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Hi everyone,

So, as some of you may know, the next edition of D&D is currently being publicly playtested, and there's been a lot of forum activity over at Wizards to try to get people's feedback on how to make the next edition of D&D better. I know some of you, like me, play D&D as well as SWSE, so you may be invested in this project too.

What does this have to do with SWSE, though? Well, if you're like me, you think that SWSE is one of the best d20 rpgs ever made, and you may think that the next edition of D&D could learn a lot from SWSE. So I've created a thread over on the boards for people to talk about the things they love about SWSE that could be ported over to the next edition of D&D to hopefully get the devs thinking about what SWSE got right. I think a SWSE-influenced D&D would be great both for the next edition of D&D and for SWSE since, if the new D&D is close enough to SWSE, we may be able to port features of this new system over to SWSE. Clearly, if you don't have a horse in this race, don't feel compelled to post, but I thought I'd mention this thread here since I thought it might be relevant to the interests of some people in this community.

The link to my post is here: http://community.wizards.com/dndnext/go ... #520288879, and I'd appreciate any comments you all throw on there!

Also, as a side-note, let me say that, as a forum n00b both here and on the Wizards forums, I am really, really impressed and thankful for the community you all have here. You're all super-supportive, wonderful individuals who don't stoop to name-calling or other terrible behavior when you disagree with someone's point of view, and I am really proud to be a member of this community.

Now, personally, I think dnd next should take a lot from SWSE -- feat ideas, the talent concept, the variety of races, the simplified equipment (and proficencies such as Pistol, Simple, Rifle, etc, instead of Simple and Martial/Military), and maybe some magic inspiration from the Force (I would especially love to see a magic system that doesn't require hundreds of overly complex spells).

However, I don't think that this is ever going to happen. Dnd next is supposed to take the entire dnd system -- past and present -- and combine it into one simple and modular game. That being said, I would think that they'll probably just pick and choose from what they have already and not some small-profit star wars game that they dropped years ago. From what I read, they mainly want to please fans by going back to the roots, which are very different both in theme and rulesets than good ol' Saga Edition.

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Duct tape is like the Force; it has two sides and binds the galaxy together.

I think you're right that it probably won't happen, but we can always dream.

And I do think that going with a talent system could help solve WotC's problem of 4e warriors battling the grognards for supremacy. If WotC goes with a talent system, they can have 4e-flavored talent trees for the 4e warriors that grant powers and older-flavored talent trees for the grognards that deal in Vancian magic or something similar. Obviously going with talents doesn't solve all of their problems, and it would still be a tricky thing to adjudicate, but I think SWSE-style talent trees could make a lot more people happy with the next edition of D&D than just revamping older editions or building solely on 4e would.

Personally, I disagree that D&D Next should take a great deal from Star Wars Saga Edition. I would prefer that it go back to the simplicity of its Gygax/Holmes/Arneson/Moldvay/Cook (that's Dave not Monte) roots. As much as I enjoy playing SWSE, I truly think it a negative as a game master having to devote the amount of time I do creating balanced encounters, studying and keeping track of PC and NPC talents, feats, ability scores, etc. I would prefer my stat blocks take up at most two to three lines of text instead a full page. It seems that thus far after play testing D&D Next with my group this past weekend, I have observed that this appears to be the direction they are taking. As Mike Mearls has recently said, "One thing I think we learned over the past 10 years is that adding lots of mechanics to the game is a bad idea over the long run. The game doesn't really need new spells, new feats, and so on."

Thanks be to God.

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Secede or Die!

Kotasen in Awaypt's EotE PbP
Guest on Star Wars Saga Edition AP podcast, Threat Detected

I think Saga could look at borrowing the advantage/disadvantage rules from D&D Next

Seems like a really good fit into the existing ruleset for adding a new situational modifier at the GM's disposal.

in case anyone hasen't read the rule its basically, if the GM says your in an advantageous position you roll 2 d20 take the better result. If GM says your at a disadvantage you roll 2 d20 and take the worse result. Always up to the GM if the situation is advantageous or disadvantageous to you.

While I've yet to download the D&Dnext rules (right now just waiting on my e-mail notification), from what I've read so far, that is the most interesting aspect of the rules so far that I've seen. It does take the whole "favorable or unfavorable circumstance" modifier to a new level, and does make tracking the "what bonuses/penalties do I need to apply to my roll?" a lot easier.

Mind you, implementing the "advantage/disadvantage" mechanic into SWSE at this point would be a rather hefty task, given how largely beneficial the ability to "roll twice, keep the best result" is for SWSE and how easy it can be to push someone down the Condition Track, which would mean being disadvantaged rather easily. Still, it's an interesting idea.

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"If you've never seen an elephant ski, then you've never been on acid."
- Eddie Izzard

Contributing Author of the GSA
Dono's Gaming & Etc Blog
Follow me on Twitter at @donovan421

The use of a "roll twice take the higher / lower" makes the advantage / disadvantage mechanic much more dramatic than, say, combat advantage. 50% of the time, the difference of the two dice will be 6 or higher (meaning the rolling character had the equivalent of +6 or -6 or more). Differences of 2 or less will come up only about 25% of the time.

Personally, I think the advantage/disadvantage mechanic can be deadly and may lead to chaos in an RPG. I will have to play test this a few more times though to add weight to this assertion, however.

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Secede or Die!

Kotasen in Awaypt's EotE PbP
Guest on Star Wars Saga Edition AP podcast, Threat Detected

Ooh! Another thing! dnd needs a Condition Track, not a 3 pg appendix in the back of the book with each and every single possible condition listed out. I don't think the CT being part of dnd would do anything but make it sleeker and simpler.

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Duct tape is like the Force; it has two sides and binds the galaxy together.

On this part, I can agree and get behind.

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Secede or Die!

Kotasen in Awaypt's EotE PbP
Guest on Star Wars Saga Edition AP podcast, Threat Detected

I completely agree. The four things that I single out in my post as being the things I'd like to see most in the next D&D from SWSE are the condition track, ease of multi-classing, magic system that works sort of like force powers in SWSE, and talents. Of the four, I think I'm most adamant about the talents and condition track. They're probably my favorite thing about SWSE.

So I read thru the playtest rules this weekend.

While I agree the Condition Track would be great, there might be an issue as it was part & parcel of SWSE, and LucasFilm pretty much owns anything that's not already under the OGL or GSL (the 4e license) that falls under the Star Wars license. That and while it works great for Star Wars, I think it would be too drastic a revamp for the much larger D&D crowd, which have proven... let's say "temperamental" to any radical changes.

As for talents, we don't have a lot to go on, but to an extent it looks like the Theme system is going to cover those sorts of things, at least that's what's suggested according to a transcript over on ENWorld of a recent chat with Mearls and another gent about D&DNext. So while they may not be called "talents," the general idea looks like it will be there.

I really don't see D&D's magic system changing anytime soon, and if anything it looks like they're going back to the pre-4e set-up for casters, barring the addition of 4e's at-will spells, most of which are pretty potent as of the moment, though Mearls admitted that they opted to start with strong at-wills and then tone down as needed.

I am curious to see how multiclassing will work, as the biggest problem with the pre-4e versions was that multiclassed spellcasters were at a disticnt disadvantage as their either casting abilities seriously lagged compared to straight casters (3e) or they had a pretty darn hefty experience penalty (pre-3e). But it also appears that the math behind D&DNext is going to have less of a growth incline compared to prior editions, so that particular hurdle of multiclassing may not be as much of an issue this time around.

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"If you've never seen an elephant ski, then you've never been on acid."
- Eddie Izzard

Contributing Author of the GSA
Dono's Gaming & Etc Blog
Follow me on Twitter at @donovan421

I think Star Wars needs to grow beyond d20. I've made so many changes to the system to make what I enjoy playing it isn't Saga anymore. I've created something interesting but massive. I'm not positively anticipating Fantasy Flight's release, no offense to the company.
I'd like to see something... well, I'll but together a committee.
Garrett

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