In design, the greatest tool for improving a game is iteration. There are very few games that are completely, objectively perfect, if any at all. Iteration is vital to improving upon an existing game, from the smallest parts to entirely new editions and systems; however, this concept can be equally staggering as it is interesting. It’s dangerous to go alone, take this guide and make the first steps of evolving yourself from player to designer.

When considering character, it is undoubtedly easier to create a character of your exact ideal in systems that do not adhere to strict race/class combinations. If I wanted to be a fishman made entirely out of jellybeans in FATE Core, I would simply describe that character and assign various aspects to adhere to my aquatic confection construct before diving into play.

So let us assume that I want to be a race that does not currently exist in a system. In a pinch, I could take one of the current races and juxtapose my mental image over it, but tying mechanical benefit to narrative structure inherently makes a game better. Rather than simply dealing with the hand the game has dealt, let’s modify it to suit our new options. For an easy example, let’s try to recreate the Goron race from Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time into Dungeons & Dragons.

Start by asking specific questions about your specific decisions. Why Goron? Furthermore, why is there not currently an option that suits that need, and what would you need to do to create an option that would accurately represent the design we’re looking for?

We can start by separating qualities and detractors from a typical Goron based on the power attributed within the game. For example, Gorons are strong and bulky, and would logically gain a +X bonus to Strength and Constitution. However, for each benefit, there must be a drawback; by creating a balanced character, we not only maintain balance in the game but accurately represent the character in a different system.

While we assume Gorons are slow, they can roll into a ball and travel quickly. Gorons also exhibit features of Wisdom, considering their respect for their elders and the ability to apply and distribute knowledge. Although, Gorons are arguably of less-than-average intelligence; while living in a mountain, they began to starve to death from not having enough rocks. They are also able to speak, but never portrayed as speaking eloquently or particularly persuasively, so we can again assume their Charisma would be lower than average.

After giving our Gorons the proper bonuses and detractors, we can move onto the less stringent aspect of their design, the racial benefits.

Gorons live in volcanoes. Therefore, we can give them a bonus against Fire damage and extreme heat conditions. However, they are shown in Majora’s Mask to be susceptible to cold environments, so we will give them an equal weakness to Frost and cold environments. Gorons are also made of rocks, and renowned craftsmen, allowing us to grant benefits to moving through mountainous terrain, natural armor, and bonuses to Craft skills.

Lastly, and most importantly, Gorons love bombs. They live next to flowers that reproduce bombs at an alarming rate. Explosions are second nature to Gorons, regardless of source. Gorons would gain a bonus to utilizing demolitions, and a specific defensive bonus against concussive blasts caused by explosions. 

While our fervent love for Gorons is overflowing, we have to make sure that the bonuses and detractors are limited in scope compared to the other races of the game. Also, as the creation of the race continues, bonuses should start to become more and more specific. The individuality that is applied to each race would be quickly diminished if multiple races had the same general bonuses. For example, Low Light Vision is ubiquitous amongst many different racial types to the point that it becomes an afterthought rather than an interesting mechanic.

So let’s make our Gorons even more specifically interesting, especially in comparison. While Gorons have a reduced Charisma, they are very much respectful in society of their elders. Therefore, we can feasibly grant our Goron a bonus to social interactions when speaking to an elder, as their inherent respect will grant favor. Their mountain, and Dodongo’s Cavern, is filled with lizards. We could give Gorons a bonus racial modifier to fighting lizard-type enemies, or having a Knowledge (Nature) specialty for lizard-kin.

The features can go on endlessly, but limiting scope will help with future balance, and definitely help with convincing your GM to allow you to use this template. Within that, adhering to specific design concepts of individuality, specific benefits, and self-policing bonuses with drawbacks will make the character more interesting in play and easier to play in a group of other players. Taking all of these factors into consideration when creating any race for any system will lead to the best results.

Is there a race or sub-race you’ve always wanted to see? Perhaps a race in a system outside of Dungeons & Dragons? Let us know, we can work together and create the right fit for the right systems.

Next week, we’ll take on an even bigger project: classes, and creating a custom class in a system. Until then, dance your troubles away with Saria’s Song!

-CP

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In design, the greatest tool for improving a game is iteration. There are very few games that are completely, objectively perfect, if any at all. Iteration is vital to improving upon an existing game, from the smallest parts to entirely new editions and systems; however, this concept can be equally staggering as it is interesting. It’s dangerous to go alone, take this guide and make the first steps of evolving yourself from player to designer.

One of my favorite games of all time is Final Fantasy Tactics. From top to bottom, it is a game that is designed to marvelously execute the designs that it implemented into a beloved franchise that had otherwise not seen those developments. Something that I still find fascinating to this day was their ability to create a wide variety of character classes, some stronger than others, but still suited for specific purposes, each holding unique abilities.

Again, there are some that simply outshine others in every way. Mathematician, despite its silly concept, has the ability to beat every enemy on the field in a single turn, whereas Knight has many abilities that are never used due to spacing restriction.  Even with that concept in mind, the ability to mix and match skills from every class into one customized set of abilities drew positives and negatives from each class, giving players reason to try each of them at least once.

This concept in design is called “endogenous value”. Endogenous value, defined as “proceeding from within” from the Greek ενδογενής, is achieved when some object or part of the game is given value by the players solely through the concepts of game design. By utilizing endogenous value, we as designers can create valuable interactions with the players through the aspects of design for our games rather than assigning theoretical value to a part of the game and hoping that players will agree.

Endogenous value is often achieved through two methods. The first method is making the achievement of something very difficult, therefore increasing the perceived and eventual value of that task and result. For anyone that has ever delved through a dungeon, barely scraping by with a few HP left simply for the promise of treasure at the end, you have completely engaged in the endogenous value of that treasure.

That is, having no idea what the actual treasure at the end would be, players will delve into a dungeon filled with known danger with the expectations that the danger will result in equivalently potent reward. It might not, which would be a terrible idea and should never happen, but there is no guarantee that it certainly will.

The second method to achieving endogenous value is through the internal economic system of a game. Final Fantasy Tactics has a system in place called “Job Points”, which allow the player to gain certain abilities and qualities in the various classes of the game, thereby unlocking them for future use. To attain job points, players must grind out levels, often monotonously through repeated fights against non-essential enemies, for an extended period of time multiplied by each job class they’re trying to engage.

On paper, this sounds as fun as watching a painting of grass growing dry. In practice, however, players will toss aside the traditional concepts of fun to engage in something that is endogenously valuable, such as the job points for Final Fantasy Tactics classes, to gain something that is even more valuable, the ability to mix class abilities in the game, to complete the most valuable aspect of progressing through the game.

Players will gladly do things that they would not normally find fun or engaging should they be engaged by the reward at the end of the work. That is the core concept of endogenous value. 

When considering creating character classes for a tabletop game, homebrewed or completely original, the endogenous value is represented by the abilities that a character will unlock further down their respective class trees. In Dungeons & Dragons, Monk is more interesting on paper than something like Fighter. The Monk gains abilities like Flurry of Blows, Quivering Palm and Diamond Body, all of which sound cool and produce tangible effects that the player is looking to achieve, giving value to the concept of spending a lot of time achieving those levels by engaging in a campaign or a game.

Fighters on the other hand get a bunch of bonus feats, which represent a blank slate for their class to be filled out as the game progresses. To some, this will be less valuable, as it is not a clear benefit for the time invested, with an additional chance of making a wrong decision at any feat choice and being confined to that choice for the future. However, it may represent something inherently more valuable to players, as they are free to make their own “builds” from the respective combat feats available as time progresses.

This difference between internal economics, experience equals levels equals actions to take, is the crux of making an interesting character class for a game. If the time spent leveling does not equate to a benefit that the player can theoretically forego the concept of fun for it has the potential to be more valuable, thereby increasing the design potency of that class. 

Have you ever tried to create a custom class for a game? What aspects did you include, and how did you balance those aspects with the time investment? 

Next week, I’ll take a look at creating the Final Fantasy Tactics Dragoon in a popular system. If you would like to see some other character class inserted into another system, let us know! We can work on the creation together.

Enjoy our content? Have something to add? Join the forums and let us know! We also have positions available for contributors and writers. Inquire within to become a StrMod contributor today! 

In design, the greatest tool for improving a game is iteration. There are very few games that are completely, objectively perfect, if any at all. Iteration is vital to improving upon an existing game, from the smallest parts to entirely new editions and systems; however, this concept can be equally staggering as it is interesting. It’s dangerous to go alone, take this guide and make the first steps of evolving yourself from player to designer.

A term often used when discussing new ideas is “scope”. Scope is the determining factor for the size of your new project, and also its attainability. Limiting scope sometimes means leaving good ideas on the cutting room floor, but allows you to focus further on making your new mechanics ready for play. To limit scope on our game modifying project, let’s start with something easy: adding an item to an existing system. 

One of my favorite weapons of all time is the gunblade from Final Fantasy VIII. There is nothing more satisfying than pulling the trigger at the right time to see the screen flash and the small burst of extra damage reveal itself on the enemy. The simple fusion of gun to sword, or a massive exaggeration of a typical bayonet, transformed the simple sword concept into something memorable and visceral, creating an iconic signature weapon for Squall.

Let’s assume that I want to take that gunblade from its digital representation and place it into an analogue system like a tabletop roleplaying game. Let’s go one step further and attempt to recreate the gunblade in Dungeons & Dragons. At the core, a gunblade is a giant revolver with a longsword attached to it.

We will start by determining the damage of the sword, based on the qualities of a longsword.

It’s an incredibly exotic weapon, crafted of heavy metals and designed to fit the user. Therefore, we add a greater weight and a higher critical chance than a typical longsword, keeping the same overall damage potential, as well as increasing the cost of such a rare weapon.

Looks good so far, let’s try adding our gun component.

As the sword is currently sitting as a longsword, we arrange our gun to be of equal damage output and sizing. After all, the revolver bullets are meant to supplement the damage of the sword and not the other way around.

We must consider that a longsword can be held in one hand, allowing for dual-wielding gunblades or the opportunity to have secondary equipment on the player’s off-hand, such as a shield. All of that does not seem to fit the flavor we are looking for, as well as outclassing the typical longsword.

While it seems initially easy to place a new item into an existing system, the concept of balance and placement come heavily into the forefront. When one option to players is objectively, without a doubt better than all other options, it is called “dominant strategy”, which is often indicative of poor design.  Obviously we want gunblades to be powerful, but we do not want them to be so powerful that they overtake all other similar options of the game.

Rather than treating the weapon as two separate weapons, we should be viewing it as one whole weapon that has an explosive quality. Using a gunblade should also require more strength and control, considering the potential recoil of the revolver. Let us instead fit the gunblade into a bastard sword template, considering that it is more akin to a hand-and-a-half sword than a longsword.

Scoping down our two weapons into one weapon, we can begin to make sense of how a gunblade would actually operate. We upgrade the cost, weight, and damage to accommodate for the new bastard sword template, while at the same time creating limiting rules to the gunblade to balance its inherent strengths.

If the gunblade holds six bullets, the player can choose whether or not to “pull the trigger”, giving damage equal to half the highest damage of the sword aspect at the cost of their diminishing resources. We can also add a rule for reloading the gun mid-combat which would require an action, diminishing another valuable resource. Also, by changing the longsword to a bastard sword, we have limited the potential for a player to wield more than one.

Now we are far closer to accurately portraying the power of a gunblade in Dungeons & Dragons while adhering to specific, targeted limitations and generating a deeply offensive play style with the weapon itself. The player can now simulate that distinct damage boost gained from pulling the trigger in the digital format by choosing when to “pull the trigger” in the tabletop version. 

We limited scope by paring down from two separate templates into one. We created balance by developing a cost to the overall benefit of the item, and we have iterated upon existing concepts without breaking the game by keeping our simple mechanic at the core of the design. Utilizing these aspects of design, we can modify and add any item or equipment to existing game systems. Let’s take this one step further and throw out a completed template for our gunblade, ready for tabletop use.

A gunblade is a customized weapon used by a distant sect of soldiers and assassins known as “SeeD”. User must take Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Gunblade) to properly use this weapon. STR 14+ required to wield gunblade. Ammunition may be changed or modified in various types (Magical, High Explosive, etc.) for additional cost equal to the crafting materials. 

*Reloading the gunblade requires a half action. All six bullets are reloaded at once unless stated otherwise. It is possible to mix different ammunition types into the gunblade at the time of reloading. 

Have any specific items in mind that you’ve always wanted to see in your tabletop of choice? Drop us a line, we can take on the design process together and get you going on your brand new super death tank.

Next week, we’ll approach more complex designs, such as creating entirely new custom classes and races for existing games. Until then, have fun with your shiny new gunblade!

-CP

Enjoy our content? Have something to add? Join the forums and let us know! We also have positions available for contributors and writers. Inquire within to become a StrMod contributor today!