fosborb Dec 15, 2006













PRE ORDER HERE AND GET A COPY OF THE FINAL RULES NOW! Release is estimated June 2013. (Read about the delay here)



moths posted: It's essentially an unfucked 3e that borrows the class balance, good math, and fun combat from 4e, while simultaneously incorporating cool story elements from the smaller indie games nobody ever runs.



13TH AGE is a D20 Dungeons & Dragons game. This means D&D dwarfs, dark elves, and dragons in medieval magical fantasy with heroes and quests and dungeons. It also means classes, spells, initiative, attributes, and skills. It's killing goblins and kobolds and ogres and rats of unusual sizes.



But this isn't 5th edition. 13th Age isn't published by Wizards, or even by Paizo. 13th Age is not a retroclone or 4e's Pathfinder or Pathfinder 2.0 or anything like that.





Custom dice not needed to play this game because this also isn't Fantasy Flight



The game has been described as Tweet and Heinsoo's house rules. These people are kind of a big deal. Jonathan Tweet was designing during 3e and 4e's release and has a hilariously awful webpage. He also designed Ars Magica and Over the Edge.

Doc Hawkins posted: Tweet also made Everway, the OG Narrativist Karma-Resolution system. He's kinda a big deal.

Rob Heinsoo was lead on 4e and one of the driving forces to pull D&D kicking and screaming from its nostalgic but outdated mechanics. He apparently fought hard to tone down caster supremacy, so he's pretty much a hero. He's a cool, funny guy too. Here's a cool, funny video Mikan posted. Rob is talking about the design philosophy behind 4th Edition. (Try to) ignore the very bald, awkward host.



Tweet is known for an easy, informal style in his rules (that apparently doesn't grate on people like Luke Crane can) and Heinsoo has designed basically the most coherent, transparent D&D edition ever. Both have designed games explicitly not D&D, and both have clearly played other designers' games. All this has people really quite excited because





early concept art



13th Age built up a bunch of internet goodwill by 1) being a pretty good game, 2) doing a playtest that listened to the results, on its 6th revision as of Jan 2013, and 3) actively participating in online communities. waderocket will be happy to tell you how much 13th Age publicity has changed his life personally and profoundly.



poo poo you want to know about 13th Age





the cover



Icons The current forces of the world. The Archmage, the Priestess, the Elf Queen, the etc. Each Icon has a seat of power, goals, ambitions, armies. All player characters start with relationships with one or more Icons. As you gain experience, your relationships with the Icons also change. The world of 13th Age is in much flux, and leveraging your relationships will help you guide the world's direction.



Icons' power and influence and beingness in the world depends on the kind of game the players and GM want to run. Are the Icons the figureheads of huge bureaucracies like Eberron, set piece NPCs like Forgotten Realms, something in between or wholly different? 13th Age steps aside and doesn't force the issue. Also advice on alternate versions or creating entirely new Icons.



Escalation Die This is a single six sided die that exists on the table. As you play through rounds of combat, you increase the facing die by one. The escalation die generally increases your chance to hit, enables some actions, and is also impacted by some actions. This dramatically speeds up combat, and is fun to link into other mechanics for giant set piece encounters or to push players from room to room without catching their breath.



One Unique Thing Each player character has One Unique Thing. It is some aspect or bit of history about the character that is truly unique in the world. It generally doesn't confer a mathematical bonus, though there are guidelines to balance it if it does. One Unique Things may be Always Knows the Value of Things, or Jumps Higher Than Anyone, or Believes Self to Be Reincarnated Dragon, etc. One Unique Things will significantly contribute to the feel of the game you're wanting to play.



Backgrounds Gone are the endless lists of skill focus: -loving, or trying to figure out the difference between athletics and swimming. 13th Age eschews boring skills and instead allows players to pick their own backgrounds and dump points into them. These really flesh out the character. Now to bend bars, you use your professional circus freak in a past life background and add a strength modifier.



gently caress interesting, what races and classes are there? Barbarian, Bard, Cleric, Fighter, Paladin, Ranger, Rogue, Sorcerer, Wizard. You'll have to pick up the game to see the races because I fundamentally disagree that blood and heritage should determine ability. Each class has unique mechanics that give each a very different feel. Fighters select maneuvers based on how they rolled their to-hits. Rogues build momentum as they kill. Barbarians kick into rages. More when you buy now!



Other Interesting Bits



Feats As you play and gain experience, you select various feats that add abilities to your character. There are a handful of general feats available to all characters, and a handful of racial feats. The meat of the feat system is in the class sections, where feats beef up your low level abilities. The Barbarian's rage becomes more frequent, lightening bolts add effects, sneak attack applies to more conditions, etc.



Magical Weapons Truly magical weapons come with a bit of personality. A particularly brutal weapon may make the wielder more partial to red meat. Most of the time, this doesn't affect you. Just a nagging tug in the back of the mind. Equip too many magical items, and these impulses become impossible to resist. Endless fun!



Stat blocks! In true houserule form, all the unnecessary bullshit of traditional stat blocks never make it over. Monster stat blocks are a quick rundown of defenses and HP and an action or two. No list of ability scores that don't matter, no long spell lists for casting characters. Very easy to run, very easy to roll your own (guidelines are provided for building your own monsters, too).



Why is this OP updated? A Mysterious PM posted: Hey! I'm talking with a 4e fan who took your first (and by now ancient) post on the 13th Age thread as gospel, and is publicly accusing me of a bait-and-switch because the game turned out not to match this part of the description:



"13th Age starts from 4e (sorry grogs!) and builds from there. 4e, briefly, has problems with ability scores, skill challenges, magic item treadmills, feat taxes and bloat, and lengthy combats. 13th Age attempts to address these issues!"



By now, people who've explored the game can see how it's more of a game in its own right than a new take on 4e. I hate to ask anyone to tinker with a post they've made, but would you be wiling to take that paragraph out?



The 4e fan is saying that because I linked to the thread from the game's Resources page, what you said is therefore an official description of the game.

This is hilarious, so lets all take a moment and laugh at lessthanpleased who takes year old posts about elfgame rumors super seriously instead of directing his considerable anger at understanding how internet forums work.





Tweet being inscrutable



Minions Minions are called mooks and work a bit different than 4e minions. Each minion has a HP value, but HP is combined into a single pool that is tracked. Damage is dealt to the group as a whole, and one minion is removed each time a multiple of the individual HP is reached. This means an attack may remove 2 or 3 minions. Or enough damage to kill 1 and a half minions, so 1 is removed and the next will be that much easier to kill. FYI, this is exactly how the new Star Wars RPG handles their minions. It's super intuitive to run and awesome when you have to figure out how your ranger's arrow killed 4 dirty little kobolds.



Theatre of the MIND Distances in 13th Age are measured more abstractly than the strict 5'x5' grid of 3e and 4e. Distances are measured relative to each character in combat. A PC and monster may be engaged: bases touching and in the midst of melee. Or a PC may be near a monster: not engaged, but could be with one move. Or far away: two or more moves to reach the monster. Everything is still done on a map, though strictly speaking the map is more optional than 3e or 4e's reliance on a map. Anyway, these measurements greatly speed up combat, and also the hardcore push/pull tactics of 4e will not be there. It is a sacrifice, but 20 minute combats are worth it.



13 True Ways is a kickstarted expansion to 13th Age. Lots of new art and monsters and detailed descriptions of locations and other things.



I Am Enjoying This Playtest It turns out this thread was the only place to get information on the game around 9 months ago because the first copy of the playtest document had a swiss cheese NDA and so we talked all about the mechanics in detail and a link to this thread hit higher on google than Pelgrane's page. So we all got a new NDA that said we could only say we were enjoying/not enjoying the playtest. Help us celebrate this hilarious gently caress up by repeating an awesome meme like at least once per page.





Why You Should



Why You Should Buy 5 Copies of This Book:

If you love or are stuck with playing D&D, 13th Age will make your life soooooo much better. Even if you can't get your group to convert fully, there are a ton of ideas and subsystems here that will instantly make life easier. Replace your skills with backgrounds. Add a One Unique Thing to each character. Get ambitious and try the abstracted distances! Along these lines, it is also stupid easy to convert old D&D content into 13th Age. I've run basic, 3e and 4e games within 13th Age and nothing felt forced.



Why You Shouldn't Buy This Game, 3.0 - 3.75 edition

The game explicitly says you cannot be a poo poo farmer unless you are the best poo poo farmer in the world. There are minions. Your precious skill lists are gone. Martial characters get a bunch of maneuvers and other abilities that if you squint real hard look like your spellcaster's spells. It does not use your million splat books. Does not reward system mastery.



Why You Shouldn't Buy This Game, 4th edition

Your tactical combat is simplified -- no more grid. 9 point alignment is back and you have to ignore it all over again. There are simple, beginner classes that do not have many options and they happen to be the martial characters. Your 30 levels have been reduced to 10. Doesn't yet have the online tools that made 4e so easy to play and run. You will not get caught up on your taxes while waiting for your turn to come around.



Why You Shouldn't Buy This Game, Indie edition

Does not kill ability scores. Classic monsters are there, but without really unique or ironic takes. More complex characters also get more background points RAW. It is still possible to be an rear end in a top hat GM and follow the rules. Does not explicitly reward engagement with the game, intra party conflict, or character development. Is still D20 D&D.





Resources!

13th Age official site

Rob Heinsoo plays elfgames with a goon

PAX demo adventure by Heinsoo

Pelgrane Press's resource page

One Page Dungeon Contest a great resource for the lazy GM.



13th Age Wiki (from Kenderama)



The Reliquary, a kickstarted Bestiary by ASH LAW. Met 1300% of goal so now is much more than a quick bestiary.

Nightfall, a totally not Ravenloft expansion by goon-owned Fun Tyrant (thanks Kenderama)



Thoughtcrimegames is a site that has a lot of 13th Age material by lurker Quinn Murphy and goon Ryven Cedrylle, including monsters, excellent skill challenge rules, and an upcoming setting.

4e Assassin in 13th Age brought to you by Ryven and -Fish-. (thanks -Fish-)



13th Age Homebrews A blog. New but going strong at least in December 2012.

Persuasions of the 13th Kind How to convert 4e to 13th Age. The design is unreadable, but the game design's pretty good. (thanks lessthanpleased)



PM me if you'd like to see other SA resources here. fosborb fucked around with this message at 01:54 on Mar 14, 2013