Herding Dice

Talents and specializations are roughly interchangeable with specializations have more unique actions and talents having bonuses. The differences in power may be attributable to their requirements but largely feels like random numbers. Additionally I will categorize them into one of the three pillars of TTRPG (combat, social, exploration) as explored by Fantasy AGE and their categories of stunts. Talents By Class Any Alchemical Explosives Animal Training Carousing Chirurgy Contacts Draak Secrets Dwarven Secrets Elven Secrets Gnome Secrets Goblin Secrets Great Endurance Halfling Secrets Human Secrets Inspire Linguistics Lore Mighty Thews Oratory Orc Secrets Performance Quick Reflexes Unarmed Style Weapon Training Envoy None Envoy or Rogue Intrigue Envoy or Warrior Command Mage Arcane Training Rogue Observation Scouting Thievery Rogue or Warrior Archery Style Dual Weapon Style Firearms Style Mixed Weapon Style Single Weapon Style Thrown Weapon Style Warrior Armor Training Mounted Combat ...

Navigating weapons in Fantasy AGE can be a bit tricky. Here are a few lists to help out. Weapon Groups and Ancestry Dwarf - Axes Elf - Bows Goblin - Light Blades Orc - Bludgeons Wildfolk - Brawling As noted in Goblin Light Blades Experiment picking an ancestry benefit that matches with a class starting weapon group choice is quite good as the double weapon group instead is a focus for that weapon group. Gets you ahead in useful advancements. Weapon Groups and Classes Envoy Black Powder Bludgeons Bows Brawling Heavy Blades Light Blades Slings Spears Mage Brawling Staves Rogue Light Blades Staves Black Powder Brawling Dueling Warrior Brawling Axes Black Powder Bludgeons Bows Dueling Heavy Blades Lances Light Blades Polearms Slings Spears Staves Weapon Talents - All Classes Unarmed Style Reqs - None Novice - removal of unarmed damage penalty 1d3 to 1d6, or bonus if you had 1d6 already (ie natural weapons from wildfolk). Also may add Strength instead of perception as damage. Expert - 1SP ...

Step One - Create a character concept While the rule book suggests creating a concept before going into the meat of class and ancestry, I would suggest you at least pick which class and ancestry is part of the concept. Knowing what your class is focused on and what benefits you might pick should influence how your starting ability scores are determined. My character concept here is an experiment in how much of a light blades beast we can create with the goblin talents and mixed weapon, dual weapon, throwing weapon, great hunter aspect warrior talents. Goblin Rogue/Warrior Step Two - Ability Scores Derived from my blog post on starting abilities , using a standard array for a total of 13 abilities. I am choosing to put 2 points into Intelligence for the level 10 "Lethality" bonus. Sure a bit far away but why not set myself up for it. P rimary 3 Accuracy 0 Communication 1 Dexterity 3 Perception Secondary 2 Constitution 1 Fighting 1 Intelligence 0 Strength 2 Willpower Notes I en...

Although related to stunt points, the stunt die is the base of that system. Stunt points could be seen as stunt die doubles, which implies there could be stunt die triple perhaps theoretically. We will stick to stunt die and how it works with advanced tests. Stunt Die Fundamentals Here is the a graph of average stunt die result as compared to different TN values. The stunt die has the counter-intuitive pattern of higher results being more likely with success which is a result of that higher number contributing more significantly to the success itself  As the TN increases the overall average goes down, but the stunt die result on a success goes up. That's the un-intuitive part. Some key data from those curves are the TN 11 values. TN 11 Overall Average - 2.15 TN 11 Success Average - 4.31 With those values we can start looking at pacing for advanced tests which take the sum of stunt die results over a number of rolls. Advanced Tests These type of tests represent longer tests over tim...

Use this chart to convert between Dungeon and Dragons ability modifiers and AGE ability scores. Since each system uses different dice and those dice affect tests we need to compare then with their change to succeed. You can see that the 50% lines up with both systems with TN11 which is why I centered the table that way. Both raw D20 and 3d6 rolls are included as that is the base comparison. Then we can calculated the modifiers for each: DnD is "=ROUNDDOWN(F5/2,0)-5" AGE is ""=G5-11" The mapping between the two systems isn't a one to one relationship because DnD has extra rows as compared to AGE. We need to look up both directions matching against the percentage to get the best results going both ways. You can see it does matter that DnD does a divide by two as there are several rolls that match better with the lower versus the higher. The only massaging needed is to round the AGE% to the nearest multiple of 5 percent. This is done since 95.4% and 4.6% are c...

The hallmark of an Adventure Game Engine system is the stunt die. AGE uses three six-sided dice where one is different and called the stunt die. It's most famous use is as a "critical roll" tool where if doubles are rolled the action gets points to spend that turn on some extra bonuses (like more damage, or a utility action). Most interesting about the stunt points are how it's numbers are a little un-intuitive. Stunt Points If you roll doubles and the ability test is a success, you will generate stunt points for that turn and be able to spend them to further augment that action. Here are some important facts about generating stunt points" A TN 11 ability test on average will general 1.004 stunt points (over successes and fails) assuming no bonuses. A higher outcome on the ability test usually mean lower than average number of stunt points. This is because the two non-stunt die are likely a better result which lets the stunt die have more options. If you. Low suc...

At the moment in Fantasy AGE the cost of improving ability scores and focuses is very simple and does not factor in the relationship in the AGE ability tests. Ability advancements affect all relevant focuses and focus only affect themselves. It would be nice if the was a cost formula took that into consideration. Naive option A first option is to value an ability advancement compared to all the focuses in under that ability. However the cost for various abilities would be different. A willpower advancement would only cost 4 (since there are 4 focuses) and intelligence advancements would cost 19 or more (depending on arcana in the setting) since there are so many under that category. Using this method does seem absurd give that discrepancy. Pay for Everything  A second option is that you only consider the focuses that the character knows. Let's start of simply with saying a focus is the base statistic since it's specific. Those increases will cost one advancement. Let's expl...