It is with a heavy heart and a plate full of crow that I approach this post/thread.  I know that I'll be laughed at and the jeers will range from good-natured to vindictive, but I must confess...

...I played Star Wars D20 on Friday...

...and I liked it.  

Mind you, it was a bit harsh to have the player of the 7th level Jedi Knight wannabe (he hadn't made it back to the Temple for his trials) tell me all about his +33 to this and +27 to that and how he could track a Wookiee through the forests of Kashyyk after 12 days of continuous rain while blindfolded, wounded and drunk.

I think the GM (Damnit, I will not call it a "DM" because that's got to be the stupidest name for a GM short of a "Storyteller" or "Bard"!) was what made the game so cool.  He played "minigames" with each of the characters that were tailored to their class.  The Noble was in a heated negotiation to gain worker rights on an industrial planet while the Jedi and the Clone Trooper fought against a Confederation plot (both returning vastly different reports, I might add!), the Force Adept, who really didn't like the way the Jedi handled things, had tossed in his loyalty with the Clone Trooper (mind you, this is pre-Order 66 stuff...).

And that's when my character, a Scoundrel, gambler, smuggler, fence, B&E specialist, entered the picture with a security expert (Tech Specialist) asked to retrieve plans for a secret weapon being developed by the Geonosians, but the plans had been removed from Geonosis and we were being contracted to find them and get copies.  

It was a cool tie-in to all the old familiar places and although I'm not really a fan of levelling or the cumbersome and heavy-handed mechanic that is D20, I had a very good time and even (:::gulp:::) ...bought the book.

My friend, who dragged me into the game, laughed at me quite a bit and kept handing me candies with a note wrapped around it that said, "crow."  

I just had to be honest with you all, though.  As someone who had been a vocal anti-D20 voice, I just had to be honest.

(I'm not sure if I feel like a member of a 12-step "Anti-D20" group or a newly corrupted member of a nasty cabal bent on gameworld conquest...)

Somewhere in a room full of people...

"Hi. My name is Ian Vellore, and... uh... I play d20."

"HI ANDY!!!"

I'm very glad you had a good time; it means the game isn't completely useless.

*rimshot*

Seriously, good goin'.  If you had fun, then you were awesome.

You had fun?
As in great time while playing because of playing?

More Power to you.
D20 is not evil. It just is.

I had such a good time that I came home (at 3:30am, mind you) with the new book and spent two more hours reading it.  The next day (evening), I created half a dozen characters to learn better how the system worked and how to make a character that was actually good at something (without min/maxing it to death).

Spurred by her love of Star Wars, my daughter also made a character and I'm going to attempt to GM the (cumbersome) D20 mechanic with her, to help learn it a bit more and have an opportunity to play Star Wars with my favorite gamer.  

Personally, I'd prefer not to play d20, but in the end, a game lies in the hands of the GM and players no matter the system.

GM always trumps Designer. A good GM -especially with good players! - can make a terrible game sing, let alone a solid game like D20.

-clash

One of my favorite D20-hate stories has to do with a guy I worked with.

He had actually been playing the D20 version of starwars for a couple of weeks, but didn't realize that there was an earlier version of it. So when he heard that there was this new hated d20 bandwagon, he merrily jumped on, and espoused how great *his* Star Wars game was and how any AD&D revision of it could never compare to the original. Then he made the mistake of describing what feats his Jedi Consular had.

Someone had to explain to him that he had been playing the d20 version all along.

Stop thinking of the system at cumbersome, because it really isn't.  You can resolve almost anything with a roll of a d20, add your bonus (skill or attribute), and compare it to a difficulty.

That's it. That's the core of the system. And the only times it gets much more complicated than that is during combat.

Also, because D20 is not point-buy, its very hard to make a character that isn't any "good" at things. You don't have to be afraid, like you do in other games that don't have classes or levels, that you will make a character that will be utterly useless just because you don't know the rules well enough (of course, knowing the rules really well can let you make better characters, but that's true in any system).  If you're worried about not knowing the system well enough, those classes and levels so many people bitch about are actually your best friend.

RPGPundit

Quote from: Abyssal MawSomeone had to explain to him that he had been playing the d20 version all along.

That's priceless!!!

Quote from: RPGPunditStop thinking of the system at cumbersome, because it really isn't.  You can resolve almost anything with a roll of a d20, add your bonus (skill or attribute), and compare it to a difficulty.

That's it. That's the core of the system. And the only times it gets much more complicated than that is during combat.

Okay.  I shouldn't keep doing that and calling it "cumbersome" without explaining what I mean.

Coming into the game from the outside, it feels cumbersome because you have to remember how to use this Feat with that action and this skill when combined with that maneuver gives a bonus to the other Feat that has a bearing on some miniscule little element of combat ...

... and while the GM is looking up all the rules, the players are reminding him of the modifications of this maneuver and that Feat from this other source book ...

... and 20 minutes later he says, "Roll a D20 and add your skill levels +2."

Honestly, I'd rather he'd wing it and just say, "Oh, I think that's about a +1 or +2, take the +2 and roll so we can keep the action going..."

That's what I mean by "cumbersome."

Having players tell the GM that some new rule has come out that changes things and spending 20 minutes looking up the minutiae is a serious waste of time and fun.

QuoteIf you're worried about not knowing the system well enough, those classes and levels so many people bitch about are actually your best friend.

I made this point to my game-developer friend who smiled and said, "That's why we included 'concepts' in our new mechanic.  D20 isn't useless, mind you.  There's some diamonds in the rough in there for the wise miner."

Quote from: RPGPunditAlso, because D20 is not point-buy, its very hard to make a character that isn't any "good" at things. You don't have to be afraid, like you do in other games that don't have classes or levels, that you will make a character that will be utterly useless just because you don't know the rules well enough (of course, knowing the rules really well can let you make better characters, but that's true in any system).  If you're worried about not knowing the system well enough, those classes and levels so many people bitch about are actually your best friend.

Truth be told the only real problems I've ever seen with useless characters are ones that were made, for whatever reason, in issolation from or in spite of what would be happening in the game and the GM choosing to just go ahead and punch through with with their initial plan, effectively cutting the PC out of the game.  The PC is still "good" at something, they just aren't good at anything relavent at that particular table.

It has little to do with class/no class, seen it in both in roughly equal measures.  Especially considering how much class systems have openned up to become defacto point-buy systems.  In fact it seems more to do with GMs screwing around with house rules or with wildly differing understandings/interpretations of rules or settings.

Glad you enjoyed it . Welcome to the other side .

Quote from: Vellorian... and while the GM is looking up all the rules, the players are reminding him of the modifications of this maneuver and that Feat from this other source book ...

... and 20 minutes later he says, "Roll a D20 and add your skill levels +2."

Honestly, I'd rather he'd wing it and just say, "Oh, I think that's about a +1 or +2, take the +2 and roll so we can keep the action going..."

"Winging it" is exactly how I run my own d20 games (primarily D&D, Arcana Evolved, and CoC).  Life's too short to waste precious game time looking up fiddly rules bits.  If I have a table handy, or don't need to drag a book out, I'll use the actual rule.  Failing that, if it takes me 10 seconds to make a rules decision, that's too long.

Usually, anyway.  One game I'm running now, I am specifically running primarily as a tactical wargame.  In that case, I'll look up a rule for up to 20 seconds before winging it.  I also expect my players to have all relevant rules for their characters at-hand - particularly oddball feats or non-SRD spells.

-O

Quote from: Vellorian... and 20 minutes later he says, "Roll a D20 and add your skill levels +2."

Honestly, I'd rather he'd wing it and just say, "Oh, I think that's about a +1 or +2, take the +2 and roll so we can keep the action going..."

That's well and good, but if every roll was resolved that way, I would wonder what the system was for. I like some cause and effect in the game, and like some character definition that means something.

Though situations like you cite come up occasionally, I find that a function rule of thumb is, if you can't quickly resolve the roll...

- make something up (like you said).
- jot it down and read (and possibly bookmark) the relevant rule AFTER the game so you know how to do it the next time.

That way you don't have to sacrifice the cause-and-effect modeling on the altar of "keeping things flowing." There is a compromise to be had.