I'd pick Shadowrun 4th and change the combat resolution so that it's either evasion or soaking, or that evasion and soaking are the same roll. That would cut down combat to three rolls per exchange.

I've picked Shadowrun because it's a game I really try hard to love and for that players are easy to find, but that includes still quite some dumb decisions to put me off. The division between evasion and soaking is just one that costs me the most nerves, and one of the rules that most often comes up during play.

Rules that were close to be regarded, but no cigar:
- The complex character creation restrictions: They are a bigger pain in the butt then the proposed change, but as they only come up once during game-prep they wouldn't have the same overall effect on the actual play experience.
- Essence division between cyberware and bioware: That also only comes up during downtime (though it's still a dumb complication).
- Race costs: Either raise them to reflect the actual effect of the attribute changes, or make racism again a _hard_ part of the rules.
- Technomancer rules: They'd need a total revamp (cost of complex forms, resonance decrease from cyberware, the dominant strategy of turning the 'mancer into an ordinary hacker who's also a sprite summoner etc.), but as this only affects one character type while the soak/evade-division affects everyone the change of the latter would improve the game more.
- Dikote and FFBA as dominant strategy: I'd include this from my knowledge from former editions, but as I don't know yet if Arsenal has changed anything about that I won't nominate this, and it wouldn't be a deal as big as the soak/evade thing.

I would ditch common magic in HeroQuest.

In Amber, everyone gets Basic Pattern for free.  This could be exchanged for points, powers and other things, but the default assumption should be that a basic Amberite should get Pattern from the get go.

Quote from: droogI would ditch common magic in HeroQuest.

So you'd have to declare a specific keyword to use any kind of magic?  Hmm...I could live with that.

!i!

I'd take Castles and Crusades skill system... oh wait.  Right then.

SilCore.

Dump Skill Complexity.  Replace with new dice mechanics using d10s (or d8s) for finer grained resolution without the ambiguity of Complexity.  This would probably create a cascade of changes, but it's where I would start.

Quote from: Consonant DudeI would change initiative in GURPS. For some reason, I've always found GURPS to be really cohesive except for initiative, which I find bland.

What???


I have never even had this come up in my games.

Character with the highest move score is the first one to go into motion.

 Eithjer that or the brightest player that thinks of the best plan and mentions it first to the GM.


- Ed C.

Well, it's a Campaign Setting, not a game, but...

I wish the Greyhawk rights were in the loving hands of Paizo and Erik Mona, instead of being unsupported and cherry-picked for the familiar bits as it stands now.

Include real spell lists in Talislanta 4E.

The current system where you're assumed to know thousands of spells, but you have to invent and mechanically build a new spell every time you cast, is one of the dumbest things I've ever seen in an RPG. Which is a shame, because the rest of the Tal/Omni system is spun gold.

I would take Weapons of the Gods and massively change the combat system - specifically, I'd rip out all of the martial arts styles and come up with a system for coming up with martial arts special effects in an ad-hoc manner (so you pick from a list of defined system effects what you want a particular stunt to achieve, and that gives you the amount of chi you have to spend on it), and I'd massively reduce the bonuses to Strike, Speed and Damage you can get from weapons.

I'd add 5-10% to every starting attribute in Warhammer FRP to cut back on the starting characters' whiff factor.

Quote from: RPGPunditFor example, in 3e D&D I would get rid of feats (replace them with series of more rigidly-defined escalating powers). To me that would go a long way to improving the game.   There's a lot of other things I might like to change, but to me that would be one single thing that would go a huge way to making the game more appealing to me.

You took mine - I've started bloody threads about it here and at D20 Haven. Take the feats out of d20 - not the powers necessarily, just the mechanism.

Quote from: Zachary The FirstWell, it's a Campaign Setting, not a game, but...

I wish the Greyhawk rights were in the loving hands of Paizo and Erik Mona, instead of being unsupported and cherry-picked for the familiar bits as it stands now.

Not that I have doubts those you mention would be great - I just have no opinion on the specifics other than WotC is out.

Then again, I wouldn't be having the fun of doing Dunfalcon.

Quote from: Ian AbsentiaSo you'd have to declare a specific keyword to use any kind of magic?

Yeah, or have unique magic as part of your character's extra Abilities. CM is just too fiddly, though I appreciate the idea.

I'd take all the "kill" type results out of Marvel Superheroes / FASERIP and replace them with "out of commission", "coma" etc.  Kill results for player's characters, or the unlucky thug they forgot to pull their punches with, really weren't in keeping with the genre / source material.  Unless you were playing the Punisher.

Quote from: James J SkachNot that I have doubts those you mention would be great - I just have no opinion on the specifics other than WotC is out.

Then again, I wouldn't be having the fun of doing Dunfalcon.

Hey, I can think of a few folks that would do a great job with it.  But I think Erik and the Paizo folks really care for the GH setting.  But if we going by what they've done (and haven't done) with it, yeah, WotC definitely does not deserve to be its caretaker/holder (pity about the whole IP rights business).  Too bad "deserve" doesn't factor into it.

And yeah, what would you do w/out Dunfalcon (decided to keep the name for now, eh?).

If I could only change one thing that'd spoil the fun.