BRP Conversions

[PK Games]

Originally Posted by DirkD

There is nothing objective about a formula where the weight of the variables is chosen subjectively. It gives you to feel of something solid, but it is not.

Of course it is harder to define the "punch" of a character in brp and the percentages may vary, but that is more an argument against a formula. The fighter was just an example - to make a good conversion, you have to look what defines a character and what makes him "tick". Then you look at your brp campaign (which will usually have a different power-level) and put the character in relation to similar characters in that environment. D&D and BRP are just to different to take the formula-approach, at least for me.

Yeah but lets say I have a random encounter happen in BRP and I am running a futuristic society game set in New York in the year 2435. So I grab a D20 future book (or maybe Judge Dredd) and look at the stats for a Street Cop of the future and I just want a quick thumb rule for how good he is at say Intimidation and Sense Motive type abilities. I see he has +7 in both skills, I multiply by 7 (to take into consideration of stat bonuses and fear bonuses) and see he has roughly a 50% (49%) ability with them. This allows me to quickly just assign stats that are probably more balanced then me just saying "He's a cop in the future, he has it at 35%" or "Stallone in Judge Dredd probably had a 80%."

I agree whole heartedly that if you are going to convert a character up front and have time to do it, just build the guy as normal and use the write up from D20 (or D6 or any other system) as a guideline. Some stats and facts you can use 100% (hmm says here he is X feet tall and Y pounds in weight, seems to me he is Z SIZ, and with his 15 CON in D20, might as well give him a 15 CON in BRP giving h im (Z+15)/2 hit points) and so forth.

Now some things are more tricky as said above, spells dont convert 100%. Are they skills? If so, dont they have skill % for success? Actually Id just make the margin you fail by the bonus the victim gets to resist the spell.

[frogspawner]

Originally Posted by DirkD

There is nothing objective about a formula where the weight of the variables is chosen subjectively. ... D&D and BRP are just too different to take the formula-approach, at least for me.

A good (though formulaic) D20>BRP Conversion system might help D&D3.5-ers (who don't like 4e) seize the opportunity to upgrade to BRP (a more mature, stable system) - even if they don't know BRP well enough to make the subjective decisions that you could.

By all means add advice about adjustments for campaign power-levels and keeping character - but I think we should have the Conversion ready for them, just in case. And where better to start than the number one BRP site?

[frogspawner]

Originally Posted by sladethesniper

D20 to BRP by me...

Originally Posted by sladethesniper

Rules
The following rules are easily able to be shifted into BRP without any difficulty; Initiative, Actions per round, Injury and death, Movement and Position, Combat modifiers and Attacks of Opportunity.

Sorry, but that's not converting D20 characters to the BRP system - it's the other way around! (Basically, though, I agree with you. Apart from combat modifiers, I use those D20 rules in my own BRP-like system. But we are supposed to be doing D20>BRP here...)

Originally Posted by sladethesniper

Magic damage remains unchanged (although due to the low hp of BRP, you may want to reduce magic damage by ½ or by ¼ depending on the GM’s discretion)

Yes, I do - but by the back door. Having a 'half-effect if spell-casting roll fails' normally halves damage (given low casting skill), and then defining spell-effects in terms of level of power expended (instead of character level) typically halves it again.

Originally Posted by PK Games

Now some things are more tricky as said above, spells dont convert 100%. Are they skills? If so, dont they have skill % for success? Actually Id just make the margin you fail by the bonus the victim gets to resist the spell.

Good point - should "Saving Throws" be handled this way?

[DirkD]

I understand that you want an easy system as a guideline and it could work pretty well for archetypes and low-level characters. Most of the data in a d20-stat-block can be converted straight forward, the only problems I see are skills, feats (abilities), spells and the attack boni.

For skills I personally would prefer two tables. Table 1 contains the d20-skills and the corresponding brp-skills. Table 2 contains the total d20 skill bonus (including feats and boni) from 0-30 and the percantage in brp. That way you can look at your d20 stat block and have a result by looking in the tables without the need to calculate anything. Additionally you can ignore all feats that give you a bonus to skills.

For weapons you can use a similar table, so that you can ignore feats that give attack boni.

For the remaining feats it is a little more complicated - instead of endless descriptions of feat-conversions you can either make some examples for common feats like power attack or a general guideline that each feat should give the equivalent of a 5% skill bonus (or whatever seems appropriate).

The spell-systems are different in a lot of d20 systems (you could use the skill conversion for star wars d20 for example). I think it would be best to just provide a table with the d20-level and corresponding brp-data like the number of spells, the total percentage to distribute on the spells and the max-percentage per spell.

[Wolverine]

The Allegiance system is a nice replacement for alignment.

Rules for "Alignment" are really outdated. Who needs guidelines to role-play their character? Not everyone falls neatly into a category, so why should are characters?

So how does Allegiance differ from Alignment?

[Skunkape]

Originally Posted by Wolverine

Rules for "Alignment" are really outdated. Who needs guidelines to role-play their character? Not everyone falls neatly into a category, so why should are characters?

So how does Allegiance differ from Alignment?

I agree with "Alignment" being outdated. Personally the only reason I'm using alignment at all is because it's part of DnD 3.5 and that's the current system I'm using. As soon as my current campaign ends and I switch back to BRP, alignment goes away. I'd also like to hear more about the Allegiance system that's been spoken of.

[NickMiddleton]

Originally Posted by Wolverine

Rules for "Alignment" are really outdated. Who needs guidelines to role-play their character? Not everyone falls neatly into a category, so why should are characters?

So how does Allegiance differ from Alignment?

Err, you HAVE played Stormbringer 5 / Elric! at some point, surely?

Alignment (in D&D) is a rather clumsy straight-jacket which really doesn't fit the way the game is usually played, but which is inter-twined with some fundemental aspects of the rules system (significant portions of the magic and class ability systems depend on the use of alignments in 3.0 / 3.5) and is awkward to remove without fairly major surgery to the game and its core assumptions.

Allegiance is a system that lets GM's codify the divine / metaphysical conflict(s) in a setting without straight-jacketing players and allows players who want pursue a specific philisophy / code for their characters to do so and, if they choose, reap some reward for it.

One could even import some Pendragon ideas - "inspiring" on ones Allegiance for example...

Cheers,

Nick Middleton

[frogspawner]

Originally Posted by NickMiddleton

Err, you HAVE played Stormbringer 5 / Elric! at some point, surely?

Nope. Is Allegiance in BRP0?

[Skunkape]

Originally Posted by NickMiddleton

Allegiance is a system that lets GM's codify the divine / metaphysical conflict(s) in a setting without straight-jacketing players and allows players who want pursue a specific philisophy / code for their characters to do so and, if they choose, reap some reward for it.

Cheers,

Nick Middleton

Sounds very intriguing to me and a better way to handle those who receive help from divine beings!

[Shaira]

Some people love the Allegiance System, some seem to hate it... You have to keep an eye on it, 'cos it can get out of hand quite easily. Basically, you can create an Allegiance to a particular god, principle, moral code, etc, and if you do something significant which embodies that Allegiance you get an increase. So, you could have Allegiance (God of Death) 12, for example. You can then compare that to any other Allegiances you or someone else might have to see how relatively strong it is.

It starts getting interesting when you start allowing special effects from Allegiance. As Nick said, you could even allow "inspiring" from Allegiance; even with the BRP rules, you could conceivably use it to augment another skill roll at an appropriate juncture. Also, the Allegiance rules suggest things like getting extra temporary PP or skill points, etc, from your Allegiance, and even becoming a "champion" of a cause or deity. It can be very flexible.

I'm toying with Allegiance Powers in my game, wondering frex whether to require a certain degree of Allegiance to a deity before you can use certain divine powers. Kind of like the Rune Priest type distinction. The problem is that quite easily you can make Allegiance a *very* powerful stat, and I'm not sure about the unbalancing effect of that. I get the feeling you'd have to keep a tight lid on Allegiance score increases.

If you also use the Status Skill from BRP (which seems to track your relative standing in your peer group(s)) together with Allegiance, you have the makings of quite a sophisticated "relationship" system. As it's presented in the BRP core book, it's very generic, and you'd have to "roll your own" to quite a large extent to determine actual game effects, but it certainly bears thinking about more. I'm definitely going to be testing both out in-game.

Cheers,

Sarah