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Friday, December 8, 2017

Easiest DFRPG template for a returning GURPS player?

One of my players is going to drop in and play DFRPG with us sometimes in my DF Felltower game.

That got me thinking, for someone conversant with the basic concepts of 4e but not the details, what templates are easiest to start with?

I have my own ideas and I've shared them with the player in question* - but I figured I'd see what you guys, the people who follow and comment on my blog, think on the subject.

What template-based characters are easiest to run in a DF game for a returning player, and why? Please share in the comments, I'm sure it will help him choose.



* Someone with a long history with me with GURPS 3e, Revised, but whose only encounters with GURPS 4e have been fairly heavily house-ruled.

(I shared my own thinking in this post.)

13 comments:

  1. Scout.

    "Shoot him in the head"

    Next turn

    "Shoot him in the head"

    And so on

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    Replies
    1. Isn't it more properly: Fast-Draw your arrows and shoot 'em in the head?" I mean, one nearly always succeeds, but there's an extra step. Unless you handwave it as "no nuisance rolls," which is probably a good idea.

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    2. There are the 2 Flawless perks to eliminate such nuisances. Not sure whether they made it into DFRPG. In GURPS defer in order to get the 2 Flawless perks and Strongbow need 60 points sunk into combat skills

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    3. Scout was one of the suggestions. I'm not sure how "Shoot him in the head!" gets you very far in DF, though. Useful and effective against fodder, but then again, almost everything is useful and effective against fodder.

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  2. For someone with extensive 3e history and that you use 3e style explosive spells, Wizard or Cleric

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    Replies
    1. I'm not sure if he has any caster experience. That's probably a net positive, because I still get holdover "This is how it's done" explanations from people remembering 3e. But is a Wizard or Cleric really one of the easier templates to build and run?

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  3. I hope you share your own answers also after you are done polling

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  4. If they are willing to stay back from fights, thief or cleric, who both have valuable non-combat roles to play that are not very different than 3e, and limited but not vital standoff combat options.

    If they want fighting, I agree with scout.

    If they want melee fighting, tanky knight.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. What do mean by a "tanky knight." I recognize the term from MMORPGs, but when I say "tanky knight" I mean high DR, high-damage front line fighter. Is that what you mean?

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    2. I mean strong defenses. Not offensively toothless, but any PC built from the knight template will have enough melee chops to be threatening. There is plenty of utility in holding the line and bashing anyone who leaves an opening.

      I say this because 4e has lots of tricky attack options if you pump skill/offensive advantages that are different from 3e, while DR and active defenses are very similar to 3e, so an offense ("DPS") PC is more of a change than a defense oriented ("tanky") PC.

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  5. EASIEST template: Gotta be knight or barbarian, but probably knight. Good fighting skills, should have decent DR, should be able to come up with a couple of go-to moves, and there you go. Thief is probably easy provided the player is OK with a utility role. Spellcasting in DF is not HARD, but is also not EASY. So I say anything with spells could not fit into "EASIEST" template to run. Holy Warrior is also probably not that hard. I'm going to say:

    Easiest to Hardest:
    Tier 1. Knight / Barbarian / Holy Warrior
    Tier 2. Scout / Thief
    Tier 3. Swashbuckler / Martial Artist
    Tier 4. Cleric / Wizard / Druid
    Tier 5. Bard


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  6. Knight/Holy Warrior*. Then Scout. Then Swashbuckler. Then Barbarian.

    At this point we're leaving "dead simple" and veering into "a bit more complex, requires thought".

    Thief, Martial Artist, Cleric*. These templates all require a bit of finesse.

    Everything else is progressively more complicated.


    * Depending on build.

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