Utility powers, level-less effects and the kitchen sink

WARNING: This is a 100% verified rambling post. I started talking about “utility” effects (that’s a 13th Age term I believe), went over "edition-neutral" abilities, my usual rants and… I guess I’m all over the place (Sanity 1/1d3). So, please enjoy the post but be warned.

Random thought of the day: through the Open Game License, and more recently the DIY and OSR, everyone is sharing their ideas about their (mostly) d20 Fantasy games and that is awesome, but I often get the impression that we’re missing a good chance of thinking outside the box. 

The thing is D&D created benchmarks for power and effects that are still taken as sacred cows in most d20s and these limits are in my opinion mostly arbitrary. In other words, they don’t affect game balance (13th Age addresses the issue quite well when it discusses utility spells for wizards).

Read this gem!

For example, why is Augury a 2nd level spell/effect? (i.e. you only get it at 3rd level) The information provided by Augury does not correlate to level at all. It is just a yes/no question for something happening in the immediate future. It is useful at 1st or 20th level. Another example would be Disguise Self or even Speak with the Dead. These effects are useful at every level (or potentially irrelevant, given the campaign). They are things that are hard to quantify with levels. OK, you can quantify/rank them among themselves (divinations, illusions… practically anything else, that is not a problem), but that is not the same thing as stating that they correlate to a certain level/tier/power.

The idea (I guess) is that we could label those effects as “level-less” effects play more loose with them, especially when creating new stuff (and variants). This is also (at least for me) a reminder that we can create new stuff outside of the traditional d20’s effect mold. An example: you may not like D&D 4E, but at least it killed the idea that teleport must always be a high level effect. Today, in 5E, we have teleporting elves at 1st level and it doesn’t break the game (although I know some DMs who hate it).

And they named them Eladrin in 4E... oh, the hate!

One of the reasons I love the Warlock class is that it kind of steps out of the traditional class template for D&D. It is a good source of ideas for creating new and different classes… and really, new classes should only exist if they do things mechanically different, otherwise just reskin, multiclass or (if you really must have something different in the rules) try a subclass or a feat.

There are some “level-less” abilities that are just ridiculous. Tongue of the Sun and the Moon from the Monk is the perfect example. Why in the Nine Hells does it take a 13th level Monk to do that?! Usually by that point language barriers are completely non-existent (i.e. irrelevant) in most campaigns. Tongue of the Sun and the Moon would be a lot more useful at middle (and lower) levels.

There are effects that are just hard to quantify “in game”, like all the flying stuff (levitate, fly etc.) and things like gaseous form. They are amazingly useful and allow you to bypass a challenge “for free” or completely irrelevant to adventure, but that is something dictated by the narrative, not the “innate power” of those effects (unless, of course your flight gives you a really fast Speed or a new attack form).

An amazing book to show how “level-less” stuff could work on d20 games (without going completely nuts like Lamentations of the Flame Princess) is Wonder & Wickedness. This OSR sourcebook creates a flavorful, simple and entire “level-less” spell system, without shying away from high level stuff like summoning and teleport. If I had more free time, I’d be tempted to change all DCC spells to a “level-less” system (after all, they are all based on rolling the result of spellcasting on a table, so basically you’re just modulating their effects). I’d probably separate spells by rarity instead of level if I did that.

Wonder & Wickedness

Now, the worst offender in 5E might be Timeless Body. It is usually given as a high level class feature. It is awesome as a dramatic trait but completely useless as a class power. I’m more biased here because I usually see classes as a set of “combat powers”, so anything outside of combat usually doesn’t have a “minimum level requirement” for me. To make things worse, we have the same class feature giving different things for different classes in 5E (check the Druid and the Monk). Timeless Body would be a lot better as a feat (actually as a boon/reward it would be perfect). Anyway, I don’t have anything better to do right now so here is a feat:

Timeless Body

You’re untouched by the ravages of mortality. This may be because of a divine blessing, magic, esoteric training or ancestry. You suffer none of the frailty of old age and can’t be aged magically. Also, choose one of the two options below:

- You do not need air, food or water.

- You can use a short rest to remove 1 level of exhaustion or transfer 1 level of exhaustion from someone else to you. You need a long rest to regain this ability***.

Define the source of your longevity. You might be an elf of an ancient bloodline, a warrior trained in mystic forms of mediation or a druid stepped in the Old Lore. You must also determine if you age at a slower rate or if you’re immortal. The last option is more interesting if bound by some condition or circumstance. For example, your druid might not age, but only while living in the Greatwood.

(With the Dungeon Master’s authorization, after completing a specific quest, you can use downtime to gain the other option.)

***Sidenote: Exhaustion is a weird thing in 5E. I think there is just one 5th level spell and one magic item - Potion of Vitality - that can recover Exhaustion. Sometimes it seems almost like an afterthought, not widely used but at the same time lethal and hard to recover. The Exhaustion chart is a brilliant mechanic that completely ignores level and hit points, which is something that I like. I wish it was more integrated into the game (the same holds for Hit Dice, which sounds a lot like Recoveries from 13th Age but doesn’t receive the same attention).

Since we’re talking about Timeless Body, I remember that when I started playing RPGs one of the most overrated abilities was longevity. To be an immortal elf or wizard was seen as so crazily awesome. The funny thing was that most of the time it was completely useless (that’s why it is usually so cheap to buy Ageless in GURPS). In my almost 30 years of gaming I remember longevity being important just ONCE: we were playing Dragonlance and (rather suddenly) the DM declared that, after an adventure, 20 years have passed. Everyone at the table was pissed off (except the elven players), and I think the half-ogre player even tore his character sheet at that moment and stopped playing. My point is: the problem there was not even the party’s lack of longevity, but an arbitrary decision by the DM, who should have told everyone that the campaign would have long time jumps between adventures.

Don't worry, 5E has no "old age" rule.

Still on longevity and immortality: so, it obvious I believe both are “level-less”. Time for an extreme example: in Brazil the most famous fantasy campaign setting is Tormenta and it has a god of prophecies and resurrection. Yes sir, a “deity of raise dead” (I can’t think of a more authentic “D&Dish” god and I love it). His name is Thyatis (I’m not sure if it is a homage to Mystara’s Thyatis or not, I hope so). So, Thyatis’ clerics can cast raise dead at 1st level and sincerely that is great! It solves A LOT of problems regarding lethality at low levels (particularly for AD&D 2nd, Tormenta’s original system), it keeps the game going and (most important) it is fun!

If you think that the above example is absurd then please let me introduce you to Thyatis' paladins: the dudes are immortal. Yeah, you kill one and she eventually will come back from the grave. Oddly, that doesn't generate any kind of balance problem at the table. Quite the contrary: Thyatis’ paladins are one of the coolest character classes in Tormenta and at the same time they don’t rule over the table’s dynamic while in play. They don’t come back from the dead right away and when they die they don’t get any XP for the game session in which they died. Now, the funny thing is that some players (dare to) complain that losing XP is too much. It is interesting, but XP is a lot more important than dying in D&D (oh boy, I miss the old energy drain rules), so in my opinion it balances quite nicely. And the fact that your PC will come back from the grave is pure badass. And no, Tormenta’s parties aren’t filled with Thyatis’ clerics and paladins.

Of course Thyatis is a phoenix!

Another example of an immortal class is from Castles & Crusades (C&C), from Troll Lord Games. The first book that I got from them was Codex of Erde, a flavorful Tolkien-like setting for D&D 3.0, published back in 2001, which also presented the first “races as class” for 3rd Edition - The High Elf (haters went crazy at the time). As I was telling, the Player’s Guideto Aihrde, a more recent sourcebook for C&C, has an Eldritch Goblin class called the Ieragon, which is immortal, only dying under specific circumstances. Each Ieragon has a unique knack or gift. It is a very flavorful class and the fact it can “raise dead itself” doesn’t seem to break any balance during play (I believe there is a 5E version of the class).

That cover!

Let me dig more crazy stuff.

Another area where I believe that “level-less” works nicely: weather. I’m not talking about raining lightning bolts upon your enemies, or destroying castles with tornados, but changing the weather (from a sunny day to rain for example). It is narratively powerful, definitely, but not game breaking (unless playing Dark Sun I guess). Most players love to have that kind of influence. I think Dungeon World’s druid has a move that does that (and I don’t understand why it is a high level move… especially in a Powered by the Apocalypse© game).

There is a Golden Age of Piracy sourcebook for D&D 3rd called Skulls & Bones. It has a lot of amazing subsystems, but I remember in particular a mystic sailor prestige class who could create small islands in the middle of the ocean. That is an awesome power, definitely not unbalanced and quite interesting in terms of narrative consequences.

The system was clunky (D&D 3.0) but full of good twists.

Another good source of weird and new powers is Legend of the Five Rings (1st Edition! Before “game balance” was an issue… 4E is so boring and I still have to read the last version). Take for example the (original) tattooed monk from the Way of the Dragon sourcebook. It would be an excellent starting point for a new class in 5E (maybe just reskinning the warlock would do it). For example: the Centipede Tattoo allows the monk to start running and reach anypoint in the same continent by the next mid-day. It is something different and potentially useful (but not abusive, because the monk can’t carry anyone with him). The power also has a drawback: the monk is considerably tired after running at such speed, which could be represented in 5E by 1d4+1 levels of Exhaustion. The power has so many conditions and limitations that it would work fine as a 1st level thing.

Probably unbalanced, but fun as hell!

Let’s keep digging: Monte Cook’s Arcana Unearthed, which was a huge influence for all d20 spellcasting systems that came later, including 5E, has a wizard’s class feature where your character can hear when someone else in the same plane speaks his name. That is an ability which should be available at 1st level because (if you stop to think about it is 100% controlled by the DM). Is it flavorful? For sure! But there is no excuse to wait for like 10 levels before getting that mojo (unless it gave you a distinct advantage, like allowing you to teleport to the side of the speaker, for example).

Still one of the best D&D variants.

Now, want a (crazy) source of ideas? Check the “D&D Next”, that was the name of 5E playtest, before fandom and commercial interest brought things back to a more common D&D experience (playtests are always the best spot to see different rules). See, for example, the initial idea for the Sorcerer. It was a class that used magic points (I believe the name was willpower), instead of slots. That is not the point, the interesting bit about the original Sorcerer was that it gained powers when his Willpower (i.e. Magic Points) started running low: for example, a Draconic Sorcerer would start manifesting claws and scales when its magic points were finishing. That is an original and cool idea both from a narrative and mechanic point.

I must also (morally and totally) suggest the Red Box Hack. I don’t have the slightest idea how it started, it is not a d20-based system. Red Box Hack is a free RPG with a splendid assortment of classes. Each class (except maybe the warrior) is a box of cool mechanics and they touch on a lot of topics described in this post. Read it, it is definitely worth of your time. Pay attention on how most classes do stuff completely different.

I started this post commenting (complaining?) about D&D traits and how they are compartmentalized in arbitrary limits and effects. I think I ended up quoting a lot of what I call “edition neutral” traits - that is, stuff that could work on any edition (and theoretically level) of D&D. To finish this rambling I’d like to share one last source of crazy powers, if you don't mind “narrative RPGs”: Spire. It is a very original take on fantasy stereotypes (drows, elves and gnolls in particular), with interesting rules (the Resistance System). However, Spire shines on its wild take on “classes”. There are good ideas worth mining there for any RPG. Take a look.

What a wonderful twist on D&D tropes.