Making the Most of the OSE Advanced Fighter, part 2

So, the OSE fighter class is still not doing it for you, even after the optimizations in article one of this series? Well, let's keep looking for some more official inspirations and options published in the official 'zine publications, in this case, Carcass Crawler Issue One.

In this issue, we get the gargantuan player race (CC1, p21), and when used as a stand-alone character option, can level to 10th level as a fighter. This race can also wield two-handed weapons with one hand, using the OSE "attacking with two weapons" rule (OSEAFP, p236), for a -2 on the primary weapon and a -4 on the secondary, and two attacks a turn total.

Combine that with the high strength to-hit modifiers of the gargantuan, the high damage of two-handed weapons, weapon proficiencies (OSEAFP, p23), and you will have a beast of a half-giant character who is a literal wrecking machine in combat, even at level one. This is one of the most potent melee builds in the game, and you do not need to mod the game to have it with official rules sources.

There are other races here that make for some excellent fighter options, such as the goblin getting a +2 AC versus large creatures (CC1, p22), making them an excellent choice as a defensive "nut" versus dragons and other large beasties, especially in plate mail with a shield. The goblin can get to 8th level as a fighter, which is good given the scope of most campaigns.

The infravision and detection options of goblins are also convenient, along with a high CON-based resistance save modifier. With a CON of 15-17, they get a +4 to all saving throws versus poison, spells, and magic wands, rods, and staves (CC1, p22)! That is a crazy good saving throw modifier, one of the best in the game. Do not sleep on a goblin fighter; they can be lethal and highly survivable.

We have rules for black-power weapons in this issue, too, perfect for high-seas swashbuckler and pirate-themed games, along with early colonial horror gaming settings, like Lamentations of the Flame Princess. OSE has you covered if you want to use this system with Renaissance and Colonial-Era gaming.

We have something for any type of fighter, too, even our brute or any other fighter in the game! We get Combat Talents (CC1, p28), which give our fighters new abilities at level 1, 5, and 10! We can select cleave, which provides us with a Swords & Wizardry-style ability to strike a second opponent when one is defeated. There are leadership, defensive, two-weapon, and other options here that beef up our fighter and make them feel like other old-school games in the OSR genre.

We have some great thief options here, too, but I may make a series devoted to thieves and making the most of those. We're focusing on fighters in this series.

The fighter in OSE was one of the weakest points in the game, with the base class feeling so basic and lacking options and abilities. I was so wrong about this! Even in the core rulebook, there are optimization options that can make you stand out as the party's front-line warrior. With this 'zine, the options get even better, and what was once a simple class has new races to add to the mix, along with selectable talents to give our fighters that extra flair they need to stand out in a crowd ...or a party of adventurers.

Highly recommended, and this makes an optimized build from the core rulebooks even better, and it gives players some of that customizability we have in other games like 5E, back to the player. It lets them specialize and tweak their builds to their playstyle.

Dungeon Crawl Classics: Feat Systems

Just because you could do it doesn't mean you should.

In my optional rules booklet, I was thinking about an optional DCC feat system, something like 3.5E-style feats that can be chosen and added to the characters like my simplified skill system. The skill system is nice. It gives characters additional areas of training based on their choices and gives them a way to specialize and customize their characters.

The skill system I developed doesn't take anything away; it adds to the characters. Having a few more training areas across skills and allowing specializations doesn't limit anyone.

The 3.5E-style feat system, as it is done in games with them? It takes away more than it gives. Like power attack, cleave, and other feats that give fighters special attack options? DCC has the mighty deeds of arms system and the "deed die" - which covers all those feats and more.

In DCC, you do not need "fighter feats" at all since the deed die covers it.

Similarly, spell-burn, thief luck, and many other DCC systems have you covered in terms of special abilities. You don't need a lot of feats giving you "extra stuff to do" since you are assumed to "get a lot of stuff to do." This is also how skills work in the base game, trained or untrained, roll against a DC with a modifier.

The 3.5E-style feat system, as it is traditionally implemented, is a "takeaway" system. A character can't do anything but "basic actions," players need to sort through a few thousand feats to find all the unique things that characters can do. This is a horribly regressive system, forcing every player to know hundreds of feats, what they do, and if a special attack or action type is already covered under a feat - and thus, disallowed as a character action during a turn.

Feat systems justify "taking away cool stuff" to add it to the feat system.

Let's add "jump attack" as a feat! That sounds cool! Suddenly, players trying "jump attacks" can't do that because that would disadvantage players who took that feat for their characters. And as a mighty deed of arms, you can't do jump attacks. That's a feat! And if you buy a book with 100 new feats, that is 100 more things you can't do.

Other feats in 3.5E are boring "straight bonuses" like "+2 to poison saves" that are better added to characters as a part of the story. DCC does a lot of "quick add" to character sheets based on what happens during the adventure, especially magical corruption and mutations. If a character saves a unicorn, and one of the "random boons" the unicorn bestows is a "+2 on poison saves," - you just add that straight on the character sheet; no feat is required. The character has that forever.

Just write it down. No special rules are required.

This is DCC; characters rarely live long enough for a permanent unique bonus to unbalance the game that much. Even if a level 1 DCC character finds a laser rifle that does 6d6, an attack isn't terribly unbalancing in the scheme of things, especially if it blows up on a fumble.

Another class of feats is "class requirements," which you want to avoid. Like the cleave, combat casting, improved initiative, or power attack feats in 3.5E, some of these were "must haves" for many character builds. These aren't even choices, so they need to be tossed out. It is like having an "improved spell-burn" feat in DCC that doubles the value contributed to those dice rolls. This is so good it is a must-have for all casters. Is it cool, and does it make sense? Yes. But it breaks the game so hard and gives such an advantage that the feat becomes a requirement for all casters.

Other feats let you break specific game rules or grant you exemptions. These are a bit more interesting, but they also have a high possibility of breaking the game and becoming "must-haves."

Just because another game "does something" does not mean "you should do it, too." A lot of the rules introduced by Wizards of the Coast, even back in 3.5E, were anti-player and anti-referee rules that put more control of the game in the hands of the company. They seemed great then, but they eventually shifted most of the freedom of building characters into purchased books and took away so much of what made the old-school games fun in favor of book sales.

If I developed a feat system, it would have a hard requirement of "adding to characters" without "taking things away from others." DCC has a default assumption that "characters are awesome" and that they can make up a lot of stuff to do on the fly. You must avoid adding a feat system that chips away at player freedom. I would likely not even call it feats since that system has a "game-breaking" expectation that removes player options.

I remember how the Low Fantasy Gaming game had a feat system; players could invent a unique ability at every few levels. They gave you a few samples, but the game also lets players come up with anything, given referee approval. This requires an experienced group and referee to do well and have excellent knowledge of the rules. This is more in the spirit of DCC, but honestly, the game does a lot without a feat system like this, and you may be creating feats to limit yourself (or others).

Maintaining the "freedom of action" that players have is paramount.

Also, keeping that spirit of "just write it down" is essential.

You can't add a system that relies on limiting options by default for everyone else.

Given DCC's two design features, adding a feat system is a very difficult task and possibly not worth pursuing since the design goals of a 3.5E-style feat system run counter to the spirit of DCC.

Dungeon Crawl Classics: Skill System

Appendix R of the Dungeon Crawl Classics rules tells judges to "expand the game to suit their own style." I don't mind if I do.

I can borrow parts from other games, such as the equipment lists, encumbrance rules, monsters, treasure tables, and magic items. I don't need to recreate the wheel; I shall if the game says to borrow it. Both Swords & Wizardry and OSRIC are excellent primary sources, and you can go right either way.

I alternate between OSRIC and S&W as my primary game, and I love both. There is no reason to limit yourself to just one, honestly. S&W is more 1974 and closer to the inspiration. OSRIC is the ultra-detailed 1980s first-edition game I grew up with.

But I am thinking of a skill system for DCC that is different from the horrid, exploitable, and complicated system that 3.5E and Pathfinder 1e turned the skill system into. In those games, you have a high INT and join a skill-generous class; you need to catch up; who cares about skills in this all-or-nothing system?

I don't want skill points, but I want players to be able to specialize or pick new background skills as they level. I like the system to work as it does, with occupation and class being the prime drivers for what your character is considered "trained" in, along with the unskilled penalty. Things should work precisely as they do but give you options to expand, specialize, or narrow the focus of your character's knowledge.

And it has to be simple.

It also has to leverage DCC mechanics and the dice chain.

But it should not blow the existing balance and challenge out of the water.

It should not replace the existing skill system.

It is so easy to go overboard with add-on rules that I could bolt on a complicated skill system that puts Rolemaster FRP to shame, but that is not DCC to me. "Great designer intentions" often make for horrible games, and I can't even count the games ruined by skill systems over the years. There is this "designer justification" for putting players through endless math, writing skills down, or pure hell in record keeping that just shows a lack of care and through on the designer's part, and a bull-headed ramming through playtesting of skill systems that should have been tossed in the garbage.

Yes, you already have a class system; why do you need skills on top of that? You better have a good reason, and you better not be invalidating or weakening classes to add a skill system that the class should primarily define. What galls me the most is a game presenting the idea of a class and then giving you a skill list of the class that the class has or is trained in.

Why did we need that class again? To make a few skills cost less? Why isn't this a skill-based system again? A game that uses classes as "skill containers," ain't it. Wizards always steal the worst rules to put into D&D, and it shows.

I am now typing up a beta for my rules and will test it on my next playthrough. I have a document I am keeping my expansion and optional rules, and if all goes well, I may publish this as a book of optional "Advanced DCC" rules that I use in my games.