so there could still be problems. From what I've read there are a lot of dependencies - one review suggested, in the context of multi-classing, that there were only very few powers that would really work cross-class for just this reason. That would suggest the problems might be minimal.

For the same reason, role overlap might be minimized too. If you pick some powers from a Striker class and others from a Defender class, you might have some trouble getting them to mesh well if the dependencies are too severe. Again, I can only speculate because right now all my Amazon bucks are going toward Thomas the Tank Engine. Maybe there's a role-playing game for 4-year-olds in there somewhere. :P

yea i have to agree with snake and ra-tiel, the powers look rather bulletproof (by DnD standards anyways) and a simple prerequesit RULE (ex. Must have a power one level lower of the same source to gain higher level power) as opposed to trying to make prerequesate stats for each power.

now my main issue into making an "omni class" is HP, Hp per level, armour proficiences, weapon proficiences, number of skills known, and bonus to defence. it would be easy to just plop some numbers down and see how it works, but fundimentaly it just seems wrong to me that every PC would have almost the same HP, AC, and weapons. The only thing making the PCs different would be the powers and special(class) abilities, and race... so how do we make one class with these still being different?

As soon as we figure this out, i will post the omni-class along with the generic ones. Thou if we get the omni-class to work, the generic ones may not be needed..

Quote from: Lathyea i have to agree with snake and ra-tiel, the powers look rather bulletproof (by DnD standards anyways) and a simple prerequesit RULE (ex. Must have a power one level lower of the same source to gain higher level power) as opposed to trying to make prerequesate stats for each power.

now my main issue into making an "omni class" is HP, Hp per level, armour proficiences, weapon proficiences, number of skills known, and bonus to defence. it would be easy to just plop some numbers down and see how it works, but fundimentaly it just seems wrong to me that every PC would have almost the same HP, AC, and weapons. The only thing making the PCs different would be the powers and special(class) abilities, and race... so how do we make one class with these still being different?

As soon as we figure this out, i will post the omni-class along with the generic ones. Thou if we get the omni-class to work, the generic ones may not be needed..

Just give the players some points with which to buy those abilitis.

For example:

Armor Proficiencies
- 1 pt: Cloth, leather
- 2 pts: Cloth leather, hide, chainmail
- 4 pts: cloth, leather, hide, chainmail, scale , plate; light shield, heavy shield

Weapon proficiencies
- 1 pt: any two single simple weapons
- 2 pts: Simple melee, simple ranged
- 4 pts: Simple melee, simple ranged, martial melee, martial ranged

Bonus to defense
- 1 pt: +1 to one defense
- 2 pts: +2 to one defense
- 4 pts: +2 to two defenses or +1 to all defenses

Health
- 1 pt: 10 + Con score HPs; +4 HPs per level; 6 + Con mod healing surges
- 2 pts: 12 + Con score HPs; +5 HPs per level; 7 + Con mod healing surges
- 4 pts: 15 + Con score HPs; +6 HPs per level; 9 + Con mod healing surges

Trained skills
- 1 pt: 6 class skills, 4 trained
- 2 pts: 8 class skills, 4 trained
- 4 pts: 10 class skills, 6 trained

Give each player 10 points and require him to spend at least 1 point in each category.

Quote from: Ra-TielJust give the players some points with which to buy those abilitis.

For example:

Armor Proficiencies
- 1 pt: Cloth, leather
- 2 pts: Cloth leather, hide, chainmail
- 4 pts: cloth, leather, hide, chainmail, scale , plate; light shield, heavy shield

Weapon proficiencies
- 1 pt: any two single simple weapons
- 2 pts: Simple melee, simple ranged
- 4 pts: Simple melee, simple ranged, martial melee, martial ranged

Bonus to defense
- 1 pt: +1 to one defense
- 2 pts: +2 to one defense
- 4 pts: +2 to two defenses or +1 to all defenses

Health
- 1 pt: 10 + Con score HPs; +4 HPs per level; 6 + Con mod healing surges
- 2 pts: 12 + Con score HPs; +5 HPs per level; 7 + Con mod healing surges
- 4 pts: 15 + Con score HPs; +6 HPs per level; 9 + Con mod healing surges

Trained skills
- 1 pt: 6 class skills, 4 trained
- 2 pts: 8 class skills, 4 trained
- 4 pts: 10 class skills, 6 trained

Give each player 10 points and require him to spend at least 1 point in each category.

I likey :), point buy systems arent normally DnD in the past but with the point buy options for stats... it dosent seem so out of place anymore... i was also thinking a priority system like Shadowrun. This is simpler and cleaner. I will put this together today and post it up.

http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=1044867 <-- Perhaps this helps as a starting point, Lath. :)

@ Ra-Tiel
I already got the classes done updated the thread starter with a thank you to you and snakefing. But i did look at the thread and i see what he did, but it seems like everyone gets half the leader class stats, and then picks half a class... dunno just didnt seem that classless to me, but he did beat my WotC post by a day >:P so thanks for the link, maybe i am bias but i like ours better :)
(my WotC post is in character class hybrids) Thanks again on your help, and maybe we can do some more Fixen to 4e
for me craft skills + a skill challange to make stuff is now at the top of my 4e to do list

No problem Lath. And thanks for the credits. :D

However, there's a small typo in your post, regarding the point costs. First you say "All PCs start with 12 points" but later you still have "Give each player 10 points" in there. ;)

Also, regarding crafting, I'd suggest the following for skill challenges:

Primary skills:
- Endurance: To keep going on crafting and get the important parts done in time.
- Perception: To notice impurities and flaws before they come permanent and ruin the piece.
- Nature: To remember that certain woods make a hotter forge fire, certain skins make a better leather, or something similar.

Secondary skills:
- Arcana: To remember that adding a certain ingredient makes the steel harder, the leather more damageresistant, the bow string more durable, and so on.
- History: To remember the threading/smithing/whatever techniques of the ancient dwarven or tiefling empires.

That should cover almost everything.

As an alternative, if you want a more "traditional" approach you could give out a number of "trained fluff skills", similar to the Shadowrun rpg. Allow each PC a number of fluff skills (craft, profession, perform, ...), e.g. 5 + Int mod, in which he is considered trained. For DCs go with pg42 in the DMG.